Windhaven

"Kivas makes the pain less," the old woman replied. "Odera makes it strong, and sometimes laces it with sweetsong or other herbs. She gives me tesis to make me sleep. I don't need your voice for my hurts."

"I know I'm young," the singer said, "but I am good. Let me show you."

"No." She smiled. "I'm sure you're good, really I am. Though I probably wouldn't appreciate your talents.

Maybe my ears are going too, or perhaps it's just a trick of old age, but no singer I've heard in the last ten years has seemed as good to me as the ones I remember from years ago. I've listened to the best. I heard S'Lassa and T'rhennian sing duets on Veleth a long time back. Jared of Geer has entertained me, and homeless Gerri One-Eye, and Coll. I once knew a singer named Halland who sang me songs a good deal bawdier than the one you were about to perform, I'd wager. When I was young, I even heard Barrion sing, not once but many times."

"I'm as good as any of them," the singer said stubbornly.

The old woman sighed. "Don't pout," she said sharply. "I'm sure you sing splendidly. But you'll never get someone as old as me to admit it."

He strummed his instrument nervously. "If you don't want a song for your deathbed," he said, "then why did you send to Stormtown for a singer?"

"I want to sing to you," she said. "It won't hurt too much, although I can't play or carry a tune. Mostly I'll recite."

The singer set aside his instrument and folded his arms to listen. "A strange request," he said, "but I was a listener long before I was a singer. My name is Daren, by the way."

"Good," she said. "I am pleased to know you, Daren. I wish you could have known me when I was a bit more vigorous. Now listen carefully. I want you to learn these words, and sing this song after I'm gone, if you think it's good enough. You will."

"I know a great many songs already," he said.

"Not this one," she replied.

"Did you make it up yourself?"

"No," she said, "no. It was sort of a gift to me, a farewell gift. My brother sang it to me as he lay dying, and forced me to learn all the words. He was in a great deal of pain at the time, and death was a kindness for him, but he would not go until he was satisfied that I had all the words committed to memory. So I learned them quickly, crying all the while, and he died. It was in a town on Little Shotan, not quite ten years ago. So you can see that the song means a great deal to me. Now, if you would, please listen."

She began to sing.

Her voice was old and worn, painfully thin, and her attempt to sing strained it to its uttermost, so that sometimes she coughed and wheezed. She had no sense of key, she knew, and she could not carry a tune any more in her old age than in her youth. But she knew the words, she did know the words. Sad words set to simple, soft, melancholy music.

It was a song about the death of a very famous flyer. When she grew old, the song said, and the days of her life grew short, she found and took a pair of wings, as she had done once in her legendary youth.

And she strapped them on, and ran, and all of her friends came running after, shouting for her to stop, to turn back, for she was very old and very weak, and she had not flown for years, and her mind was so addled that she had not even remembered to unfold her wings. But she would not listen. She reached the cliff before they could catch her, and plunged over the edge, falling. Her friends cried out and covered their eyes, not wanting to see her dashed against the sea. But, at the last moment, suddenly her wings unfolded, springing out taut and silver from her shoulders. And the wind caught her, lifted her, and from where they stood her friends heard her laughter. She circled high above them, her hair blowing in the wind, her wings bright as hope, and they saw that she was young again. She waved farewell to them, dipped her wing in salute, and flew off toward the west, to vanish against the setting sun. She was never seen again.

There was silence in the room when the old woman had finished singing her song. The singer sat tilted back in his chair, staring at the flickering of an oil lamp, his eyes gone far away and thoughtful.

Finally the old woman coughed irritably. "Well?" she said.

"Oh." He smiled and sat up. "I'm sorry. It's a nice song. I was just thinking how it would sound with some music behind it."

"And with a voice singing it, no doubt — one that didn't wheeze and strain quite so much." She nodded.

"Well, it would sound very good, that's how it would sound. Did you get all the words?"

"Of course," he said. "Do you want me to sing it back to you?"

"Yes," said the old woman. "How else would I know if you got it right?"

The singer grinned and took up his instrument. "I knew you'd come around," he said pleasantly. He touched his strings, his fingers moving with deceptive slowness, and the little room filled with melancholy.

Then he sang her song back to her, in his high, sweet, vibrant voice.

He was smiling when he had done. "Well?"