killing them.
And Ansel doesn’t want us dead, she said to herself, else he would have left us to our fate long ago. No, our deaths would somehow spoil his great game.
Mulling the possibilities, Maudrayne made her way around the end of the promontory, climbing among huge granite boulders veined with white quartz and overgrown with thick mats of slippery seaweed. This part of the shore was unfamiliar. In their abbreviated outings with the old woman, she and the boy had never gone so far away from the steading. When the tide turned, the easily traversed sections of these rock piles would probably be submerged, and Maudrayne was beginning to be concerned about getting back safely with Rusgann and Dyfrig ahead of the flow.
The next cove was small and extremely steep-sided, with a towering islet poking up amidst a welter of exposed reefs a few hundred ells offshore. The boy and the handmaid were nowhere in sight, perhaps concealed among the many large rocks at the base of the cliff. She was ready to call out to them when she caught sight of something that brought her to a standstill with her heart pounding.
Barely visible in its anchorage on the far side of the high island was a single-masted fishing lugger with a blue hull. It was almost certainly the same boat that had cruised past two tennights ago.
Dear God! Was it possible that Rusgann had signaled Vik Waterfall to come ashore?
In her haste, she tripped and fell, spilling the contents of the basket into a tide pool. She muttered an oath and hurried to retrieve only the important things—the knife and the finely made wooden cups—thrusting them into the capacious pockets of the peasant apron that was part of her everyday garb at the steading. Unencumbered now, she scrambled over the rocks as fast as she could. Some of them were house-sized or even larger, with narrow gaps between them that had to be threaded with care. She was still unable to see much of the cove shoreline ahead, but she was encouraged by the occasional sight of footprints on patches of wet sand.
Dyfrig and Rusgann had certainly come this way.
At last she came out onto the narrow beach and pulled up short.
About twenty ells away, a leather coracle was drawn up on the strand, one of the lightweight watercraft with whalebone frames that the smaller Tarnian sailing boats often used as tenders.
Two men stood near it, hailing her approach with eager shouts. Rusgann sat on the Page 24
pebble-strewn sand a short distance away from them, with her back pressed against a half-buried boulder and Dyfrig huddled against her skirts. The maid’s hair was disheveled and her face distorted by fury.
The older of the two men came striding toward Maudrayne, and her heart sank as she realized that he was not her affable old acquaintance Vik Waterfall but rather the latter’s younger brother Lukort, a character notorious in former years for his violent temper and unsavory dealings.
Eleven years ago, the Waterfall clan had banished him for stealing lobsters from the traps of other fishermen. Yet here he was, wearing a skipper’s cap, in charge of his brother’s boat.
Lukort Waterfall was sinewy, straggly-bearded, and not very tall. His eyes, almost as pale as a wolf’s, were close-set under bushy brows.
He wore a vest of pieced and embroidered sealskin, canvas trousers cut off at the knees, a belt with a tarnished silver buckle, and high seaboots. His companion was a burly, oafish-looking youth with a soup-bowl haircut, a heavy jaw, and cheeks as smooth as a girl’s, clad in a homespun tunic and trews of undyed wool. His huge feet were bare.
“Princess Maudie!” Lukort exclaimed, doffing his cap with a flourish and bowing deeply. “You took long enough gettin‘ round the point.
We feared you had a mishap.”
file:///K|/eMule/Incoming/May,%20Julian%20-%20[Bor...0-%20Boreal%20Moon%202%20
-%20Ironcrown%20Moon.html (24 of 228)2-2-2007 18:46:18
May, Julian - Boreal Moon 2 - Ironcrown Moon
“Mama!”
And Ansel doesn’t want us dead, she said to herself, else he would have left us to our fate long ago. No, our deaths would somehow spoil his great game.
Mulling the possibilities, Maudrayne made her way around the end of the promontory, climbing among huge granite boulders veined with white quartz and overgrown with thick mats of slippery seaweed. This part of the shore was unfamiliar. In their abbreviated outings with the old woman, she and the boy had never gone so far away from the steading. When the tide turned, the easily traversed sections of these rock piles would probably be submerged, and Maudrayne was beginning to be concerned about getting back safely with Rusgann and Dyfrig ahead of the flow.
The next cove was small and extremely steep-sided, with a towering islet poking up amidst a welter of exposed reefs a few hundred ells offshore. The boy and the handmaid were nowhere in sight, perhaps concealed among the many large rocks at the base of the cliff. She was ready to call out to them when she caught sight of something that brought her to a standstill with her heart pounding.
Barely visible in its anchorage on the far side of the high island was a single-masted fishing lugger with a blue hull. It was almost certainly the same boat that had cruised past two tennights ago.
Dear God! Was it possible that Rusgann had signaled Vik Waterfall to come ashore?
In her haste, she tripped and fell, spilling the contents of the basket into a tide pool. She muttered an oath and hurried to retrieve only the important things—the knife and the finely made wooden cups—thrusting them into the capacious pockets of the peasant apron that was part of her everyday garb at the steading. Unencumbered now, she scrambled over the rocks as fast as she could. Some of them were house-sized or even larger, with narrow gaps between them that had to be threaded with care. She was still unable to see much of the cove shoreline ahead, but she was encouraged by the occasional sight of footprints on patches of wet sand.
Dyfrig and Rusgann had certainly come this way.
At last she came out onto the narrow beach and pulled up short.
About twenty ells away, a leather coracle was drawn up on the strand, one of the lightweight watercraft with whalebone frames that the smaller Tarnian sailing boats often used as tenders.
Two men stood near it, hailing her approach with eager shouts. Rusgann sat on the Page 24
pebble-strewn sand a short distance away from them, with her back pressed against a half-buried boulder and Dyfrig huddled against her skirts. The maid’s hair was disheveled and her face distorted by fury.
The older of the two men came striding toward Maudrayne, and her heart sank as she realized that he was not her affable old acquaintance Vik Waterfall but rather the latter’s younger brother Lukort, a character notorious in former years for his violent temper and unsavory dealings.
Eleven years ago, the Waterfall clan had banished him for stealing lobsters from the traps of other fishermen. Yet here he was, wearing a skipper’s cap, in charge of his brother’s boat.
Lukort Waterfall was sinewy, straggly-bearded, and not very tall. His eyes, almost as pale as a wolf’s, were close-set under bushy brows.
He wore a vest of pieced and embroidered sealskin, canvas trousers cut off at the knees, a belt with a tarnished silver buckle, and high seaboots. His companion was a burly, oafish-looking youth with a soup-bowl haircut, a heavy jaw, and cheeks as smooth as a girl’s, clad in a homespun tunic and trews of undyed wool. His huge feet were bare.
“Princess Maudie!” Lukort exclaimed, doffing his cap with a flourish and bowing deeply. “You took long enough gettin‘ round the point.
We feared you had a mishap.”
file:///K|/eMule/Incoming/May,%20Julian%20-%20[Bor...0-%20Boreal%20Moon%202%20
-%20Ironcrown%20Moon.html (24 of 228)2-2-2007 18:46:18
May, Julian - Boreal Moon 2 - Ironcrown Moon
“Mama!”
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