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Now, that was a smart political move, little sister, Signe thought grudgingly. And you did it despite the fact that you hate Tiphaine as much as I do Sandra… and unlike Sandra, Tiphaine hates you right back. She's not nearly as emotionless as you'd think, underneath that Icy Elegant Killer Dyke facade.
The Association contingent raised a cheer, hammering their weapons on their shields and shouting out, "Lady d'Ath! Lady d'Ath!" The sound grew as the news spread to those out of earshot; the harsh male chorus echoed back from the walls of the castle, and frightened skeins of wildfowl into flight from the Willamette behind them, rising like black beaded strings into the cloudless sky.
It sounded a lot like Lady Death, which was Tiphaine's nickname in Portland's domains.
The cheer gradually swept down the ranks, since it wouldn't do to leave the Protectorate troops on their own. Each group joined in its own fashion-you could tell the banshee shrieks of the Mackenzies as soon as they came in, or the Bearkiller growl of Ooo-rah. And the warrior Benedictines of the Order of the Shield sang a few stanzas of a military hymn instead of just yelling:
"Kyrie Eleison, down the road we all must follow-"
The other leaders made their variations on the same speech as Sandra, and the commanders of the forces they'd contributed did homage to Astrid; Eric was grave as he went to one knee and put his hands between hers-Signe had been half afraid that he'd absently call their younger sibling sis or peanut. As the affair wound up Sandra looked aside.
"Isn't that your son, Lady Signe? He's the living image of his father these days."
"Yes," Signe said brusquely. "He is."
And I have him and his four sisters, Signe thought, and knew Sandra was thinking it as well. While your precious singleton Mathilda is off East of the mountains in the Goddess-knows-what peril. I don't wish Rudi any ill… not anymore, and I love Ritva and Mary even if they're difficult and prickly. But your daughter, on the other hand, is all you've got…
"A handsome lad, but then, his father was the most beautiful man I'd ever seen, in an extremely masculine way. In fact young Mike looks a great deal like Rudi. With less red in the hair, of course," Sandra went on politely.
Ouch, Signe thought.
It was true, too; Mike had been Rudi's blood-father. That brief encounter with Juniper Mackenzie had been before they were married, but…
Don't try to get into a meaner-than-thou contrast with the Spider of the Silver Tower, she reminded herself.
"He'll be going East with your brother?" Sandra went on.
"Yes," Signe said. "He's a military apprentice now, and among the best of his year."
And this isn't a time when a ruler can keep himself safe, she thought. I don't wish Rudi ill, but my son will have his own heritage. And to do that, he has to have experience and to gain it in front of the other warriors.
"Ah, yes, that Spartan-style thing you Bearkillers have," Sandra said smoothly, looking at her out of the corners of her brown eyes. "I pray that every mother's child shall return safely."
It isn't a time like that, Signe thought, controlling her glare. But, oh, how I wish it was!
"Hey, hey, laddie-o
Paint your face and string your bow!"
Juniper Mackenzie waved as she passed by the campfire where they were roaring out the old marching song to a skirl of pipes and a hammer of drums. The air in the Mackenzie encampment beneath Castle Todenangst was thick with the smell of woodsmoke and grilling food and the incidental odors that even a cleanly folk couldn't avoid, as the sun fell westward behind the towers in a blaze of black and golden clouds above the Coast Range. It had been a warm afternoon, perfect for the speeches and rites; she and Judy Barstow were still in their robes of ceremony as High Priestesses and carrying their staffs.
"This is how it starts," she said sadly.
"Hopefully, it will be over soon, at least this first phase," her handfasted man, Nigel, said beside her. "Though I hesitate to say Home before Christmas… or Yule. That prediction hasn't got a happy history."
"Wars are always easier to start than end," Juniper agreed, and sighed. "Sure, and you can start them yourself, but the other side must agree for the dance to stop. And their outcomes are never certain. If it weren't for all that, and the waste and pain and grief and sorrow and general wicked black ugliness, it's a splendid and glorious thing war would be."
"Hey, hey, lassie-o
Plant the stake and face the foe!
What use the lance and the golden rowel
As their faces turn white at the Clan's wolf-howl?"
She winced slightly; that was a song from the War of the Eye, and not too tactful now considering the time, place and circumstance. Though there were Protectorate folk mingling among the Mackenzies. One dark young squire was even dancing to the beat of the war-chant-the golden bells on his shoes twinkling in the air as he did what the old world would have called a breakdance and clansfolk no older clapped and cheered him on.
"They're all so young," she said despairingly.
"You asked for volunteers," Chuck Barstow said with infuriating reasonableness, and his wife Judy nodded. "So you get the young ones who don't have kids and crofts depending on them."
"They weren't born yet when the Change came."
"Or near as no matter. Even Oak"-his foster son-"doesn't remember the old world much, and he was… what, nine, when we found that school bus on the way here?" A shrug. "It's all easier for the Changelings."
Judy Barstow silently reached over and put a hand on her shoulder; Juniper covered it with her own for an instant, grateful for her oldest friend's presence.
Only a scattering of the warriors were old enough to have fought in the War of the Eye, mostly the bow-captains, and they were quieter. The two couples passed another fire where the youngsters were kneeling in pairs, touching up the savage patterns swirling across their faces and bodies and limbs in soot black and leaf green, he
" That's a bit early," Chuck said dryly. "They're going to run out of war-paint before there's any fighting, if they keep that up every day."
One tall girl among them suddenly sprang up and snatched a sword free, whirling naked into a battle dance around the fire with the sharp steel flashing. Her painted face contorted as she leapt and lunged, her eyes blank and exalted as they stared beyond the Veil, graceful and deadly as the cougar whose catamount shriek she gave. Her blade-mates joined her, screaming out the calls of their totem beasts, their bare feet stamping the measure as they invited those spirits to take possession on the road to battle.
Juniper shivered slightly, watching the snarling faces and the steel that flashed bloodred in the light of the dying sun.
"Oh Powers of Earth and Sky, what is it that you've brought back, to run wild once more upon the ridge of the world?" she said softly. "You know, I don't understand the younger generation. I love them, but even Rudi… we were never as strange to our parents."
"I don't think so," Judy said dryly; her old friend had always had that gift of bringing her back to earth. "But they and we didn't have the Change between us. You'd have to skip back quite a few more generations to get that, eh? Go far enough back, and we'd be the odd ones, not the Changelings."
"They… they accept things in a way we didn't," Juniper said.
Her companions all nodded.
"They speak English, but they don't speak our language. When they say 'time' or 'death' or 'rebirth,' it means something different from the way we used the words," Judy said.
Death… how many of these happy youngsters will lie stark and dead in a month's time, all their fierceness and beauty gone too soon? Juniper thought. And rebirth, yes, but death comes first, and we are right to fear it, for it is dreadful to pass through the dark gate, even if you know what waits beyond.