father, but present, smiling, dancing. All his childhood friends were theretoo, half of them married by now to the other half, it seemed, but there wasstill plenty of flirting going on, and several pretty girls were always nearhim. He drank a good deal of Gadge Brewer's excellent beer, and found he couldendure the music if he was dancing to it and talking and laughing while hedanced. So he danced with all the pretty girls in turn, and then again withwhichever one turned up again, which all of them did. It was Golden's grandest party yet, with a dancing floor built on the town green down the wayfrom Golden's house, and a tent for the old folks to eat and drink and gossipin, and new clothes for the children, and jugglers and puppeteers, some ofthem hired and some of them coming by to pick up whatever they could in theway of coppers and free beer. Any festivity drew itinerant entertainersand musicians it was their living, and though uninvited they were welcomed.A tale-singer with a droning voice and a droning bagpipe was singing The Deedo[ the Dragonlord to a group of people under the big oak on the hilltop.When Tarry's band of harp, fife, viol, and drum took time off for a breatherand a swig, a new group hopped up onto the dance floor. "Hey, there's Labby'sband!" cried the pretty girl nearest Diamond. "Come on, they're thebest!" Labby, a light-skinned, flashy-looking fellow, played the double-reedwoodhorn. With him were a violist, a tabor-player, and Rose, who played fife.Their first tune was a stampy, fast and brilliant, too fast for some of thedancers. Diamond and his partner stayed in, and people cheered and clappedthem when they finished the dance, sweating and panting. "Beer!" Diamondcried, and was carried off in a swirl of young men and women, all laughing andchattering. He heard behind him the next tune start up, the viol alone,strong and sad as a tenor voice: "Where My Love Is Going." He drank a mug ofbeer down in one draft, and the girls with him watched the muscles in hisstrong throat as he swallowed, and they laughed and chattered, and he shiveredall over like a cart horse stung by flies. He said, "Oh! I can't -- !" Hebolted off into the dusk beyond the lanterns hanging around the brewer'sbooth. "Where's he going?" said one, and another, "He'll be back," and theylaughed and chattered. The tune ended. "Darkrose," he said, behind her in thedark. She turned her head and looked at him. Their heads were on a level, shesitting crosslegged up on the dance platform, he kneeling on the grass. "Come to the sallows," he said. She said nothing. Labby, glancing at her, set hiswoodhorn to his lips. The drummer struck a triple beat on his tabor, and theywere off into a sailor's jig. When she looked around again Diamond was gone. Tarry came back with his band in an hour or so, ungrateful for therespite and much the worse for beer. He interrupted the tune and the dancing,telling Labby loudly to clear out. "Ah, pick your nose, harp-picker," Labbysaid, and Tarry took offense, and people took sides, and while the dispute wasat its brief height, Rose put her fife in her pocket and slipped away. Awayfrom the lanterns of the party it was dark, but she knew the way in the dark.He was there. The willows had grown, these two years. There was only a littlespace to sit among the green shoots and the long, falling leaves. The music started up, distant, blurred by wind and the murmur of theriver running. "What did you want, Diamond?" "To talk." They were onlyvoices and shadows to each other. "So," she said. "I wanted to ask you to goaway with me," he said. "When?" "Then. When we quarreled. I said it allwrong. I thought .... "A long pause. "I thought I could go on running away.With you. And play music. Make a living. Together. I meant to say that." "You didn't say it." "I know. I said everything wrong. I did everything wrong. Ibetrayed everything. The magic. And the music. And you." "I'm all right," shesaid. "Are you?" "I'm not really good on the fife, but I'm good enough. Whatyou didn't teach me, I can fill in with a spell, if I have to. And the band,they're all right. Labby isn't as bad as he looks. Nobody fools with me. Wemake a pretty good living. Winters, I go stay with Mother and help her out. SoI'm all right. What about you, Di?" "All wrong." She started to saysomething, and did not say it. "I guess we were children," he said."Now...." "What's changed?" "I made the wrong choice." "Once?" she said.

"Or twice?" "Twice." "Third time's the charm." Neither spoke for a while.She could just make out the bulk of him in the leafy shadows. "You're biggerthan you were," she said. "Can you still make a light, Di? I want to seeyou." He shook his head. "That was the one thing you could do that I nevercould. And you never could teach me." "I didn't know what I was doing," hesaid. "Sometimes it worked, sometimes it didn't." "And the wizard in South Port didn't teach you how to make it work?" "He only taught me names." "Whycan't you do it now?" "I gave it up, Darkrose. I had to either do it andnothing else, or not do it. You have to have a single heart." "I don't see why," she said. "My mother can cure a fever and ease a childbirth and find alost ring, maybe that's nothing compared to what the wizards andthe dragonlords can do, but it's not nothing, all the same. And she didn'tgive up anything for it. Having me didn't stop her. She had me so that shecould learn how to do it! Just because I learned how to play music from you,did I have to give up saying spells? I can bring a fever down now too. Whyshould you have to stop doing one thing so you can do the other?" "Myfather," he began, and stopped, and gave a kind of laugh. "They don'tgo together," he said. "The money and the music." "The father and the witchgirl," said Darkrose. Again there was silence between them. The leavesof the willows stirred. "Would you come back to me?" he said. "Would you gowith me, live with me, marry me, Darkrose?" "Not in your father's house,Di." "Anywhere. Run away." "But you can't have me without the music." "Or the music without you." "I would," she said. "Does Labby want aharper?" She hesitated; she laughed. "If he wants a fife-player," shesaid. "I haven't practiced ever since I left, Darkrose," he said. "But themusic was always in my head, and you .... "She reached out her hands to him.They knelt facing, the willow-leaves moving across their hair. They kissedeach other, timidly at first. IN THE YEARS after Diamond left home, Goldenmade more money than he had ever done before. All his deals were profitable.It was as if good fortune stuck to him and he could not shake it off. He grewimmensely wealthy. He did not forgive his son. It would have made a happyending, but he would not have it. To leave so, without a word, on his namedaynight, to go off with the witchgirl, leaving all the honest work undone, to bea vagrant musician, a harper twanging and singing and grinning for pennies -there was nothing but shame and pain and anger in it for Golden. So he had histragedy. Tuly shared it with him for a long time, since she could see her sononly by lying to her husband, which she found hard to do. She wept to think ofDiamond hungry, sleeping hard. Cold nights of autumn were a misery to her. Butas time went on and she heard him spoken of as Diamond the sweet singer of theWest of Havnor, Diamond who had harped and sung to the great lords in theTower of the Sword, her heart grew lighter. And once, when Golden was down 'atSouth Port, she and Tangle took a donkey cart and drove over to Easthill,where they heard Diamond sing the Lay of the Lost Queen, while Rose sat withthem, and Little Tuly sat on Tuly's knee. And if not a happy ending, that wasa true joy, which may be enough to ask for, after all.

URSULA K. Le GUIN OLDERS The moon slips and shines in the wrinkled mirrorbefore the prow, and from the northern sky the Bright Companions shootglancing arrows of light along the water. In the stern of the boat thepolesman stands in the watchful solemnity of his task. His movements as hepoles and steers the boat are slow, certain, august. The long, low channelboatslides on the black water as silently as the reflection it pursues. A few darkfigures huddle in it. One dark figure lies full length on the half deck, armsat his sides, closed eyes unseeing that other moon slipping and shiningthrough wisps of fog in the luminous blue night sky. The Husbandman of Sandryis coming home from war. They had been waiting for him on Sandry Island eversince last spring, when he went with seven men, following the messengers who