“A joyous Long Night, Philomena,” I said, “and to you, Gerick.”
Philomena sighed. Gerick bowed politely, but didn’t say anything. One couldn’t expect too much.
Gerick sat on the edge of his mother’s bed while I pulled up a chair. I poured the wine and shared around the roasted duck, sugared oranges, and cinnamon cakes. There was no conversation, but no hostility either. When we were finished eating, Gerick and I moved the table out of the way. Philomena frowned and said, “Aren’t you planning to read tonight?”
“On the contrary…” From my pockets I pulled two wrapped parcels and gave one to each of them. I had ordered the two books from a shop in Montevial. Philomena’s was an exotic Isker romance, and she insisted I begin it immediately. Gerick’s was a manuscript about Kerotean swordmaking, so beautifully illustrated that I had hesitated to give it to him. I hated the thought that he might destroy it because it came from me. But while I read to Philomena, he sat cross-legged on her bed turning every page. His cheeks glowed in the candlelight.
When he closed the book at last, he jumped off the bed. I paused in my reading while he pecked his mother on the cheek. “Excuse me, Mama. I’m off to bed.” Then, his eyes not quite settling on me, he made a small gesture with the book. “It’s fine. Thank you.” Tucking the book securely under his arm, he ran off, leaving me feeling inordinately happy. Even Philomena’s gleeful report on his most recent demand that I be sent away did not spoil it.
A mere two days before the turning of the year and Covenant Day, I took my afternoon walk on the south battlement, forced to confine myself to the castle because of a snowstorm that had raged throughout the day. The wild whirling snow made me dizzy, and a sudden gust sent me stumbling toward the crumbling southernmost cornice. As I grabbed the cold iron ring embedded in the stone, thanking the ancient guardian warriors for protecting the daughter of Comigor yet again, I began to feel a burning sensation in the region of my heart. I thought I had frosted my lungs or developed a sudden fever in them, or perhaps something I’d eaten was bothering my digestion.
Before going back inside, I pulled on the silver chain about my neck as was my custom when I was alone, drawing Dassine’s talisman from my bodice, expecting to find it cold and dull as always. But, as the storm wind whipped my hair into my face, the snow swirled about me in a rose-colored frenzy, picking up a soft glow from the translucent stone, banishing all thoughts of storms or loneliness or difficult children. I wrapped my cold fingers about the stone until my hand gleamed with its pink radiance, and I relished every moment of that burning, for I had been assured that when the stone grew warm and glowed with its own light, Karon would arrive with the next dawn to visit me.