Sometimes he felt as if the name were really his. As if he had been carrying it around in him like a seed that only now had begun to grow in this world of words.
He was feeling better. The fever was still there, like opaque glass in front of his eyes, but the pain was a tame kitten by comparison with the beast of prey that had still been tearing at him in the cave. He could sit up if he gritted his teeth, he could look around to find Resa. He seldom took his eyes off her, as if, in that way, he could protect her from the glances of the soldiers, their kicks and blows. The sight of her hurt more than his wound. By the time the gates of the Castle of Night closed behind her and the other prisoners, she could barely keep on her feet for exhaustion. She stood still and looked up at the walls surrounding her, like a mouse examining the trap it has fallen into. One of the soldiers pushed her on with the shaft of his spear, and Mo longed to put his hands around the man’s neck and press hard. He tasted the hatred on his tongue and in his heart like a shivering sensation, and cursed his own weakness.
Resa looked at him and tried to smile, but she was too exhausted, and he saw her fear. The soldiers reined in their horses and surrounded the prisoners, as if they could possibly have escaped from those steeply towering walls. The vipers’ heads supporting the roofs and ledges left no one in any doubt who the lord of this castle was. They looked down on the forlorn little troop from everywhere, with forked tongues in their narrow mouths, eyes of red gemstone, silver scales shimmering like fish skin in the moonlight.
“Put the Bluejay in the tower!” Firefox’s voice was almost lost in the huge expanse of the castle courtyard. “And take the others to the dungeons.” So they were going to be separated. Mo saw Resa, moving painfully on her sore feet, turn to Firefox. One of the mounted men kicked her back so roughly with his boot that she fell to the ground. And Mo felt a dragging sensation in his breast, as if his hatred had given birth to something, something that wanted to kill. A new heart, cold and hard.
A weapon. If only he had a weapon, one of the ugly swords they all wore at their belts, or one of those sharp, shiny knives. There seemed to be nothing more desirable in the world than such a sharp piece of metal – more desirable than all the words Fenoglio could write. They hauled him off the cart. He could hardly keep his footing, but somehow or other he stood upright. Four soldiers surrounded him and seized him, and he imagined himself killing them one by one. While that new, cold heart in his breast beat time.
“Hey, go a bit more carefully with him, will you?” Firefox snapped at them. “You think I brought him this whole damn way just for you fools to kill him now?”
Resa was crying. Mo heard her call his name again and again. He turned, but he couldn’t see her anywhere, he only heard her voice. He called her name, tried to break free, kicked out at the soldiers who were dragging him away toward one of the towers.
“You just try that again!” snarled one of them. “What’s biting you, then? You two will soon be reunited. The Adderhead likes wives to watch an execution.”
“That’s right, he can’t get enough of their weeping and wailing,” mocked another man. “You’ll see, he’ll keep her alive a little longer just for that. And you’ll get a magnificent execution, Bluejay, you mark my words.”
Bluejay. A new name. A new heart. Like ice in his breast, with edges as sharp as a blade.
Chapter 49 – The Mill
“We rode and rode and nothing happened. Wherever we went, it was calm, peaceful, and beautiful. You could call it a quiet evening in the mountains, I thought, if that hadn’t been so wrong.”
– Astrid Lindgren, The Brothers Lionheart
It took Dustfinger over three days to reach the Spelt-Mill with Meggie and Farid. Three long, gray days during which Meggie hardly spoke a word, although Farid did his best to cheer her up. Most of the time it was raining, a fine drizzle, and soon none of them could remember what it felt like to sleep in dry clothes. Only when, at last, the dark valley where the mill stood opened out before them, did the sun break through the clouds. Low in the sky above the hills, it shed golden light on the river and the shingle roofs. There wasn’t another dwelling to be seen far and wide – only the miller’s house, a few outhouses, and the mill itself, with its great wooden wheel dipping deep into the water. Willows, poplars, and eucalyptus bushes lined the bank of the river on which it stood, together with alders and wild pear trees. There was a cart standing at the foot of the steps leading into the mill. A broad-shouldered man, dusty with flour, was just loading it up with sacks. There was no one else in sight except a boy who, on seeing them approach, ran over to the house. All looked peaceful – peaceful and quiet, apart from the rushing of the water, which drowned out even the chirping of the cicadas.
“You’ll see!” Farid whispered to Meggie. “Fenoglio’s written something. I’m sure he has. Or if not, we’ll just wait until –”
“We’ll do no such thing,” Dustfinger brusquely interrupted him, looking distrustfully around.
“We’ll ask about the letter and then go on. Many people come to this mill, and after what happened on the road the first of the soldiers will soon be putting in an appearance. If it was up to me, we wouldn’t show our faces here until everything had calmed down a bit, but if you must. .”
“Suppose the letter hasn’t come yet?” Meggie looked at him with anxiety in her face. “When I wrote to Fenoglio I told him I’d wait for it here!”
“Yes, and I don’t remember saying you could write to him at all, did I?”
Meggie made no answer, and Dustfinger glanced at the mill again. “I just hope CloudDancer delivered the letter safely, and the old man hasn’t been showing it around. I don’t have to tell you what damage the words on a page can do.”
He looked around for the last time before moving out of the cover of the trees. Then he signaled to Farid and Meggie to follow him and strode toward the buildings. The boy who had run to the house was sitting on the steps outside the door of the mill again, and a few chickens ran away, squawking, as Gwin shot toward them.
“Farid, catch that damn marten!” ordered Dustfinger, as he whistled Jink to his side, but Gwin hissed at Farid. He didn’t bite him (he never bit Farid), but he wasn’t letting himself be caught, either. He slipped through Farid’s legs and bounded after one of the chickens. Cackling, it fluttered up the steps of the mill, but the marten wasn’t to be shaken off that way. He shot past the boy, who was still sitting on the steps apparently taking no interest in anything, and disappeared through the open door in pursuit of the chicken. A moment later the cackling stopped abruptly and Meggie glanced anxiously at Dustfinger.
“Oh, wonderful!” he murmured, making Jink jump back into his backpack. “A marten in the flour and a dead chicken, that’s going to make us very popular here! Speak of the devil. .”
The man loading up the cart wiped his floury hands on his trousers and came toward them.
“Excuse me, please!” Dustfinger called to him. “Where’s the miller? I’ll pay for the chicken, of course. But we’re really here to collect something. A letter.”
The man stopped in front of them. He was a full head taller than Dustfinger. “I’m the miller now,”
