The Singing by Alison Croggon Page A

for a long time. Dernhil's furniture—a huge wooden desk and two chairs covered in azure silk—was still there, but the books that had filled the shelves were gone, leaving behind a litter of dusty oddments. A chill winter sun shone through the casement, casting a silver light over the dusty desk and chairs. Clearly no one used the room now.
    Maerad entered the chamber and shut the door behind her, filled with a sudden and overwhelming sense of bereavement. It was as if she hadn't really believed Dernhil was dead until this moment. Some secret part of her had still thought that he was really waiting here at work in his room, that she would knock on the door and he would glance up to greet her with that quick, ironic smile and clear a space for her on the chair beside his.
    He died in this room, Maerad thought. That's probably why no one took it over. She wandered around the room, looking at the shelves, and found a broken pen she remembered Dernhil using, lying forgotten against the wall. She picked it up and closed her fist around it; she would keep it with Dernhil's book, and the beautiful pen he had given her for her own use, as a memento. Then she walked over to the desk and sat down. The desk that she remembered as scarcely visible under a clutter of books, writing materials, parchments, and scrolls was completely bare, covered in a thin layer of dust. Into her mind, unbidden, came the chant Cadvan had sung for Dernhil, after they had heard the news of his death:
    Where has he gone? His chamber is empty And bright are the tears in the high halls of Oron
    Where once he stepped lightly, singing deep secrets Out of the heart-vault and into the open ...
    I didn't know him long enough, Maerad thought, to feel this sad. But even as she thought this, she knew it to be nonsense, a denial of a deeper knowing. I know he loved you, Cadvan had told her, long ago it seemed now, in another life. He was one of those who can see clearly into another's soul, and his feelings were true. Such things have little to do with brevity of meeting.
    All too brief, all the same. When we parted, there was promise of so many things, of deep friendship, of learning; and now all that promise is frozen in the past, like those strange animals I saw deep in the glacier. ... Is that what I am really mourning? All the conversations we never had, the books you will never read to me, the lovers we will never be. If you kissed me now, would I hit you?
    In her mind's eye, Maerad could see Dernhil as vividly as if he stood before her. He was tall and slender, his brown hair falling carelessly over his forehead, his expression intelligent, mobile, amused. He was, she realized, very handsome. She hadn't really noticed that when they had met. No, she thought, I would not hit him now.
    What would you say to me if we met now? Would you say, like Indik, What happened to the shy, charming Bard I met last spring? Would you still want to kiss me? I have changed so much. But I am still Maerad ...
    "I wanted to tell you—" she said, and jumped, because she had spoken aloud. But who would hear her? She dug her nails into her palms to stop herself from crying. It was important that she say at last what she wanted to say, even if there was no one there to hear it.
    "I wanted to tell you that your poem saved me when I was captured by the Winterking and held in his palace," she said. I read your poem, and it reminded me of everyone I love.
    Including you. It reminded me of why we are fighting so hard. It reminded me how much beauty there is . . ." Maerad stared down at her hands lying on the desk, one whole, the other maimed, and bit her lip. "How much beauty there is in the world, and why it matters. It reminded me that even if we die, it doesn't mean that everything we do is useless. That even though you are dead, you are still speaking to me. I hear your voice every time I read your poems."
    She paused, taking in a long breath. "But it made me feel sadder than ever,