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- Herausgeber: Ryer Publishing
- Kategorie: Fantasy und Science-Fiction
- Sprache: Englisch
- Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2021
Destiny demands a price.
In a brutal kingdom run by tyrants, murderers, and thugs, it’s the brutality of her home life that finally makes young Bradamante say
enough.
With one rash act, she takes away one of her mother’s favorite weapons against her.
And with it, unlocks a vision of a future for herself.
A future as a warrior. As a bold young woman with power and skills beyond any Bradamante could have imagined. And she meets her teacher, a mystical warrior named Manat, who speaks of destiny and sacrifice … and hope for a better future. Not only for Bradamante, but for the entire kingdom.
But Bradamante is about to learn that destiny demands a price—including giving up the ones that she loves.
Will she follow the path she seems born to, or will she choose one of her own?
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BOOK OF EARTH
BRADAMANTE SAGA, BOOK 1
ROBIN BRANDE
RYER PUBLISHING
Book of Earth
(Bradamante Saga, Book 1)
Prophecy
(Bonus Short Story)
By Robin Brande
Published by Ryer Publishing
www.ryerpublishing.com
Copyright 2015 by Robin Brande
www.robinbrande.com
All rights reserved
Cover art by Konstanttin and Esebene/Dreamstime
Cover design by Ryer Publishing
All rights reserved. This is a work of fiction. Any references to historical events, real people, or real locales are used fictitiously. Other names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination, and any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
Created with Vellum
CONTENTS
The White House
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Gibeah
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
The Long Walk
Chapter 24
The White Temple
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Chapter 34
Chapter 35
Chapter 36
Chapter 37
Chapter 38
Chapter 39
Chapter 40
Chapter 41
Abincort
Chapter 42
Chapter 43
Chapter 44
Chapter 45
Chapter 46
Chapter 47
Chapter 48
Chapter 49
Chapter 50
Chapter 51
Chapter 52
Chapter 53
More
Bonus Story: PROPHECY
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
About the Author
Also by Robin Brande
THE WHITE HOUSE
1
Bradamante knelt in the mud and cut away all of her hair.
Rain peppered her bare scalp. The wind shoved at her in gusts, plastering her wet clothes against her skin. It was stupid, she knew, to kneel here in the storm—even in summer the combination of wet and wind could prove deadly. Her fingers were already wooden from the cold. But she continued working, pulling each new section of hair taut and slicing it away with her hunting knife.
Just one more section to go. She grasped the last hank of hair and sucked in a breath, prepared for the pain. The lump on the back of her head throbbed as the knife scraped across it. But then it was over. She was free.
She sat back and examined the heap of long brown curls before her. Twelve years of growth, minus a few of her brother’s haircuts. Her head felt impossibly light and bare without its long cloak of matted curls. But it was better this way. She would get used to it.
Movement in the distance caught her eye. Even in the dark and the rain she could detect the smudge of a figure moving toward her. It could only be Rinaldo. He must have been searching for hours.
Bradamante gathered the wet hair into the hem of her tunic and rose onto stiff legs. Rinaldo still hadn’t seen her. She set out across the field to meet him, strewing handfuls of hair as though they were seeds.
Rinaldo saw her, and broke into a run. He opened his cloak and sheltered his little sister inside. She shivered against his chest.
“Are you trying to kill yourself out here?”
“No.” Even wet, the cloak was warm. Bradamante breathed in the scent of damp wool.
Rinaldo peeled away part of the covering to examine her. “Your hair.” He reached out to touch her head, but Bradamante flinched away. “What happened?”
“I cut it.”
“Why?”
“I wanted to.” She clamped her teeth together to keep them from chattering.
Rinaldo hugged her in closer. “You need a fire. Come on. And then you’re telling me everything.”
Not everything, Bradamante thought.
Rinaldo led her from the field. At seventeen, he stood a head taller than his sister, but Bradamante made a point of matching him stride for stride. Once off the field, they turned onto the dirt road that led past the cottages toward their house. Water had pooled in the cart tracks, making the road a swamp of mud. But the earth was warmer than the rain, and Bradamante appreciated the comfort of it against her bare feet.
They trudged along in silence for several minutes before Rinaldo questioned her again. “What happened?”
“It doesn’t matter.”
“It matters to me.”
Bradamante shrugged and walked on.
“I’m sorry,” Rinaldo said. “I didn’t think I’d be away for so long. I was so caught up talking with Father and Cyrus—”
“It isn’t your fault,” Bradamante said.
“But I should have—”
“Naldo, stop.”
Rinaldo sighed. “What can I do for you?”
“Nothing. I’m all right.”
“Why did you cut your hair?”
“I don’t know. I just wanted to.”
Bradamante glanced with envy at the cottages they passed along the way. She liked to imagine their lives—the families sleeping within, huddled five or six to a bed, children piled on top of each other, warm and safe beside their parents.
She wondered what they’d had for dinner. Maybe mutton stew, or maybe some of the elk she’d shot with her bow a few days before. After dinner the families might have spent the last of the light catching up on their mending or whittling or maybe spinning a little more thread. They would have gone to bed with the dark, exhausted from working in the fields, grateful to escape into dreams. Their cottages were dirty and cramped and smelled of smoke and grease, and Bradamante wished more than anything that she was turning toward one of those doorways instead of her own.
Rinaldo paused at the entrance to the great stone house. “They’re sleeping. Get out of your wet clothes. I’ll stoke the fire.” He pushed open the heavy wooden door and the two of them crept into their house.
Lord Aymon’s snores rumbled down from the open loft above them. Lady Aya slept soundlessly in the lower bedroom.
Rinaldo rooted in his trunk for a dry shirt and handed it to his sister. Then he busied himself with the fire. Bradamante moved to a dark corner, pulled the shirt over her head, and removed her wet clothes from underneath. The shirt was one of Rinaldo’s, so long it fell past her knees. She didn’t have any clothes of her own. She’d always worn whatever her brother outgrew.
Rinaldo unrolled two wool blankets and laid them in front of the fire. “Are you hungry?” he whispered.
“No.” She was, but food would be too much trouble.
“Then lie down,” Rinaldo told her. “Get warm.”
Bradamante settled onto her blanket. She winced as the back of her head touched the floor. For a moment she had forgotten about her injury.
“Let me see,” Rinaldo said.
“I’m all right.”
“Brad,” he insisted in a whisper, “let me see.”
Reluctantly Bradamante rolled onto her side. Rinaldo examined her head in the firelight. “What did she do?”
“I fell. Please, Naldo, just leave it.” Bradamante sat up and hugged her knees into her chest. Rinaldo rearranged the blanket around her.
“I’m sorry,” he said. “I’m so sorry.”
“When are we going to leave?”
“I don’t know. Soon. You have to be patient.”
“I am patient,” she whispered, “but why can’t we go now?”
“I told you—I have to find the right place. I can’t just take you anywhere—it’s not safe.”
It’s not safe here, Bradamante thought, but she didn’t say it.
“And it has to be someplace I can find work.”
“I can work,” Bradamante answered. “Every village needs meat.”
“They’re not going to hire a girl to do their hunting.”
“Then I can work as a servant.”
“You don’t know how to do any of the things servant girls do.”
Bradamante quietly groaned in frustration. “Then I can hunt and you can pretend it’s you. No one has to know. Let them pay you.”
Rinaldo shook his head. “No. Not until I know it’s safe. I’ll find somewhere—I promise. But right now this is the best place for you.”
They had had this conversation too many times for Bradamante to believe it would go any further. Too tired to argue any more, she lay back down. She turned onto her side and stared into the fire, hoping for inspiration. I’ll do it myself, she thought. I’ll find a way.
The fire burned down to ash while the two of them slept.
“Bradamante... Bradamante...”
The voice awakened her from a dream. Bradamante opened her eyes and searched the dark room. Rinaldo slept deeply beside her. No one else was near, yet still she heard the voice.
“Bradamante...”
A woman’s voice. Her mother’s.
Bradamante pulled the blanket over her head and pretended not to hear. The rough wool scratched her tender scalp.
“Bradamante...” The voice was strangely inviting and sweet. What new trick was this? Aya never said her daughter’s name that way. In fact, Bradamante couldn’t remember the last time her mother had used her name at all.
Bradamante propped up on her elbows and peered toward her mother’s room. The voice seemed to have come from somewhere much closer than that, but how could it? She held her breath and listened harder. The only sounds were her brother’s steady breathing and the rumbling bass of her father’s snores echoing down from the loft.
“Bradamante!” The whisper was insistent now.
Too curious to ignore it any longer, Bradamante decided she would sneak just outside her mother’s room, listen at the door, and decide then what to do.
She padded across the rough stone floor, careful not to wake her brother. At the doorway she listened to Lady Aya’s shallow, rhythmic breathing.
“Mother?”
There was no reply.
She stepped into the room and tried again. “Mother?”
Aya snuffled and burrowed deeper into her goose down blankets.
Bradamante turned to go.
A moan came from the bed. “What are you doing here?” her mother grumbled. “Get out.”
“But you called me.”
“Why would I call you? Get out.”
With pleasure. Bradamante retreated to the main room and fed another log to the starving fire. Then she lay back down.
She had barely fallen asleep when the voice called again.
“Bradamante... ”
Bradamante threw off her blanket and stormed to her mother’s room. “Why do you keep calling me?”
“Get out! Stop waking me, stupid goat!”
Bradamante fumed back to the fire.
“What’s wrong?” Rinaldo asked sleepily.
“Nothing. Just a dream.”
“You all right?”
“Yes. Go back to sleep.”
This time the voice was beneath the blanket with her, timbling so closely into her ear she felt the vibration of every syllable: Brad-uh-mont.
She held her breath and listened.
The voice was quieter now, a whisper inside her head. “Bradamante. I’m here.”
“Where?”
“Give me your hand. Come and see.”
2
Bradamante felt a warm, strong grip on her wrist. In the next instant she was in another room, beside another fire, in a house she had never seen before.
She was not alone: a young woman sat in a rocking chair beside the fire.
“Hello?”
The young woman didn’t answer.
Bradamante took in her surroundings. The house was small—smaller even than the tenants’ cottages—and made entirely of white wood. Its single room was clean and bright, with windows courting sunshine from every direction. Instead of an open firepit like the one Bradamante and Rinaldo slept beside, this room had a fireplace with a chimney. An iron kettle hung from a hook above the fire. The only pieces of furniture were the rocking chair, two cushions beside the fireplace, and shelves along every wall, brimming with books.
Bradamante could see the whole room from somewhere above it, looking down, and from inside it at the same time. She wondered what was wrong with her eyes. She shut them tightly and pressed her fingers against the lids. When she opened them again, she could see only the fire in front of her.
A voice said, “You’re awake.”
Bradamante sat upright in the rocking chair. The movement felt strange. She caught sight of the hands in her lap. She lifted them for a closer look. They were not hers. They were too large. She gazed down at her clothes. Instead of Rinaldo’s shirt she wore a gray wool robe and thick woolen socks. Tucked into the back of her robe was a long braid of thick hair, tied at the end with a strip of leather. Bradamante reached back and felt the braid, knowing it couldn’t possibly be hers. Her hair was gone. This hair—this body—were someone else’s.
“Here, this should warm you.” A woman appeared from behind carrying two mugs. She was tall and sturdy-looking, with a tan weathered face and shoulder-length dark auburn hair. She wore a faded black tunic belted at the waist and loose black trousers.
She filled the two mugs with steaming liquid from the kettle, then sat cross-legged on one of the cushions beside the fire and tucked her bare feet beneath her thighs.
“Come sit with me,” she said. “You’re still shivering.”
Bradamante stayed where she was. She knew her shivering was not from the cold. She felt locked in the wrong body, unable to lift even a finger.
“Try,” the woman encouraged. “You’ll feel better if you move.”
This isn’t real, Bradamante told herself. It’s only a dream. She gazed down at her body again, this time shyly noting the curves she knew she didn’t have. This isn’t me.
“It is you,” the woman answered, as if Bradamante had made the comment aloud. “You’re not twelve anymore. You’re older here. You’re thinking with an older mind, too. Can you feel it?”
Bradamante’s thoughts scattered, none of them settling long enough for her to know whether they were childlike or adult.
“Come sit with me,” the woman coaxed. “Give yourself time. I know it can be difficult at first.”
Bradamante rose slowly, testing her legs. She took two halting steps, feeling her way forward as though she were walking in the dark. Nothing felt right. She was slow and too large and out of balance.
She sank onto the empty cushion.
The woman beside her smiled warmly. She handed Bradamante one of the mugs. “Drink this.”
“What is it?” Bradamante asked in a voice she knew wasn’t her own.
“Black clove tea. It brings clarity. I thought you might need that right now.”
Bradamante sipped the spicy, unfamiliar liquid. It slid down her throat and warmed her chest from inside. From her vantage point above she looked down and saw the younger of the two women drinking from her mug. I can taste this, Bradamante thought. Maybe this is me. But how can I be her?
“Look again,” the older woman told her. “Believe your eyes.”
Bradamante studied the young woman. She was long-legged and broad-shouldered, with light brown skin and curly brown hair gathered into a braid. She looked like Rinaldo, with his full cheeks and square jaw, but her skin and eyes were darker. She looked like Lady Aya, too—a fact which did not please Bradamante. Although she had heard people refer to Aya as beautiful, when Bradamante looked at her mother, she saw only coldness and anger.
The young woman shook her head. No, Bradamante thought, she’s right—that’s not my mother’s face at all. Mine is … softer.
Bradamante shut her eyes tightly. When she opened them, she was looking at the fire once again, through the eyes of the body she wore. She reached up to touch her cheeks and knew that she felt her own skin.
“But this can’t be me.”
“It is.”
“I don’t look like this,” Bradamante insisted. She traced the length of her braid. “This isn’t mine. I cut it all off.”
“Not here,” the woman answered. “Not now.”
Bradamante’s pulse quickened. “Where is here? What is now?”
“Here is in the white house,” the woman said. “Now is when you’re older—twenty-two, twenty-three. In your regular life you’re still a girl, but when you’re here, you’re already grown. Your hair grew back long ago.”
“That’s not possible.”
The woman smiled. “Believe me when I say you hardly know what is possible.”
“But—”
The woman held up her hand. “Drink. We have work to do.”
Bradamante had barely taken a sip when the woman reached over and tugged lightly on her braid. “You cut this off tonight. Why?”
Bradamante's eyes narrowed. “How do you know that? Who are you?”
“My name is Manat. Now tell me why.”
Bradamante hesitated. She hadn’t told her brother the truth, so why should she tell this stranger?
“You’re worried,” Manat said. “Don’t be. I already saw what happened with your mother today.”
“You saw? How?”
“The same way I saw you cut your hair.” Manat waved her hand dismissively. “But I don’t want to speak of her. Your mother is of no consequence—”
“No consequence?” Bradamante repeated with a laugh. “You wouldn’t say that if you really knew.”
“I do know. And that is why I can say her cruelty is meaningless. You have greater matters to attend to than the ravings of one bitter woman.”
Bradamante could barely contain her shock. No one had ever spoken of Lady Aya that way.
“So tell me,” Manat pressed on, “why did you cut your hair?”
Bradamante’s lips curved into a smile. This was the best dream she had ever had. Was it possible, after all these years of concealing her pain—of withholding all the terrible details so that Rinaldo wouldn’t feel any greater burden than he already did—was it possible Bradamante could finally tell someone exactly how she felt?
She ran her hand down the length of her thick braid. Then for the first time in her life she said it out loud: “I hate my mother.”
“A useless emotion,” Manat said, “but go on.”
Emboldened, Bradamante did. “And I’m never going to let her do it again.”
“Hurt you.”
“Yes.”
“In particular, drag you by the hair like that.”
Surprised, but relieved not to have to say it herself, Bradamante nodded.
“Good,” Manat said. “Very good. I don’t agree with your method, but it was the best you could do with what you know now. You defended yourself. You tried to take away your opponent’s advantage. Those are good strategies. In your heart you already know who you are.”
“Who I—”
“Come outside,” Manat said, rising to her feet. “I want to show you something.”
Surprised at the abruptness, Bradamante nevertheless followed Manat to the door. As they crossed over the threshold, Bradamante’s long wool robe transformed into a thigh-length tunic like Manat’s, only brown instead of black. Underneath she wore soft thin breeches that grazed the tops of her ankles. Bradamante reached back to make sure her braid was still there.
“You won’t lose that,” Manat said. “You’ll always look the same here, even when you’re much older.”
They stepped off the covered porch onto a white sandy beach. Bradamante walked slowly, savoring the view. She dug her toes into the warm white sand. In front of her was an endless blue bay stretching toward the horizon. A moist breeze funneled off the waves onto shore. White gulls dipped and sailed through the air. In the distance a fish exploded from the water.
To their left a trail led away from the house up a slope to a lush meadow where long grasses and yellow and blue wildflowers nodded in the breeze. Beyond the meadow was a forest, where aspen leaves fluttered on their stems and pine trees stretched their tips toward the heavens. Everywhere Bradamante looked she found unfaltering splendor. “What is this place?”
“Do you like it?”
“It’s beautiful.”
“The white house is my favorite place to come,” Manat said. “I discovered it a long time ago—when I was your age. One night I fell asleep a girl and awakened in the body of this forty-five-year-old woman, wondering how I’d grown so old.” Manat laughed. “Of course, that was before I knew what old was.”
Bradamante liked Manat’s lopsided smile. She liked her sun-weathered face and deep-set eyes. Manat looked older than Bradamante’s mother, and yet she seemed so much more... alive. She lacked that pale fragility that Lady Aya and so many other women regarded as beautiful. Instead Manat moved with the effortless grace of someone comfortable in her strength.
Bradamante knew her mother would scorn a woman like this—consider her rough or common—but Bradamante liked the way she looked. She liked how regally Manat had sat in her bare feet and simple clothes in front of the fire. She liked Manat’s strong, lined hands, her warm hazel eyes, her thick wavy hair the color of freshly-turned soil.
And there was something else: an intensity about her, like the charge in the air before a storm. Even standing still, Manat seemed capable of tremendous force. Her face was kind, her words were gentle, but Bradamante could see there was nothing delicate about her.
“You’re strong, too,” Manat said. “Look at yourself.”
Bradamante gazed down at her body. She pushed back her sleeves and found tightly-muscled arms. She lifted her pant legs and examined her sturdy calves. It was true: this body looked and felt powerful. Bradamante wished she could test it—lift something, throw something.
“Run,” Manat suggested.
Bradamante turned up the hill and ran toward the meadow. She pumped her arms and legs and raced across the grass to the edge of the woods. The part of her that was still a child thrilled at the speed and strength of her movements. She took deep, hard breaths that would have burst the chest of the girl at home asleep next to Rinaldo. But here, this girl—this woman—could run as far as she wanted, as fast as she wanted.
She raced along the pines, touching the trunks as she passed so she would know the trees were real. A stag startled and burst out in front of her. Bradamante chased the deer as long as she could. Then she turned from the dark woods back into the sunlit meadow. She stretched out her legs and ran to the limits of her lungs. Flying down the hill, she sped back to shore.
She bent over to catch her breath, then grinned up at Manat.
“Do you see?” Manat said. “This is who you are. I’ve been watching you for years, Bradamante, and tonight I finally saw what I was waiting for. You proved to me that in your heart you already know who you are.”
“What do you mean, who I am?”
“Look at yourself,” Manat answered. “Feel what it’s like to be inside that body and to think with that mind. What you and I are here in the white house is the best of what our souls have to offer. I’ve spent my life striving to become the woman I am here, and now it’s your turn. But to become this young woman,” Manat said, pointing to Bradamante, “you have to make a choice. And you have to make it tonight.”
“What choice?” Bradamante’s brain fogged with confusion. It was all coming too fast.
“Between the life you have now, and the larger life that awaits you.”
“What larger life? I don’t understand.”
“In your soul you’re a fighter, Bradamante—a warrior. Test your heart. You know it’s true.”
“A warrior,” Bradamante repeated, her heart pumping furiously. A strange heat sped through her veins. Her skin prickled, as though flames flickered just below the surface. Her heart felt suddenly larger—almost too large for a single body to contain. She imagined a mound of coals burning brightly in the center of her chest, heating her body from the inside out. Her fingers tingled. Her entire body crackled with energy, as if she were standing in an open field during a lightning storm. Bradamante pressed her hand against her chest, trying to contain the flames.
“Am I really a warrior, Manat?”
“You can be, if you choose that life and work hard to have it.”
“How do you know?”
“Because I am this young woman’s teacher,” Manat answered, pointing to the grown Bradamante. “I have been training her since she was twelve.”
3
Bradamante stared at Manat, not quite certain she had heard what she thought.
“You’re... my teacher?”
“Yes.”
“Since I was twelve? But I am twelve.”
“Yes,” Manat said. “Which is why you have to decide now if this is what you want.”
Bradamante’s lips broke into a grin. “Of course I want it! Why wouldn’t I? When can we start? Right now?”
But then her smile faded. It was only a dream, after all. Why was she allowing herself to get so excited?
“This isn’t a dream,” Manat answered, even though Bradamante had kept her thoughts to herself. “It’s a vision. Do you know the difference?”
“No.”
“Dreams come from your mind. A vision comes from your soul. Tonight I called to your soul and it answered me. I sent my soul to be with you here, and you sent yours. We’re both asleep, far from each other, but we can meet here in the white house as easily as if we were in the same room.”
“How? I don’t know how to do that.”
Manat pointed to the young woman standing in front of her. “She does.”
“But you said she is me.”
“Not yet. Perhaps not ever. That is for you to decide.”
“I don’t understand,” Bradamante said. “If this is really true, then why do I have to decide anything? If I can already see myself this way, then isn’t it going to happen?”
“No,” Manat said. “Not for certainty.”
She began walking again down the warm white beach. Bradamante strode beside her.
“I know this might be difficult to understand,” Manat said, “but all I can do tonight is show you a glimpse of how your life can be. None of this will come to pass unless you accept it and work hard to achieve it.”
“Of course I accept it,” Bradamante said. “Why wouldn’t I want to be like this?”
Manat glanced at her from the side. “Like what? All you can see is how you might look as a young woman. You don’t know anything else about her.”
“But I do know,” Bradamante insisted. “I know how she feels inside. I know how she thinks.”
“How does she think?”
Bradamante paused and closed her eyes. She watched herself from above—saw her hand press against her forehead—while at the same time she examined herself from inside. “I can hear her mind moving. It feels like... like she’s found extra room in her head. Like she’s filled it up to the top. I can feel how much she knows. It’s so much more than I do.”
“That’s true,” Manat said, “but perhaps that comes to everyone over time, no matter what life they choose. Perhaps what you’re sensing is simply age and experience.”
“No,” Bradamante said. “It’s different than that. There’s something … stronger. It’s like the way this body feels—like I could jump over that house if I wanted to.”
The strain of seeing from above and from inside her body at the same time made Bradamante’s head ache. She pinched her fingers against her eyes. “Please, Manat, I want this. I want to be her. Please tell me what I have to do.”
“You’re too impatient,” Manat said. “Your head hurts. This isn’t a decision to make impulsively. You need time to calm your thoughts.”
Manat resumed walking. Bradamante strode silently beside her, trying her best to seem patient and serene.
After a time, Manat stopped and stared out over the water. Sunlight glinted off the waves.
“Few people are courageous enough to live as full of a life as they can,” she said. “Do you feel you are that courageous?”
“I am,” Bradamante said with confidence.
“You must commit yourself completely to this life. Commit to it without reservation. Do you understand?”
“I will,” Bradamante said, trying not to show her excitement. “I promise.”
“Don’t be misled, Bradamante. What your soul asks of you is not easy. Tonight you’ve seen only a small part of your life, but there is so much more, and so much of it may be difficult. At times you may suffer greatly.”
I’ve already suffered, Bradamante thought. “I don’t care how hard it is,” she said. “I want this.”
“How much do you want it? Enough to put aside your own desires to do what is best for others? The warrior’s life is one of service. At times you will feel what a burden that is. Are you willing to give up your own comfort and safety—even your happiness—to protect those who will depend on you?”
“I will,” Bradamante said. “I swear.”
Manat paused. “Understand me: this is not an easy way. You may lose people you love.”
A coldness attacked Bradamante’s skin. Her nerves tingled. “Who? Not Naldo.”
“Perhaps. I can’t tell you that.”
Whatever joy Bradamante felt now fled. She shook her head. “I won’t do anything to hurt my brother. You should have told me that from the beginning.”
“Nothing is certain,” Manat answered. “No one but your god knows the future. I can only tell you what is possible if you choose to accept this life.”
“But what will happen to Naldo?”
“I can only tell you that he has one life, you have another.”
“But we can still be together, right? You’ll train him, too.”
“No,” Manat said. “You can teach your brother what you learn, but the white house is only for you.”
“Why?”
“Because Rinaldo has his own possibilities to explore. He can’t choose for you, and you can’t choose for him. You must go your own way.”
“You make it sound like I have to leave him. I won’t ever do that.”
“Won’t you?” Manat asked. “Well, then, you’ve made your choice.”
Without further comment, she turned and walked away.
“Wait!” Bradamante wished she could talk to Rinaldo. How could she make this decision without talking to him? “Please, can I have more time? I have to think about it.”
Manat turned and faced her with a wry smile. “How unlike you. I’m sorry, but the answer is no. Now is the time—this moment—when you must make your choice.”
“But why? Why now?”
“Sometimes moments arrive, whether we want them to or not, when we have to decide for ourselves what course our lives will take. Can a mother watching her child drown ask for more time? Can the warrior when a sword is at his throat?”
“That's different,” Bradamante argued. “That’s not me. Why do I have to decide right now?”
“Because what happened today has already changed you,” Manat said. “Tonight when you stood in that field and made a decision to protect yourself, you changed. You understood something you hadn’t before. You took control where before you thought you had none.
“Now you are standing where two roads part. You can take the one that leads you back to the life you were living before. You can try to pretend nothing has changed, but you will always know you could have had a different life if you had simply been brave enough to claim it.”
“Or you can take the other road,” Manat said. “The one that carries you forward toward the life you’ve seen is possible. But you can’t stay where you are—too much has changed. Your soul won’t allow it. The moment has arrived when you must choose one life or the other.”
“Why can’t I have both?” Bradamante asked. “Why can’t Naldo and I stay together no matter what I’m doing?”
“Can you walk down two roads at the same time? Your brother may follow you or he may not. He may take another path that will intersect with yours one day—that is not for you to consider. The truth remains that you cannot stand where you are. You must choose a road and take it.”
Bradamante had been so sure of her choice before, but now her confidence wavered. She couldn’t imagine giving up her life with Rinaldo any more than she could imagine turning her back on this young woman she might become.
Bradamante closed her eyes and breathed slowly, deeply, trying to calm herself and think clearly. She listened to the waves foam over the shore. She caught the cry of a hawk hunting somewhere over the meadow behind her.
Then she heard something else: the young woman’s heart pulsating inside her like flames whipped by the wind. She heard an echo of the young woman’s thoughts, of the ideas and wisdom Bradamante could only begin to grasp. Was it wrong to risk Naldo to have this? And was she really risking him? Manat had only warned of the possibility. In fact, choosing a new life could benefit them both. If Naldo were here, what would he choose? Bradamante felt sure he would seize the opportunity, and that he would use his training to help his sister in whatever way he could.
But what did Manat say? Nothing was certain. She only knew the possibilities.
Bradamante opened her eyes. “I want to feel like this. I want to think like this. I choose this life, Manat. With all of my heart.”
“And you will accept whatever it brings?”
“I will.”
Manat’s gaze was almost too intense for Bradamante, but she forced herself to bear it while Manat seemed to examine her very soul.
Finally Manat nodded. “Yes, I believe you are ready. We will begin your training tomorrow. We must work quickly now. Matters are already in motion.”
“What matters? What’s going to happen?”
“It’s not always good to know your future,” Manat said. “Trust that if you have faith and work hard, you’ll be prepared for whatever is to come.”
“But—”
“Either you have faith in yourself and me or you don’t, Bradamante. Decide.”
Bradamante took a deep breath. Maybe this was part of her new life, she thought—this willingness to accept what she didn’t fully understand. “All right,” she told her teacher. “I do.”
Manat squinted toward the sun. “Our time tonight is almost over. You’ll be waking soon.”
Bradamante’s heart sank. “I have to go?”
“For now. You’ll be back tomorrow, when you sleep.”
“But how will I—”
Manat held up her hand. “No more questions. You’re almost awake. We’ll talk tomorrow night.”
She drew a small vial from the pouch tucked into her belt and poured oil from it into her hand.
“Remember who you are, Bradamante. You are a warrior. You’re already stronger than you know.”
Manat dipped her finger into the oil and painted a line down each of Bradamante’s cheeks. “Be strong in body.” She drew a line across Bradamante’s forehead. “Strong in mind.” Then she opened her oily palm and pressed it hard against Bradamante’s chest, saying, “Above all, be strong in heart.”
Bradamante felt a shock of heat as the spirit of something forceful, as dangerous as what she sensed lay within Manat, penetrated her chest and lodged somewhere deep inside. The sudden weight of it dropped her to her knees.
“Manat,” Bradamante gasped, clutching at her chest. “Are you sure? Are you sure this is me?”
“This has always been you, Bradamante. I’ve been waiting for you to remember.”
4
“Take it outside and kill it.”
Rinaldo crept quietly beside his sister along the edge of the meadow, the two of them searching for morning prey. His eyes kept straying to Bradamante’s bald head and the swollen lump in back.
“Take it outside and kill it.”
She still wouldn’t tell him what happened, but he could guess. Their mother had hated Bradamante from the very night she was born. Her voice was weak, her eyes hard as she told her husband to take the baby outside and kill it. Then she turned her head away and refused to look at the child again.
Rinaldo saw and heard all of it. He’d been standing in the doorway.
Lord Aymon scooped up the infant and carried her from the house. Rinaldo raced after him, scratching at his arms, shouting at him, begging him, determined to wrench the baby away.
“Now, now,” Aymon said when they were clear of the house. “Settle down, son. I’m just taking your sister to the barn.”
Rinaldo held Bradamante while Aymon heaped hay into a wooden frame. “I thought we’d keep her in here,” Aymon explained. “Until your ma’s better.”
“I heard Mother say to kill her. You’re not, are you?”
“No, no,” Aymon answered. “I could never do that. Your ma’s not well. She doesn’t know what she’s saying.”
Aymon squeezed milk from one of the cows and showed Rinaldo how to feed his sister.
“Dip your little finger in the milk, then let her suck on it. She’ll be fine.”
Rinaldo stayed awake the rest of the night, cradling the baby, afraid to fall asleep and find her gone.
In the morning Aymon brought word that despite her massive bleeding, Aya had lived through the night. “Best keep your sister out here, though. Your ma thinks I... well, it can be our secret for now, hm?”
The boy nodded.
“I’ll tell her when she’s well again.”
Rinaldo hid with his sister in the dank barn for several weeks, leaving only to secure food from the house. Lord Aymon divided his hours between caring for his wife and working the ever-demanding fields. The five-year-old boy and his infant sister were on their own.
Tired of the barn, Rinaldo devised a way to carry his sister outdoors. He fashioned a sling from one of Aymon’s old shirts and strapped Bradamante to his chest. Then he wandered the estate, letting anyone who asked hold his beautiful new sister.
“How’s your mother?” the peasant women asked.
“Still sick,” he told them, watching carefully to make sure they held Bradamante right.
As the weeks melted into months, the questions became more pointed.
“Still not showing herself?” one of the women asked. “Is she even out of the bed?”
“My sister likes it better if you hold her head up more,” Rinaldo cautioned. “She likes to look around.”
The woman rested Bradamante against her hip. “Now, young one, I think I know how to hold a babe.”
Rinaldo reached for Bradamante. “She doesn’t like that,” he scolded. “We have to go now.”
The woman clucked her tongue as Rinaldo spirited his sister away. But he didn’t care. Bradamante was his responsibility alone, and no one knew her better than he did.
As she grew, he learned what to feed her: a daily portion of milk, a soft mush of corn meal and water, crushed berries, softened pieces of dried meat. Bradamante learned to walk while Rinaldo held her hands. Her first words were the ones Rinaldo taught her. By the time Aya realized she had been deceived, it was too late. Everyone knew she had a daughter, and Rinaldo knew it would always be his responsibility to protect her. The first time Aya struck her, Rinaldo bit his mother’s hand so hard he tasted blood.
“Something happened last night,” Bradamante told him now, bending to gather stones for her sling.
Rinaldo glanced again at sister’s bald head. “I can see that. Does it hurt?”
Bradamante swept her hand over her scalp, pausing to poke gingerly at the lump. “A little. Naldo, listen to me. Last night I saw my future. You and I are going to be warriors.”
Rinaldo halted midstride. “What?”
“I met a woman last night. She showed me my future. She’s going to teach me to be a warrior. Then I can teach you. We can both learn how.”
Rinaldo clasped Bradamante’s shoulder and turned her to face him. “What woman? What are you talking about?”
“Her name is Manat. She said she’s been watching me.”
“What do you mean? Who’s been watching you?”
“Manat. We were in a place called the white house. I was already grown up. Manat said she’s going to teach me everything I need to know so I can be a warrior some day. I asked her if you could come, too, but—”
“What white house? One of the cottages? Is that where you were when I was looking for you last night?”
“No, it was in my dream.” Bradamante shook her head. “Not a dream—a vision.”
Rinaldo relaxed. “Oh, just a dream.”
“No, it was a vision—that’s different. She was real—I swear it.”
Rinaldo draped his arm across his sister’s shoulder. “You had a terrible day yesterday. I’m sorry about that. I’m glad you had a good dream, but you understand that’s all it was.”
Bradamante jerked to a halt and held up her hand. Then she pointed ahead of them.
Rinaldo squinted. “I don’t see it.”
A rabbit bounded ahead of them, searching for deeper cover. Both hunters loaded their slings.
“Go first,” Bradamante offered.
He knew she was only being polite. He had never been the hunter she was. He arced the sling over his head and released the rock. Bradamante waited for it to miss before sending her own stone flying.
“Good!” Rinaldo said. “A perfect hit.”
“Not perfect. Look, he’s still moving.” Bradamante hurried to her fallen prey. Gently she cradled the animal in her hands, then broke its neck with a snap. She laid it back down on the grass and drew her knife.
They worked together skinning the animal and carving its meat away from the bone. Bradamante dug a hole and buried the offal. Rinaldo wrapped the meat in a rag and stored it in his pack.
“Can you get another?” he asked.
“I’ll try.”
Rinaldo crept behind his sister, peering over her shoulder. As often happened, Bradamante made the kill before he even spied the prey.
“How do you do that?” he asked.
Bradamante shrugged. She set to work with her knife. “Listen to me. I’m going to begin my training tonight. I can’t take you with me, but Manat said I can teach you everything she shows me. Then we can both be warriors some day. What do you think?”
“Brad... listen to me. Something happened to me yesterday, too. I didn’t want to tell you last night. I didn’t think you’d want—you were so tired—”
“Tell me what?”
“A messenger came.”
“From where? From the king?”
“Yes. He came out to talk to Father while I was in the field with him.”
“Is it war?”
“Yes—a small one. Father decided to send Cyrus this time.”
“Cyrus? Well, he’ll be happy to hear that.” Bradamante knew as well as Rinaldo how anxious the young peasant was to serve in the king’s army. “Did you tell him yet?”
“He already knows. He was working the field with us when the messenger came.”
“I thought Father didn’t want to send him. Cyrus is one of his best workers. I thought that’s why he didn’t let him go last time.”
“And he wasn’t going to this time, either. But Cyrus begged hard—you should have seen him. He wore him down. Finally Father said he could go.”
“I’m glad. Cyrus doesn’t belong here. It’s good he’ll have the chance at something better.”
Bradamante finished carving the second rabbit, and handed it to Rinaldo. He stuffed it into his pack.
“I want to talk to you about something,” Rinaldo said.
“All right.” Bradamante wiped her hands on the tall grass, then stretched out on her back and laced her fingers behind her bald head.
“What would you think if I...” Rinaldo’s eyes drifted to his sister’s head. He paused, momentarily distracted. “Stand up.”
“What? Why?”
“I need to see something.”
Bradamante complied.
“Now turn around. Slowly.”
Bradamante eyed him skeptically. “All right.” She rotated in front of him, arms hanging loosely at her sides.
“Again. Please.”
“Why?”
“Come on, Brad, just do it.”
She turned once more, her bare feet flattening the grass. By the time she faced him again, he was smiling.
“You look like a boy.”
Bradamante looked down at herself. “I do?”
“It’s your hair,” Rinaldo said. “I never thought about cutting it. You should see yourself—you really could fool people now.”
Bradamante sat down again. “But why—”
“I know what to do now,” Rinaldo told her. “I couldn’t think of it last night, but now I know. You can come with me.”
“Come where?”
“The king’s army. Father asked me if I wanted to go yesterday, but I told him to send Cyrus instead.”
“Why? You should have said yes! That was your chance to go!”
“I wasn’t sure how I’d do it—how I’d bring you with me,” he said. “But now I know. You can pretend to be my servant. Lots of soldiers have their own servants, and if we keep your hair short no one will know you’re a girl. What do you think?”
Bradamante smiled. “It’s perfect. Manat can teach me how to fight, and I’ll teach you. We can both join the army and—”
“Brad, stop. I’m talking about something real.”
“So am I. I’m going to be a warrior. I decided last night. Manat said—”
“Fine,” Rinaldo said with a sigh. “We’ll talk about it later. You can think it over. We wouldn’t go right away, but the next time the king sends for a soldier—”
“She’s real,” Bradamante said.
“All right. Maybe she is.”
“She is.”
“Let’s make a fire,” Rinaldo said. “I’m hungry.”
The young monk Astolpho startled awake. His eyes came back to focus on the white walls around him. He stood alone in the corridor. He wiped the sweat from his upper lip.
How long had the vision lasted? Minutes? An hour? He could hear music coming from the sanctuary, so perhaps he had not been away that long. He had been walking to morning worship when suddenly he saw her, hunting in the meadow with her brother. While Astolpho stood rooted where he was and watched and listened, oblivious to all else, the other monks must have streamed around him and continued on their way. They were used to these episodes by now.
Bradamante’s hair—the lack of it—had been a shock. When had she cut it all off? He had seen her last only yesterday morning, and her hair was still intact then, covering her shoulders like a cape.
She looked different now, but not worse. Without her hair, her dark eyes had nowhere to hide. Without her hair, Astolpho could see her whole face and might more easily gauge her moods. And without her hair, he could see the purpling lump on the back of Bradamante’s head. He could easily guess who was responsible for that.
A few times, as Bradamante walked along, Astolpho caught her reaching up out of habit to tuck a strand of hair behind her ear. He studied her face for a reaction. Was she sad about what she’d done? Proud? Resigned to it? For as well as he thought he knew her, he couldn’t say what her emotions were that morning beyond excitement over meeting Manat.
Bradamante had met Manat. What did that mean?
“Visions come from our god,” Astolpho’s master Samual once said. “It is not for us to decide what we see, but only to understand why our god has sent them.”
Astolpho had been having visions of Bradamante for as many of his fourteen years as he could remember, and he still didn’t understand why. He had spent hours of his life watching her, learning her moods, her strengths, her disappointments. He knew her mouth grew small when she was angry, that she always bit down on her lip just before releasing her arrow, that her dark eyes softened when she smiled and her lips twitched when she slept. Why would his god want him to know any of that?
Astolpho had no control over the visions. They came upon him any time, day or night. One moment he would be carrying home grain from the mill or chopping wood for the fire, and the next he would stand immobilized as a scene from Bradamante’s life flashed before him. He dropped baskets of eggs and buckets full of milk. He let his father’s sheep wander away. While Astolpho’s brothers and sisters spent their days in rabid enterprise, Astolpho couldn’t be depended upon to complete even the simplest task.
Their narrow strip of leased land and small herd of sheep were barely enough to support Astolpho’s family in the best of times. When famine struck, Astolpho’s father realized he could no longer support a child who was too confused to work. One frosty morning he brought Astolpho to the doors of the White Temple and left him there. Astolpho was at that moment watching Bradamante fish through a hole she had cut in the ice. He didn’t notice that his father was gone.
If not for Bradamante, Astolpho often thought, he might still be tending sheep and sowing his father’s fields. If not for her, he might have wasted his life and never understood his destiny.
Perhaps that was the purpose of the visions, he thought. But after all this time he was certain of only one thing: that he felt closer to Bradamante than to anyone. Hers was the face he longed to see each day, the voice he wanted to hear. She was the one constant in his life.
She was his best friend, even though she didn’t know he existed.
“Astolpho!” a young girl cried. She hurried down the corridor toward him.
“Don’t run, Rayda.”
The warning came too late. Rayda paused and bent over to cough so violently, flecks of blood stained her hand. Astolpho rushed to her and rubbed her back until the fit passed.
When she could breathe again, Rayda asked, “Did you see her?”
“Yes, but I’m tired right now. Can I tell you later?” He could see she was disappointed. “I’ll tell you tonight. I promise.”
“What was she doing? Just tell me that. Please?”
Astolpho sighed, but he knew he couldn’t resist. Rayda was the one person who relished the details of Bradamante’s life as much as he did.
“I’ll tell you what she was doing,” Astolpho said. “She was eating, so she could grow big and strong.”
“What was she eating?”
Astolpho borrowed details from other visions. “Bread and squash and carrots and turkey, and she drank a whole jug of milk.”
Rayda grinned. “Did she really? Just for breakfast?”
“You should eat, too, so you can grow as strong as she is. Go tell the cooks what you want. They’ll be so happy to see you out of bed they’ll feed you anything you want.”
“Promise you’ll tell me more later?”
“I promise.”
Rayda smiled. She covered her mouth to cough. Then she strolled down the corridor toward the dining chamber, strumming her fingertips along the wall as she went.
What would Rayda think of the stories now? Astolpho wondered. He would have to be careful how much he told her, now that Manat was beginning Bradamante’s training.
The little girl’s heart might not survive the excitement.
That night, Bradamante smoothed her hand down the sleeve of her gray woolen robe. Manat sat in front of the fire, sipping from her mug.
This is real, Bradamante assured herself.All of it is real.
Once again Manat seemed to read her thoughts. “Did you doubt that?”
“No …” A guilty smile escaped. “Well, just for a moment. Naldo kept saying it was a dream.”
“Was your brother here last night to see what you saw? Or to feel what you felt?”
“No.”
“Then perhaps that should be your first lesson. A warrior must learn to trust herself before trusting anyone else. Your instincts will reveal to you much more than another man’s opinion.”
“He wasn’t trying to... he just wants to make sure I’m careful.”
“Are you careful?”
“Yes.”
“Then we don’t need to talk about this anymore. Come. We have work to do.”
Before crossing the threshold of the white house this time, Bradamante paused. If I go slowly.... She tried to capture and hold that moment when her long gray robe transformed into brown tunic and pants, when her socks disappeared and left her barefoot on the porch, but it happened too quickly. She stepped onto the warm white sand and stretched her toes wide. A moist breeze lilted toward her from the ocean. Bradamante followed Manat down the beach, once more feeling that lightness of heart the place had brought her the night before.
“You have so much to learn,” Manat said, “but first you have to understand what is possible here. Close your eyes. Relax. Feel the wind against your face.”
Smiling, Bradamante closed her eyes and tipped her face to the sun. It was so bright and warm here, so quiet and restful, and the breeze felt so soft against her cheeks—
Bradamante’s head snapped to the side.
Her knees buckled, her arms flailed. She pitched to the ground so suddenly she didn’t have time to brace with her hands. She landed hard on her face.
Bradamante spat sand from her mouth and stared up in bewilderment. Manat loomed over her, fist still balled.
Bradamante rolled to her side and leapt to her feet. She held her hands in front of her, ready to ward off another attack.
“You … you hit me!”
“I did,” Manat answered calmly. “Does it hurt?”
5
“What?! Of course it hurts—you hit me!”
She glared at Manat, anger and disappointment bubbling in her chest. Why had she trusted her? Manat was no different from her mother—worse, in fact, since she’d tricked Bradamante into closing her eyes. “Why did you do that?”
“Clear your mind, Bradamante. Don’t let your feelings rule your thoughts. Just tell me, does it hurt?”
The question was so peculiar, Bradamante had to ponder before answering. Cautiously she raised her hand to her cheek. No, she realized with astonishment, it doesn’t hurt at all. She tried to recall everything she had felt: a brief, sharp sting; the weight of Manat’s fist against her cheek; her uncontrollable spin and fall into the sand.
“Does it?”
Slowly Bradamante shook her head.
“Good,” Manat said. “Come here.”
“No.”
“You have to trust me,” said Manat. “I’m trying to help you.”
“Trust you? You hit me! When my eyes were closed! How could you do that?”
“I did it to show you what’s possible. If we’re going to train here as hard as we must, you have to understand that you won’t be hurt. Nor will I. You have to be willing to fight as hard as you can, without fear.”
“You could have told me that.”
“No, I had to show you.”
“No,” Bradamante said. “You tricked me.”
Manat stepped forward casually, ignoring Bradamante’s upraised hands. “Try this,” Manat said. “Keep your eyes on my hands.”
Bradamante allowed her to come closer. Manat extended her hand and pinched the skin beneath Bradamante’s arm.
“Ow.”
“You see, then. That’s why I asked you to close your eyes.”
“I don’t understand.”
“You felt that?”
“Yes.”
“Because you expected to feel it,” Manat said. “If you’d seen me raise my fist and hit you, you would have expected that pain as well.”
“Of course I would have.”
Manat calmly smiled. “Let go of your anger, Bradamante. You’ll understand as soon as you clear your mind.”
Reluctantly, Bradamante breathed deeply. Clear my mind... forget what you did...
