Free A Blackbird In Darkness (Book 2) by Freda Warrington Page B

his farm?’
    ‘Yes,’ she answered flatly, ‘and the farm was not there. He ran this way, and I lost sight of him.’
    ‘Oh,’ Falin sighed in distress. ‘His family, they were all killed. Why didn’t he come to me? I know where he will have gone – we’d better go up and find him.’
    Medrian said nothing as she followed him between the cottages and along a path winding up a grassy slope. Falin was trembling as he walked, shattered by the arrival of Medrian and the news that Estarinel was here. It was only a few days since the farm had collapsed, undermined by the Serpent’s poison, killing Estarinel’s family – including his own beloved Arlena. Since then he had barely slept – dreading the moment when Estarinel would return and he would have to tell his friend the awful news. He dreaded facing his dearest friend’s grief. He knew he would be unable to bear it, after everything else.
    Even more he had feared that Estarinel would never return at all. Falin’s thoughts raced; he had never, ever expected him to come back so suddenly, and if he understood Medrian correctly, they would be going away again, a second parting in so much more pain and despair than the first.
    His thoughts then moved to Medrian, and he glanced sideways at her. He noticed how controlled she seemed, how icy and emotionless, as if nothing had happened, and she did not care if it had. Just who was she? Had he really entrusted his friend to this person who seemed as uncaring and treacherous as ice?
    These thoughts were becoming unbearable, so he broke the silence.
    ‘There’s a long barn – it was the wheelwright’s but he gave it over after the Serpent came, for use as a – well, a place of rest. We have lain all the dead there. I’m sure E’rinel will have gone up to see if his family–’ he fought the tightness of his throat.
    ‘And are they there?’ Medrian asked in the same matter-of-fact, chilly voice.
    ‘Yes.’
    They reached the low stone barn and entered. Each side of the long building was lined with wooden pallets where many of those slain by the Serpent had been placed. All were covered in cloths of pale green and had leaves and yellow flowers twined in their hair. There was nothing grim about the barn; the atmosphere was like the clear twilight of a spring evening, cool and peaceful.
    At the far end, Estarinel was kneeling by a pallet, grasping his mother’s hand. His face was whiter than any of the corpses and he looked too numb with shock to weep. Very slowly, Falin approached him, Medrian a little way behind.
    ‘E’rinel,’ Falin said softly. He flinched as his friend looked up. The terrible grief in his eyes was just as Falin had imagined it would be, time after time. Falin went to him and Estarinel stood up, and the two embraced each other without speaking.
    Medrian looked at the bodies of Estarinel’s family. She recognised Estarinel’s sister Arlena, a tall silver-fair girl who had also been at the House of Rede. Their mother was similar, though fair in a warmer, more golden way. Next to her lay a man who was obviously Estarinel’s father, he was so like his son and did not look much older. The younger sister, Lothwyn, also resembled her brother in her darker colouring. Her face was gentle and sweet.
    Strange how suddenly and infinitely more real Estarinel seemed to her amid his family, as if before he had been no more than a spectre whose path had happened to cross hers. How different her perception was without M’gulfn in her skull. It was both painful and wondrous to know that people mattered to each other, existed and suffered in a vital way that she had not understood before. It was as though she had known, abstractly – but only now did she feel the truth of it. She no longer felt detached.
    I must stay detached! she thought, turning her back on Estarinel and Falin so that they could not see her face.
    She recalled how his family must have died, crushed by the collapsing farmhouse. The others