Free Tale of Birle by Cynthia Voigt Page B

she could pick up the oars and steer them to one bank or the other, and it didn’t matter which; but she judged that for the time they were safest in midstream. She didn’t think it necessary to wake the Lord.
    The moist, white world around her made no sounds except for the gentle sweep of the river, nuzzling up against the boat as a kid nuzzles up against its mother for milk. As far as Birle’s senses told her, there was only the boat and its two passengers in the whole empty world.
    When the Lord stretched, his heels splashed into the water. His eyes opened in surprise and he was immediately awake. He pulled his legs in, sat up, and looked around. “Is it late?” he asked. “It feels late.” He rubbed at his face with his hands. “I guess you can sleep deeply even without a feather bed.”
    â€œAye you can, my Lord,” Birle agreed. If that were not so, only the Lords would get rest. “When the fog burns off, we’ll see where we are.”
    Wrapped around by fog they drifted on. After a time, he asked for his sack, and Birle passed it to him. He took out the map and spread it out over his knees. “How near are we to this port?” he asked.
    Birle had no idea. For a minute, looking at the map—at the line of river opening into the sea, at the emptiness once the sea began, and the unknown land falling away to the south—she felt a washing of fear go over her. It was a small thing, no more than a little wave washing on the river’s bank. She thought of her family at the Inn, and how they might worry, and she wished she could have sent them word, somehow, that she was well. The Lord’s stained cloak reminded her that those merchants might have taken word to the Inn; but there had been no chance to give them a message. It was odd, however, that the fog didn’t lighten.
    The Lord reached over the side of the boat to wash his face, splashing water over his eyes and cheeks and chin. His tongue licked at his lips. “Birle? Wash your face, as I have.”
    She wondered what marks were on her, but didn’t hesitate to do as she was told. There might well be dirt, and the blood, too, which would be an ugly sight. The water was cold, and she splashed it hastily over her face. It trickled cold down her neck and into her mouth. There was a salt taste to it, she thought, dipped her hand into the gray water again and tasting it on her tongue. She turned around to ask him.
    â€œWe must be near the sea,” he said.
    Birle looked at the map. If it was seawater they floated on, they must have passed the port in the night, and they might be drifting out now into the landless area. “Should we turn back?” she asked. “You don’t want to go out there—” Her finger hovered above the broad empty space.
    â€œCould we have passed the port in the night and never know?”
    â€œIf I could see the sun, I could know which way is south,” Birle said.
    â€œHow do you know I want to go south?”
    â€œAye, my Lord, that’s the only direction for you, if you would come at the end to a city.”
    â€œBut how do you know that the cities lie to the south?”
    â€œBecause north”—she pointed at the letter N with the arrow underneath it—“is that way.” Then she saw her error. Her hand drew back, as if it had touched fire, and she spoke quickly. “Or so I understood from the way the map looks. Because the Inn was here, you said it, and I know the Kingdom lies to the north of the Inn, and the river—everybody says—runs to the south and west.” If he knew she knew letters, and words, and how to read them, he would never trust her. “Or, is it that you don’t want to go to the cities of the south?”
    His bellflower eyes just stared at her, and he said nothing.
    â€œI thought—you were looking for a dragon,” she said, trying to make him smile.
    He folded the map up