Free The Corn King and the Spring Queen by Naomi Mitchison Page B

‘after he was dead; he left them. Look, Berris.’ Berris looked, and looked again, and frowned. He took them into his own hand and peered at them closely. ‘These are copies of my keys,’ he said. ‘I worked on them too long not to know.’ ‘And those?’ Berris shook his head, beginning to look horrified; these were the keys that locked up his precious metals and stones. There was only one use that could be made of a duplicate set. Tarrik jingled the others gently in his hand. ‘Copies of somebody else’s keys?’ he said. ‘Well, Berris?’ ‘Yes,’ said Berris, with a dry mouth, trying to speak ordinarily. ‘Yes, Tarrik, I see.’

Chapter Four
    S LOWLY AND JERKILY the ox-team was dragging back the great cart; every jolt went straight from axle to floorboards, and through the thick, black carpets, and shook ErifDer till her teeth rattled. She and the other women in the cart talked in whispers, and nursed their hands, scored across and across with arrow-heads for dead Nerrish. Wheat-ear was there, and Essro, and four or five older women, cousins or aunts, and the nurse, tired out with wailing round the grave. Erif Der herself was wondering whether her dead mother had yet started that journey, a little angry with her for having died just then, when her daughter might be needing her so badly. She frowned across at Wheat-ear, who was crying, more from excitement than anything else, then, finding it had no effect, pulled the little sister over to sit on her knee where she would not feel the jolting of the cart so much. By and bye Wheat-ear quieted down and began sucking her thumb, as she still did after any passion; unconsciously, Erif Der held her a little more closely, musing over children unborn. Once they came through a wood of ash trees, and the broad, dry leaves blew about, some falling into the cart; there were not many left on the trees now, for it was late autumn.
    The cart came to the town of Marob, jarring along the deep ruts from street to street, and so to Harn Der’s house, where the funeral feast was held. The men were there already; they had been drinking, and some had cut their cheeks as well as their hands. Her father was covered with a black blanket, only slit in two places for his eyes and mouth. Tarrik was there, with his high crown showing over every head; but no one spoke to him now unless they had to, and Erif Der noticed with an odd calm how much thinner he was getting every week. When he sat down at the table, the man on each side of him edged away, till there was a space both ways; he looked straight in front of him, white rather than flushed, pressing his thumbs into a piece of bread. After a time, Erif Der left her sister and came slowly over and sat down at her husband’s right hand; she heard his checked breathing deepen, and felt him stir a little on the bench beside her. One or two of the men stared at her; but she knew the Chief was not unlucky—only magicked; how should she be afraid of what she had done herself?
    Every one was hungry after their long ride or drive in from the burying in the plains; they ate without talking much at first—boiled mutton passed round hot andsteaming in the three-legged cauldrons, with garlic and beans and salsify, and stewed fish, and soft, sweetish strings of seaweed. Tarrik ate little, though; obscurely, that began to worry Erif Der, and she put bits from her own plate on to his. She could not eat either, but this was partly because she knew that soon her father was going to talk to her, urge her, put his will in place of her own. While she was still a child that had not mattered; but now she was a woman, four months married. She sat up very straight and lifted her head, heavy with the weight of the stiff cone and veil she wore. People were staring at her as well as at Tarrik.
    Suddenly it seemed to her that there was an unwarrantable amount of unhappiness in the room; not much for