Come What May

They come to the village at sunset, the bard and her companion. The bard is a white-haired woman with a warm voice, Tecima; she's broad-shouldered, strong, ready to laugh, and it's obvious that she wields her guitar as easily as the long knife on her belt. She offers to sing and to share news for supper, and the village immediately agrees. They're a bit away from the traditional trading pathways, and both news and songs are always hard to come by.

Maryam's father is in charge of the food stores and festivities, and Maryam always lurks when somebody new arrives. She likes Tecima immediately, because the woman looks unlike anyone she's seen in the village. She's wearing wide skirts and a vest patched and re-patched with so many different squares of cloth that she looks like a rainbow, her wide-brimmed hat is hung with glinting silver medallions, and her staff is polished by her palms to near-mirror sheen. She looks like she belongs on the road, and like the road can never scare her.

When Tecima leans toward her father and asks if there's a place to rest and freshen up before the evening meal, her companion takes off the hood of her cloak, and Maryam barely remembers to stifle her gasp so she's not discovered and sent away to the other children. She had almost forgotten about the other woman because of how silent she had been, standing motionless next to Tecima, not saying a word in the exchange. She has a close-cropped head of salt-and-pepper hair, and a steely face with a slightly beaked nose. But Maryam can't see her eyes, because they are wrapped in a soft black band of cloth. And the emblem for Tele is embroidered on the cloak, black-on-black, in careful silk.

Maryam's father does a double take. "Madame..."

"It's okay," Tecima says, cheerfully, and picks up her staff. "Don't talk to her unless you want to Talk to her, you know? And if you or anybody else wants to Talk to her, they can. We'll stay until the last request. For any of you, or for the entire village."

"It's an honor," Maryam's father says. "But..."

"Takes some working up to, doesn't it? Take your time. For now you have me, and I promise this kind place an evening none will soon forget. And now - a bath?"

"Let me show you."

He leads them upstairs, to the guest rooms, and the Tele woman walks steadily and surely - but she keeps a careful hand on Tecima's elbow. Rumor has it they blind themselves when they earn their sign, by the end of their training, to swear to the world they're keeping the secrets told to them, and Maryam shivers thinking about it. But perhaps it's just a rumor. Perhaps under this band of black cloth she just has ordinary eyes.

There has never been a Tele in their village, from its foundation. Everybody knows the rumors... but everybody also knows that they will not even speak unless somebody requests an audience with them, and then they will speak and listen... and things will change. Maryam wonders if anybody will dare.

***

In the evening Tecima, dressed in a slightly different assortment of patched and bright colors, sits down by the hearth, puts her battered hat in front of her, crown down, and cradles a battered wooden guitar. The other woman settles in the shadows to her side, her blindfolded face turned towards Tecima like a drooping flower, and there's a little ring of space around her. People fill the tavern, pack it to the rafters, jostle for room. For a while Maryam doesn't have to watch; she and her sister and Katya the serving girl are run off their feet serving beer, sausages, onion rings, and fried bread. Her father is going to make a month's profit by the end of the night. She hopes he treats the bard fairly. It's bad luck to stint on your good fortune.

"Good evening, good people of Arre!" Tecima says cheerfully. "Thank you for your hospitality; settle in, open your ears, and enjoy your evening."

She starts with a simple, lilting tune that Maryam doesn't recognize, and sings about an island full of magical apples, an island in the mist; Maryam stops in the entrance to the kitchen and listens, until her sister cuffs her over the ear, gently, and she has to hurry again. But Tecima continues to sing - a travel song, a song about the moon and the fish and the church on the hill, a song about the lady in a green sleeved dress, a song about the lord's wife and her unhappy suitor, a song about -

A song about a sheep-herding girl who catches a leprechaun and makes a wish of him, and the wish... Maryam crouches in the corner of the tavern, free for now - everybody is listening quietly, caught in the spell Tecima's weaving, forgetting to drink from their cups or chew their food - and Maryam listens, wide-eyed, to how the sheep girl demands the leprechaun show her her true face. Her true name.

A boy's name. A boy's face. The last chords die in the air, and Tecima switches to a faster, cheerier, clapping melody, and Maryam can't find her feet or her hands. Her ears ring faintly. There's a sour, metallic taste in her mouth. And she feels - she feels -

She raises her eyes, and sees, across the tavern's smoky hall, the Tele woman. Her head is inclined towards Maryam; from beyond her blindfold she seems to be looking at Maryam, steadily and simply, and her lips are curved in a gentle, knowing smile.

Maryam shudders and turns away.

Tecima changes the tune to dancing songs after that, and soon has the entire tavern clapping and stomping their feet and dancing; she beats the rhythm on the body of her guitar, and she chats between the songs, telling them snippets of news from Miran and from Liage and from Parriete, and even from fairytale-like places like Niark and Tingan, probably lying half the time. Coins fall, clinking, into her hat, and the silver medallions chime, and all through the noise the Tele woman sits quietly, serenely, without moving a muscle. She stopped looking at Maryam, thank the sleeping ones, and if Maryam had to guess, she'd say that her unseeing gaze has shifted to her companion. She looks, of all things, fond.

Maryam doesn't think about any of that. She refills the tankards and collects dirty dishes, she pockets the tips, she runs back and forth and smiles and stomps her feet in time with the songs, and she doesn't think, doesn't think, doesn't think. She doesn't think about it as Tecima sets down her guitar and collects her sagging hat, she doesn't listen as Tecima chats with the surrounding patrons, she doesn't think as Tecima leads the Tele woman away, she doesn't think as everybody files out and she and her sister and Katya sweep and clean and scrub. She doesn't think as she undresses and goes to sleep on her pallet. She doesn't think for at least two hours in the dark, lying there and counting slowly to herself.

Then she climbs to her feet, pulls a shawl over her nightdress, and walks barefoot down the corridor. She knows the room her father put the women in; she helped prepare it. She walks there as if asleep, thinking of nothing, looking straight ahead, and when she reaches the door she knocks without hesitating.

The door opens on the third knock. Tecima stands in the doorway, blinking, clad in a rough linen nightshirt, and behind her shoulder Maryam sees the Tele woman sitting up in the bed, her hands bare and her eyes still hidden.

She walks towards her as if pulled, heedless of the indelicacy of what she's doing, and the older woman doesn't stop her. She bows to the Tele, deeply, and says, "I want to Talk."

"And I will listen, Maryam of Arre," the woman answers, immediately, "and keep your secrets."

Her voice is rusty, but the cadence of it makes Maryam feel - seen. Seen and heard, and known. And she's smiling.