this, he was handsome as a wild hawk, with straight black hair and white skin. His hand grasped, not quite cruelly, the shoulder of the boy, who gazed at them in horror. The man’s lips flattened in contempt. “How dare you use my son to attack me, Witch!” He lifted his hand, and lightnings danced around it. “Your son, Kaerothlyndaron?” Gerda asked, using his full name, pronouncing each liquid syllable carefully. It was the name she had teased from him as he lay, half-asleep, by her side one summer’s day. She pushed her hood back. The lightnings died down and he lowered his hand. After a pause, he said, ‘You’re a Witch. Witches have no time for children.’ Tears of anger and pain, held back for the seven long years of searching welled up. “I wanted you,” she said. “And I wanted to be with you. I loved the child then because he was part of you. I could have stopped his growth within me, but I did not.” It was true women shaman rarely had children, for in her land shamans were rare and much needed, and the strain on their bodies was great. But she had loved Kae, with the wounded heart he had shown only to her and the father he both adored and feared. She had feared the old sorcerer too, not for herself—an ice sorcerer could not really harm a summer witch—but for his hold over his son. In her arrogance, she had thought her love would free Kae. She had thought that when the sorcerer left the Summer Fair, Kae would stay behind with her. The birth was hard and long but, somewhat to her surprise, she survived. The baby was placed on her breast, and when his sapphire eyes looked into hers, she fell in love with him. She kissed his ears and whispered his name to him. Exhausted, she fell asleep, but when she woke, the baby was gone from the birthing tent. The women who brought her the traditional reindeer milk given new mothers told her Kae
48 Timeless Tales 7