XVII
Our man in the middle of things will now be a man called Yorlayvo, who was Karvalo’s choicest friend and closest companion. His parents were southerners from Sleydesya. His father, Alsyeo, was a warrior beholden to a powerful earl, and his mother, Yoldea, was one of the earl’s household attendants. It happened that Yoldea became pregnant during a time of terrible strife in that land, and Alsyeo was slain before Yorlayvo was born. Yoldea survived that and fled from her homeland, fearing for her life, and that of her unborn son.
Yorlayvo was born at a town called Wango while his mother was travelling northwards through Gonnalonn, and she named him Ayolo. She then continued travelling destitute, and she eventually came to Syorbak in Arlonn, when Ayolo was nearly two years old. There she met a woman called Aydha, who was the daughter of Thambrano Hammer and a thane beholden to Thyomalo, Lord of Pearmol. Aydha had come to Syorbak in Thyomalo’s company for the lawmoot that year, and on the evening of their arrival, she chanced upon Yoldea trudging through the lesser roads, Ayolo coughing in her arms. At once, pity beset her. She offered Yoldea every kindness, but Yoldea accepted only her coat and hat. Aydha said this was the very least she could give.
‘If your heart should change,’ she said, ‘seek me out in the king’s yard.’
‘They would not let such a grotty woman as me past even the outer gate,’ said Yoldea.
‘No matter! Say you seek Thambrano’s daughter, Thyomalo’s friend, and the way will surely open.’
Then they parted.
On the following morning, Aydha awoke to find Yoldea standing quietly in her booth. She said she could not put Aydha’s generosity out of her mind, and that she wished to thank her properly. Aydha rose from her bench, placed a hand on Yoldea’s shoulder, and refused this.
‘There is no need to thank me,’ she said, ‘and least of all while I remain undressed. It would have been shameful indeed to be unmoved by your plight, for you have clearly suffered at the hands of blind-eyed fate.’
‘That is to say the least of it,’ said Yoldea.
Then Yoldea told Aydha her tale of woe. She spoke of the strifes that drove her from her homeland, and the weary way to Syorbak.
‘Such tales are too often told,’ said Aydha. ‘Come, let us ensure you need tell no more.’
Then the pair got to talking, and this went on for the better part of the day, and also the following three, until the lawmoot was done and Thyomalo was ready to leave for Pearmol. Aydha went to him and asked whether Yoldea could go with them.
‘I have not so much room on my boat,’ said Thyomalo.
‘Tell me this, then,’ said Aydha. ‘If I surrender my spot, and I walk with her to Pearmol, will you let her into your hall?’
It should be mentioned that Thyomalo was notorious for keeping a rather homelier hall than most, and his penchant for the unrefined was a matter much discussed among his peers.
‘I reckon so,’ he said, ‘but if she dishonours me, so do you, and it would pain me to be so wounded. Let it not come to pass, and we can be merry.’
‘Merrily!’
Then Thyomalo set sail, and Aydha walked home with Yoldea, Ayolo yet clutched in his mother’s arms. Upon their arrival, Yoldea petitioned Thyomalo herself. She told him she had been a woman of high status in her homeland, brought low only by misfortune beyond her control. Thyomalo asked her to walk to him with poise, and this she did.
‘You blink in the fashion of a foreigner,’ said Thyomalo, ‘but I am satisfied. Hear me, Yoldea my friend. My house is yours, and yours mine. Your work is mine, and mine yours.’
Yoldea bowed, thanked Thyomalo for his hospitality, and then she left the hall with Aydha at her side.
Yoldea and Aydha married one another a year or so later.
Ayolo was about the same age as Karvalo, and they were made into men at one another’s side. In their youth, Karvalo said Ayolo’s name was unbecoming and much too foreign, so he named him Yorlayvo instead.
‘Yes,’ said Karvalo, ‘that is rather more tasteful.’
Yorlayvo liked his new name, and he kept it. Only his mother called him Ayolo after that, and only in private. He and Karvalo ventured into adulthood with a lifelong love strung between them.
* * *
On the day Thalo came to Pearmol, Karvalo bade Yorlayvo speak with him, that they may know their new man better. Thalo had been put up in one of the large houses furthest from the hall, where he troubled himself with neither the names nor the friendship of his housemates. Yorlayvo came into the house in the afternoon while Thalo was stashing his things about his bench, seized him by his arms, and pulled him to his feet.
‘You,’ said Yorlayvo. ‘I suppose you are Thalo, the clamourer?’
‘I suppose I am,’ said Thalo.
‘Very good.’ Then Yorlayvo named himself. He said, ‘Would you care to go riding with me?’
Thalo said he was busy.
‘Then let me make myself clearer, Thalo man. I am going riding, and you are coming with me. If you refuse, you will be riding out of here all the same.’
Then Yorlayvo went outside, and Thalo went behind him.
Their route took them out of Pearmol, past the farms, and up into the moors. They ranged here and there around the heath for a while, Yorlayvo pointing out all the landmarks he knew and recounting what tales he knew of each, until they came back down to the cliffs. Yorlayvo got off his horse at a spot a little way north of Pearmol, not far from Lewvanvek, and there he stood stark on the clifftop, looking out to the sea.
‘They say you killed two trolls,’ he said, ‘and had their heads rolling about in the hall. Tell me about that.’
Thalo climbed down from his saddle and stood behind him. ‘Why?’
‘I would like to understand how you came to be here, and so loudly. It is my task, after all, to ensure my lord’s business proceeds unimpeded. If I am not convinced of your faithfulness, neither will be Karvalo, and your place in his hall will be forfeit.’
‘Do you not trust me?’
‘You have given me no reason to trust you.’ Yorlayvo turned to face Thalo, his gaze hard and penetrating. ‘I have never known someone who has met a troll, and yet you claim to have killed two. I can only suppose it was all some trick, some cunning ploy to worm your way into our house for foul purposes I would rather not let come to light.’
‘If all you seek is proof, I could have shown you their heads before we came all the way here.’
Yorlayvo scrunched up his nose and said, ‘That will not do. I have heard about magic men who use dubious arts to contort the dead. The proof I want is the tale you tell of it. I understand you have been very frugal with your words. No more. It is time to speak.’
Thalo was happy enough to boast of his feats. He told Yorlayvo he had been an aimless wanderer drifting about until he came to a village called Moyr, where a troll attacked.
‘I fought him,’ he said, ‘but to call it a fight would be poetic. One swing of my sword, and I had his head off. The locals all cheered my name and gave me treasure, for I was their saviour. The road then led me to Alvennawl, where the second troll attacked. He said they were brothers. I slew him there and then, my heart unwavering, and thereby claimed the second head. Yonnago gave me Yamveke for that. He told me about Pearmol, so I came here to make myself useful to your lord, and with two trolls’ heads to prove it so.’
As Thalo spoke, Yorlayvo nodded along in silence, until he said, ‘You were a vagrant? How did that come to be?’
Thalo did not want to say anything about that. He hesitated for a while, but Yorlayvo was nothing if not patient. Though his face remained hard, he wore a warm smile, and one that demanded honesty.
‘I was raised by my mother,’ said Thalo, ‘at Klagenn, in Eylavol, but I left after she died. I made the road my home after that.’
Yorlayvo said, ‘Why was that?’
Thalo hesitated again. He nearly spoke of the murder of Gaylodho, and of his exile, but even he knew better than to say such things under such scrutiny. ‘I made my mother a promise—one I could not keep at home.’
‘And one you might keep here?’
‘Maybe so.’
Yorlayvo said nothing more. He climbed upon his horse and rode back home, and Thalo rode on after him.
Upon his return to Pearmol, Yorlayvo made straight to the small fire room, where he found Karvalo sitting alone. He sat opposite him, and he told him Thalo’s account of the killing of the trolls, and that he believed it.
‘Or for the most part, at least.’
‘And what do you make of the man himself?’ said Karvalo.
‘He is odd, as northerners are, but I do not doubt his intentions. He means only to suckle at your glory, and to make it his own. He may be a handy fellow to have around, if only to have a friend called Thennelo. I expect it would make quite an impression among your peers, after all. And if it comes back to bite you, then let it bite me too.’
Karvalo hunched forward, looking into the fire for whatever guidance its spirits might offer, and then he said, ‘No. There is an unhappy feeling arising in my gut, as if my soundest foresight warns me of matters in which I want no stake. If I am to house this man about whom I know so little, I must be sure he speaks truly.’
To that end, Karvalo sent Yorlayvo to Alvennawl the next morning to ask about the killing of the troll. Yonnago came to meet him, but the moment he recognised him, Karvalo’s most beloved thug, his face hardened into a scowl. He asked Yorlayvo why he had come.
‘We have received a visitor at Pearmol,’ said Yorlayvo, ‘and he came with a fantastic tale. He named himself Thalo, Thalo Thennelo, and he says he came from here.’
To learn that Thalo had gone straight from Alvennawl to Pearmol was quite the disappointment, but Yonnago did not let it show. ‘What of him?’
‘Tell me what happened.’
‘I suppose you are asking about the troll? He killed it.’
‘Say more.’
‘What more is there to say? The beast came, and he killed it.’
‘What became of the body?’
‘We buried it over the river.’
‘Take me there. I want to see it.’
‘We buried it.’
‘You dug the grave, did you not? Dig it back up.’
Yonnago sighed, then took Yorlayvo down the hill and over the river. They had a pair of hefty lads dig down into the grave, and once they had dug far enough, they gently parted the earth until daylight touched Fowdho’s skin once more, skin which had dwelt for centuries in darkness. Yorlayvo peered into the grave and beheld the corpse, half submerged in the soil, and promptly turned away. But though they found the body, they found no heads where they had buried two.
‘Lads,’ said Yonnago, ‘can you see the heads?’
The diggers rifled through the dirt again, but they found no trace of them.
‘Thalo brought them with him,’ said Yorlayvo. ‘I did not see it myself, but I hear he threw them at Karvalo’s feet.’
Yonnago’s heart quivered once again, and again, his face held firm. He gave the slightest of nods, said, ‘There you have it, then,’ and walked back up to the house.
Yorlayvo came back shortly thereafter. He said he was satisfied, and that it was time for him to leave.
‘But first,’ he said, ‘you should know that Thalo also came to us bearing a certain shield, one with which you will be quite familiar.’
Yonnago’s stomach turned to stone.
‘Understand, Yonnago, Karvalo does not take kindly to thieves. What is dealt is dealt in kind. Scorn begets only scorn.’
Yonnago stepped up to Yorlayvo, his voice full of anger, but his eyes dim and drawn. ‘Are you threatening me?’
‘You are not Karvalo’s man to threaten, and I doubt he will take it up with the reeve.’
‘Then you can sod off already. I have shown you what you want to see. If you are not going to murder me, it is time to leave.’
So Yorlayvo took his leave with a bow. Once he was gone, Yonnago took himself to a quiet place, and there he cried alone, his husband’s only treasure twice yielded to undeserving hands.
Yorlayvo went to Karvalo as soon as he came back to Pearmol, and he told him what he had seen and heard at Alvennawl.
‘There is no doubt about it,’ he said. ‘Thalo killed a troll at Alvennawl.’
‘Very well,’ said Karvalo. ‘I will have him.’
So Thalo came to the hall to become a man Pearmol, Karvalo sitting in his chair upon the platform, with some other attendants standing by to listen in. Yorlayvo stood Thalo before the firepit, and he put himself beside it.
‘Make me an oath,’ said Karvalo. ‘Swear that you will be loyal to me, and that you will be a reliable member of my household. Swear that you will be bound to me as I will be to you, until either of us should die, or else I should relieve you of this obligation. Swear this before me, and you will thenceforth be a member of my retinue, entitled to all the worth and honour that entails.’
Thalo bowed his head. ‘I swear it.’
Yorlayvo went to Thalo and took out a wooden stick inscribed with a brief summation of the terms and conditions of the oath, not that Thalo could read it. He cut a notch into one end, then presented the stick to Thalo. Thalo notched the other end, kissed the middle, and put the stick into the fire.
‘So it is,’ said Karvalo. ‘You, Thalo, are my man of now, mine full and proper. Do not disappoint me.’
‘I will not,’ said Thalo, but only farsighted fate could determine whether it would be so.