Iylaine says goodbye

Iylaine found Malcolm waiting for her beneath a torch-​lit arch in the court.

“Why didn’t you come in, Malcolm?” she asked.

“I don’t want to disturb the family.”

“You are family.”

“Your family. I already said goodbye to everyone here. I wanted to say goodbye to you.”

“But you already did say goodbye to me,” she said. Her thin, girlish voice was a little like a whine, a little like a sigh.

“That was different. Everyone was there. Now, I should like to say goodbye to you again, and give you some advice.”

Iylaine wrinkled her nose. “Some advice?”

“Do you want to go sit in our spot? It should be dry enough.”

She shrugged and followed him out to the grassy, forgotten corner of the inner bailey where they liked to sit when Iylaine was forbidden to leave the castle. They left the torchlight far behind.

She giggled and said, “It’s funny, in the dark,” but she was startled by the the shrillness of her own voice in the hush of night. In the dark, their familiar corner was like a foreign land, and her senses were sharpened by the hint of danger.

“What is your advice?” she whispered after they had seated themselves on the dewy grass. Somehow Malcolm’s presumption did not seem so presumptuous on this side of the court.

“Well, Baby,” he said, “let me make certain I remember it all. First, I want you to make sure you get outside this summer and get some air and sun. You make Bertie and Dunstan take you, and I told Lord Hingwar he should take you himself if your Da doesn’t think Bertie and Dunstan are enough.”

“I don’t want to go with him.”

“Bertie would come with you, then. But you must get out, Babe. No moping while I am away!”

Iylaine sighed, a little mopey already. “I know.”

“I talked to Bertie-​boy today and told him to keep an eye on you. You stick with him, and don’t let anyone else come nosing in while I’m away and your Da is away. You never know whom you can trust.”

“I know.”

“And so… you know, Baby, perhaps we won’t see one another again, and so I want to tell you some things before I go.”

Iylaine leaned over to smack his knee. It seemed closer than usual in the dark.

“Don’t say that!” she scolded. “Anyway, you’re only going raiding, not to war. And you’re not going into battle to get killed. You’re only a squire.”

“But what if I am captured?”

“Captured?” She hadn’t thought of that possibility. “What will they do to you if you’re captured?”

“I don’t know. Put me in prison and hold me for ransom. Or send me away to be a slave, like Lord Hingwar.”

“Oh, Malcolm!” she whimpered. “My Da too?”

“I suppose so, if they capture him.”

“But you will try to escape, won’t you?”

“Of course I will! And succeed, too. And I shall come back here. But it might take many years. So listen and stop sniveling.”

“I’m listening.”

And I’m not sniveling, she wanted to add, but on the eve of his first foray into armed conflict she was too in awe of him to say it.

“Good girl. So, I wanted to tell you that I like you best of all the girls, except my mother, and even more than my sisters because I hardly see my sisters. And you are my cousin, even if you are an elf, no matter what anyone says. So, if anyone tells you that I like some other girl better, you know it’s a lie.”

He waited a moment, and she waited with him.

“So,” he continued, “I wanted to ask you something, too. All the men have a lock of hair from their wives or their sweethearts or someone. And I don’t have anyone but a girl-​cousin, but my father says that’s close enough. So would you give me a lock of your hair to take with me?”

Iylaine scowled hard enough for it to be seen in the dark.

“You don’t want?” he asked, startled by her reaction. “I won’t show anyone.”

“My Da used to carry my hair with him,” she said. “But now I’m certain he carries hers!”

“Ach! Well, I shall carry yours now, if you like.”

“Aye! You shall carry it!” Her voice was low and fierce. “And I don’t care whom you show! You may show anyone! Especially him!”

“Oh, well…”

She sat up on her knees and took a thick shock of hair in her hand. “Cut it!”

He laughed uneasily. “Now, Baby! I shall only take a little tuft. I don’t want to leave you looking cockeyed.”

She took him by his shoulders and pulled him up to kneel before her. “Cut it!”

“I’m cutting, I’m cutting…” He pulled out his knife.

She lifted her face to him, and her eyes were wild. He hesitated.

“Cut it!” she said in a savage whisper.

“All right. I shall only take a little bit from underneath.”

She laid a hand on his shoulder and turned her face away, and he coaxed out a thin lock of hair from behind her ear. “Here?” he asked.

“Cut it!”

He cut. They both sat silent for a moment and stared at the wisp of hair that dangled from his fingers, twisting and swaying on the currents of night air. It seemed as alien to her as if it had never belonged to her. Now it belonged to him.

She laughed suddenly, and her laugh was wild. A spark of it leapt across the space between them, and he began to laugh with her. For a moment they shared the same wild laugh. They shared the same breath, hot on their faces. Then she turned her head.

“My Da!” she whispered.

“What?”

A moment later came his call, loud enough to be heard even by Malcolm’s ears. Iylaine scrambled to her feet.

“Wait—Baby!” Malcolm had the knife in one hand, the lock of hair in the other, and was clumsy as he tried to rise.

She turned back to him and hesitated. “He told me not to stay outside,” she whispered. “But I didn’t want to go in!”

“You should have told me,” Malcolm grumbled as he put his knife away. “I don’t want to get you in trouble with your Da.”

“I didn’t want to go in! I didn’t want to! Not for him!”

Malcolm sighed.

She threw her arms around his neck, and he stiffened. “Goodbye, Malcolm!” she whispered.

He still held the hair in one hand, but he laid the other against her back.

“I shall pray for you every night!” she promised, and her voice was high and thin again. “I shan’t forget!”

“And I for you.”

Her father called again. Next he would be coming.

“Goodbye!” she said with a little, frightened laugh. This was their Goodbye. She released him and ran up the hill, faster than any other girl could run.

Malcolm spoke softly as she ran. “Goodbye, Baby,” he said. “I know you can hear me. Be good, and don’t mope. And don’t forget me. Do you hear?”

She stopped at the edge of the paved court and turned back to wave at him. To her, he was a shadow lost in shadows. To him, she was a silhouette in the torch-​lit arch, waiting.