Gifts Read Free

Stone House, I am in the hearth seat, in the muddy courtyard or the clean stables of Caspromant; I am in the kitchen garden with my mother picking beans, or with her by the hearth in the round tower room; I am out on the open hills with Gry; I am in the world of the never-ending stories.
    A great, thick staff of yew wood, crudely cut but polished black at the grip by long use, hung beside the door of the Stone House, in the dark entryway: Blind Caddard’s staff. It was not to be touched. It was much taller than I was when I first knew that. I used to go and touch it secretly for the thrill of it, because it was forbidden, because it was a mystery.
    I thought Brantor Caddard had been my fathers father, for that was as far back in history as my understanding went. I knew my grandfathers name had been Orrec. I was named for him. So, in my mind, my father had two fathers. I had no difficulty with that, but found it interesting.
    I was in the stables with my father, looking after the horses. He did not fully trust any of his people with his horses, and had begun training me to help him with them when I was three. I was up on a step stool currying the winter hair out of the roan mare’s coat. I asked my father, who was working on the big grey stallion in the next stall, “Why did you only name me for one of your fathers?”
    “I had only one to name you for,” my father said. “Like most respectable folk.” He did not often laugh, but I could see his dry smile.
    “Then who was Brantor Caddard?”—but then I had figured it out before he could answer—“He was your father’s father!”
    “My father’s father’s father’s father,” Canoc said, through the cloud of winter fur and dust and dried mud he was bringing up out of Greylag’s coat. I kept tugging and whacking and combing away at the mares flank, and was rewarded with rubbish in my eyes and nose and mouth, and a patch of bright white-and-red spring coat the size of my hand on Roanie’s flank, and a rumble of contentment from her. She was like a cat; if you petted her she leaned on you. I pushed her off as hard as I could and worked on, trying to enlarge the bright patch. There were too many fathers for me to keep straight.
    The one I had came around to the front of the mare’s stall, wiping his face, and stood there watching me. I worked away, showing off, pushing the currycomb now in strokes too long to do much good. But my father didn’t say anything about it. He said, “Caddard had the greatest gift of our lineage, or any other of the western hills. The greatest that was ever given us. What is the gift of our lineage, Orrec?”
    I stopped work, stepped down from the stool, carefully, because it was a long step down for me, and stood facing my father. When he said my name, I stood up, stood still, and faced him: so I had done as far back as I could remember.
    “Our gift is the undoing,” I said.
    He nodded. He was always gentle with me. I had no fear of harm from him. Obeying him was a difficult, intense pleasure. His satisfaction was my reward.
    “What does that mean?”
    I said as he had taught me to say: “It means the power to undo, unmake, destroy.”
    “Have you seen me use that power?”
    “I saw you make a bowl go all to pieces.”
    “Have you seen me use that power on a living thing?”
    “I saw you make a willow wand go all soft and black.”
    I hoped he would stop, but that was no longer where these questions stopped.
    “Have you seen me use that power on a living animal?”
    “I saw you make…a…make a rat die.”
    “How did it die?” His voice was quiet and relentless.
    It was in the winter. In the courtyard. A trapped rat. A young rat. It had got into a rain barrel and been unable to clamber out. Darre the sweeper saw it first. My father said, “Come here, Orrec,” and I came, and he said, “Be still and see this,” and I stood still and watched. I craned my neck so that I could see the rat swimming in the water that