The Crown of Dalemark by Diana Wynne Jones

Author:Diana Wynne Jones
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: HarperCollins

16

Mitt’s head snapped up. A tall golden man came walking along the lane toward him and bent his head in a solemn nod of greeting as Mitt looked. At this season Old Ammet had a face that was neither young nor old. He could have been the same age as Navis, except that the long golden hair blowing about his head and shoulders made him seem young.

“Now it’s you,” Mitt said. “Why do you Undying keep pushing me about?”

“It’s not our fault, Alhammitt,” Old Ammet answered. “The times are pushing us. And I should remind you that when you chose the wind’s road, you chose the green road, too.”

“I know, I know,” Mitt said. “Once I got on, there’s never been a moment I could have got off. But I keep having to choose all the same! And every time I choose and try to get right, things turn round on me and try to make me go the other way. The One told Noreth to kill me this morning—and Navis and Moril. You tell me what I’m supposed to do about that!”

Old Ammet looked at him gravely, in a way that reminded Mitt of Wend all of a sudden, except that Old Ammet was blowing and rustling in the wind. “I am not here to tell you what to do.”

“No,” Mitt said bitterly. “You Undying never do give a straight answer. You just push.”

“It is not my place,” said Ammet, “to question our Grand Father, whom they call the One. His law is that we do not tell his mortal family what to do. That is to make people into puppets.”

“Then the One just broke his own law,” Mitt said.

“I am here to tell you to think about that,” said Ammet.

There was a silence full of the warm wind and the rustling and streaming of Ammet’s white-blond hair, while Mitt digested this. “I don’t get it,” he said at last. He found Old Ammet looking so kind that it made him feel terrible.

“I should remind you that we gave you our names to say at need,” Old Ammet said.

Mitt nodded. He felt his face screw up. There were indeed four names, the greater and lesser names of Old Ammet and Libby Beer, tucked away in the corner of Mitt’s mind. That part of his head always felt like a sore tooth, where you kept putting your tongue even though you knew it would hurt. “You mean, I could say your biggest name at her?”

Ammet laughed. It felt as if the wind had turned to a warm gale. “That name is not to be used that lightly. It will be many a long year before you will need to say my Great Name. But you have three other names. I am here to tell you that if you use those names properly, the Shield of Oreth can be covered again with fields like these.”

His hand spread to show Mitt the surging barley and the stiff rustling wheat. Mitt looked wistfully, thinking of that farm he might have.

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