Deverry - A Time Of War Part 8

'Bain't Rhodry a lord, then?'

'What did you say, lad?'

'Bain't Rhodry a lord?'

After a moment the old man laughed, and hard.

'Not half, lad, not half. A stinking mercenary and naught more, fighting for coin, not honour like a decent man. Little better than thieves, all of that lot, Got into trouble young, they did, or they wouldn't be riding the long road at all, would they now?' There was the sound of him spitting onto the floor. The gall, a silver dagger giving me orders.'

Muttering under his breath, the fellow stumped away, and this time he never returned. Jahdo poured Meer a cup of water- it was indeed clean, even cool - and helped him drink.

'I can break this bread up with my fingers,' he said. 'You know what I really hate, Meer? They did take my grandfather's knife, and it were the only thing of his I ever did have that were just mine.'

Meer moaned as he pa.s.sed the cup back.

'If only I'd never brought you on this fool's errand!'

'It's what the G.o.ds did decide for us. I guess.' Jahdo heard his voice break as he wished from the bottom of his heart that he'd never come, either. 'You couldn't know Thavrae was going to be killed.'

He swal-f lowed hard, concentrating on pouring himself water. 'Oh. You know f, what? I do have somewhat to give you, and I never did remember it till this moment.' He gulped the water, set the cup down, and began fishing in his pocket. 'Here they are. It's the stuff Thavrae wore, the amulets and things.

I did cut them off for you.'

When Jahdo laid them in Meer's palm, the bard tightened his fingers over them for a moment, then muttered a curse and flung them hard against the wall.

'I have done what our mother asked. I will do no more. If it weren't for him and his foul demons, his false G.o.ds, his blasphemy and his heresy, then our clan would still have the hope of life, and neither you nor I would be caged here in this loathsome dungeon. Is it not one of the seven worst things in all of life, to fall into the hands of one's enemies?'

Jahdo tried to find some comforting thing to say and failed. He broke the bread up into chunks and gave Meer a big one, but the bard handed it back.

'Eat it all, lad, the whole loaf. You are young, and you have hope. Many a faithful slave's been rewarded with freedom.' 'But bain't you hungry?' Meer shook his head no.

'Meer, you must be - oh Meer, don't. Don't starve yourself to death. You mayn't, you mayn't! You're all I've got, Meer. Please eat some of this bread. Please.'

Meer folded his arms over his chest and turned his head away. No matter how Jahdo begged and wept, he spoke not one word. In the end Jahdo gave up. His own stomach was growling from the scent of food. He wiped his face as best he could on his filthy sleeve and began to eat. Meer must have heard, because he allowed himself a brief smile.

Jahdo finished one chunk and started on another. He was wondering if they'd be fed more later in the day, or if he should be saving half the loaf, when he heard a slight sound without the door, or so he thought until he looked up to find someone inside the cell with them. In the dim light she seemed to glow, a beautiful woman, tall and slender with long ash-blonde hair that cascaded down her back, deep-set eyes the colour of storm clouds but slit vertically like a cat's, and the strangely long and curled ears he'd seen on the G.o.d by the stream. She was dressed in clothes of silvery grey, a full shirt, belted at the waist, a pair of doeskin trousers, and boots of the same.

'Evandar wouldn't come himself, but I can't bear to leave you this way, child. Fear not: things aren't as dark as they must seem. I promise you that.'

She seemed to swirl like a trail of smoke above a campfire; then she was gone.

'What was that voice?' Meer snapped. 'Who was that?'

'It were a G.o.ddess.' Jahdo had never been so sure of anything in his life. 'A G.o.ddess did come to us, Meer. It's needful for you to eat now, bain't it? She came and did say that all be well.'

When Jahdo handed him the bread, he began to eat, slowly, savouring each bite in something like awe, while Jahdo poured himself more water and drank it the same way.

After he made his final threats to the jailor, the man who preferred to be known only as Rhodry from Aberwyn stood in the ward for a moment, considering how badly he wanted a bath and some clean clothes after a fortnight in the saddle. He knew, however, that he'd best make his report to those who'd sent him on this hunt. He headed across the ward to the broch complex, aiming for one of the smaller towers that were joined to the flanks of the main broch. Although he was planning on slipping in quietly, he found waiting for him a man he couldn't ignore. A tall, hard-muscled fellow with moonlight-pale blond hair and grey eyes, Lord Matyc of Dun Mawrvelin was leaning against the door with his arms crossed over his chest. Since he had no choice, Rhodry made him a bow.

'Good morrow, my lord. Somewhat I can do for you?'

'Just a word, silver dagger. Those two prisoners you just brought in? By whose order did you take them?'

'The gwerbret's himself, my lord. He sent me and Yraen out with a few of his own men.'

'I see.'

His lordship peeled himself off the door and walked away without so much as a fare thee well. And since it was the gwerbret, Rhodry thought, there's not one wretched thing you can do about it, is there?

He would have disliked so arrogant a man as Matyc on principle alone, but recently an incident or two had left Rhodry wondering just how loyal the lord was to his overlord, Gwerbret Cadmar of Cengarn.

What interested him about this latest brush with his lordship was not that Matyc had asked him a question - simple curiosity would have explained that - but the lack of further questions, such as a wondering about who Meer might be or how he'd been found, the normal sort of things you'd expect a man to ask.

Rhodry watched Matyc until the lord had gone into the main broch, then went on his own way.

Right inside the door of the side tower a wrought iron staircase led up every bit as steeply as the dwarven stairs, spiralling round and past all four floors of the small and wedge-shaped chambers belonging to various of the gwerbret's honoured servitors. On the fifth and final floor was an open area for storing sacks of charcoal to one side and one last chamber to the other Rhodry stood for a moment catching his breath, then knocked. A woman's voice called for him to enter. He hesitated ever so slightly before he opened the door and strode in.

Dressed in pale grey brigga and a heavily embroidered white shirt, Jill was sitting on a curved, three-legged chair with a large leather-bound book on the table in front of her. Her hair, cropped off like a lad's, was perfectly white, and her face was thin, too thin, really, so that her blue eyes seemed enormous, dominating her face the way a child's do. Overall, in fact, she was shockingly thin, and quite pale, yet she hardly seemed weak, her eyes snapping with life when she smiled, her voice strong and vibrant as well.

'Well?' she said. 'Success?'

'Just that. We followed your directions and found them just about where you said they'd be, one human lad, one Ge! da'Thae. I've stowed them in the dungeon keep.'

Jill made a face.

'Oddly enough, they're safer there than anywhere,' Rhodry went on. 'Keeling in the town's running high.

A lot of townsfolk lost kin to those raiders, and the word's gone round that their leader was a hairy creature straight out of the third h.e.l.l. How are they going to feel about having another of the same lot right within reach? Here, an odd thing. That Gel da'Thae I killed was this bard's brother.'

'Odd, indeed. How do you know the prisoner's a bard?'

'His servant told me. And here's the oddest thing of all. They speak the same tongue as Deverry men do. I've never been so surprised in my life, Jill. The lad just spoke right up, and I could understand him.

Not easily at first, mind. His way of speaking's a fair bit different, all flat and watery, like, and he uses a lot of words that I'd say were very old. The kind of thing you find in my esteemed ancestor's books - words that haven't been spoken round here in two hundred years.'

'No doubt they haven't, and no doubt he was as surprised as you were. If I'm guessing a-right, his forefathers were escaped bondsmen. The bondfolk came from many different tribes, you see, before our ancestors conquered the lot. And each of those, or so the lore runs, had its own language, a hundred of them all told, or so the priests say.' She tapped the book before her with reed-slender fingers. The only tongue that they all had in common was the language of their old masters, and they were forced to use it to survive.'

'I'll wager it griped their souls. It would have mine.'

'No doubt.' She smiled briefly, then glanced at the book. 'It must be a strange place, the Rhiddaer. I haven't been able to learn much about it, which is why this pair of prisoners is so important. But there's no high king, and no lords nor gwerbrets, either, to keep order or form alliances - not that I can truly blame the people for wanting to leave all that behind forever. The high king's justice never did apply to them, did it? But as for the lad and the bard, I hate to do this, but I'd say leave them where they are for a while, at least, until they're scared enough to consider talking to me and the townsfolk find somewhat else to gossip about.'

'Done, then.'

'Tell me, was your ride quiet enough?'

'It was. No signs of trouble, no sign of more of those raiders, but we might have ridden right past them, and they past us, with no one being the wiser. It's wild country out that way.'

'It's wild country all round here. That's the problem with Cengarn, isn't it? Ye G.o.ds, we're isolated! Tell me somewhat, Rhoddo. How many men do you think Cadmar could field, if things came to some sort of war?'

'Not all that many. Let me think. Matyc's his only va.s.sal to the north, and then Gwinardd is his richest va.s.sal, which should tell you somewhat about this place, when you look at the kind of gear his men have.

There's a lot of small lords round here, with say, five, ten men sworn to them. But anyway, our gwerbret has alliances further east, of course, but Arcodd province isn't exactly a rich and settled place itself. Say five hundred men easily, another five hundred if all his nearby allies sent their treaty-bond due. And of course, the common-born are all free farmers, out this way. They'll fight for their own, and they could field what? Say another thousand men, half-armed and half-trained, but brave and determined.'

'And if the entire province were threatened, the High King would march, wouldn't he?'

'Of course, but it would take months to mobilize and get an army out here.' All at once the implications of all these questions sank in. 'Jill! What are you saying? Do you really think we're in that kind of danger?'

'I don't know. I hope not. But all my life I've expected the worst and planned for it, and you know what? I've never been disappointed yet.'

Rhodry tried to laugh, then gave it up as a bad job.

'I honestly don't think we've seen the last of this trouble,,' Jill went on. 'But how big the danger is?

Well, I have no idea. As soon as I find out anything, I'll tell you and the gwerbret both.'

'Fair enough, and speaking of his grace, I'd best find him and tell him I've brought his men back.'

'Just so. And give him my thanks, will you?' She turned another page in the book. 'I'll come down the great hall in a bit.'

The great hall of Gwerbret Cadmar occupied the entire ground floor of the main broch. On one side, by a back door, stood enough trestle tables and backless benches for a warband of well over a hundred men; at the hearth, near the table of honour itself, furnished with actual chairs were five tables more for guests and servitors. On the floor lay a carpet of fresh braided rushes. The walls and the enormous hearth were made of a pale tan stone, all beautifully worked and carved, while huge panels of interlacement edged the windows and were set into the walls alternately with roundels of spirals and fantastic animals.

An entire stone dragon embraced the honour hearth, its head resting on its paws, which were planted on the floor, its winged back forming the mantel, and its long tail curling down the other side. Even the riders' hearth on the far side of the hall was heavily decorated with interlacing and dragons' heads, When Rhodry walked in, he found the hall mostly empty, except for a couple of servant la.s.ses over by the warband's hearth, and a page, polishing tankards up at the table of honour. When Rhodry hailed the page, the boy ignored him.

'You, Allonry! I know your father's a great lord, but you're here to run errands for anyone who asks.'

Scowling, the lad slouched over, a willowy lad of about ten summers, red-haired and freckled.

'Where's his grace?' Rhodry said.

'Out in the stables with the equerry.'

'Will lie be there long?' - 'I wouldn't know. Go ask him yourself, silver dagger.'

Rhodry restrained himself with difficulty from slapping the boy across the face. Although he himself had served as a page in a gwer-bret's dun, he couldn't remember having been this arrogant. He'd been terrified, mostly, of making a wrong step and disgracing himself, but young Allonry seemed to have no such worries.

'I will, then,' Rhodry said. 'But I wouldn't strut like this around Lord Matyc and his ilk, if I were you.'

The boy ducked his head and looked away. Rhodry turned to go, but the gwerbret himself made the point moot by coming in, trailed by the equerry and the chamberlain. Even though he limped badly on a twisted right leg, Gwerbret Cadmar was an imposing man, standing well over six feet tall, broad in the shoulders, broad in the hands. His slate-grey hair and moustaches bristled; his face was weather-beaten and dark; his eyes gleamed a startling blue under heavy brows. As he made his way over to the table of honour, the page bowed, and Rhodry knelt.

'Get up, silver dagger, no need to stand on ceremony.' The gwerbret favoured him with a brief smile.

'You're back, are you? I've heard that you brought prisoners. I take it Jill was right, then, and there were spies prowling round my borders.'

'Well, Your Grace, we found a couple of prowlers, sure enough, but I doubt me if they're truly spies.

One's but a lad, you see, and the other's blind.'

The equerry and chamberlain exchanged startled looks, and Cadmar himself grunted in surprise.

'Cursed strange, then. Why were they riding in my lands?'

'I have no idea, Your Grace. I do know that Jill has great hopes of getting information out of them.'

'No doubt she'd like me to leave the matter in her hands?'

'If his grace agrees, of course.'

'Well, most likely I will.' The gwerbret turned to the page. 'Alli, run up to Jill's chambers and ask her, and politely, mind, but ask her to come down for a word with me.'

Although the boy bowed and ran off fast, he was obviously smarting at the vertical hike ahead of him.

Cadmar glanced at the chamberlain.

'Think he'll learn courtesy one of these fine days?'

'I can only hope so, Your Grace,' the old man sighed. 'I'm doing my best to teach the wretched little snot.'

Cadmar laughed, then remembered Rhodry and turned to him with a quick wave of one hand.

'You may go, silver dagger. No need for you to be standing round here.'

'My thanks, Your Grace.'

Rhodry went out to the barracks, those structures built into the walls that had so puzzled Jahdo, and drew himself water at the stable well for a cold bath. Once he was shaved and reasonably clean, he went back to the great hall to keep an eye on things. He got himself some ale, dipping his own tankard to avoid giving a servant la.s.s the chance to snub him, then found himself a seat at a table on the far side of the hall, where he could watch the n.o.ble-born from a proper distance. A few at a time, the honour-bound men in the various warbands quartered at the dun came drifting in, chivvying the la.s.ses and settling down at one table or another to wait for the evening meal. Unlike the servants and the n.o.ble-born, most of the men had a friendly greeting for Rhodry or a jest to share. They'd seen him fight, after all, and judged his worth on that.

The hall filled up fast. For the war against the raiding party captained by Meer's brother, Cadmar had called in two of his closest va.s.sals, Lord Matyc and Lord Gwinardd, and as their oaths of realty demanded, they'd brought twenty-five men apiece with them to add to Cadmar's oath-sworn riders.

One of the latter, a young brown-haired lad named Draudd, sat himself down beside Rhodry.

'Where's Yraen?'

'Don't know, but he'd better be cleaning himself up,' Rhodry said. 'I thought he'd be in by now. Why?'

'Just asking, wondering if he's up for a game of carnoic or suchlike.' Draudd yawned profoundly. 'He plays cursed well. Here, Rhodry, some of the men have a wager on, like, that Yraen's n.o.ble-born.'

'Do they now? I hope they don't go asking him outright and hope to live to collect it. Prying into a silver dagger's past is bad for a man's health.'

Draudd snorted into his ale.

'I'm not having a jest on you,' Rhodry spoke quietly, levelly. Tell them to lay off.'

Draudd looked up sharply, his good cheer gone.

'And another thing,' Rhodry went on. 'Am I included in this little game?'

Draudd turned beet-red in silent confession. Rhodry grabbed him by a twist of shirt that nearly choked him and hauled him face to face.

'Lay it off, lad. Do you understand me?' He let Draudd go with a thrust of his wrist that sent the lad reeling, 'Do you?'