The Bristling Wood

  “Good work! You’ve got the weasel Lord Madoc wanted, right enough.”

  “Talks like a simpleton, his lordship told me, and he must be one, too, to answer to his name like that.”

  Although the world still danced around him, Perryn forced himself to raise his head and look in time to see a guard rummaging through his saddlebags. With a bark of triumph, he held up the rambling scribe. When Perryn made a feeble grab at it, another guard slapped him across the face.

  “None of that, horse thief. The only thing this scribe’s going to write for you now is your death writ.”

  They disarmed him, bound his hands behind him, then pushed him along through the streets. Those few people still out at night stopped to stare and jeer when the guards announced that he was a horse thief. At one point they met a slender young man, wearing the plaid brigga of the noble-born, who was followed by a page with a torch.

  “A horse thief, is he?” the young lord said. “When will you be hanging him?”

  “Don’t know, my lord. We’ve got to have the trial first.”

  “True enough. Well, no doubt I’ll hear of it. My mistress is quite keen on hangings, you see.” He gave the guard a conspiratorial wink. “She finds them quite … well, shall we say exciting? And so I take her to every single one.”

  At last they reached the guard station at the foot of the royal hill and turned Perryn over to the men there, though the man who’d first recognized him stayed to escort him into the royal compound itself. By then Perryn had recovered enough from the blows to feel the terror: they were going to hang him. There was no use lying to the king’s officers; the rambling scribe would hang him on its own. Although at one point he did have a sentimental pang that he’d never see Jill again, at the root he was too terrified to care much about that one way or another. What counted was that he was going to die. No matter how hard he tried to pull himself together and face his death like a warrior, he kept trembling and sweating. When his guards noticed, they laughed.

  “You should have thought about this rope when you were putting one on another man’s horses, you cowardly little bastard.”

  “There must be a bit of fun to being hanged, lad. Why, a man gets hard, then spews all over himself when the noose jerks.”

  They kept up the jests the entire time that they were dragging him through the warren of sheds and outbuildings that surrounded the king’s many-towered broch complex. In the flickering torchlight Perryn was completely disoriented. By the time that they shoved him into a tiny cell in a long stone building, he had no idea of which way north lay, much less of the layout of the palace grounds.

  The cell was about eight feet on a side, with fairly clean straw on the floor and a leather bucket, swarming with flies, in one corner. In the door was a small barred opening that let in a bit of light from the corridor. Perryn stood next to it and tried to hear what the guards were saying, but they moved down along the corridor and out of earshot. He heard: “Of course Lord Madoc’s interested in horse thieves; he’s an equerry, isn’t he?” before they were gone. All at once his legs went weak. He slumped down into the straw before he fell and covered his face with his hands. Somehow or other, he’d offended one of the powerful royal servitors. He was doomed.

  Perryn had no idea of how long he’d sat there before the door opened. A guard handed him a trencher with half a loaf of bread and a couple of slices of cold meat on it.

  “Pity that we had to take your dagger away, lad.” His smile was not pleasant. “Just use your teeth like a wolf, eh? In the morning one of the undercouncillors will be along to see you.”

  “What for?”

  “To tell you about your rights, of course. Here, they caught you red-handed, but you’ll still get a trial, and you’ve got the right to have your kin by your side. Just tell the fellow, and he’ll get a herald to them.”

  “I don’t want them to know. Ah ye gods, I’d rather die slowly in pieces than look my uncle in the eye over this.”

  “Pity you didn’t think of that before, eh? Well, I’m sure it can all be arranged. If you don’t want your kin here, no need to waste the herald’s time.”

  The warder handed in a tankard of ale, then locked the door. Perryn heard him whistling as he walked away.

  Although the food and drink were unexpectedly decent, Perryn ate only to pass the time. The thought of Benoic and Nedd learning of his shame had taken his appetite away. Sooner or later they would, too, no matter whether they were there to watch him hang or not. He thought of the warder’s words, that he might have thought of all this before, and wept a few tears for the truth of it.

  “But I didn’t really steal them. They followed me, didn’t they?”

  “Only in a manner of speaking.”

  He yelped and leapt to his feet, scattering the bread into the straw. There was a man standing on the other side of the door, a pleasant-looking fellow with blond hair and blue eyes. The sheer bulk of the elaborate embroidery on his shirt proclaimed him a member of the king’s household.

  “I’m Lord Madoc. Guards, bring him out.”

  “Are you going to hang me right now?”

  “Naught of the sort. I want a few words with you, lad.”

  They bound his hands, then marched him along to the wardroom, a long, narrow chamber with an oppressively low ceiling. Down one wall was a row of sconces and lit torches; down the other, a narrow table spread with the tools of the torturer’s trade.

  “I’ll confess,” Perryn bleated. “You don’t have to do anything to me.”

  “Splendid, but I wasn’t planning on having you tortured. I want a look at you. Guards, tie him to the wall; then you can get back to your dinners.”

  “My thanks, Your Lordship.” The guard captain made him a bow. “Do you have any idea of when he’ll go to trial?”

  “Oh, he won’t be tried here. Our liege is remanding him to Rhys, Gwerbret Aberwyn. This little idiot raped the daughter of one of the gwerbret’s highly regarded subjects, and under Eldidd law her father has the right to cut him to pieces.”

  Perryn’s knees buckled. If he hadn’t been tied to an iron ring attached to the wall, he would have fallen.

  “Huh,” the captain snorted. “A fine figure of a noble lord he is, raping women and stealing horses!”

  Once the guards were gone, Madoc turned to Perryn and considered him with eyes so cold and distant that Perryn began to sweat again.

  “Do you know who Jill’s father is, lad?”

  “I don’t, my lord.”

  “Cullyn of Cerrmor, that’s who.”

  Perryn yelped, a strangled little sob.

  “Just so. They’ll give him a sword and shield, hand you a dagger to defend yourself, then turn him loose on you. Think you’ll win the ritual combat?”

  Perryn shook his head no.

  “I doubt me, as well. And even if you had all the gold in the world to offer as compensation, Cullyn wouldn’t take it instead of your blood. So, are you going to face him, or are you going to do as I say instead?”

  “Anything, my lord. I’ll do anything. Please, I never raped her, I truly didn’t. I thought she loved me, I truly did.”

  “I know, and your stupidity is the one thing that’s saving you now. If I untie you, will you give me your word of honor that you won’t try to escape?”

  “Gladly. I doubt me if I could run, my lord, the way I feel.”

  “No doubt.” He stepped back and considered him in a strange way, his eyes moving as if he were looking all around Perryn rather than at him. “Truly, you’re halfway to being dead, aren’t you?”

  The lord’s words seemed true enough. As soon as he was untied, Perryn staggered and would have fallen if it weren’t for Madoc’s support. The equerry half led, half hauled him down the room to a low bench by a hearth, where some tinder and small sticks were laid ready for a fire. Madoc laid on a pair of logs, then snapped his fingers. Fire sprang out and danced along the wood. Perryn screamed. He clapped his hands over his mouth to for
ce a second scream back, then swiveled around, crouching, to stare up at Madoc in terror.

  “Well, you looked chilled, lad. Thought we’d have a bit of a blaze. Now, you young dolt, do you see what you’ve gotten yourself tangled up in? From now on, you’re going to do exactly what I say, or …”

  “I will. Anything at all, my lord. I swear to you on the honor of the Wolf clan and the gods of my people.”

  “Good. Remember that during your trip to Eldidd.”

  “I’m going there? You said you wouldn’t …”

  “I said I wouldn’t let Cullyn get hold of you. There’s another man there who very much wants a chat with you. My uncle.”

  THREE

  In those days, Cerrmor had yet to expand to the place where the Gwarmael and the Bel rivers meet. A small village, Dei’ver, stood there, some forty houses and a pair of wooden docks, with a couple of inns to serve travelers who couldn’t reach Cerrmor before nightfall. The royal galley put in there, ostensibly to buy ale, but in reality to set Jill ashore. Since Salamander had letters for the gwerbret, he would be marked at once as an important man in the city. Since she wanted to ask some questions of the kind of people who would have nothing to do with anyone associated with His Grace and his wardens, she needed to ride in alone.

  Carrying the old saddle and bridle she’d brought from Dun Deverry for this purpose, and laden down with her gear, too, she made a great show of limping and cursing as she came into the village, as if she’d had to walk a long way in her riding boots. When she reached the dusty open space that did duty as a town square, she saw a couple of idlers sitting in the shade of a willow tree.

  “What happened, silver dagger? Lose your horse?”

  “I did. Broke his leg about five miles north of here. Is there anyone in town who can sell me another? By the love of every god, I hope I never walk that far again.”

  Since horses were a luxury beyond their reach, the villagers laughed in a nasty sort of way, but one of them waved his hand southward.

  “Try the big inn by the Cerrmor road, lad. Old Mat sometimes has an extra horse or two in his stable.”

  “My thanks. By the way, have there been any other silver daggers through here recently? I’m looking for a friend of mine, an Eldidd man he is, but I wouldn’t know what name he’s traveling under.”

  The two of them exchanged a brief look.

  “Well, seeing as how you’re another silver dagger and all, I don’t suppose there’s any harm in telling you. An Eldidd man calling himself Adoryc came through here two days ago. He had the dagger in his belt.”

  “What’s he wanted for?” the second man chimed in.

  “Cursed if I know. The gwerbret’s men don’t tell the likes of me their business.” Jill shrugged as best she could under all her burdens. “Well, I’ll be getting along. My back’s breaking.”

  As she limped away, Jill was thinking that Rhodry must have spread plenty of silver around on his ride south to keep local tongues mute. Even so, it was odd that no one who’d seen him had told the gwerbret’s men the truth once the man who’d given them the coin had ridden on. It was probably the reputation of silver daggers that kept them honest, she supposed, the simple fear that Rhodry or someone else would come back to slit their throats if they failed to keep the bargain.

  She found the big inn and Old Mat easily enough, and indeed, he did have a horse for sale, a decent gray gelding with a white off-fore and a white blaze. She haggled long enough to be convincing, then paid over some of Blaen’s coin and saddled up the gelding. They left the village at a quick walk-trot pace, but once they were well on the road, she let the gelding canter.

  In about an hour, not long before sunset, Jill reached the north gate of the city. Coming to Cerrmor always made her a bit melancholy. Since her parents had been born and raised there, she’d heard about it all her life, and it seemed that it should have been her home, too. Except that I have no home at all, she thought. Now she had even more reason to feel a total stranger, because dweomer was riding into town with her. With a bitter twist of her mouth, she realized that whether she fought against her own dweomer or not, it had already made her an alien among her people. It was also putting her in danger. As she led her horse down the narrow, twisting streets, through the packs of beggars and crowds of merchants and townsfolk, she was aware of how easy it would be for someone to slip up behind her and stick a dagger in her ribs. During her long walk down to the harbor, she constantly looked around and behind her.

  That was probably why she saw the old woman at all. Just as Jill crossed the market square, a wagon filled with hay for the gwerbret’s horses took a turn a little too sharply and tipped, blocking the street. Cursing, the carters picked themselves up off the cobbles as the strollers who had been right behind them milled in confusion and a noble on horseback began yelling at everyone to get out of his way that very instant. Jill turned her horse around and started working her way back along the edge of the square. All at once, she felt that she was being watched and spun around. Perched on a low wall with a market basket in her lap was a gray-haired woman wearing the black headscarf of a widow. Although much-mended, her plain blue dress was clean, caught in by a precisely folded kirtle. She was staring at Jill so intensely that Jill laid her hand on her sword hilt without thinking. The old woman shrank back.

  “My apologies, lad. You just remind me of someone I used to know, like.”

  “No offense, good dame.”

  Up ahead the crowd cleared and began to disperse. Jill hurried through the opening, then stopped cold. That voice—the old woman’s voice—by the gods, it had sounded familiar! But whose? Like her mother’s. And the old woman had found her familiar in turn. Swearing under her breath, Jill got her horse turned around in the crowd and shoved her way back to the wall. The old woman was gone. Although she searched the area around the market square for some twenty minutes, she never caught another glimpse of the woman who might have been her grandmother. She felt her eyes fill with tears, irritably wiped them away, then headed down to the harbor. Rhodry—and the dweomer—had to come before her and her kin.

  Immediately around the Cerrmor harbor, of course, was the area known as the Bilge, a tangle of narrow alleys, dirty shops, brothels, and taverns, all catering to the sailors, or perhaps preying upon them would be the better said. As much as Jill needed the kind of information the Bilge could give her, she had no intention of spending a night there. A safe distance upriver, in a bleak but decent district of warehouses and longshoremen’s cottages, was an inn called the Capstan that had a good reputation among silver daggers, or at least, as good a reputation as any silver dagger inn could possibly have. Jill stabled her horse in a smelly split-roof shed, while the bald, squint-eyed innkeep scratched himself as he watched without a move to help her.

  “You’re cursed young to have the dagger.”

  “What’s it to you?” Jill laid her hand on its hilt.

  “Naught, naught. You can have a chamber to yourself if you like, lad. Custom’s slow this time of year.”

  “Done, then.”

  The chamber was a tiny wedge of the second story, with warped shutters over the window and a mattress on the floor. When she kicked it out of the way, bedbugs swarmed and roiled. She dumped her gear in the corner, then left, padlocking the door behind her. The long narrow tavern room was dark and smoky, but the tabletops and the straw on the floor were reasonably clean. Jill swaggered in, trying to look as masculine as she could, and got herself a tankard of dark. Sooner or later someone was bound to realize that she was a lass, but she preferred it to be later. Since it was right at the dinner hour, the tavern was crowded with sailors spending their wages, a couple of wenches to help them at it, traveling peddlers, and a sprinkling of indifferently dressed men who were most likely thieves. The tavernman pointed to the hearth, where a stout woman fussed over a kettle.

  “Beef stew tonight, silver dagger.”

  “Good.”

  Jill saluted him with her tanka
rd and strolled away, to stand with her back to the wall. She’d had only a few sips of ale when she heard someone yelling out in the innyard. The tavernman ran to the window.

  “Ye gods, it’s some of the gwerbret’s men! They’re coming here.”

  Several of the customers melted away out the back as a man in mail threw open the front door. Three swordsmen, all dressed in dark red brigga, marched in and collared the innkeep.

  “Any more customers upstairs?” the leader said.

  “Not that I know of. Here, what is all this?”

  “We’re looking for someone, that’s all.” The swordsman turned to study the crowd. “We’ve already swept the Bilge. You can wager that we weren’t entirely welcome, but sweep it we did. Here, you, silver dagger! Get over here.”

  Jill walked over as slowly and as insolently as she dared.

  “What’s your name, lad?”

  “Gilyn. What’s it to you?”

  “Naught, scum, if that’s the stance you’re going to take. Do you know a man named Rhodry of Aberwyn? He’s a member of your band.”

  “I do. Last time I saw him was up in Cerrgonney. What are you looking for him for?”

  “Naught that concerns you.” He started to turn away, then glanced back with a conciliatory smile. “Here, I’ll tell you this, though. I swear on my honor that we mean him good, not ill. He’s not wanted for a crime or suchlike. If you see him, tell him that, will you? It’s worth gold in his hand if he’ll just come to His Grace’s dun.”

  “I will, then.”

  The gwerbret’s men stomped out again, and the tavern’s customers gave a unison sigh of relief. The tavernman turned to Jill.

  “Do you believe what they said about your friend?”

  “I do, at that, because Rhodry’s a strange kind of man.” She paused for a sip of ale. “He’s never said a word about his past, and silver daggers don’t pry into what a man may have done, but I’ll wager he was noble-born.”