The Penwyth Curse

  The prince flicked his wand, nothing more, just flicked it in Callas’s direction. The old man leapt back, then yelled. “No, don’t, prince, no! Damn you, prince, no!”

  The prince watched for a moment while Callas tried to scratch all the places on his body that were itching so badly he was nearly dancing with it.

  “Make it stop. Please, make it stop!”

  “Will you take me to Brecia?”

  Callas yelled, “Aye, I will take you to her. Let her destroy you with her magic. She is strong now and—yaagh, make it stop!”

  The prince flicked his wand once again, still smiling. Callas shook himself down, scratched violently at his left knee, then paused, blinked, and looked immensely relieved. “I wish I could do that. Will you teach me? It really is a stupid curse, but it is very effective.”

  “I will consider teaching you if you take me to Brecia.”

  Callas turned his long kesha in his hands, watching the tip glow. “A dark wizard such as you should not come into the forest. Your darkness destroys the holiness of our sacred oak groves.”

  “Leave go, Callas. I promise I will destroy nothing. Take me to Brecia. I am sure the witch will see me.” So close, he was now so close to her. He laughed. “Perhaps I will cast a spell on her. Not itching, no. I will make her desire me above all men. I will make her want to strip me down to my hide and caress me. Aye, I would like to have that witch in my power. Do you think she would like that?”

  The prince thought Callas would fall over in a faint. “Brecia would not do that, even under a spell. She is inviolate. You should not make sport with us, prince.”

  “All right,” the prince said agreeably. “Since I am a wizard, I can snap my fingers—” And he snapped his fingers right in Callas’s face. The old man yelped and jumped back. The prince laughed. “Aye, I can snap my fingers and we will be there, at your most sacred shrine, right in front of Brecia.” If only he really could do that, he thought, glad Callas didn’t realize he couldn’t. “Is that what you wish me to do? Only the gods know what shifts and changes that would bring.”

  Callas groaned, then swallowed it as if realizing that a priest should not show weakness, particularly to the dark prince. “No, no. You will not do your evil magic on me. No, stay away from me. Follow me. It is not far, only as far as Brecia deems it to be.”

  That sounded ridiculous to the prince, but he would be the first to admit that Brecia was cunning, mayhap just that clever. He fell into step closely behind Callas, who was walking as nimbly as a mountain goat. The floor of the forest was soft with rotted leaves and pulpy vegetation beneath his boots. It was still darker than not, and he stumbled several times.

  He wanted Brecia, and he fully intended to have her this time. No more treaties to dictate his mate. He was free to follow his own way. He began whistling in the darkness, and Callas looked ready to spit with fear.

  The prince smiled.

  12

  Present

  BISHOP LAY STILL, WAVES of pain crashing through his head, the stark image in his brain of a filthy old man and a young man—no, the young man was more than that, aye, the young man was a prince, by all the saints, he was magic, he was a wizard, he had a damned wand and he could use it. It was impossible, but there they were, alive in his brain, their faces as clear as if they were standing right in front of him. But even in the next instant, they were fading into the mist that covered that thick, ancient oak forest. For an instant he swore he heard the young prince’s laughter, and he thought, He is going to get Brecia.

  Then there was nothing. Just nothing.

  Bishop didn’t move, perhaps afraid to move. A dream, he thought. He’d dreamed—a vivid, very strange dream, nothing more than that, no matter the rich, detailed colors, the strange speech they’d spoken, which he’d understood.

  He drew a deep breath, shook his head. The images were gone.

  But there was one thing he was very sure of in that moment.

  There was no oak forest near where he and Merryn had lain in that tent beneath the drowning sky. “Wake up, Bishop. Come on, wake up.”

  “I don’t want to.”

  “Good, you’re alive. In the single day I’ve known you, I’ve learned a lot about you. Now I’m seeing that you’re also selfish. Just listen to you—I don’t want to—” She’d mimicked him quite well, actually. “Well, I don’t care what you want. Get up before the tent collapses.”

  He opened his eyes to see Merryn not an inch from his nose, her warm breath fanning his face. His brain righted itself. What was this? She was the one who had gone headfirst down the hillock. He said, frowning, “Are you all right? You fell and hit your head. I remember that.”

  “I’m better than you are. I opened my eyes and I saw you hunkered over me. You jerked your head up at this loud clap of thunder, and a flash of lightning streaked your face white. Then you just fell on top of me.”

  “A loud clap of thunder,” he said.

  “Aye, something must have happened. There aren’t any lumps on your head that I can tell. My lump is good-sized, but you don’t see me flat on my back, do you? You’re a warrior, aren’t you?”

  “It’s raining.”

  “It’s more than raining. It’s making up for the months when there was nothing at all except blowing dust. I don’t know how much longer the tent can stay up. You have to get yourself together, Bishop.”

  He looked past her, saw the blur of rain battering down on the tent. Surprisingly, it was holding. But for how long?

  “You were right about the rain. It is incredible. You are a wizard, aren’t you?”

  “Aye, I am a wizard,” he said without thought, without any consideration at all. Now wasn’t that odd? He felt suddenly filled with energy, the pain gone, and he wanted to draw his sword and leap out of the damned tent and kill bandits. No luck there. No self-respecting bandit would be out in this deluge.

  “We can’t stay here. How do you feel?”

  “I healed myself,” he said, just to see what she would say, just to see how she would react to that.

  She reared back, alarm in her eyes. “You are jesting again, aren’t you, Bishop?”

  “Of course,” he said. “We will stay here until the rain stops or the tent collapses in on us. Come down beside me and we can warm each other.”

  She hesitated only a moment before easing down beside him. They were both damp, and that wasn’t good, but she realized soon enough that the heat from his body would warm her quite well. Even in the dead of winter he would warm her. She said, “When I woke up I realized that I didn’t know how much time had passed. But it’s dark. It wasn’t dark when I fell down the hillock. It was full into the day, wasn’t it?”

  “Aye, it was, but then the sky darkened, don’t you remember?” He was remembering that huge flash of white light that stayed and stayed until suddenly—there was just nothing. The dream, there had been the dream. Gone now, all of it.

  “Aye, just before the rain came down it darkened, but look now, Bishop. It’s night. Did you do something?”

  “By all the saints’ knee-bent prayers, what do you think I am? A god to change day into night at my whim?”

  She was silent. He felt her fingertips wandering over his chest. “Could you?”

  He wanted to laugh. The cost of coincidence. He’d been right about the damnable rain and now he’d moved beyond that simple task—now he could change the march of the sun. “Very well. I am a god, not just a wizard.”

  She giggled. “You are jesting with me again. My head hurts a bit, but it isn’t bad.” She paused a moment, then said, “Were you really going to tie me down? Let me lie there in the rain?”

  “Yes.”

  She didn’t say anything more, just settled her cheek against his shoulder. Soon both of them slept.

  And when they awoke it was still raining and the tent still hadn’t collapsed. They could see dirty light outside. How long had they slept? Had it really been night? How long had that bloody dream laste
d?

  He knew suddenly, knew with absolute certainty, that if he left Penwyth land, there wouldn’t be any more rain. The rain was for this land only. But how could that be?

  Five hours later, Bishop, with Merryn in front of him atop Fearless’s back, rode beneath a now sunny sky to St. Erth Castle. The torrential rain had turned to billowing dark clouds that hid the sun, and then the clouds turned white and the sun was bright.

  All this happened the moment they left Penwyth land.

  He shouted to the porter at St. Erth’s gate, waved at Gorkel the Hideous, and Eldwin, the master-at-arms, and shouted out greetings.

  The last thing he wanted was an arrow through his gullet because someone believed him an enemy.

  When he rode Fearless into the inner bailey of St. Erth, he was nearly deafened by all the noise.

  It was warming, that noise, because it was normal. It didn’t hide any mysterious dreams, or any—what? He couldn’t remember. The children shrieked, animals grunted, butted each other and any humans close enough. Chickens squawked as they pecked at the children’s bare toes, sending them running and yelling. Above it all was the armorer’s hammer, striking iron, making it ring and echo throughout the bailey.

  The main thing was, the noise was all young.

  Bishop breathed in the scents of baking bread, horse dung, human sweat, and fresh rosemary. He saw Philippa holding a basket in her hand, and in that basket was a pile of rosemary she’d just picked.

  “Bishop. Welcome. Who’s this? Goodness, neither of you looks very good. What happened?”

  Merryn could just imagine how they looked. Their clothes weren’t yet dry, but she knew her gown was wrinkled and torn, her hair whipped into tangles around her head.

  She looked at Bishop, saw that he was smiling.

  “It is good to be back to something I know and understand,” he said, “something that is utterly normal. Merryn, that bent little man is Crooky the Fool and the other is Gorkel the Hideous, well named indeed, a man endowed with the ugliest face in Christendom. And that is Eldwin, Dienwald’s master-at-arms, out of breath from running down the wooden stairs from the ramparts.”

  Bishop looked down at Dienwald and Philippa. “This is the maid of Penwyth who’s been married four times. Merryn de Gay, this is Lord Dienwald de Fortenberry, earl of St. Erth. And this is Philippa, his wife and helpmeet, the king’s sweet daughter.”

  Merryn had never before visited St. Erth. She’d heard stories about the Scourge of St. Erth, but he didn’t look at all wicked. And Philippa, the king’s bastard daughter, was beautiful, all that thick, curly hair, plaited through with pale yellow ribbons.

  Dienwald laughed and clasped Merryn beneath her arms to lift her off Fearless’s back. “You’re just a bit damp, both of you. Why? Look at the sun overhead. You were sporting with her, weren’t you, Bishop, and you both fell into a river or perhaps a small pond somewhere?”

  “Ah, Dienwald, no sporting around with her.” Bishop laughed, dismounted, and handed Fearless’s reins to Gorkel, who gave him a blinding smile. “Actually, it is raining hard on Penwyth land.”

  “But not here?” Dienwald arched an eyebrow. “How is that possible, Bishop?”

  Bishop could do nothing but shrug. “It is a bit unusual, I suppose. I cannot explain it.”

  “Bishop made it rain,” Merryn said.

  That brought instant and complete silence.

  “No,” he said, all calm and indifferent, “I didn’t. She jests.”

  Dienwald gave him an odd look, then stepped aside as his wife said, “We can have explanations later. Come in, come in. First, dry clothes for both of you. Ah, it is a very good thing that we have more than enough sheep now to weave wool for clothes. Merryn, you’re about my height, so my gowns should fit you well enough.”

  “Ha,” Dienwald said. “You’re a giant, a maypole. This is but a little bit of a girl and—”

  Philippa stuffed a bit of rosemary into her husband’s mouth. He spat it out, laughed, and said, “Come along, Bishop. Gorkel will take good care of Fearless. Indeed, he is the only one to take care of the brute, since he’s the only one Fearless won’t try to bite.”

  “Aye, Fearless is afraid that Gorkel will bite him.”

  Not long thereafter, Merryn walked beside Philippa de Fortenberry, countess of St. Erth, up the deeply worn stone steps into the great hall.

  There was so much noise, everyone talking at once, everyone moving here and there, going about their tasks, half their attention on Bishop and Merryn. And the laughter and the sounds of children playing, shouting, arguing.

  “At Penwyth,” she said to Philippa, “there isn’t this noise.”

  Philippa raised an eyebrow at that. “Every keep I’ve visited shatters the eardrums, even the inner bailey at Windsor.”

  “It’s all old men at Penwyth,” Merryn said. “They don’t usually speak loudly. Thank you for the clothes.”

  “These lovely clothes were given to me by Kassia de Moreton some years ago. They fit you well enough. What do you mean there are only old men at Penwyth?”

  They’d reached the great hall. “Oh, no,” Philippa said and rolled her eyes.

  Crooky the Fool had hopped on top of one of the trestle tables. He sang at the top of his lungs:

  “Here’s the king’s Bishop

  Not here to play at chess.

  There’s a maid he’s got to wed,

  Then he’ll haul her off to bed.

  All the while he’ll pray

  That the curse won’t strike him dead.

  All hail Bishop the 5th—husband.”

  Merryn looked up at Philippa. “That rhymed, Philippa—at least some of it did—but it wasn’t true what he said. What is wrong with him? Bishop didn’t come to Penwyth to marry me. He came just to remove the Penwyth curse.”

  Dienwald roared, leapt over to the trestle table and cuffed the fool so hard he flew off into the rushes and rolled and rolled until he lay on his back and grinned up at his master.

  “Master, heed me, I will do better. Until the evening arrives on night feet, I will practice until I can find rhymes that will rhyme even with themselves, mayhap even a few choice words to rhyme with ‘husband.’ Another line? Aye, I’ll even add another line. What think you, noble master?”

  “Enough, you brainless sot,” Dienwald said. “Bishop isn’t to wed her.”

  “But he is, I heard all of you—” Crooky’s eyes rolled back in his head and he clasped his own hands around his throat and started squeezing. “Oh, dear, oh, begorra, and oh, my mother too, I will be smote down because my brain has grown warts and died.”

  “Aye, it has,” Dienwald said. “Keep your mouth shut.” He looked over at Bishop, who hadn’t moved an inch. He still held the goblet of fine St. Erth ale in his hand. He was staring at Merryn. He was wondering if Crooky the Fool had just signed his death warrant.

  Merryn cleared her throat. “Why, Fool, do you call him Bishop the 5th? Why do you think he came to Penwyth to marry me? Tell me.”

  “No,” Bishop yelled at the top of his lungs. “I would cut off my toes before I would marry you. The fool here mistakes his bishops. Bishops litter the land. It is another one of them he cackles about, not me.”

  “Aye, thass true enough, mistress,” Crooky said and stopped strangling himself, then rolled in a ball until he came to a stop at Merryn’s feet. He came gracefully upright, which was only to Merryn’s shoulder. He fingered the sleeve of her lovely pale-green gown. “I remember when the beautiful princess Kassia, so dainty and gracious she is, brought this gown. The mistress here gnashed and ground her teeth and yelled that she’d throw it to the wolfhounds, ah, but she didn’t, she—”

  Dienwald came toward Crooky and the fool quickly rolled beneath one of the trestle tables.

  “He’s a fool,” Dienwald said. “Actually, since he’s my fool, he’s all right. Come, Merryn, and have some of the wench’s delicious bread and ale. Aye, the gown, given to her by the beautiful little Kassi
a, so incredibly soft and gentle, looks much better on you than it did on my wench here. I say, wench, did you ever wear this lovely gown? Or was it too small for your bountiful charms?”

  Philippa cuffed her husband’s shoulder. He laughed and laughed, then threw back his head and shouted, “Where are my babes?”

  Margot came scurrying forward. She had a little boy under each arm, and a little girl was plastered to her gown, her fingers in her mouth.

  Dienwald looked sideways at Merryn and said, “Come look at my babes, Bishop. They have grown in these few days since you last saw them. Is that not true?”

  “They will be giants, Dienwald,” Bishop said.

  “Aye, and if ever you wed”—Dienwald shot a look at Merryn—“which I know will not happen for many years yet, particularly since you are not here to wed Merryn of Penwyth—why, then, these are the babes you will want to have. Toss me Edward, Margot.”

  And Margot, not strong enough, thankfully, to throw the little boy to his father, instead handed him over, cooing over him even as Dienwald brought him close.

  “Aye, look at Edward, Bishop. You too, Merryn. Look at this perfect babe who looks just like his brother, Nicholas. Ah, wench, is this Edward I’m holding?”

  “Aye, my lord, that is Edward.”

  Nicholas began yelling. Eleanor took her fingers out of her mouth and began yelling in harmony.

  “When you have children, Merryn de Gay, which won’t be for many years yet—you have to wed, and that won’t happen until many more suns have sunk low in the sky, and it doesn’t involve Bishop—you will wish to have babes like my little ones here. My precious Eleanor is the loudest, isn’t she? Just like her mother.”

  Dienwald now held all three of his babes.

  Philippa was laughing so hard she was holding her sides. She was also looking out of the corner of her eye at Merryn, wondering if she was thinking about Crooky’s ill-chosen words.