The Dragon Revenant

by Katharine Kerr

  “Time to go?”

  “It is. No use in keeping the priest waiting.”

  As she followed him down the long spiraling stairs, she had a brief moment of doubt, yet when they left the broch and he held out his hand, she took it as trustingly as Rhodda always did.

  Shall we walk down? he said. “I can get my horse if you’d rather ride.”

  “Oh, a walk is fine. It’s a lovely morning, isn’t it?”

  It was warm and clear, as if the threatening clouds of the night before had left to make them the present of a splendid day. Down in the harbor the turquoise sea was at low tide, rolling slow breakers onto the pale beach.

  “Tell me somewhat,” Tevylla said. “Do you want another child? We might well have one.”

  “Well, I do, at that. Ah ye gods, I don’t think I’ve ever wanted anything as much as I want a son. I suppose it’s because I’m getting old. I’m not saying I’d turn up my nose at another lass, mind, but you’ll have to stop me from spoiling this one rotten.”

  “I’ll do my best, but you don’t seem like the sort of man who likes to be argued with.”

  “It might be a good thing if I learned to put up with it.”

  “Good, because you’ll have to.”

  When they shared another smile, Tevylla felt that they were married. The ceremony before the priest was only a formality.

  Yet, when they returned to the dun, they had a surprise ahead of them. With a howl of laughter and shrieks like battle cries, both warbands came bursting out of the broch and swept across the garden. A horde of young men mobbed them, slapping Cullyn on the back, grabbing Tevylla’s hands and kissing them. Then Calonderiel shoved his way through the mob with a goblet in his hand.

  “Let the lady breathe, lads!”

  As Tevylla made her way clear to the group of women standing near the main door, Calonderiel flung the mead in his goblet straight into Cullyn’s face. At the signal mead seemed to come from everywhere and drench her new husband like a summer storm. With a whoop, the warband grabbed the struggling, swearing Cullyn and carried him bodily toward the ornamental pond round the side of the broch complex. Laughing and calling, the women hurried after, their brightly colored dresses billowing and streaming in the wind.

  With one last howl the warband dumped Cullyn into the pond and ducked him a couple of times when he tried to scramble out. When they finally let him go, he was soaking wet but laughing, taking mock swings at his men and vowing that he’d chop them into dog meat. In a great pretence of terror they danced back out of reach. Laughing herself, the tieryn appeared and began calling for order.

  “Let the captain go change his clothes,” Lovyan said. “We’ve got a feast on the way, you know, and mead all round.”

  The men spontaneously cheered the lady who was their lord.

  Although the evening meal included an entire roasted hog and other fancy dishes, there was, all in all, as little fuss as Tevylla wanted. When Cullyn fed her the first bite from the trencher they shared, the warband did cheer, as they did again when they shared a goblet of mead—or at least, she took a few sips and let him finish the rest. At the end of the meal, she was planning on retiring with the other women and letting him drink with his men, but when she left the table, he came with her, taking her hand as they walked to the staircase.

  “The warband can drink itself sick without me,” he remarked.

  She was so pleased to hear him say it that she suddenly realized just how much she wanted him. Yet with her wanting came a shyness, a sudden feeling that she hardly knew him, a last reserve about letting him close to her in such an irrevocable way. Her early fear of him, she saw then, was a fear that she might love this man too much, if she let herself, a warrior whose craft might take him away from her for long months at a time, whose death might claim him at any moment. And now she had gone and married him, right when the province was on the brink of open war. In her mind she heard her mother’s weary voice: have you no common sense, lass? No, she answered, and I’m proud of it.

  In her chamber, strangely silent without Rhodda there, his wet clothes lay in a puddle on the floor. She picked them up, glad of the excuse to keep from looking at him, leaned out the window to wring the worst of the water from the clothes, then draped them over the sill to dry.

  “My apologies,” he said. “I was just in such a cursed hurry to get back downstairs.”

  “Oh, I don’t mind.”

  “You’re rid of Rhodda for the night, and so you need someone to play the nursemaid for.”

  When she forced herself to turn around and face him, she found him smiling at her, his hair half-silver, half-gold in the candlelight, with such good humor that her shyness vanished.

  “Nursemaid? Oh, I wouldn’t call it that.”

  He caught her by the shoulders and kissed her openmouthed, just once before he let her go—the first kiss he’d ever given her. She untied her kirtle and laid it down on the table carefully, smoothing the elaborate needlework. While she took off her overdress he unbuckled his sword-belt and slung it onto the table, the scabbard lying golden and heavy across the embroidered flowers. She felt weary, as if at an omen. Ah well, she thought, we’ll have our good times before I have to wear black again. Cullyn looked at her so solemnly that she thought he was about to speak, but he picked her up like a child and carried her to their bed.

  At the Inn of the Flying Fish, down near the harbor in Indila, Jill had spent the past three days working harder than she ever had in her life. Not only was Nevyn’s idea of mental exercises a good bit stricter than Salamander’s, but the old man set her to memorizing lore as well. While she struggled to remember the names and characteristics of the ten secret levels of the universe and the thirty-two paths between them, Rhodry and his men spent their time drinking and dicing down in the tavern room with Salamander to entertain them. What Perryn may have done, she neither knew nor cared.

  Finally, on the morning of the fourth day when the archon summoned Nevyn to his palace, Jill went with him, mostly as a reward for her hard work. Gurtha received them in his private chambers and had his slaves spread an elaborate meal and pour the best wine. Lunching with them was a huge and ominous man introduced as Hanno, captain of the city guard. After some polite talk of civic affairs, Gurtha remarked that the date for the trial had been set.

  “It’s not for two weeks, I’m afraid. The courts are always busy this time of year, because the winter weather gives people the leisure to invent lawsuits.” Gurtha glanced at Hanno. “Two weeks is a long time. You must be very careful, captain, that the barbarian prisoners don’t escape.”

  “Of course, sir. Why, how could they escape, with my men guarding the inn? I’ve got them posted all round.”

  “True. On the other hand, tonight, just when the tide is full, there’s going to be that procession in honor of the Star Goddesses. You’ll need to reduce the guard at the inn.”

  “Hum, so I will. We’ll have to leave a few men there, though.”

  “But what if they started drinking out of boredom and became wine-muddled?”

  “Never happens. Not with me there to watch them.”

  “Ah, but you might become distracted.”

  “That’s true.” Hanno smiled at Nevyn and gave Jill a wink. “What an awful thought.”

  “So it is, so it is.” Gurtha shook his head sadly. “But you can’t blame human beings for making a mistake now and then, can you?”

  “No, you can’t,” Nevyn said. “Happens to the best of us.”

  That night, while they waited for the tide to turn, they had a feast of sorts in the inn. The innkeeper hovered nervously near the table, while outside the archon’s men prowled back and forth, occasionally sticking a head through a window to see if it were time yet for them to neglect their duty and let the prisoners escape. Since all of the other customers ate in their chambers to avoid sharing the common room with criminals, they had the echoing tavern room to themselves. In this far from festive atmosphere Rhodry hurri
ed through his meal, then left the table to go stand in the door and chat with the captain of the watch. He needed to be seen by a passerby or two if anyone was going to believe that he had somehow managed to distract the formidable Hanno in order to escape.

  While he picked at a bit of bread, Nevyn went over a last few logistical arrangements.

  “We need to sell or return those horses that the archon of Surat gave us. Oh, and that reminds me—we never could go back for all those wretched horses we left in Pastedion, as I remember telling a certain gerthddyn was most likely. Well, when the archon confiscates them, they’ll repay him for some of his trouble.”

  “Begging your leave and all, oh master in this craft of ours,” Salamander said. “I should like to have them as well as the stock we’ve got with us.”

  “Whatever for?”

  “So I can pose as Evan, traveling horsetrader from the faraway barbarian kingdom, renowned for steeds. You are all sailing for home on the morrow, but my work here, alas, is not yet done.”

  “What?” Nevyn seemed torn between annoyance and curiosity. “What stupid scheme do you have in mind now?”

  “A scheme not of stupidity but of compassion, or so I may hope. During our travels, I ran across someone who showed a certain basic talent for dweomer but who never had the least chance to develop it. Since she’s much addicted to fortune-telling, I fear me she may come under the influence of certain unscrupulous types unless she’s given some way to tell gold from mica. She’s rich, and aforesaid types are bound to come flocking round her. But since at the time the Hawks were stooping to impale us all upon their blood-soaked claws, I had no leisure for long and civilized conversations on the subject.”

  When Jill realized whom he must mean, she was profoundly glad that Rhodry had already left the table.

  “Um, well, I see your point,” Nevyn said. “If she’s got money to attract lying fools and tricksters, this woman could indeed come to a great deal of harm. Well and good, then, but please, don’t get yourself embroiled in more mischief over here. I shan’t be asking the wind to bring me over just to bail you out of trouble.”

  “You have my promise, oh Master of the Aethyr, that I shall be circumspection itself.”

  Jill looked up to see one of the archon’s men waving at her from the window.

  “I think they’re going to start being drunk on duty now,” she said. “Salamander, you’d best go upstairs and get out a window or suchlike if you’re not coming with us.”

  “I shall, my turtledove.” He got up, bowed to the table, then strolled over and kissed her lightly on top of the head. “We shall meet again. You’ll forgive me for not coming to sing at your wedding?”

  “I will. But be wary as you ride, won’t you?”

  “You have my promise on that.” He hesitated, looking stricken. “Say farewell to my brother for me, will you? I shall vanish while his back is turned and save us both a nasty scene.”

  When she started to speak further, Jill found to her surprise that her throat was choked with tears. Salamander waved and trotted over to the staircase, hesitated, turned to wave once more, then hurried up and disappeared.

  The rest of them gathered up their gear and slipped out the back way through the kitchen. They passed only one guard, and he was busy drinking down an enormous cup of wine to ensure that Hanno could smell it on his breath later. Even so, Jill found herself hurrying through the dark and twisting streets and chivvying the others along, too. The sooner that there was an ocean between them and the Hawks, the happier she would be. Finally they reached the harbor and found the right pier. Pacing back and forth on deck, Elaeno was waiting for them with a lit lantern.

  “Just in time,” he boomed. “The tide’s about to turn, lads. Let’s get aboard and be on our way.”

  Even though Rhodry protested, Elaeno insisted on giving his private cabin to the gwerbret. It was tiny, of course, with a narrow bunk on one side, a bench built into the wall on the other, and a sliver of table bolted to the floor in between, but Elaeno was so large that what was a single bunk to him could actually hold two people provided they did love each other very much. That first night, when they were cramped in together, watching the hanging lantern throw wild shadows as it swayed, Jill realized that they had more privacy in this wardrobe of a room than they’d had in weeks. It was time to talk of important things, she supposed; yet she was afraid to voice even her smallest doubt, lest the rest all come rushing out like one of the Bardekian floods.

  Rhodry himself was in a melancholy mood, and simply because it was easier to listen to him than to talk about herself, she asked him what he was thinking.

  “Oh, just some cursed strange thoughts, my love, about the long road and all. You know, I’m going to miss it—just a bit, mind, but miss it I will.”

  “What? I never thought I’d hear you say that, after the way you used to moan and groan about your exile.”

  “True spoken, and I owe you an apology for making you listen. But we were free, weren’t we, riding where we liked, and never seeing the same town twice if it didn’t suit us. And we never had to mince and bow and pay court to men we hated and who cordially hated us, or be even so politic and careful to curry favor with men who might support us, and all the rest of it.” All at once he laughed. “Ah, curse Rhys anyway—it’s just like him. He never could do anything right, not even live to a ripe old age!” He paused, smiling, his fingers stroking the embroidered dragon on his shirt. “Oh, the dragon has me in its claws, sure enough, and you along with me, my love. From now on it does all the flying, and we follow in its wake.”

  For a moment Jill hated him, just for his wretched elven eloquence that had voiced her worst fear better than she ever could have put it herself.

  “Here, my love, you look sad.”

  “It’s because I agree with you, I suppose. After all, I’ve never known anything but the long road, traveling with my Da like I did and all. Well, except for those miserable weeks before you got exiled. Rhodry, I hated being at court.”

  “But then you were only my mistress, and truly, I hated to put you in such a terrible position. Now, my love, you’ll be my wife. Oh, things will be different now, just you wait and see. When Lady Gilyan comes into a room now, no one’s going to sneer and look down their long noses. Oh, that they won’t! Instead it’ll be bowing here, and if it please Your Grace there, and everyone clustering round to see just what her ladyship requires or thinks or wants, because you’ll have more influence over the gwerbret of Aberwyn than any other person, human being or elf alike, in the kingdom. In some ways, my love, you’ll be Aberwyn, especially when I’m off on a campaign or suchlike.”

  Jill’s stomach clenched cold, but she smiled, just because he so badly wanted to please her.

  “But Rhoddo? There is one thing we’ve got to talk about. You know that I’ve started studying dweomer, and …”

  “Well, who’s to say one wrong word about that, even if they do find out, and from what Nevyn’s been saying, you’re supposed to keep it secret anyway, if you’re an apprentice. My love, you don’t understand. The only person in the world who can tell you what you may or mayn’t do is the High King, and judging by what Nevyn told me, the High King knows how blasted useful the dweomer can be.”

  “That’s not what was worrying me. It’s the time.”

  He stared at her, blinking a little.

  “I’ve got to have so many hours a day to do this work. Time and privacy, where I can concentrate and not be burdened with entertaining your guests or having pages barging in to ask what sort of bread to lay on table and that kind of bilge.”

  “Oh. Um, I see.” He considered for a long moment, chewing on his lower lip. “Well, we’ll just have to make sure you have your privacy then, in the evening watch after dinner, say, or suchlike. It might be hard at first, my love, but soon enough, things will settle down, particularly in the winter months.”

  She wanted to cry out, to scream at him: that’s not good enough! But she bit
back the angry words, because she knew that once started, they wouldn’t stop, and they would lead her inexorably to the decision she refused to make. I won’t leave Rhodry, I won’t! She thought it over and over, like a prayer to the Goddess. And in the golden lamplight he looked so beautiful, grinning at her now, glowing with honorable pride at finally having come into his own, that her love for him swelled and wrapped her round until it seemed that she would simply die without him.

  That particular evening, while Tevylla was putting Rhodda to bed, Cullyn climbed up to the catwalk round Dun Aberwyn’s walls and leaned onto a merlon to enjoy the view. Far away to the west the last of the sunset hung over the fields and farms, while down at the harbor to the south the waves rolled in all silver in the fading light. Although the night was chilly, and he was wrapped in a good wool cloak, it wasn’t truly cold, either. Spring would come soon, and good sailing weather. He wondered if the regent would be able to endure waiting patiently for Nevyn or if she’d send a galley with marines across the Southern Sea. If she did, he intended to be on it, for all that it would ache his heart to leave his new wife behind.

  “Cullyn? A word with you?”

  He turned and looked down to find Aderyn and Calonderiel at the bottom of the ladder.

  “Of course, my lord, any time.”

  As agile as a page the old man climbed up, with the elven warleader right behind him. When Aderyn sniffed the wind and held up a licked finger to test its direction, Cullyn found himself remembering, even though he would have preferred to forget it, that the dweomerman could turn himself into an enormous silver owl and fly when he felt like it.

  “I’ve had news,” Aderyn announced. “From a reliable source. Gwerbret Blaen of Cwm Peel is on his way to Eldidd.”