Darkspell

by Katharine Kerr

  So, she thought, I’ll wager he doesn’t know Rhodry’s his brother. She felt sad, knowing that she could never tell them the truth, but she held her tongue. It was truly best that Rhodry thought himself a Maelwaedd, for his sake as well as Eldidd’s.

  Later that night, when they were going out to the hayloft to sleep, Salamander went with them, for a word in private, or so he said. When she heard what he wanted to know, Jill was very glad that he had the sense to keep quiet about it in the tavernroom.

  “Opium smugglers?” she said. “Don’t tell me you’re stupid enough to use that stuff.”

  “Not on your life,” Salamander said. “Nevyn asked me to help track them down, and so I thought Dun Mannannan would be a logical place to start.”

  “Oh, the lads here would never touch that kind of cargo. The smuggler lords have a certain amount of honor, you see.”

  “So much for that, then. It’s lucky I met up with you, because truly, for all that my tongue is glib and golden, I was having a hard time thinking up the right sort of questions to ask.”

  “And the wrong sort would have gotten your throat slit.”

  “The thought had occurred to me. Now, here, Jill, from what Nevyn tells me, you’ve traveled all over this kingdom and been in many a strange place, too. Do you have any idea who buys the vile distillation of peculiar poppies?”

  “Brothel keepers, mostly. They use it to keep their lasses in line.”

  Salamander whistled under his breath. Rhodry was listening as if he couldn’t believe she’d said it.

  “I never knew that,” Rhodry said. “How do you?”

  “Da told me, of course. He was always warning me about men who lure lasses into brothels. It’s most common in Cerrmor, he said, but it happens all over.”

  “Oh, by the black hairy ass of the Lord of Hell!” Salamander said. “Here it’s been under our noses the whole time! When I see Nevyn next, I must tell him that silver daggers know many a thing worth learning.”

  Floating above the fire, Nevyn’s image looked as startled as if someone had just dumped cold water all over him.

  “I never would have thought of that in a thousand years,” the old man’s thoughts came in a wave of bemusement. “And a vile and impious thing it is! Well, I’m almost to Eldidd. I think I’ll have a long talk with our Cullyn.”

  “It seems a sensible thing to do,” Salamander thought back. “And I’ll return to Cerrmor if you like.”

  “Splendid, but don’t make a move or say one thing until I tell you to. There are thugs mixed up in this trade as well as the dark dweomer, and we’re going to have to move carefully and lay clever snares.”

  “Just so. You know, some brothels are secretly owned by men with considerable influence.”

  Nevyn’s thought came like the growl of a wolf.

  “No doubt! Well, we’ll see what we can do. My thanks, lad. This is a very interesting bit of news.”

  After they broke the contact, Salamander put out the fire in the charcoal brazier with a wave of his hand. Through the window of his innchamber the gray dawn light was creeping in. When he glanced out, he saw Jill and Rhodry below, saddling up their horses. Hurriedly he pulled on his boots and went down to say farewell. Although he couldn’t say why, he’d never met a man he liked as well as Rhodry on first meeting.

  “I take it you leave on the wings of dawn,” Salamander said.

  “We do,” Rhodry said. “It’s a long ride up to Yr Auddglyn from here.”

  “So it is. It saddens my heart that our paths should cross only to part again. Ah, well, mayhap we’ll meet again on the long road.”

  “I’ll hope so.” Rhodry held out his hand. “Farewell, gerthddyn. Maybe the gods will allow us to sit over a tankard again.”

  As he shook hands, Salamander felt a dweomer-touched cold run down his back. They’d meet again, he knew, but not in the way that they were hoping. The dweomer-cold was so strong that he shivered convulsively.

  “Here,” Jill said. “Do you have a chill?”

  “A bit of one. Ye gods, I hate rising early.”

  They all laughed and parted smiling, but all day, as he rode back west to Cerrmor, Salamander remembered the dweomer-cold.

  In a splendidly appointed innchamber in Dun Deverry, Alastyr and Camdel sat at a small table and haggled over the price of twenty bars of opium. Sarcyn leaned against the windowsill and merely watched this meaningless charade. Although the money meant little to Alastyr, he had to pretend it did to keep Camdel convinced he was nothing more than a midnight importer. Finally the deal was done, the coins handed over. It was time for the true purpose of this meeting. Sarcyn opened up his second sight to watch.

  “My lord,” Alastyr said, “you must realize that it’s dangerous for me to come to Dun Deverry. Now that we’ve met, I’d prefer that you deal directly with Sarcyn.”

  With a sneer of objection, Camdel looked up, but Alastyr sent a line of light from his aura, threw it around the aura of the lord, and sent the egg of light spinning like a top. Camdel swayed drunkenly.

  “Sarcyn is very important,” Alastyr whispered. “You can trust him like you can trust me. You will trust him. You will trust him.”

  “I will, then,” Camdel said. “I trust him.”

  “Good. You will forget you’ve been ensorcelled. You will forget you’ve been ensorcelled.”

  Alastyr withdrew the line and let Camdel’s aura settle.

  “Of course, I understand,” Camdel said briskly. “Dealing with your lieutenant will be most satisfactory.”

  Sarcyn shut down the sight and escorted the lord out the door with a bow, then latched the heavy oak door after him. Alastyr chuckled under his breath and stood up, stretching his back.

  “Done, then,” the master said. “Now, remember, work on him slowly. If you can, only ensorcell him when he’s mead-drunk or smoke-drunk, so he never realizes somewhat odd’s afoot.”

  “Easily done, master. He boozes like a swine and sucks smoke like a chimney.”

  Alastyr chuckled again. Sarcyn couldn’t remember a time when the master had been this pleased, but then, Alastyr had worked for years to reach this point in his plans. As an intimate in the king’s chambers, Camdel was in a perfect position to steal them a thing that they could never reach themselves.

  “I can see that the lad makes you itch,” Alastyr went on. “But then, you always were a little fiend for bed.” Casually he patted the apprentice on the behind.

  Sarcyn went stiff with shock. Never before had he realized that Alastyr thought he’d enjoyed the master’s attentions, all those years ago.

  “My apologies,” Alastyr said, misunderstanding. “Isn’t he to your taste?”

  “I hate the little swine’s guts.”

  “Oh. Well, soon you’ll be in a position to make him pay. Keep working on him until we can lead him like a horse—on a very long rein. I’ll be waiting outside the city. Once he’s thoroughly ensorcelled, ride out and join me. But remember, there’s no rush. If it takes weeks, so be it.”

  After Alastyr left, Sarcyn spent a long time pacing back and forth from one side of the chamber to the other. His hatred drove him like a goad.

  For all his pose of a shabby old herbman, Nevyn was well-known in the great broch of Dun Gwerbyn. When he arrived at the gates one morning, the two men on guard both bowed to him, then called for servants to take his horse and pack mule to the stables. Out in the ward stood several large wagons, and servants, working slowly in the warm sun, were loading them with bundles and barrels.

  “Is the tieryn leaving soon for her summer residence?” Nevyn asked.

  “She is,” the page said. “In just two days’ time we’ll start for Cannobaen. Her grace is in the great hall right now.”

  Lovyan was sitting at the honor table with a scribe. Although they seemed to be discussing important matters, she dismissed him as soon as she saw Nevyn and sat the old man down at her right hand. Straightaway he told her all the news he had of Rhodry, because he knew
that her heart ached to hear that her son was safe.

  “And, finally, I scried them out last night,” he finished up. “They’re in the Auddglyn, looking for a hire. I must say Jill knows how to squeeze a copper hard enough to polish it. They seem to have plenty of coin left from the winter.”

  “That gladdens my heart, but ah, ye gods, the summer’s just begun, and there’s my poor little lad, selling his sword on the roads.”

  “Oh, come now, Lovva. You must admit that the ‘poor little lad’ happens to be one of the very best swordsmen in the kingdom.”

  “Bad luck happens to even the finest warriors.”

  “True spoken, and for all my fine words to you, I worry myself.”

  “I know that, and here, of course, I forgot you wouldn’t know yet! I’m troubled about Rhodry’s exile for more than his sake these days. Nevyn, the most truly appalling thing’s happened. Do you remember Donilla, the wife Rhys put aside for being barren?”

  “Quite well.”

  “Well, her new husband was absolutely besotted with her, and he’s been courting her as if she were a young lass. Apparently he’s been quite successful, because she’s with child.”

  “Oh, by every god! Has Rhys heard the news yet?”

  “He has. I rode to Aberwyn myself to tell him, thinking it would be best if he heard it from me. He did not take it well.”

  “No doubt. You know, I can even find it in my heart to feel sorry for Rhys. The gossip must be spreading like wildfire.”

  “He’s become the laughingstock of every lord in Eldidd. My heart absolutely aches for his poor little wife. They treat her like a prize mare! Here, people actually have been making bets on whether she’ll conceive, and I take it the odds against are very high. Ah, ye gods, how cruel men can be!”

  “Just so. But I see what you mean about Rhodry. He’s the last Maelwaedd heir for Aberwyn. We’ve got to get him back.”

  “With Rhys in this temper? You haven’t seen him. He walks around in a fury all day long, and not a soul dares to mention the very word ‘baby’ in front of him. He’ll never recall Rhodry now. Besides, there are too many ambitious men to feed his hatred for his brother, in the hope that if Rhys dies childless, their clan will have a chance at the gwerbretrhyn.”

  “That has the disgusting ring of truth.”

  “Of course. I’ll wager that the scheming and jockeying among the Council of Electors has already begun.” She gave him a faint, self-mocking smile. “I’ve already started my own scheming. When we go to Cannobaen, I’m going to take Rhodry’s bastard daughter out of fosterage and keep her with me. Little Rhodda will be a pawn in this struggle, and I want to supervise her training myself. After all, the man who marries Rhodry’s heir, bastard or not, will have a small claim to push before the council.”

  “By the Goddess Herself, I have to admire you. Most women would still be tearing their hair over their son’s exile, but you’re scheming fourteen years in advance.”

  “Most women have never held the power I do, not even the women of my rank.”

  For several minutes they sat in a troubled silence. Lovyan looked so weary and miserable that Nevyn surmised she was thinking about the bitter truth: Rhodry was no true Maelwaedd at all. Yet it was crucial that men think he was. Although Nevyn couldn’t read the future clearly, of course, he was certain that Rhodry was meant to rule in western Eldidd, if not as Gwerbret Aberwyn, then at least as tieryn in Dun Gwerbyn. Neither he nor the Lords of Wyrd cared one jot who Rhodry’s father was, but the noble-born would.

  “Do you know what I fear most?” Lovyan said abruptly. “That things will come to open war when Rhys dies. It’s happened, you know, when a disgruntled candidate feels himself wronged by the council. Ah, well, I’ll be long gone myself by then, and past worrying over it.”

  Since Rhys was a healthy man of only twenty-nine, her remark was eminently reasonable, but Nevyn felt a sudden stab of dweomer-warning. It seemed likely that she would have to bury yet another son.

  “Is somewhat wrong?” she said, reading his expression.

  “Oh, just thinking that we’ve got to get Rhodry recalled.”

  “If words were gold coins, we’d all be as rich as the king.” She sighed heavily. “It’s always hard to see the death of a great clan, but it would be a true pity to see the end of the Maelwaedds.”

  “It would indeed.”

  And a greater pity than she could know, in fact. The Maelwaedd clan had always been important to the dweomer, ever since its oddly humble beginning, close to three hundred years before.

  CERRMOR AND ELDIDD 790-797

  And are all things that happen in life pre-ordained by the gods? They’re not, for many things happen by blind chance. Mark this well: every man has a Wyrd, and every man has a Luck. The secret of wisdom is telling one from the other.

  —The Secret Book of Cadwallon the Druid

  About a week’s ride from Aberwyn, on what might as well have been the western border of Eldidd, since no one lived beyond it, a dun stood at the top of a grassy cliff overlooking the ocean. A stone wall, badly in need of repair, ringed a big ward where weeds poked up through the cobbles. Inside stood a squat stone broch, a clutter of wood sheds, and a narrow tower like a stork standing among chickens. Every afternoon Avascaen climbed the hundred fifty spiraling steps to the flat top of the tower. Using a heavy winch and pulley, he would haul up loads of firewood, which his sons had put in the sling far down below, and stack them under the little shelter above the beacon pit. Just at sunset he would light a torch and fire the first load. Not far out to sea lay submerged rocks, a little ripple of white water from his vantage, but virtually invisible to a ship sailing toward them. Any captain who saw the Cannobaen light knew that he should swing wide, out to the safety of the open sea.

  Not that many ships had sailed their way in the last few years. Thanks to the war for the Deverry throne, trade was falling off badly. There were times, especially when the cold winter winds whipped under the shelter, when Avascaen wondered why he even bothered to keep tending the fire. But if just one ship founders, he would tell himself, just think of how you’ll feel then. Besides, Prince Mael himself had enjoined him to keep this light, all those years ago before the prince rode off to war and never returned.

  Avascaen was training his two sons, Maryl and Egamyn, to take over the job of lighthouse keeper when he died. Maryl, a stolid sort of lad, was glad enough of the work and their somewhat privileged position in the village of Cannobaen. Egamyn, however, who was only fourteen, grumbled, cursed, and constantly threatened to run away to become a rider with the king’s army. Avascaen would generally give him a cuff on the head and tell him to hold his tongue.

  “The prince asked me and my family to tend the light,” Avascaen would say. “And tend it we will.”

  “Oh, here, Da,” Egamyn always answered. “I’ll wager you never see the wretched prince again.”

  “Maybe not, but if I do, then he’ll hear I did what I said I was going to do. I’m like a badger. I hold on.”

  Avascaen, his wife, Scwna, and the lads all lived in the great hall of the broch, where they cooked, slept, and generally made do. The upper stories were shut up to save heat in the winter. Twice a year Scwna aired out each chamber, wiped the dust off the furniture, and swept the floors, just in case the prince should return to his country lodge one fine day. Out in the ward they tended a kitchen garden, a few chickens, and some young hogs. The farmers in the nearby village supplied the rest of their needs as part of their taxes to the Cannobaen light. The farmers also supplied the firewood, which came from the vast primeval oak forests stretching to the north and west.

  “We’ve got a good life,” Avascaen would tell Egamyn. “You should thank the gods that things are peaceful, like.”

  Egamyn would only shake his stubborn dark head and mutter that things were tedious. Aside from the farmers, company rarely came to Dun Cannobaen.

  It was, therefore, quite an event when someone did turn up at the
gates one afternoon. Since he slept all morning, Avascaen was just starting his day with a stroll when he saw a rider on a chestnut horse coming up the road followed by two gray mules heavily laden with canvas packs. When the rider dismounted, Avascaen realized that it was a woman, stout and middle-aged. Although she wore a dress, she wore a pair of dirty brigga under it so she could ride astride like a man. Her gray hair was caught back in a clasp, marking her an unmarried woman, and her dark eyes brimmed with good humor. The oddest thing of all was the color of her hands, a dirty brownish-blue all the way up to her elbows.

  “Good morrow, good sir,” she said. “I’ll wager you’re surprised to see me riding up.”

  “Well, that I am, but you’re most welcome, anyway. May I ask your name?”

  “Primilla of Abernaudd, good sir. I’m out here looking for rare plants and suchlike for the dyers’ guild in Abernaudd.”

  “Fancy that! Well, won’t you take our hospitality? I can offer you a meal, if you don’t mind having breakfast for your dinner, anyway.”

  Primilla minded not in the least. While Maryl tended her horse and mules, she agreeably pitched into a trencher of bacon and a bowl of barley porridge. She was full of precious news from Abernaudd, the royal city of Eldidd, and Scwna and Egamyn listened avidly as she described the goings-on in the town.

  “And I don’t suppose there’s any news of my Prince Mael,” Avascaen asked finally.

  “Well, now, there is, and sad news at that. His wife just died, poor thing, of a fever.” Primilla shook her head sadly. “A pitiful thing, her never getting to see her husband again.”

  Tears welled in Scwna’s eyes. Avascaen felt a bit rocky himself.

  “And is there talk of disclaiming my prince and putting his son in his place?”

  “Well, there is, and what will you think of that?”

  “Mael’s the prince I swore to serve, and serve him I will. I’m like a badger, good dame. I hold on.”

  Primilla smiled as if she found his loyalty delightful, a great relief after all the people who mocked him for it. As he considered her eyes—shrewd, really, for all the jolly look of her round face and pink cheeks—Avascaen wondered about her.