The fallow field to which the market had moved was just south of the village, so it took Deri only a few minutes to reach the strangely silent lower bailey. As Surefoot stepped onto the drawbridge to the upper bailey, a faint echo of voices made Deri look up at the wall above him, but no guard was there, and the dwarf could not think of why any guard should hail him from the wall anyway. Then he thought he heard a shout. A servant or two who had not walked down to the tourney; nonetheless, sling and pebble were concealed in his right hand before the pony emerged from under the inner portcullis.
The mingled yells of three men drew Deri’s head left, toward the well, just in time for the corner of his eye to catch a figure streaking across the bailey in the other direction. Curiously, the runner was trailing something pale, not trying to escape the bailey but making a desperate leap to grab the edge of the roof of an outbuilding. Deri did not recognize the speeding figure nor see whether the leap was successful, because his eyes had already gone back to the shouters. He did see them, now charging after their prey, at least clearly enough to know they were not men-at-arms. The pebble flew from Deri’s sling, and one man was down, howling and clutching his thigh. That stopped both other men in their tracks. They would have run instinctively if he had not been blocking the exit, Deri thought half ruefully, half joyfully.
Deri did not pick quarrels—he had been taught not to be cruel, even though there was always a kind of rage inside him for what he had been born—but if someone else attacked him, an unholy joy woke in him at being able to strike out under the excuse of self-defense.
“It’s the dwarf who was with the boy,” Joris snarled. “We can quiet them both now.”
They rushed toward him, trying to duck and weave so that he would miss if he tried to use the sling again, but Deri had already put it away, grinning hugely at what Joris had said. He slipped his feet from Surefoot’s stirrups, put one hand on the cantle of his saddle, the other on the pommel, stood upright, and launched himself on Joris just as he reached for the pony’s head. The juggler fell back with Deri atop him, but the dwarf did not land flat. Holding tight to the juggler’s shoulders, he drew up his short legs and thrust with them so that his feet stabbed viciously into Joris’s belly as they landed. That thrust gave Deri the impetus to flip right over his victim’s head in a handstand and come up on his feet again. Ignoring the other man, who had to come around Surefoot—the pony was leisurely continuing toward the stable, indifferent to activities he could not distinguish from normal tumbling and other human idiocies—Deri picked up Joris and threw him headfirst into the wall.
The dwarf’s long arms were already reaching up and back to seize the man whom he expected to grab him from behind, but an agonized screech made him whirl around. A silent, wild-haired fury had attached itself to the man’s back, steel-muscled legs locked around his chest, equally powerful fingers gouging at his eyes.
“Don’t blind him, Carys!” Deri yelled.
“He was going to jump you from behind,” she spat, but her forefingers ceased digging into the man’s eye sockets.
“I know,” the dwarf said, laughing. “Get off him. Don’t spoil my fun.”
“Let me go!” the acrobat screamed.
His flailing hands had found Carys’s, and she let him drag them down, but no lower than his shoulders. These she gripped, simultaneously letting go with her legs, which she drew up, while pressing down hard with her arms. Her whole body lifted above his head, and she set her feet flat on his back. At that moment, she let go of his shoulders and straightened her legs forcefully, propelling him violently forward toward Deri and herself backward. Her body curved, and her hands came out to touch the ground and flip her neatly the rest of the way over to stand erect.
In flipping, Carys missed Deri’s part of the action, but what he had done was clear enough when she saw the acrobat lying some yards away, to the left of Joris, but not against the wall. The man, making no attempt to rise, whimpered in the expectation of a beating, with his arms over his head and his legs pulled up to best protect his most vulnerable parts.
“You should have aimed him more to the right,” Deri said critically. “There was no way to turn him enough so he would hit the wall when I passed him along.”
Carys stared for a moment, wide-eyed still with fear and shock, and then burst out into laughter tinged with hysteria. “I did not do it apurpose,” she gasped. “I only wanted to get away so he could not grab me.”
Deri grinned broadly. “I know that, silly. It was only a jest to make you laugh.”
“Thank you,” Carys said, smiling more calmly if still tremulously. She took a deep, shuddering breath and gestured toward Joris with her head. “Is he dead?”
“I hope not,” the dwarf replied, but without anxiety. After all, it was only a player he had killed, if Joris was dead, Deri thought; and then his smile turned wry. He was only a player himself. “I don’t think he hit the wall hard enough to break his neck or crush his skull.” He walked to Joris and flipped him over onto his back. “No harm done. His eyes are starting to move.” Then he went to the acrobat, who tensed in terror, and prodded him gently enough with his foot. “Get up and get your friend with the sore leg up, and drag this limp prick out of here. And remind him that Deri Longarms is not easy to quiet, even though he is a dwarf.”
The man he had hit with the pebble had been trying to crawl out of sight, but he stopped when he heard himself mentioned and got hesitantly to his feet. He was limping badly but able to walk. Carys backed away warily in case the limp was a ruse and he intended to rush at her, but he made as straight for his companions as he could while also detouring widely around Deri. Between them they helped Joris to his feet and, with him stumbling but no longer limp, sidled along the wall to keep clear of the dwarf. Deri had not moved but grinned wolfishly at them until they disappeared under the inner portcullis.
Deri watched the mouth of the passage thoughtfully until Carys came and touched his arm. “Are you angry?” she asked. “I did not provoke them, I swear it. I was practicing on the fence there when I first saw them, and Joris asked about my work—but I saw the one you hit with the pebble slipping toward the tents, and I knew they had come to steal.”
“You tried to stop three men from stealing?” Deri asked, shaking his head. “Stupid! Why did you not run down and call the guards from the lower gate?”
“Because I did not want to see them maimed or hanged,” she said. “Not that I knew the guards were at the lower gate. I thought I was alone in the keep. But I stopped them from stealing quick enough. I told them I would tell you, and you would tell Telor, and he would tell the lord, who would pursue them to the ends of the earth.”
Deri’s expression softened at her first words, and he smiled understandingly, but he shook his finger at her. “You should have run before you threatened them, not after. Not that I mind. I enjoyed the exercise, but I might not have come in time, and you would not have enjoyed that.” He beckoned her to come with him and started toward the stable.
“No, no,” Carys protested, folding her dress as she walked beside him. “I am no fool. I was up in the rafters of the stable when I said I would accuse them. And I knew they would lie in wait in the hope I would come down after a little while so they could be rid of me and take what they wanted. But I had left Telor’s shirt near the pump to dry, and I was afraid they would take that.”
“You are ten times a fool,” Deri said, stopping and turning toward her, his voice harsh and angry for the first time. “A shirt is not that precious, even if it is Telor’s. Do not look too fondly at him, Carys. He is good and kind—but he is good and kind to every woman who smiles at him.”
“But it was not mine,” Carys cried.
Deri’s bourgeois assumption that Carys would expect fidelity from Telor if they became lovers was totally incomprehensible to her. Thus, she was too surprised by what Deri had said to make any reply other than what had been in her mind all along. As she spoke, she wondered what it could
possibly matter to her if Telor slept with every woman who smiled at him. Even if she should be crazy enough to lie with him herself and find pleasure in it, what he did at other times with other women was no business of hers.
“Child—” Deri spoke very gently now. “Can you believe that Telor or I would prefer you beaten or dead to the loss of a shirt?”
Carys stared at him blankly for a moment, bringing her mind back from Deri’s previous, puzzling remark, and then sighed. “It was stupid,” she said slowly. “I do not know why I…I suppose it was because Ulric was so stupid. He would not have wanted me hurt either, but he could not think so far ahead as to see what would have happened, so he would have beaten me for losing the shirt and…and I was growing as empty-headed as he.” She shuddered sharply and then laughed and added merrily, “Oh, well, since I risked my neck for it, I guess I had better fetch it down from the roof.”
Deri had not interrupted her slow thinking out of why she had acted so senselessly because the lump in his throat made it impossible for him to speak without weeping. Now he watched her run lightly across the bailey and leap for the roof, hang for a moment from one hand to snatch the shirt with the other, and jump lightly down again. The lithe, easy motions recalled to him her assault on Joris’s companion, and his sympathy was swallowed up in admiration. He was a fine acrobat himself—a necessity for a dwarf who wished to deal with normal-sized men on terms of equality—but there could be no doubt that Carys was a better one. Apparently she had not been boasting when she claimed to be an expert rope dancer.
“I am sorry I missed your practice,” he said. “I am looking forward to seeing your work.”
“I will show you as soon as I have unsaddled Surefoot,” she called over her shoulder as she trotted back to the pump to pick up her dress.
“I will take care of Surefoot myself,” Deri said, his voice grating a little with pity at the way the girl seemed ready to accept all the menial duties. “There is something else I want you to do.”
“I like to tend the horses,” Carys protested, afraid she would be set to some woman’s task that, though physically easier, would be far more time-consuming.
Deri laughed. “You will like this, and anyway, I think I will not unsaddle. I had better ride down to the field again and tell Telor what happened. He should know in case Joris decides to complain to de Dunstanville about being beaten—”
Carys giggled. “By a boy and a dwarf? Do you think he will complain or that the lord will believe him?”
“Oh, the lord will believe him.” Deri’s lips twisted cynically. “One of his men challenged me to wrestle the last time Telor and I stopped here. His lordship was not overpleased when I threw his man, and he set two more on me. It was fortunate that a neighbor rode in just then and applauded my skill so heartily that de Dunstanville thought better of having his whole troop pull me to pieces. But Joris will not know that, so you may be right that he will not complain. Still, I think Telor should know that those three intended thievery. You cannot be sure that one did not steal while the others watched for you. They will be gone before Telor can report it, so if nothing was lost, no harm will be done.”
Carys nodded, having thought the same herself, but she said uneasily, “You do not mind that I will not join them, or the others?”
“No, and neither will Telor. We have decided to go to Oxford. Perhaps you will find a troupe there.”
Deri was about to add that before she decided she should consider doing a single act with him as fool to drum and call for her and Telor to play, but he thought better of it and instead beckoned her to follow him into the stable, where Surefoot had wandered to stand by Doralys. It would be unwise to make her party to his plan before he had induced Telor to agree to it. He gestured to the bundle of clothing tied to the saddle.
“Untie that,” he said flatly, and as soon as she had undone it from the saddle, he placed his right foot in the leather loop that hung low enough to permit him to get his left into the stirrup and mount without help. “Telor wants his clothes back. If you work while you are still with us, you can pay back the cost of what we bought for you with part of your takings. If you go to another troupe, the leader will have to pay.”
He turned Surefoot and was riding out of the stable before Carys had managed to close her mouth, which had dropped open in surprise; but once the initial shock was over she dropped to her knees and swiftly undid the sleeves of the tunic. She froze into stillness for another moment, shocked again at the richness and variety of garments, but in the next instant she was up and running. She caught up with Deri about halfway across the bailey.
“Wait! Wait!”
Deri looked down at her, grinning. As at the booths, her eyes were so big they were all one could see of her face, but they were like molten gold in the sun rather than the dark pools of longing with which she had gazed at the unobtainable. He felt a warm pleasure in giving her such joy, but only said jocularly, “What? Complaining already? You have not had time to try on anything, so it cannot be the fit. If the colors do not suit you, next time do not come away without your baggage.”
If she heard the jest, she gave no sign. “I can never pay for all that.”
There was no coy suggestion in her face for a way to wipe out the debt without touching her earnings, but there was no revulsion either, only a mixture of wonder and gratitude and fear. When Deri patted her shoulder, she did not recoil, only repeated, “I can never pay.”
“Nonsense,” he said briskly. “You are very ignorant. And I am afraid your partners cheated you, too. The clothing is not new and came cheap because this is the last day for selling. I will give you a tally stick of the cost, and you will be able to mark it off and know when you are free of debt.”
That assurance did not have the effect Deri expected; although it seemed impossible, Carys’s eyes got even bigger. She does not know what a tally stick is, Deri thought, and rage at how she had been mistreated mingled with pity so that his voice was harsh and abrupt when he added, “Go try on the shoes. If they are impossible to use, I will take them back and try to find another pair before the merchant packs away his goods.”
The angry tone brought an obedient nod from Carys, but she knew quite well that Deri was not angry with her. So many different ideas were whirling around in her head that she urgently needed to be alone, and trying on the shoes—she had not seen any shoes, but they must be there if Deri said they were—was as good a reason as any to go back to the stable without further words.
Kneeling beside the opened bundle, she lifted aside the green tunic and the two pairs of braies, gaped at the leather vest but did not pause to examine it, and at last found the shoes and pulled them on. They were too long, but that did not matter—the toes could be stuffed—so she went to the entrance of the stable and waved. Deri waved back and started toward the bridge again. He was smiling and content. Carys had understood that the clothes were not meant as a bribe for her body.
Actually, Carys was still too stunned to understand anything; however, the one idea that had not come into her mind was that Deri might want to couple with her as part payment for what he had brought her. Morgan and Ulric had taken her as a right, and without conscious thought she assumed Deri would have tried that already if he wanted her.
When she went back into the stable, Carys did not touch or try on any of the other garments. She sank down beside the bundle of clothes and put her hands to her head, as if to hold it on. Then she brought them down and folded them together and sighed, “Lady, Lady,” but she did not dare pray, having the feeling that even giving thanks would be dangerous in calling the attention of a deity to her. Nothing she could actively remember had prepared her for such wonders of kindness—but something buried very deep sent out a pulse of warmth that accepted without doubt. Finally, her hands went out to touch and turn over the treasures she had been given. She wept over the fine comb, kissing it and caressing it, sighing with delight as she passed it through her hair and felt how smoothly th
e teeth ran, and laughing at the pain when it caught on a tangle and she was able to work it free.
So much, so much, she thought. I never will be able to pay. And that brought the tally stick back to mind. It was true that she knew nothing of tally sticks, aside from the fact that they were used to keep accounts. No one had kept accounts, even when Morgan led the troupe. Takes were shared out among the players who had a share after each performance. It was true that she had never had a share, but it had not really been cheating, Carys thought. There was no amount that could repay Morgan for just keeping her alive for so many years before she was worth anything to anyone. And Ulric…
What had happened to her after Morgan died? Now that she was no longer sick inside with terror, she realized that something had happened to her. Had she loved Morgan? Not as a woman loved a man, that was sure, but she had not been frightened until she lost him. How she had hated him for letting himself be killed! His stupidity had destroyed her world, and now she thought back on herself after Morgan’s death and saw a different person, dull and vicious, who fought to live as an animal did. Over those horrible years, life seemed to be broken into pieces so that anything more than simply staying alive lost all meaning—like washing—and she had not been able or had not cared to put the shards together into some kind of whole.
That was why she went with Ulric, she thought, cocking her head to the side with brightening eyes as she made some sense out of something that was as stupid as Morgan getting killed. She had done it because everything seemed ruined and she had wanted all the worst to happen at once. It seemed now, looking back, that she had not been “herself” for a very long time. But a piece of that self had been alive, the piece that was a rope dancer. Because she had held to her art, the world had come together again and she was safe with Telor and Deri. If she had drifted into whoring, they would have left her at Chippasham—she knew that.
The Rope Dancer Page 15