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“What? Da, are you going to take me with you?”
“Cursed right. And today.”
“Now, here,” Macyn broke in. “Hadn’t you best wait and think this over? You’re not yourself right now, and—”
“By all the ice in all the hells!” Cullyn spun around, his hand on his sword hilt. “I’m as much myself as I need to be!”
“Ah, well.” Macyn stepped back. “So you are.”
“Get your clothes, Jill. Well go see your mother’s grave, and then well be on our way. I never want to see this stinking village again.”
Pleased and terrified all at the same time, Jill ran to the chamber and began bundling the few things she owned into a blanket. She could hear Macyn trying to talk to Cullyn and Cullyn snarling right back at him. She risked calling out softly to the Wildfolk. The gray gnome materialized in midair and floated to the straw-strewn floor.
“Da’s taking me away. Do you want to come? If you do, you’d better follow us or get on his horse.”
When the gnome vanished, Jill wondered if she’d ever see him again.
“Jill!” Cullyn yelled. “Stop talking to yourself and get out here!”
Jill grabbed her bundle and ran out of the tavern. Cullyn shoved her things into the bedroll tied behind his saddle, then lifted her up on top of it. When he mounted, Jill slipped her arms around his waist and rested her face against his broad back. His shirt was stained all over in a pattern of blurry rings, rust marks made by his sweating inside his chain mail. His shirts always looked like that.
“Well,” Macyn said. “Farewell, Jill.”
“Farewell.” All at once she wanted to cry. “And my thanks for being so good to me.”
Macyn waved, somewhat teary-eyed. Jill turned on her uneasy perch to wave back as the horse started off.
On the downhill side of the village stood the holy oaks, sacred to Bel, god of the sun and the king of all the gods. Scattered among them were the village burials. Although Seryan had no stone to mark her grave as the richer people did, Jill knew that she would never forget where it lay. As soon as she led her father there, Cullyn began to keen, throwing himself down full-length on it, as if he were trying to hold his beloved through the earth. Jill trembled until at last he fell silent and sat up.
“I brought your mama a present this trip,” Cullyn said. “And by the gods, she’s going to have it.”
Cullyn pulled his silver dagger and cut out a piece of sod, then dug a shallow hole. He took a bracelet out of his shirt and held it up for Jill to see: a thin rod of bronze, twisted round and round to look like rope. He put it into the hole, smoothed the dirt down, and put the chunk of sod back.
“Farewell, my love,” he whispered. “For all my wandering, I never loved a woman but you, and I pray to every god you believed me when I told you that.” He stood up and wiped the dagger blade clean on the side of his brigga. “That’s all the mourning you’ll ever see me do, Jill, but remember how I loved your mother.”
“I will, Da. Promise.”
All afternoon, they rode down the east-running road, a narrow dirt track through sharp-peaked hills and pine forests. Every now and then they passed fields where the grain stood green and young. The farmers would turn to stare at the strange sight of a warrior with a child behind his saddle. Jill was soon stiff and sore on her uncomfortable perch, but Cullyn rode so wrapped in a dark brooding that she was afraid to speak to him.
Just at twilight, they crossed a shallow river and reached the walled town of Averby. Cullyn dismounted and led the horse along narrow twisting streets while Jill clung to the saddle and looked round wide-eyed. She had never seen so many houses in her life—easily two hundred of them. On the far side they reached a shabby inn with a big stable out in back, where the innkeep greeted Cullyn by name and gave him a friendly slap on the shoulder. Jill was too tired to eat dinner. Cullyn carried her upstairs to a dusty wedge-shaped chamber and made her a bed out of his cloak on a straw mattress. She fell asleep before he’d blown the candle out.
When she woke, the room was full of sunlight, and Cullyn was gone. Jill sat up in a panic, trying to remember why she was in this strange chamber with nothing but a pile of gear. It wasn’t long before Cullyn came back, with a brass bowl of steaming water in one hand and a large chunk of bread in the other.
“Eat this, my sweet,” he said.
Gladly Jill started in on the bread, which was studded with nuts and currants. Cullyn set the bowl down, rummaged in his saddlebags for soap and a fragment of mirror, then knelt on the floor to shave. He always shaved with his silver dagger. As he took it out, Jill could see the device engraved on the blade, a striking falcon, which was Cullyn’s mark, graved or stamped on everything he owned.
“That dagger looks awfully sharp, Da.”
“It is.” Cullyn began lathering his face. “It’s not pure silver, you see, but some sort of alloy. It doesn’t tarnish as easily as real silver, and it holds an edge better than any steel. Only a few silversmiths in the kingdom know the secret, and they won’t tell anyone else.”
“Why not?”
“And how should I know? A suspicious lot, the smiths who serve the silver dagger. I tell you, not just any exile or dishonored man can buy one of these blades. You have to find yourself another silver dagger and ride with him awhile—prove yourself, like—and then he’ll pledge you to the band.”
“Do you have to show him you can fight good?”
“Fight well.” Cullyn began to shave in neat, precise strokes. “That’s somewhat of it, truly, but only a part. Here, silver daggers have an honor of our own. We’re scum, all of us, but we don’t steal or murder. The noble lords know we don’t, and so they trust us enough to give us our hires. If a couple of the wrong kind of lads got into the band, gave us a bad name, like, well, then, we’d all starve.”
“Da, why did you want to be a silver dagger?”
“Don’t talk with your mouth full. I didn’t want to. It was the only choice I had, that’s all. I’ve never heard of a man being so big a fool as to join up just because he wanted to.”
“I don’t understand.”
Cullyn considered, wiping the last bit of lather off his upper lip with the back of his hand.
“Well,” he said at last. “No fighting man joins the daggers if he has a chance at a decent life in a lord’s dun. Sometimes men are fools, and we do things that mean no lord would let us ride in his warband ever again. When that happens, well, carrying the dagger is a fair sight better than sweeping out a stable or suchlike. At least you get to fight for your hire, like a man.”
“You never could have been a fool!”
Cullyn’s lips twitched in a brief smile.
“But I was, truly. A long time ago your old Da here was a rider in a warband in Cerrmor, and he got himself into a good bit of trouble. Never dishonor yourself, Jill. You listen to me. Dishonor sticks closer to you than blood on your hands. So my lord kicked me out, as he had every right to do, and there was nothing left for me but the long road.”
“The what?”
“The long road. That’s what silver daggers call our life.”
“But Da, what did you do?”
Cullyn turned to look at her with eyes so cold that Jill was afraid he was going to slap her.
“When you’re done eating,” he said instead, “we’re going to the market fair and buy you some lad’s clothes. Dresses aren’t any good for riding and camping by the road.”
And Jill realized that she would never have the courage to ask him that question again.
Cullyn was as good as his word about the new clothes. In fact, he bought her so many things, boots, brigga, shirts, a good wool cloak and a small ring brooch to clasp it with, that Jill realized she’d never seen him with so much money before, real coins, all of them bright-minted silver. When she asked him about it, Cullyn told her that he’d captured a great lord’s son on the field of battle, and that this money was the ransom the lord’s family had to pay him to get their son back.
“That was honorable, Da. Not killing him, I mean, and then letting him go home.”
“Honorable? I’ll tell you, my sweet, it’s every silver dagger’s dream to capture a lord single-handedly. It’s the coin you want, not the glory. And by the hells, many a poor lordling has made himself a rich lord doing the same thing.”
Jill was honestly shocked. Taking someone prisoner for profit was one of those things that never got mentioned in the bard songs and the glorious tales of war. She was glad enough of the coin, however, especially when Cullyn bought her a pony, a slender gray that she named Gwindyc after the great hero of ancient times. When they returned to the inn, Cullyn took Jill up to their chamber, made her change her clothes, then unceremoniously cropped off her hair like a lad’s with his silver dagger.
“That long hair’s too messy for the road. May the gods blast me if I spend my time combing it for you like a nursemaid!”
Jill supposed that he was right, but when she looked at herself in his bit of mirror, she felt that she no longer really knew who she was. The feeling persisted when they went down to the tavern room of the inn for the noon meal. She wanted to get up and help Blaer the innkeep serve, not sit there and eat stew with the other customers. Because it was market day, the tavern was crowded with merchants, who all wore checked brigga as a sign of their station. They looked Cullyn over with a shudder for the silver dagger in his belt and gave him as wide a berth as possible. Jill was just finishing her stew when three young riders from a warband swaggered in and demanded ale. Jill knew they were a lord’s riders because their shirts had embroidered blazons, running stags in this case, on the yokes. They stood right in the way near the door and kept Blaer so busy that when Cullyn wanted more ale, he had to get up and fetch it himself. As he was coming back with the full tankard, he passed the three riders. One of them stepped forward and deliberately jogged Cullyn’s arm, making him spill the ale.
“Watch your step,” the rider sneered. “Silver dagger.”
Cullyn set the tankard down and turned to face him. Jill climbed up on the table so she could see. Grinning, the other two riders moved back to the wall.
“Are you looking for a fight?” Cullyn said.
“Just looking to make a lout of a silver dagger mind his manners. What’s your name, scum?”
“Cullyn of Cerrmor. And what’s it to you?”
The room went dead silent as every man in it turned to stare. The other two riders laid urgent hands on their friend’s shoulders.
“Come along, Gruffidd. Just drink your wretched ale. You’re a bit young to die.”
“Get away,” Gruffidd snarled. “Are you calling me a coward?”
“Calling you a fool.” The rider glanced at Cullyn. “Here, our apologies.”
“Don’t you apologize for me,” Gruffidd said. “I don’t give a pig’s fart if he’s the Lord of Hell! Listen, silver dagger, not half of those tales about you can be true.”
“Indeed?” Cullyn laid his hand on his sword hilt.
It seemed that the whole room gasped, even the walls. Jill clasped her hands over her mouth to keep from screaming. Frightened men leapt back.
“Here!” Blaer yelped. “Not in my inn!”
Too late—Gruffidd drew his sword. With a sour smile, Cullyn drew his own, but he let the blade trail lazily in his hand with the point near the floor. The room was so quiet that Jill heard her heart pounding. Gruffidd moved and struck—his sword went flying. Across the room men yelped and dodged as the sword fell clattering to the floor. Cullyn had his blade raised, but casually, as if he were only using it to point out something. There was a smear of blood on it. Cursing under his breath, Gruffidd clutched his right wrist with his left hand. Blood welled between his fingers.
“I call you all to witness that he struck first,” Cullyn said.
The room broke into excited whispers as Gruffidd’s friends dragged him away. Blaer hurried after them, quite pale and carrying the rider’s sword. Cullyn wiped the blood off his blade on his brigga leg, sheathed it, then picked up his tankard and came back to the table.
“Jill, get down!” he snapped. “Where’s your courtesy?”
“I just wanted to see, Da. That was splendid. I never even saw you move.”
“Neither did he. Well, Jill, I’m going to drink this ale, and then we’ll be packing up and getting on the road.”
“I thought we were going to stay here tonight.”
“We were.”
All aflutter, Blaer ran over.
“By the pink asses of the gods! How often does this sort of thing happen to you?”
“Far too often. These young dogs would count it an honor to be the man who killed Cullyn of Cerrmor.” Cullyn took a long swallow of ale. “So far all they’ve won for their trouble is a broken wrist, but ye gods, it wearies me.”
“So it must.” Blaer shuddered as if he were cold. “Well, lass, it’s a strange life you’re going to lead, riding with him. You’ll make some man a cursed strange wife someday, too.”
“I’ll never marry a man who isn’t as great a swordsman as my Da. So probably I’ll never marry at all.”
That afternoon they rode fast and steadily, finally stopping about an hour before sunset when Cullyn judged that they’d gotten far enough away from Gruffidd’s warband. They found a farmer who let them camp in a corner of his pasture and who sold them oats for Cullyn’s horse and the new pony. While Cullyn scrounged dead wood from the nearby forest for a fire, Jill put the horses on their tether ropes and staked them out. She had to stand on the head of the stakes and use her whole weight, but finally she forced them in. She was starting back to the camp when the gray gnome appeared, popping into reality in front of her and dancing up and down. With a laugh, Jill picked him up in her arms.
“You did follow me! That gladdens my heart.”
The gnome gave her a gape-mouthed grin and put his arms around her neck. He felt dry, a little scaly to the touch, and smelled of freshly turned earth. Without thinking, Jill carried him back to camp and talked all the while about the things that had happened on the road. He listened solemnly, then suddenly twisted in her arms in alarm and pointed. Jill saw Cullyn, trotting back with a load of wood, and his eyes were narrow with exasperation. The gnome vanished.
“Jill, by the gods!” Cullyn snapped. “What cursed strange kind of game or suchlike were you playing? Talking to yourself and pretending to carry something, I mean.”
“It was naught, Da. Just a game.”
Cullyn dumped the wood onto the ground.
“I won’t have it. It makes you look like a half-wit or suchlike, standing around talking to yourself. I’ll buy you a doll if you want something to talk to that badly.”
“I’ve got a doll, my thanks.”
“Then why don’t you talk to it?”
“I will, Da. Promise.”
Cullyn set his hands on his hips and looked her over.
“And just what were you pretending? More of that nonsense about the Wildfolk?”
Jill hung her head and began scrubbing at the grass with the toe of her boot. Cullyn slapped her across the face.
“I don’t want to hear a word of it. No more of this babbling to yourself.”
“I won’t, Da. Promise.” Jill bit her lip hard to keep back the tears.
“Oh, here.” Suddenly Cullyn knelt down in front of her and put his hands on her shoulders. “Forgive me the slap, my sweet. Your poor old father’s all to pieces these days.” He hesitated for a moment, looking honestly troubled. “Jill, listen to me. There’s plenty of people in the kingdom who believe the Wildfolk are real enough. Do you know what else they believe? That anyone who can see them is a witch. Do you know what could happen to you if someone heard you talking to the Wildfolk? For all that you’re but a little lass, there could be trouble over it. I don’t want to have to cut my way through a crowd of farmers to keep you from being beaten to death.”
Jill went cold all over and started shaking. Cullyn drew her into his arms and hugged her, but she felt like shoving him away and running wildly into the forest. But I do see them, she thought, does that make me a witch? Am I going to turn into an old hag and have the evil eye and poison people with herbs? When she realized that she couldn’t even share these fears with her father, she began to cry.
“Oh, here, here,” Cullyn said. “My apologies. Now don’t think of it anymore, and we’ll have a bit to eat. But now you know why you can’t go babbling about Wildfolk where other people can hear you.”
“I won’t, Da. I truly, truly promise.”
In the middle of the night, Jill woke up to find the world turned to silver by moonlight. The gray gnome was hunkered down near her head as if he were keeping guard over her. Since Cullyn was snoring loudly, Jill risked whispering to him.
“You’re my best and truest friend, but I don’t want to be a witch.”
The gnome shook his head in a vigorous no.
“Isn’t it true? Do only witches see you?”
Again came the reassuring no. He patted her face gently, then disappeared with a gust of wind that seemed to send the moonlight dancing. For a long time Jill lay awake, smiling to herself in profound relief. Yet she knew that her Da was right; from now on, she would have to be very careful.
