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Even though dark clouds hung close to earth all day in what might have been either a heavy fog or an outright drizzle, out in the sacred grove beyond the city walls of Aberwyn the ancient oaks glowed with a light of their own, the autumnal splendour of their scarlet and gold leaves. A few sparks of that flame had fluttered down to lie in the muddy grave like golden offerings to match the grave goods already in place, jars and ewers of mead and oil, loaves of bread, a fine sword in a gilded scabbard, pottery statues of the gwerbret’s favourite horses, all set around the wicker-work chariot. Although Deverry men had stopped fighting from chariots some thousand years earlier, their memory persisted as a thing belonging to heroes, and great men were buried in them, but lying down, unlike their ancestors, who were sometimes propped up in a parody of action that seemed indecent to Deverrian minds.
Lovyan, Tieryn Dun Gwerbyn, regent to the gwerbretrhyn of Aberwyn, stood at the edge of the grave and watched the shaven-headed priests of Bel clambering around in the mud as they laid the body of Rhys Maelwaedd, her eldest son, down for his last rest. By then the rituals were long over, and most of the huge crowd of mourners gone, but she lingered, unable to cry or keen, weary to the very heart, as they arranged his fine plaid, the silver, blue, and green of Aberwyn, around him. Once they began to fill in the grave, she would leave, she decided. She had watched wet earth fall on the faces of other men she had loved, her husband, her second son Aedry, the third son dead in childbirth that they’d never even named; she had no need to watch it again.
Beside her Nevyn laid a comforting hand on her shoulder. A tall man, with a shock of white hair and piercing blue eyes, he had skin as wrinkled as one of the fallen leaves and hands spotted all over from age, but he stood as straight and walked as vigorously as a young warrior. Although everyone who knew him considered his energy a marvel, Lovyan was one of the few who knew the truth, that he owed it to the dweomer of light, because he was one of the greatest sorcerers who had ever lived in Deverry. Just lately he had come into her service as a councillor, but in truth, she assumed, she was the one who was serving his particular ends. It mattered not to her, because not only did she trust him, but their particular goals were, for the moment at least, the same.
‘It’s cold out here, Your Grace,’ he said, his voice soft with sympathy.
‘I’m well aware of that, my thanks. We’ll be leaving soon.’
The priests were fastening the enormous golden ring-brooch to the plaid and clasping it closed around the dead gwerbret’s neck. She looked away and saw two men pushing a slab of stone, balanced on a hand-cart, towards the grave. The epitaph was already carved, an englyn of praise for the ruler of Aberwyn, lost to a hunting accident, but of course, it never mentioned the true cause of his death: evil dweomer. She shuddered, remembering the day when they’d ridden out together to fly their hawks. They’d been calmly trotting down the river road when Rhys’s horse had gone mad, bucking and rearing, finally falling to crush its rider. Even at the time the accident had seemed inexplicable; later she had learned that dark dweomermen had caused the horse’s madness and thus had murdered Rhys as surely as if they’d used a sword. Why? That, no one knew.
The priests climbed out of the grave and signalled to the diggers, leaning on their shovels nearby. Lovyan blew a kiss at her dead son.
‘Sleep well, little one,’ she whispered, then turned away. ‘Come along, all of you. We’d best get back to the dun.’
Nevyn took her arm, and the small crowd of pages and serving women fell in behind her as they made their silent way to the edge of the grove, where her escort was waiting. Twenty-five men of Rhys’s warband and fifteen of her own stood at respectful attention beside their horses. As she approached, her captain, Cullyn of Cerrmor, led over her horse, a beautiful golden mare with a silvery mane and tail, and held it for her as she mounted and adjusted her long dresses and cloak over the side-saddle.
‘My thanks, captain.’ She took the reins from him, then turned in the saddle to make sure that the rest of her retinue were ready to ride. ‘Well and good, then. Let’s get back home.’
At the captain’s signal the men mounted, and the procession set off, Lovyan and Nevyn at the head, her women and pages just behind, and bringing up the rear, the warbands. As they rode up to the high city walls, the men on duty at the gates snapped to smart attention, but Lovyan barely saw them, so wrapped in numb grief was she. It’s all been too much, she thought to herself; simply too much to bear. Yet in her heart she knew that she could indeed bear it, that she would somehow find from somewhere the strength to see her through the difficult months ahead. Many noblewomen, it seemed, lived lives that allowed them the luxury of hysterics; they could wallow in fits of weeping, or shut themselves up dramatically in their chambers and get sympathy from half the kingdom with no one being the worse for it; she, however, had always had to stifle her griefs and rise above her weaknesses. At times, such as that moment in the chilly drizzle, she resented it, but even in her resentment she knew that she’d been given the better bargain by the gods.
As the procession wound through the rain-slick cobbled streets of Aberwyn, the townsfolk came out of house and shop to pay their respects quite spontaneously to the tieryn, who had been well-liked here when she’d been the wife of the then gwerbret, Tingyr, before their son Rhys inherited the rhan. Their heads bared to the drizzle, the men bowed and the women curtsied, and here and there someone called out ‘Our hearts ache for you, Your Grace’, or ‘Our sorrows go with you’. Lovyan’s heart ached more for them. Soon, unless she and Nevyn were successful in averting it, war would ravage Aberwyn’s prosperous streets, and these people would have more to sorrow over than her mourning.
The rank of gwerbret was an odd one in the Deverry scheme of things. Although by Lovyan’s time the office passed down from father to son, originally, back in the Dawntime, gwerbrets had been elected magistrates, called ‘vergobretes’ in the old tongue. A remnant of this custom still survived in the Council of Electors, who met to choose a new gwerbret whenever one died without an heir. Since the rank brought with it many an honour as well as a fortune in taxes and property, every great clan and a few optimistic lesser ones as well vied among themselves to be chosen whenever the line of sucession broke, and more often than not, the contest turned from a thing of bribes and politicking into open war. Once the Council got to fighting among themselves, the bloodshed could go on for years, because not even the King could intervene to stop it. Any king who marched in defiance of the laws would find himself with long years of resentment and rebellion on his hands. The most his highness could do was use his honorary seat on the Council to urge peace if he were so minded, or to politick along with everyone else for the candidate he favoured. The latter was the more usual occurrence.
Since Rhys had died childless, the members of the Council were already jockeying for position at the starting line of this possible horse race. Lovyan knew full well that they were beginning to form half-secret alliances and to accept gifts and flatteries that were very nearly bribes. She was furious, in a weary sort of way, for though Rhys had no sons, he did leave a legal heir, one marked with the approval of the King himself, Rhodry, Rhys’s younger brother and her last-born son. If only Rhodry were home safe in Aberwyn there would be no need for Council meetings disguised as social visits, but he had been sent into exile some years before by a fit of his brother’s jealousy and no better cause. Now, with the King’s own decree of recall published and all Aberwyn waiting for him as heir, he had disappeared, as well and thoroughly gone as a morning mist by a hot noontide. When the King had made his proclamation of recall, some days before, his highness had set the term as a year and a day – just a year and a day for them to find the heir and bring him home. Less than that now, she thought; an eightnight’s almost gone.
Although she was certain that Nevyn knew his where abouts, the old man was refusing to tell her. Every time she asked, he put her off, saying that someone was on their way to bring Rhodry back home and no more. She knew perfectly well that her son was in some grave danger. By trying to spare her feelings, Nevyn was making her anxiety worse, or so she assumed, thinking that her troubled mind would no doubt make up worse dangers than her lad was actually in. She suspected that some of those who coveted Aberwyn had kidnapped him, and she lived in terror that they would kill him before Nevyn’s mysterious aide could rescue him. If, however, she had known the truth, she would have seen the wisdom in Nevyn’s silence.
That night the drizzle turned into a full-fledged winter storm, a long howl and slash of rain pounding out of the south. It was only the first of many, Nevyn knew; the winter promised to be a bad one, and the Southern Sea impassable for many a long month. In his chamber, high up in the main broch of Aberwyn’s dun, the shutters strained and banged in their latches, and the candle-lanterns guttered in the draughts. Although the charcoal brazier was glowing a cherry-red, he put on a heavy wool cloak and arranged the peaked hood around his neck to ward off the creeping chill. His guest was even more uncomfortable. A Bardekian, close to seven feet tall and massively built, Elaeno had skin so dark that it was as blue-black as ink, a colour indicating that he was at home in hot climates, not this damp draughtiness. This particular night he was muffled up in two cloaks over a pair of linen shirts and some wool brigga that had been specially sewn to fit him. Even so, he shivered at each gust of wind.
‘How do you barbarians manage to survive in this godforsaken climate?’ Elaeno inched his chair a bit closer to the brazier.
‘With great difficulty, actually. You should be glad we’re here on the coast, not way up north, say in Cerrgonney. At least it rarely snows in Eldidd. Up to the north they’ll be over their heads in the stuff in another month.’
‘You know, I’ve never seen snow. I can’t say I’m pining away from the lack.’
‘It wouldn’t ache my heart if I never saw the nasty stuff again, either. I’m cursed grateful you’d winter here.’
‘You don’t need to keep saying that.’
‘My thanks, but ye gods, I feel so weary these days. There’s so blasted much riding on our Rhodry, and there he is, off in Bardek where we can’t reach him till spring, and the gods only know how he’s faring. When I think of the worst possibilities – ’
‘Don’t think of them. Just don’t. There’s naught we can do now, so don’t dwell on what might be. Easier said than done, I’ll admit.’
With a sigh Nevyn took a scoopful of charcoal out of the bucket and scattered it into the brazier, where the Wildfolk of Fire were dancing and sporting on the pinkish-red coals. Although he wasn’t sure who had hired them, Nevyn knew that Rhodry had been kidnapped by one of the Bardekian blood guilds, who permanently removed little problems like rivals for an inheritance for those that had the coin to hire them. He could only hope that the lad was still alive, and that if he were, he hadn’t been put to the – resolutely he turned his mind away. The blood guilds were known to amuse themselves with their prisoners in ways that did not bear thinking about. When he heard distant thunder crack, he jumped like a startled cat.
‘I’ve never seen you this worried,’ Elaeno remarked.
‘Naught’s come along to worry me this badly in close to a hundred years.’
‘I keep forgetting just how long you’ve lived.’
‘It’s a hard thing to remember, no doubt. I tend to forget it myself. Along with a great many other things about the past, let me tell you. It all blurs together after a while.’
‘I see.’ Elaeno hesitated for a long while on the edge of a question. ‘You know, I’ve often wondered what’s given you your – well, I suppose it’s none of my affair.’
‘Hum? Haven’t you heard that tale? You see what I mean about my ancient mind? I’d been thinking I’d told you already, and here I’d forgotten I hadn’t. All those long years ago when I was young, and, truly, I was indeed young once no matter what I look like now, I loved a woman named Brangwen, and I got myself betrothed to her. But I thought I loved my dweomer studies more.’ Nevyn heaved himself out of his chair and began to pace by the brazier. ‘There are a great many ins and outs to this story, most of which I’ve forgotten, but in the end, I betrayed her. Because of me, Brangwen died, and her brother, and an innocent man who loved her, too. That part I’ll never forget. And it fell to me to dig her grave and bury her. I was beside myself with guilt and grief that day, well and truly shrieking mad with shame. So I swore a vow, that never would I rest until I’d put things right. And from that day to this, I’ve done my best to put them right, over and over as Brangwen and the others were reborn and crossed my path, but I’ve failed every time, and so I’ve never gone to my rest.’
‘Are you telling me that the Great Ones accepted a vow like that?’
‘They did. Well, I’d broken one vow, hadn’t I? I suppose they wanted to see if I could keep the new one.’ He laughed, but there was no mirth in it. ‘Does it seem wonderful to you, living over four hundred years?’
‘It doesn’t, and especially not when I hear the weariness in your voice.’
‘Good. You’ll go far in the dweomer, Elaeno.’ Nevyn sat down again and sighed with a heavy exhaustion. ‘But keep that vow I will. Brangwen belongs to the dweomer, and by every god in the sky, I’ll make her see it this time or die trying – Oh by the hells, what a stupid excuse for a jest!’
‘This time? She’s been reborn, then, has she?’
‘She has. Jill, Cullyn of Cerrmor’s daughter.’
Elaeno gaped.
‘The same lass that’s off with that lackwit Salamander,’ Nevyn said. ‘On her way to Bardek after Rhodry. The very same one indeed.’
The storm blew itself out finally after two long days of rain. Everyone was glad to get free of the enforced leisure of drowsy hours spent huddled near the hearths in the great hall, and the ward was a-bustle that morning when Cullyn went out just to be going out, walking in the fresh and rain-washed air. He was strolling across the ward, aiming for the main gates merely to have a goal, but about halfway there he paused, struck by some odd observation that for a moment he couldn’t identify. Someone he’d passed, back by the wash-house, was somehow out of place. He turned back and saw a young man he vaguely recognized, Bryc by name, one of the undergrooms, but he was carrying a load of firewood, and his walk was wrong, not the shuffle or scramble of a servant, but the confident stride of a warrior. Cullyn hesitated only a moment before following him. Sure enough, Bryc carried the anomalous firewood right past first the wash-house, then the cookhouse as well. There was no other building where that firewood might belong between him and the outer walls.
Cullyn stayed with him until the lad passed the armoury, then ducked into it, ran down to the door at the far end, and opened it a crack to look out. His hunch paid off. Bryc was indeed looking back to see if anyone was following him, but he did not notice that the armoury door was ever so slightly open. When he angled round a shed towards the broch complex, Cullyn slipped out and followed at a good distance, keeping close to the shadows of the various buildings. The lad never glanced back again until he reached the low brick wall that separated the gwerbret’s formal garden from the work-a-day rest of the ward. Cullyn hid in a doorway as Bryc unceremoniously dumped his load of firewood, looked cautiously around him, then leapt over the wall. As Cullyn went after, Bryc hurried across the lawn, where, some distance away, little Rhodda, Rhodry’s illegitimate daughter and only heir, played with a leather ball while her nursemaid, Tevylla, sat and sewed on a small stone bench. There was absolutely no reason for Bryc to be in the garden at all.
With an oath, Cullyn drew his sword and broke into a run. He leapt the wall just as the fellow made a grab at the child. Screaming, Tevylla jumped up and hurled her sewing scissors at his head – a miss, but he had to duck and lost a precious moment. As he charged across the lawn, Cullyn saw that Bryc had a dagger and that he was swinging down.
‘Run, lass!’
Rhodda twisted away and dodged as Bryc spun around, saw Cullyn coming, and turned to flee. Tevylla grabbed the leather ball and threw it under his feet. Down he went just as the captain reached him. He grabbed Bryc by the shirt, hauled him up, and broke his wrist with the flat of his sword. The dagger spun down to the grass. He kicked it far out of his prisoner’s reach.
‘Thanks be to the gods!’ Tevylla snatched it up. ‘Cullyn, I’m so glad you were right there.’
‘Oh, I don’t know. You seemed to be handling things pretty well on your own.’
Tevylla shot him a weary sort of smile, then tucked the dagger into her kirtle and scooped Rhodda up. The child herself was oddly calm, only a bit pale as she stared at her rescuer for a moment, then turned in her nurse’s arms to look at the whimpering Bryc.
‘Get him,’ she said to no one in particular. ‘He’s nasty.’
The lad screamed, twisted in the captain’s grasp, then threw himself this way and that in sincere pain while he screamed over and over again. When Cullyn, utterly startled, let him go he fell to the ground full-length and writhed and screamed the more.
‘Stop it!’ It was Nevyn, racing across the lawn. ‘Stop it right now, all of you! Rhodda, you wretched little beast!’
Sobbing and gasping for breath, Bryc flopped onto his stomach and hid his face in folded arms. Cullyn realized that the lad’s arms and face were nicked and bleeding, as if a hundred cats had been clawing at him. While Tevylla stepped back in horror, Rhodda giggled and snickered until Nevyn glared her into silence.
‘Never ever do that again,’ the old man said.
‘But he had a knife. He was nasty, Gran.’
‘I know. I saw it all from the window. You waited until he was helpless, and that’s dishonourable. Well, didn’t you?’
The child hung her head in shame.
‘What a sweet little poppet you have in your charge, Mistress Tevylla,’ Nevyn said. ‘She’s Rhodry’s daughter, sure enough.’
‘She’s a handful at times, truly, but here, good sir, you can’t be saying that she did all that.’ Tevylla pointed with one clog at the bleeding man on the ground.
‘You’ll have to take it on faith that she did, and you too, captain. Come here, Rhodda. I’m going to talk to you, and then we’re all going to go see your grandmother. Cullyn, drag that young dog along to the great hall.’
When Nevyn left, Tevylla started after, but the old man irritably waved her away. Trembling a little, as if the shock had finally just caught up to her, she lingered to watch while Cullyn knelt down, grabbing Bryc by the shoulders and flopping him over like a caught fish. In his pain the lad cried out and stared up at the captain in bewilderment. Something was wrong with Bryc’s eyes, or so Cullyn thought of it. He’d never seen any man look so bewildered, so utterly lost and confused, as if his very eyes themselves had clouded over until he stared without truly seeing a thing.
‘Here, lad, have you gone blind?’
‘Not at all, but captain, where am I? My wrist!’ Whimpering from the effort, he held up his broken hand and stared at the blood running. ‘Did I fall? Did the dogs do this to me? What is this?’ His voice rose to an utterly sincere hysterical wail. ‘Tell me, for the love of the gods! What am I doing here like this?’
Cullyn grabbed him again, but this time to steady him.
‘Hold your tongue, lad. I’ll explain in a bit. Can you stand? We’ve got to go see old Nevyn about this.’
‘The herbman? Oh, truly.’ His voice was a bare whisper. ‘It was like being asleep, then waking.’
‘Indeed? Well, come along. You’re safe now.’
Even though he’d spoken without thinking, Cullyn suddenly went cold, knowing that he’d told the truth, that Bryc had been in as much danger as the child. Tevylla caught her breath in a gasp.
‘How do you fare, lass?’ Cullyn said.
‘Well enough, captain. I just remembered somewhat.’
‘And it was?’
‘I won’t tell anyone but Nevyn, but I think me I’d best tell him straightaway.’
Since as regent it was one of Lovyan’s duties to administer the laws of the gwerbretrhyn, Nevyn had her convene their private hearing in the chamber of justice, yet they were a scruffy little crew among the splendours. On the wall hung the dragon banners of Aberwyn and the golden sword of justice; the massive oak table and the high-backed gwerbretal chair stood on a floor made of slate tiles, inlaid in a key pattern, but Lovyan perched on the edge of the chair with Rhodda in her lap while Nevyn had Bryc sit on the table itself so that he could bind the lad’s wrist as everyone gave their testimony. To Lovyan’s right Tevylla sat on a low bench with Cullyn hovering behind her. Once the testimony was over, the tieryn gave her granddaughter a little squeeze.
‘Oh ye gods,’ Lovyan said. ‘It seems obvious this lad tried to kill our Rhodda, and yet somewhat makes me doubt his guilt.’
‘Quite so, Your Grace,’ Nevyn said. ‘To be precise, his body was being used for the attempt, but his soul and mind are blameless. Now Tevva, what’s this urgent story you have to tell?’
‘This morning when I woke, my lord, I had what I thought was a strange dream. Have you ever had one of those dreams where you think you’re wide awake? Our chamber, Rhodda’s cot, the hearth – it all looked exactly right, and dawn was coming in the window, but when I tried to move, I couldn’t, and I realized that I was still asleep.’
‘Dreams of that sort do happen.’ Nevyn finished binding the lad’s wrist and turned to look at her. ‘What came after?’
‘I dreamt there was a witch in the chamber with me. My Mam used to say that a witch could draw out your soul and put it into a little jar. I laughed, then, but this morning, I felt just that, like someone was trying to steal my soul.’
Nevyn felt that weary sort of annoyance that comes from seeing your worst fear confirmed.
‘How did you fight this witch off?’
‘I don’t know.’ She looked profoundly embarrassed. ‘I couldn’t move to give the sign of warding, and I couldn’t even really see where the witch was. I just knew that she was there with me. So, I … well, I just sort of pushed back. I called on the Goddess to protect me, and pushed the witch away. Does that make any sense, my lord?’
‘It does to me, Mistress Tevva. Just one thing, though. That witch was more likely to be a man than a woman. You see, our enemies were trying to do to you what they eventually did to Bryc. They can take over a person’s body for a little while, if he’s weak enough, and use it like their own.’
Bryc moaned, tears starting in his eyes.
‘Your Grace,’ he said to the tieryn. ‘I never would have. Never would I have hurt the lass. Please believe me.’
Lovyan flicked Nevyn a questioning glance.
‘I believe him, Your Grace. Now that I know what they’re doing, I can put a stop to it, too. If I may make suggestions, Your Grace?’
‘Of course.’
‘Two things. Bryc needs to be sent away – not out of blame, mind, but for his sake.’ He turned to the heart-sick boy. ‘They’ve made a link with you now, lad, and they might try to use it again. If they’re successful, this time they’ll kill you. Do you understand? They’ll use you, then toss you aside.’
His face pale, Bryc nodded a slow agreement.
‘The other thing is, the captain should be the child’s bodyguard from now on. Whenever you go outside, Mistress Tevva, you take him along with you. I can’t imagine anyone taking over Cullyn’s mind.’
‘No more can I,’ Cullyn said. ‘I agree with Nevyn, Your Grace. Since they can’t work their stinking trickery anymore, they might send someone in here with a sword.’
‘Done, then.’ Lovyan gave them each a firm nod. ‘And as for you, Rhodda, you obey the captain’s orders from now on.’
‘I will, Granna.’
Everyone smiled, doting on the pretty little lass because she was such a welcome relief from the dark things around them. Only Nevyn knew that the child was touched by strange magicks, that thanks to the elven blood she’d inherited from her father, not only could she see the Wildfolk, she also could command them. Poor Bryc’s scratched and bruised face made it clear that she had a good streak of elven vengefulness, too. Even with all his other worries and burdens weighing him down, Nevyn knew that he’d have to scrape out a little time for her.
That night, his worries pressed heavily upon him. Just after sunset he went up to his high chamber and threw open the shutters to let in the brisk autumn air. The evening was so brilliantly clear that he could see far beyond the town down to the harbour, where the ghostly white wave-foam mirrored the stars just coming out in the velvet dark sky. Distantly he heard the booming of the bronze bell at Manannan’s temple, announcing that the gwerbret’s men were raising the iron chain to close the harbour for the night. In town, a few dogs barked in answer, and the dark was pricked or slashed here and there by a lantern bobbing down a street or a crack of light from a window. At the sight of the stars and the rising moon some of his weariness ebbed away, and he stood there for some minutes, leaning on the sill and thinking of very little, until a soft knock at his chamber door roused him. With a muttered apology, Elaeno slipped in, shutting the door softly behind him. It always amazed Nevyn that the enormous Bardekian moved as gracefully and quietly as a cat.
‘I was just taking a look at our prisoner,’ Elaeno said. ‘He seems much better today. It looks like he’s mending cursed fast. That fever he had should have killed an ordinary man … well, not that I’m any sort of a chirurgeon.’
‘Oh, I agree with your diagnosis well enough. Did you look at his aura?’
‘I did, and it seems a good bit stronger. I can’t get over that peculiar colour, a mucky sort of green it is, with those odd purplish stripes and specks.’
‘I’ve never seen one like it before, truly. Well, let’s go down and have a look at him. If he’s well enough, we’ll try a working. Let me just put together the herbs and things I need.’
The prisoner in question was housed in a small chamber in one of the half-towers that clustered round the main broch. Outside his door stood an armed guard, because Lord Perryn of Alobry had been until his recent capture one of the worst horse-thieves in the kingdom, an offence punishable by a public hanging after a public flogging. He had committed another, more serious crime as well, but Nevyn was keeping that a secret for several good reasons. The summer before, Perryn had abducted and raped Cullyn of Cerrmor’s only daughter, Jill, but he’d done it by a muddled dweomer in circumstances so unusual that Nevyn had no idea of whether or not he were a criminal or a victim of some peculiar spell. Although the matter would require more study before he reached his conclusions, if Cullyn found out, Perryn wouldn’t live long enough to be studied. As it was, he’d nearly died already from a consumption of the lungs brought on by his misuse of his instinctive magical powers.
That evening, though, he did seem much recovered, a peculiarity in itself. As Elaeno had said, that consumption was severe enough to have killed an ordinary human being. Nevyn was beginning to suspect that Perryn was far from ordinary, and, in fact, perhaps not truly human at all. On the tall side, Perryn was a skinny, nondescript sort of young man, with dull red hair and blue eyes, a flattish nose, and an overly generous mouth. At the moment he was also deathly pale, his eyes still rheumy as he sat up in bed and coughed into an old rag. When the two dweomermen came in, he looked up, whimpered under his breath, and shrank back against the heap of pillows behind him.
‘Still coughing up blood?’ Nevyn said.
‘None, my lord. Er, ah, well, is that all right?’
