The Black Raven. Katharine Kerr
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the human men, they diced to pass their time, although the elven game was a fair bit more complex. Each player took a handful of brightly-coloured wood pieces – cubes and pyramids both – shook them hard, then strewed them in a rough line. Counting the points amounted to another game in itself, with a lot of argument and token cursing from the other players. At times during these sessions one or another man from the warband would stroll over to the elven tables and watch their game, but they never asked to join, and no one invited them, either.
Every now and then a servant girl would come to the table to pour the men ale from a dented flagon or set out a meagre basket of bread. One particular evening, Rhodry realized that it was always the same girl, a buxom little blonde, when she stopped for a moment to chat with one of the archers, Melimaladar, a dark-haired fellow whose eyes were a smoky sort of green, unusual even for one of the People. They whispered together, head to head, until something he said made her giggle, and she trotted off, still smiling to herself.
Vantalaber took a sip of the ale she’d brought and nearly spat it out.
‘Ye gods, it’s watered!’ the captain snarled, but in Elvish. ‘Thin as swill!’
‘The dun’s running out,’ Rhodry said in the same language. ‘Soon enough the steward will be breaking out the vinegar.’
‘What? Why would anyone drink vinegar?’
‘You don’t drink the stuff for itself. You just put a dollop in a tankard of well water. To make it safe, like.’
‘Well, the way these people live in filth, I’m not surprised. But I don’t mean to insult all of humankind. Gwerbret Cadmar’s a fine man in his way.’
‘He is that,’ Rhodry said. ‘Though I worry about his health. He doesn’t have a son to inherit the rhan, and the last thing the Northlands can afford is a cursed feud over rulership.’
‘That doesn’t make any sense. What about his daughters?’
‘Van, they can’t inherit. They’re women. If Cadmar were only a tieryn or a lord, maybe his vassals would back a daughter, but she could never rule as gwerbret.’
Vantalaber rolled his eyes in disgust. Melimaladar, who’d been watching his blonde as she served other tables, leaned forward to join the conversation.
‘The daughters have got sons, right? What about them?’
‘Cadmar can designate a grandson as heir, yes,’ Rhodry said. ‘But the High King will have to approve it.’
‘Huh.’ Mel paused, thinking. ‘It’s a strange place, Deverry. I don’t like it. I feel like riding out right now, snow or no snow.’
‘We’ll all be leaving in the spring,’ Rhodry said. ‘What’s so wrong?’
Melimaladar exchanged a look with Vantalaber. All the archers at the table had fallen silent, Rhodry realized, to listen.
‘Well, look,’ Van said. ‘Here’s our Prince Dar, and he is a prince; none of us would deny it. But he’s a prince of the People, not one of your lords, and before this he’s always known what that means and how he should take it. Now look at him! He’s learning to give himself airs, isn’t he? With all the Round-ears bowing and scraping every time he walks into a room!’
Rhodry slewed round on the bench to look across the great hall. Near the honour hearth Cadmar was sitting in his carved chair with Prince Dar at his right hand and his favourite hounds lying at his feet. Once Cadmar had been a powerful man, but now his hair was white and his face somehow shrunken. Every now and then he would rub his twisted leg and its old injury, as if it pained him despite the warmth of the nearby fire.
By contrast Daralanteriel seemed all youth and strength, even though he sat still, contemplating the enormous sculpture of a dragon that curled around the hearth with its stone back for a mantel. He was an exceptionally handsome man even for one of the Westfolk, and Rhodry could see how a young girl like Carra would have followed him anywhere once he’d been kind to her. Over the winter his pale skin had turned even whiter, setting off his dark hair and violet eyes.
As they watched, Cadmar leaned forward to bark an order at the boys playing by the hearth. Two of them jumped up and ran off to do their lord’s bidding, but not before they’d bowed to both prince and gwerbret.
‘That kind of grovelling around,’ Vantalaber said. ‘I don’t like it. None of us do.’
‘Notice how the boys made their bow to Dar first?’ Melimaladar put in. ‘And how he smiled?’
‘And look at what he’s wearing,’ Vantalaber went on. ‘All the time now.’
Rhodry obligingly looked, though it took him a moment to see what Van meant. Around his neck on a golden chain the prince wore a gold pendant. In the firelight a jewel winked and gleamed.
‘By the Dark Sun herself!’ Rhodry whispered. ‘It’s Ranadar’s Eye.’
‘We all know he’s royal,’ Vantalaber said. ‘He doesn’t need to flaunt it.’
‘Just so,’ Rhodry said. ‘Huh. I’ll try to have a word with him. You’re right. The People will never stand for this, not out on the grass.’
* * *
Despite the cold in the tower room, Dallandra often stayed up late, reading one or another of Jill’s books by the silver light of the Wildfolk of Aethyr. Usually her studies led straight to her sleep work, when she went to the Gatelands to renew the magical wards that kept Rhodry’s dreams safe from Raena. That particular evening she had just finished restoring the flaming stars when Niffa joined her there. For some while they merely considered each other in the red and gold glow from the wards. She was a little thing, to Dalla’s elven way of thinking, not much more than five feet tall and slender with long dark hair that she wore loose over her shoulders.
‘There be a need on me to thank you,’ Niffa said finally. ‘Your news about our Jahdo did do my mam’s heart much good.’
‘I’m glad to hear it,’ Dallandra said. ‘He worries about her and the rest of you as well.’
‘Well, if you’d be so good, do tell him that Mam fares well, though in truth, she be sick again. There be naught he can do, so far away, and I’d not have him fret.’
‘I’ll do that, then. Is there a good herbwoman in your town?’
‘One of the best, or else I’d be sore troubled about my mam. Otherwise, there be much trouble upon us and our town. Tell me if you would – Raena, is it that she does cause grief to you and yours?’
‘She has in the past, truly. What’s she done to you?’
‘Naught that I can prove.’
‘Indeed? What do you think she’s done?’
‘Murdered my man, that’s what. I did see her in vision, like, laughing and laughing when he lay dead, but the councilman, and he be her man and not likely to bring her to trial, is he now? But the councilman, he did say it was evil spirits, and now the whole town does believe him.’
‘I have no idea of what you’re talking about.’ Dallandra paused for a smile. ‘Slowly now, lass. I don’t know the councilman nor much about your town. I didn’t even know you’d been married.’
Niffa’s dream image blushed.
‘My apologies,’ the lass said. ‘I do forget that you be your own self, somehow, and not just some woman in my dreams.’
‘And how do you know that?’
Niffa stared at her for a long moment. All at once her image wavered, turned pale, and faded away. No doubt Dallandra’s call for rational thought had woken her, because it takes long years of practice for dweomerworkers to stay lucid and rational in their dreams. Dallandra could safely assume that Niffa held no real control over her magical gifts. Someone should be teaching the lass, she thought. When she looked at the