The Red Wyvern by Katharine Kerr
They were looking roughly west, and the lazy sun was sinking into a haze of brilliant gold. Thanks to Loc Vaed’s heat, Cerr Cawnen itself lay free of snow, but beyond the town the first fall of the season turned pink and gold in answer to the setting sun. Here and there in the distance stood a copse, dark against the snow, or a farmer’s hut, barely visible in the drifts, with a feather of smoke rising from its chimney.
“It do be lovely up here, the long view,” Verrarc said.
“Someday soon, my love, I’ll be showing you a view so long that all this,” Raena paused to wave a contemptuous hand, “will look like a dungheap.”
“Oh, will you now?”
“I will. The things that I have seen, my love, did stagger my mind and my heart, just from the seeing of them. The world be a grand place, when you get yourself beyond the Rhiddaer.”
“No doubt.” Verrarc hesitated. “And just where have you been learning all these secrets?”
“You’ll know in good time.” She shivered and drew the cloak more tightly about her. “It be needful for me to consult with Lord Havoc, to see what I may be telling you.”
He looked at her sharply. Her mouth was set in a stubborn twist.
“Let’s get back to the house,” he said. “I want to see you warm, and I’ve got a few matters to attend to before the settling of the night.”
Dera had a rheum in her chest. Huddled in her cloak, she sat close to the hearth fire and sipped a mug of herb brew.
“Gwira left me a packet of botanicals,” Niffa said. “I can make more.”
Her mother merely nodded. She was a small woman, short and thin, and now she looked as frail as a child, hunched over her mug. Her once-blond hair hung mostly grey around her lined face.
“You be vexing yourself about our Jahdo, Mam. I can see it by the way you look at the fire.”
Dera nodded again. Niffa knelt down beside her and laid a hand on her arm.
“I do know it in my heart that he’ll be coming home to us safe, Mam. Truly I do. I did see it, nay, I have seen it many a time in my true dreaming.”
“Hush. You mayn’t speak about those things so plain, like.”
“There’s naught here but us two.”
“Still, it frightens me. And what would our townsfolk do, if they began thinking you could dream true and see deaths in their faces?”
“Well, true spoken. I’ll hold my tongue.”
Dera sighed, then coughed so hard she spasmed. Niffa grabbed a handful of straw from the floor and held it up for her mother to spit into, then tossed the wad into the fire.
“My thanks,” Dera whispered. “And will I be here when our Jahdo comes home?”
It took Niffa a moment to understand what her mother was asking.
“You will. I did see that as well, you laughing with us all.”
“Good. I—here, what be making that noise?”
From outside the two women heard shouting, swearing, and a peculiar sort of hollow bumping sound. Niffa got up and hurried to the door, opened it to a blast of cold air and peered out the crack. She could just see up the narrow steep alley that led from their door to the public street on the slope above. Panting and puffing, two men were struggling to get a four-foot-high barrel of ale down the rocky track without it escaping to crush the fellow at the bottom. The one at the top she recognized as Councilman Verrarc’s servant, Harl.
“What are you doing?” she called out.
“Bringing you a gift,” Harl panted. “From my master. For your wedding.”
“Less talk!” the other man snapped. “Don’t let it get away from you!”
With a grunt Harl steadied his grip on the barrel. Once they had it level with the entrance, getting the barrel over the doorstep and inside required a last round of curses and a lot of banging, but finally it stood on the straw-strewn floor. Harl and his helper—Niffa recognized him as one of the blacksmith’s sons now that he was visible—wiped their sweaty faces on the sleeves of their baggy winter shirts, then stood panting for a moment.
“Ye gods,” Harl said. “The stink of ferrets in this place be like to knock a man flat!”
The blacksmith’s lad nodded his agreement. Dera wrapped the cloak tightly around her and walked over to survey the gift, almost as tall as she.
“It be a kind thing for the councilman to remember us,” Dera said. “And so generously!”
“It be the best ale, too,” Harl said. “My master was particular about that, he was, the best dark ale. He did send it this early so it could settle. He said to tell you to leave it be till the wedding day itself.”
“We will, then.” Dera shot Niffa a glance. “And there be a need on you to go thank him.”
Niffa and her family, the town ratters, lived with their ferrets in two big rooms attached to the public granary, lodgings provided them in return for keeping the rats down. The big square building stood low on the Citadel hill, while Councilman Verrarc’s fine house stood high, just below the mysterious ruins at the island’s crest. To get there Niffa panted up the steep alley to the broader, cobbled path above, then followed it as it spiralled up the hill, past the whitewashed fronts of family compounds and the occasional stone bench, provided for the weary. She dodged between the militia’s armory and a huge boulder to come out on the next street up. Here and there, twisted little pine trees grew in patches of dirt or shoved their way to the sunlight from between rocks.
In the high white wall Councilman Verrarc’s outer gate stood open. Niffa walked into a square court, paved with flat reddish stones, where huge pottery tubs stood clumped together to catch rainwater. A pair of big black hounds, lying in a patch of sun, lifted their heads, sniffed at her, then thumped lazy tails. The house itself stood beyond them, a low white structure roofed in thatch. The front door sported a big brass ring. Niffa banged it on the wood, then waited, shifting from foot to foot, until it opened a bare crack. She could just see Magpie, a girl of about her own age, staring back out. Magpie had a pudgy round face, dark eyes, and a thin mouth that always hung a little open.
“Let me in, Maggi,” Niffa said. “There’s a need on me to see the councilman.”
Maggi considered, tilting her head a little.
“Come on now, you’ve had the knowing of me since we were children! Do let me in, and then fetch the councilman.”
When Magpie’s eyes narrowed, Niffa realized she’d made a mistake by linking two different tasks together. It would take the poor girl a while to sort that out, she supposed. Fortunately, a voice sounded from inside the house, and old Korla, a bent and withered woman who shuffled along in big sheepskin shoes, took over the door from her granddaughter.
“Ah,” Korla said to Niffa. “So, you’ve come about that ale?”
“I have. I do wish to thank your master properly for so fine a gift.”
Giggling to herself, Magpie ran off. Korla led Niffa into the councilman’s hall, a square room with a low-beamed ceiling and a floor covered with braided rushes. Below each shuttered window stood a carved chest; in the middle of the room, a table with benches; at the massive hearth, two carved wooden chairs with cushioned seats, and against the wall, three other chairs—a fortune of furniture for a Cerr Cawnen house. Here and there on mantel and table some small silver oddment caught the firelight and glittered. Sitting in one of the chairs, her feet up on a footstool, was Raena, dressed in fine blue cloth and with her hair bound up like a great lady. She acknowledged the servant with a small nod but said nothing to either her or Niffa.
“I’ll be fetching the master,” Korla said and shuffled through a side door.
Niffa walked close to the fire and held out her hands to the warmth. She could feel the older woman studying her, but when she looked up and arranged a smile, Raena looked away with a sneer. Perhaps she felt her shamed position—Niffa tried to think kindly about her. After all, Raena had been cast off by her husband for being unfaithful to him with Verrarc. She must have known that every woman in town gossiped about her.
“Be you well?” Niffa said. “Should I be calling your maid to you?”
“My thanks but no. Tired I be, not ill.” Her words slipped out one at a time.
“Very well, then, but I—”
Niffa stopped in mid-sentence, caught by the way Raena was looking at her. The older woman’s dark eyes glittered in the firelight, but her stare was cold, thorough, searching over Niffa as if she were hunting lice upon her cloak. All at once Niffa felt like screaming at her, like slapping her as well and yelling that she should take her filthy self out of Cerr Cawnen forever. She turned and hid her face in the shadows thrown by the fire, but she fancied that she could feel Raena’s cold stare prying at her back.
“Well, a good day to you, Niffa!”
Verrarc strode in through the side door. He was tall, the councilman, blond and good-looking by most people’s standards, but his blue eyes peered with a winter’s cold, and to Niffa his smiles looked as painted as a wooden doll’s.
“I trust your mam be well?” he went on.
“She does have a rheum, Councillor, though she fares better today than last. I did come in her place to thank you for that splendid gift.”
Briefly his smile turned warm.
“Most welcome you are to it, and your kin as well. Now, if your mother should need of somewhat, whether medicaments or food, please do ask me for it. I mean that from the bottom of my heart.”
He did, too—Niffa could tell even as she wondered why his very generosity irked her so. She managed a few more polite exchanges, then curtsied and made her glad escape.
As she picked her way down the icy steps that led to the granary and home, she was wondering why she hated Raena so much, and on sight, too. She’d never actually met the woman before that day. Unless she was very badly wrong, Raena hated her as well.
But little could either of them know that their hatred went back hundreds of years to another life, when both of their souls had been closely linked indeed, as mother and daughter in a life so far removed from what they shared at the moment that it would seem to lie in another world—could they ever know of it. And less could they know that the man Raena hated as Rhodry Maelwaedd had been bound up with them in a knot of Wyrd, though he, too, had lived in another body and another life, back in those distant years.
PART TWO
Deverry
849
The year 849. The spring brought terrible omens in the sky above the Holy City. A cloud shaped like a dragon flew overhead, and there was lightning. The sky turned the color of copper, and a huge cloud like a spindle of black wool drew water from Lake Gwerconydd only to spit it out upon the land. So many refugees fled to Lughcarn that the city could not take them all in. High Priest Retyc gave them what food he could gather and sent them farther east, where the farmlands had need of them.
—The Holy Chronicles of Lughcarn
CHAPTER ONE
In the midst of a clamor, Lillorigga, daughter of the Boar clan, sat on a bench in the curve of the wall and wished that she were invisible. The king’s great hall roiled with armed men, standing, talking, sitting, eating, calling out to one another and calling for ale. Spring had come and brought with it the annual muster of the king’s loyal lords and their warbands, but in the two enormous hearths at either side of the hall, fires blazed and sent wafts of smoke into the hazy room. The stone walls of the enormous round hall oozed cold, for the attacking sun never made more than a brief sally into the tangled complex of brochs and outbuildings that made up the royal palace of Dun Deverry.
Not that the hall looked particularly royal these days—a hundred long years of civil war had left the king poor in everything but men. Tapestries sagged threadbare and faded on the rough stone walls; straw and torn Bardek carpets lay together on the floor; the tables and benches listed and leaned, all cracked and pitted. The lords and the servants alike ate from wooden trenchers and drank from pottery stoups. Only the king’s own table retained some semblance of royal splendor. From where she sat Lillorigga could just see a page spreading a much-mended and somewhat stained linen cloth over it while others stood by with silver dishes and pewter mugs. Behind the boys came the royal nursemaid with cushions to raise the seat of the royal chair; King Olaen had been born just five summers ago.
Lilli was the king’s cousin—they shared a great-grandmother through the maternal line—and her uncle, Burcan of the Boar, stood as regent to his young highness. Her rank brought her bows and curtsies every time someone passed her bench or looked her way. She answered each one with a nod or a smile, but she hated the way the various lords looked her over, as if they were appraising a prize mare ready for market. Soon her mother would be arranging her betrothal to some son or another of one of the king’s loyal men. She could only hope that when the time came, her husband would treat her decently.
Across the hall a herald called out for the men to make way. A procession of women was descending the huge stone staircase, with Queen Abrwnna at the head. Older than her royal husband, the queen was almost a woman, no longer a girl. Behind her came her retinue of maidservants and noble-born serving women, who included Lillorigga’s mother, Merodda, a widow and sister to both Tibryn, Gwerbret Cantrae, and Regent Burcan. In the flickering dim light, Merodda looked no older than the young queen. Her yellow hair lay smooth and oddly shiny, caught by a silver clasp at the nape of her neck. Her skin was the envy of every woman at court: smooth and rosy just like a lass, they said, and her with a marriageable daughter and all! She walked like a lass, too, and tossed her head and laughed with spirit. A marvel, everyone said, how beautiful she is still. If they only knew, Lilli thought bitterly. If they only knew—her and her potions!
At the bottom step Merodda paused, looking over the great hall, then turned to speak to a page before she rejoined the queen’s retinue at table. When Lilli realized that the page was heading for her, she rose, briefly considered bolting, then decided that if she angered her mother now, she’d only pay for it later. The page trotted over and made her a sketchy bow.
“Honored Lillorigga,” he said, “your mother says you’re to come to her chambers when she’s done eating.”
Lilli felt fear clutch her with cold, wet hands.
“Very well.” She just managed to arrange a smile. “Please tell her that I’ll wait upon her as she wishes.”
With barely a glance her way he turned and trotted back to the queen’s table. Lilli saw him speak to Merodda, then take up his station for serving the meal. Lilli herself was supposed to eat at one of the tables reserved for unmarried women of noble birth. Instead she grabbed a chunk of bread from a serving basket as a page carried it by and left the press and clamor of the hall.
Outside the sun was setting, dragging cold shadow over the courtyard, one of the many among the warren of brochs and outbuildings. Lilli hurried past the cookhouse, dodged between storage sheds, and slipped out a small gate into a much bigger court, the next ward out, ringed round by high stone walls that guarded pigsties, stables, cow sheds, a smithy, a pair of deep water wells—everything the dun needed to withstand a siege.
At the gates of this ward someone was shouting. When Lilli saw servants hurry past with lit torches, she drifted after them, but she kept to the shadows. Down at the wall, the torchlight glittered on chain mail and a confusion of men, arguing about who would do what, a debate the captain of the watch finally ended—he ordered his guards to man the winch that opened the enormous iron-bound gates. They creaked open a bare six feet to let an exhausted rider stumble through, leading a muddy horse.
“Messages for the king,” he croaked. “From the Gwerbret of Belgwergyr.”
Servants rushed to take his horse. Lilli trailed after the messenger and the watch captain as they hurried up to the main broch.<
“Good news, I hope,” said the captain.
“Bad,” the messenger said. “His grace the gwerbret’s lost more vassals to the false king.”
Lilli felt suddenly sick.
She trailed after the messenger and his escort as they hurried to the great hall. By then all the important lords had gathered around the king. On his cushions at the table’s head Olaen, a pretty child with thick pale hair, was eating bread and honey. At either side of him Lilli’s two uncles—Tibryn, Gwerbret Cantrae, and his younger brother, Burcan, the regent—sat as a matched pair between the king and the rest of the gwerbretion and other such powerful lords who dined at this table. Both of them were handsome men, tall and warrior-straight, with the wide-set blue eyes they shared with their sister, Merodda, but unlike her they showed their age in grey hair and weather-beaten faces.
As the guards hurried up, everyone stopped eating and turned to look. The messenger knelt before the king, then pulled a silver tube out of his shirt and handed it to Olaen with a flourish. Burcan leaned forward and snatched it, then gestured at the man to speak. The great lords huddled around, narrow-eyed and grim. At the queen’s table the women fell silent and turned, leaning to hear the news. From her distance Lilli could hear nothing of what the messenger said, but a rustle of talk broke out, first at the royal table, then spreading through the great hall: more lords gone over to Cerrmor. With a curt nod, Burcan dismissed the messenger. King Olaen was watching the regent with eyes full of tears.