The Dragon Revenant (58 page)

“Then listen to one last thing I say. If I’ve read Aedda aright, she’ll grow to hate you, and if she does, you’d best make very sure who fathers her younger sons.”

For a long moment he paused, his mouth half-caught in the strangest smile she’d ever seen on a man’s face, a stunned amusement, a laughing disbelief. Then he did laugh with a toss of his head, an utterly elven gesture that froze her heart as she realized what that smile must mean.

“Oh no doubt,” Rhodry said. “Mother, on that matter I’d trust your word beyond the oaths of a thousand priests, I would indeed.”

The time for fencing was long gone.

“You know the truth, then, don’t you?” she said, forcing her voice calm.

“I do, at that. I’d never blame you for a thing, mind.”

“My thanks.” Slowly, and as casually as she could manage, she found a chair and sat down. “You know, I never told you about your father because I was afraid you’d abdicate. You did have such a fine sense of honor, Rhoddo, and I somehow always knew that the rhan would need you one day.”

“So I did, and so it did, and you were right enough, weren’t you?” All at once he sighed and ran both hands through his hair. “But all that’s a long time behind us, Mam. Aberwyn’s mine, and cursed and twice-cursed I’d be before I gave her up.”

At last she could smile, thinking that after all was said and done, she’d raised him well.

“When do you think Aedda will arrive for the wedding? Would you like me to plan it?”

“A thousand thanks, Mother. I’d like nothing more.”

O
NE

F
or some weeks now Alaena had had trouble sleeping. Every morning she would rise before the sun, throw on a linen shift, and go out into her night garden, perfumed with jasmine and honeysuckle, to pace aimlessly back and forth among the statues of her husband’s ancestors until the dark sky turned to gray. At times she would sit on the edge of the marble fountain and run her hand back and forth in the water like a child while she wondered if she would ever hear what had happened to her barbarian boy. Now that his good looks were far away from her, she was nothing but pleased that she’d never gotten pregnant or persuaded him to stay. Marrying a freedman would have been the mistake of my life, she would think, but I do hope he’s safe and well. Once the sun came up, she would hurry back inside where it was dim and cool and take out her fortune-telling tiles. Although her readings were always inconclusive, still she pored over them, often for hours at a time, hoping desperately that she would see something—even some bearable misfortune—that would break the tedium of her days. She never found anything more thrilling than the usual love affairs and news from afar.

Yet those common predictions did come true for her in a spectacular way—or so she saw it. One particularly hot afternoon, she was lounging on her cushions and desultorily studying a lay-out of tiles when Porto appeared in the doorway. “Mistress? There’s a Deverry man to see you, Evan the horse trader by name. He says he has news that might interest you.”

“Really? Is he an old friend of my husband’s or someone else I should know?”

“No. I’ve never seen him before.”

“Well, show him in, and have Disna bring some wine.”

Her visitor was wearing a pair of gray Deverry trousers and an embroidered shirt instead of red-and-gold robes, all his rings and jewels were gone, and his pale hair was soberly cut and neatly combed, but Alaena recognized him the moment he strolled into the room.

“Horse trader, indeed! Or have you cast a spell on yourself, wizard?”

“Do you realize that you’re the only person in this town who’s recognized me?” Without waiting to be asked, he stepped up onto the dais and sat down next to her on a purple cushion. “Everyone else remembers my finery, not my face, which is, I must admit, all to the good. For this trip, at least, I prefer to be known as a shrewd merchant, not a theatrical fool.”

“I never thought you were a fool at all.”

“Really? Then my disguise was not, alas, impenetrable.”

Disna came in with the wine and set the tray down on the low table. She glanced at this so-called Evan with a perfectly ordinary curiosity—apparently she too failed to recognize the wizard of last autumn.

“I’ll pour, Disna. You may go.”

But Evan picked up the pitcher before Alaena could reach it and filled both their goblets. When he looked up with a lazy, soft smile she felt a flickering of sexual warmth, simply because his mouth reminded her so much of his brother’s.

“Is Rhodry well?”

“Most definitely. Do you realize who he was? The gwerbret of Aberwyn? He’d been kidnapped by political enemies and sold into slavery in a vain attempt to keep him from an inheritance.”

“No!”

“Yes, oh yes indeed, and so, my paragon of all things beautiful, I wouldn’t bother feeling shamed if I were you. He may have been a slave here, but at home I think he’d qualify as your equal.”

“In social position? Certainly.” She had a sip of her wine. “What a fantastic story! And here I was just thinking that nothing interesting ever happened to me.”

“Although normally I’d hate to correct one so lovely as you, in this case I must point out that you were indeed mistaken. Not only did something of great interest happen once, perhaps something even greater may happen in the future.”

“Oh, really?” She allowed herself a lazy smile to match his. “Is your brother going to come my way again?”

“I doubt that. He’s nicely safe and married off by now, I imagine, to Jill—the woman who was pretending to be my slavegirl.”

“Only pretending?”

“Only pretending. She was Rhodry’s betrothed the whole time.”

“Fascinating! It was kind of you to come tell me—that Rhodry safe, I mean.” She had a sip of wine. “Were you passing this way on business?”

“No. I came specifically to see you.”

“Very very kind, then.”

“Kind? Perhaps, but to myself. It would be a cruel man indeed who’d deny himself the pleasure of seeing you again after having met you. All winter long I’ve thought about the lovely Alaena and this room, filled with your presence like some rare perfume.”

She smiled again, but delicately, while he sipped his wine and merely watched her. He’s the same rank as the brother of an archon, really, she thought to herself—a very important man. And what if he really were a sorcerer? She remembered, then, how frightened she’d been by seeing him perform his marvels, and how exciting that fear had been.

“Will you dine with me tonight, Evan? I’ve never shared a meal with a wizard before.”

“I should be honored. I’ve never shared anything with a woman as beautiful as you.”

When he raised his goblet, she clinked hers against it, and for a moment their fingers touched.

Two

After he slipped away from the gwerbret and his men in Abernaudd, Perryn rode north, keeping away from the main roads and sticking to country lanes and patches of fallow country. At first traveling was difficult. Although he was used to being out on the road, often for weeks at a time, he had none of his usual gear with him, no woodsman’s axe, no kettle, no fishing lines and rabbit snares. His pitifully small cache of coppers dwindled faster and faster as he bought meager provisions at one farm or another. Since he didn’t even have a flint and steel to light a fire, he slept cold under hedgerows or covered with leaves in copses. With Nevyn’s strictures about stealing fresh in his mind, he resisted all the small temptations that Wyrd put in his way: chickens loose from their pen with no farmer in sight, meat pies left cooling on untended windowsills, axes carelessly left in woodpiles. Finally his newfound piety was rewarded when he reached Elrydd and found a caravan, heading north into Pyrdon, that needed a man who was good with horses. From then on he was decently fed and a good bit warmer.

While they worked their way north, Perryn tried to avoid thinking of his future, but when they left Eldidd behind and headed toward Loc Drw, the question became unavoidable. With a soul-numbing weariness he realized that there really was nowhere to go but back to his Cousin Nedd and Uncle Benoic. At first they would rage at him, but they’d take him in. For months, of course, maybe even for years, he would be the butt of hideous family jokes and humiliating references, trotted out as an example of stupidity and dishonor—but that would be nothing new. He could live with it, as he had before.

At Dun Drwloc the caravan disbanded, and the master paid over Perryn’s wages, a generous four silvers’ worth of coppers, enough money in that coin-shy area to replace his gear and provision him for the long ride to Cerrgonney. By talking with the local merchant guild, which had a map of sorts, Perryn figured out that if he rode northeast through the province of Arcodd, he had about three hundred and fifty miles to go to reach his uncle’s town of Pren Cludan. The locals, however, suggested that he take a longer route by heading straight east to the Aver Trebyc, which would lead him to the Belaver, which he could then follow straight north to Cerrgonney.

“You could get lost if you just head north, lad,” the merchants all said with grave nods of their heads. “The roads aren’t too good, and there’s long stretches of naught but forest. The Arcodd men call their blasted wilderness a province, but there’s only two proper towns in the whole thing, and them far apart at that.”

Perryn didn’t bother to tell them that Arcodd sounded like paradise to him. When he rode out, he headed north, angling east whenever the roads and deer trails would allow and following his inner lodestone that pointed, grimly and inexorably, to his kin and their version of a welcome. During his first four days of riding, Perryn saw no human beings at all. Soon enough, though, he came to farms and fenced meadows, where white cattle with rusty-red ears grazed under the watchful eyes of young lads with dogs. Everyone he met asked him where he came from, but in a kindly way, and when they found out he came from the south, they treated him as a marvel, that he should travel so far and not get himself lost. Since the spring was blossoming and the threat of winter’s famine over, everyone was generous, too, offering him a meal here or oats for his horse there.

Perryn avoided Arcodd’s two towns completely. About a hundred miles apart, they lay on a tributary of the Aver Bel that the locals called Aver Clyn, Moon River, but Perryn found a crossing about halfway between them, where the men of a farming village that was growing toward a small town had banded together to build a wooden bridge across a narrows. For a copper in toll they not only let him cross, but stood him a tankard in the local alehouse in return for a bit of news from Pyrdon. As he headed northeast and back toward wilderness, he realized with a sinking heart that he was a good third of the way home. In his mind he could already hear Benoic’s accusatory bellow.

That evening he camped in a little dale where a glass-clear stream tumbled over rock and pooled under willow trees. He caught himself a pair of trout, stuffed them with wild mushrooms and wild thyme, then wrapped them in clean leaves to bake in the coals of his fire while he bathed, panting and blowing at the water’s cold. Once he was reasonably dry he pulled on shirt and brigga, dug his dinner out of the coals, and built up the fire again. Cursing at singed fingers he pulled open the charred leaves to release a cloud of wonderful steam and the smell of herbs. For the briefest of moments he was happy; then he remembered his uncle, and he groaned out a long sigh of despair.

“What’s wrong?”

The voice was soft and female, so close at hand that he yelped in sheer surprise. Not even his horse had heard her coming, it seemed, to nicker a warning. When he looked up he saw her standing among the willows, a lass of about sixteen, barefoot and dressed in a dirty brown smock torn off at the knees, with her waist-length tangle of bright red hair loose and flowing down her back. Although no one would ever have called her beautiful—her mouth was too generous, her nose too flat, and her hands too large and coarse for that—she had lovely green eyes, as wide and wild as a cat’s. For a long moment they contemplated each other; then her eyes strayed to the fish.