The Prize in the Game (28 page)

The musicians were getting ready to sing, and servants were pouring out more ale as Conal crossed the room. "Your mother said I can speak to you," he said, leaning on Emer's shoulder. "Where can we go?"

"Outside," Emer said, rising at once.

Allel smiled at them benignly. Ap Carbad frowned and muttered something quietly to Orlam.

Conal bowed and followed Emer out of the hall.

Emer greeted the guard at the door and led Conal through the village toward the
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stables. The night was overcast and damp and the ground was muddy. It -wasn't easy to see where they were going. They walked in silence.

It was even darker inside the stables. There was a smell of horses and of hay and damp springtime, and then

Emer was in his arms and he was intoxicated by the scent of her. They held each other for a long moment, murmuring nonsense and affirmations.

"Did Conary agree?" Emer asked after a little while.

"It wasn't easy, but he did in the end," Conal said. "And I see you got your mother to agree to something, but it isn't something I can possibly consider."

"My parents have been fighting about it," Emer said. "That you become a champion of Connat is supposed to be a compromise. I know how impossible it is."

"I feel terrible for having left you here all this time with them," he said. "I didn't realize until tonight how awful she is. We'll have to run away. I think we could go to Muin, or, failing that, right away across the sea to seek our fortunes in other lands." The thought was enticing.

Traveling together had been a joy. He wished they could start at once.

Emer hugged him tighter. "I never thought you'd say that," she said, so quietly he could hardly hear her. "But we can't, you know we can't. Not now. Maga won't turn aside for anything. You can't desert Oriel now, and it would be the same if you agreed to Maga's offer or if we ran away.

You couldn't live without honor."

"You're right," Conal said, his heart sinking. "Well, if I must die, at least you should know that I love you more than breath."

Emer kissed him, and if he had to die, he wished he could die in that moment. "I don't think you need to die,"

she said breathlessly. "I have been talking to ap Fial, our priest, and he seems to think that the most likely thing is that all the fighting folk of Oriel will fall sick for a span of time, three days, or maybe six or nine days.

After that, they will be well again. And Inis ap Fathag, may the Lord of Healing let him see many more summers, has made Maga say in front of everyone that she won't cheat. So it ought to be possible to hold the roads for that long."

"Who could?" Conal asked. A horse shifted nearby and another sent out a whuffle that sounded inquiring.

"You and me, if you can fight. But if not, anyone who will fight. I've been thinking about it.

There are bound to be exceptions. Probably it will only strike champions. Maybe the farmers will be able to fight. And then there are people like your father who would hardly count as fighting folk of Oriel but who can fight. And ..." She hesitated, then kissed him again.

"Ap Fial might be wrong, but he seemed to think that Darag would be able to fight because his father is a god."

"Darag's father?" Conal asked blankly.

"They're calling him Black Darag here because of the way he was black with blood when he came down from the heights," Emer said.

"Why does ap Fial think his father was a god?" Conal's voice seemed to echo in his ears in the darkness. He clutched at Emer as if he were drowning.

"I expect he saw it across the worlds," Emer said. "You should ask Inis. But he thinks Darag will be able to fight and hold one of the roads."

"And Atha can hold the other," Conal said.

"Atha? Can you trust her that far? She might take the whole country if nobody can stop her."

"She's married to Darag. While we're down here. Today, in Ardma-chan. It should be done by now. She won't be bringing troops from the Isles, her mother won't countenance it, but she'll be there herself. But could

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anyone hold a road for nine days? Against everyone, even one at a time?"

"I will go and help," Emer said. "As soon as the war starts, I will run away and find you, and help hold the road."

"Maga will be furious with you," Conal said.

"I will do it in disguise, so she doesn't know who I am. If she did, she's perfectly capable of kidnapping me, to stop me. Then afterward, when Oriel is safe, we can go right away and change our names and leave everything behind. We could go to Tir Tanagiri, to King Urdo. My mother has told me that his sister is plotting against him, we could tell him that and warn him and he might accept us as champions. After three years, we can marry without needing our parents' blessings."

"Come away with me now," he said. "When we leave tomorrow. Don't stay here with her another day."

"She would call that an abduction and cause for a feud between Connat and Oriel," Emer said sadly. "But once the war has started, she won't miss me in the daytime as long as I am here to eat at night."

They held each other for another long moment. "You are so brave," Conal said, already feeling the pain of the thought that she could die holding the road for Oriel. "I will always love you," he said.

"I love you," Emer said. "What will you tell Maga?"

"That I cannot in honor desert Oriel now, but that we shall see what time brings." Conal shrugged. "It is not a lie."

"You must get Conary to bring his fighting folk south before the Feast of Bel, so that after the three or six or nine days, they will be there where they are needed," Emer said.

"Unless it is thirty days, or ninety," Conal said. "Even nine days is a terribly long time."

"On the other side of it, we will be together," Emer said. He squeezed her in silence, trying to believe in another side of the perilous gulf that lay ahead of them.

22

(ELENN)

It should have been lovely. They were going to defeat Oriel, but Lagin was allied to them.

Ferdia was here.

The good thing about everyone in Oriel being struck down by the curse would be that nobody got hurt. They had a big army ready, her father said, in case the farmers came out to fight. Her mother said the big army was to keep their allies happy and to glorify Connat. But in any case, no champions of Oriel were supposed to die, and none of Connat either, none of her friends, none of the people who she had smiled at when they opened the gates for her. The army went out of Cruachan on the morning after the Feast of Bel, all in a long stream, chariots ahead and farmers following along behind in little clumps. The champions were painted and armored for war. Many of them had banners flying. Most of the banners were the naked man of Connat, black against blue, but among them flew the bramble of Muin, red on black, the raven of Anlar, black on white, and the green hill of Lagin. War seemed a splendid thing when she stood at the gate of Cruachan and waved them off.

But it was all wrong already. By sundown, they were not even across the border of Oriel, and they had thirteen bodies to burn and sing the Hymn of Return for. She hadn't known it, but it had all gone wrong from the moment that Inis tricked her mother into agreeing not to go around the two roads. That meant there were only two ways they could get into Oriel.

That shouldn't have mattered, but both roads were held against them.

They were astonished when the news was first brought back to them.

First they heard that the road through the woods was guarded by Atha ap Gren. It wasn't such a surprise as it might have been, because they'd had the news that she had recently married Darag in a great hurry. The

Isles had promised not to send support even so, they knew Connat was going to win. But Atha
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was there, and not alone.

Allel told them about it at dinner. The family were eating in a tent out near the border, where the whole army was encamped. They were alone in the tent except for the champion Nandran ap Roth. Dinner was scant, bread and cheese brought up hastily from Cruachan. Maga had expected to be halfway to Ardmachan by now, living off the land.

"They waited, hidden in the woods, until the army of Connat and its allies advanced onto the soil of Oriel.

Then we heard cries, letting us know that the curse had fallen on the waiting folk of Oriel. But even as we rejoiced, Atha and her companions fired their deadly slingshots and some of our champions fell to the ground.

Others had to stop as chariots up ahead collapsed as their horses stumbled, legs broken. Then Atha came out in her chariot, with a charioteer. I asked her why she was there fighting us, when we had no quarrel with the Isles. She said she was married to Darag. I asked about her charioteer and companions. She laughed and said that every bride may bring her handmaidens from home. She said she had brought twelve handmaidens, all chosen for such fine womanly skills as she had thought she might have need of in Oriel."

Allel sounded almost admiring. Nandran had a smile on his face, too. Mingor shook his head a little. Elenn didn't see what was so good about it.

"What did you do then?" she asked.

"Oh, she waited in the middle of the road and called out for honorable single combats, one against one as we had promised ap Fathag. My nephew Bran demanded the honor of fighting her, which I granted. He went forward to fight her and died almost at once, a spear through his heart." Allel paused. "Then a champion of Muin came forward and fought her, a woman called Samar ap Ardan, one of the war-leaders, very experienced, with many heads on her chariot, but old for a champion, with gray in her hair. They fought for quite a while before Atha killed her. This was discouraging for the rest of our champions. Atha has a formidable reputation. Nobody was pressing to come forward to fight against her. I decided to leave half the army there to keep her there and take the others to the other road."

"Dithering," Maga snapped. "Showing weakness."

"It should have worked," Allel said mildly. "We went on until we reached the ford on the other road. On the far side of it were some folk of Oriel, standing beside the road looking very weak and unhappy, and in front of them was Darag, fit and well, in his chariot. His charioteer was disguised, a scarf over her face. There was no way of telling who she was, not even by the way she moved or stood. She did not speak."

Emer opened her mouth, but closed it again when her father gave her a stern look. Elenn wondered who it could be and why she would need a disguise.

"We were astonished to see Darag, much more than Atha. Atha belonged to the Isles when the curse was spoken, and maybe even now. But Darag is unquestionably one of the fighting folk of Oriel. I asked him why he was here and not laid low. He answered that it seemed he had his father to thank for that, whoever his father might be."

"Who is his father?" Nandran asked.

"Nobody knows," Maga said. "His mother was unmarried, and he was born at the Feast of the Mother.

Nobody ever knew Dechtir to care about any man except her brother Conary."

Elenn didn't want to say anything; she especially didn't want to make Maga angry, but she couldn't help remembering Darag's face when he'd talked to her at the Feast of Bel last year. "Everyone knows the gods go to the festivals sometimes," she said quietly. "If he's not been struck down, it's more likely because his father is a god than anything unnatural."

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"Incest is hateful to the gods," Nandran agreed. He looked at Elenn worshipfully. She smiled at him. He was only two years older than Mingor, but already he was acknowledged the greatest champion in Cruachan. He would have been handsome if it hadn't been for his scars. A few years ago, she used to think he was wonderful. It was nice that he looked at her like that even though she must look a mess. She still had her hair straggling loose around her face from the funeral.

"Go on," Maga directed Allel.

"Darag demanded single combats, exactly as Atha had. Eleven men went against him before the light went, eleven champions, and all of them he killed or wounded. Only one of them struck him, wounding him in the upper thigh. He recovered from it rapidly."

"So what tomorrow?" Mingor asked.

"The same," Allel said.

"The same except that someone will kill Darag or Atha, and the army will move forward as we planned," Maga said impatiently.

"Atha is a famous warrior in the prime of her life," Allel said. "Darag is young and relatively untried, but he did remarkably well today. Even though they are fighting alone against us all, we must fight them one at a time,

so it might not be as easy as you think to get past them."

"I have heard that Darag once played hurley alone against all of the children of Ardmachan,"

Mingor said.

Maga frowned at him. "We have such a large army," she said. "Some champion will bring them down. Let us send champions against both of them until one of them falls."

Allel looked at Nandran, who looked away. Elenn waited for him to say that he would kill Atha.

She hoped it would be Atha, who was loud and rude and thought herself better than everyone else. She liked Darag. She realized abruptly that war was horrible when it came to killing people.

She remembered the Ward, the vow that Maga had renewed only yesterday. How could you have strife without bitterness if you were killing people, one against another?

She wanted Connat to win, of course, but her cousin Bran was dead. Dead, never again to laugh and flirt with her or try to get her to go for walks with him outside the dun. Even now, his soul would be moving through the underworld, giving back his life, ready to come out and be reborn. He'd have to go through childhood again somewhere else, as someone else. It would be twenty years before he was again as old and wise as he had been this morning. He would never again be Bran of Cruachan, or know that he had been. His soul was passing through the underworld and all his memories were being given back with his name. Poor Bran. Or worse, maybe Atha had taken his head, and one of his souls would live on trapped inside it as one of her protectors. Either way was terribly sad. She wondered suddenly how Darag felt. Atha had killed people before, but Darag hadn't.