Daggerspell

by Katharine Kerr

  “It’s not, but for my lord, a token of my esteem.”

  “An honorable gift indeed. Now, I usually get a decent horse for one of these blades.”

  “How about a gold piece instead?” Loddlaen flashed him a cold, hard smile. “I have coin, unlike the rest of the stinking rabble in this part of the world.”

  “Splendid. A fair price indeed.”

  “Far too high, actually, but there are some things that must never be haggled over.”

  Although Dregydd looked shocked at such an idea, he took Loddlaen’s gold Deverry regal quickly enough. He even found a bit of cloth to wrap the sword in, escorted the councillor to his horse, and held the bridle while Loddlaen mounted. With a small contemptuous nod, the councillor rode off, sitting with the ease of a man who’s spent most of his life in the saddle. Dregydd scratched his beard in puzzlement.

  “Now, that was a strange one, lass. I’ve seen many a man in my trading, but that was a strange one.”

  “He was. I half wondered if he wanted that sword to stab his lord or suchlike.”

  “Odd, I had the same thought, but listen to us, Jill, insulting a man we don’t even know. Huh. Did you see his horse? It’s a western hunter, one of the breed I’m after. His lord must honor him highly to give him an expensive animal like that.”

  That night, Jill had a dream, and grotesque though it was, it was so clear and coherent, so filled with small details, that she was forced to admit it had to be a true dream. She saw Loddlaen take off his clothes in the middle of a chamber, then go to a window. She heard him chanting aloud in some peculiar language; then all at once, he was enveloped in a flash of blue light and turned into an enormous red hawk. When he leapt from the sill and soared above the countryside, she somehow was flying up above him. Suddenly he stooped and plunged, just like a real hawk, and came up with a rabbit in his beak. Only then did she realize just how unnaturally large this hawk was. She woke with a start and sat up, listening to the reassuring sound of Cullyn snoring nearby. The dream was so disgusting that she felt cold all over.

  To rid herself of it, she rose and went over to the river-bank. In the moonlit shallows the Wildfolk of Water disported themselves, an ebb and flow of faces in silver foam. When she put her hand in the water to call them, they clustered round and rubbed silvery backs against her fingers.

  “Do you know Councillor Loddlaen?”

  She felt their terror break over her like a wave. They vanished utterly, leaving the river only ordinary water. Jill ran back to camp and burrowed into her blankets as if they’d hide her.

  Much to Jill’s relief, on the morrow the caravan packed up early, clattered over the toll bridge, and headed west, far away from Loddlaen. All morning the men and mules wound their slow way through the prosperous farmlands of Eldidd, past stone-fenced fields and round farmhouses and through meadowland where white cattle with rusty red ears grazed. At times Jill rode rear guard with Cullyn; at others, she rode beside Dregydd, who, true merchant that he was, loved to have an ear to talk into. He began telling her more about the horses he hoped to obtain.

  “We call them western hunters,” Dregydd said. “Even the mares stand sixteen hands high, and they’ve got the best wind you’d ever hope to find in a horse. But here’s the big thing, lass. Some of them are golden, well, a yellowy brown, really, but in the sunlight, you’d swear they were made of gold.”

  “By the hells! I don’t suppose a silver dagger would ever get enough coin to buy one.”

  “Not likely by half. The Westfolk know their value, and they make you trade high. Worth it, though. If I can get a golden stud, the gwerbret of Caminwaen will give me two gold pieces for him.”

  Jill caught her breath. Two gold pieces would buy a decent farm. Suddenly she remembered Loddlaen again, handing over a Deverry regal for a sword worth a third of it, if that. Why had he insisted on cheating himself that way? Odd bits of bard lore drifted to mind, and at last she remembered the persistent tale that if a dweomerman wanted to enchant an item, he was forbidden to haggle for it.

  “Tell me somewhat,” Jill said to Dregydd. “Do you think there’s such a thing as real dweomer?”

  “Well, now, most people dismiss those tales out of hand, lass, but I’ve seen an odd thing or two in my day.” Dregydd gave her a sly smile. “I think me you’re going to be well and truly interested in the Westfolk when you meet them.”

  Although Jill questioned him further, he put her off with a simple “wait and see.” Yet later that same day she had an inkling of his meaning. The farther west they rode, the bolder grew the gray gnome, popping into materialization to sit in front of her saddle even when she was riding beside another person. His long, thin mouth open in a gaping smile, his green eyes gleaming with excitement, he would grab one of her reins in both skinny hands and shake it, as if trying to make the horse go faster. Finally she dropped far enough behind the caravan to speak to him.

  “You know where we’re going, don’t you? Do you like the Westfolk?”

  He nodded his head in a vigorous yes, then leapt up to throw his arms around her and kiss her on the cheek.

  That night, the caravan camped in a pasture beside the last farm on the Eldidd border, where Dregydd traded cheap goods for loads of hay and fodder. Jill discovered the reason on the morrow. Just an hour’s ride brought them to primeval forest, a tangle of old oaks and bracken, where what little grass there was grew thin and straggly.

  All day they followed a narrow track through ancient trees, standing so close together that it was impossible to see more than ten feet beyond the trail. They made their night’s camp in a clearing that was just barely big enough to accommodate men and mules. Everyone huddled around a campfire to talk in strangely hushed voices. Every now and then, one of the men would turn sharply to peer into the forest as if he felt he were being watched, then laugh at his own foolishness. Jill, however, knew they were being watched. Just beyond the circle of firelight she could see Wildfolk, clustering thick in the branches of the trees to stare down at these intruders in their land.

  The next day brought more forest, but now the land rose in a gentle slope that promised hills at some far distance. Men and mules alike sweated as the trail wound up and on through the dapple-dark forest. Finally, some four hours after noon, they came to a river, churning white in a deep gorge. Over it in a graceful arch was a stone bridge, as well made as any in Deverry. The side rails were carved in a looping pattern of leaves and vines, and here and there, in roundels, were chiseled marks that had to be letters in some utterly alien alphabet. As the caravan clattered over the bridge, Jill studied the carvings. Here and there, as a decoration, the face of one of the Wildfolk peered out through a cluster of stone leaves.

  “Dregydd?” Jill said. “Did the Westfolk build this bridge?”

  “They must’ve, lass. No one else out here to build it.”

  Then, Jill supposed, the Westfolk had to be able to see the little creatures she could see. It might explain why the Wildfolk here were so bold. That night, when they camped in another clearing, the Wildfolk wandered in for a close look at these interlopers. They strolled round, peering at the muleteers, touching anything shiny with long pointed fingers, occasionally pinching one of the horses just to make it stamp. Although only Jill could see them, most of the men could feel that something peculiar was going on. They turned sullen, sitting close together and concentrating on dice games, snapping at each other, too, over every roll. Eventually Cullyn would step in, speaking to every man personally and judging the games. Jill began to see why Dregydd wanted her father along.

  Fortunately, at about noon on the morrow the caravan broke free of the forest. As the land rose, the trees began to thin, until finally they left the last of them behind and came to a wide, flat plateau. Ahead, wind-ruffled grasslands stretched like a green sea out to the horizon. Although Jill was glad to be out of the forest, the plain had its own eerieness, too, simply because she had never seen any view so empty.

  “Are th
ere any towns or suchlike out there?” Jill said.

  “Naught that I know of. But then, I’ve never been much farther than this. Just a few miles along now, there’s a place where I always camp and wait for the Westfolk to find me. They always know when I’m here. It’s an eerie thing.”

  The Wildfolk told them, Jill assumed, but of course she wasn’t going to tell Dregydd any such thing. When they came to the campsite beside a pleasant stream, hundreds of Wildfolk flocked round, considered the caravan for a few minutes, then abruptly disappeared.

  That night, Jill had trouble sleeping. She kept waking to lie on her back and look at the stars and the great drift of the Snowy Road, which seemed to hang closer to earth out there. For all her restlessness, she never heard anything moving near the camp, but when dawn broke, two men of the Westfolk were there. Jill woke for the last time to see them standing quietly a few yards away, waiting for the sleeping camp to rouse. They were tall, but slender, with deep-set eyes and moonbeam pale hair like Loddlaen’s. Their faces would have been handsome if it weren’t for their ears, which rose to a delicate point like the curled tip of a seashell. Even though Dregydd had warned her that the Westfolk cropped their children’s ears as babies, Jill still found the sight unnerving. They were dressed in leather boots and trousers, and cloth tunics, heavily embroidered in a free pattern of flowers and vines that splashed across one shoulder and trailed down the front.

  Since she slept mostly dressed, Jill got up and walked over barefoot to greet them. When she was close enough to notice their eyes, she was in for another shock. Their irises were enormous, with barely any white showing around them, and their pupils were a vertical slit like a cat’s. They don’t do that when their children are babies, Jill thought, I wonder how Dregydd explains that away. Her feeling of being faced with something totally alien was so strong that she nearly yelped aloud when one spoke to her in perfect Deverrian.

  “Good morrow, fair maid,” he said. “Have you and your menfolk come to trade?”

  “We have. Our leader’s name is Dregydd.”

  “I know him, truly.” He cocked his head to one side and studied her with a faint smile. “I’ve never seen one of your womenfolk before. Are they all as lovely as you?”

  When Jill stood there tongue-tied, he laughed and made her a bow.

  “Tell Dregydd we’ll bring the others.”

  They walked away, glided away, really, without the slightest sound, as if the grass were parting to let them go through. At some distance they’d left their golden horses. Jill stared after as they mounted and rode out of sight.

  Just past noon, a tribe of Westfolk rode in from the grasslands in a long procession of mounted riders driving a herd of horses ahead of them. The group turned out to be an entire clan, men, women, and a few children, all dressed exactly alike, except that the women wore their long hair severely braided, like Deverry women of the Dawntime. Instead of wagons, they dragged their possessions along behind them on wooden travois. A couple of hundred yards from Dregydd’s camp, they pulled up and pitched their own. Fascinated, Jill watched the organized swarm of activity as everyone in the clan lent a hand to raise round leather tents, unpack their belongings, and tether out the horses. In less than an hour, the camp stood as if it had always been there, a gaudy, noisy affair of brightly painted tents, running children and dogs, and swarms of Wildfolk.

  “Now we wait some more,” Dregydd said. “They’ll come when they’re ready.”

  Sure enough, a few at a time the Westfolk strolled over to see what Dregydd had brought them. Singly or in pairs, they walked through the rows of cooking pots and knives, swords, woodsmen’s axes, shovels, and arrow points. Occasionally they would squat down and pick something up to examine it, then lay it down again, and all without a word. As she grew used to them, Jill found herself thinking them beautiful. They were graceful and lithe, with a self-possessed dignity that reminded her of wild deer. She was surprised to find that the muleteers, and even Cullyn, looked on them with scorn. That entire afternoon, the men stayed down by the river and played dice with their backs to the proceedings. Only Jill sat with Dregydd in the grass and watched his customers.

  When the sun was getting low in the sky, a young man came over with a leather meadskin.

  “Good morrow,” he said. “We’re pleased with the trinkets you’re offering us.”

  “That gladdens my heart, Jennantar,” Dregydd said. “So we’ll trade on the morrow?”

  “We will.” Jennantar handed him the skin. “For your men, to sweeten their hearts a bit.”

  Seeing that he knew the men despised his people embarrassed Jill profoundly, but he merely smiled in a wry sort of way as Dregydd hurried over to the muleteers. When Jennantar sat down beside her, the gray gnome appeared in her lap and leaned back with a contented smile.

  “Here,” Jennantar said sharply. “Do you see the Wildfolk?”

  “You mean you do?”

  “All our people know them. We call them by a name that means the little brothers.”

  When she looked into his smoky gray cat-slit eyes, Jill could feel the kinship there, for all that the Wildfolk were ugly and deformed, and these beings men called Westfolk were beautiful.

  “You know,” Jennantar said, “there’s a man of your people who rides with us. I think he’d like to meet you.”

  Without another word Jennantar got up and walked away, leaving Jill wondering if she’d insulted him.

  It was getting on toward sunset when an old man came from the Westfolk’s camp. Since his eyes and ears were normal, even though he dressed like one of the Westfolk, Jill assumed that he must be the man whom Jennantar had mentioned. He was not very tall, with heavy shoulders and arms, though the rest of him was slender, and he had enormous brown eyes and white hair that swept up from his forehead in two peaks like an owl’s horns. When he hunkered down next to Dregydd, his posture was somehow birdlike, too, especially the way his hands hung loosely between his thighs. It turned out that Dregydd knew him; he introduced him round as Aderyn, a name that made Jill giggle, because it meant bird.

  “I’ve come to ask a favor, Dregydd,” Aderyn said. “I need to travel to Cannobaen, and I’d rather ride with a caravan than on my own.”

  “You’re most welcome, but what is this? Are you suddenly feeling longing for the folk you left behind?”

  “Not truly.” Aderyn smiled at the jest. “This is an unpleasant little matter of justice, I’m afraid. One of our people murdered a man, and now he’s a fugitive. We’ve got to fetch him back.”

  “Unpleasant indeed. He should be easy enough to find, eh? He’ll stand out among Eldidd folk.”

  “Not truly. He’s a half-breed, you see.”

  “Councillor Loddlaen.” The words burst out of Jill’s mouth before she could stop them.

  When Aderyn turned her way, Jill felt that he was looking through, not at her, as if his casual glance would nail her down the way a farmer nails a shrike to a barn wall. After some moments he smiled and released her.

  “Well, his name is Loddlaen, sure enough. Now, you must be Jill.”

  “I am.” Jill was certain that she’d never told any of the Westfolk her name. “Have we met, good sir?”

  “We have, but not so you’d remember.” For a moment, Aderyn looked melancholy, as if he wished that she would remember. “But why did you call him Councillor Loddlaen?”

  “Well, that’s what he called himself. He’s part of Lord Corbyn of Bruddlyn’s retinue now.”

  “Indeed? And isn’t that passing strange? Well, at least we know where to find him, then.” Aderyn rose, glancing off into the night. “Most strange, it is—truly.”

  He walked off without even a backward glance.

  “Here!” One of the muleteers spoke up. “Is that old man daft or suchlike?”

  “Oh, I wouldn’t call him that,” Dregydd said, thoughtfully scratching his beard. “He has his little ways, but his mind is as sound as an oak.”

  The muleteers e
xchanged doubting glances.

  “Must be daft,” Cullyn muttered. “Running off with the Westfolk like he did.”

  Although Jill knew better than to say so aloud, she was thinking that running off with these people didn’t seem like a daft idea to her.

  Later that night the music started. Across the moonlit meadow a woman’s voice began a melancholy melody. Three other voices picked up a harmony that sounded out of key until Jill realized that they were singing in quarter tones, just like the Bardek minstrels one heard every now and then down in port towns. Suddenly instruments joined in, a cool, clear sound like a harp, then something that made a constant drone, and finally a small drum. The music came faster, faster, flowed from one song to the next with barely a pause. Cullyn and the men crowded close together and concentrated on dice. Jill slipped away and went to stand on the edge of the camp. Across the meadow torches flared among the jewel-bright tents. Drawn as if by dweomer, Jill took a few steps forward, but suddenly Cullyn grabbed her by the shoulder.

  “And just what are you doing?” Cullyn snapped.

  “Listening and nothing more.”

  “Oh, horseshit! Listen, don’t you dare sneak off. Those people are more wild animals than they are men, but I wouldn’t be surprised if you pleased their men well enough anyway.”

  “Oh, ye gods, Da! You think every man I meet is lusting after me.”

  “Most of them are, and don’t you forget it. Now, come along. You can hear this blasted squawling well enough by the fire.”

  Even for a tieryn with a vast demesne, coin was hard to come by in western Eldidd. Since Dun Cannobaen was only Lovyan’s summer retreat, she had to send back to her main residence, Dun Gwerbyn, for silver for the soapmaker’s daughter. When it finally arrived, Rhodry was incensed to find that his mother expected him to deliver it personally.

  “Why can’t the chamberlain go?” Rhodry snapped. “Or the wretched equerry? Let them earn their meat and mead.”

  Lovyan merely crossed her arms over her chest and glared at him. With a sigh, Rhodry picked up the pair of saddlebags from the table and went to the stable to get a horse.