The Black Raven

by Katharine Kerr

  “My thanks, good herald,” she said. “These will do splendidly.”

  “Most welcome, Your Highness,” Gavlyn said. “May you fill them with happiness as well as words.”

  Gavlyn bowed again, walked backwards, and bowed himself out of the door. Maryn strolled over to examine her new treasure. He ran his fingertips down the surface of one piece and nodded his approval.

  “What are you planning on using these for?” he said.

  “Lore about Dun Deverry. What’s in it, and its history, and any oddities I can discover.”

  Maryn looked utterly baffled.

  “Like the book I found down in Dun Cerrmor,” she said, “and then I finished out the blank pages.”

  “Ah. I do remember that, truly. Very well, if it amuses you. Except—wait a moment. I remember what you were like then, poking around filthy old chambers and sitting with the servants in the kitchens and suchlike. You’re not going to do that again, are you?”

  “I am. How else can I find out what I want to know?”

  “Well, I don’t want you to go about alone. Some of the floors in these old towers are half rotted through. And it’s not seemly, anyway.”

  “I’ll take one of the pages.”

  “That’s not sufficient. Take a pair of men from my guard.”

  “They’ll get in the way. The old people aren’t going to talk freely if they’ve got a great hulking pair of silver daggers looming over them.”

  “Only one man then, and some pages, but I’ll not have my wife wandering around alone like some servant lass. Here, I know. What about Maddyn? He’s a bard, he’ll find the lore interesting.”

  “Done, then. I shan’t mind him as much. Which reminds me.” Bellyra laughed, feeling pleasantly wicked. “Have you heard his song about the fox who’s really Councillor Oggyn?”

  “What?” He picked up her mood and grinned. “Shall I ask him to play it?”

  “Not right out in the great hall where poor Oggyn could hear it. It’s a flyting, because Oggyn tried to extort some coin out of men who wanted to be silver daggers. He made them pay him for introductions to Owaen.”

  “Ye gods! Owaen might have killed him for that.”

  “He nearly did, apparently.”

  “Huh, no wonder Oggyn kept urging me to send him off to fetch Riddmar.” Maryn shook his head in mock sadness. “How Oggo’s greedy little heart must have ached! I will ask Maddyn, if I have a moment, but when that will be, the gods only know. And now I’d best be off, my lady. Nevyn will be waiting for me.”

  Bellyra sent one of her servant girls off to find a page, and him she sent off to find Maddyn. Although she couldn’t receive the bard in the women’s hall, she saw nothing wrong with standing just outside the open door and talking with him in the corridor. When she explained her new venture, he seemed genuinely pleased to be invited along.

  “Our prince thinks I need guarding,” Bellyra said.

  “Treasures should be guarded, Your Highness,” Maddyn said. “And a treasure you are.”

  “Oh, get along with you! What’s this? The wars really must be over, if silver daggers are turning into courtiers.”

  Maddyn laughed. “Maybe so,” he said. “But I’ll be honored to be your guard, Your Highness.”

  “Splendid! What I want to do first is just walk around and see everything. Such as the bolthole. Maryn’s told me about the silver daggers opening the gates.” She felt her sunny mood disappear. “My heart aches, thinking of your losses. I’ll write about Caradoc in my book, so he’ll be remembered.”

  Maddyn’s eyes filled with tears. Hastily he turned away, wiping his face on the sleeve of his shirt. The silver dagger device embroidered there, she realized, summed up his life, his honor, and his loyalties beyond even those he paid to her husband. Losing so many comrades must have wounded him worse than a sword.

  “My apologies, Your Highness,” he mumbled. “You took me by surprise, like.”

  “None needed. I know you honored the captain. So did my husband, and he’s told me that he misses Caradoc still.”

  “Well, so we all do.” Maddyn managed a smile. “My thanks for the honor you’ll be paying him.”

  “Most welcome. I’ll get my cloak.”

  Bellyra returned to the women’s hall to find Degwa, standing off to one side but close enough to the door to hear anything that might have been said. Degwa dropped her a distracted sort of curtsy.

  “I’ll be back in a bit,” Bellyra said. “Make sure nothing happens to my parchments.”

  “Of course, Your Highness. They’re ever so lovely.”

  When she left the broch with her silver dagger in attendance, Bellyra took a pair of the youngest pages with them as well, as much to give the boys a chance to run around and play as for the propriety of the thing. Maddyn led her through the maze of walls, sheds, towers, and wards to the ruins that hid the bolthole. Men of the fortguard stood on duty there all day and all night, matched by another guard far away, inside the ruins where the escape tunnel debouched beyond the dun walls.

  “Our prince is talking of rebuilding that dun and settling it upon some particularly loyal lord,” Bellyra told him.

  “That’s a good idea, Your Highness,” Maddyn said. “It would be a fitting demesne for Branoic, if I can presume to offer my advice.”

  “You may. It’s a good idea. I’ll mention it to the prince.”

  “We’d best do somewhat about getting Branoic and his lady married soon,” Maddyn went on, “before he gets her with child. Well, if he hasn’t already.”

  “Oh indeed? And why are you worrying about that?”

  “There are nights when he doesn’t sleep in the barracks, and Branoic’s never been a man for sleeping out in the rain. One of the other lads twitted him about it, and I had to step between them. Branno was ready to kill him over the insult to his betrothed.”

  Bellyra smiled, and this time her wicked feeling had little of the pleasant about it. Revenge upon her husband tasted sweet, but beyond that Lilli’s unfaithfulness to Maryn had its practical advantages. The prince would tire of Lilli sooner or later, no doubt, but now, when she had a child, there’d be no talk of it being another royal bastard. Having one of those out in fosterage was quite enough.

  It also occurred to her, as they walked through the sunny ward, that Lilli was young, so dreadfully young that she might well not realize just how dangerous her situation was, caught between two men like the hull of a boat twixt rocks. Since she could hardly warn Lilli herself, she decided to send Elyssa for as honest a talk as Lilli would allow.

  Nevyn set the wood box in the center of his table, then opened his dweomer sight and inspected each etheric seal. They held strong, but he was aware of a feeling emanating through the wood, the touch of some force that manifested as a deep unease. When he shut down his dweomer sight it appeared ordinary enough.

  “I swear the wretched curse is gathering strength!” Nevyn said. “Look at it, Lilli, but don’t touch it. Do you see anything odd?”

  “I do, my lord. It’s almost like it’s glowing, or maybe it’s making the air tremble, but it’s all oily and strange. Oh here, that doesn’t make any sense.”

  “I’m afraid that it does. It’s drawing power from a very unpleasant part of the Inner Lands.”

  On a stormy afternoon they were sitting in Nevyn’s tower chamber. Rain splashed down onto the roof overhead, and the wind moaned, trembling the leather drapes over the windows. Every now and then it would flip up the edge of a hide and come rushing into the room until Nevyn had despaired of keeping candles lit. Huge balls of glowing silver light clung to the walls and lit the chamber with a peculiarly even glow.

  “We’d best have a good look at the thing,” Nevyn said. “Shall I take it out of the box?”

  With a little cry Lilli laid a hand to her throat. Nevyn’s first thought was that the curse tablet was terrifying her, but then he realized that she was staring at something behind him. He turned around and saw the spirit who ap
ed Lady Merodda, standing just inside the doorway.

  “A good evening to you,” Nevyn said. “Have you come to let me help you?”

  The spirit laughed. “I’m not so easy to trick, old man. What you have in that box belongs to Lady Merodda. Did you steal it, too?”

  “I won’t be answering your questions until you answer some of mine.”

  “That I won’t do.”

  “Then I’ll tell you naught.” Nevyn leaned over the box and started to open it. “You’d best be gone. I’ll be drawing a dweomer circle in a moment, and it might trap you.”

  “Well, I might answer one question.” The spirit took a step closer.

  “Very well.” Nevyn let the box lie. “You say this belongs to Lady Merodda. Did she create it, then?”

  “She didn’t, but that ugly man who served her.” She glanced at Lilli. “Your uncle slew him.”

  Lilli nodded, her face dead-pale. “So I heard.”

  “I found a baby with this tablet,” Nevyn said to the spirit. “Was he Merodda’s own?”

  “I’ll not answer that till you answer one for me. Where is she now?”

  “She’s dead.”

  “What does that mean?”

  “She’s gone to the Otherlands. She no longer lives on the earth.”

  “Where does she live?”

  “She doesn’t live at all. Here.” Nevyn glanced around, saw a bit of charcoal lying on the table, and picked it up. “She’s all broken and gone, like this.” He crushed the charcoal in his fingers and let the black dust sift to the floor.

  “And just what is that supposed to mean?”

  “I don’t know how to make you understand.”

  “You lie, old man. You must know where she is.”

  “I tried to tell you.”

  The spirit snarled like an animal. Her careful image of Merodda wavered and swelled like an image reflected in a pool of water when a breeze disturbs it.

  “I shall find her, old man. I warn you. I shall find her, and then together we will come get her daughter back.”

  “I was not stolen,” Lilli snapped. “I came of my own free will.”

  The spirit ignored her.

  “You can’t find Merodda,” Nevyn said. “She’s dead and gone.”

  The spirit screeched like an angry lynx and slapped at him. Nevyn flung up one hand and sketched a banishing pentagram in the air. With one last snarl she vanished. Nevyn let out his breath in a puff of relief.

  “Will she keep troubling us?” Lilli said.

  “I have no idea.” Nevyn paused, considering her. “Are you frightened of her?”

  “Not truly. When she appears, she always startles me, but then I remind myself that she’s not truly my mother.” Lilli grinned at him. “No spirit could be as bad as that.”

  “That speaks volumes, doesn’t it? Very well, then.” Nevyn laid one finger on the wood box. He could feel nothing particularly unusual, but the spirit’s appearance had troubled him, breaking his concentration. “I think I’ll put this back for the nonce. But sooner or later, I’ll have to think of a way to deal with it.”

  “Well and good, my lord. Uh, do you have further need of me?”

  “Not in particular. Why? Is Branoic waiting for you?”

  “He is.”

  “Then by all means go keep your tryst.”

  “My thanks.” Lilli blushed, then got up, turning quickly as if to hide it. “Will I see you at nightfall?”

  “Not tonight. I’m having dinner with the prince and Gwerbret Ammerwdd.” Nevyn paused, sighing. “I suppose I’d best put on a clean shirt, come to think of it. That fancy one with all the blazons. Irritating, but there we are. The prince needs must act like a king these days, and so I’ll play the part of a courtier.”

  Late that evening Elyssa came to Lilli’s chamber, but instead of asking her how she felt and leaving again, she sat herself down without being invited in one of the chairs. A fire was burning in the hearth, and Lilli had closed the shutters over the windows, so that the room glowed warm with comfortable firelight.

  “It’s good to see you.” Lilli sat down in the other chair.

  “Well, we’ve missed you,” Elyssa said, smiling. “Lilli, is it truly your illness that’s kept you out of the women’s hall?”

  Lilli felt her face burn with a blush worse than any fever.

  “The princess herself asked me to speak to you,” Elyssa went on. “She thinks that you must fear her, and that distresses her. She bears you no ill will.”

  “Truly?”

  “Truly. It’s not like you’re the first lass her husband’s fancied.”

  “So Nevyn says, too.”

  “That must be a hurtful thing to think on.” Elyssa was watching her in concern.

  “Well, it is,” Lilli said. “Everyone tells me that, and they think I’m supposed to feel the better for it, but I don’t. I feel like a prize mare, either bred or locked in the stables at her master’s whim.”

  “That’s not far wrong, is it?”

  “True spoken. And I keep wondering when he’ll find some other horse to ride.”

  “He might not, you know. Who knows why men do what they do? Mayhap he’s finally found the one lass he’s been looking for all these years. If so, won’t that ease the princess’s heart rather than vex it?”

  Lilli considered this with a feeling much like shock.

  “You know,” Lilli said at last. “That’s true spoken, but I hadn’t thought of it that way.”

  “There’s a great deal to think about, isn’t there? It will take time for you to sort through it all.”

  “Just so. And then there’s Branoic.”

  “The prince will never forbid you that marriage. I hope you realize that.”

  “Oh, I do. He has his own sort of honor, Maryn.”

  For a moment they sat in silence.

  “Tell me to hold my tongue if I’m prying,” Elyssa said at last. “But do you think you might be with child?”

  “Not yet, but truly, it might happen.”

  “It will happen, sooner or later.”

  “Oh I suppose, but I don’t want to think about that.”

  “Lilli, Lilli, how old are you? Do you have any clear idea?”

  “Well, I was twelve when I came here out of fosterage, and that was over two years ago now. I was born in midsummer, my mother told me once.”

  “So let’s think: you’ve seen maybe fifteen years? I’ve seen a fair few more, and I know it would be for the best if you started thinking about this possible child now. Will it be Maryn’s, or could it be your silver dagger’s?”

  “Either, I suppose.” Lilli shrugged, feeling increasingly miserable. “I’d never ask the prince to claim it.”

  “It’s you I’m worried about. What will Branoic say if he thinks the child’s not his?”

  “You don’t understand. Branoic is as devoted to the prince as I am. Why else would he want to marry me, knowing what he knows?”

  “He knows?” Elyssa stared for a long moment. “Well, then!” She rose, smiling. “I think me you’ve made a good choice for your husband. Now, please remember to come to us tomorrow, in the late morning, say, or early afternoon. You can help tease Decci about Oggyn.”

  Only later, long after Elyssa had gone, did it occur to Lilli to wonder how she’d known that Branoic had been sleeping in her chamber now and again. She felt suddenly sick, wondering if Maryn knew it as well.

  On the morrow, Lilli woke up convinced that she’d continue to avoid the other women as she’d been doing, but as the morning dragged on, her fat conviction faded into a thin fear. Finally, not long before noon, she decided that she was tired of her own cowardice. She left her chamber and went up to the next floor of the broch to the women’s hall. The sight of the door, and the thought of opening it, filled her with a sudden revulsion, so strong that she finally realized it had little to do with Bellyra. She’d spent time in this hall with Bevyan and her mother both. For a moment she thought she coul
d see them, pale grey wraiths, walking down the corridor toward her, yet she knew she was only seeing her own memories. They clawed her heart worse than any ghost.

  With one last gasp for breath, Lilli pushed open the door and walked in. Across the big sunny room Bellyra, Degwa, and Elyssa were sitting at a wooden table frame and stitching on a bed hanging. For a moment Lilli could neither speak nor move, not, however, from the sight.

  “It’s so different,” Lilli blurted out. “The hall, I mean.”

  “It certainly is,” Bellyra said, smiling. “I couldn’t believe how awful it was when we first arrived. Do come in, Lilli, and have a look around.”

  “My thanks, Your Highness.” Lilli curtsied, then shut the door. “It’s truly lovely.”

  All the old furnishings had been replaced by the princess’s own. Bright tapestries graced the walls, and Bardek carpets lay like little gardens upon the polished floor. The chairs, the cushions, Bellyra’s little tables with her silver oddments—she had brought Cerrmor with her. None of Lilli’s memories belonged to this hall.

  “It’s splendid,” Lilli said.

  Out of sheer habit she took a chair and brought it over to the frame. When she sat down, Elyssa handed her a needle threaded with bright red wool.

  “If you’ll start on that wyvern there,” Elyssa said, “I’ll just finish off these spirals.”

  Lilli brought her thread through to the front of the hanging and began to stitch, one hand below, one above, in a rhythm so familiar that her self-imposed exile struck her as one of the stupidest things she’d ever done. And the talk, the news of the dun, news of Maryn’s allies and the negotiations over Cerrmor—after the silences of her sickroom no bard song had ever sounded so sweet.

  “Lilli,” Bellyra said eventually. “You’re so quiet today!”

  “Well, Your Highness, my life’s been terribly dull. I’ve been shut up so long.”

  “Oh huh! And what about Branoic? Is he dull?”