Bard I (21 page)

‘I know. But I’m in your house and you are drinking with me. You wouldn’t do that if you believed I had a hand in your nephew’s death.’

Oban grunted moodily. ‘I can be wrong. And Besdath is one of my kindred, however ill-natured a louse. If ifs true about the tracks as you say, and only Besdath was there when Cas and Marnoc died. . . you know what it must signify.’

‘That he slew them.’

‘And if it’s untrue, there’s but one reason you could have for lying.’

Felimid took no offence. ‘Are you hoping it’s myself and not he that lied? But Besdath did not seem a clever man to me. If guilt of murder is in him. I doubt that he’ll be able to hide it long.’

‘He challenged you. I heard him. If need be, would you meet him in battle, the winner to be justified?’

‘I would.’

Any other answer would have cost him Oban’s sympathy at once, Felimid knew. but he did not want to settle the matter that way– the idea offended his sense of justice and harmony and the fitness of things. Where was judgement, where was intelligence, in a trial by combat? Never would the great kings of Erin have depended on such “justice”.

In the morning, two horses came out of the mist to cross the guarded causey. They were saddled and bridled, but their saddles were empty and they stepped heavily through the mire, heads hanging low.

Felimid knew them; he’d seen them the previous day. They were the horses of the murdered men, Cas and Marnoc, come home with the news, not knowing it had gone distorted before them.

Hands stripped them gravely of harness. for they would not wear it again. Among these people, it was one man for one horse-as, in marriage, for one woman. When the rider died the horse was turned free.

Oban the Strong and four of his kindred rode out to bring home the dead, with Felimid to guide them. The corpses lay sodden and forlorn on the turf. The night’s hammering rain had made them almost a part of the soaked ground. They were brought home, cleansed and shrouded.

A wild wake for them was held that night. Laughter and weeping were not restrained; nor was the swiving. The widows were bolder for that than anybody, as if to reject death by living. Men sat the dead up in their grave-clothes and gambled with them, holding the dice­boxes over their stiff shoulders and paying when they lost. Any Christian priest would have shuddered with horror, deeming them all possessed by demons. For that matter, any civilized pagan would have curled his lip in disgust. Felimid did neither. His harp throbbed hauntingly through the smoky din. He sang love songs, and war songs, and dirges as the fancy took him, and often his eyes were drawn to Cein’s fox-red hair.

But Besdath was not there.

The shrouded dead were burned on pyres the next day. Their horse-furniture and whatever they had won ‘dicing’ at the wake. went to the burning with them.

Their steeds watched the yellow flames rise. When the burning was done and the ashes had been scattered on the running wind, the horses were set free.

Besdath had kept sullenly to his hut all the while, with his wound for excuse. Felimid wondered about the man; it annoyed him to know how much he wondered.

Besdath seemed cankered within by something bitter that had festered for years. yet he had a grim patience and endurance too–Felimid had heard his dogged courage spoken of. It hadn’t made him one friend in the dun, however. Nor did it seem that he’d ever sought one. Maybe not even in the wife whose name meant jewel.

She was not disliked The bard knew she could tell him more about Besdath than anybody else, but he did not approach her. The little poison spiders of gossip were too quick to spin their webs, and nothing could be hidden in a place like Oban’s dun. He waited patiently for Kyle.

Kyle appeared that same morning, out of the kind of weather he most hated. Rain was a whip with a thousand long grey lashes in the hand of an unfriendly wind. Oban the Strong, who was the band’s ironsmith, was beating out a spearhead in the little smithy; the noise of his work set Felimid’s teeth on edge. Twice lately there had been attempts to harm him, necessitating sudden flight. and both times a smith had been present. Things like that had a way of running in threes. If these men tried to slay Kyle. Felimid could not stand by.

The horse-lord entered the dun as if all its armed men were his to command.

‘Good morrow, singer,’ he said coolly to the bard.

‘You have run far.’ He greeted Oban the Strong with respect. ‘Good morrow, chieftain. I think we met at Badon. or after. Men from Calleva were there with Count Artorius’s auxiliaries. I led them; my name is Kyle.’

‘I remember,’ Oban replied. ‘You fought well. But only Artorius could have induced us to fight side by side with Romans. He’s not here now.’

‘Someone else is.’ Kyle indicated the bard. ‘This man has crimes to answer for in my king’s presence. I know he’s a bard, and sacrosanct—’

‘He’s our guest as well.’

‘You do not know all about him, chieftain! He’s a thief, and maybe by now a murderer. Bind him that I may take him to Calleva-give me an escort there-and my king will reward you. This man has maimed his heir with a broken arm and struck him down so that he lies unconscious.’

‘So he told me.’ Oban laughed aloud. ‘And I tell you it’s the best joke I’ve heard in some while! I like it better than yours about sending him to Calleva with men to grovel for a reward. Reward! For selling a guest! I’ve had men killed for less!’

‘Don’t be killing this one, Oban,’ Felimid said. ‘Hold him to ransom, since you cannot get a reward for me. It will do his king good to be open-handed with his wealth.’

‘Will you listen to a thief?’ Kyle shouted. ‘I serve my king! I came here alone when I might have come with a hundred swords!’ This was exaggeration, but sounded well. ‘J too worship the goddess and have offered at her altar.’ He drew a thin chain from within his tunic. It bore a coin as pendant; a gold Icenian stater from before the conquest, stamped with the outline of a horse. ‘Let there be friendship between us. Give me that man.’

Oban said, ‘No.’

He made an abrupt gesture with his hand. Behind Kyle, the heavy logs swung down, making a barrier too high for any horse to leap. Kyle never turned his head. He knew what the sound meant.

‘Drag him out of that saddle, lads.’

The chief was enthusiastically obeyed. Kyle reached for his sword, more slowly than he would have done with real intent; so slowly that the blade was a scant hand-span out of its sheath when they pulled him down. Once on the ground, he let the sword be. He resisted bare-handed with enough skill and fury to make the scuffle a memorable one, and none of the men who subdued him at last were unmarked.

Neither was he.

From a bloody mouth he panted, ‘You will see. . . those hundred horsemen. . . at your dun yet, because of this.’

‘I think not.’ Oban was cheerful. ‘But if I do, there are other duns. and men in them who will gladly join us to fight Romans-even men who’d ordinarily be no friends of ours! If your hundred come, they’ll be met by a hundred and fifty. In the meantime, let’s dicker for your ransom, eh? What! Haven’t you disarmed him yet?’

With two sword-tips pricking his neck, the horse-lord made no further fuss. He threw Felimid a look which the bard interpreted as saying, ‘I wonder how you will turn this into a hero-song.’

A large black carrion-crow flew down to perch on the ramparts and watch. Its clever eyes glittered with malicious laughter.

Hair like a wonder of autumn-fire burning,

Eyes that divert like the changeable sky,

Hidden her reasons, obscure, many-turning;

Hard to know what she desires or why.

The truth of her mind there is little discerning,

But I or her husband at sunrise may die.

Felimid mac Fal,
The Seeking of Kincaid

I
N
THE
AFTERNOON
,
THERE
WAS
A
RAID
. The weather had sweetened; at least, the wind had dropped, and the rain was enfeebled to a misty, drizzling greyness. A man could scarcely see a spear’s cast in front of him. But it was good weather to what had gone before, so the cattle were grazing out. Men on hardy horses watched them. The raiders struck swiftly. Oban’s men were as swift to respond, when curled ram’s-horns shouted the alarm from a wet dimness. This kind of work was their daily bread. They grabbed helmet, targe, javelin, and leaped on their horses’ backs. A man caught at the jakes dragged up his trews and moved, not even finishing what he was about.

Felimid joined them, springing to the back of the ready, saddled dun gelding. He swore briefly, for putting his backside on a wet saddle was something be detested. Then he charged over the causey with the rest.

Confusion greeted them; fighting, the clash of iron, figures indistinct in the chilly murk.. The strangers turned tail as Oban’s men chased after them, whooping. Felimid thought of the cattle. They were the object of the raid; they must be. He scented trickery, some ruse or feint of cattle-raiders. He knew a good deal about that.

Well, so must Oban’s men, he thought, if they’d only pause to use their wits.

Two men apart from the bard had stayed to keep the cattle from running. They worked furiously to turn the small herd back to the dun-and then another party of strangers charged among them. The first lot had come to draw off Oban’s main strength. Now this lot was slipping in to achieve the real business of the raid, with three men to stop them.

One of the bard’s companions lifted a horn to his mouth. A raider flung a javelin at him. He caught it on his large, and made the weeping sky shake with a blast of his horn.

With Prince Justin’s sword, Felimid struck aside a spear thirsty for his blood. The thrower rode close. He hewed at Felimid’s leg. The bard’s buckler leaped between, so that his foe’s blade skidded across it. Felimid’s borrowed sword flashed. A crimson wedge of biceps muscle flapped loose. The raider dropped his sword to clutch desperately at his arm.

Another took his place. Weapons rang harshly. Hands gripped hilts as if they were life. Grey rain drizzled. Bits of wet earth flew up from the horses’ feet.

More raiders battled Felimid’s two companions, while others shouted wildly as they drove off the cattle. One was gored through the thigh by a shaggy, irascible bull who did not wish to leave his home pasture. Felimid never saw it. He was occupied.

With Prince Justin’s blade, he turned a short, chopping cut. The dun gelding’s big shoulder battered the chest of his foe’s horse. Felimid gripped hard with his knees against the violent jolt, and hacked edgewise through a large, hacked through wicker and bullhide into a brawny wrist. Blood sprayed behind the ruined shield.

The raider’s mouth stretched into an agonized square. He cut fiercely at Felimid’s head. The bard turned that stroke with his buckler, shoving the enemy blade aside, and chopped downward into the rider’s hip, striking him hard with the metal-bound buckler even as he used the sword. The man rolled out of his saddle, and grass crimsoned where he fell.

Felimid raced after the cattle. Two of the raiders turned back to halt him, leaving but four to manage their cloven-footed loot. They had the look of a formidable pair.

So they proved to be. Not only did they ride well, and handle weapons better, they worked together like one pair of hands. From the first clash of blades, Felimid found himself desperately hard pressed.

They attacked, and attacked. Never was there any chance to hit back that Felimid dared seize. Always, to strike at one would have exposed him to some disabling or mortal blow from the other. He could only give ground, and be thankful he rode a trained war-horse.

The fierce, moustached faces grinned at him. One bore an effort-crimsoned scar across cheek and broken nose. The second was fairer. They bobbed and swung above their horses’ manes like apples on cords, their swords forever leaping before them.

This couldn’t last. Felimid knew his own agile sword-hand and superb riding would not keep his skin whole much longer. He’d have run, but he dared not show these two his back for long enough to begin running. One of them would surely cut his spine in half.

‘Hai! Dun Oban!’

The cry was beautiful to hear. Felimid returned it, loudly as he had breath in his lungs to do. Oban’s men had returned from chasing after the first attackers; three of them came to his aid.

The pair of raiders besetting Felimid rode breakneck away. Oban’s kin laughed hoarsely, and cried insults after them. but didn’t follow. They set themselves to recover the cattle.

The numbers fighting over the beasts became more equal. The raiders could fight, or drive their loot, but they couldn’t do both, and if they stood and fought hard, winning would prove more costly than leaving with empty hands. Downsmen judged such things pragmatically. The raiders abandoned the cattle and made themselves scarce.

It happened with the swiftness of flames blowing out. One moment the mist was filled with weapon-noise, fighting horses and angry men. The next, all was quiet save for fading hoofbeats. Oban’s kin were not amazed, being masters of such hit-and-run tactics themselves. They knew the raiders would be disgruntled by failure, and might return to strike again as swiftly as they had vanished. Oban’s men knew, because they had tasted the same feeling more than once. Alert for trouble, they herded their cattle within the palisade.

‘Now there is a foolish way to guard your clan’s wealth!’ Felimid said. ‘Running off after any gang of wastrels who make noises at you from the mist-and leaving your guest, a bard at that, to fight against the real attack! You may be strong, but you’ll die poor at that rate.’

‘Huh!’ grunted Oban. ‘That’s how we entertain our guests! Now if we’d been greedy and hogged the sport, you’d have cause to complain.’

Another moustached, long-tressed wild man, joyously bloody, clapped Felimid on the shoulder. ‘You didn’t do badly! By the goddess, I saw him fending off the map Tart brothers, him alone, while a man might count a hundred! Slowly! And look at him! They didn’t get one drop of his blood!’