Bristling Wood (28 page)

“Is the wound healing well?” she said.

“It is. You must have brought my uncle with you from, all the noise outside. I knew he’d come. If he didn’t have me and Nedd to complain about, his life would be cursed dull.”

At that, Benoic himself strode in, slapping his pair of gauntlets impatiently against his thigh.

“You dolt, Perro! And Nedd’s twice a dolt! But Naddryc’s a whoreson bastard, having the gall to besiege my kin. Well and good, we’ll wipe him off the battlefield for it. Are you riding with us?”’

“I am. A wolf can run on three legs.”

“Now wait a moment, my lord,” Jill broke in. “If you ride, that cut could start bleeding again.”

“Let it. I’ve got to go with them. I can lead the army through the forest, you see. We’ll save twenty miles and a night that way.”

“Splendid,” Benoic said. “Glad to see you’re finally showing some spirit, lad. Don’t worry, Jill. We’ll have your man out of that worm-riddled dun as fast as ever we can.”

“Your Grace is most honorable and gracious. If I were a bard I’d praise your name for this.”

With a small bow she retired and left them alone. Out in the ward a pair of Benoic’s vassals were conferring with their captains while the men unsaddled and tethered their horses outside for want of room in the stables. She went out the gates and walked about halfway down the hill, then sat down where she could be alone and called to the gray gnome, who appeared promptly.

“Is Rhodry still all right?”

It nodded yes, then hunkered down in front of her and began picking its teeth with one fingernail.

“You still haven’t told me why you hate Lord Perryn.”

It paused to screw its face up in irritation, then went on picking until it’d finally gotten its fangs clean enough to suit it.

“Come on now, little brother. You could at least tell me why. Or is it too hard to explain?”

Rather reluctantly, he nodded his agreement to this last.

“Well, let’s see. Did he hurt you or some other Wildfolk?”

No, he hadn’t done that.

“Can he even see you?”

Apparently not, since it nodded a no.

“Is he an evil man?”

Frowning in concentration, the gnome waggled its hands as if to say: not exactly that, either.

“You know, I’m having a hard time thinking up more questions.”

It smiled, pressed its hands to its temples as if it had a headache, then disappeared. Jill supposed that she’d never find out the reason, but as long as the gnome behaved itself and didn’t pinch the lord or tie knots in his hair, it didn’t particularly matter at the moment, not when she had Rhodry’s safety to worry about. She decided that she couldn’t bear to sit here in Nedd’s moldering dun and wait for news.

Since she had a mail shirt and a shield of her own, on the morrow Jill rose and armed when the warband did. Once the army was mustered outside the gates, she led her horse into line at the very rear. Since these men had been hastily assembled from Benoic’s various allies and vassals, everyone who noticed her at all seemed to assume that she was a silver dagger hired by some other lord. All that counted to them, truly, was that she was another sword.

By keeping strictly to herself and speaking to no one, Jill escaped discovery all that day, because Perryn led the army off the road into the forest on a track so narrow that they had to ride single file. All day they wound around hills and through the trees by such confusing paths that she prayed Perryn actually knew what he was doing. She also understood why all the provisions were on pack mules, not in carts; apparently Benoic knew his nephew’s daft ways very well. That night, however, they made camp in a mountain meadow, and there Jill was caught out. Like the excellent commander he was, Benoic made a point of walking through the camp and speaking to his men personally. When he came to Jill, he stared for a moment, then, roared with laughter.

“Have all my men gone blind? Mail or no, Jill, you don’t look like a lad to me. What are you doing with the army?”

“Well, Your Grace, my man’s all I have in the world. I’ve got to see him with my own eyes as soon as ever I can.”

“Huh. Well, we can’t be sending you back. now. You’d only get lost trying to follow Perm’s wretched deer trails. You’d best come camp with me. You can keep your eye on Perryn’s wound, and everyone will know you’re under my protection.”

When Jill shifted her gear over to the tieryn’s campfire, she found Perryn there, slumped against his saddle. Although he was pale with exhaustion, he looked up and smiled at her.

“I thought you’d find a way to come along,” he said.

“Why, my lord?”

“Oh, er ah, just rather thought you were that sort of lass. I hope Rhodry’s worthy of you.”

“I hold him so, my lord.”

Nodding absently, he stared into the fire. She was struck by how he looked, a perpetual melancholy that was beginning to wear lines a face too young to have them, rather as if he were in exile from some far country rather than among his kin. A puzzle, that one, she thought to herself.

On the morrow, Jill saw yet another puzzling thing about the lord. Since she was riding right behind him, she could watch how he managed his leading. When they came to a spot where two trails joined or one petered out, he would wave the army to a halt, then ride a few steps ahead to sit on his horse and stare blankly around him, his head tilted as if sniffing the wind. For a moment he would look profoundly uncomfortable, then suddenly smile and lead the men on with perfect confidence. She was also impressed with his riding. Most of the time he left the reins wrapped around the saddle peak and guided the horse with his knees, while he swayed in a perfect balance in spite of having one arm in a sling. On horseback he looked much more graceful, as if his peculiar proportions had been designed to make him and a horse fit together in an artistic whole.

About two hours before sunset, Perryn found the army a large meadow in which to camp and announced that they were a scant six miles from Graemyn’s dun. After the horses were tended, Jill put a clean bandage on Perryn’s wound, which was oozing blood and lymph, and tied up his sling again. Although he pleaded that he was too weary to eat, she badgered him into downing some cheese.

“We’ll reach the dun tomorrow,” he remarked. “I can rest then, after the battle, I mean.”

“Now listen, my lord. You can’t fight. Trying to swing a sword would open that wound up again.”

“Oh, don’t trouble your heart about that. I’ll just trot around the edge of things. See what I can see.”

It was such a daft remark that Jill couldn’t answer.

“Oh, er, ah, well, I heard my uncle talking with the other lords, they’re thinking of riding right into battle.” He looked sincerely distressed. “There’s bound to be wounded horses, and maybe I can get them to safety.”

“Oh. I keep forgetting how valuable horses are up here.”

“I cursed well hope that Nedd and Rhodry are still alive.”

Although she knew that they were, she had no way of telling him.

“So do I,” she said instead. “You seem to honor your cousin highly, my lord.”

“I don’t, because he’s not truly honorable. But I love him. We were pages together in Benoic’s dun. I think I would have gone mad if it weren’t for Nedd.”

“Was the tieryn as harsh as all that?”

“He wasn’t, not truly. It was me, you see. I just . . . well, oh ah er.”

As she waited for him to finish, Jill wondered if Nedd’s efforts to keep him sane had all gone for naught. Finally he got up and went to his blankets without another word.

“You’re certain it will be today?” Graemyn said.

“As certain as the sun is shining,” Rhodry said. “Your Grace, I know it sounds daft, but I swear to you that the relief army’s close by. We’d best be ready to arm and sally. If they don’t come, then Your Grace will know I’m daft, and we can all surrender and be done with it.”

For a long moment Graemyn considered him with an expression that wavered between doubt and awe. Perched on Rhodry’s shoulder, the gray gnome squirmed impatiently until at last the tieryn nodded his agreement.

“True enough, silver dagger.” He turned to his captain. “Have the men arm. One way or another, today sees the end of this.”

The gnome grabbed Rhodry’s hair and gave it a tug, then vanished.

The warband drew up behind the gates; watchmen climbed to the ramparts. As the waiting dragged on in the hot sun, the men ended up sitting down on the cobbles. No one spoke; every now and then someone would look Rhodry’s way with a puzzled frown, as if thinking they were daft to trust this silver dagger’s words. All at once, a watchman yelled with a whoop of joy.

“Horsemen coming out of the forest! I see the Wolf blazon! It’s Benoic, by the gods!”

Laughing, cheering, the men leapt to their feet. Nedd threw an arm around Rhodry’s shoulders and hugged him; half a dozen men slapped him on the back. At the tieryn’s order, two servants lifted down the latch beam at the gates and rushed to man the winches. From outside, the battle noise broke over them; men yelling, horns blowing, horses neighing in panic, and through it all was the strike of sword on shield and mail. Rhodry started to laugh, a little cold mutter under his breath; he felt so light on his feet that it seemed he hovered over the cobbles.

“Remember!” Nedd hissed. “We’re going after Naddryc.”

Although he nodded agreement, Rhodry went on laughing.

With a groan and creak the gates swung back. Screaming and jostling, the warband rushed out, just as when leaves and sticks dam a stream, which worries at them, nudges them, and at last breaks free in a churn of white water. Down the hill, the enemy camp was a screaming, shoving, bloody madness. Half of Naddryc’s men had had no time to arm; those wearing mail were trying to hold the breach in the earthworks against a full cavalry charge, and they were doing it with swords, not pikes. Horses went down; others screamed and reared; but for every horse lost, three or four of the enemy were trampled. All at once the cry went up: the sally to our rear! the sally to our rear! Rhodry’s laugh rose like a wail as the horsemen drove through. The defenders broke, swirling and running to face the new threat as Graemyn led his men downhill.

“There he is!” Nedd shrieked. “With the trimmed shield.”

A burly man with mail but no helm was racing across the battlefield in retreat, the silver edging on his shield winking in the sunlight. At an angle Rhodry went after him, his laugh gone as he thought only of running, and soon he’d left the wounded Nedd behind. Naddryc was slowing, panting, gasping for breath. Then he stumbled, and Rhodry dodged round to cut him off. For a moment they merely stared at each other, panting while they got their breath back, Naddryc’s mouth working under his blond mustache.

“So,” Rhodry said. “Here’s the man who was going to kill women and children.”

Then the cold, mad chuckle took over his voice. As he lunged, Naddryc dodged back, flinging up his sword and shield. He parried gracefully, his shield a little high to protect his bare head, and made a quick thrust that Rhodry easily turned aside. Suddenly light flared in a drift of black smoke; someone had fired the tents. Rhodry feinted in from the side, then struck; Naddryc parried barely in time, jumped back, and began to circle. As Rhodry swung to face him, the murk reached them, smoke, dust, thicker than a sea fog. They both checked, coughing for a moment, but the smell of burning drove Rhodry mad.

With a choking, gasping howl he charged, as wild as an injured lion, striking, parrying, cursing, and coughing while Naddryc desperately tried to fend him off, rarely getting in a blow of his own as he parried with both sword and shield. Yet even in his madness Rhodry saw that the lord was tiring. He feinted to the side again, dodged fast to the other, and then back as. Naddryc tried to follow—too slowly. Rhodry’s blow caught him hard on the side of the neck. With a ghastly bubbling scream he fell to his knees, then buckled as his life’s blood pumped out the artery.

Rhodry’s berserker fit left him, dropped away like a wind-caught cloak, but he was possessed by an even madder panic. Somewhere Jill was lying dead or wounded, somewhere in the burning. He knew it, even as he knew that he was being irrational. He heard Nedd yell his name, but he turned and ran toward the blazing tents in the same blind way that he’d charged Naddryc. All at once he heard hoofbeats and saw a horse emerging from the murk. Even flecked with soot, Sunrise’s pale gold coat still shone.

“Rhoddo!” Jill yelled. “Get up behind me! Naddryc’s horses are about to stampede.”

Rhodry sheathed his sword and swung up behind her. He was barely settled when she kicked Sunrise to a trot.

“What are you doing here?”

“Rescuing you. I could hear you laughing and rode straight for the sound. Look behind us. Are they coming?”

When he glanced back, he could, see little in the smoke and dust, but he did make out an orderly procession of horselike objects moving away from the burning camp.

“By all the gods! Someone’s gotten them out of there.”

“It must be Epona herself, then. When I rode by a few minutes, ago, they were screaming and puling at their tethers.”’

She paused the horse and turned in the saddle to give him a puzzled look. He grabbed her and kissed her, remembered his irrational panic, and kissed her again. With a laugh she pushed him away.

“You’re breaking my neck, twisted around like this. Wait til we’re alone, my love.”

At that Rhodry remembered that they were in the middle of a battle, but as he looked around, somewhat dazed as he always was when the fit left him, he realized that the fighting was over. Naddryc been so outnumbered that most of his men had been slaughtered and the fortunate few remaining taken prisoner. As they dismounted and walked on, leading the horse over the uncertain ground, he saw Nedd talking to Graemyn over Naddryc’s corpse.

“Come here, silver dagger.” Nedd hailed him with a shout. “Your Grace, this is the man who killed this bastard.”

“You’ll be well rewarded for this, silver dagger,” Graemyn said. “Indeed, well rewarded for everything you’ve done for me.”

The tieryn knelt beside the corpse, then took his sword two-handed and severed Naddryc’s neck in one swift blow. Rhodry’s stomach churned; it was an impious thing that he was seeing. Graemyn grabbed the head by the hair and stood up, looking at every man nearby as if challenging them to say one wrong word, then strode away, the head dangling in his hand. Even though the priests had long since banned the taking of trophy heads with mighty curses, the sight of Graemyn with his enemy’s head touched something deep in Rhodry, as one string of a harp will sound when another is plucked. Although Jill and Nedd were watching the tieryn in honest revulsion, he felt a certain dark satisfaction.