Darkspell (49 page)

“Only a rabbit,” Rhodry said.

Since she knew he could see in the dark, she turned back, keeping her eyes on the crest of the hill, looking for a
movement that would mean enemies stirring in the night. Suddenly Nevyn moaned. Jill stepped forward just as he flopped over onto his side. With a muddled thought that he’d been poisoned, she flung herself down beside him. He half sat up, then flopped sideways, but all the time his eyes were shut tight and his breathing was slow and deliberate. He kicked out, narrowly missing Rhodry, then heaved himself onto his stomach with a scuttling motion like a crab that carried him a foot away. When his head barely missed a rock, Jill grabbed him by the shoulders and tried to pin him, but his trance strength overwhelmed her. Easily he flung her off and pitched to one side. Swearing, Rhodry flung himself down to help.

For what seemed a grotesque eternity they wrestled with Nevyn’s body as he twisted, jerked, and flung his arms about. Once he landed Rhodry a hard blow on the jaw, but though Rhodry swore even louder, he hung on. Jill could only pray to the Goddess to keep away any enemies that might be approaching. At last Nevyn went limp, and she could just see him smile in the moonlight. His mouth worked as if he were speaking; then he lay utterly still.

“Oh, ye gods,” she said. “Is he going to die?”

Just then he opened his eyes and grinned at her.

“What have I been doing?” Nevyn said. “Flopping?”

“Like a fish on a riverbank.” Rhodry let go his hold.

“It happens now and then in trances.” The old man sat up, looking around as if he were a bit dazed. “Did one of you kill Alastyr’s body?”

“We didn’t,” Jill said. “We stayed with you.”

“Then Blaen and his men must be at the farm already. No time to explain. We’ve got to hurry.”

And yet they reached the farm just at the same time as did Blaen and the warband. At the head of his men the gwerbret trotted over to them. In the gray dawn light he looked profoundly annoyed.

“Thanks be to every god that you’re safe,” Blaen snapped. “We scoured the hills for you.”

“I owe you an apology, Your Grace,” Nevyn said. “But the battle’s already over.”

Camdel heard them all ride into the farmyard. He went tense, every muscle in his body spasming in panic when he realized that he wasn’t going to starve to death but be rescued. With a moan he heaved himself to his knees, the ankle chain clanking. It was just long enough for him to stand and take a few steps. Lying on the kitchen table was a long-bladed knife, which would do to slit his throat or his wrists if only he could reach it. He wanted death, lusted for it, the one thing that could wipe away his shame and make him forget the hideous truths about himself that Sarcyn had taught him.

The chain let him reach the table, but the knife lay at the end of its six-foot span. He leaned over the edge, stretched out, couldn’t get up far enough to lie on it, stretched and stretched but could just brush the handle with his fingertips. From outside came voices, and two that he recognized: Gwerbret Blaen and Lord Rhodry Maelwaedd of Aberwyn, here to see what had become of the Master of the King’s Bath. With a stretch that ached his shoulder he touched the knife. He could just close two fingers on the handle scissorlike, but as he began to pull it toward him, his aching hand spasmed and knocked the knife to the floor. It bounced on the edge of the hearthstone and lay far out of his reach.

Sobbing, gasping for breath, he let himself fall from the table and crouched in the straw. Why hadn’t Sarcyn killed him? Perhaps his master knew he wanted to die and left him alive as the last torment of all. Blaen will hang you, he told himself, because you stole from the High King. He clung to his one comfort, that soon he’d be dangling from a rope in Dun Hiraedd’s market square. Outside the voices came closer.

“I only pray we find Camdel alive.” That was Blaen, who doubtless wanted the pleasure of hanging him.

“So do I,” said an unfamiliar voice. “But I warn you, Your Grace, he might be mad.”

“Ah, the poor lad!” Blaen’s voice was full of pity. “Well, no man can hold him accountable for this, from what you’ve told me.”

Camdel felt his head jerk back. Blaen wasn’t going to hang him. He was forgiven, and he would have to live with what he knew about himself. He began to scream over and over as he tossed himself from side to side. Dimly he heard running footsteps and men shouting but he went on screaming until someone knelt in front of him and grabbed him by the shoulders. He looked up into Blaen’s face, twisted in horror and pity both.

“Kill me,” Camdel stammered. “For the love of every god, I beg you to kill me.”

Although Blaen’s mouth worked, he couldn’t speak. An old man with a thick shock of white hair and piercing blue eyes knelt beside the gwerbret.

“Camdel, look at me,” he said. “I’m a healer, and I’m going to help you. Just look at me, lad.”

His voice was so kind that Camdel did what he asked. The blue eyes swelled to fill the world, as if he were looking into a lake of clear water. When the old man laid a hand on his arm, he felt warmth running into his blood, a soothing, calming warmth that made all his cramped muscles ease into peace.

“Later we’ll have to talk about what’s happened to you, but for now there’s no need for you to remember all that.”

Camdel felt drunk, a pleasant, giggling sort of drunk.

“He’s forgetting already, aren’t you, lad? Of course you are. You only know that you’re very ill, and that we’re going to help you.”

Camdel nodded in agreement, thinking that his long illness had left him fevered and confused. He clung to the old man’s hand and wept in gratitude for his rescue.

As soon as he saw how broken Camdel was, Rhodry backed out of the kitchen in a hurry. The man was mad, his mind torn to pieces and the pieces scattered forever—or so Rhodry saw it. Death in battle he could face, but this misery? Feeling sick to his stomach, he wandered around to
the main door of the house, where a pair of Blaen’s men were keeping guard.

“Did they find him, my lord?” Comyn said.

“Never call me that again.”

“My apologies, silver dagger.”

“Well and good, then, but find him they did, and it’s not pretty.”

Comyn shivered.

“I sent some of the lads out to search the farmstead,” the captain remarked. “Just in case there’s someone lurking around, like.”

“Good idea. Has anyone been inside yet?”

“No one wants to go, and I can’t order a man to do somewhat I’m afraid to do myself.”

“Well, you’ve got a silver dagger riding at your orders. I’ll volunteer. Better than letting Blaen do it and put himself at who knows what dweomer-soaked risk.”

Comyn hesitated, then handed Rhodry his shield.

“Don’t know what you’ll find in there, do you, now?”

“I don’t.” Rhodry settled the shield on his left arm. “My thanks.”

Rhodry drew his sword as Comyn kicked open the door. The farmhouse was big, about sixty feet in diameter, and like most houses of its type it was cut up like a pie into small wedge-shaped chambers, divided from one another by wickerwork partitions. Rhodry stepped into what had been a parlor of sorts with two wooden chairs, a carved chest sitting under a window, and on the wall a wooden shelf that proudly displayed three painted earthenware plates. The dust lay so thick on the floor that he left footprints.

In either wall were openings, hung with blankets. Since the one to his right would lead to the kitchen and Camdel, Rhodry decided to go left. He approached the opening cautiously, then flicked up his sword and pulled down the blanket. As it crumpled, he saw a bedchamber, with fresh straw on the floor and a couple of hay-filled pallets. He walked in, spotting several bedrolls and piles of saddlebags, all strewn about as if someone had recently
searched through them. Although it looked like perfectly ordinary gear, he refused to touch it. For all he knew, it was filled with strange magicks.

The blanket over the next opening was pulled to one side. He peered into a chamber, far bigger than the last two, where plowshares, old horse gear, and a couple of pieces of broken furniture lay scattered about. Sitting by the doorway on the far side was a corpse, a gray, puffy thing dressed in farmer’s clothing and holding a woodcutter’s ax in both hands. Rhodry assumed that the farmer must have tried to defend himself as the dark dweomer overwhelmed and slew him.

“Well, old man,” he said as he walked in, “we’ll get you a proper burial.”

The corpse raised its head and looked at him. Rhodry yelped aloud and stood frozen for a moment as it slowly lurched to its feet. Although its eye sockets were empty, it raised the ax and staggered toward him just as if it could see. Rhodry wanted to gag, but he flung up his shield and stepped aside as a clumsy blow swung down and missed him. When the thing turned toward him, he swung his sword up under its slow parry and caught it full across the throat. There was a gush of some dark liquid with an acrid smell, but the corpse calmly raised the ax again and stepped forward.

Rhodry’s berserker laugh rose in his mouth. Sobbing and chortling, he dodged, lunged, and hacked into the corpse’s armpit. Although more stinking liquid spewed, the thing came on and swung down at him. When he caught the blow on his shield, he heard the wood crack; the unnatural warrior was strong. His laughter rose to a howl as he swung up hard and cut the thing’s right arm half-off. It merely shifted the weight on the ax to its left hand and swung again. With a dodge he darted round and stabbed it in the back. Slowly it turned to face him.

Distantly Rhodry heard voices yelling, coming closer, but he kept all his concentration on the ax as the thing swung it from side to side as if it would cut Rhodry down like a tree. He dodged, caught a blow on his shield, and
sliced its arm open, but still it swung. He was hampered by the clutter in the room as they went round and round. All at once he slipped; the ax sailed by, a bare inch from his head. He jumped up, shrieking with laughter, and put all his berserker’s strength into the blow. The sword bit deep and cracked bone as it caught the thing on the back of the neck.

Its head dangling from a strip of skin and muscle, the corpse swung the ax full into Rhodry’s shield. The wood and leather split and cracked to the boss, and half the shield fell away. Rhodry ducked and dodged, then swung at its left arm. Although it dropped the ax at last, still it kept coming for him. He leaped back fast. It seemed that being touched by its fingers would be worse than the blow of a blade. Desperately he sliced its abdomen open. No guts spilled, and still it came for him.

“Halt in the name of the Master of the Aethyr!”

The tattered, oozing corpse stood stock-still. As Nevyn came in, Rhodry flung sword and shield down, dropped to his knees, and vomited, uncaring of who might see him. He heard other voices, then, as men crowded into the chamber. Comyn knelt down beside him just as he was wiping his mouth on his sleeve.

“Are you all right, silver dagger? By the Lord of Hell’s asshole, what was that thing?”

“Cursed if I know, but I’ve never been more grateful for the loan of a shield in my life.”

As he got up, he heard Nevyn chanting in a strange language. When the old man came to the end of it, the corpse buckled, its knees giving way, and settled rather than fell to the floor. Nevyn stamped thrice on the floor. Rhodry saw ugly and deformed Wildfolk dancing on the corpse for one brief moment before they vanished.

“After this, Rhodry lad,” the dweomer-master said, “you might ask my advice before poking around in strange places.”

“You have my sworn word on that.”

And yet the worst horror of all still lay before him. Nevyn walked to the opening in the last chamber and
pulled down the blanket to reveal a tiny, windowless room with a piece of black velvet hanging on the curved wall. On it was embroidered an upside-down five-pointed star and some other marks that Rhodry couldn’t recognize. The chamber stank of incense and a fishy sort of smell.

Lying in the middle of the floor was the body of a stout, gray-haired man, his arms outstretched on either side. He looked like an ordinary Cerrmor man, but someone must have hated him, because he’d been stabbed in the chest over and over, so many times, truly, that he must have been long dead before the final blow fell. Although seeing the corpse meant little to Rhodry, merely looking into the room terrified him, so much so that when Nevyn walked in, he wanted to scream at the dweomerman to stay out. He forced himself to follow, but only because he was sure that Nevyn needed guarding. In the dim light it seemed that things moved, half-seen, silent. Nevyn nudged the corpse with the toe of his riding boot.

“Well, Alastyr,” he said, “at last we meet in the flesh. You’ve been very clever, because I don’t remember ever having seen you before.” He glanced at Rhodry. “This is the man who wanted you dead, the one who stood behind Loddlaen in the war.”

More in bewilderment than rage, Rhodry stared at his old enemy. Since he’d been picturing the dark master as a fiend in human form, he was oddly disappointed to find him so ordinary looking. Yet the room was fiendish enough. His irrational terror grew until Nevyn laid a reassuring hand on his shoulder.

“This danger’s long over,” the dweomerman said. “It’s the touch of elven blood in your veins that makes you so sensitive.”

“Truly?”

“Truly. This is the chamber where Alastyr worked his foul perversions of the dweomer, you see. Ah, ye gods, poor Camdel!”

“What did they do, make him watch?”

“Watch? Hah! They used him for their rituals. He was repeatedly raped in here.”

“Oh, pigs cock! How can you rape a man?”

“Don’t pretend to a naïveté that a court-raised man doesn’t have. You know cursed well what I mean. They cut him when they were doing it, too, to spill blood for their twisted spirits.”

If Rhodry had had anything left to heave, he would have vomited again. Nevyn was watching him.

“Blaen and I are minded to tell the king that Camdel’s dead,” the old man said. “Will your honor allow you to keep our secret?”

Rhodry glanced around the chamber and wondered how it would look to a man thrown down on the floor.