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By Root 676 0

two huge hearths drifted in blue wisps across the round room. On one side the warband of thirty-five men was sitting and drinking at their tables. Up by the honor hearth, Tieryn Melaudd was slouched in his carved chair and drinking with his two sons, Waldyn and Dovyn. The tieryn was a florid-faced, raven-haired man, heavy with middle age but still capable of swinging steel. Of the sons, Waldyn, the elder, had the blond hair he’d inherited from his Deverry mother, but the younger looked much like a slender version of his father. Everyone knew that Dovyn was his father’s favorite son, too—a pity, since under the new laws he could never inherit a share of the demesne. Cinvan knelt before the tieryn, who gave him leave to speak with a wave of his hand.

“I’ve returned to your service as I pledged you, my lord. A thousand humble thanks for giving me leave.”

“Welcome, lad. And how fares your kin?”

“They’re doing well, my lord.” Cinvan was lying, but he saw no need to burden the tieryn with a problem he could do nothing about.

“Good, good. Get yourself some ale and join your comrades.”

Cinvan rose, bowed, and made his escape from the awesome presence of the noble-born. He dipped himself a tankard of ale from the open barrel in the curve of the wall, then strolled over to join the warband. Most of the men were watching Edyl and Peddyc play Carnoic, a board game where the players moved black or white stones along a pattern of triangles in attempts to capture each other’s men. Every move the two of them made was slow, studied, and accompanied by either cheers or oaths from the rest of the warband. As Cinvan stood watching them, Garedd came over and laid a hand on his shoulder.

“So our falcon’s flown back to the nest, has he? Pity—I was hoping you’d drown on the road.”

Cinvan threw a mock punch his way.

“Bastard! Anything happen while I was gone?”

“Naught. And how was Elrydd?”

“As well as it needed to be.”

Garedd shot him a look of honest sympathy. They took their tankards and sat down at a table far from the crowd around the game.

“And your sister?” Garedd said.

“That’s the cursed worst thing of all. By the hells, I was minded to beat her black and blue. First she has to go and get herself a bastard, and now she’s given it up.”

“She what?”

“Gave the babe up. To her rotten cat-eyed man. He rides in and wants the little lass—because she’ll only be a burden on our Dewigga, or so he says, and so she up and lets him take her away.” Cinvan slammed the tankard down on the table. “And Da was too cursed drunk to know or care. Ah, horseshit!”

“Now here, maybe it’s for the best. Your sister’s got a chance at a decent marriage someday now.”

“Ah, that’s what she said, blast her! But the shame of it, my own niece, one of my blood kin, riding with the Westfolk! What’s her da going to do, I says to Dewigga, teach her to steal? And she’s got the gall to slap me across the face and tell me to hold my tongue! Women!”

Garedd nodded in silent sympathy. Cinvan drew his dagger and began fiddling with it, just for comfort. On the hilt was graved his personal mark, the striking falcon that had earned him his nickname in the warband. He ran a heavily callused thumb over the mark and had thoughts of slitting this Gaverenteriel’s throat for him one sweet day.

“And you know what else Dewigga had the gall to say? She’s always known her man was going to take the babe when she was old enough. ‘You’re cursed lucky you didn’t let me know,’ says I. ‘Why do you think I held my tongue?’ says she. ‘Cursed good thing,’ says I, and she slaps me again.”

“Why didn’t you beat her black and blue?” Garedd said.

Cinvan shrugged, laying the dagger down on the table and picking up his tankard. The truth was too bitter to tell: he’d seen too much of that already, with his father beating his mother half to death every time she looked at the old man wrong. Her sobs still echoed through his dreams.

“Ah, wouldn’t be worth the trouble,” Cinvan said. “I just tell her that if she has another bastard, don’t come running to me for coin for the midwife this time, and