A Time of Omens - Katharine Kerr [106]
Once his horse was fed and stabled, and his gear stowed in a neat pile under a table by the hearth, Rhodry and the innkeep, Merro, sat down to have a tankard of dark apiece in the otherwise empty tavern room.
“You’re on the road late, silver dagger.”
“I am, at that, and a cursed ugly thing it is, too. I couldn’t find a hire for the winter, you see.”
“Ah, well.” The tavernman considered, sucking his teeth. “Well, now, there were some merchants through here not so long ago, from Dun Trebyc way, they were, and they told me about a feud brewing, down in the southern hills.”
“Sounds like work for a silver dagger’s sword.”
“It does, truly. What you do, see, is ride dead east from here till you reach the lake, then take the south-running road. Keep asking along the way. If there’s war brewing, it won’t be any secret, will it now? Or if that comes to naught, you might give his grace our gwerbret a try. He’s a generous man, just like he should be, and he remembers the old days, too, when you lads put a king on his throne, or so he always says. We remember the old days, here in Pyrdon.” Merro paused for a sip of ale. “This village, now? It used to be royal land, you see, when there was a king in Dun Drw instead of a gwerbret. That’s why it’s got this name. Ty Ric, it was once, the king’s house. There was a royal hunting lodge here in those days, you see, right where this inn is now, though of course there’s not one stick of wood left from it. That’s the way things go, eh?”
“Interesting,” Rhodry said to be polite. “But it’s a free village now?”
“It is, and on good terms at that, when it comes to the taxes. Lord Varyn, he’s our local lord, you see, is an honorable man, but even if he weren’t, well, we remember the days when this was the king’s land, not his, and we hold to our charter, like, and so does the gwerbret, and that’s that.” Merro raised his tankard in brief salute, had a sip, and proceeded to lecture Rhodry about local politics in great detail.
When the sun sank so low that the storm clouds blazed red and gold, Merro closed the inn. Rhodry went along with him and his family to join the village in lighting the Bel fire. At the crest of a low hill near town two priests waited, dressed in white tunics, gold torcs round their necks, golden sickles dangling from their belts, with the village blacksmith and his son to help them. One at a time each village or farm family panted up the hill with a burden of wood, added it to the stack, and received the blessings of Great Bel. When everyone who lived under the temple’s jurisdiction was assembled and blessed, the priests laid the wood ready for a proper fire and sprinkled it with oil. As if in answer to their chanting, the twilight grew as gray and thick as fur. The blacksmith lit torches and stood prepared.
Then came the waiting. Far away, hundreds of miles away in the High King’s city of Dun Deverry, the head priest would light the first fire. The instant that the nearest priests on their hilltops saw the blaze, they would torch their own wood. Those next away would see and kindle theirs—on and on it would go, thin lines of light springing up and spreading out across the kingdom in a dweomer web, until beacon fires burned from the sea coast up to Cerrgonney and all across from Cwm Peel to here on the Pyrdon border. The younger priest raised a brass horn, long and straight in the ancient style, to his lips and stared off to the east. The villagers huddled close together in the gathering dark. All at once the priest tipped his head back and blew, a rasping, shrieking cry straight from the heart of the Dawntime. Down went the torches. The fire blazed up, crackling with oil, a great leap of gold flame lurching in the night wind. When Rhodry spun around, searching the horizon, he saw the neighboring