Daggerspell - Katharine Kerr [125]
Jill started shaking, a little tremor of her whole body.
“Your Grace is truly the most generous lord I’ve ever met. If ever you have need of my sword, then it’s at your disposal.”
It was such a masculine way of thanking someone that Lovyan nearly laughed.
“Let’s pray things never come to that. But you have my thanks.”
“So Corbyn’s taking our bait?” Rhodry said.
“He is,” Nevyn said. “I found the army farther east than I expected. They’re angling round to follow you, sure enough.”
“Splendid.” Rhodry glanced up at the sun—about three hours after noon. “What of the men from Cannobaen?”
“They’re on the way. Aderyn can tell your messenger exactly where to find them.”
“I’ll detail a man straightaway. My thanks.”
After the messenger rode off, Rhodry led the army a bit farther east, then decided to make camp and wait for the reinforcements, who, according to Aderyn, were riding fast and letting their provisions follow. Rhodry felt profoundly ungrateful, but he thought to himself that all this dweomer aid, as useful as it was, was a cursed unsettling thing to have around you. The rest of the noble-born doubtless agreed. When just at nightfall Edar rode in, he was swearing in amazement at the ease with which the messenger had found the reinforcing army.
“At first I thought it was some trick of Corbyn’s,” Edar said. “But Comerr recognized your man.”
“Well, there’s somewhat odd afoot. Uh, come have somewhat to eat, and I’ll tell you about it.”
As the noble-born sat around a campfire together and shared a meal, Rhodry had the unpleasant job of convincing still more of his allies that the rumors of dweomer were true and twice true. With Sligyn on his side, the job was easier, because no one had ever seen Sligyn give in to the slightest touch of whimsy or fancy. For a long time they sat in silence, the noble-born as cowed as their men. Rhodry wondered why none of them—and he included himself in this—were comforted by the knowledge that they had dweomer on their side. Finally he realized that they all felt insignificant, mere playing stones on a game board of the dweomer’s choosing. For weeks Rhodry had thought of himself as the focus of the rebellion and his death as its goal. Now he’d become only a pebble, set down as one small move in a war between Aderyn and Loddlaen.
That night, long after the other lords had gone to their tents, Rhodry walked down to the banks of the stream. In the light from the stars and the waning moon, he could see quite well, an odd talent that he’d had since childhood but kept strictly to himself. Out in the meadow surrounding the sleeping camp, guards prowled back and forth on watch. The stream itself ran silver, flecked with foam as it chuckled over the rocks. All day Rhodry had been troubled by a premonition, and now it clung to him with cold arms. Something was going to happen to him, something important and irrevocable—and for a warrior, there was only one thing that something could be. He didn’t want to die. It seemed wretchedly unfair that he was going to die, when all his death would mean was that Loddlaen had jumped one of Aderyn’s stones and taken it off the board.
When he heard someone moving behind him, he swirled, his sword half drawn, but it was only Cullyn, stumbling a bit in the darkness.
“I just wondered who was out here, my lord. It’s my turn on watch, you see. Is somewhat wrong?”
“Naught. I was just thinking of Carnoic. Ever play that game, silver dagger?”
“Oh, every now and then, my lord. There’s not much challenge in it.”
“You think so, do you? Well, then, when this war’s over, we’ll have to sit down and play, and you can teach me what you know.”
Cullyn smiled briefly, as if he were wondering if they’d live to sit down to a board together. Rhodry felt the premonition again as a clench of his stomach. Something irrevocable was about to happen, something that had guided his whole life here, to this moment and to Cullyn of Cerrmor.
“I’d best get back to my post, my lord.”
“So you’d better. Here, Cullyn, tomorrow on the line of march, you come ride