Daggerspell - Katharine Kerr [178]
“By the hells!” Rhodry said. “A touch, sure enough.”
Cullyn smiled and saluted him with the wooden sword, but all at once Rhodry felt that he was in danger, that wooden or not, that blade could kill him in Cullyn of Cerrmor’s hands, and that Cullyn was thinking just that.
“Somewhat wrong, my lord?”
“Naught. Here, you’ve done enough for one day.”
“So I have. It gripes my heart to admit it, but I’m tired. Ah, well, I’ll get my strength back soon enough.”
Again Rhodry felt a shudder of danger, as if Cullyn were giving him a warning. Had he noticed the way Rhodry had been looking at Jill? If he’d been obvious, Cullyn might well have. Rhodry wanted to say something reassuring, some good plausible lie to put Cullyn at ease, but he was just sensible enough to realize that he’d best not speak Jill’s name where her father could hear it.
“It looks remarkably good,” Nevyn said. “I’m pleased.”
Cullyn was glad that the herbman was pleased, because to him his once-broken arm looked bad—white flesh, puckered and wrinkled, and far thinner than his other arm after the long weeks in the splints.
“The break mended fairly straight,” the old man went on. “It should be good enough for shield work if you’re careful about building it up. Favor it for some time.”
“My thanks, truly, for all your work on me.”
“You’re most welcome.” Nevyn paused, consideringly. “Truly, you are.”
Now that his wounds were fully healed, it was time for Cullyn to formally take Rhodry’s service. That very night, before everyone in the dun, assembled in the great hall, he knelt at Rhodry’s feet. Rhodry leaned forward in his chair and took both of Cullyn’s hands in his. By the flaring torchlight, Cullyn could see how solemn the young lord looked. It was a grave thing they were doing.
“And will you serve me truly all your life?” Rhodry said.
“I will. I’ll fight for you and die with you if need be.”
“Then may every bard in the kingdom mock and shame me if ever I treat you unjustly, or if ever I’m miserly to you.”
Rhodry took a comb from a waiting page and made the ritual strokes through Cullyn’s hair to seal the bargain. As Cullyn rose to the cheering of the warband, he felt strangely light and free, even though he’d just pledged his life away. The thought was puzzling, but he somehow knew that he had just repaid a debt.
Now that he was officially the captain of the tieryn’s warband, Cullyn was back in the barracks, but he had a chamber of his own over the tack room, not over the horses, with a proper bed, a chest for his clothes, and the biggest luxury of all, a hearth of his own. When he moved in, Amyr carried up his saddlebags and bedroll, and Praedd brought an armload of firewood—two prudent moves to curry favor with the man who had the power to discipline them with a whip if need be. Cullyn hung his new shield, blazoned with the red lion, up on the wall and decided that he’d unpacked.
“Well and good, lads. We’ll be taking the horses out soon. I want to see how well you all sit on a horse, now that I’m not distracted by little things like dweomer.”
The two riders allowed themselves small smiles.
“Captain?” Amyr said. “Are you and Lord Rhodry going to start finding new men soon?”
“Cursed right. We’re badly under strength.”
They were, truly, because out of the fifty men Rhodry had had at Dun Cannobaen, only seventeen were left, and out of the fifty from Dun Gwerbyn, only thirty-two. Yet Cullyn knew that, soon enough, young men would show up at the gates to beg for a place in the warband. Not for them to worry that places were open because of so many bloody deaths; they would want the honor enough to ignore