Darkspell - Katharine Kerr [125]
“Come here, silver dagger,” he snapped. “What’s this message?”
Jill hurried over and started to kneel, but she was so saddle-weary that she lost her balance and nearly fell spraddled.
“Your pardon, Your Grace,” she stammered. “I’ve been riding for two days and fought a battle before that.”
“By the asses of the gods! Then get up off the cursed floor and have a chair. Page! Get some mead! Get a trencher! Move! This lad must be half-starved.”
Before the startled pages could intervene, Blaen grabbed her by the shoulders, helped her up, and sat her down in his chair. He shoved a goblet of mead into her hand, then perched on the edge of the table, his meal forgotten behind him.
“I’ll wager I can guess,” he said. “There’s been trouble in that demon-ridden pass again.”
“Just that, Your Grace.”
While Jill told the story, Blaen’s captain came over to listen. He was a heavyset man in his thirties, with a faded scar slashed across one cheek. When she finished, the gwerbret turned to him.
“Comyn, take fifty men and a change of horses and leave tonight. I—here, wait a moment.” Blaen grabbed a slice of roast beef from a golden platter and tossed it to Jill. “Help yourself to bread, lad. Now, listen, Comyn. Chase these whoreson bandits into Yr Auddglyn. If Gwerbret Ygwimyr has the gall to complain about it, tell him it means war if we don’t have their heads on pikes in a week or two.”
“I will, Your Grace, and I’ll send back a messenger the minute there’s somewhat to report.”
Jill went on eating as they worked out the details. When Comyn left to pick out his men, Blaen took his goblet of mead and gulped a good bit down as fast as if it were water. A waiting page stepped forward smoothly and refilled it.
“Looks like you’ve barely touched yours, lad,” Blaen said. “What kind of silver dagger are you to drink so slow? What’s your name, by the way?”
“Gilyan, Your Grace, and I’m not a lad but a lass.”
Blaen stared, then tossed back his head with a laugh.
“I must be growing old and blind,” he remarked, still smiling. “So you are. What makes a lass take to the long road?”
“The man I love’s a silver dagger, and I left my kin to follow him.”
“Now, that was stupid of you, but then, who knows what women will do?” He dismissed the problem with a shrug. “Very well then, Gilyan. We can’t have you sheltering out in the barracks, so I’ll give you a chamber in the broch for the night.”
Earlier that same day, the patrol of Cwm Pecl riders escorted the remnant of Seryl’s caravan back to the border station before they rode out again to go bandit hunting. Rhodry helped carry Seryl to a bed in the barracks, saw to it that his guards and the muleteers were properly fed, then went out to the stables to make sure Sunrise was safe. The groom told him that Jill had indeed ridden out at dawn as a speeded courier.
“So she’d be reaching Dun Hiraedd about now.” Rhodry glanced out the door at the sunset.
“Just that. Been in our city before, silver dagger?”
“Once or twice. Well, I’m going to get my dinner.”
After he ate, Rhodry checked on the wounded bandit, who had been locked in a storage shed. The precautions turned out to be unnecessary, because the lad was dying. Not only was he too feverish to talk, but Rhodry could smell the stench of his septic wound even through the bandages. He gave the lad a drink of water, then sat back on his heels and considered him. Never in his life had he seen a bad wound spread so fast—and he’d ridden in many battles. Since bandits weren’t known for eating like lords, no doubt the lad had been badly fed for some time and thus abnormally weak. Yet still, the foul humors should have spread more slowly, especially since Jill had put a proper bandage on the wound right after he’d got it. If someone had wanted to shut the lad’s mouth, they couldn’t have been luckier.
“And was it just luck?” Rhodry said aloud.
The dying lad moaned and gasped for breath in his fevered sleep. Although Rhodry had been ready to slit his throat the day