Fire Dragon - Katharine Kerr [96]
Yet deep in her heart, Arzosah knew that she was travelling to see Rhodry again and little more. He was the first friend she'd ever had, and compared to friendship, even revenge paled.
Spring brought warmth to Cengarn and hope with it. The winter wheat had sprouted; soon it would be milk-ripe, fit for porridge if not for bread. This first harvest would be a scant one, since the farmers would hold back plenty of seed grain for the next planting, but still, the prospect of food to come raised everyone's spirits. The hope was rewarded, in fact, when just before the harvest an unexpected surplus arrived at Cadmar's dun. On a sunny noontide, Dallandra was studying one of the Jill's books when she heard shouting from the ward below.
“The wyvern! The wyvern! It's the king's men!”
Servants and noble-born alike poured out of the brochs and into the ward, then flooded like snowmelt down to the gates. Up in her tower room, Dallandra leaned dangerously out of the window to watch. Through the town and up the hill a procession came riding. At its head two heralds, mounted upon white horses, carried staves bound with ribands. Just behind them a lad on a pony held the banner of the Gold Wyvern, and then came a noble lord, whose shield, slung at the saddle peak, bore the same device, proclaiming him one of the king's household men. Behind them rode a squad of forty fighting men of the King's Own on matched bays, and after them creaked and crawled a long procession of wooden carts, loaded to the brim with heaped sacks of… of something.
Dallandra left her book and hurried down to the crowded ward. Over by the well stood a gaggle of boys, Jahdo among them. When she waved to him, he bowed to her so awkwardly that all the other boys laughed. In the doorway of the main broch stood Gwerbret Cadmar, leaning on his stick, with Prince Daralanteriel standing at his right hand and Princess Carra, accompanied by her wolfish dog, just behind him. She was carrying her own baby like a maidservant. Cadmar smiled when he saw Dallandra and waved her over to join him.
“Good morrow, Your Grace,” Dallandra said. “What is all this?”
“Succor from the high king, I'll wager,” Cadmar said. “Our liege is as generous as he should be, eh? You'll remember how I sent him messages at the lifting of the siege.”
“Last autumn? I do, truly.” Mentally she counted out months—it would have taken the courier a long time to ride to Dun Deverry, so far to the south, and of course, it would have been wasted effort for the king to send wagons north in the winter. “This is as soon as his men could have reached us, then.”
“Just that.”
“I see they've brought their own provisions. And thank all the gods for that!”
But in the event, the carts proved to hold far more than the necessary provisions for the king's men. The king had sent seed grain of the best kind of wheat from his own stores. His personal envoy, a Lord Yvaedd, announced this as soon as he'd presented himself to the gwerbret. He was a smooth-looking man, Yvaedd, with oiled black hair, pale grey eyes, and the soft lilt of Eldidd in his speech.
“The high king sends you this grain as a gift,” Yvaedd said. “Doubtless, Your Grace, you're short up for coin. The farmers will gladly pay for this bounty.”
Cadmar considered him for a moment with narrow eyes.
“My lord,” the aged gwerbret said finally, “I see you hail from the coast lands. Things are different, up here on the border. My farmers are all freemen. Their grandfathers came here willingly with