The Bristling Wood - Katharine Kerr [103]
“What? Oh, come now, don’t be so harsh with yourself. The Goddess of the Moon is mother of us all, and she and the Three Mothers will listen to anyone’s prayer.”
“Not to mine. And the Moon’s not my mother, either.”
Although Jill supposed that this statement bordered on blasphemy, she neither knew nor cared enough about the worship of the gods to refute it.
“It’s not that I like being this way, mind,” Perryn went on “It’s just that I know it in my heart. Kerun’s the only god who’ll have me. I would have liked being his priest, living out in the wilderness somewhere and doing whatever his rites are. I couldn’t even find anyone who knew much about that, you see.”
“Well, here, maybe you should go to Dun Deverry. I’ve been told there are ancient temples there where the priests know everything there is to know. I’ll wager there’s a book or suchlike, and you could maybe hire someone to read it to you.”
“Now there’s a thought!” He smiled at her. “You’re actually taking me seriously, aren’t you?”
“Of course. My father always said that if a man wants to be a priest, the gods will favor those who help him.”
“Your father sounds like a splendid fellow. But it’s just that no one ever takes me seriously, not even Nedd. I mean, he cares about me and defends me and suchlike, but he thinks I’m daft, you see, even though he won’t admit he does.”
“Well, I don’t think you’re daft.”
“Truly?”
“Truly. I’ll be honest with you. I think you’re a truly eccentric man, but I’ve met stranger fellows than you along the long road. Compared to some of them—why, you’re perfectly ordinary.”
With a toss of his head, he laughed. She was surprised at his laughter, deep, smooth, genuinely humorous, and realized that she’d been expecting it would be as halting and strange as his way of speaking.
“Well, then, maybe I should ride to Dun Deverry and see more of the world,” he said at last. “I could scrape up some coin from my brothers. They’d probably give me a bit, you see, just to be rid of me for a while. My thanks, Jill. I never thought of that. I hate cities, and it never occurred to me that there’d be anything worth having in one.”
“Well, I like them myself. They stink, but there’s always so much to see among the smells.”
He smiled, watching her so warmly that she went on her guard, mindful that they were alone and hidden. Since she could have bested him easily in any sort of fight, she wasn’t afraid of him, but she refused to give him the slightest encouragement that might cause trouble with Rhodry. She had no desire to see poor Perryn dead at the hands of her jealous man. Aware that her mood had changed, he sighed and looked away.
“Oh, er, ah, well, I might have made a good priest. I’m certainly not much of a warrior.”
“Oh, now, don’t smear mud on your name.”
He nodded absently. She waited for him to go on and waited and waited, until in some twenty minutes she realized that he was capable of sitting silently for hours. Although she felt no interest in him as a man, as a puzzle he was fascinating.
That night, the army made camp about twenty miles north and east of Graemyn’s dun, on the very spot of land that was the cause of the war, where they would remain while a messenger went ahead to Naddryc’s brother. Since the weather was warm, the cart containing the noble remains was stowed a good bit downwind of the camp itself. As Nedd remarked to Rhodry, it was possible that Aegwyc wouldn’t even unwrap his brother’s corpse to see how it had been mutilated.
“So we can hope, my lord,” Rhodry said. “How far away is it to Lord Aegwyc’s dun?”
“Just ten miles. With luck, he’ll come by sunset tomorrow.”
Together they walked back to the camp, sprawled over a meadow. Although the dust was thickening to a velvet gray, Rhodry, of course, could see quite well with his half-elven eyesight. As they passed a clump