Kitabı oku: «Sword of Fire», sayfa 4

‘Excellent!’ Rhys said. ‘We can get together provisions and the like from the collegia. And saddlebags. Alyssa can tell anyone who asks that they’re carrying offerings for the grave.’

‘Good idea!’ Dovina gave him an approving smile. ‘Now listen closely, Cavan. Only Alyssa can draw the coin that will pay your hire. The money will be waiting at Haen Marn itself. If you give her the least bit of trouble, you won’t get paid.’

‘Here!’ Cavan snapped. ‘I’ve not agreed yet.’

‘Do you want to stay in town and hang?’ Dovina smiled brightly at him. ‘Sooner or later, Father will puzzle out where you’re hiding and get the court to force Wmm’s men to hand you over. He is the court, you know. Which means he gets to pass the sentence, too.’

Cavan sighed and rubbed his neck with one hand.

‘Ah, you understand me,’ Dovina went on. ‘Well?’

‘My thanks, my lady. I’ll take your hire gladly.’

And, he reminded himself, the hire offered compensations. Although he had every intention of treating Alyssa as honorably as he’d treat the queen, even queens were known to take a fancy to a man now and then. No doubt a common-born lass would care less for her delicate honor than a high-born woman. Never would he give Alyssa ‘trouble’, as her ladyship had termed it, but it would hardly be trouble if she were willing. The memory of that kiss in the market square made him smile, until he realized that Dovina was watching him with her lips set tight, as if she knew what he was thinking.

‘I’m going to tell Alyssa that you’re noble-born,’ Dovina said. ‘That way she’ll know better than to believe a honeyed word you say.’

With that she turned and marched off back to the women’s hive. Cavan bowed out of habit, but he would rather have snarled. As he walked back to Wmm’s with Rhys, he noticed Travaberiel standing in the doorway, watching them with a polite little smile. Smile or not, Cavan felt his suspicions catch fire. What was this fellow, a spy? People always said you couldn’t trust the Westfolk if their interests crossed yours. They’re not truly human, he reminded himself. Let’s just stay on guard.

Yet what if Travaberiel had dwimmer? The ancient magic – dweomer, they called it in the old days; so many people said it was only an old wives’ tale, a silly superstition, or maybe at most a debased witchery. Cavan, however, had seen and felt things that had convinced him it was real and true, perhaps the only truth that mattered. Or was it just that he so badly wanted the dwimmer to be real? He could never be sure, but one thing he did know. The wanting was real enough.

The first difficulty in making their escape, Alyssa soon realized, lay in hiding the preparations from Lady Tay. Fortunately, Malyc Penvardd, who was allowed into the women’s great hall because of his advanced age, arrived to dine with Lady Tay and plan Cradoc’s funeral. An average-looking fellow, neither tall nor short, with gray hair that barely covered his head, he had a face as wrinkled as the sea. Yet he strode into the collegium grounds as vigorously as a young man. As Alyssa escorted him across the lawn, he told her in his trained and booming voice that he himself, as the chief bard, would deliver the gwerchan in tribute.

‘That will be splendid, honored one,’ Alyssa said.

‘So I’ll hope. I wanted a private word with you. Let’s pause here a moment.’

They found a little bit of privacy in the shelter of a pair of young trees near the women’s hive.

‘I know Cradoc favored you as if you were his daughter,’ Malyc said. ‘Your heart must be heavy.’

‘It is, sir, heavy and near breaking. At moments I remember that I’ll never see him again.’ She paused to wipe her eyes on her sleeve. ‘I’ll honor his memory always.’

‘As I will, myself. It vexes me, that he died for so little. All we asked of the gwerbret was a fair hearing on this matter of the law courts and the nobility. The bard is the voice of his people under the laws, is he not? That voice has the legal right to be heard.’

‘True spoken. But it’s not a small thing, that right. If the bards are silenced, the people have no voice, and the lords may do as they please with no one to shame them.’

Malyc smiled and nodded. ‘Good answer,’ he said. ‘You do understand. Their precious honor tarnishes more easily than silver for all that they value it higher than gold. At any rate, you may rest assured that I shan’t let this matter end here.’

‘That gladdens my heart.’

‘I thought it would. Huh, it’s getting chilly out here. Let’s not keep Lady Tay waiting.’

They walked on in silence. When they entered the hive, Lady Tay was standing near the door to greet the penvardd and escort him to the head table. Alyssa took her place with the other senior students. A servant brought the head table wine, and another brought the students boiled water with a bit of wine in it for flavor.

Up at the front of the hall, Malyc announced, in his ringing voice that carried through half the hive, that he had ordered Cradoc’s apprentice to abandon the starvation siege at the gwerbretal gates.

‘We’ve lost one of our best men already,’ Malyc said. ‘No use in losing two. Ladoic has made it clear that he won’t give in, for all his talk about respecting custom and law. I am both shocked and heartsick over Cradoc’s death, my lady. I should have stopped this deadly ritual. Had I only known how far the gwerbret would go—’ He paused to make one sharp sob. ‘I never dreamt it would end this way.’

Lady Tay made a reply that Alyssa couldn’t quite hear. She did catch the words ‘dreadful shock’.

‘His note about Cradoc’s body was that last drop of water that ruins the ale,’ Malyc continued. ‘I intend to make him pay for that.’

And how can you? Alyssa thought. Apparently Lady Tay asked something similar, because Malyc said, ‘I have a weapon that will make His Grace tremble, were I to use it, but by the gods, I’ll pray it doesn’t come to that! Too many innocent persons would suffer.’

‘Ye gods!’ In her surprise Lady Tay spoke almost as loudly as the chief bard.

Malyc merely smiled and speared a fragment of pork with his table dagger. After that he spoke somewhat more quietly, and only of the funereal details.

Alyssa left the table as soon as she could. She needed to pack supplies for her journey north. Dovina took charge of wheedling provisions out of the hive’s cook. Mavva gathered bits of spare clothing from those women who could afford to give it. One of the other senior students handed over a pair of fine leather saddlebags.

‘You’d best take as much clothing as you can in the saddlebags,’ Dovina said. ‘You’ll have to make a decent appearance in Cerrmor, you see. I’ve scrounged up what coin I can for the first part of your journey. Once you get to Haen Marn and use the draft, you’ll be able to buy what you need.’

‘We’d best travel as fast as possible, anyway,’ Alyssa said. ‘If we can get over the border into the Bear clan’s demesne, we’ll be out of your father’s reach.’

‘True, but you’ll have to get the book to Cerrmor. I wish you could go by ship, but you won’t dare return to Eldidd. Best go overland to Dun Trebyc and down from there, though ye gods, it’ll take so long!’

‘Better a long journey than one that ends too soon. In your father’s gaol.’

Later that night, before the chaperones locked the doors into the women’s hall, Dovina, Mavva, and Alyssa met Cavan and Rhys out on the lawn. Travaberiel joined them at Rhys’s invitation. By the light of candle lanterns they all walked down to the back wall where they were less likely to be overheard.

‘Be cursed careful once you reach the Bear lands,’ Travaberiel said. ‘If this feud turns into a war, Standyc’s likely to arrest anyone from Eldidd. Lie if you have to. He’s a suspicious man, Standyc, sure that he has hidden enemies somewhere.’

‘Is he right about that?’ Alyssa said.

‘Not to my knowledge. He’s got plenty of enemies right out in the open among my folk. You’d think that would be enough for him.’

‘My thanks.’ Cavan made him a half-bow. ‘I’ll remember that.’

Alyssa felt the night air turn cold around her. Dovina held up her punched-tin lantern and cast spangles of gold light over the silver dagger.

‘Will you keep her safe?’ The cold in her voice made Alyssa shiver again. ‘If I find out you haven’t, I’ll turn you in to my father.’

‘On my honor, my lady.’ Cavan made her a full bow. ‘I swear it on my silver dagger, and that’s the truest oath a man like me can swear.’

Rhys glanced at Travaberiel, who murmured, ‘I believe him.’

‘Done, then,’ Rhys said. ‘But you might remember that Wmm’s priesthood is like a net cast over the kingdom. Messages do travel.’

‘I know it well.’ Cavan laid a hand on the pommel of his dagger. ‘Fear not. I swore I’d guard the lady, and I cursed well will! I may be a silver dagger and scum of the road, but I’ve still got some sense of honor.’

Dovina and Rhys nodded in satisfaction.

‘Lyss, I’ve got summat for you.’ Rhys reached into his shirt and brought out some sheets of pabrus, folded into a square in the Bardekian fashion. ‘If you find yourself needing help, show these around at the nearest temple of Wmm.’ He dropped his voice to whisper. ‘Two copies, both signed by a couple of the masters here. Not a word of their names to anyone outside the priesthood, mind. And a third one only for the Advocates’ Guild.’

‘A thousand thanks!’ Alyssa took the packet. ‘Please tell those men who don’t exist that I’m truly grateful, not that they’ve done anything.’

‘Lyss!’ Mavva broke in. ‘Do you really want to do this? It’s horribly dangerous. I don’t think I realized it at first. It was all like a gerthddyn’s tale or suchlike. But—’

Alyssa gathered her breath with a gulp. ‘I will not let Cradoc die in vain. If this book will help bring the gwerbret round, then I’ll do my best to get it to Cerrmor and the advocates there. Our cause is just, and justice we shall have.’

When she glanced at Cavan, she found him smiling at her in honest admiration. She felt, very briefly, brave.

Chapter 3

Even though Cradoc had taught rhetoric as a master in Lady Rhodda Hall, to give the women’s collegium its proper name, the women rode at the end of the funeral procession, except for Lady Tay, who was allowed to ride next to Malyc Penvardd just behind the cart that carried Cradoc’s body. None of the women were surprised that the rest of them were consigned to the position of least prestige behind the Bardic Guild, the noble-born men of King’s, and the priestly neophytes of Wmm’s Scribal. No one complained, either, since it suited their plans so well.

The procession formed up in the old market square. Alyssa and her silver dagger took the very last place of all. She was wearing a pair of Rhys’s knee breeches under her skirt to allow her to sit astride her gentle dun palfrey. She carried the banker’s draft and the loan note for the book sewn onto her underskirt. To protect the documents, Dovina had cut several hunks of silk off the bottom of one of her dresses and made a many-layered envelope.

Getting a procession of such a size ordered and moving took some while. While she waited her turn to ride out through the north alleyway into the streets of the town, Alyssa had plenty of time to wonder if she were doing the right thing. Had it not been for Cradoc’s sake, she might have surrendered to her doubts, but he had fought several battles with the collegium authorities and his own guild before he’d been allowed to teach her rhetoric and bardic lore. All of the collegium women were trained in expressing themselves clearly, but Alyssa had received the further instruction normally reserved for men. He fought for me, she reminded herself. It’s my duty to fight for what he championed.

And she would be riding with Cavan, a danger of another sort. She wondered why he attracted her so much. He was far from the handsomest man she’d ever seen. His face tended toward the square, his mouth was a bit wide and thin, and he apparently combed his hair once every week or so judging from the tangled way it fell over his ears. But his energy! He seemed to blaze at times like one of Lughcarn’s famous forges. His gray eyes snapped with it, and when he smiled, she felt as if she’d stepped up to a hearth after being outside on a winter’s day.

But a silver dagger, she reminded herself. It’s no matter that you’re hungry when the meat on the table’s gone bad.

At last the men from Wmm’s Scribal urged their horses forward. The women just ahead brought their mounts to the ready. Cavan rode up next to her and made her a half-bow from the saddle.

‘I’ve been thinking,’ he said. ‘You’d best ride a bit ahead of me. I don’t mind posing as your servant till we get free of this mob.’

‘Only till then, eh?’ But she smiled at him. ‘Good idea.’

She clucked to her horse and followed the other women riders out of the market square.

All along their route through Aberwyn, townsfolk lined the streets or sat in the upper windows of the buildings to watch. As the procession passed them, both men and women keened and called out their farewells to Cradoc, who had died in his attempt to bring them justice. Bolder folk ran outside and walked silently behind the riders. At moments Alyssa felt her eyes fill with tears, but always she brushed them away. Cradoc would have wanted strength, not mourning, from his best pupil.

When they passed the walls of the gwerbretal dun, however, nothing but silence greeted them.

At the northern city gate, Alyssa turned in the saddle and looked back. Several hundred walkers had joined the procession. Many of the men, she realized, carried stout sticks, some as thick as clubs. Cavan rode up close to her.

‘I don’t like the looks of this mob,’ he said.

‘Mob? It’s their right to attend a funeral. The Bardic Guild’s putting on a feast for all the mourners, and it’s bound to be a huge one. They don’t stint when it comes to food.’

‘I still don’t like it. Too many angry men among them.’

The procession slowed at the narrow gate. The riders closed up their ranks and trickled through into the silence of the market gardens and pastures beyond the city walls. About half a mile ahead stood the grove of ancient oaks where Cradoc would join the bards who had gone on to the Otherlands before him. The road led up to the grove, then divided. One half circled round the trees and ran west; the other headed roughly north along the river Gwyn.

The priests of Bel, who presided over funerals, had set up a holding area for the horses of the attendees beside the north-running road in a stretch of pasture land. Riders were dismounting; horses were tossing their heads and stamping impatiently; grooms ran back and forth under a cloud of dust. In the confusion it was a simple matter for Alyssa and Cavan to keep on the road rather than turning in to join the mob. If any of the priests or servants noticed them riding steadily north, no one called out a question or gave an alarm.

Since Dovina had been keeping a watch on Alyssa and her silver dagger, she did see their escape. Once she could tell that they were safely on their way, she turned her attention to the crowd. Here and there she spotted men who served her father. As she and the other students passed by them, she recognized the underchamberlain, a couple of footmen, and some of the grooms. Even more ominous was the presence of a couple of the younger sons of the Hippogriff, the clan that held Abernaudd under her father’s old enemy, Gwerbret Tewdyr. Neither of them wore their clan colors of brown, green, and a rich gold, but she’d seen them at enough social events and religious festivals to know who they were. Neither attended any sort of collegium. Warriors, both of them, and she doubted that they’d come to mourn Cradoc.

The rest of those walking in the procession were another matter, townspeople, mostly, but here and there she saw men and women whose bent backs and rough clothing proclaimed them farmfolk. Many of the common-born mourners carried walking sticks – stout walking sticks, as far as she could tell, with the glint of metal bands upon them, tools that had nothing to do with the chunks of roast pork and bread that the guild was going to distribute. No doubt they were carrying table daggers as well, or good knives.

Although Cradoc’s actual grave lay among the sacred oaks, the ceremonies took place some hundred yards away on a level lawn beside an artificial stream. The priests of Bel maintained a large wooden platform with a row of chairs for important people. By the time Dovina and the women students reached the lawn, two priests of Bel, a priest of Wmm, and Lady Tay were already seated. Most of the women went to stand at one side of the crowd where the townswomen had gathered but, as the gwerbret’s daughter, Dovina found herself pointed to a chair right on the platform, though at the rear.

At the front of the platform Malyc Penvardd was conferring in whispers with an elderly priest. With them stood two more priests, wearing their traditional garb for the ceremony – long tunics caught at the waist with a leather belt, sandals on their otherwise bare feet. From the belts hung the small silver sickles of their office. Their legs were pasty-white; like most priests of that time they wore knee breeches and boots with their tunics in their daily lives. As she passed them, one of them broke off their conversation and turned to her.

‘Allow me to escort you to your seat, your ladyship.’

Although she curtsied out of respect for his god, she would rather have been escorted by a snake. At least, given the strict celibacy of his order, he refrained from offering her his arm.

‘We did want a word with you,’ he said in a quiet voice. ‘Just to tell you that your father can count on our support.’

‘The support of the god is always welcome.’ Dovina forced out a smile. ‘My thanks.’

For a moment his face showed confusion, as if he couldn’t decide if he’d been rebuffed or not. He gave her a smile as oily as her own and led her to her chair.

Once she was seated, Dovina turned in her chair to look at the towering oaks of the grove. Men in Bardic Guild livery were guarding the wagon where Cradoc’s body lay. Behind them lay cooking pits with the cooks standing ready to pull off the covering of sod and bring up the roast hogs. Tables mounded with loaves of bread stood off to one side. With her weak eyes, Dovina couldn’t be sure, but she thought she saw Alyssa’s father in charge and her older brother there as well. It made sense that the Bakers Guild would send their highest officials in respect. Dovina sent up a brief prayer of thanks that Alyssa had gotten on the road before the bakers saw her do so. She turned back before they noticed her watching them.

She had an easier time picking out details of the crowd that waited for the ceremony to begin, because they stood in strong light, not the shade of the trees. She disliked the way that the Aberwyn and Abernaudd men had placed themselves – never together, but always within hailing distance of each other. Now and then she saw the underchamberlain raise a casual hand and the others answer him with a quick wave or a nod of the head. The two gwerbretion of Aberwyn and Abernaudd were technically allies but in most things bitter rivals. That some of their sworn men would co-operate was ominous, she realized. She wondered again why Ladoic had refused to end Cradoc’s fast. Some grim reason, she thought, that involves more lords than Father.

Malyc walked to the edge of the platform. When he raised both arms for silence, the crowd gave it to him. He lowered his arms and boomed out the first line of the gwerchan, the ‘last song,’ in Cradoc’s honor.

‘Voice of valor, silenced now, void-tossed …’

The crowd sighed as the poem unrolled in great waves of sound, emphasized now and then with soft moments of regret. Malyc never faltered once during the long performance, never dropped a syllable, never gasped nor caught his breath. By the time the gwerchan finished, many people in the crowd wept, men as well as women.

Malyc stepped back to allow his second, Callyn, to come forward to speak. An apprentice handed Malyc a discreet goblet of something to soothe his throat as Callyn raised his arms in turn to quiet the crowd.

‘My friends,’ he began, ‘today is a dark day for Aberwyn. One of our great men, anchor of the people, strong as an iron mace, has been laid low by arrogance and a vast disrepect for the sacred laws of our kind. What must the gods think of a man who lets a bard starve outside his—’

‘Hold your tongue!’

‘Treason!’

‘You’re slandering our gwerbret!’

The voices rang out in a well-rehearsed chorus, like chimes of a bell. The underchamberlain and the other Fox men had slithered their way forward to the front of the crowd. The two Abernaudd men stood close by them. Shocked beyond belief, Callyn did naught but stare – only for a tiny space of time, but too long a one.

‘Filthy liar!’ the underchamberlain roared. ‘Slander!’

A burly fellow with a leather apron over his clothes grabbed him by the shoulder, spun him around, and punched him so hard under the chin that the underchamberlain left his feet and fell hard. The other Fox men yelled and tried to push their way toward him. Screams broke out. Women tried to get free. Men jostled to get closer. Screaming, yelling, little eddies of fighting around the Fox men like water swirling around rocks in a stream – Malyc dropped the goblet and ran to the edge of the platform. His voice boomed out like thunder over the crowd.

‘Stop! Fellow citizens! Stop, I beg you! This is no way to honor Cradoc!’ Over and over he repeated it more loudly than Dovina had ever imagined a man could shout. ‘I beg you, stop, calm, stop.’

‘Listen to our bard!’ Callyn joined in. ‘Listen to the penvardd!’

And slowly, a few at a time, the men in the crowd did, stepping back, catching the arm of a companion who looked inclined to continue the fighting, muttering soft words while the women called to each other and gathered in little groups to surround and thus hobble the troublemakers. The Fox men grabbed the underchamberlain, hauled him to his feet, and dragged him, as floppy as a rag doll but upright, out of the crowd.

Dovina suddenly realized that she’d stood up. She breathed out with a sharp sigh and sat down again. Lady Tay leaned over the back of her chair to speak to her.

‘That was entirely too close to another riot.’

‘It was, my lady,’ Dovina said. ‘I think me we’d all best leave before the feasting starts.’

‘I agree. I’ve spotted far too many ale barrels. I’m surprised at your father, stooping so low.’

‘Do you think he sent those men, my lady? He wouldn’t. You forget. The men in his service will do almost anything to curry favor. I’d bet high that the underchamberlain organized this little expedition.’

‘Ah. I see what you mean. Much more likely, indeed.’

But what about those Abernaudd men? Dovina asked herself. She saw two men leaving the crowd and hurrying in the direction of the waiting horses, but with her poor eyesight, she could no longer tell who they were.

It took Lady Tay some while to gather the scholars and get them organized to leave. As Dovina was climbing down from the platform, Malyc caught up with her. He helped her descend, then leaned her way to talk in a quiet voice – quiet by his standards at least. His voice finally showed the strain with just the beginnings of hoarseness here and there.

‘My lady, I owe you a courtesy. Soon enough your father will know about this, but I wanted to give you a bit of a warning. The guild is thinking of filing a formal suit against the gwerbret for his treatment of Cradoc.’

‘Good,’ Dovina said. ‘It was despicable.’

‘I trust you won’t see fit to tell your father?’

‘I shall wait for the formal announcement. No doubt it will come soon enough.’

‘As soon as we decide how to proceed.’ Malyc hesitated, visibly thinking something through. ‘I know I can trust your discretion, my lady. I see no reason to file suit the way things stand. Why ask the gwerbret to take the matter into his court?’

‘No reason on earth. We all know what his verdict would be.’

‘If my plan carries the day in the guildhall, we’ll petition the Prince Regent to establish a justiciar here on the western border. If he does, then we’ll take the actual suit there. If he doesn’t – well, there’s no use in continuing to fight that particular battle.’

‘I’m afraid I have to agree. All you can do is try to outflank him. This should be very interesting. I shall endeavor to be in the great hall when the messenger arrives.’

It’s going to be quite a display, Dovina thought, when Father hears about this. She felt a little stab of fear, a sense that more lay behind the Bardic Guild’s desire for fair courts than she’d been allowed to see.

Since Alyssa and Cavan had travelled several miles down the road before the crowd erupted, they of course had no idea what had happened at the funeral. In the bright sunshine, free of stone walls and gloom, Alyssa felt almost happy, but losing Cradoc ached like a fever in her heart. When Cavan urged his horse up next to hers, she turned in the saddle to glance his way.

‘I hate to miss hearing Cradoc’s gwerchan,’ Alyssa said. ‘But it has to be.’

‘Just so. I’ll wager you could compose him a splendid tribute of your own.’

‘Mayhap. I’d like to think so.’

‘This road we’re on. Does it run the whole way to Haen Marn?’

‘It doesn’t, but it’ll take us to the actual road. There are inns and suchlike on the way. Lots of people travel there, you see, for the healing.’

‘It must be a hard journey for someone who’s gravely ill.’

‘There are canal boats for them. Well, at least, the canals run most of the way.’

‘Not all of it?’

‘The noble-born who live around there—’ She hesitated.

‘Are stubborn old bastards?’ He grinned at her. ‘I know their kind. I’ve had to listen to too many of them, muttering over their mead, saying all these canals and the mail coaches are only going to unsettle the common folk. Let them know too much. Don’t need all this cursed learning to read, either.’

‘Just that!’ She smiled in return. ‘Anyway, about the boats, we’ll reach the river harbor by tonight, and you’ll see.’

The road fell lower in gentle slopes until they’d left the coastal hills behind. The fog had long since burned off, and the warm sun was a welcome luxury. The road here ran beside the Gwyn on their right hand and rich farmland on their left. In the fields the winter wheat had sprung up and dusted the land with pale green. In the meadows white cows with rusty-red ears grazed on the new grass. Young calves followed their mothers on spindly legs or took a few venturesome steps away.

‘A question for you.’ Cavan turned in his saddle to look at Alyssa. ‘Why exactly are we going to Haen Marn?’

‘What? Didn’t anyone tell you?’

‘I suppose there wasn’t time. I know we’re supposed to be fetching some old book, but that can’t be the real reason.’

‘But it is. It’s not any old book, but an ancient volume about the customs of the Dawntime, when gwerbretion were elected by the people to be judges, not overlords.’

‘Elected? Judges? Ye gods! I’ve never heard of such a thing.’

‘Neither had Dovina’s father until she told him about it. He refused to believe it, of course. It’ll be a right fair shock when we prove it to him. Maybe he’ll be less stubborn about keeping his grip on the law courts.’

‘He’s not the only one who’s going to refuse to believe it. Every gwerbret in the kingdom will squall. Do you truly think it’s going to make a difference, what some old book says? This whole thing sounds daft to me.’

‘It’s not the book itself. It’s what the Advocates Guild in Cerrmor can make of it. It’s only a gesture, in a way, but in this war a gesture’s like a skirmish. It’s not the real battle. Winning the war will take a long time.’

‘That’s one way to think of it, I suppose. But I don’t see how it’ll do much good.’

‘It’s a legal precedent that can lead to a compromise. Give us men who are proper judges, and we shan’t say a word about your rank. We’re not saying that the gwerbretion ought to be abolished. Just that they shouldn’t be in charge of the everyday law courts.’

‘Legal precedent?’ He paused to grin at her. ‘You sound like a priest of Bel.’

‘I’d take that as a compliment if you weren’t smirking.’

Cavan winced. For some little while he studied the road ahead in silence. ‘My apologies,’ he said at last. ‘You’re not like any lass I’ve ever known, you see, and at times I don’t know what to say to you.’

He spoke so quietly, so sincerely, that she believed him. ‘Well,’ she said, ‘I’ve never met a noble-born man turned silver dagger before, either.’

‘The second, fair maid, trumps the first. Think of me as dishonored scum. The rest of the kingdom does.’ He tossed his head and grinned, but she could hear pain in his voice. Tempted though she was, she knew better than to ask a silver dagger what shame had earned him the long road. After a moment’s strained silence he spoke again.

‘You know, I never got to hear your speech, thanks to that foul-mouthed dog in the market square. Could you recite a bit of it while we ride?’

‘In truth, I was almost finished. My teacher always urged me to keep important speeches short. Listeners’ minds tend to wander if you go on too much. Do you truly want to hear it?’

‘I do.’ He was looking at her without a trace of his smile, and his eyes seemed utterly sincere, but she remembered Dovina’s warning against the flattery of noble-born men. They learn it at their father’s knee, and I wouldn’t trust it one bit.