"You will begin to teach me this tomorrow, eh?" he said, adding cheerfully, "And if you speak of it, little dove, I will send your friend back to the kennels."
Matters resolved to his own satisfaction, Gunter rolled over, and was soon snoring. I lay awake, rolling my eyes at the prospect, and prayed to Naamah for aid and guidance.
It would be, I thought, a formidable task.
So began my second tutorship among the Skaldi, and I daresay it went well enough, at least as the Skaldi would measure such things. I never heard, afterward, that Gunter had any complaints. It brought to light, though, a deeper danger.
If the greatest danger one faces as a slave is displeasing one's masters, this is the second: pleasing them. All too soon, it becomes all too easy to forget doing aught else. Skaldi reckon time differently than we do, but the meeting of the tribes they named the Allthing was still some weeks away; and once we had found our feet, Joscelin and I, on solid ground at Gunter's steading, we began sliding into the trap of growing too comfortable in our roles. Wearing the mask of obedience so long, I saw Joscelin forget at times that it was but a mask.
And for my part, to my dismay, I found myself falling asleep at times thinking with pride—and even pleasure—upon Gunter's progress at our private lessons.
Until the next time they raided.
The shock of it was like ice-cold water. Gunter and his thanes arose in the small hours of the morning, rousing the entire household to service as they armed themselves for the raid, laughing and jesting and testing the edges of their weapons. They wore little in the way of armor, but wrapped themselves well in furs, and each man carried a shield as well as a sword or axe, and the short spear they favored.
The horses were brought round, stamping and blowing frost under the faint stars. They would ride through the waning hours of the night, bursting through the pass at dawn to descend upon a hapless village in full daylight. Amid the clangor and bustle, Joscelin and I stared at each other, pale with horror. I saw him begin to shake all over with repressed rage, and turn away to hide his face from Gunter and his thanes. He made himself wisely scarce, and I did not see him until Gunter came striding, sheathing his sword, to bid me farewell, shouting as he came. "I ride into battle, little dove! Kiss me and pray to see me alive come nightfall!"
I believe, in truth, that he had forgotten for the moment who I was, and where I came from. I had not, and froze.
And then Joscelin was between us, brushing Gunter's reaching hands aside with a sweep of his forearms, effortless as thought. His blue eyes locked with Gunter's. "My lord," he said softly. "Allow her one ounce of pride."
What passed between them, I do not know. But Gunter's eyes narrowed, gauging the measure of Joscelin's rebellion, while the Cassiline kept his face calm. After a moment, Gunter nodded. "We ride!" he shouted, turning and beckoning to his thanes.
They streamed out of the great hall, brawn and fur and iron, mounted and rode, while those left behind cheered them on. Joscelin sank to his knees and gave me a sick look. I, I just stood, gazing out through the open doors of the hall, and wept.
They came back after nightfall.
They came back victorious, boisterous and half-drunk and singing, staggering under the spoils they'd taken: meager enough stuff, sacks of grain, and stores of winter roots and fruit. I heard Harald boasting about the number of D'Angelines he had slain; when I caught his eye, he fell silent, blushing. But he was one among many.
Piecing the story together, I gathered that they had met with a party of warriors; Allies of Camlach, riding under the sign of the naming sword. There had been a second banner, someone said, with a red forge on brown. Not d'Aiglemort's men, then, I thought. Two thanes had fallen—Thorvil among them—but they had won the day, slaying half the D'Angelines before retreating through the skirling snows.
If Gunther had been mindful of my sensibilities upon leaving, he took no such niceties upon his victorious return, and I had had the wit to caution Joscelin not to intervene. Thanks to Elua, he did not, for I think Gunter in a drunken state might have set upon him. When the celebration had reached its apex and besotten warriors sprawled about the hall, Gunter hoisted me over his shoulder amid roars of approval, carrying me away.
It was not a night for lessons.
When he was done, I left him snoring and crept from his bed, into the great hall, where his thanes slept off their mead, rumbling and murmuring. Someone had remembered to secure Joscelin's leg-irons. I thought he too slept, there by the hearth-bench, but his eyes opened at my near-soundless approach.
"I couldn't stay there," I whispered.
"I know." He moved over, cautious not to clank his irons, and made room for me on the rushes. It was one of his duties, to see that they were replaced when the hall was swept. I sank down to the floor and curled up next to him. His arm came around me, and I laid my head on his chest and stared into the dying embers of the fire.
"Joscelin, you have to leave," I murmured.
"I can't." Low as it was, I could hear the agony in his voice. "I can't leave you here."
"Damn your Cassiel to hell, then!" I hissed, eyes stinging.
His chest rose and fell beneath my cheek. "He believed he was, you know," Joscelin said in a low voice. He touched my hair lightly with one hand, stroking it. "I learned it all my life, but I never truly understood it until now."
A shudder ran through me. "I know," I whispered, thinking of Naa-mah, who had lain with strangers, who had lain with the King of Persis, thinking of Waldemar Selig, the Skaldi warleader. "I know."
We did not speak then, for a long time. I had nearly fallen asleep when I heard Joscelin ask softly, "How can d'Aiglemort bear it? He is sending D'Angelines to die against the Skaldi."
"Ten may die, and a hundred more rally to his banner," I said, staring into the embers. "And he can blame the King for Camlach's losses, for not sending him further troops. That was his plan, with the Glory-Seekers. He is building an empire. How he can do it, I don't understand, but I can see the why of it. What I would like to know is, why does Gunter have no fear of him?"
"Because d'Aiglemort pays him," Joscelin said bitterly.
"No." I shook my head against his chest. "It's more than that. Gunter knows something that d'Aiglemort doesn't; he laughed, when I told him there were things Kilberhaar didn't know. Gonzago de Escabares said it, a year ago. The Skaldi have found a leader who thinks."
"Elua help us all," Joscelin whispered.
After that, neither of us spoke, and then I did sleep, and wakened only to a light tug on my sleeve. Opening my eyes, I met the worried features of Thurid, the shy one, who had risen early to her chores. Dim light filtered into the great hall from the oiled skins over the windows, and slumbering thanes still snored around us, stinking of stale mead.
"You must go," she whispered to me. "They will wake soon."
It was the first moment, I think, that I realized how things had begun to change between Joscelin and me. In the shock and horror of the night, it had only seemed natural that we held to each other for comfort. The faint awe on Thurid's face made something different of it. I sat up, brushing away bits of rush tangled in my hair and caught in my skirts. Joscelin's eyes were open, watching me. What he thought, I could not say. Neither of us dared speak now, for fear of rousing the thanes. I squeezed his hand once and rose, stealing after Thurid, who picked her way carefully among the snoring warriors, to slip back into Gunter's room and between the warm furs of his bed.
He made a rumbling noise in his sleep and turned over, drawing me into his embrace. I lay wide-eyed in the curve of his massive arm, despising him.
FORTY-FOUR
After the raid, matters settled back into familiar routine, though neither Joscelin nor I were likely to succumb to its comforts any time soon. The raid had served its purpose as a bitter reminder of the reality of our situation.
Winter in the City of Elua is not a pleasant time; it grows chill, and betimes a sweeping wind blows that drives everyone indoors, and halts trade and leisure alike. But it is nothing to life on a Skaldi steading. Here, we were truly snowbound, for at times the weather grew so fierce, not even the Skaldi would venture out for any length of time. And even when it was fair, there was nowhere to go, and precious little to do. In some ways, I think, the tedium was easier on the women and carls, for even in winter there was work to be done. But when they could not hunt, Gunter and his thanes were oft condemned to idleness. If the Skaldi are overly fond of wagering, bickering and drinking among themselves, I learned why: When the men are winter-bound in the confines of the great hall, there is naught else to be done.
They have their poetry, of course, and of that, there was an abundance. In addition to the Skaldi war-songs I knew and those homelier tales I learned from the women, I heard endless heroic sagas, humorous stories, epic lays that related tales of warring Gods and Giants, and a new, growing body of verse—the rise of Waldemar Selig.
Of him, many wonderous things were told. It was said that when his mother died in childbirth, a she-wolf was heard scratching at the door of the great hall in his steading, of which his father was the lord. When his thanes opened the door, they saw the wolf, and none dared harm her, for her fur was as white as snow and they knew her for a supernatural creature. She padded through the hall and straight to the infant Waldemar, lying beside him, and he reached for her fearlessly, taking hold of her white fur with his chubby fists and nursing.
They said that when he was still a lad, though half a head again taller than any man in the steading, and fully as broad, his father gave him a handful of gold and bid him to see the land. Thus did Waldemar travel disguised, with only two loyal thanes to accompany him. To all who gave him hospitality, he revealed himself and paid them in gold. Those who shunned him, he challenged, and defeated every one, revealing himself only after the victory.
So did his name and his fame spread across the far-flung Skaldic territories, and he came to be spoken of in terms of awe. He freed an owl caught up in a trapper's lines, who turned into a wizard and gave him a charm that would blunt the edges of his enemies weapons so they would deal him no wound. He met a witch, they said, whose son was of Giant blood; him he slew by discovering that his life was held in a gnarled root-ball the witch kept in her cupboard, which Waldemar threw upon the fire. He threatened to slay the witch as well, but she begged for her life, and gave him a charm to make him proof against poison.
When he came home at last to his own steading, he found his father slain, and the most powerful of his thanes, Lothnir, had wed his sister and laid claim to the steading and the leadership of the tribe. Lothnir met him with an embrace, and offered him a poisoned cup in welcome. Waldemar drank it down and threw the cup upon the snow, where it hissed and gave forth fumes, but he was unharmed. Then Lothnir came upon him at night while he slept, and struck at him with a dagger, but the edges of the blade turned dull and slid from his skin as if from a stiff-cured hide, and Waldemar only sighed in his sleep. In the morning, he challenged Lothnir and slew him with one cast of his spear, so mighty it split his shield and pierced his heart. He was acclaimed as leader, and gave his sister to one of his steadfast companions to wife.
These were the tales of Waldemar Selig, and if I was not naive enough to believe them the literal truth—indeed, I recognized in some the echoes of ancient Hellene tales—the glee with which the Skaldi heard and told them made me uneasy. Of a surety, they reckoned this man a hero; and not, from what I knew, without reason. If no other part of these stories was true, one thing was. He had united the contentious Skaldi tribes in their admiration of him.
Soon enough, though, a new dispute rose out of the cloistered life we led, providing the steading with a new distraction from the tedium of winter. And this dispute, unfortunately, had Joscelin at its center.
The young Skaldi woman Ailsa persisted in her interest in him. True to her word, she had washed and mended his Cassiline garb, presenting it to him with an insinuating smile. Joscelin blushed and smiled, there being naught else, as a slave, he could do. When he did not don it, but continued to wear the woolens given him by Thurid, Ailsa pouted and flounced about the hall, flaunting her displeasure until he put it on to quiet her.
I know Hedwig had a sharp word with the young woman, reminding her that Joscelin was a slave, and Gunter's property. Ailsa, however, was clever enough in her own right, and pointed out that as a D'Angeline lord's son—and it had been Gunter himself who'd put about word that Joscelin was a warrior-prince—he was as much a hostage as a slave, and therefore of a worthy status.
Gunter kept a wary eye on these proceedings and had no great trust of Ailsa, but the prospect of a ransom intrigued him. When he asked Joscelin if his father would pay money for his safe return, Joscelin, all unwitting, promptly answered that he was sure he would, as would the Prefect of the Cassiline Brotherhood, although, he added, not unless I accompanied him.
The matter gave Gunter somewhat to mull over, and Ailsa no reason to desist in her pursuit. I had little hope of the prospect of ransom coming to fruition—fierce though they were, Gunter and his thanes weren't likely to succeed in fighting their way across the whole of Camlach to deliver the message, and d'Aiglemort was hardly like to carry it for him—but it sufficed to give me concern.
For the other point in this triangle of dispute was one Evrard the Sharptongued, a surly thane who'd come honestly by his nickname and harbored a jealous fondness for Ailsa.
It did not help that she was a terrible flirt, reckoning herself the belle of the steading, and it did not help that Evrard was a homely man, albeit a wealthy one. Evrard's persecution of Joscelin was blatant. Echoing Ailsa's own unsubtle techniques, the thane made a point of putting himself in the Cassiline's path; but instead of a flounce or an incidental brush, he dealt in trips, shoves and taunts. Time and again, Joscelin attempted to step out of his way, only to find himself mocked or sent sprawling. It got so bad that he could not even go to spread new rushes on a clean-swept patch of floor without finding Evrard's boot-heels propped on the spot, while the thane cursed and swatted at him for the inconvenience.
If Joscelin had given no reason for Gunter and his thanes to mistrust him, he had not incited their love either; his effect upon the women of the steading had provoked too much resentment for that. And when they saw the white lines of silent fury etched on his face, they remembered his early days, and taunted him further, hoping to kindle him to wild rebellion for their sport.
Eventually, they succeeded.
It fell on an evening of blizzard, when everyone was confined to the hall and Joscelin came in shivering from the outdoors with an armload of wood for the cookstove. Catching his eye, Ailsa blew him a kiss and made an unsubtle gesture, hoisting her bekirtled breasts at him to show off her considerable cleavage.
Blushing and distracted—he had not wholly lost his Cassiline prurience—Joscelin failed to see when Evrard thrust a booted foot in his path and tripped over it accordingly, measuring his length on the floor of the great hall, scattering kindling as he fell.
Even that, he endured. I was playing the lute quietly at the time, and saw him kneel, head bowed, gathering up the fallen wood. Gunter sat in his chair by the fire, watching idly.
"Look at that," Evrard said contemptuously, flicking Joscelin's braid with one brawny hand. "What man has such hair, and none upon his chin? What man blushes like a maid, and takes no offense at being treated like a carl? No man, I say, but a woman!" It drew a laugh from the thanes, although I saw Hedwig's lips thin from across the room. Joscelin's shoulders stiffened, though he continued to ignore the thane. "He's pretty enough for one, eh?" Evrard continued. "Maybe we ought to check!"
Everyone has their own particular genius; Evrard the Sharptongued's was for goading others, and he saw from Joscelin's tense stillness that he'd landed a bolt that stung. "What do you say?" he asked two of his comrades, bluff and boisterous. "Give me a hand, eh, and we'll skin this wolf-cub of his drabs, see if he's a bitch after all, shall we?"
I stopped playing, and looked at Gunter, hoping he would stop it. Alas, he was bored enough to see it as good sport.
So it was that Evrard the Sharptongued and a handful of thanes set upon Joscelin, intent on wrestling him to the ground and stripping off his clothing. Of their intent, I've no doubt; how it played out was another matter. The moment the first hand closed on his shoulder, Joscelin was on his feet, a stout length of branch in each hand.
It was the first time, I believe, they had occasion to witness him fight in the Cassiline style of combat. The edge of Joscelin's skill had not dulled; if anything, the weeks of hard labor and smothered rage had honed it. He fought with calm, deadly efficiency, the impromptu staves moving in a blur, whirling and warding. Within moments, the rest of the hall was in an uproar, thanes rushing into the fray and staggering back out, clutching bruised limbs and battered skulls.
I understand some little about the two-handed Cassiline fighting style. It is designed to afford the most protection to one's ward, making an armed human shield of the wielder. With no companion to protect, Joscelin grimly protected himself, holding nearly the entire fighting force of Gun-ter's steading at bay for a goodly amount of time. For his part, Gunter watched it with the same interest he'd shown when they first captured Joscelin. It took some seven or eight men to bring him down at last, muscling with brute force past the reach of his staves and bearing him to the floor, where he continued to thrash as they roared with laughter and tugged at his clothing.
I had drawn breath to shout, though my mind was empty of words, when Gunter did it himself, raising his voice to a bellow of command.
"Enough!" he shouted.
He had mighty lungs; I could swear the very rafters trembled. His thanes grew still, and allowed Joscelin to rise. He gained his feet, disheveled, his clothing askew, fair shivering with rage—but to his credit, he stood his ground, crossing his arms and bowing stiffly in Gunter's direction.
If anything, it was that which saved him. Gunter took on his canny look, drumming thick fingers on the arm of his chair and looking thoughtfully at the infuriated Evrard. "So you claim injury of this man, eh, Sharp-tongue?"