‘Better yet, Salamander can read and write. Neb can give him what he needs for the job.’
‘Well, there you are, then. Easy and twice easy.’
Cadryc went back to the stables, and Gerran started for the broch. He took a shortcut through the kitchen garden, then realized that someone was lurking behind the cook’s little gardening shed. He could guess who it was.
‘Come out, gerthddyn,’ Gerran said wearily. ‘I should have known you’d be eavesdropping.’
‘Think of all the effort I’ve saved you.’ Salamander strolled over to join him. ‘This way you won’t have to tell me what our noble tieryn said. My thanks, by the way. You were quite right. We didn’t need the pile of horseshit. I’ll just go tell Neb that the matter’s settled.’
Salamander trotted off with a cheerful wave. As Gerran followed, he happened to glance up. Far above the dun the black dragon floated on the summer breeze. Although he didn’t know where Arzosah was lairing, at various times during the day this strangest of all possible allies would appear, keeping watch over the dun. She’d take a turn or two over it at night, as well, when she was on her way to hunt down a wild meal. Gerran was never sure if her presence was comforting or terrifying. As long as she doesn’t scare the horses, he thought. With a shrug he went inside to join the warband.
‘Well, it gladdens my heart to have that settled,’ Branna said. ‘I feel horribly selfish, though. I’m just so happy that Neb will be staying here safe in the dun.’
‘Why not be happy?’ Salamander gave her one of his sunny grins. ‘Life is short, so grasp what joy it gives you. As to safe, I hope you both will be, but you’ll need to be on your guard.’
‘Because of the raven mazrak?’
‘Precisely. He may not know who you specifically are, but dweomer can always smell out dweomer. He must know you have it, and that therefore you’re a potential thorn in his feathered side.’
‘Let’s hope I can be a dagger, not a thorn.’
‘Someday, mayhap, but not now.’ Salamander’s voice dropped to a cold seriousness. ‘Never challenge him. Merely watch. He’s got a hundred times the power you do.’
‘Well and good, then. Will Arzosah be carrying messages back and forth? I can always send you one if I see him.’
‘Alas, I doubt it. We’ll need the dragons with the army.’
‘Rori will be there, too?’
‘Oh, of course. He never was the sort of man you could keep out of a good fight.’
Branna felt that she should know exactly what he meant, but the memories eluded her. She was about to ask more, but she heard voices behind her. They were standing just inside the honour door of the great hall, which was beginning to fill up for the evening meal. When she glanced over her shoulder she saw Aunt Galla and her daughter Adranna walking towards them. She stepped aside to let them enter. As they passed, Salamander bowed to both women. Galla favoured him with a smile and a wave of her hand, but Adranna strode on by with her mouth set in a thin line and poison in her eyes.
‘Alas,’ Salamander said. ‘I fear me your cousin will never forgive me. Truly, if I were her I wouldn’t forgive me, either. My heart aches for her loss.’
‘She’s better off without Honelg,’ Branna said. ‘So are the children.’
‘No doubt, but it must be hard on a woman to return a widow to her father’s dun.’
‘Little do you know how true that is! She and Galla squabble all the time.’
‘That must be unpleasant.’
‘It is, but at least she’s here to help with the spinning.’ Branna reflexively rubbed her right wrist with her left hand. ‘The more women the better for that. It’s so tedious.’
While they waited for the gwerbret’s army to ride in, Branna had been spending as much time as she possibly could with her cousin. During their long talks, Adranna occasionally discussed her dead husband and even wept for him, briefly and now and then, but the loss she felt most keenly was nothing so domestic as lord and dun. That evening they left the dinner table early and went up to the women’s hall, where they pulled their chairs over to a window and the cooler air.
‘You don’t know what it’s like, Branni,’ Adranna said. ‘Being part of a clan of believers, I mean. That’s how we thought of ourselves, as kin and clan, Alshandra’s people all, whether we were farmers or noble-born.’
‘I feel that way when we go to the Moon temple on the feast days and suchlike.’
‘Oh, that!’ Adranna tossed her head. ‘That’s just tradition. Alshandra is real. You can feel her presence. Our lady’s different, truly she is.’
‘How can she be? All goddesses are one goddess.’
‘That’s what the priestesses of the Moon say, but why should we believe them?’
Branna decided to ignore the question. ‘Alshandra certainly could be a new aspect of the goddess,’ she went on, ‘but all that talk of Vandar’s spawn and the like – that sounds like the Horsekin men to me, making up a new excuse to start wars and conquer other people’s land.’
‘I have to admit that it sounded that way to me, too, especially the bit about Vandar’s spawn. They do want pasture for their horses, the Horsekin men. The ones that visited us, they practically came right out and said so, but well, I thought maybe Alshandra wants them to live on the grasslands.’
‘Grasslands, perchance, somewhere or other. I wouldn’t wager high on it. Goddesses don’t draw up boundary maps like a village priest, deciding which son gets what when a farmer dies.’
At that Adranna managed to smile.
‘Besides,’ Branna said, ‘why would your goddess want the Westfolk destroyed? She –’
‘Hold a moment!’ Adranna leaned forward in her chair. ‘The Westfolk? I never heard anything against the Westfolk.’
‘But that’s who Vandar’s spawn are, according to the Horsekin leaders. Salamander told me about it. The Westfolk lands are the ones they want for themselves.’
‘That can’t be true!’
‘It is true. Ask Salamander if you don’t believe me.’
‘And why would I believe one word that lying viper says?’
‘Well, why would he make that up? He only lies when he’s got a good reason. He told me that he heard it from the priestess Rocca.’
‘Still –’
‘Besides, Dallandra told me the same thing. Would she lie?’
‘She wouldn’t.’ Adranna whispered, and her hands tightened on the arms of her chair. ‘But that’s a horrible idea.’
‘I rather thought so myself.’
Adranna suddenly noticed, or so it seemed, that she was clutching the wood so tightly that her knuckles had gone white. She let go with a sharp sigh and let her hands rest in her lap. Branna waited for some little while to give her a chance to think things over.
‘From everything I’ve heard,’ Branna went on, ‘I’d say that the Alshandra cult modelled her on Aranrodda. And Aranrodda’s an aspect of the one true goddess, isn’t she?’
‘She is, truly.’
‘Well, then. Wouldn’t that mean Alshandra’s an aspect herself?’
‘Oh. I’d not thought of it that way, but –’
Branna