Camber of Culdi Read Free

begun to discover.
    If confronted, he would have vigorously denied that he favored any one of his children above the others, for he loved all of them fiercely; but Evaine unquestionably occupied a special place in his life and his heart—Evaine, youngest of his living children and the last to remain at home. Evaine accepted this facet of her father as she accepted all the others, without consciously stopping to analyze it—and without needing to.
    She reached her father’s door and knocked lightly before slipping the latch and going inside.
    Camber was seated behind a curved hunt table, the leather surface littered with rolls of parchment and ink-stained quills and other accoutrements of the academic mind. Her cousin, James Drummond, was with him, and both of them stopped speaking as she entered the room.
    Cousin James looked decidedly angry, though he tried to conceal it. Camber’s face was inscrutable.
    â€œI beg your pardon, Father. I didn’t know Jamie was with you. I can come back later.”
    â€œThere’s no need, child.” Camber stood, both hands resting lightly on the table. “James was just leaving, weren’t you, James?”
    James, a blurred, darker copy of the silver-blond man behind the table, hitched at his belt in annoyance and controlled a scowl. “Very well, sir, but I’m still not satisfied with your analysis. I’d like to return tomorrow and discuss it further, if you don’t mind.”
    â€œCertainly I don’t mind, James,” the older man said easily. “I am always willing to listen to well-reasoned arguments different from my own. In fact, stay and share Michaelmas with us, if you can. Cathan won’t be here, but Joram is coming, and Rhys. We’d love to have you join us.”
    Disarmed by Camber’s reply, James murmured his thanks and something about having things to do, then bowed stiffly and made his exit.
    With raised eyebrows, Evaine turned to face her father, leaning thoughtfully against the closed door.
    â€œGoodness, what was that about? Or shouldn’t I ask?”
    Camber crossed to the stone fireplace—a rare luxury in so small a room—and pulled two chairs closer, gesturing for her to sit. “A slight difference of opinion, that’s all. James looks to me for guidance, now that his father is dead. I fear he didn’t get the answer he wanted to hear.”
    He yanked on a bell cord, then busied himself with poking at the fire until a liveried servant appeared at the door with refreshment. Evaine watched curiously as her father took the tray and bade the servant go. Then, cupping a goblet of mulled wine between her palms, she gazed across at him. Despite the fire and the tapestried walls, it was chill in the old room.
    â€œYou’re very quiet this afternoon, Father. What is it? Did Jamie tell you about the murder in the village last night?”
    Camber tensed for just an instant, then relaxed. He did not look up. “You know about that?”
    She spoke carefully. “When a Deryni is killed, practically under one’s window, one learns of it. They say that the king’s men have taken fifty human hostages, and that the king intends to invoke the Law of Festil if the murderer is not found.”
    Camber drank deeply of his wine and stared into the fire. “A barbarous custom—to hold an entire village to blame for the death of one man—even if the man was a Deryni.”
    â€œAye. Maybe it was a necessary barbarism in the early days,” Evaine mused. “How else for a conquering race, few in numbers, to secure its hold over the conquered? But you know how much Rannulf was disliked, even among our own people. Why, I remember that Cathan practically had to evict him bodily from Caerrorie one day, when you were still at Court. If gentle Cathan would do that, I can imagine how boorish the man must have been.”
    â€œIf we execute every boor in Gwynedd, I think