Silver May Tarnish Read Free Page B

tears and rode. I was keep lord now. I must be strong. Behind us I heard shouting. Berond slowed, despair in his voice.
    â€œThey’re devils. They’ve found the trail again.”
    Harkon was dour. “Aye. So we fight again.”
    Talsa shook her head. “I’m old and tired. I can ride no further. I’ll stay back. If they find me it may be they’ll delay enough for the rest of you to get to safety.” I remembered Lisia.
    â€œI forbid it.” My voice trembled but I forced it to a steady tone. “I am keep lord. We throw no friend to the wolves.”
    How it would have been settled, I do not know. I am thankful I never had to find out for it was then that a handful of the invaders came howling at us out of the dark. Talsa fell to a sword as Harkon fought. One of the invaders fell, too, but four remained. Then three. In my mind’s eye I can still see Hakon’s ax carving arcs in the moonlight, steel gleaming dully as he kept them back. But one must have been cannier than his fellows. He had a bow and used it.
    The first arrow took me in the shoulder, so that I yelped in pain and surprise. Berond spurred to my side. With one hand he snapped the shaft at my clothing. With his swordhand
he struck a deadly blow at the man who rode up alongside. The invader fell and our ponies trampled him. A third arrow glanced off Berond’s mail. He wasted no more time. In a leap he was behind me in the saddle and, with his own pony running at our knees, he held me upright as he raced our mount for the sheltering dark.
    I was near fainting, but as we fled I heard Harkon giving tongue to the hunting call, the notes with which one wishes good hunting to those who go forth. Then it broke off and I knew where the next arrow had gone. I mustered strength to ask.
    â€œWill they pursue?”
    Berond was letting the over-burdened pony slow. “I think not. One is wounded.” I must have made a sound, “You saw not? Old Talsa. He slew her, but she fleshed her dagger in his thigh as she fell, and she’d know where to strike. He’s like to bleed out before he can be got back. I think the archer will not follow. He never closed with us hand to hand.” I thought the man a coward but was grateful if it was so.
    Perhaps the archer was too busy getting his comrade back, or perhaps he was indeed less eager to fight with steel against steel. For whatever reason it was, none followed. Berond was able to remove the shaft in a cold camp later that day. The point had come through my clothing at the front and he had only to draw it out. After that, he tied me down and poured grain-spirit from a flask through the wound. I screamed, fighting my bonds before I fainted. Once I came around again, he gave me a few mouthfuls of the spirit. That was the soldier’s way.
    We made for Paltendale. I had kin-right and they would take us in. It took several weeks to reach them, since the hills were filled with bands of the invader who shot at anything they saw. I was young and healthy and thanks to the grain spirit the wound did not fester. It even healed a little as I rode. Each night I worked on sword drill with Berond until I was exhausted enough to sleep. Many nights I
dreamed: of how some in the village must have died. At least my father had given Lisia a clean death. I dreamed of Talsa and Harkon. Of my father and brothers, and when I woke to remember they were no more I wept silently into my bedding.
    But at length we came to sanctuary and they opened the keep gates to us. I was now the Keep Lord of Erondale in title, ten years of age, but everything I cared about was gone. I came as a beggar to Paltendale, riding in bitter sorrow.

II

    Y es, they took us in. Berond, because he was a seasoned and canny warrior. Me, they took reluctantly, yet I was kin, and Lord Hogar’s pride would not allow him to turn me from the door. I ate the bitter bread of charity there for the next few years. Perhaps