Hawkmaiden (15 page)

The party eventually set out, and for one of only a handful of times in her life Dara ventured beyond the chasm that was the eternal border of the Westwood, proper, and entered the wider world.  Not that she was going far.  Sevendor Castle was about a mile away from Westwood Hall as the falcon flew.  The long, circuitous route through the valewood and down into the road to the castle took far longer, of course.  Once they arrived at the gate of the castle, the sun had set behind the ridge and all was growing dark.

All but Sevendor Castle, that was.  It was lit with a strange, unearthly glow from several bright balls of light that just seemed to float in mid-air.

“Magelights,” her brother Kyre explained quietly, when she halted to stare.  “The castle uses them all the time, now.  No torches, no tapers – well, just a few, I guess; not everyone there is a mage.  But the Great Hall is lit by them now.”

“Amazing!” Dara grinned.  She had never seen anything so wondrous before, save her falcon.  The castle seemed to glow and sparkle in the arcane light.  “So spells for light, spells for wood . . . what does the magelord even
need
with villeins, then?”

“Someone has to empty the chamberpots,” Kobb quipped.  “No magic for that, probably.”

“You will be respectful and polite to everyone this evening,” Kyre ordered his younger brother.  “The magelord is expecting a lot of new settlers from the Wilderlands, and everyone is like to be on-edge over Brestal.  This could develop into a tense situation, and I won’t have it said that the Westwoodmen contributed to it.”

Dara was shocked – none of the young men with her gave any of their usual jeers or insults when Kyre spoke, now.  Not even Kobb.  Uncle Keram looked pleased, nodding as his own sons signaled their obedience.

They walked under the gate along with other folk destined for Sevendor Castle’s Yule celebration – not just Vale folk, from Genly and Gurisham, but strangely-dressed people from the Wilderlands, way to the northwest, and good Riverlands tradesmen wearing their festival best under their thick woolen cloaks.

“Most of those now live in Sevendor Village,” Kobb whispered to her, when a beefy-looking man in a furry hat stopped ahead of them to greet a friend.  “Tradesmen and artisans.  Carpenters.  Wainwrights.  A smith.  You won’t recognize the place anymore,” he promised.  “They’re building houses there so fast you’d swear they’re using magic!”

“They
are
using magic,” Uncle Keram reminded them, quietly.  “They used it to cure the timber from the valewood, and they’re using it to bind the pieces together, I’ve heard.”

“That’s very interesting,” Dara said.  She didn’t know much about magic, aside from a few folktales around the Flame, but the lights above the castle intrigued her mightily.  She wondered what they would look like from the peak.

The castle was crowded as they went through the second gatehouse and into the inner bailey.  The yard was a riot of horses and wagons, carts and donkeys, castle servants yelling to each other and throngs of villeins and villagers drinking merrily in the yard outside of the castle’s great doors.

The place seemed far more festive than foreboding, now that there was a proper lord in residence.  The shabby-looking exterior Dara remembered from last time she was here had been meticulously scrubbed and the steps swept.  A youth (one of the Wilderlands folk, she guessed) just inside the door invited then each to wash their hands in a warm basin, and then dried them with a towel.  Dara hadn’t had anyone wash and dry her hands for her since she was a child, but she had to admit it made her feel quite noble.

The hall of Sevendor Castle was even more brightly lit with the floating spheres than the exterior.  Every corner and rafter in the place seemed to be lit up, and the fresh rushes on the floor had been mixed with evergreen boughs, giving the hall a spicy scent.  A gallery above them contained a few village musicians sawing away at a viol, a tabor, and singing some seasonal hymns.  Dara looked around at the many trestle tables that had been packed into the room.  There had to be a hundred or more folk crammed in, yet there were places for plenty more.

“Where shall we put these?” Kyre asked a tall, important-looking man in a long mantle.  A Wilderlord, Dara guessed.  He had a darker-complexion and his face was bisected by a bushy mustache, brown hair with just a bit of curl over the top of his large ears.  He carried himself with the dignity of an oak tree, she noticed, and when he spoke his voice seemed to fill the hall.  Was this the Magelord? She wondered.

The tall man stared at the dressed bucks and the other provisions the boys carried or hauled in a wheelbarrow.

“What . . . what
is
this, may I ask?  And who are
you?
”

“I am Kyre, son of Kamen, Master of the Wood,” Kyre said, proudly.  “And I bring our Yule tribute . . . and a gift from the Master of the Westwood to the Magelord.  My father apologizes for being unable to be here himself, but his leg is yet splinted after an accident this autumn.”

“And I am Sir Cei, castellan to Sire Minalan, the Magelord of Sevendor,” the man – a
real
knight, Dara realized excitedly, and one who looked the part the way Sir Erantal didn’t – said, graciously.  “To what occasion does the Master of the Wood ascribe this generous bounty?”

“No more than the thoughtful consideration of a yeoman for his rightful lord,” Kyre said, boldly, stressing the term “rightful” just a hint. 

Dara couldn’t believe this was actually her brother speaking.  Kyre had always been confident, but he spoke with the tall castellan nearly as he would a peer.  “When he heard the Lord was expecting . . . additional guests for Yule,” he said, referring to the Wilderlands folk that were arriving at the castle from up the Sevendor Road even now, “he did not want it said that the Castle lacked the hospitality of the season because the Westwood did not provide.  By the Flame, he would not have it so.” 

Sir Cei looked surprised and grateful,
and then carefully studied her brother’s face.  “I think I’m going to like your father, young Kyre of Westwood.  Pray introduce me to the rest of your party,” he encouraged.

“If it please you,” Kyre said. “This is my Uncle Keram, called the Crafty, my father’s right-hand man.  My brothers Kobb and Kran, my cousins Kapi, Keru and Kitt, and my uncle Kamal . . . and this is my little sister, Lenodara,” he finished.  Dara was startled by the introduction, although she had known it was coming, and hurried to give the tall knight a curtsey – only the second time she had ever made the formal gesture in earnest.

“A fine family, and a fine estate you have,” Sir Cei boomed, warmly.  “I will have the servants take charge of your bounty, and move it to the kitchens and storerooms.  It is much appreciated.  Please, by the gods come in and warm yourselves, take some wine and food . . . Magelord Minalan will be holding court and receiving pledges of fealty in a while,” he assured them.

The Westwoodmen made their way toward the large stone fireplace as if the Flame bade them.  Along the way Dara passed some folk she knew but many who she did not.  She made sure to keep her eyes open and her ears pricked up to hear the slightest bit of gossip.

Kyre filled his drinking horn from a jug borne by the castle butler, and Dara found herself with a battered but polished tin cup full of wine – the first unwatered wine she’d ever had.  She took a sip and immediately regretted it. 

She vowed to sip it, slowly.  And not much – the flavor did not like her tongue.  But sipping gave her an opportunity to observe the rapidly-filling hall and determine who was who among the crowd.  That’s why her father had sent her, after all.

The Genlymen and the Southridge folk were huddled in one corner of the hall, while the Gurisham folk and a delegation from Caolan’s Pass, including old Yeoman Karkan and his children, was near to the folk from suddenly-reunited Brestal.  Dara could see these people as regular folk of Sevendor Vale - Sevendori. 

Then there was the knot of strangely-dressed Wilderlands folk at the other end of the Great Hall.  The
Bovali,
she overheard them call themselves.  As opposed to the Sevendori. 

We’re the Sevendori,
she realized.  She had never considered herself so before.  The Westwood was part of Sevendor, but it wasn’t
of
it.  To the Wilderlands folk – the Bovali – she and the villein farmer girls from Genly might as well been the same, she realized.

Between the Bovali and the Sevendori were a third knot of people – the new artisans and shopkeepers who had come with the Bovali and the new lord.  They looked a little uncomfortable, at first, but the Bovali were no stranger to drink, for all their odd manner of speech and dress, and they were plying the Riverlands artisans with a lot of it.  Soon the new residents of Sevendor Village were toasting the health of the Magelord with their new Bovali neighbors.  Yeoman Jurlor’s folk joined in, soon enough, Dara noted.

The representatives of Genly and Southridge, Dara noted, glared balefully at the merrymaking.  Railan the Steady (who had been removed from his position as head of Sevendor Village in favor of a common footwizard, she heard someone mention nearby) was deep in conversation with Yeoman Ylvine, and their faces bore looks of frustration and concern. 

Dara had seen the Southridge man at market once, and hadn’t liked him then or now.  He had always held himself up as a shield between the corruption of the castle and the hardworking folk of the vale, and was respected – if not liked – nearly everywhere for his fair judgment.  But he was also a figure of some derision, as well as sympathy, in the Westwood.  A man who seemed so passionate about who got the privilege of plowing, sowing, weeding and harvesting a particular piece of dirt, and who ruled his estate with iron control, was the antithesis of a good life in the Wood.

While she watched, her uncle came up behind her.  “What do you see, Little Bird?”

“Genly and Southridge are against the Magelord,” she reported, quietly.  “But Jurlor, Caolan’s Pass, and the Westwood stand with the Bovali.  The Brestali don’t know who to trust, and don’t care – they just want to eat.  Who are the Bovali?”

“The Wilderlands folk.  Like that big knight we met, Sir Cei.  The land there is wild and remote, and their folk are as hardy as the Westwoodmen, so it seems.  And they’re fighters.  They lost their lands to the goblins,” Keram said, just as quietly.  “The Magelord rescued them, and wants to settle them here.  The vale folk are not happy about it, as you can see – at least
some
of them,” he amended, as squat Yeoman Jurlor began to roar with laughter in the company of three Bovali.

“The Bovali
want
to be friendly,” she said, realizing the situation as she spoke the words aloud to her uncle.  “The vale folk –
some
of them – are going to try to subvert the new lord!  Why would they want to do that?  Everyone suffered under Sir Erantal!”

“Not everyone suffered
equally
,” Keram pointed out.  “Sevendor Village bore the brunt of Erantal’s whims, yet Railan the Steady was one of the most important men in the vale.  And one of the richest, outside of the castle.  Now he isn’t even among the top ten most important.  Yeoman Ylvine has schemed to position himself near the old lord, yet now his plots are undone and he has to start anew . . . with a lord who won’t fancy his wife, I’m guessing.”

“So what do you want me to do, Uncle?” Dara blushed, wanting to change the subject.

“Be the Little Bird you are,” he chuckled, kindly.  “Fly around the room.  Keep your ears and eyes open.  Say
nothing
.  Remember
everything
.  We’ll speak of it afterwards,” he promised.

She nodded and began to slowly circle the room like a falcon over a rabbit.

She was fortunate – no one paid much mind to a scrawny Westwood girl, with all the other distractions available for their eyes and ears.  By the time she had made a complete circuit of the room she had a much better idea of the state of the vale, and the opinion of the vale folk of the new lord.  The Genlymen, in particular, seemed angry about the wizard who now ruled them . . . though they drank his wine and ate his food freely enough.

Finally, the Magelord himself appeared along with his lady.  It was the first time Dara had seen the mage, and she was struck by how young he was.  She had expected a long white beard or something, but Magelord Minalan was not much more than twenty-five, by her estimation.  He had a beard, but it was close cropped and as brown as his hair.

His wife was close to him in age, a pretty woman with honey-colored hair and a tired expression.  Likely, Dara reasoned, because she was so
very
pregnant, and while she seemed determined to put a brave face on the festivities she did not look comfortable in the slightest.

Dara found a spot out-of-the way near her brother when court began.  She watched Kyre stand in his turn and swear fealty on behalf of the Westwood estate, and saw him receive twenty new spears from the new lord in return.

Twenty new spears seemed like an odd gift to Dara – you only needed a few to hunt boar, she knew.  Then she realized with horror what the gift implied.  The new lord had armed the Westwood not to hunt, but to go to war at his command.

Suddenly, the Magelord did not seem so benevolent anymore.