LITMIR.BIZ

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of Aberwyn stood on the highest hill in town, as befitted the dwelling of one of the most important noblemen in the land. A wall of worked tan stone set it off from the city, but its cluster of towers and brochs stood so tall that you could see them, pointing up like hands, over the wall. Some of the towers bore a conical roof, covered in slate tiles, in the new courtly style, and glass caught the setting sun in every window. A fortune, that dun had cost the Western Fox clan, and townsfolk grumbled that bribes from the gwerbret’s law courts had paid for it all.

      Just outside the main gates huddled a crowd of some hundred persons, but they kept a respectful distance from Cradoc, who was sitting cross-legged on the ground and slumped against the wall. Under his dirty gray breeches and a shirt as loose as a shroud, he was so ghastly thin, all bone and skull’s grimace, his skeletal fingers clutched round his harp, that Alyssa wondered how he managed to hold his head upright. Kneeling beside him were his two young apprentices, both in tears, and the grim-faced journeyman who’d sworn to take his place when the end came.

      ‘Not one sign of the gwerbret and his wretched heir,’ Rhys muttered. ‘May the gods curse them!’

      ‘Hush!’ Alyssa snapped. ‘You’ll get yourself transported to the Desolation for saying things like that.’

      Behind them the crowd swelled steadily. It filled the street, spilled out into the long carriage drive round the dun walls, but everyone kept silent, barely breathing, it seemed. Alyssa felt them as a huge hand pressing at her back, driving her forward. She moved close enough to see Cradoc clearly – the pale gray hair, plastered to the all-too-prominent skull; the eyes, pools of unseeing shadow. One of the apprentices dipped a linen napkin into a jug of water, then held it to his master’s lips. For some days now Cradoc had been too weak to drink from a cup. The bard’s mouth stayed shut. With a wail the ’prentice burst out keening and flung the napkin to the cobbles.

      ‘He’s gone!’ the journeyman shouted. ‘Look you at Aberwyn’s justice!’

      The crowd roared. The keening began, high and musical, sobbing and wailing as everyone began to sway, back and forth, back and forth. Alyssa keened with them; she linked her arms with Mavva on one side and Rhys on the other as they rocked, bound by grief. Their leader was dead, their leader had fallen in a battle as real as any fought with swords and crossbows. In a time of change all over the far-flung kingdom of Deverry, the gwerbret of Aberwyn had held firm for the past and its outmoded ways, even while the most famous bard in the province of Eldidd starved himself at his door in protest.

      Cutting over the keening and the sobs came the call of a silver horn. With the grinding of a winch and the grumble of timbers on stone the great gates swung slowly open. Through the widening view Alyssa caught sight of men in red and brown tartan trousers and vests over their loose shirts mounting horses. Cavalry sabres flashed as the horn sounded again. The men were sheathing the sabres and taking some other weapon out of their belts. Alyssa stood on tip-toe to see: horsewhips!

      ‘Run!’ Alyssa screamed. She let go of Mavva and Rhys’s arms. ‘When the crowd breaks we’ll be trampled!’

      But although the crowd swirled as the prudent slipped away, it refused to break. When the cavalrymen edged their horses out, they carried not sabres but horsewhips – after all, it was their own fellow citizens they were facing, there in the darkening streets. For a moment utter silence and utter stalemate held. The troop leader, the gwerbret’s younger son, Lord Gwarl, urged his bay horse forward.

      ‘Disperse!’ he called out. ‘In the name of Aberwyn I command you! Clear this street immediately!’

      The keening continued. The crowd swayed but never moved to leave.

      ‘Rabble, all of you!’ Gwarl stood high in his stirrups and yelled. ‘Scum! Disperse!’

      A rock sailed through the air and smacked Lord Gwarl’s horse in the chest. With a whinny it reared, nearly unseating its rider. The crowd laughed and howled. Gwarl settled his horse down and began screaming at the top of his lungs, but his words died in the screech from the mob, laughter and rage all mingled into one hideous noise. Another rock, another – the troop swung horsewhips up and charged full toward the crowd.

      Alyssa heard herself shriek with the others. She tried to run, found herself caught in a press of bodies, looked round frantically but saw no sign of Mavva and Rhys. Apparently they’d taken her good advice even if she’d been too stupid to follow it herself. All round her people were screaming, staggering, flailing out at one another as they tried to get free enough to run. Horses neighed and reared; the cavalrymen were swearing and yelling as the whips snapped and swung. As people scrambled to get away from the whips, the crowd turned porous. The horsemen pressed forward into the gaps. Horses kicked and bit. People screamed and bled. Moving back toward town became impossible.

      Alyssa worked her way between two burly young men, then darted forward toward the wall just as a whip cracked the air beside her ear. Her mouth framed a soundless scream as she looked up into the sweaty face of a young cavalryman, leaning from his saddle. He was weeping, cursing a steady stream as duty drove him past her into the helpless crowd. The men behind her saw that she was heading for the clear space at the wall so that she could run round the dun and find safety that way. Yelling to one another they surged forward behind her just as another horseman swung his mount round to their direction. Alyssa nearly fell, steadied herself barely in time, kept moving, half-running, half-carried forward as the men behind her pressed forward toward the wall.

      The screams turned horrible as agony and terror lashed the crowd. Cries and shouts told Alyssa that people were falling, being trampled. She bent her will to staying upright, staying on her feet. Someone slammed into her from the side as he tried to evade the oncoming horseman. Someone else screamed, slipped, clutched at her arm. She shook him off before he could take her down with him, then staggered foward only to stumble over something hard – she never did see what it was – and nearly fall. Strong hands grabbed her arm from behind and swung her around, hauled her back onto her feet. She found herself staring up at the dead-pale face of a young man. Nothing else about him registered, but that he was as frightened as she was.

      ‘Hold on!’ he yelled at her. ‘We’ll get out of this better as two.’

      She linked her arm with his and pushed forward again. Buoyed up by his strength she could keep walking, keep her head up, too, and see where they were going. From the screams behind her she knew that she didn’t want to turn and see where she had been. At last they gained the wall, could sidle along it, could ease themselves in position for one last burst of speed and rush forward. They gained an alley at the beginning of the town proper and trotted down it, turned out into the Street of the Silversmiths and into a pool of lamplight.

      Safe.

      ‘Thank every god they hang those street lamps so high,’ her rescuer said. ‘If one of them fell into the thatch …’

      Alyssa felt suddenly sick and oddly cold. He caught her elbow and steadied her. For a few minutes they stood listening to the sounds – the screaming, the weeping, the neighing of frightened horses, and over it all the cracking of the whips and the cursing of troopers.

      ‘This night will light a fire of a different kind,’ Alyssa said at last. ‘His Grace will feel its heat soon enough.’

      ‘Oho! So you’re one of the rabble-rousers, are you?’

      ‘Is that how you see us? Rabble?’ She pulled her arm free. ‘My thanks for your aid, but I’ve naught more to say to you.’

      Alyssa turned on her heel and stalked off.

      ‘Wait!’ He was calling out, trotting after her. ‘I meant no insult, fair maid. Just a jest of sorts. Here, look, if anyone’s rabble, it’s me.’

      Alyssa stopped in the next pool of lamplight. She could still hear the screaming and the horses, but faintly now, as if the noise had both lessened and moved far away. Was the troop following the mob down to the collegium? If so, she’d best wait to go back, but here she was, a woman alone on a darkening street. And what of Rhys and Mavva? Were they safe? Her rescuer hurried up and made her a bow.

      ‘Forgive

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