Bridge of Swords (24 page)

Rhiannon smiled. ‘But that will be fine! He is taking me back with him, of course he can bring you as well! We are going to marry!’

‘He is taking you back? You will marry?’ Huw gasped.

‘I am?’ Sendatsu was almost as horrified and frantically had to compose his face. Had he really said that? Could he truly have been so stupid? He couldn’t remember promising anything so rash but Rhiannon’s expression warned that he had.

Sendatsu looked from one human to the other as they stared at him, and realised how deep a hole he had dug for himself. With a snarl, he shoved Huw away and the bard tumbled across the floor, landing almost by the chair next to the fire. How was he going to get out of this?

‘Sendatsu! What are you doing?’ Rhiannon cried, rushing over to Huw’s side.

Sendatsu could not talk, he was so furious, with himself and these two humans.

‘He doesn’t want to help us humans any more. He wants to go back to his own kind.’ Huw shrugged off Rhiannon’s helping hand and pushed himself back to his feet. He had been a little afraid Sendatsu would hit him but, after the pain of what he had listened to before, he almost welcomed a real blow. Being thrown across the room was nothing, although his hip and back were telling him he would feel it tomorrow.

‘That’s not true! He’s going to help us and he’s going to take us back to Dokuzen,’ Rhiannon said stubbornly, staring at Sendatsu, who kept his back to them.

‘Sendatsu! Tell him! Show Huw he’s wrong!’

Sendatsu thought fast, and desperately. ‘It’s Huw’s fault,’ he said quickly. ‘I can’t go back to Dokuzen until I have some answers for the Elven Council. But Huw wants me to stay out here until the Forlish are defeated. He seeks to keep us from going to Dokuzen!’

He watched with satisfaction as Rhiannon swung her attention to Huw.

‘Huw, is this true?’ she demanded.

‘We need his help and this is the only way to ensure he does not slip off to Dokuzen in the night, without either of us,’ Huw stated.

‘He would never do that! He is not some man, he is an elf — they only speak the truth!’

Unseen behind her, Sendatsu winced.

‘Well, we shall be as quick as possible. But we cannot leave the people here to be killed by Ward’s Forlish, as he killed your father,’ Huw said craftily.

Rhiannon clenched her fists. ‘No, you are right.’

‘And I want to go to Dokuzen as much as you. It is just a question of waiting a moon or two.’

‘True,’ Rhiannon agreed.

‘Then it is all settled?’ Huw smiled, his eyes firmly fixed on Sendatsu’s face.

‘It sounds like a plan!’ Rhiannon enthused. ‘And I have a wonderful idea for when we travel around the villages. We shall
arrive and sing a song about Sendatsu, tell them he is here to help!’

‘What?’ Huw and Sendatsu asked together.

‘A song to announce him and praise him, tell everyone how he’s a hero, here to help them,’ she exclaimed. ‘We can start work on it tonight. Oh, I can just hear it in my head! We’ll sing it as we enter each village, let them know how lucky they are to have an elf to help them.’

Huw ground his teeth. He knew he would not be able to sing Sendatsu’s praises. The words would choke him.

Sendatsu instinctively shied away from this. But he had no choice, he just had to go along and pray he found a way out.

‘So what do we say?’ Rhiannon asked.

‘Fine,’ Huw grated, feeling Rhiannon’s eyes on him.

‘Perfect,’ Sendatsu lied.

‘That’s settled then!’ Rhiannon smiled.

The Magic-weavers were defeated, their power broken and their leaders either killed or forced to swear their lives to me. The shattered survivors were willing to do whatever asked of them. But, in Dokuzen, appearance is everything and my standing had been humbled by their revolt. The loss of several clan leaders, the death of my wife and the fact that they had dared to attack me had the people whispering: ‘The forefathers must have made a mistake’; I was ‘not strong enough to lead the people forwards’. The whispers were being led by my old friend Naibun. I trusted him to finish what I had begun. Instead he smiled to my face and worked behind my back. Everything I did fell into his trap.

When I mourned my wife he said I was weak. When I tried to lead the discussion he said I was distracted. And all the time he was murmuring that the forefathers were wrong. I had let the Magic-weavers nearly seize power. I was leaving the humans with the power to destroy us.

I did not hear — but others listened.

Huw had been worried the village would react badly to the news they were leaving. But while there was some concern, the spirit of the victory from yesterday allowed him to convince them this was the best thing to do.

‘The raiders are not going to come back here quickly — not after what we did to them!’ Huw told them, to roars of approval.
‘They have learned to fear us and instead will seek easier targets. That is why we must go, to help protect the other villages.’

‘Can’t we let them burn Crumlin to the ground first?’ Glyn called, which brought a gale of laughter.

‘That is what I fear they will do. And we cannot let that happen. So Sendatsu, Rhiannon and I will journey around Vales, trying to get to the villages before Ward’s raiders.’

‘But what about us? What if they come again?’ someone called. ‘Without the elf …’

‘You do not need the elf to defeat them any more! We shall have more than enough crossbows in a day or two so that we can post men — and women — around the entire wall,’ Huw fired back.

‘But what if they get inside the wall?’

Sendatsu had been watching, sourly, as Huw spoke but now, with some prodding from Rhiannon, he stepped forwards. He could not see a way out of this and the knowledge was heavy on him.

‘We shall leave tomorrow so today I shall show you how to fight,’ he announced and felt a little sick as they cheered enthusiastically.

It was not going to be enough. They needed months and years of training to take on the Forlish and what little he could teach in a day would merely allow them to survive a few heartbeats against a proper warrior. But he wanted to move on and, in that, Huw was in agreement with him — every day more of the Forlish raiders had to be arriving in Vales.

Training started almost immediately, with normal village life suspended while the men worked. Crude wooden swords were quickly fashioned by Kelyn and his carpenters, basically just branches cut to the right size and rough shape. The real swords, the ones seized from the dead Forlish raiders, were kept hidden away, for fear of the villagers doing more damage to themselves.

The men were all excited. The tale of how Sendatsu had taken on five raiders had been told and retold and even grown in its retelling, to the point where there were now almost a dozen of
them falling to the elven blade. The older boys were all running around, pretending to be elves and slaughtering Forlish warriors by the hundred. Something of that was within their fathers, who lined up, crude wooden swords in hands, ready to listen to Sendatsu.

But instead of making them duel each other, he formed them into three lines and spent the whole day drilling them, teaching the three basic blocks and six sword strokes, from the double-strike to the figure-eight, and making them practise these over and over, until even their work-toughened hands were blistered and muscles aching and they were cursing both their own enthusiasm and, quietly, the elf himself.

‘You must do that every day, until you can do them in your sleep. In battle, your mind will be swamped by fear, by the thoughts of what you have to do. You must know those strokes so you can make them without thinking,’ Sendatsu finally explained. ‘That is the only way you will survive.’

Huw watched Sendatsu for a while. He thought about learning himself, but he worried it would affect his lyre playing — his hands had only just recovered from all the digging. More importantly, he knew he would look clumsy and foolish compared to Sendatsu if he tried to use a sword. It was stupid, particularly as Rhiannon had already made her choice.

Instead, he worked with Kelyn for the day, preparing a series of models to show how the elven crossbow could be built, so that — in Kelyn’s words — any half-sober carpenter with more than one hand could make them. With them went a huge bag of the bolts, as well as three working crossbows — one each for Huw and Rhiannon and one to use as an example as they travelled around. He started to understand how the crossbow worked, watched Kelyn make one from scratch and felt much happier about going out to a strange village and telling them how these would save them.

He also practised with the crossbows. Holding them at the hip made it almost impossible to aim but he persevered, loosing an endless stream of bolts, and began to feel he could direct them
with some confidence. Of course, the fact they were only useful within twenty yards meant the target had to be close anyway, so it made accuracy possible.

Finally, he also found a couple of teenagers, sons of older farmers, and used some of the gold he had brought back from Ward’s court to make sure his father’s farming strip and various animals would be looked after and run well, in his absence. Truth be told, he had never been good with crops, much less animals. A pair of young farmers’ sons, both of them a year past their manhood of sixteen, would do a far better job than he ever could.

It was warm in Kelyn’s workshop and, even better, Rhiannon was nowhere in sight. He could not bear the thought of seeing her with Sendatsu but, equally, he could not think of leaving her behind.

Rhiannon could not stop thinking about going to Dokuzen, about showing the elves how she could dance and hearing their applause. None of her dances seemed to be good enough, so she spent the time working on new ones, trying to outdo what she had already achieved at the court of King Ward. She also worked on a song for Sendatsu and, when she took a break, more practically made sure they had plenty of twice-baked bread, salted meat, dried oats and dried fruit to take with them. The villages would feed them, she was sure, but there would also be nights when they would have to make camp.

She also decided to repair her relationship with Huw.

After extracting the promise from Sendatsu, the rest of the night had been somewhat uncomfortable, with nobody speaking much. Huw had finished a bowl of porridge, then disappeared into his room. Rhiannon had wanted to speak to him but he had been quick to make his excuses. Strangely, Sendatsu was much the same with his behaviour, curling himself into a blanket by the fire. She glanced over at Sendatsu — and saw him tucking something away in his belt pouch, the pouch he had been careful to hide from her when she had been treating his wound. She thought about asking him but his eyes were now closed and he seemed to be asleep.

The next morning, when she walked out, it was to find the pair of them had already vanished, leaving her alone with the dirty plates and the bowls.

‘Do they think I am some sort of servant?’ she muttered.

She found herself some bread and cheese before working on her dancing, but thoughts of Huw nagged at her and she finally went to find him. She had to ask around before finally discovering him in Kelyn’s workshop.

‘Hello Huw,’ she had greeted cheerfully. ‘Greetings Kelyn!’

‘And a good afternoon to you,’ Kelyn had responded warmly. He had been smiling since Huw told the village Kelyn was just as much the hero of the battle as Sendatsu, for designing and building so many crossbows in so quick a time.

Huw just grunted.

Kelyn chattered about the weather and the villages they would need to visit but gradually the awkward atmosphere reached even him and he found an excuse to be elsewhere.

‘I thought we should talk,’ Rhiannon said immediately.

‘About what?’ Huw replied surlily. Seeing her was tearing him in two.

‘Last night should change nothing between us. We are still friends.’

Huw held back what was on the tip of his tongue.

‘We have been through too much for this to come between us,’ Rhiannon continued. ‘I shall always be grateful to you for how you saved me from Ward, after he killed my father.’

As usual, mention of her gratitude for his lies silenced him, even more effectively than fear of driving her away.

‘What is happening between Sendatsu and me … it might bring our two races closer together! We could be the start of a new relationship with the elves. And he has promised to take me to Dokuzen! I shall meet his friends and family, dance and sing for the elves — and you can visit us whenever you want …’

‘Oh yes? And was this before or after he rutted with you?’ Huw asked nastily, unable to help himself.

Rhiannon flushed and this time he was afraid he had gone too
far. ‘Now that is not something a friend would say,’ she told him stiffly.

‘I’m sorry — it is just because I care for you, am worried about you,’ he said quickly. ‘After saving you from Ward, I do not want to see you hurt by Sendatsu. He might intend to take you back to Dokuzen but what if the other elves disagree? What if he really has an elven girl promised to him back there, waiting for his return? I’m sure he did not come to our world thinking to fall in love.’

Rhiannon paused and he kept his face still, just a hint of honest concern there. Referring to Ward was a risk but he had thought hard last night — sleep being difficult — and come to the conclusion Rhiannon was going to end up in tears, her heart broken. And who better to pick up the pieces and provide the shoulder to cry upon than her only friend?

‘I know you only want the best for me, that you’re trying to do what my father would, if only he was here …’ Rhiannon said slowly.

More likely he would be offering to sell you to the elf for a sack of gold and a pledge the elves would recommend his performing academy to the boys and girls of Forland, Huw thought cynically.

‘But I ask you, as a friend, to be happy for me and to trust me — I know what I am doing.’

Huw bit his tongue once more and merely nodded his head.

‘Of course I trust you!’ he lied.

‘Then we are friends still?’ she asked, a little nervously.

‘We are friends still,’ Huw confirmed.

So they worked a little on Sendatsu’s song but mainly on a new dance for her, Huw coming up with music for her new moves. It had been hard for him to watch her — since last night, she seemed to have acquired a new grace, a new fluidity to her movements. What had occasionally seemed awkward or uncomfortable now flowed together and had him struggling to keep his mind on the music and off her lithe body.

All he could do was curse himself for not acting sooner — and curse the elf. If only the Velsh did not need a hero so much — and if only there was a better one than Sendatsu.

‘You know, I saw him putting something back into his pouch last night,’ she said.

‘Did you see what?’

‘No, but I shall ask him.’ She smiled.

Broyle watched three riders leave Patcham, heading west towards the twin village that waited just a few miles away. The pair riding with the elf looked strangely familiar. He stared at them and then remembered — it was the dancer and the bard from Cridianton! They had been there when King Ward explained his plan for Vales. That made them traitors and Broyle burned for revenge.

‘Do we take them, sarge?’ Ricbert asked hoarsely.

‘Not yet,’ Broyle said scornfully.

He only had a dozen men — several of the wounded had died, for he had no way to treat them, while most of Oswald’s surviving men had all left, heading back south to their homes or their units — Broyle did not care which. The men he had left were all battle-hardened but he was not going to rush in again. Not after the disaster last time. He could still hear the screams as men died — and could remember only too clearly how the elven warrior had sliced apart his warriors. There was something going on here — something the king needed to know about. But not yet. Broyle knew better than to return with just bad news. He had to return with this elf and those two traitors in ropes — and those crossbows as well. If word of these weapons reached down south, it would be a disaster. The Balians and Landish had learned not to face the Forlish armies in battle. They had been defeated too many times by the implacable shield wall that turned their best warriors into so much carrion for the birds. Now they skulked behind walls and tried to hold their cities. And they even failed there, for the Forlish armies were used to breaking down tall stone walls and taking their swords to the terrified people inside. But if the walls were packed with men and women using those crossbows … Broyle could see the enormous cloud of shafts that would cover any Forlish attack, dooming it to failure. This could change the course of the wars, could even see the king’s armies
forced to retreat. Bringing both the elf and the crossbow back to the king would get Broyle his own company of men.

But, above all else, Broyle wanted revenge. He hated losing his men — and he hated being beaten even more. Seizing those three was more important than the king’s praise.

‘We follow them. We have to attack where they can’t escape — and where we won’t be followed. They’ve got horses, remember, and we have none. We’ll strike when they least expect it,’ he vowed.

Huw had never been to Crumlin. For one they were rivals for grazing land and, in times of drought, for water. They were like brothers, always squabbling. Patcham was definitely the younger brother in the relationship. While Patcham had been founded barely a century ago, Crumlin dated back before the time of the elves and elves had actually lived there once. Several former elf-built buildings still stood at the centre of the village. A hall, a villa and three outbuildings had, over the years, been turned into the heart of Crumlin. All had brick walls, tiled roofs and light, spacious rooms. All were home to several families, the richest and the oldest in the area.