The Dreamstone

Another came—Old wolf, Ciaran thought at that grim broad face, besweated and flushed with battle-heat He straightened himself at once when that man came in with more men-at-arms behind him. He set himself most carefully on his feet. “Scaga?” he ventured, for he was very like his son, a huge man and red-haired. “I come from the King; and from your lord.”

“Let me see this ring,” Scaga said; and Ciaran thrust out his hand, which the old warrior took roughly, turning the ring to the firelight. Scaga let it go again, his scarred face still scowling.

“I have a message,” Ciaran said, “for your lady’s ears.” And became he could guess the keep’s want of hope: “Good news,” be urged on Scaga, though he was charged to take it higher.

“Then it comes welcome, if true.” Scaga turned his face toward the open door, where sounds of battle had much faded, then looked back again, looked him up and down. “How came you here?”

“My message,” he said, “is for lord Evald’s lady.”

Scaga still frowned; it might be the nature of his face, or of his heart: this was, Ciaran thought, a fell man to cross. But Evald trusted him as steward, in a hold beset with enemies: he was then a man of great worth and faithfulness.

“With neither armor,” said Scaga, “nor weapon . . . How came you into the courtyard?”

“Your lord’s ring,” Ciaran insisted. “I speak only to your lady.” He felt the stone which lay hidden within his collar, a presence, a warmth which seemed greater than natural. It frightened him, with that against his heart and the like of Scaga staring into his eyes, full of suspicions.

“You shall go to her,” Scaga said, and motioned to the stairs. “Boy!” he called. “See my lady roused.”

A lad scampered up the steps at a run. Ciaran shivered in weariness and cold, for wind blew through the door. He wished desperately for a cup of ale, for a place to lie down and rest himself.

And there was none, for Scaga looked on him with narrowed eyes and offered nothing of hospitality—motioned men-at-arms to go before and behind him and led him up the steps to another hall within Caer Wiell’s thick walls, which at least was warmer, with a fire blazing in the hearth.

“Beware,” a voice seemed to whisper in his hearing, and it startled him. He wondered could all the rest hear it; but the others did not turn: it was for him alone. “Beware this hall. They do not love elven-kind. And do not show them the stone.”

A stone wolf’s-head was set above the fireplace. It seemed he had seen it before; that he had sat here, a man, and that a harp should hang so, upon the rightward wall—he looked, and was dismayed to find a harp hanging there, just where he had thought it should. He had then dreamed this place.

Or she had. There was a great scarred table once had sat a chair, before the fire. He blinked it clear, went to it, leaned there wearily against the table, while weary men guarded him.

And women came, so soon that he supposed they had not been asleep. Surely they had not been, with the enemy hurling fire against the hold. They came from the i

“Your message,” Scaga’s harsh voice insisted.

Ciaran looked at Lady Meredydd instead, took a step toward her, but hands moved to weapons about him, and he did not go nearer. He tugged the ring from off his finger and gave it over to Scaga, who gave it to the lady. She took the ring as something precious, looked on it closely, lifted anxious eyes. “My husband,” she asked of him.

“Well, lady, he is well. I bring his love and my King’s word: Hold, defend, and do not be deceived by any lies of the enemy or accept any terms. The King has won a great battle at Dun na h-Eoin, and the enemy hopes for this valley as their last holding place. Only hold this tower, and the King and your lord will come as soon as possible against their backs. They know this. Now you do.”

“Now bless your news,” the lady wept, and even Scaga’s frown was eased. Meredydd came and offered her hands to him in welcome, but he felt Scaga’s heavy hand on his shoulder, pulling him away.

“There is more to hear,” said Scaga. “This man came over the walls somehow, with no armor, no arms—unmarked through the lines outside. There are questions should still be asked, my lady, however good and fair the counsel seems. I beg you, ask him how he came.”

For a moment doubt shadowed the lady’s eyes.

“My name is Ciaran,” he said, “Lord Ciaran of Caer Do

He was not used to lies. He felt fouled, wounded when the lady pressed his hands. “You will show us where,” Scaga said, and gave him in his turn a bearish embrace, gazed at him with emotion welling up—hope, it might be, where hope had been scant for them before. Branwyn too came and kissed his cheek; and weapons were done away as men came at last to clap him on the back and to hug one another for joy. A cheer lifted in the hall, and there was such desperate happiness—He felt a stirring through the jewel too, a presence, a distressing realization that he had said nothing on his own which ought to have convinced them and so relieved their hearts, but that some strangeness overlay him and his words, making them better than they were.

They gave him wine, and brought him upstairs to a princely room—her lord’s when he was young, the Lady Meredydd said; and true, everything there showed some woman’s love, the fine-pricked stitchery of coverlet and tapestries, the hangings of the bed. Branwyn herself brought a warm rug for the floor, and maids brought water for washing, while Lady Meredydd with her own hands brought him bread hot from the morning’s baking. He took it gratefully, while the lady and her daughter lingered to ply him with questions, how fared Evald and kinsmen, cousins, friends, men of the hold, a hundred questions during which maids eavesdropped and men-at-arms contrived to listen on pretext of errands. Some few men he knew; sometimes the news was sad and pained him; and most often he knew only a name, or less—but it gave him joy when he could report some loved one safe and well. Scaga’s son was one, for Scaga bent enough to ask. “He is well,” Ciaran said. “He led a good portion of Caer Wiell’s men at Dun na h-Eoin, first of those that broke the shields of the Bradhaeth while lord Evald cut off their retreat. He came out of the battle well enough; he was by lord Evald when we parted, in the King’s own tent.” The old warrior did not smile to hear it, but his eyes were bright.

“He must sleep,” Meredydd declared at last. “Surely he has travelled hard.”

“I fare well enough,” Ciaran said, for he ached after human company, for noise of voices, for all these sights and sounds of humankind.

“Before he sleeps,” said Scaga, “he must show us this weak place in our wall.”

The warmth drained from him. He nodded consent, not knowing what he was to do, but compelled to go. He swallowed a bit of bread gone dry in his throat, drank a last sip of the wine and set the cup down. “Aye,” he said. “Of course. That will not wait.”

Scaga rose, waiting at the door. Ciaran took his leave of the ladies, walked with the old warrior through the hall, his heart beating hard within his breast.

“I do not know if I can find it easily,” he said to prepare his excuse, and hating the lie. “From all the turnings of this place inside . . . I ca