So Dryw came, winter as it still was, and the frosts still too bitter for any greening of the land. He came riding up the Caerbourne with enough armed men about him to force his way if he must, like a cold wind out of the southern heights—so unlooked for that at first the outposts took alarm. But then they could see his banners from the walls, the blue and the white, and the first cheer came that Caer Wiell had known for days.
Evald watched them ride beneath the gates. It was, he knew, like what his father had told him of Dryw, not to waste time with messengers, and for the first time he felt an affection for that skull-faced madman. They came with rattle of armor and the gleam of spears and expected to be housed; but among them came a pony with ribbons in its mane, and on that pony rode a cloak-shrouded girl.
“Meredydd,” he whispered, slinking from the wall as if he had seen something best forgot. He had no heart for marryings. Not now, never now.
But, “Yes,” his father said when Dryw had come to him. “Yes, good for you, old friend.” His mind was clear, at least this evening.
So Evald met his bride, who was a thin girl whose clothes ill-fit her, and whose eyes looked nervously over him. Meara had scarcely any time for her with so much on her thoughts, so Evald was left to murmur courtesies in the lesser hall. He was only grateful she had brought her nurse to take care of her.
“I wish,” Meredydd said mouselike, from the door in leaving to go upstairs, “I wish I had got my best dress finished. It doesn’t fit.”
This was all very far from him, but he saw the red in her cheeks and saw how young she was. “It was good of you to come sooner than you promised,” he said. “That was more important.”
Meredydd lifted her face and looked at him, seeming heartened.
She was not, he decided, what he had planned, but not what he had dreaded either, having a capable way about her when she looked like that. And truth, she quickly had her own baggage up the stairs and ordered her own room and was down seeing to her father’s housing and running back and forth with this and that, taking loads from the servants and sending them on other errands so deftly all that number was fed, while his mother took the respite offered her and simply stayed by his father’s bedside.
So Evald stayed there what time he could, but never now did Niall stir that evening, but slept a great deal, and seemed deeper in his sleep.
“Go,” Meara said to him. “Tomorrow the wedding, Dryw has said. And it would please him to know. She is a fair child, is she not?”
“Fair to us,” Evald said, numb in his deeper feelings, but Meredydd had settled into his thinking as she had settled into the hold, without question, because it had to be. “Yes, fair.” His eyes were for Niall’s face. And then he turned away, and passed the door where Scaga stood watch, haggard and grim and never leaving.
“He sleeps,” he said to Scaga.
“So,” said Scaga. Nothing more.
It was a premonition on Evald that he should not go up to bed tonight, but stay near. He went down into the wardroom where there was a fire, and lingered there a time, into the dark of the night and the sinking of the fire. There was little murmur from the courtyard or the barracks where Dryw’s folk had settled: there was little sound from anywhere.
But the beat of hooves came gently through the dark, gently past the wall, so that it might have been a dream if his eyes had not been open. The hair prickled at his nape and for a moment there was a heaviness over him too deep to throw off.
After that came a scratching at the stones of the wall, and that was too much. He got up and flung his cloak about him, moving quietly, not to disturb the peace. He went out onto the wall, padding softly as he could, unsure whether his ears had tricked him.
Suddenly a darkness bounded up onto the wall, a hairy thing, all arms and eyes. He cried out, a strangled cry, and it leapt back again.
“Cearbhallain,” it piped. “I have come for Cearbhallain.”
Evald lunged at him: it was too quick and bounded away, but he threw his knife at it. It wailed and dived over the wall, and now everywhere men were crying after lights.
But Scaga reached him first, pelting down the stairs.
“It was a hairy man,” Evald cried, “some dark thing—come for him; it said, it had come for him. I flung my knife at it—it went down again.”
“No,” said Scaga. No more than that. Scaga went running for the stairs; but that no was one of anguish—of fear, as if he knew the nature of the thing. Evald hurried after, but “Stay by your father,” Scaga shouted at him, and was gone.
He stood still upon the stairs. He heard the lesser gate open, heard the hoofbeats going away and rushed to the wall to look. It was a piebald horse with something on its back; and after it Scaga ran, down by the river, under the trees.
“Dryw!” Evald shouted into the yard. “Dryw!”
So it stopped, small and forlorn. The horse had fled, going whatever way it could. And Scaga stopped, crouched near, panting.
“Iron,” it wept, “o the bitter iron. I bleed.”
“Come back,” said Scaga. “Was it for him you came? O take him back.”
A shake of the hairy head, of all the body, indistinct in the moonlight, among the leaves. “The Gruagach pities him. Pities you. O too late, too late. His luck is driven all away now. O the bitter iron.”
Scaga looked down at himself, his weapons. He laid aside his sword. “That was his son. He did not understand, never knew you. O Gruagach—”
“He is gone,” the Gruagach said, “gone, gone, gone.”
“Never say so!” Scaga cried. “A curse on you for saying it!”
“Scaga goes wrapped in iron. O Scaga, ill for you the forest, ill for you. The Gruagach goes back again where you might go, but never will you. Ill for you the meeting. You were never like your lord. Eald will kill you in the day you meet. O Scaga, Scaga, Scaga, they wept for you when you left And the Gruagach weeps, but he cannot stay.”
There was nothing there—neither shadow nor moving branch or leaf, only the moonlight on the river.
And Scaga ran, ran with all that was in him, to reach Caer Wiell.
“He is dead,” Evald told him when he came inside, when he had reached the doors. And Scaga bowed down in the hall and wept.
There was a decent time of burying and mourning, and Dryw stayed, buttressing Caer Wiell against its enemies. Evald—lord Evald—with Scaga at his side, dispensed justice, ordered this and that in the lands round about, set guards and posts and took oaths from men that came.
Even from aged Taithleach came a message that only Dryw understood. “The King,” said Dryw privily, his skull’s-face ever more grim than its wont: “this passing has set back the time that might have been. Had your father lived and been strong—but he is gone. Alliances must be proved again.”
“Send back,” Evald said, “and say that I am Cearbhallain’s son and the lady Meara’s, no other.”
“So,” said Dryw, “I have done.”
And another time: “You cannot go back to your lands,” Evald said, “without the promise kept my father made. And I shall be glad of your daughter.” It had come to be the truth, for Meredydd had nested in the heart of Caer Wiell to his mother’s comfort and to his own, and if it was not love at least it was deepest need. If he had had to sue for Meredydd on his knees now he would have done so; and it was his father’s will, the which he tried to do in everything.
“It is nigh time,” said Dryw.
So Caer Wiell put off its mourning in the spring. The stones remained, and the grass grew and flowers bloomed, violets and rue.