Dynard couldn't contain his smile at that. He squeezed SenWi close again and grinned at her.
"And now we are all hard at work on the roads," Laird Ethelbert went on. "You will find your traveling far easier on the trails just west and north of my holding, and though you will have to pass through lands still wild, you will again find solid roads awaiting you as you near Pryd, if that is where you plan to go."
"It is indeed. My mission is ended, more successfully than I could ever have imagined. Have you word of Father Jerak and Pryd Holding?"
"None of Jerak," said Ethelbert, "but Laird Pryd is well, and his son is making quite a name for himself in driving back the powrie threat."
Dynard nodded and smiled, though the news did catch him a bit off his guard. Prydae had been a mere boy when Dynard had left the holding, after all, and the sudden realization that the boy was now a man came as a stark reminder to him that he had been gone a long, long time.
"I will see to it that you are escorted to the borders of my holding when you are ready to go," Laird Ethelbert said. He came forward in his seat and motioned to the nearest sentry, indicating that the audience was at its end. "Is there anything more you would ask of me?"
"No, Laird, you are most generous," Bran Dynard said with a bow. He started to walk away with SenWi and the guard, but Ethelbert waved him back suddenly.
"Approach closer," the laird said, waving him right up to the throne.
Brother Dynard glanced back at SenWi, who kept looking at him over her shoulder and at the guard, who kept pulling her along to the doors.
Ethelbert put his hand on Dynard's wide shoulder and pulled him close.
"Have I offended you, Laird?" the confused monk asked.
"Me? No, no. But I offer you now a word of advice. Call it my respect for the Church of Abelle, or perhaps it is merely that I am fond of a man such as yourself who dares travel the world. I traveled extensively in my own youth, you know."
"Indeed, I had heard as much, Laird."
"To the desert of Behr on several occasions," Ethelbert explained. "I would tell you then, with worldly knowledge and a better understanding than you possess, perhaps, of man's failings, that you would not be wise to so openly announce this dark-skinned creature as your wife."
Brother Dynard reflexively pulled away, staring hard at the laird. "Am I to be embarrassed?"
"Of course not. Her beauty cannot be denied. But you must understand that Ethelbert Holding is unique among the lands of Honce in our understanding and acceptance of the southern race of Behr. You'll not find…"
The laird paused and smiled warmly, if a bit resignedly. "Well, take my advice as you will, good brother. I congratulate you on your safe return and on the knowledge and happiness you have seemingly discovered."
"For so long, I feared my journey to Behr," Dynard admitted. "I had been taught that the people south of the mountains were animal-like, and so you can imagine my surprise when I witnessed the beauties of Jacintha, and when I…" He paused, seeing that Laird Ethelbert was holding up his hand.
"Again I congratulate you, good brother, and take pleasure in welcoming you home. I pray that you will find your forthcoming journey through the lands of Honce as enlightening as your travels south seem to have been." He waved to the now-closest guard as he finished, and Brother Bran was escorted out of the room to rejoin SenWi.
"What did he want?" SenWi asked, using the language of Behr.
"Nothing important at all," Dynard assured her, and he leaned in and kissed her on the forehead. "A private welcome for a returning countryman."
Dynard was not so blind as to expect that SenWi believed that explanation, but she did accept it.
As she accepted the curious stares of those they had passed on the way up to the castle, he supposed.
5
Long Roots With great effort, his limbs wearier this night than usual, old Father Jerak pulled on the brown robes set with the red trim that marked his station in the Church of Abelle. The news had just come in to him that an adulteress had been caught, and now, predictably, old Bernivvigar was demanding his rite of justice. Father Jerak could well imagine the scene of eager onlookers, and he had personally witnessed the look upon the Samhaist Bernivvigar's face several times in the past: the satisfaction, a calm so profound that it reeked of savagery, as if this act of brutal retribution and the willingness of the laird and the people to go along with it somehow denied the changes sweeping through the land with the ascendant Church of Abelle.
There came a soft knock on Jerak's door, and it creaked open. He turned to see brothers Bathelais and Reandu.
"Are you ready to go, father?" Bathelais asked, his tone appropriately somber.
"If anyone can ever be ready for such a journey as this," Jerak replied, and he started toward the door.
"The legacy of Samhaist justice," Bathelais said with a shrug that made it clear to Jerak that the younger man was not so upset by the rite.
"The woman is guilty," young Reandu declared rather bluntly, and both of the other monks turned their surprised gazes upon him. Reandu-a short man with close-cropped black hair and a solid, if diminutive, frame-shrank back beneath those looks.
"There is always the question of proportion, brother," Father Jerak quietly offered. "In this case, the proportion of sin to punishment was determined long ago, and it has not been within our province to modify its balance. Someday, perhaps, we will see a different measure of things and convince the lairds of our enlightened position. For now, though, our duty is to acquiesce to the law humbly and to bear witness to its legitimacy."
Jerak paused, as if considering his own words. "But it is a long journey."
The three monks swept up four other brothers before they had exited Chapel Pryd. By the time they had gotten outside, they could see the bonfire marking the ancient Stone of Judgment already burning brightly. "Try not to reveal your enjoyment of the spectacle, if indeed you do find it amusing," Laird Pryd said to his son. Lying on his goose-down bed and wearing only a cotton nightshirt that reached to his ankles, the Laird of Pryd Holding didn't seem quite so formidable this particular evening. Laird Pryd had taken ill that very day, and now his eyes were sunken and darkly ringed, contrasting starkly to the chalky color of his face.
"You are the eyes of Pryd this night," the laird went on. "Your presence sanctions the event under the laws of the holding."
Prydae, dressed in his full military regalia, bronze breastplate and all, bowed.
"You need do nothing but bid Bernivvigar to commence," Laird Pryd explained. "Take your seat and bear witness; the old Samhaist will preside over the course of events. He takes great pleasure in these things, you see."
Prydae felt a bit of hesitance, leading to an expression that his perceptive father did not miss. "This will not be a crime paid for with coin," Pryd said.
Prydae looked at his father directly and nodded.
"Bernivvigar is not to allow that in these times," Pryd went on. "The Samhaists feel the press of the Church of Abelle, you see, and what have they to offer the peasants but the surety of order contained within their codes of strict justice?" Pryd raised a hand and dropped it on Prydae's forearm. "You are prepared for this?"
Prydae shook his head at the whole question. "I will not disappoint you, father," he said, and he gave a low bow.
Laird Pryd waved him away.
As he exited the room, castle guardsmen sweeping up in his wake, Prydae considered the events. There could be little doubt of how the evening would proceed, given the claim of the wronged husband that he had actually caught his wife in the arms of another man. And, as his father had said, Prydae's role was minimal; he was just there to give the weight of law to the proceedings.