Silence pursued him. He went out onto the stairs and made noise going down them, through the warding room with its armor hung like the empty shells of beetles, with its smell of oil and war and its iron closeness that quivered through his limbs like Some noisome sickness.
He reached the open air, the walls, the sight of the sun and lifted his face to it, eyes squeezed shut until he had purged the moment's touch of iron.
Liosliath! he called, not daring to call Arafel. But still there was nothing. The stone hung insensate at his heart, giving him only the things the wind and sun gave.
He took his breath and opened his eyes, and drew another and walked along the wall and down again by the stone stairs to the yard.
It was better in the light. He smiled at the pages, at the smith who was setting to his day's work, in his smithy over against the inner wall, with its tangles and knots of iron. This he avoided, making small deviations in the pattern of his day.
Youths gave him their silent respect as he wandered within his walls. They were farmers' sons, come at his asking: Ruadhan had their training at arms, which saw them drilling with sword and shield and bow. The skill with the bow was against beasts; that with sword and shield—against the sometimes bandits that strayed down from the Bradhaeth above Lioslinn and the forest to the east . . . for there were still bandits. It had been the Cearbhallain's way to guard the land; and Evald's after him; and it was his, that he kept no great number of men-at-arms lounging about the hold—less than a hundred, hardly outnumbering his craftsmen, and them mostly sons and brothers of freeholders, as much of Caer Wiell's land was given in freehold, save the fields and pasturage closest about the walls; but even from the farthest steadings the boys came eagerly to learn arms. It was Caer Wiell's way. The King looked askance on it. But the land was sown with swords, since the war; every farmer's cottage boasted some weapon gleaned from the fields; and bows were kept against wolves and such (though no wolves were seen). Caer Wiell had not gone to the winning of Dun na h-Eoin as some holds had, a-hedge with spears in untrained hands; but briskly, shielded, glittering with well-honed swords, a thousand blades sprung up from the land at Evald's summons, invisible the day before. This was Caer Wiell. An Beag sat in its hills like some bandit lair, fed by its serfs who had each some cruel lordling to support, each worse than the other. Caer Damh was much the same; so also they distrusted everything, partic ularly their own. Such lands bred nothing good, not those who ruled them, not even the occasional farmer lad who left his sheep and ran. Caer Wiell had taken in a few such, forlorn attempt at rescue, of folk who had grown up in knavery and expected nothing else. Most of them came to nothing. Some came to worse. Like Coille there, sulk ing at the scullery work, with no grace to recommend him. There was suspicion that Coille stole. Cook thought so. Coille knew noth ing of arms; and that was, perhaps, as well. He was forever surly.
Send him off, was Beorc's advice. But Ciaran had not found any cogent reason for it, except Coille's unpopularity. Coille did his work. He had asked for land, but complained of danger in what Ciaran offered him, which was to go north and east, to clear land bordering the New Forest as others had done. So he did the work of the hold; and he sulked about that, cruel with the cattle and with every living thing, so that it was Coille got the work of killing chick ens for the pot: he does that well, Cook had said, if nothing else. And there was no one in the hold but loathed him.
"Good morning, lord," said Coille, with a smile of the sort of all of Coille's smiles, and speaking up when the country lads were content to nod and pass. Coille was drawing water from the well in the shade of the scullery roof, and heaved a bucket up, wiped his brow, being very sure his work was seen. Ciaran paused, stared distractedly at the man, with the clatter of the scullery beyond, the kitchen, the maids already at their washing and water sluicing everywhere on the stones, before it got to the channel and headed downslope and under the walls. There was the granary, the pen beyond, though they kept most all the animals outside; there were the stables and the sheds of harness, and the Old Hall, that had been the first and oldest part of Caer Wiell, with part of the wall still standing, which was the wall of the scullery now, and had once enclosed the well; but the Old Hall they used for storage, mostly old harness and oddments of this and that; and the Old Granary, that was the barracks, lodging for his men-at-arms; and the older Barracks, that was below the Cearbhal lain's tower, which came up by the gate—that was all lodgings now, for those who served the hold; and the Cearbhallain's tower, which added its mass to the gates and enclosed the wardroom stairs in its depths, that was Beorc's domain, where he maintained what little luxury he wanted. No wife, not in these years, no child, but a young widow off by Hlowebourne that he supported with gifts of more than small substance, and visited from time to time, but generally he courted Cook, a stout and dour-faced woman who managed the understairs as Beorc managed a troop of horse, with ringing orders and a precision of expectations.
"Coille," Cook shouted now, "Coille!"
The outlander moved, hunch-shouldered, carrying his bucket.
"Lord," said Ruadhan coming up beside—a cheerful man who looked always a little simple, but men mistook that to their misfor tune. "There's some of the lads will hunt, by your leave."
Ciaran blinked and thrust his hands within his belt behind, with an inward flinching. Ruadhan stood there, having come up on him from the yard where the barracks stood, whence came the rhythmic thumps and noise of practice. "Is there need?" he asked.
"Naught but bones left. If my lord would go himself—"
"No. Not I. Rhys might go. He's chafed for exercise. Domhnull. Ask Domhnull."
"Aye, my lord." There was the lightest of frowns on Ruadhan's face. "Is something wrong, lord?"
"Nothing," he said. "Nothing." He walked away, up the stairs by the scullery, along the wall again into the storage, where a few un used rooms offered privacy, and sank down in a smallish windowed closet, finding a bench only half-loaded with dusty oddments of pot tery. He set the pots in the floor and stretched himself out, tucked up on the bench, having found a safe place.
So he had done as a child, finding some nook of Caer Donn to make his own. He clenched the stone within his hand and brought it to his lips as he lay there, then sought the sleep the night had denied him, in this quiet darkness far from the iron and the noise outside. Here he need not fear, he thought. Here what befell when he slept was without witness, and if he should dream, he need not fear for Branwyn.
So he abandoned himself.
"Man," said Lord Death, settling closely in the room, on a stack of crockery which failed to break beneath his weight, "is this the lord of Caer Wiell, sleeping like a scullery lad above the kitchens?"
"Give me peace," he replied.
"Ah, that I cannot. I have lost that power over you."
"My friend," Ciaran said softly, never stirring from where he lay, his head against his arms, one toe resting against the floor, for the bench was narrow. "Why have you come here?"
There was no answer. The walls gave way to mist, and he was disquieted. This was what he had feared, the realm of dream, in which elvish trees grew like white pillars of some hall, in which the landscape was chill and gray. He drew back from it, recovering his little room again, alone, his body stretched on the unyielding bench, which was uncompromising in its discomfort.