"Thanks to you for that," Juhel said, and looked at him dubiously. "They'd have gotten away otherwise, and taken a lot with them. But the Spider's awful tight with a coin. Happier taking it in than giving it out. Usually bleating about the tithes just gets you what the sheep gets at shearing time."
"Yeah, she's not what you'd call openhanded. But she knows you have to spend to get, believe me… and I know the Princess Mathilda, and that her mother listens to her."
Juhel grinned delightedly and clapped the younger man on the shoulder.
Ah, Edain thought. And the tanist doesn't even have to come right out and say he'll urge the princess to advise her mother. What a Chief he'll make for the Clan someday!
Rudi lowered his voice: "And if I were you, I'd be very careful. The Haida knew too much about just where and when to hit you. Something smells there, and not like attar of roses, either."
Juhel nodded, then walked his horse a few steps over to where the other Mackenzies were grouped. Raen's friends and kin from Sutterdown had laid out his body and those of three others; they weren't keening them, being among strangers, but they'd put the coins on their eyes and laid holly on their breasts, and were chanting softly:
We all come from the Mother
And to Her we shall return;
Like a stalk of wheat
Falling to the reaper's blade Otter and Rinn were a little way off with nothing worse than nicks and bruises, accepting basins of water, soap and towels and bits of food and mugs of beer from an admiring crowd that seemed to include a lot of teen age girls, starting to grin as the relief of surviving their first hard fight sank in. Eithne leaned on her spear, still white and tense, sweat like teardrops making tracks through the blood on her face.
"Lord who holds this land," she broke in, her voice with an edge like sharpened silver. "What will you do with your captives?"
There were about a dozen of them, mostly wounded, bound and under guard. Juhel looked at her oddly, and shrugged.
"Take off their heads and send them to Portland, I suppose, mistress," he said. "Easier than sending all of them."
"No," she replied. She pointed with the spear.
The whole length of it still glistened dark red as the blood grew tacky. Juhel looked at her… but over her head, rather than in the face.
I wouldn't like to meet her eyes right now, either, Edain thought as she went on, giving orders like a queen:
"Is it that there's an ash tree there, not far from your castle, tall and great?"
The nobleman nodded, and his look grew odder still and more sidelong.
"Put your men about it-about it in a circle, wearing iron and carrying spears and the emblems of your god. Bring your dead and lay them beneath a cairn with the blessings of your Mass priest. Then hang the evildoers from the tree in sight of the dead and leave them for three days and nights. Do that, and you'll have… luck, luck for you and your land. Do that, or bury them living at a crossroads with a spear driven in the earth above."
"Ahhh…" Juhel swallowed, crossed himself and looked aside, shivering a little.
Rudi gave him a nod, short but sharp, and the baron drew a deep breath.
"I suppose we might as well hang them now. Sir Brandric! See to it! And the rest, as well."
"A pleasure, my lord. Very much a pleasure," the tall grizzled knight who commanded the garrison of Castle Tillamook said, and stalked off barking orders and grinning.
Eithne's knees buckled then, as if something-or Someone-withdrew a hand that had worn her like a glove. She shook her head as Edain tried to help her, then almost fell. When he caught her in his arms the eyes rolled up in her head and she went limp; somehow he'd been expecting her to be heavier, but it was the familiar slender form he picked up, though her head rolled against his shoulder. Cold fear worse than any he'd felt in the fight clawed at his gut as he bore her over to the aid station the nuns had set up, letting the spear fall to lie in the wet trampled grass.
One of them bent over the pallet he laid her on, pushed back an eyelid, felt her forehead and took her pulse with professional briskness. He showed her how to unbuckle the brigandine along the side and draw it off.
"Just stress and exhaustion, but a bad case of it," the nun said, clucking her tongue and drawing blankets over her. "A young girl's got no business doing this! She'll be fine with sleep and a good meal-just a few little cuts and scratches and some bruising here. Now, if you're not going to help, young man, get out! She won't be waking for a good many hours, and I've got urgent cases to see to."
Edain blew out his cheeks in a whistle of relief and backed away; they were busy here, and he would be as useless as an udder on a bull.
Rudi and the local lord had dismounted, holding their horses' heads not far away as they spoke.
"Remind me never to piss your people off, Rudi," Juhel said with feeling.
He looked at the spray of dead where the Mackenzies had struck out of the fog with surprise and terror at their backs; bodies in the mud with gray fletched arrows in them, or tumbling gashed and bloodless in the cold seawater. He shook his head.
"Dad fought at the Battle of Mount Angel back in the Protector's War, and evidently he wasn't exaggerating."
While he spoke, a crossbowman with his arm in a sling came up leading a pony Edain recognized. Young Gas ton was on it again, looking none the worse except for some dirt and bruises. Garbh trotted at his heel, then dashed over to Edain and gave a single bark as if to say, The job's done.
The baron's heir gulped a little at some of the sights around him and went paler, but sat his pony proudly beside his father. Juhel looked at him for a moment with a quiet and tender delight that went oddly with the blood-splashed armor and sword, and put his hand on his shoulder.
Then he looked at Edain and smiled. "I've thanked Rudi," he said. "But I haven't thanked you yet, Master Aylward. I saw you save my son. That was bravely done, and done for strangers."
Edain felt himself blush to the roots of his hair, and shrugged awkwardly as they shook hands.
"It's a poor excuse for a man who won't fight for his host, or help out a little kid caught in a battle," he said shortly. "Besides, I didn't notice these Haida buggers telling me they wouldn't hurt me if I were to kindly stand aside."
Rudi grinned. "He's a good man to have your back," he said, and clapped Edain on his. "And that's a fact."
Juhel laughed. "I don't doubt it. Fought with you before, has he?"
"No," Rudi said. "This was your first real fight, eh, Edain?"
The younger Aylward nodded, and the Chief's son went on: "But I thought he would be someone I wanted with me if it came to one. Now I know it."
Juhel's brows went up. "If that was your first fight, I'd hate to see what you'll be like in ten years! But you did save my son; you put your back between him and those arrows. Name a reward, and if it's mine, it's yours. In honor I can't do less."
Edain drew himself up despite the burning tiredness that made him want to crawl into the nearest haystack and sleep for a year.
"I didn't do it for that, sir," he said. "I'll take your thanks, and that's all that's needed-the gods and the Three Spinners will see to any reward."
Juhel looked bewildered, and Edain cursed himself as he saw the beginnings of offense. For a fact, he didn't understand how an Association noble's mind worked. Outsiders didn't understand Mackenzies, and that was a fact too.
"There is a gift you could give him, Juhel, and one he'd value highly, though he'd never ask for it," Rudi said.
He was grinning again, like a fox for all that his totem was Raven.