There was a buzz in the air as the castle stirred to wakefulness, a clatter, a bugle call, a hail and a bit of song. The wind smelled of woodsmoke. From this terrace the River Oiss was not visible, but its cataracts rang loud. Hard to imagine how, a bare two hundred kilometers west, that stream began to flow through lands which had become one huge city, from foothills to the Wilwidh Ocean. Or, for that matter, hard to picture those towns, mines, factories, ranches which covered the plains east of the Hun range.
Yet they were his too—no, not his; the Vach Ynvory’s, himself no more than the Hand for a few decades before he gave back this flesh to the soil and this mind to the God. Dhangodhan they had preserved little changed, because here was the country from which they sprang, long ago. But their real work today was in Ardaig and Tridaig, the capitals, where Brechdan presided over the Grand Council. And beyond this planet, beyond Korych itself, out to the stars.
Brechdan drew a deep breath. The sense of power coursed in his veins. But that was a familiar wine; today he awaited a joy more gentle.
It did not show upon him. He was too long schooled in chieftainship. Big, austere in a black robe, brow seamed with an old battle scar which he disdained to have biosculped away, he turned to the world only the face of Brechdan Ironrede, who stood second to none but the Roidhun.
A footfall sounded. Brechdan turned. Chwioch, his bailiff, approached, in red tunic and green trousers and modishly highcollared cape. He wasn’t called “the Dandy” for nothing. But he was loyal and able and an Ynvory born. Brechdan exchanged kin-salutes, right hand to left shoulder.
“Word from Shwylt Shipsbane, Protector,” Chwioch reported. “His business in the Gwelloch will not detain him after all and he will come here this afternoon as you desired.”
“Good.” Brechdan was, in fact, elated. Shwylt’s counsel would be most helpful, balancing Lifrith’s impatience and Priadwyr’s over-reliance on computer technology. Though they were fine males, each in his own way, those three Hands of their respective Vachs. Brechdan depended on them for ideas as much as for the support they gave to help him control the Council. He would need them more and more in the next few years, as events on Starkad were maneuvered toward their climax.
A thunderclap cut the sky. Looking up, Brechdan saw a flitter descend with reckless haste. Scalloped fins identified it as Ynvory common-property. “Your son, Protector!” Chwioch cried with jubilation.
“No doubt.” Brechdan must not unbend, not even when Elwych returned after three years.
“Ah … shall I cancel your morning audience, Protector?”
“Certainly not,” Brechdan said. “Our client folk have their right to be heard. I am too much absent from them.”
But we can have an hour for our own.
“I shall meet Heir Elwych and tell him where you are, Protector.” Chwioch hurried off.
Brechdan waited. The sun began to warm him through his robe. He wished Elwych’s mother were still alive. The wives remaining to him were good females, of course, thrifty, trustworthy, cultivated, as females should be. But Nodhia had been—well, yes, he might as well use a Terran concept—she had been fun. Elwych was Brechdan’s dearest child, not because he was the oldest now when two others lay dead on remote planets, but because he was Nodhia’s. May the earth lie light upon her.
The gardener’s shears clattered to the flagstones. “Heir! Welcome home!” It was not ceremonial for the old fellow to kneel and embrace the newcomer’s tail, but Brechdan didn’t feel that any reproof was called for.
Elwych the Swift strode toward his father in the black and silver of the Navy. A captain’s dragon was sewn to his sleeve, the banners of Dhangodhan flamed over his head. He stopped four paces off and gave a service salute. “Greeting, Protector.”
“Greeting, swordarm.” Brechdan wanted to hug that body to him. Their eyes met. The youngster winked and grinned. And that was nigh as good.
“Are the kindred well?” Elwych asked: superfluously, as he had called from the inner moon the moment his ship arrived for furlough.