Bradley, Marion Zimmer Ed. Sword and Sorceress 16

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should he waste his expensively trained men on beast battles when
appeasement was so easy?
The Queen, now the First Lady, resisted the plan. She had neither the desire
to produce princesses simply to lose them, nor the willingness to share the
women's
quarters with other queens, even if they were subordinate to her and even if
their sole purpose was to provide the necessary volume of princesses. She
agreed finally after much solicitous attention by the king and an ironclad law
that only princes born of her blood could inherit the throne.
The king had reacted to her agreement with enthusiasm, so much so that at
one point Tirrod's accountant had balked at paying the support of so many
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princesses, to say nothing of the nobles' tax complaints. When the beast
showed up after eleven years, many of the lords pointed out that one princess
had been quite sufficient. The grousing continued until the monster
returned a mere three years later. Then a year later. Then every few months.
The last princess, a toddler who had had the charming habit of latching on to
Darla's skirt as she swept, had been gone no more than a week when the
beast's demanding roar could be heard in the early evenings.
Tirrod was desperate. He didn't even have a princess in the making at least
none any queen would admit to with which to tempt the beast. He had been
discussing possible solutions with the First Lady when Darla had walked into
the chamber with a freshly cleaned pot and found herself summarily
ennobled.
Enprincessed? Darla sat back on her heels and wiped her running nose with
the back of her hand. It didn't matter what it was called. She knew what had
been done to her.
She sat beside the Beast Stake and shivered. The shade crept beyond her
perch, out across the valley below as the sun sank slowly behind the
mountain, muting the gold of the fields. If the beast didn't show up soon,
she'd never see what killed her. An irrational fear rose in her, an anger at
being killed by an unknown. She felt as helpless as the smith, William Caird,
who had fallen to the red line sickness after a small cut on his finger had
swollen his hand hard as the stone beneath her.
It had been years since he'd died, but she still mourned his loss. Others
missed him too, though for his work. He'd had no child and had but one
apprentice, Cedric, who had great strength but none of Master Caird's feel for
metal nor skill with horses. Tirrod had sent word with every traveler who
came to the Diamond Keep, but travelers were few, and free smiths valued
enough where they were that none were willing to take the long journey
around the mountain as the traders did, nor the dangerous shortcut through
the beast's territory. Finally, Tirrod had pressed Ann Caird, the master's
widow, to try shoeing the horses and making those pieces that required more
skill than strength. She had often helped William and did the work well
enough, but she had no enthusiasm, for the women gossiped meanly within
her hearing, and the men spoke to her only of business, and in that tried to
cheat her.
Darla felt guilty, now that she, too, had been cast out. She had spoken no
word of friendship to Ann since she began her work, despite the fact that
Darla saw her whenever one of the queens or princesses required the repair
of a belt buckle or brooch.
In truth, Darla spent as little time as possible with Mistress Caird in order to
lessen her own pain, for she missed the woman's husband terribly. Although
an excellent weapons maker, he had a talent for making jewelry from
precious metals, much to the delight of the queens. Darla had frequently run
back and forth picking up new pieces or dropping off broken pieces for
repair. In her life surrounded by women, he was like a strange and wonderful
beast, like the giant brown bear from the herb woman's homeland.
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When she was very little, he would set her on a stool close enough to the fire
to be thoroughly warmed, yet far enough away that no spark hit her. If it were
near midday and Mistress Caird brought his lunch, he would break his loaf
and give her part to eat while she watched him work.
His muscled fingers shaped the soft metals with grace
and confidence, forming lilies, violets or tendrils of ivy. If she'd been told to
hurry, he'd lift her from the stool as soon as he'd finished and pat her cheek
with his warm, hard hand.
"Hold it fast, Darla," he'd say. "You've strong hands, too."
Sometimes, on quiet days, she would stay and watch him work the weapons
and tools. The smoke, the sparks, the flare of flames and groan of the bellows
could have been plucked whole from a priest's sermon of hell, but Darla had
never known a truer heaven. Even on the cold rock, tied by iron to iron, she
could see William Caird, the sweat dripping from his matted brow, glistening
on his muscled arm. She could see him swinging the great hammer, striking
iron, swinging again to the top of his arc
Darla's eyes snapped open in the encroaching dusk. Master Caird had found
power at the top of his swing; perhaps she would find power at the top of the
Beast Stake.
She began to climb, grasping leaves and flowers as finely rendered as any
Caird had ever made. She could feel her flesh tear as she stepped on the iron
thorns, but this was one more chance, one more hope. At the top was an
enormous rose, multipetaled and exceedingly beautiful. Caird would have [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]

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