A Time of Exile (The Westlands) by Kerr Katharine

Author:Kerr, Katharine [Kerr, Katharine]
Language: eng
Format: azw3
Publisher: Random House Publishing Group
Published: 2010-08-10T16:00:00+00:00

PART THREE

ELDIDD

918

AFTER SIXTY-ODD years in Bardek, Nevyn returned to Eldidd late in the summer of 918, landing in Aberwyn with some unusual cargo tucked inside his shirt for safety’s sake. While he’d been abroad, studying the scholarly dweomer lore of the Bardekian priests, he’d gotten the idea of making a talisman for the High King, a magically charged jewel that would radiate the noble virtues endlessly to its owner’s mind. To that end, he’d bought an extremely unusual stone and studied the various writings about such creations in the libraries of various temples, but to make the talisman, he brought the stone home. As big as a walnut, but perfectly round and smoothly polished, a tribute to the art of Bardek jewelers, the opal was shot through with pale gold veins and bluish-pink shadows, as mottled as the coat of some exotic animal. At the moment, for all its beauty, it was an ordinary jewel, a dull thing in its way, though worth a fortune. By the time Nevyn got done with it, it would be supremely interesting, and worth a man’s life.

Down in the center of Aberwyn stood the hall of the merchant guild, an imposing fat tower with glass in the downstairs windows and a stout slate roof. Their official money changer held court in a bare stone room with a hearth, two chairs, and a long table, where Nevyn found a stout and gray-haired man sitting behind a litter of Bardek-style scrolls. Behind him, at the entrance to another room, an armed guard slouched against the wall.

“I’m just back from Bardek,” Nevyn said to the money changer.

“You’ve hit the rate of exchange at a good time, good sir. Sit down, sit down.”

As Nevyn pulled up the rickety three-legged chair, he noticed the guard watching with the interest of the longtime bored, a young man of about twenty, tall and well muscled, with blond hair, blue eyes, and the beginnings of a mustache blotching his upper lip. Nevyn wouldn’t have given him a second thought if it weren’t for the silver dagger at his belt. As it was, he took a good look at the lad’s face and then nearly swore aloud, because the soul behind his eyes struck him as familiar and friendly both. Before he could observe more, the money changer’s voice claimed his attention.

“We’ve been giving thirty Deverry silvers for each Bardek zotar of full weight.”

“Indeed? That certainly is generous! Are things troubled in Eldidd?”

“Have you been away for some time?”

“Years, actually.”

“Hum.” The money changer reflected upon something before he spoke again. “I hope to every god in the Otherlands that these rumors are only rumors, but they say the gwerbrets are still pining for the days when they were princes. The High King’s a long way away, my friend.”

“Just so. Rebellion?”

“Let us merely say that Bardek merchants have never gotten rich by allowing themselves to be caught in the middle of trouble. They’re not bringing as much sound coinage in as they once did.”

The

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