Free Daggerspell by Katharine Kerr Page A

prince stepped in, giving the Boar another reason to chafe under the High King’s rule. How would the Boar take it if his mother hinted that the prince was yielding to a prior claim?”
    “I’ve no doubt he’d honor the prince always.”
    Smiling, Galrion made her a deep bow. It could work out well, he told himself. Yet at the thought of Brangwen lying in another man’s arms, his heart flared rage.
    When the day came for Prince Galrion to ride back to court, Gerraent accompanied him for a few miles simply because he was expected to. The prince smiled and chattered until Gerraent wanted to murder him and leave his body in a ditch by the road. At last they reached the turning, and Gerraent sat on his horse and watched the prince’s scarlet-and-white plaid cloak disappear into the distance. Three more weeks, only three more weeks, and the prince would return from Dun Deverry to take Brangwen away. With her, Gerraent’s heart would go, breaking.
    When he rode back to the dun, Gerraent found Brangwen sitting outside in the sun and sewing. He gave his horse to Brythu, his page, and sat down at her feet like a dog. Her golden hair shone in the sun like finespun thread, wisping around the soft skin of her cheeks. When she smiled at him, Gerraent felt stabbed to the heart.
    “What are you sewing?” Gerraent said. “Somewhat for your dower chest?”
    “It’s not, but a shirt for you. The last one I’ll ever make, but don’t worry, Ysolla does splendid needlework. I’ll wager that your wedding shirt is ever so much nicer than my poor Galrion’s.”
    Gerraent rose to his feet, hesitated, then sat again, trapped in his old torment, that his beautiful sister, the one beautiful thing in his world, would turn him into something ugly and unclean, despised by the gods and men alike, if ever they knew of his secret fault. All at once she cried out. He jumped to his feet before he knew what he was doing.
    “I just pricked my finger on the beastly needle,” Brangwen said, grinning at him. “Don’t look so alarmed, Gerro. But, oh, here, I’ve gotten a drop of blood on your shirt. Blast it!”
    The little red smear lay in the midst of red interlaced bands of spirals.
    “No one’s ever going to notice it,” Gerraent said.
    “As long as it’s not a bad omen, you’re right enough. Doubtless you’ll get more gore on it than this. You do get so filthy when you hunt, Gerro.”
    “I won’t wear it hunting until it starts to wear out. It’ll be my best shirt, the last one you ever sewed for me.” Gerraent caught her hand and kissed the drop of blood away.
    Late that night, Gerraent went out to the dark, silent ward and paced restlessly back and forth. In the moonlight, he could see the severed head of old Samoryc glaring down at him with empty eye sockets. Once every dun and warrior’s home would have been graced with such trophies, but some years past, the priests had seen visions stating that taking heads had come to displease great Bel. Of all the lords round about, Dwen was the last to defy the change. Gerraent remembered the day when the priests came to implore him to take the trophy down. A tiny lad, then, Gerraent hid behind his mother’s skirts as Dwen refused, roaring with laughter, saying that if the gods truly wanted it down, they’d make it rot soon enough. Chanting a ritual curse, the priests left defeated.
    “I’m the curse,” Gerraent said to Samoryc. “I’m the curse the gods sent to our clan.”
    He sat down on the ground and wept.
    The days passed slowly, long days of torment, until Gerraent fled his sister’s presence and rode to Blaen on the pretense of seeing his new betrothed. He and Blaen were more than friends; the year before, when they’d ridden to war together, they’d sworn an oath that they would fight at each other’s side until both were dead or both victorious, and they had sealed that oath with drops of their own blood.
    In his blood-sworn friend’s soothing company Gerraent spent