Bard I Read Online Free

denials.
    ‘Be silent,’ Oisc told him. Then, to Felimid, he said, ‘Why should he lie?’
    ‘Och, wizards are more jealous than concubines! I reckon my joke on Tosti has him thinking that one wizard in this burg is enough.’
    ‘You do not convince me,’ Oisc declared. ‘It’s not your intention to stay past the end of winter, and Kisumola knows that.’ He turned to Kisumola. ‘Listen, you dog of the tundra! I saved your miserable life in the north, and I’ve kept you, fed you, protected you ever since. I’ll have you buried to the neck in sea sand to wait for the tide if you’re telling me lies.’
    ‘Master, have I lied or been mistaken before? Ever?’
    ‘No,‘admitted Oisc. He looked hard at Felimid. ‘He’s just such a one as the British kings might send, for a fact.’ The mistrust in his grim stare grew. Although his wits were not especially quick, his suspicion was, and his anger. ‘Take him!’
    Men had already hemmed Felimid in, waiting for such an order. They were too slow about performing it. The bard had expected some such command, as well.
    He drove his knee between one man’s thighs. Another laid hands on him, to win a broken jaw as a reward for his zeal when Felimid half turned, making sudden, violent use of his elbow. His assailant sat down as if struck with a maul, fouling two more of the king’s gesiths who had pressed close.
    Felimid ran.
    His sword, Kincaid, did not hang within reach. The Jutes wore no weapons while they ate, and neither did the sons of Erin, as a rule. Still, each wall and pillar was glitteringly hung with weapons. Felimid snatched a spear without pausing in his flight.
    A earl, armed in the same way, blocked his path. A spear’s point darted at Felimid’s throat like the beak of a thirsty bird of war. With a clatter of shaft on shaft, Felimid knocked the spear aside. His own point sank into the man’s belly, encountering yielding, heavy softness. A long shining spurt of red followed as Felimid drew back the spear.
    One swift glance the length of the hall showed him that there was no way out. Thirty men, forty, had massed between him and the far end. Even if he reached the anteroom he’d be dragged down long before he could unbar the outer door alone.
    There didn’t seem much for him to do but die-quickly, if he could contrive it, with all the style and grace such an essentially graceless business could afford. Felimid set his back against the hall’s thick central pillar. Now they should see!
    The king shouted, ‘Take him alive!’
    ‘Alive, is it?’ Felimid laughed. ‘Cairbre and Ogma! High is the price you will pay for that! I’m determined, see you, not to be taken alive! I know what your Jutish amusements are! The next three men who come near me will die, if you hamper them with commands not to slay. Or why don’t you come, Hengist’s son?’
    Oisc’s blue eyes glittered as he heard this insolence.
    ‘I will!’ he said. ‘None of you men attack him! Make two lines with a narrow lane between, so that he cannot move from where he stands without showing his back to some of you. Then leave him to me.’
    Felimid was puzzled. Did Oisc himself mean to fight? He held no weapon. Also, Felimid could not guess the purpose of the orders Oisc had given, which made him uneasy.
    Oisc then showed why he was a king. Ripping a great shaggy bearskin from the wall, he ran forward between the double line of men. Five paces from Felimid, whirling the skin with all his gigantic strength, he threw it.
    The bard couldn’t avoid it, because of the men hemming him in. He was covered, enwrapped, whelmed in smothering fur. It felt weighty and vast as the sea. They gave him no chance to struggle free. They pinned him with his face in the greasy rushes, legs held down, an unrelenting foot in the small of his back. Disarmed, he was dragged upright, to look at Oisc’s grimly laughing face.
    ‘Bring him to the pit,’ the king commanded.
    The bard’s wrists were dragged