The Silver Hand Read Online Free PDF Page B

your king!”
    Before anyone could lift a hand to prevent him, Siawn Hy had a spear in Llew’s ribs, and he was shouting, “Meldron is king! Meldron is king!”
    Siawn pulled Llew’s arms down and knocked the firebrands from his hands. He gestured to the foremost of the Wolf Pack, who stepped into the circle, glancing nervously at the people gathered close about. I noticed they avoided my eyes.
    Meldron, raising the torc above his own head, declared himself king, saying, “Hear me now! I hold the torc of the Llwyddi kings! The kingship of my father is mine by right!”
    â€œThere is no such right!” I countered. “Only a bard can bestow kingship. And I have given it to Llew!”
    â€œYou have no power here!”
    â€œI am the chief bard of our people,” I replied, calmly, confidently. “I alone hold the sovereignty. I alone hold the power to confer kingship.”
    â€œYou are nothing!” the prince roared, clenching the torc in his fist and shaking it in my face. “I hold my father’s torc. I am king!”
    â€œAnd I tell you that holding a torc will not make you a king, any more than standing in the forest will make you a tree!”
    Some laughed at this, and Meldron’s rage deepened at the laughter. I rushed on, recklessly. “Go ahead! Wear the golden torc, and command the gosgordd of warriors,” I challenged. “Array yourself in fine clothes, and lavish gifts of gold and silver on the yammering pack who clamor after you. Do all you will, Meldron! But remember this: Sovereignty does not reside in the torc, or in the throne, or even in the might of the sword.”
    I turned to the people. It was time for them to act, to put down Meldron once and for all. “Listen to me! Meldron is not the king. You have just seen a kingmaking: Llew is the chosen king. Resist Meldron! Defy him! He has no power here. He can do no—”
    Then, before I could say another word, Meldron screamed to his Wolf Pack, “Seize them! Seize them both!”

4

T HE C APTIVE P IT
    I am sorry, brother.”
    I might have been speaking to the mud at my feet. Llew sat with his knees drawn to his chest, his head resting on his arms. In the dim light of the pit, he was a shadow—a morose and miserable shadow.
    After seven nights and days in Meldron’s captive pit, I did not blame him. The fault was mine. I had underestimated Meldron and his readiness to overthrow the long-honored ways of our people. I had misjudged the support he enjoyed among his warrior band, the Wolf Pack, and their willingness to uphold him against their own kinsmen. Yes, and I had overestimated my own ability to exploit the respect the people felt towards Llew. They might have exalted Llew, but Meldron was known to them, and he was one of their own. Llew was the outsider, the stranger in our midst.
    Nevertheless, I had thought—no, I had believed in my blood and bones—that the people would not stand by and let Meldron challenge their last remaining bard. A king is a king, but a bard is the heart and soul of the people; he is their life in song, and the lamp which guides their steps along the paths of destiny. A bard is the essential spirit of the clan; he is the linking ring, the golden cord which unites the manifold ages of the clan, binding all that is past with all that is yet to come.
    But fear makes men blind and stupid. And these were troubled times. I should have known the people would not challenge Meldron to the shedding of blood. In the Day of Strife, even brave men would not risk their lives for the truth by which we have ever lived.
    â€œI am sorry, Llew.”
    â€œStop saying that, Tegid,” he muttered. “I am sick of it.”
    â€œI did not mean this to happen.”
    He raised his face to the low black roof above his head. “It is my own fault for letting you talk me into it. I never should have listened to you.”
    â€œI am sorry,