The Penwyth Curse (Medieval Song 6)

She punched him in the stomach. His breath whooshed out even as one of the nearby servants gasped in horror. Merryn said right in his face, all the while shaking her fist under his nose, “You’re just a man, damn you, just like all the rest of them. Does the king hate you, then, that he sends you to your death?”

“No,” he said once he could breathe again. “He merely wants it done to his satisfaction, and that is you safely wedded to me and the curse a past memory.”

“Listen to me, Bishop. If you wed me, you will die.”

He stared down at the top of her head. She was strong. His belly still hurt. That bloody curse—by all the saints’ crooked teeth, Bishop hated what he couldn’t see, what he couldn’t examine, what he couldn’t understand. Sometimes, he thought suddenly, sometimes he couldn’t bear a wizard’s knowledge, a wizard’s gifts, a wizard’s obligations.

He blinked, shook his head. He felt a moment of dizziness, and his vision grew dim. He managed to hold himself still until he was steady again.

Where had that bizarre thought come from? It had to be the curse creeping toward him, eager to topple him into his grave. Would foam ooze from his mouth? Would all his blood spurt out of his nose? He said, “I am tired of your evasions, your secrets, Merryn. I want the truth—the curse comes through you somehow, doesn’t it? And you manipulate it in some way, don’t you?”

The great hall was as silent as stone. How had anyone heard him here in this shadowed corner with two damned dogs gnawing and growling over a leather strap near his left foot? But they had, and everyone had gone silent, leaning toward him. Suddenly one of Dienwald’s twins started crying. Bishop heard Philippa say quietly, “It’s all right, sweeting, come to Mama. If Bishop can’t fix this, why, then, your father will tend to it.”

Merryn said, “It’s true I have red hair and green eyes, it’s also true that there always has been a girl with red hair and green eyes for as far back as anyone can remember. But the curse—it was fashioned hundreds of years ago. How could it have anything to do with me, Merryn de Gay?”

“Then why are four men dead?”

She shook her head. “I’m not a curse bearer, nor am I a poisoner. I haven’t the skill or knowledge of such things.”

Bishop slowly turned her to face him. He held her shoulders, leaned down, and said in her face, “When will you stop your damned lies?”

He managed to grab her wrist the instant before her fist would have slammed hard into his stomach. He drew her up against him, but it was she who said against his mouth, “I’m not lying to you. I have no secrets.”

But he could see that she did, and it enraged him. The pulse pounded in his throat, “Very well, Merryn. I believe that even if I married you here—away from Penwyth—I would still die.”

“You will return me to Penwyth?”

“No.” He smiled down at her, not at all a pleasant smile. “I told you, I have other plans for you.”

She looked up at him, studying his expression, trying to judge what was in his mind. “A lot has happened since you came to Penwyth, Bishop.”

“Aye, you are right about that. It’s now been just two full days since I yelled up to the old men on Penwy

th’s ramparts to let me enter. By all the saints’ sour breaths, just two damnable days.” His eyes darkened, now nearly as dark as the shadows that surrounded them. “If you wished to marry me, if you weren’t coerced, then I wouldn’t be struck down.”

She said, so close now that her warm breath fanned his face, “Listen to me, Bishop. I believe that even if I stood on the Penwyth ramparts and yelled for all to hear that I wished to take you as my husband, you would still die.”

“How do you know the curse would fell me if you agreed to wed me?”

“I don’t know, but I’m not about to take the chance.”

“What is this? You don’t want me dead?”

She looked at him for a very long time, until one of the dogs slapped her foot with the leather strap. She raised her hand to touch him, then dropped it to her side again as she said, “No, I don’t want you dead.”

He smiled then. “Ah, you’re protecting me.”

She shrugged.

He knew everyone in the great hall was still listening, but he didn’t pause. He said, “All right. I won’t marry you.”

Crooky jumped atop a trestle table, poked out his chest, scratched his armpit, and sang out:

“The maid has won.

But she won’t be glad.

She’ll die a virgin