'Arawn sent his warriors to slay us,' cried Gwydion, 'and here they stand in your council hall. Do you say that you know nothing more?'
'Arawn sent warriors to find, not slay you,' answered Achren, 'or you would not be alive at this moment. Now that I see you face to face,' she said, her eyes on Gwydion, 'I am glad such a man is not bleeding out his life in a ditch. For there is much we have to discuss, and much that you can profit from.'
'If you would treat with me,' said Gwydion, 'unbind me and return my sword.'
'You make demands?' Achren asked gently. 'Perhaps you do not understand. I offer you something you cannot have even if I loosened your hands and gave back your weapon. By that, Lord Gwydion, I mean? your life.'
'In exchange for what?'
'I had thought to bargain with another life,' said Achren, glancing at Taran. 'But I see he is of no consequence, alive or dead. No,' she said, 'there are other, pleasanter ways to bargain. You do not know me as well as you think, Gwydion. There is no future for you beyond these gates. Here, I can promise…'
'Your promises reek of Annuvin!' cried Gwydion. 'I scorn them. It is no secret what you are!'
Achren's face turned livid. Hissing, she struck at Gwydion and her blood-red nails raked his cheek. Achren unsheathed Gwydion's sword; holding it in both hands she drove the point toward his throat, stopping only a hair's breadth from it. Gwydion stood proudly, his eyes blazing.
'No,' cried Achren, 'I will not slay you; you shall come to wish I had, and beg the mercy of a sword! You scorn my promises! This promise will be well kept!'
Achren raised the sword above her head and smote with all her force against a stone pillar. Sparks flashed, the blade rang unbroken. With a scream of rage, she dashed the weapon to the ground.
The sword shone, still undamaged. Achren seized it again, gripping the sharp blade itself until her hands ran scarlet. Her eyes rolled back into her head, her lips moved and twisted. A thunderclap filled the hall, a light burst like a crimson sun, and the broken weapon fell in pieces to the ground.
'So shall I break you!' Achren shrieked. She raised her hand to the Cauldron-Born and called out in a strange, harsh language.
The pale warriors strode forward and dragged Taran and Gwydion from the hall. In a dark passageway of stone, Taran struggled with his captors, fighting to reach Gwydion's side. One of the Cauldron-Born brought a whip handle down on Taran's head.
Chapter 6
Eilonwy
TARAN CAME TO HIS SENSES on a pile of dirty straw, which smelled as though Gurgi and all his ancestors had slept on it. A few feet above him, pale yellow sunlight shone through a grating; the feeble beam ended abruptly on a wall of rough, damp stone. The shadows of bars lay across the tiny patch of light; instead of brightening the cell, the wan rays made it appear only more grim and closed in. As Taran's eyes grew accustomed to this yellow twilight, he made out a heavy, studded portal with a slot at the base. The cell itself was not over three paces square.
His head ached; since his hands were still bound behind him, he could do no more than guess at the large and throbbing lump. What had happened to Gwydion he dared not imagine. After the Cauldron warrior had struck him, Taran had regained consciousness only a few moments before slipping once again into whirling darkness. In that brief time, he vaguely remembered opening his eyes and finding himself slung over a guard's back. His confused recollection included a dim corridor with doors on either side. Gwydion had called out to him once? or so Taran believed? he could not recall his friend's words, perhaps even that had been part of the nightmare. He supposed Gwydion had been cast in another dungeon; Taran fervently hoped so. He could not shake off the memory of Achren's livid face and horrible screaming, and he feared she might have ordered Gwydion slain.
Still, there was good reason to hope his companion lived. Achren could easily have cut his throat as he braved her in the council hall, yet she had held back. Thus, she intended to keep Gwydion alive; perhaps, Taran thought wretchedly, Gwydion would be better off dead. The idea of the proud figure lying a broken corpse filled Taran with grief that quickly turned to rage. He staggered to his feet, lurched to the door, kicking it, battering himself against it with what little strength remained to him. In despair, he sank to the damp ground, his head pressed against the unyielding oaken planks. He rose again after a few moments and kicked at the walls. If Gwydion were, by chance, in an adjoining cell, Taran hoped he would hear this signal. But he judged, from the dull and muffled sound, that the walls were too thick for his feeble tapping to penetrate.
As he turned away, a flashing object fell through the grating and dropped to the stone floor. Taran stooped. It was a ball of what seemed to be gold. Perplexed, he looked upward. From the grating, a pair of intensely blue eyes looked back at him.
'Please,' said a girl's voice, light and musical, 'my name is Eilonwy and if you don't mind, would you throw my bauble to me? I don't want you to think I'm a baby, playing with a silly bauble, because I'm not; but sometimes there's absolutely nothing else to do around here and it slipped out of my hands when I was tossing it…'
'Little girl,' Taran interrupted, 'I don't…'
'But I am not a little girl,' Eilonwy protested. 'Haven't I just been and finished telling you? Are you slow- witted? I'm so sorry for you. It's terrible to be dull and stupid. What's your name?' she went on. 'It makes me feel funny not knowing someone's name. Wrong-footed, you know, or as if I had three thumbs on one hand, if you see what I mean. It's clumsy…'
'I am Taran of Caer Dallben,' Taran said, then wished he had not. This, he realized, could be another trap.
'That's lovely,' Eilonwy said gaily. 'I'm very glad to meet you. I suppose you're a lord, or a warrior, or a war leader, or a bard, or a monster. Though we haven't had any monsters for a long time.'
'I am none of those,' said Taran, feeling quite flattered that Eilonwy should have taken him for any one of them.
'What else is there?'
'I am an Assistant Pig-Keeper,' Taran said. He bit his lip as soon as the words were out; then, to excuse his loose tongue, told himself it could do no harm for the girl to know that much.
'How fascinating,' Eilonwy said. 'You're the first we've ever had? unless that poor fellow in the other dungeon is one, too.'
'Tell me of him,' Taran said quickly. 'Is he alive?'
'I don't know,' said Eilonwy. 'I peeked through the grating, but I couldn't tell. He doesn't move at all, but I should imagine he is alive; otherwise, Achren would have fed him to the ravens. Now, please, if you don't mind, it's right at your feet.'
'I can't pick up your bauble,' Taran said, 'because my hands are tied.'
The blue eyes looked surprised. 'Oh? Well, that would account for it. Then I suppose I shall have to come in and get it.'
'You can't come in and get it,' said Taran wearily. 'Don't you see I'm locked up here?'
'Of course I do,' said Eilonwy. 'What would be the point of having someone in a dungeon if they weren't locked up? Really, Taran of Caer Dallben, you surprise me with some of your remarks. I don't mean to hurt your feelings by asking, but is Assistant Pig-Keeper the kind of work that calls for a great deal of intelligence?'
Something beyond the grating and out of Taran's vision swooped down and the blue eyes disappeared suddenly. Taran heard what he took to be a scuffle, then a high-pitched little shriek, followed by a larger shriek and a moment or two of loud smacking.
The blue eyes did not reappear. Taran flung himself back on the straw. After a time, in the dreadful silence and loneliness of the tiny cell, he began suddenly to wish Eilonwy would come back. She was the most confusing person he had ever met, and surely as wicked as everyone else in the castle? although he could not quite bring himself to believe it completely. Nevertheless, he longed for the sound of another voice, even Eilonwy's prattling.
The grating above his head darkened. Night poured into the cell in a black, chilly wave. The slot in the heavy portal rattled open. Taran heard something being slid into the cell and crawled toward it. It was a shallow bowl. He sniffed carefully and finally ventured to touch his tongue to it, fearing all the while that it might be poisoned food. It
