Haunting Warrior (5 page)

She moved deeper into the woods, and Saraid trailed her like a duckling its mother. “Y’ think I have the Book of Fennore? Are y’ Cathán Half-Beard’s spy, then? Because if y’ are, y’ can tell him as I have before and again. I’ve no Book. I’ve never had it.”

“I’m no one’s spy, least of all Cathán’s. But you believe what you want to believe. Either way it will be true.”

“Why must y’ speak in circles? I don’t know what to make of yer message.”

Colleen sighed, and turning, she reached out a small, wrinkled hand to Saraid’s cheek. There was no feeling in the caress, and yet strangely Saraid was comforted by it.

“And sure, wouldn’t I love to guide you?” Colleen said in a gentle tone. “But this is your path, and all I can do is done already. You must win him to your cause, child. Do you hear me?”

Slowly, Saraid nodded.

“Whatever it takes. You must beguile him, Saraid. Entice him, entrap him if you can. Make him think of nothing but you.”

“Bewitch him? Is that what yer saying to me?”

“Aye. Win him over, and he will be your greatest champion. Leave him on his own course, and he will darken the skies forever.”

Saraid’s mouth pursed as she considered this, picturing the skies going black for all of eternity. She wanted to scoff. She wanted to run. Instead she stood there, waiting for the old woman to tell her how she would convince this man who would come. How she, Saraid, could seduce him away from the Book of Fennore?

“Would it help if I told you he’s the man you dream of ?”

Astounded, Saraid asked, “How do y’ know of my dreams?”

“Otherworld,” Colleen reminded her with a wicked smile. “ ’Tis no matter. Just know it is true. Now, you’ll not be happy with my parting words, but I give them with my heart and I swear them to be true. Have faith in yourself, Saraid. Nothing that comes to you will come by chance. Not ever. Each gift has a reason, even this one that you hate. Only in death will there be resurrection. Only in trust will there be truth.”

Saraid stared at her, feeling the words fill her like an echo in a chamber. Only in death will there be resurrection. Is this why she saw the dead? So that she would know the resurrected? Or did this woman speak of the Christ God? Was her message one of religion and faith?

“You’ll find your answers in time,” Colleen said. “And now the day is about to break. Best get back to your brothers. They are men, so sure enough they’ll be wanting some breakfast. Some things don’t ever change.” Her smile was wistful, her eyes sad now.

“Will I see y’ again?” Saraid asked.

Colleen studied her for a moment and then said, “One day, you will return this . . . favor. You’ll come to me as I do to you. And rest assured you will confound me in the same way and leave me full of questions and anger at my own confusion. But I will tell you what you will tell me. Without questions, there can be no answers.”

Colleen’s smile changed yet again, and now the wicked glee was back in her eyes. “ ’Tis the chicken and the egg,” she said with a laugh.

“What chicken? What egg?” Saraid demanded.

“Did I tell you first, or did you tell me? I guess neither of us will ever know, will we now?”

“I could make a list of what I don’t know after this night.”

“No, it’s best you not write it down. That’s not gone well for us in the past.”

And what did that mean? Before Saraid could even sigh in exasperation, the woman began to fade, and she knew there would be no chance to ask. It was their way, the dead. They came for their own reasons and cared little for the unrest they left behind. As Saraid stood in the chilled darkness, she watched until even the strange shoes had disappeared.

Wide awake and full of thought, she made her way back to the camp and her sleeping brothers. Colleen of the Ballagh had spoken in riddles, but she’d delivered two very clear messages. A man was coming and with him, change.

T
HE sun had broken the horizon when Saraid added small bits of wood to the fire, blowing softly with each addition, urging the cooling coals to spark and flame. Colleen Ballagh’s appearance still felt like a dream, but she knew it was nothing so simple. Prophesy was never clear. Lore was as riddled with cryptic messages as Saraid’s visitor had been.

She wore her homespun dress, the wool warm against the chilled morning. Beneath it her shift kept the gown from chaffing her skin. Its sleeves billowed out at the arms and down to her wrists. She’d strung a thin twine through both armholes and tied it at the back of her neck to pull the sleeves up and keep the fabric from dragging through the food she prepared or, worse, the licking flames of the fire. She was silent as she worked, preparing their meal without thinking of the task. Instead, she dwelled on the message Colleen had delivered.

A man would come disguised as another. Who could he be? Someone Colleen thought Saraid would know once she saw him. But who would he pretend to be? Someone looking for the Book, it would seem. But Colleen had said it was she, Saraid, he must have. Why would he think Saraid a good substitute for the Book of Fennore? She, who knew nothing of it but that Cathán Half-Beard had ever been convinced Saraid’s mother, Oma, had stolen it from him.

She coaxed a bright flame into life and then built it up to a good blaze. Liam, the youngest of her stepbrothers, had risen early and killed and cleaned two rabbits for their meal. It was more than they’d had the night before, when only old bread and cheese had sufficed. The rabbits were now spitted and ready to roast over the fire. Her belly growled with anticipation.

“Saraid?”

Tiarnan’s voice startled her, and she spun to find her twin brother standing in the shadows. He wore a tunic that covered his broad chest and hung almost to his knees, leaving his arms bare and unfettered. Once it had been the color of saffron and fine. Now it was ragged and patched over and again, faded to an unpleasant brownish hue. His belt was leather and supple, finely tooled, and a sword hung from it—not jeweled or graven as a king’s should be, but honed and polished with care. It was a good sword, Tiarnan liked to say, and he used it like an extension of his own arm.

A cloak was draped over one shoulder, leaving his right free from any restraint. It was fastened with a brooch made of three connected spirals, seeming to have no beginning and no ending. His trews tied just below the knee, and Saraid knew a dagger was strapped to his thigh, high where it couldn’t be seen but could be pulled in an instant from the slit in the seam. Leather sandals covered his feet. He would long for his boots when the cold set in, but they were gone forever, burned or ransacked from their
tuath
by Cathán Half-Beard’s barbarians.

He took another step forward, and now she could see his unsmiling face. His expression made her uneasy, but she didn’t let it show.

“Is it my heart y’ would be trying to stop with yer stealth?” Saraid teased, releasing a shaky laugh. Colleen’s appearance in the chill of predawn had disturbed her more than she knew if even her brother’s familiar voice made her jump.

“We must speak, sister,” Tiarnan said, his expression darkening even more.

Though they were twins, they did not much resemble one another. Tiarnan was tall and broad, as big a man as any warrior she’d ever seen. Saraid was the opposite—small, even for a woman. Their mother had been Saracen, their father an Irish king born of Irish kings. Of the two, Saraid had the look of her mother, or so people said. There were tales told of the exotic and mystifying beauty Oma had been. Saraid did not know what truth was in the tales. Her mother had killed herself when Saraid and Tiarnan were just babies.

When they’d been children, she and Tiarnan had been so close they could talk to each other’s minds. Words were rarely used between them, and no emotion or thought was experienced alone. But Saraid couldn’t remember the last time they’d shared themselves in such a way. She didn’t know if they still could even if they’d wanted to. It made her sad, that loss, though she was thankful that he couldn’t read her confused and anxious thoughts now.

“Well,” Saraid said when Tiarnan shuffled his feet but did not continue. “I’m listening. What is it we must discuss?”

She set the skewered rabbits on the spit over the fire and turned to give him her full attention. Tiarnan was not one to easily show emotion. That his face bore such troubles concerned her. Colleen’s words danced in her memory.
Your brother will bring you hard news. . . .

“I have met with Cathán Half-Beard,” Tiarnan said.

She felt the blood drain from her face. He’d met with Cathán? “And why would y’ do such a thing? Is it a death wish y’ have? Because sure enough if that’s the way of it, I can brain y’ with my skillet and take care of it cleanly.”

His smile was tight and without a trace of humor. He was a big man, solid and banded with muscles hard as rock. Yet he looked very much a boy just then, standing uncertainly in the bright morning light.

“Are y’ serious, then?” she said.

“It must come to an end, Saraid. We’ve not the men or the means to fight any longer. Winter is but a cold breath away, and if we doon starve first, then we’ll freeze to death waiting.”

“And what is it makes y’ think talking to that monster now will do what it’s not done before?”

“It was he who sent a messenger. A hostage to keep until after the meeting.”

“A slave no doubt,” she said, wondering how a messenger had come without her knowing.

“His son,” Tiarnan said.

“The Bloodletter?” she gasped.

“Aye.”

The conversation got queerer and queerer, but at least one question had been answered. This was the reason why Tiarnan had chosen Cathán Half-Beard’s forest to make their camp. The risk of it still stunned her, hostage or no.

“And where is his highness?”

“I’ve sent him back to his father.”

“In pieces I hope.”

Tiarnan didn’t answer, and that did not bode well with Saraid. So was this the news that Colleen had foretold? Or could it be something worse?

“Tell me why Cathán Half-Beard wanted to speak with y’,” she demanded. “And how y’ could meet with the man who has spilled the blood of our people like it was dirty water?”

“He made an offer of truce. It was my responsibility to listen to him.”

What to say to that? He’d struck her speechless.

“Truce?” she repeated, feeling numb and giggly at the same time. “Did his tongue turn to stone when he spoke the word?”

Again, her brother remained stoic, and a spark of alarm hissed to life inside her. Above them, silent clouds slipped over the sun and dimmed it out. She did not need the omen to tell her that whatever her brother had to say next, it would not be good.

“He, too, wants to end the bloodshed,” Tiarnan said, watching her.

“And what of his spawn? What of the Bloodletter?”

Tiarnan swallowed and looked down without answering. The spark of fear sputtered and then burst into flame.

“It’s an alliance he proposes,” Tiarnan said softly.

“What kind of alliance? One where we willingly lie down and let him put an end to us? I’m sure that would make him happy, but I didn’t think y’ such a fool that y’ would agree to it.”

That got a reaction, as she’d known it would. Tiarnan was many things that he did not like to admit, but he could not tolerate being called the fool. He glared at her, straightening his shoulders and raising his chin. Aye, he could intimidate the most fearsome of warriors with just such a stance, and she might be a fool herself for provoking him, but she would take the fierce warrior over the shuffling uncertainty. This, at least she knew.

“I’ll not have that tongue flaying my hide, woman,” he said in a tight voice. “Sister or no.”

She bit back her scathing answer. Tiarnan would turn his back and tell her no more if she continued to goad him. It was unusual enough that he’d come to her in the first place. She dropped her gaze and spoke in a conciliatory tone. “And what is it he proposes, Tiarnan?”

“A match.”

She pulled her brows in a frown, not liking the sound of that at all.

“A joining of our two people to make us one,” Tiarnan went on. “A match between y’ and Ruairi.”

“The Bloodletter?” she said, the air leaving her lungs in a rush. Her short bark of laughter was high with panic, but she could not seem to control it. “And what did y’ tell him?”

Tiarnan stared steadily back, his silence an answer in itself.

“Tell me y’ did not agree to such a thing? Y’ would not. Tiarnan, tell me y’ could not.”

“T’will end the fighting, Saraid,” he said, his voice deep and angry.

“We’ve little choice but to take the chance before he wipes us out completely. We’re not far from annihilation now—y’ know it as well as I.”

She did know it, but knowing did not help her swallow the bitterness. Pledge her troth to Ruairi the Bloodletter? Cathán’s murdering son? The man she’d watched strike down women and innocent children? Slaughter old men and green boys who’d barely learned to grip a sword . . .

“It will bring us peace.”

“Yer worse than a fool if y’ believe it, Tiarnan,” she told him.

“And what am I if I do not? We’ve less than twenty soldiers, no allies that are left breathing. Just women, children, and old men who will starve or freeze before the winter is done. What of that do y’ not understand? He has hundreds standing with him. Strong and seasoned men. Neighbors and allies—Northmen. Men who fight for him—”

“Out of their fear,” she insisted.

“Does it matter? A blade to the heart is the same no matter what hand wields it. We’re living in caves, like animals. And still he hunts us. We either join him or spend our lives running until he catches us. Which would y’ have?”

She curled her fingers into tight fists. He spoke the truth again, but that made it no easier to abide. Had he said she was to wed the Christian’s devil himself, Saraid would have taken the news better.