Ravenheart (20 page)

“I’ll not be drawn into talking of a man’s guilt before I have spoken with him, but let me tell you this, highlander: When I find the people responsible, they will hang. You have my word on it.”

Kaelin thanked him and walked away. Mulgrave seemed a good man, but twice now Bindoe had escaped the noose. Who was to say it would not happen a third time?

The thought continued to occupy his mind as he left Five Fields and began the long walk back to Old Hills. The numbness of shock began to wear away, leaving grief to rise in its stead. Kaelin saw again the bright smile of Chara Ward and heard her voice whispering in his mind. She had set off for a day of sunshine and laughter and had had her life ripped away in a lonely wood. Kaelin paused by a hedge and wept for Chara Ward.

He heard a whispering voice and looked around. The road was empty. The voice came again, and he recognized it as the Wyrd. It was as if he were listening to an echo from far away.

“Kaelin, can you hear me?”

“Aye,” he said, pushing aside the branches of the hedge, expecting to find her on the other side. The field was empty. “Where are you?”

“I am in the Wishing Tree woods. I cannot hold this spell much longer. So do not talk—just listen. I saw the killing. I have tried to touch the spirit of the white-haired officer, but he is not of this land and my words whisper past him. Go to him. Urge him to find Bindoe. He is at the barracks, but not for long. He plans to take the Scardyke Road. If he is not apprehended
now, then by dawn he will have reached the old log bridge and then will go into the lands of the Pinance. You understand me, Kaelin. Find the officer.”

The words faded away.

Kaelin Ring stood very still. Yes, he could run back to Eldacre and try to find Mulgrave. What then? Bindoe had been accused twice of rape and both times had walked free. The second time his accuser had been birched for “falsehood under oath.” Would there be justice? Mulgrave seemed a fair man, but then, so did Galliott the Borderer. Yet he had spoken up for Bindoe, telling the court that the sergeant had been in his company when the second rape had taken place.

The choices seemed simple to the young clansman: trust in Varlish law or find Bindoe and show him Rigante justice. A terrible stillness settled on Kaelin Ring. The night air seemed charged as he gazed at the stark outline of the distant mountains.

Do you have the nerve? he asked himself.

The old log bridge was nine miles east and south of Old Hills. If he moved swiftly, he could make it home and be at the bridge an hour before dawn.

Kaelin began to run, long easy strides that ate the miles between Five Fields and Old Hills. Just under an hour later he slipped into the rear door of Aunt Maev’s house. He could hear Grymauch snoring, but apart from that the house was silent. He made his way to the old teak cabinet in the sitting room. Opening the lower door, he carefully removed the bottles of elderflower wine Aunt Maev kept there. Behind them was a polished panel. Kaelin reached in and with great care eased it out. Hidden behind it was a dusty walnut box some eighteen inches long. Kaelin lifted it and carried it to the table by the window. As he opened the lid, moonlight fell on two ornate silver dueling pistols. Beside them, in cunningly crafted compartments, were a silver powder horn, a small phial of oil, a packet of gun cotton wadding, and a box of lead balls. Once, when Maev had been away on business
in Eldacre, Grymauch had shown him the pistols. “They belonged to your father,” he had said. “One day they will be yours.”

They had spent an hour loading and firing the pieces before cleaning them and replacing them behind the hidden panel. For a highlander to be in possession of projectile weapons such as these was a hanging offense.

Kaelin loaded both pistols and tucked them into his belt. Then he replaced the panel and lifted the wine bottles back into the cabinet. Rising, he slowly climbed the stairs to his room. From the back of a drawer he pulled clear his bone-handled skinning knife. The four-inch curved blade was as sharp as any razor. Placing knife and sheath into his coat pocket, Kaelin descended the stairs to the kitchen and stepped out into the night.

A cold breeze whipped against his face. What are you doing? he asked himself. You are a boy, for heaven’s sake.

No, I am a man, he corrected himself.

I am Ravenheart.

7

L
USS
C
AMPION CLOSED
his eyes tightly, but he could still see the dead face of Chara Ward, the eyes staring sightlessly up at him. The horse stumbled beneath him, and he almost fell from the saddle.

“Hell’s bells, boy,” said Jek Bindoe, “get a grip.”

“I can’t stop thinking about her,” he told his uncle. “We did a terrible thing.”

“She asked for it. Look at my face!”

Luss did not want to look at Bindoe, but he did, seeing the four angry gashes starting under his right eye and slicing down across his lip. Luss had gashes of his own, but they were on his soul, and he feared they would never heal.

“I don’t see why I have to come with you, Uncle Jek,” said Luss. “Nobody saw me with … her.” He could not bear to say her name.

“No, but someone would have seen you when you fetched the rope. I told you to put it under your coat. Didn’t I say that? Should have listened to your uncle Jek, boy. We’ll get some coin in Scardyke, then head south. Maybe the capital. I’ve friends there. They’ll find us a berth. Truth to tell, I was getting tired of the highlands, anyway.”

He seemed untouched by the horror of the night, and Luss Campion felt as if he had wandered into a crazed nightmare.

“You shouldn’t have done it,” he said before he could stop the words.

Jek Bindoe drew rein. “We shouldn’t have done it. You stuck your meat in her, too, boy.”

“I didn’t kill her.”

“Oh, really?” Bindoe answered with a cruel smile. “You think she was dead
before
we hoisted her up?”

Luss remembered his hands on the rope. His eyes had been closed, but he had felt the weight as they had hauled her body up. Tears fell from his eyes. “We are going to burn in hell,” he said.

Jek Bindoe’s hand slashed across the youth’s cheek. “You can shut up with that,” he said harshly. “There ain’t no hell. She was just a tart. Now she’s a dead tart. Not a great loss to the world. There’s plenty of tarts. Always has been, always will be. One—or two—less don’t make no difference to nothing.”

They rode on in silence, Luss remembering the walk to the feast and the angry exchange with Taybard Jaekel. He remembered also Chara’s carefree movements as she linked arms with Kaelin Ring. Closing his eyes once more, Luss began to pray to the Source, begging forgiveness. It felt as if his prayers were seeping out into a great emptiness, echoing unheard among the stars. He made promises in his mind never, ever to commit another evil act, to spend his life doing good works. Instinctively he knew that no amount of good deeds could wash away the stain on his soul. He was damned.

They rode slowly through the darkness. Occasionally Bindoe would move up to higher ground and scan the back trail. It was unlikely, he said, that anyone would be following yet. Best to be sure, though, he told the despairing youth.

Luss half hoped they would be followed. Aye, followed and caught. Then he could hang like poor Chara Ward, and maybe his death would cancel out his sin.

Toward dawn they angled down a steep slope leading to the river. An old log bridge spanned the narrow crossing. “Best dismount and lead your horse across,” said Bindoe. “Them boards is pretty slippery this time of year.” The soldier stepped down and advanced onto the bridge. Luss followed him.

A dark shape moved into sight on the far side. “Who’s there?” called out Jek Bindoe.

“Kaelin Ring.”

“What do you want?”

“I want your heart in my hand, you murdering piece of filth.”

Luss saw that Kaelin was holding two pistols. His heart began to beat faster, and fear rose in him like a forest fire. A few moments earlier he had wanted to be caught and punished. Not now. Now he just wanted the chance to ride south with Uncle Jek.

Bindoe slowly drew his cavalry saber. “I hope you know how to use them beauties, boy,” he told Kaelin Ring. “Because I’m going to rip out your bowels if you don’t.” As he spoke, he rushed forward.

Luss saw Kaelin raise one of the pistols and pull the trigger. The flash pan flared, but no shot followed. The second pistol came up and fired. The ball smashed into Bindoe’s face, shattering the teeth on the right side of his mouth and exiting in a bloody spray over his cheekbone. He staggered and almost fell, then righted himself. With an angry roar he charged at Kaelin Ring.

Instead of running, Kaelin dropped both pistols and reached into his pocket, coming up with a small knife. Flinging the sheath aside, he darted in to meet Bindoe. The saber slashed through the air. Kaelin Ring ducked under it. The knife slid into Bindoe’s belly and ripped upward. A scream of mortal agony came from the dying soldier as his entrails spilled over the hands of his killer. Kaelin wrenched the knife up farther, then slammed it deep into Bindoe’s chest. Pushing the soldier away, Kaelin kicked him in the chest, hurling him to the boards. His guts splayed around him, Bindoe began to shake and scream. Kaelin Ring knelt beside him. Grabbing his hair, he hefted the skinning knife and carved seven letters into his brow. As he reached the seventh, Bindoe gave out one last shuddering sigh and died.

Luss Campion saw Kaelin Ring rise up from beside the body and walk toward him. His hands and arms were covered
in blood, and in his eyes there was a fury that Luss found almost inhuman.

“I’m so sorry,” he said. “So sorry. I didn’t want …”

Something cold swept across his throat. There was little pain. He tried to speak, but only a garbled noise came out. His vision swam, and he pitched to his knees. Blood was pumping from his neck. He tried to reach up and stem the flow, but Kaelin Ring pushed him to his back. The knife cut into his brow.

There was no pain.

Kaelin Ring knelt by the water’s edge in the shadow of the old log bridge. The dawn sun shone down on him, and by its light he stared at his blood-covered hands and arms, at the gore-drenched white shirt, and at the red streaks and splashes on his leggings.

The frenzy had passed now, and he felt weak and disoriented, his mind numb. He found himself looking at the reflections in the water, the glints of light sparkling on a jutting white rock, and the newly opening yellow flowers on the riverbank. He wondered what made the flowers open in sunlight and close in darkness. On the far bank he saw two rabbits emerge from their burrow. Birdsong filled the trees, and the land seemed to sigh with awakening.

Kaelin’s hands were sticky, and he plunged them into the water. The movement caused the rabbits to flee back to their burrow. Kaelin watched the blood swirl on the surface. Not so long ago the same blood was flowing in the veins of living men, now headless corpses sprawled on the bridge above. The water was cold, but Kaelin waded out into it, ducking down and scrubbing at his shirt, trying to remove the stains. He was shivering as he emerged some minutes later. The front of his shirt was still pale pink. He stripped it off and scrubbed it again, beating it against a rock until no sign of his excesses could be seen on the garment.

He had not known what to expect or what he would feel if he avenged Chara’s murder. But there ought to have been at
least a sense of satisfaction, of balance. There was none. A sweet girl was dead, and no amount of vengeance could alter that. “The blame is mine,” he whispered, remembering her words in the lane outside her home.

“I don’t care what people say, Kaelin.”

“It is not about what they say.”

“I’m not frightened of them, either. You are my friend, Kaelin. I value that friendship, and I’ll not hide it to please bigots.”

I should have refused, he thought.

And there was a deeper guilt. Grymauch had asked him if he was in love with Chara Ward. The truth was that Chara was a dear friend, no more than that. Her beauty touched his body but not his soul. He was not in love with her. It felt like betrayal of her memory even to acknowledge it. Would love have grown had she lived? Kaelin would never know now. What he did know was that a sweet and loving person had been murdered. She would never experience the joy of watching her children playing at her feet nor hold the hand of her husband as they watched a sunset. Chara Ward was gone, her life torn from her in a dark wood by evil men. Tears fell from Kaelin’s eyes. A wracking sob burst from him, and he wept again for all that Chara Ward would never know.