The Dowry Blade (27 page)

He bowed his head to Grainne.

‘Cousin,’ he said, unrepentant still, undaunted. She half raised her hand, a fluttering in the corner of his eye, no time to think what it might mean: Phelan moved swiftly. He made no attempt to harm Grainne, no bid for freedom. He dived for the balcony, the open shutter, and the freedom of the air.

Maeve’s fingers grazed his shoulder as she lunged after him but no more than that, and Phelan flung himself from the parapet, out and down, falling three storeys.

Maeve stared down in horror, her warning to Inir stark in her mind.

Far below her, Phelan stirred. His arms still pinioned, he began to crawl, with agonising slowness, forcing himself toward the river through sheer will. Maeve scarcely heard the commotion behind her, too shocked to take in what else was happening.

Brede reached Phelan first. She made no attempt to touch him; she simply stood between him and his goal, understanding what he was trying to do. If he died, he could not be forced to bear witness at any trial, there would be only her word and Sorcha’s that he had confessed, and that he implicated those others who should stand trial with him. Grainne might be accused of his murder, which would further discredit their evidence. Phelan must not be allowed to die.

So, Brede stood between the man and his drowning, and hated herself. He was bleeding and broken, and he cursed her with steady loathing. If ever cursing might be effective, this cursing should be.

Corla arrived, out of breath, and tried to assess his injuries. He screamed at her touch, and Brede pulled her swiftly away. Corla gagged quietly, heart-sickened at Phelan’s broken struggling and at Brede’s grim refusal to allow him to die.

Brede tried not to think of what she was doing. She wanted nothing more than to allow Phelan to welcome the embrace of the Scavenger – nothing.

Sorcha now, collapsing to her knees beside Phelan, setting about his healing; grim faced, icy voiced, visibly shaking. She sang, and willed his body to mend, but Phelan’s will was stronger. To heal, the body must wish to be healed. Sorcha was so tired already, and he wished to die. And still Phelan cursed.

Sorcha sat back on her heels, taking her blooded hands away from the tensed, unmoving body.

‘I can’t hold you,’ she said quietly, and the tension left Phelan in a rush, and with it, his last breath.

Brede closed her eyes, relief weakening her.

Sorcha reached out once more to Phelan, smoothing his hair. Now that he was gone, she could afford to remember him as he had been, the amusing young friend of her youth, the reckless laughing boy, the vulnerable one, always in love with someone – always in love.

‘I would not have thought this of you,’ she whispered.

Somehow she must find the strength to stand. Somehow she must get to her feet, and somehow she must tell Grainne that Phelan had beaten her. She stared without thought at Phelan’s bruised, distorted face, slackening in death. At last she held out her hand to Brede, asking for help to rise, and looked up into Brede’s face for the first time. She met an expression that she could find no words to encompass – the blindness in Brede’s eyes, the bleached-bone pallor of her skin. Brede eyes dropped to that outstretched hand and she stepped away. Sorcha made to wipe her eyes, and understood Brede’s involuntary wincing away. She wiped her hands against the thin grass, but it was not enough to clean the blood from them. Slipping on the sloping ground she forced herself to the water’s edge, plunging her hands in to the ice-cold water.

Brede helped Sorcha back to her feet, offering no apology nor explanation.

Sorcha went, trembling, to explain to Grainne.

Brede watched her go, and a sudden need to see nothing but a horizon engulfed her – no walls, no monarchs, and no witches. She closed her mind to the exhaustion in Sorcha’s walk, and allowed her to get to the gate before she started after her. She didn’t plan to go back into Grainne’s tower, or anywhere else, with Sorcha. She turned sharply towards the stables, her mind icy.

Maeve was still in Grainne’s chamber, stiffly at attention. Sorcha met her eyes, and shook her head. Maeve, to her surprise, found new depths for her despair. She had not thought to fail so completely, and she had liked Phelan – She didn’t understand why she was still standing there, why Grainne had not ordered her execution. Grainne saw the shake of Sorcha’s head and sighed.

‘I need to sleep, Sorcha. How can I sleep?’ she tried not to sound like a petulant child, but she was too distraught to be dignified.

‘I am here,’ Sorcha replied wearily.

‘No, you’ve done too much already. I’ve asked too much of you; you and Brede. Now I have tasks I do not think I can ask of either of you. Maeve shall be my guard for the next watch, and after her, Tegan, if she has returned. Find me drugs – that’s all I ask. You need rest; take as long as you need.’

Sorcha considered Grainne levelly. She translated her words –
Get away from me. I can’t bear to have you here now.

Well enough, Sorcha preferred not to be close to Grainne now either. She bent her knee, formal, contained. She put the herbs where Grainne could reach them, gathered up a cloak, and left the Queen’s quarters.

Sorcha ran down the stairs, almost blind with anger and exhaustion. The halls seem strangely unpeopled. She forced herself to stop her headlong flight, and fought for calm. This was an unnatural quiet, as though the whole city held its breath in fear. Even though several feet of stone closed off the courtyard, Sorcha could hear the flurry of pigeons on the walls. She closed her eyes. She thought of Brede, and the terrible, closed expression that had passed over her face inflicted itself upon her memory. Sorcha shivered, and pulled the cloak close about her. Walking slowly now, she stepped out of the grey light of the tower into the brightness of the courtyard that separated the tower from the barracks. She glanced up at the pigeons, lead-grey wings spread, as she passed under the arch into the practice yard. Here too there was a feeling of desertion. Across the yard then, and round to the stables. If Brede could not be found, there would at least be the horses. Macsen would be a poor substitute, but she could pretend he understood.

Grainne looked at Maeve’s immobile face.

‘You have failed me, Maeve,’ she said, ‘and now I must deal differently with those you arrested for me this day. Do you understand me?’

Maeve nodded, unwillingly.

‘You will deal with them personally. I have no choice but to believe I can still trust you. You will not fail me again.’

Grainne couldn’t bear to look at Maeve. She longed for Tegan to return, Tegan who had told her nothing but the truth, even when she hadn’t wanted to hear it. The silence stretched and she turned back to Maeve, waiting for her answer.

Maeve paled, but at last she inclined her head in response. She was a soldier, she must follow orders. She must deal with the prisoners, as soon as Tegan could be found to relieve her of her present duty. She wished abruptly that she had thrown Killan from his roof; it would have been easier – she recoiled, seeing again Phelan’s broken determination to die. Maeve took an unsteady breath, trying to imagine what must come.

I can’t,
she thought,
I can’t do it – I can’t, I can’t –

Chapter Twenty-Nine

In the familiar darkness of the stables, Brede headed straight for the corner where Guida’s tack was stored. She wrenched the bridle from the hook and slung it over her shoulder, then hauled the Plains saddle from its rest, cradling it against her chest as she moved the few steps that took her to Guida’s side. She settled the saddle hastily in place and pulled the bridle over Guida’s head. She swore bitterly as Guida pulled sharply away from her fumbling.

‘Leave the poor beast be,’ Eachan said, taking the leather from her shaking hands.

Brede tried to get her breathing under control, willing her eyes to stop smarting. Neala pulled at her elbow.

‘Which way is the wind blowing?’ she asked, her voice husky and her accent shaky. Brede looked down at her next-kin.

Towards death
she thought.

‘Kinward.’ Her voice sounded tight, even to her own ears. She ushered Neala away from Guida, who was beginning to stamp at too many people too close.

‘My kin?’ Neala asked uncertainly.

‘Yes,’ Brede said fiercely, ‘I will claim Clan Right for you. You’re blood of Wing Clan on both sides, they’ll not refuse you.’

‘Even though I sound like a city dweller? Even though I’ve no horse?’

‘Even so. Carolan will be grateful to have something of Falda again.’

‘Are you sure?’

‘Certain. And if by some lunacy he does not, you have kin in the Marshes too. My mother would welcome you with open heart.’ Brede put a reassuring hand on Neala’s shoulder, and briefly the child looked so like Falda that it stopped her breath.

‘I need to know,’ Brede said abruptly. ‘I need to know how and when and –’

Neala laid a hand over Brede’s, and nodded quickly.

‘My mother died at midwinter four years ago, of a fever. She’d been ill for a long time. Nothing particular, only that she got thin and tired and had nothing left to fight with when the fever came.’

Neala looked up at Brede’s shadowed face trying to gauge how much she should say, wanting to move away from that memory. Brede winced at that calm, adult explanation. Neala caught the look, but didn’t know what to do with it.

‘She spoke of you often. She thought you were dead. She said she saw you struck down;’ Neala made a slicing movement with the side of her hand. ‘She grieved for you, more than for any of her kin, save Carolan.’

‘She was so close? I couldn’t find her. I couldn’t see her.’

‘She had no chance to go to your aid, she was captured almost at once.’

‘By Madoc?’

‘The same.’

Brede waited for Neala to continue, but the silence dragged.

‘He sold you when Falda died?’ Brede prompted. Neala nodded, a slight movement that kept her eyes hidden. She tied knot after knot into the cloth of her belt, pulling each one tight, then wrapping the loose end around her fingers.

‘I was no use, once she was dead; a burden. He used to allow her to teach me Clan ways, provided he was there. I hardly saw her but he was there too. He wanted to know everything there was to know about the Clans.’

Brede shuddered, remembering Madoc’s offer to Grainne. Neala glanced up suddenly, a fierce grin on her face, the belt unravelled from her fingers.

‘We taught him a thing or two, before he got good enough with the language. It was days before he realised that what we’d told him was the correct greeting to another Clan was actually
I am your enemy.
’ The smile slipped. ‘He thought it amusing,’ she said, her voice utterly bleak. Brede reached out, intending comfort, but Neala shrugged her away and slipped past, to take Guida’s reins from Eachan.

Brede heard steps behind her, and turned. Sorcha’s eyes flickered from her face to the horse.

‘Leaving?’ she asked.

Brede looked away, taking the reins from Neala and twisting them.

‘I’ve fulfilled my contract.’

Sorcha rubbed her hand across her eyes. No comfort then. She gazed about the stables, grasping after some way of expressing the depth of her distress.

Eachan saw, and beckoned Neala to him.

‘Come and help me wax some saddles,’ he suggested.

Neala trailed reluctantly after Eachan.

‘I must take my next-kin back to our Clan,’ Brede said, her voice husky, angry with herself for making excuses. ‘I needed time to talk to Neala.’

‘Has it helped?’ Sorcha asked, aware of how short that time had been.

‘Yes.’

Sorcha didn’t need the saddled horse to know that Brede was on the point of walking out of her life.

‘Phelan was my friend once,’ she said at last, feeling her way through the litter of possible causes for Brede’s rejection.

Brede sighed restlessly. ‘Have mercy on your enemies.’

‘It was a long time ago. He was young, charming, ambitious, wild. The sort of man who gets his way. I suppose we all indulged him, Aeron, Grainne and I.’

Sorcha rubbed patterns into Guida’s hide, frowning.

Brede checked Guida’s girth, pretending that what Sorcha was saying was idle chatter, but when Sorcha’s voice trailed into silence, she looked up, straight into Sorcha’s eyes, too close for comfort. Brede went to collect her saddle roll.

‘Aeron indulged him more than either you or Grainne realised.’

Sorcha hunched a shoulder, bemused.

‘I think that hurts Grainne more than anything else, that she had no idea.’

‘Or because she is jealous?’

‘No, she could’ve had Phelan for the asking, but Aeron always came first with Phelan, and with Grainne. Losing her hit them both hard.’ Sorcha sighed deeply. ‘Grainne can’t cope with this.’

Brede placed the saddle roll across Guida’s back, gently shifting it to lie level. Sorcha reached a hesitant hand to stroke Brede’s fingers. Brede jerked away momentarily, then took Sorcha’s hand and turned it palm up, sniffing at it.

‘Between us – Grainne, Maeve, you and I – we killed this man who was your friend.’

Sorcha shook her head.

‘It was his choice.’

‘We drove him to that choice, and you allowed him to die.’

‘I couldn’t stop him.’

‘He cursed me, Sorcha, he cursed me with such – hatred – I could feel the words sticking to me, just as his blood stuck to your hands.’

‘Just words.’

‘No, Sorcha, no more than your songs are just words. I feel stained – marked.’

Brede rubbed her forehead gently with the side of her thumb.

‘Is that why you’re running away?’ Sorcha asked.

‘I don’t imagine I can outrun a curse, but I can’t stay here any longer.’

‘Why not?’

‘I can’t. There is no why.’ Brede lapsed into her own language suddenly. ‘The wind is blowing,’ she said softly.

Sorcha wrapped her arms about herself, seeking comfort.

‘I feel it,’ she said.

‘Feel it?’

‘The wind. I never have before, but you are right. It is no longer safe here.’

‘What about Grainne?’

‘Grainne.’ Sorcha’s voice had a sombre tone to it. ‘Grainne is an old friend. Well, I allowed one old friend to die today. Grainne has asked more of me than she has a right to, and I’ve done it, in the name of friendship, without thinking. I have allowed her needs to become my own.’

‘So, now?’

‘I can’t. I promised her.’

Brede frowned. ‘Loyalty?’ she asked.

Sorcha’s mouth twisted. ‘She still needs to try for peace; she still needs the strength I can give her. Not for long now, one way or another, and then I will be free of what Grainne needs. It must be loyalty, mustn’t it, for it feels like a burden now.’

‘What was it before?’

‘Love.’

Brede tested that word against the terrible doubt in her heart and found it still held her, there was still some spark of value there.

‘Talk to me,’ she said. ‘Tell me who you are, or what you are. Tell me why you can keep Grainne alive, why the whole course of the war depends on you – and don’t tell me it doesn’t, I won’t believe you. I am staying, but only while you talk. The wind is at my back, I will listen; but not for long.’

A slow smile spread across Sorcha’s face.

‘I love you,’ she said softly. Brede’s fingers clenched about the leather.

‘That isn’t what I meant.’

‘It is what I mean, with every bone in my body. It isn’t who or what I am, but it could be.’

‘You don’t mean that. Your sense of duty is far too strong.’

‘Is that what you think? I came here because I was running away from duty. I crept away to be with an old friend who needed me, and I left behind duty. I thought of this as an adventure, as freedom.’

‘This was freedom?’

‘Yes, but – so irresponsible; a mistake. I should have sent someone else, someone who would have kept Grainne strong, and no more. I’m too close to Grainne, I couldn’t see where I should stop, only that I could meet her needs.’

‘What are we talking about?’ Brede asked, confused. Sorcha reached suddenly, gripping Brede’s wrist.

‘Power. That is what you’re asking me, isn’t it? Who I am, what I am. You know that I am a witch. You know how strong I am.’

Brede nodded impatiently. ‘A Songspinner.’ She pulled against Sorcha’s hand; reassured that she had chosen physical force, to keep her still.

‘More,’ Sorcha continued, abandoning caution. ‘I’m
the
Songspinner.’ She shook her head suddenly. ‘I’ve been deceiving myself, in blaming Grainne. I chose every step I took. But it’s too late now. I have to finish what I’ve begun.’

‘And if you had not begun?’

‘Then I would be free to come with you – but you will not have me.’

Brede pulled free of Sorcha’s grip and took a sudden interest in Guida’s mane, finding snarls that were invisible to Sorcha.

‘Tell me what you are afraid of,’ Sorcha said. ‘Tell me what I have to do to convince you.’

Brede shook her head.

‘What does the – Songspinner? – want with me?’

‘Love.’ Sorcha said, barely a whisper. ‘Desire, need.’

‘Need?’ Brede asked doubtfully.

‘Need,’ Sorcha said firmly. ‘Like water, like air, like the movement of wind on tall grass.’

‘You don’t expect me to believe that,’ Brede asked, shaken.

‘Expect? No, but hope – for pity’s sake Brede, stop doubting me. Stop building walls and expecting me to knock them down for you. If you can trust
Grainne
, if you can
love
Tegan; you can show
me
a reason for my meagre hope.’

Brede slapped Guida’s shoulder, edging her out of the way. Very slowly she stepped forward so that she was within touching distance of Sorcha. Sorcha risked a glance at Brede’s eyes. She could see no softening of Brede’s resolve, no understanding. She tried to swallow the tight knot of distress that choked her.

Brede’s fingers traced the spasm in Sorcha’s throat, barely touching, a flicker of flesh against flesh.

‘It isn’t the same,’ Brede said. ‘I hope for nothing from Grainne, so it costs very little to trust her. I resisted Tegan; I put my life in her hands, but never my heart.’ She lifted her hand, caressing the side of Sorcha’s face. Even to think of the trust she had offered Sorcha was to be reminded of desire, which seemed like a betrayal now. ‘So much power,’ she said, and her voice was no more than breath. ‘You frighten me.’

Sorcha reached a hesitant hand to Brede’s hair, which was coming loose from its bindings.

‘Stay.’

Brede laughed – a strange sound, like anger – like despair.

‘I can’t.’

‘Stay,’ Sorcha said, again, more assertively.

Brede pulled free, alarmed at the quickening in her blood at Sorcha’s touch.

‘I can’t,’ she said, very gently. ‘I have to get Neala away.’

‘Will you come back?’ Sorcha asked, watching for a shift in Brede’s granite resistance.

‘No,’ Brede said at last. ‘Once I’m back with Wing Clan, I’ll not return.’

‘If you didn’t have to go, would you stay with me?’ Sorcha asked, echoing Brede’s question.

Brede thought, and thought, and finally reached out to hold Sorcha.

‘How can I say what I think, or what I hope? I can’t speak my heart. There are no words.’

‘So?’ Sorcha asked, hoping that the tremor in Brede’s arms spoke of passion.

‘So,’ Brede said. ‘This is where we stand.’

‘So,’ Sorcha echoed, ‘you will go to Wing Clan.’

‘Yes.’

Sorcha reached to pull Brede closer.

‘But not until morning?’

‘First light,’ Brede said firmly.

‘Sunrise,’ Sorcha compromised, winding her arms about Brede tenderly; feeling the tremors still, resistance ending.

‘Sunrise,’ Brede agreed.