Uncertain Magic (41 page)

Earnest gripped her elbow.
Come with me, Roddy
, he pleaded.
Get out of here
.

"No!" she said furiously. "I won't go. I'm not afraid of the people here—they'd never hurt us. Never. I
know
that, Earnest."

"The people be damned," Earnest shouted. "It's this—"

He broke off as a heavy pounding came at the door. In the heat of the moment Roddy had been aware of nothing but her brother's fury, but now the agitation seemed to spread as her gift expanded. Outside she heard the scuffle of many feet as Martha shoved open the heavy wood.

"Beggin' your pardon. Beggin' your pardon, Your Lordship, but Mr. O'Sullivan says to tell you there's redcoats coming up the hill!"

For an instant the scene seemed frozen, with the cottiers crowding behind Martha in silence and Roddy and Earnest standing in suspended confrontation. Then Faelan moved, swinging out the door and pushing through his workers, leaving Roddy and her brother in front of the glowing hearth.

Roddy picked up her skirts without a word and dashed after Faelan. She knew Earnest followed close behind, his tirade forgotten in sudden fear that he was too late now to rescue his sister from anything.

It was a picture of eerie familiarity in front of the great house, with Faelan standing on the steps with the wind in his face. This time, though, instead of the gathering of tenants and cottiers facing him, they were turned away, looking down the hill, watching uneasily as the company of redcoats approached.

Unlike the easygoing militia that had bivouacked and held halfhearted maneuvers for a few months on the road to Glenbeigh, this detachment marched with the discipline of experienced soldiers. Roddy tried to count, and lost the number after she reached a hundred rows of three abreast. Along with a mounted officer at the column's head were two riders who appeared to be civilian. As they neared, Roddy drew stiff in recognition.

Mr. Willis and Rupert Mullane. And with them, in full uniform and complete control of his horse, was the captain who had danced with Fionn on the night of the fairy ball.

Roddy felt for a moment that she could not breathe. It took no talent at all to read what was in their faces, these men who came with guns and soldiers at their backs.

Earnest stood behind Roddy, his hands tense and protective on her arms. As the scarlet company halted in front of the house and re-formed under hoarse shouted orders, she felt MacLassar come trotting up belatedly. He plopped down on the step beside her. The crowd of cottiers was growing as more laborers came straggling up from the fields below.

It was a complex shift of mood and emotion that came to Roddy through her gift: too many people and reactions to seem more than a babble rising in intensity. She caught the ugly turn of feeling as Willis was recognized, and a spurt of pure violence toward his deputy, Mullane.

Faeian had seemed a devil once, but now the memory of Mullane and his horsewhip burned stronger than any fading fears of their new lord.
Oh, aye—Mullane. He was the bully buck He was the rogue. Didn't he raise the rack rent, and put a man out if it pleased him? Didn't he come beddin' an honest man's daughter, and hold the cattle and bid 'em out to strangers, and pull a man off his own wee harvest to do the big men's work
?

They looked at Mullane and hated, and Mullane looked back and feared.

Within the turmoil of the crowd, Roddy could glean no more from Rupert or Mr. Willis than that angry nervousness. Their reason for riding with the redcoats was lost in the swell of emotion.

The officer rode forward. The tumult of voices quieted, though the buzz of heated thought did not.

For a long minute of silence, he looked at Faeian. Roddy kept her eyes down, terrified, wishing her husband would fade back in the crowd, try to prevent the inevitable recognition. But he stood there, alone on the stairs, as striking and arrogant as Finvarra himself.

Finvarra. King of the Fairies of the West.

The captain had long suspected he'd been made a fool. Now, facing this mansion and Faelan's unmistakable blue gaze, he knew it as certainty.

Anger blazed in the officer, agonizing memory of the embarrassment he'd suffered, the ridicule from higher authority, the final indignity of transferral to another command when he'd persisted in broadcasting his folly. But now, as then, there was no way to call the fantastical bluff without exposing himself to scorn.

"Captain Norton Roberts," he snapped. "Under command of General Sir James Stewart. I've orders to effect the surrender of all arms, pikes, and ammunition in this district."

The crowd stirred, a mixture of fear and defiance. Faelan simply waited.

His calm, faintly mocking smile fueled Roberts' temper. The captain spurred forward to the foot of the steps as he had done once before. "You are Lord Iveragh?" he demanded.

"Yes."

"Then I place upon you the full responsibility of collection. We have reports that three hundred pikes and four thousand stand of smuggled arms have been concealed in this neighborhood. You have twenty-four hours from this moment to lay them before me."

The fear spread suffocating fingers from Roddy's stomach to her throat. Twenty-four hours. God, oh, God—where had Geoffrey taken the guns?

"I do not accept any such responsibility," Faelan said.

"I'd advise you to reconsider that, Your Lordship. My orders are to free-quarter my men. If the arms are withheld, I turn them loose to forage."

Almost imperceptibly, a muscle tightened in Faelan's jaw.

The captain caught that betrayal. His frown transformed to a wicked grin. "In fact, Your Lordship… I venture to predict we'll lay the country waste."

Mr. Willis started forward. "There's no need for that, Captain. I've lodged the information. An arrest, a simple arrest, is all that's necessary."

If not for Earnest's support, Roddy thought her knees would have collapsed beneath her.

Captain Roberts glanced at his informant with unconcealed annoyance. "We're here to recover the arms, Mr. Willis. There'll be no arrests without due process."

"But I've proof of his connection with Cashel—I've shown you the message I intercepted. That seditious rogue is hidden here now—" Willis flung out his hand. "Look at this place. It commands the whole bay. Iveragh's fortifying it, by God—he's gathered every ruffian in the district in to speed the process. The law's in your hands, man. Arrest him. Tear the house apart and you'll find Lord Cashel, I swear it. One judicious arrest, and you've cut off the dragon's head."

"I am not Saint George, Mr. Willis." Captain Roberts was sour and chagrined, but he was no hothead. He disliked Willis, and after the experience of the fairy ball, he was exceedingly tired of having people point out his supposed errors of perception, most particularly in public. "I shall carry out my orders as I see fit, without recourse to your schemes of petty revenge. Notes can be forged."

Amid the threatening murmur from the crowd, Willis flushed with shame and rage. "He's a damned traitor, with his damned cropped hair and French airs—"

"
Mr. Willis
." Roberts' voice slashed across the other man's. "I'm well aware that Lord Iveragh has put you out of a comfortable living. That hardly renders him a traitor. I think you'd be advised to keep a civil tongue before you find His Lordship has you up on charge of libel."

"Thank you," Faelan said. "I hadn't thought of that."

Captain Roberts glared at Faelan, a look that warned. The officer had set himself a goal now, and that was to play Faelan as neatly as he himself had been played that night of the fairy ball. The officer knew the elaborate distraction had hidden something. Roberts was just as convinced of Faelan's treason as Willis, but the arrest of a peer on such flimsy evidence as vague notes and cropped hair could backfire all too easily.

The captain had seen the newly planted fields and the livestock and stores of food and grain that Lord Iveragh had imported. Roberts guessed with deadly accuracy that for Faelan the potent threat of free-quarters would be a more subtle and devastating victory than Willis' clumsy efforts.

As the officer sat there on his horse, well pleased with himself and his plans, Roddy felt her talent slip away. She turned, though she did not have to, knowing already that Senach was near.

He stood behind Faelan on the stairs, his blank gaze focused out beyond the red-coated company to the sea.

Roberts' horse moved restlessly. Then suddenly it shied, rushing into Willis' and aiming a kick that barely missed. In a thunder of hooves the other horses began to twist and rear, reeling out of control toward the scarlet row of soldiers. Discipline held the line until Willis lost his seat and his mount careered right through the column, knocking men aside and narrowly missing a murderous kick at the color-bearer's head. The soldiers broke and scattered. Roddy screamed, struggling in Earnest's grip as she saw a man take aim with a pistol at the officer's raging mount.

The animal quieted instantly.

The soldier paused, looking up from his sighting as if he weren't sure whether or not to fire. But Roberts was in control again, and the man apparently thought the better of shooting a horse out from under his senior officer.

Willis and Mullane were both on the ground. In a sweep of bannered tails and thunder, their mounts fled away down the hill.

Mullane struggled to sit up, but Willis lay twisted and utterly still. Another infantryman knelt over him, and looked up at his captain.

"Sir. He's gone and broke his neck, sir."

Roddy put her hands to her mouth and closed her eyes. . "Jesus," Earnest said under his breath.

She heard Roberts ride forward again. "Lieutenant!" There was a peculiar, controlled note in the captain's voice. "Have him taken inside."

"Forgive me," Faelan said coldly. "But I don't think I'm required to provide shelter for the body of a man who has just accused me of treason. I suggest you remove him from my property."

With the force of a blast furnace, Roddy's talent returned. She opened her eyes and saw Roberts' face; his fear and fury filled her as it had once before. He could not explain it, had no reason or logic to uphold it, but he knew in his soul that he'd been mocked again.
You did this
, his mind screamed.
How
?

This time, he knew better than to demand answers aloud. In a low, furious voice, he ordered a stretcher, and watched as Willis' body was loaded upon it. The men formed again in their blood-red columns. Roberts wheeled his horse and confronted Faelan.

"Don't think," he hissed, "that this means Willis' accusations are forgotten." He backed his horse and raised his voice so that all could hear. "We'll withdraw for one night, Your Lordship. One night."

With a snapped order, the troops fell in to march. Rupert Mullane struggled to his feet, glanced at the crowd of cottiers that began to flood into the forecourt in the army's wake, and began a limping run. He caught up with Roberts, and was trotting alongside, reaching out to lay an imploring hand on the officer's boot, when Roberts kicked him away and put his mount to a canter. The cottiers began to laugh and call out insults. Mullane was left to keep up with the soldiers as best he could.