Wolfskin (61 page)

“Hush,” Rona said, patting Nessa's shoulder, “hush now, little one. I'm
very well, as you see. This girl's been nothing but kind to me, though she's weary and sick and full of sadness, and I can't understand a word she says. Hush your weeping, now. I know what happened at the Whaleback. That's a morning will never be forgotten. A terrible sorrow; a great wrong. Knowing such evils are to come makes bearing them no easier. You must sit down, Nessa. Here. And get this soup into you, girl. There's a task to be done, and your mind won't be fit for it if you neglect to nourish your body. There, now. Dry your tears.”

“I have—I made—”

“Shh. Drink the soup first. Then tell us.” Rona's deep eyes were calm, watching as Nessa ate broth and bread, as Guard feasted on crusts and scraps of mutton bone. Margaret did not eat. She stood silent by the fire, waiting.

“How can I tell her?” Nessa whispered when the meal was over. “What I carry here is…it is the final witness to her husband's murder, the only voice that cannot be denied. You remember what I was told.
Find the truth in ash and bone.
Already this harp speaks, though the last string is not yet wound tight. How can I say it? She'll think me no better than grave-robbing carrion.”

Rona nodded. “Tell her the truth. What else can you do?”

“You must explain yourself now,” Margaret said. “Speak in this language so that I can understand. There's to be no more talk in the island tongue. I must be careful here; how do I know I can trust you? Tell me why you are on this land, and where you are going. Tell me how you escaped the…tell me how you got away from the Whaleback, that morning. Show me what you carry in this bag. And be quick about it. I have many armed men here, and I am under no obligation to help you.”

“I understand. Still, we share a bond as women, the three of us, and I see honesty in your face, as I did the last time we met,” Nessa said. What was this girl doing here, all by herself among guards in an isolated cottage? Wasn't she Somerled's sister-in-law? Why wasn't she at his court? “I helped you then, or tried to. Did you make use of the charm I gave you?”

Margaret's lips tightened. Nessa noticed how thin she had grown, thin and worn, the skin of the cheeks pale and dry, the eyes shadowed. Her hands were clenched together, her shoulders tense.

“It doesn't matter,” Margaret snapped. “That's past now. Tell me. Give me answers, and quickly.”

Nessa's heart was pounding. There was no right way to say this. “Before
I do that, I would thank you for giving Rona refuge here. I don't know how that came about, but it is no longer safe for my folk to wander abroad, and I recognize that your kindness has probably saved her life.” She turned to Rona. “I said thank you,” she told the wise woman in her own tongue. “For putting up with you, that is. You're a stubborn old woman, and too brave for your own good.”

“It was no trouble,” Margaret said gravely. “Your friend makes undemanding company, and she's earned her keep cooking for the men, though I could do without her herbal teas. Now go on. I need your account of yourself. They say you are King Engus's close kin. I did not know that the day I came to your dwelling. You must have thought me somewhat ill-mannered.”

Nessa managed a smile. “No, my lady. I thought you a little misguided, but courageous and open. You've given me no cause to change my mind, even though your people have cut down my own with heedless savagery. I need your help tonight. I must make my way to Somerled's hall. I must be there by dawn. I need a horse, and I need you to let me pass unhindered.”

Margaret's eyes widened. “That, surely, would be the height of folly,” she said. “If you are indeed Engus's kin, you should go anywhere but there. If Somerled knew you lived, he would see you only as an enemy and a threat to his authority. You should leave the islands forever. To travel to the settlement spells only death or captivity for you. Why would you do it? You do not seem a foolish girl.”

“I can explain. But…this will be very shocking to you; it will distress you greatly.”

“I can't consider letting you go unless you tell me what you're doing,” Margaret said gravely. “My husband was chieftain here. I have a certain responsibility.”

Nessa could not hold back a flare of sudden anger. “Forgive me,” she said, “but is not that responsibility somewhat shadowed now that your husband's men have hacked down my kinsmen and taken my kinswomen captive? You should hang your head in shame that our good king was burned in his hall, and the ancient seat of the Folk made into a bloody killing field, only because your husband's people chose to set foot on these islands. This place has been our home since the time before memory. You tell me to leave forever. It is I who should bid you leave, I think. Your responsibility should have been to stop those acts of slaughter. It is too late now.”

Margaret stood very still. Her lips were a thin line. The restless hands clutched and twisted together.

“If it is too late,” she said in a whisper, “then why are you here?”

“Ah,” said Nessa. “Will you listen? Will you listen until I am finished?”

Margaret gave a tight nod.

So Nessa told the tale: how they had found Eyvind and sheltered him, how she had spoken to him about Ulf's murder, and how the Wolfskin had confirmed what the Folk already knew in their hearts for truth. Somerled had killed his own brother because he wanted what Ulf had: land, power, chieftainship. She did not say what trembled on the tip of her tongue: that perhaps Somerled wanted Ulf's wife as well. That part of it was Margaret's; the truth of what was between those two would probably never be told. Nessa described Eyvind's stand against the men who would have captured Rona; she told how he had gone to confront Somerled, and escaped, and how he had given himself up so that Nessa might go free. There was a part of the tale she left out; it was just as well, she thought, that Rona could not follow the details of this narrative, for the wise woman was an acute interpreter of the unspoken. And Nessa could barely utter her warrior's name without trembling, without feeling such conflict inside her that she was hard-pressed to keep her mind on what must be done. She had made a promise, a deep and solemn one. Just how she would keep it was a matter for later, once the task was complete.

Margaret listened in silence. At one point she bowed her head; later she sat down and put her hands over her face. It was not so much a reaction of shock, more the response of one who sees that her worst imaginings are indeed true.

The hardest part was still to come. “I need to ask you,” Nessa said carefully, “if, in the old tales of your people, the stories of Thor and—and Odin, and your ancestors, there are any that touch on—” She glanced helplessly at Rona, but Rona only shrugged, unable to comprehend the foreign words, though her eyes showed she had an idea of what it was that Nessa wrestled with. “Among our tales, there is one about a princess drowned by her sister,” Nessa went on, her voice shaking. “Her body floats downstream and a miller finds it. He makes a—he makes a harp from her bones and hair and carries it to the king's court, and there it plays a terrible tune, a song that relates the tale of the wrong that was done.” She was unable to look Margaret in the eyes. “Have you any such stories? Do the people from the snow lands know of the instrument of bone, which speaks only truth? The undeniable witness?”

Margaret said not a word. She rose and took two steps forward, and with trembling fingers she reached to draw back the wrapping, revealing
the graceful, small harp gleaming in the firelight, the neat pegs of finger bone, the twists of sea wrack that bound the joints, the dark, silent strings. The harp quivered of itself.
Ulf…
it hummed low.
Ulf…chieftain…

Margaret's face was gray, her eyes dark pools of horror. She stepped back, made a choking noise, and fled out the back door of the cottage. Sounds of painful retching could be heard, punctuated by strangled gasps for air. Nessa's heart was pounding; she made to go after the other girl.

“No,” said Rona. “Leave her be. There's nothing ails her that time and a bit of hard thinking won't cure, poor lass. Now tell me. I see what you've made, and I know what it's for. I'm impressed. You summoned the Seal Tribe? That was risky. What did they want in return?”

“They didn't ask me for anything,” Nessa said, shivering. “Not yet, anyway. The Hidden Tribe helped me, too. All played a part.”

“It's as well the old ones are stirring.” The old woman's voice was grave. “There aren't many of us left. That day on the Whaleback, the flower of our people was plucked before its time. Say you get to court with this harp, and it tells its tale, and people believe it. What then? The Folk are weakened almost beyond saving, and these Norsemen have weaponry and numbers. Maybe you persuade them this cruel chieftain is not the best leader they have, but what do you see them doing about it? They'll set up another in his place and start the whole thing again.”

“This is not like you,” frowned Nessa. “Where is your faith? Where's your belief? We cannot fail. Truth must win here, truth and goodness. Eyvind will help me…” Her voice trailed off.

“Oh, yes?” Rona asked, brows raised.

“If I can reach him in time,” Nessa whispered. “If I can get there before Somerled kills him. Trust me, Rona. I haven't forgotten that I am a priestess.”

Margaret was coming back; she held herself very straight, shoulders square, head high, as if determined to show she was a noblewoman, and in control. She walked past the harp, not looking now, and sat rigidly upright on the bench by the hearth.

“Cover it up,” she said. “I don't want to see it. Did you—no, I can't say it—was it you—?”

“I made this,” Nessa told her gently. “I am a priestess of the mysteries. Our faith has sustained us since the days of the oldest ancestors; it has guided us since time before time. Its pathways are found in the depths of earth and ocean, the eternal patterns of sun and moon. I have studied the
ways of it since I was a small child, and Rona has been my wise teacher. There is a solemn ritual for the making of such charms. Both the taking and the returning are carried out with deepest respect. If you visited your husband's grave mound tomorrow, you would see it quite untouched. Would not Ulf want justice? This is the only way he can have a voice here, my lady. Let us grant him the right to speak. Once that is done, he can rest peacefully in this place that he loved and honored. Ulf was a good man; what happened here was not his doing, though it was his desire for voyaging that began it. We owe it to him, and to King Engus, and to all the fine men whose blood has been shed in this dark time, to carry this witness to Somerled's hall and ensure the future of the islands does not descend into chaos and darkness. I need your help, Margaret. Without you, I cannot be there in time.”

“You can see I'm sick,” Margaret said flatly. “Sick and weary. What help could I be? You told me yourself, it's too late now. I should have stopped him, I should have been strong enough. I did try. I thought I could sway him, I thought he would listen to me as he did in those early days. But he wouldn't listen. Nobody would listen, they're afraid to speak out, since they know what he can do to them. In such a place as this, there's great power for the taking, if a man is bold enough. I spoke, and he sent me away so he didn't have to hear me. Nothing has gone right here, nothing. I was angry at first to be banished from his court, but now I'm glad. Out here, I don't have to think about those things. I don't have to think about anything.”

The voice was expressionless, but Nessa saw the trembling of the young widow's hands, the clenched jaw; she saw what it was costing Margaret to maintain that tightly held control. There were tears very close, but on no account would Margaret allow them to fall.

“Is it love that weakens your will for justice?” Nessa asked softly. “Love for a man in whom, against all the evidence of your eyes, you still see some spark of goodness? Or do you not believe what I have told you of the manner of your husband's death? There is a voice here, which can give you indisputable proof of the truth, if you will let it speak.”

“Love?” Margaret whispered. “Love weighs nothing in this balance. I have come beyond caring. There is no point in it.”

“Would you give up so easily?” Nessa asked her. “How old are you, my lady?”

Taken by surprise, Margaret answered automatically. “Seventeen. Old enough to learn a woman's opinion means nothing in a world where men
play all the games that matter. Old enough to know how it feels to be discarded once I am no longer deemed to be of value.” She bit back more words; her eyes glinted with tears.

“You and I are of an age,” Nessa told her. “You have decided not to act. That is your choice. I will tell you what I will do tonight. I will get on a horse and ride to Somerled's hall. I will walk into that place and demand to be seen. I am Engus's only surviving kin, and the last of the royal line in the Light Isles. In that court, I will be surrounded by enemies. And I am afraid, believe me. There I will speak of the way Somerled murdered his brother, and brought darkness to this fair place. And I will release the voice of the only true witness to that crime. Your people are not all bad; they are merely slaves of fear and of custom. I hope this voice will awaken them, and open their eyes to what is true and just. There are women and children of my own folk captive in that settlement, Margaret. The Wolfskin is a prisoner there, and Somerled will silence him forever if I do not reach him by dawn.”

“The Wolfskin? You mean Eyvind?” Once more Margaret was startled into speech. “Somerled would never kill Eyvind. He loves him. Eyvind is the only person he has ever really cared about.”

Nessa nodded. “Perhaps that is why he will do it, because he cannot bear to see his own reflection in his friend's eyes: the image of a man who has failed utterly in his life's great ambition. This is no king, it is no more than a warped and crazy shadow of a leader, deformed by the cruelty he carries within him and can never be rid of. The sound of truth on his dearest friend's lips must cut him like a knife. I cannot say what is in Somerled's mind. But I am a priestess, and I hear the voices of the spirit. I know that if I do not leave soon, it will be too late. Stay here if you will. It is your choice to shut your eyes to the truth as soon as it becomes too hard to bear. It is your choice to block out what is too difficult for you. Never mind what your husband wanted. Never mind the courage I once saw in your eyes, when you sought me out at great danger to yourself. That strong girl has disappeared. At seventeen, you have become a frightened old woman. I see that you are sick; I suppose that is an excuse of sorts. Give me a horse, Margaret, and let me go unpursued. Let me go now. That's all I'm asking.”