Firebrand (Rebel Angel Series)

by Gillian Philip

  I grinned back. ‘That’s different, then. Innit?’

  Sheathing my sword, I held out my hand.

  Sheathing his, he took it.

  When we caught up with the others, camped for a few hours’ rest, I took him straight to Conal. Torc looked at Aonghas, then at Reultan, then at my brother.

  ‘Burnt my friggin’ boats,’ he said cheerfully. ‘I’m your bondsman now, Cù Chaorach. You idealistic—’

  The word he used was blunt, and succinct, and as Anglo-Saxon as he was. And the disgusted horror on Reultan’s face is a memory I treasure to this day.

  36

  They were expecting us.

  What’s more, the dun was impregnable. That was how it was meant to be. That was how Griogair had made it, and Conal after him, and the rest of us had pitched in. Knowing it was our own fine work didn’t cheer us up.

  Calman Ruadh came out with two of his lieutenants to stand on the parapet. He didn’t jeer, only looked down at us with a smirk and limitless contempt.

  ‘If he lets his block down for one second,’ said Reultan coolly, ‘I’ll make his ears bleed.’

  I gave Torc a sidelong glance, and he raised his eyebrows.

  ‘Nice to see you entering into the spirit, Reultan,’ I said.

  ‘No point going along with this lunacy if I don’t,’ she retorted.

  ‘Is it true she’s a witch?’ Torc muttered in my ear.

  ‘Heavens, no,’ I said loudly. ‘We’re not allowed to call her a witch.’

  ‘Give it a rest,’ said Conal, but his heart wasn’t in it. He was too busy studying the walls and the defences, not to mention the three corpses dangling by their necks against the north wall. Two men and a woman. All ours.

  ‘They weren’t keen on defending the dun, Cù Chaorach,’ shouted Calman Ruadh. ‘Slackers. You’re better off without them.’

  ‘Don’t answer him, Conal,’ growled Aonghas. ‘Don’t give him the satisfaction.’

  Conal ground his teeth but he said nothing.

  I took a couple of paces forward to get a better look at the usurper. His pale red hair was cropped close to his skull. His eyes were pale too, and his eyelashes. He was a striking-looking bugger, I’ll give him that.

  ‘Calman Ruadh,’ I yelled. ‘When I cut off your balls should I feed them to my wolf or my horse? Or should I just feed them to you to stop your squealing?’

  Reultan tutted, but Aonghas laughed. ‘Murlainn, what are we going to do with you?’ He dug me hard in the ribs. ‘And what would we do without you?’

  ‘Let’s hope you never find out,’ I said. I liked Aonghas better, now that he wasn’t my captain anymore. I was never going to like Reultan, but there you go, you can’t have everything.

  ‘Be good little traitors,’ shouted Calman Ruadh, ‘and wait there till I decide what to do with you. Come any closer to the dun, this one joins her father.’

  He yanked a small figure to the parapet beside him.

  ‘Gods,’ I said. Nobody else managed to speak.

  Uilleann’s nine-year-old daughter, the one he’d fathered on a wild night in the dun after a battle. She wasn’t Raineach’s, but Raineach had been fond enough of her to look after her when her mother was killed. I remembered her in the forge as a three-year-old, half-hiding behind Eili, daringly sticking out her tongue at me. The child’s hands were tied in front of her. She was trying not to tremble. There was a thin rope around her neck.

  ‘I let this one live.’ Calman Ruadh was loving this. ‘Thought she might come in handy.’

  ‘I made up my mind,’ I growled bitterly. ‘He can eat his own.’ But I’d lost my sense of humour now. No-one else laughed, either.

  ‘I’ll dangle her over the wall. Wouldn’t want to break her pretty neck, it’s awful fragile. Now, wait there like I told you. You leave, she dangles, but I need a while to plan some entertainments. Cù Chaorach, I’m looking forward to gelding your brother with a blunt knife.’

  ‘Shit,’ I muttered. ‘Me and my big mouth.’

  * * *

  ‘Anybody wants to throw themselves on Kate’s mercy, that’s fine with me.’ Conal looked like a black dog was biting his backside.

  Some of them must have been thinking about it, but nobody said anything. Yet.

  ‘Surprise attack?’ said Righil. He was reciting a rulebook for the sake of it.

  ‘You want to watch the child choke?’ asked Conal bleakly. ‘The last of Uilleann’s offspring? I don’t.’

  ‘Somebody needs to open the dun gate,’ said Raonall. ‘Otherwise we’re stuffed.’

  ‘That’s what they tried to do.’ Carraig jerked his head at the dun wall, where the crows were squabbling and hacking at the three bodies. ‘Nobody else will get near it.’

  ‘Oh, yes. Yes, they will.’ I rubbed my temples with my thumbs, wondering why I was opening my mouth again, after what happened last time. ‘I’ll do it.’

  Conal said, ‘You can’t.’

  ‘I’ve told you before, don’t patronise me.’ I wouldn’t look at him. ‘Of course I’ll do it. I’ll climb the wall and open the sodding gates, all right?’

  They were all staring at me, none with more horror than Catriona.

  ‘You want to die?’ barked Conal.

  ‘No.’ I went on fiercely rubbing my temples, glaring at the ground. ‘I don’t want to be gelded, either. However sharp the knife is.’

  Conal watched me for a long time. I didn’t meet his gaze but I could feel it.

  ‘All right,’ he said at last.

  ‘All right.’ My heart sank.

  ‘And since you’re into miracles? Get the girl out first.’

  * * *

  Of all the people I might have expected at my shoulder that night, she was the last.

  ‘You know the girl’s as good as dead,’ said Reultan crisply.

  ‘That’s what I like about you. You’re so positive and so damn nurturing.’ I stared at the dun wall as I rubbed wet earth across my naked chest and arms and belly. Behind me Catriona was dealing with my back and shoulders. ‘Can you cast a spell on that moon, by any chance?’

  It was like a great white lantern. Couldn’t have been a worse night. I had doubts about getting across the stretch of empty machair that lay between me and the dun, let alone up the walls.

  ‘No,’ she said. Thoughtfully she eyed me. ‘You missed a bit. There. You’re as pale as a slug. He’ll kill the girl whether Conal yields or not.’

  ‘I’m aware of that.’ I had to say it through gritted teeth.

  Catriona rubbed mud down my spine, making me shiver. I loved the way she wasn’t complaining or whining or trying to talk me out of it. Half of me wished she would. She was ignoring Reultan, and Reultan was pretending Catriona didn’t exist.

  Calman Ruadh had us besieged, despite appearances. There was nothing Conal could do, and in the morning his men would begin to drift away, either to go into the wilds, captainless, or to throw themselves on Kate’s mercy as she had always known they would.

  Or Conal could rally them and make his attack, and sacrifice the child. She was going to die anyway, everyone knew it. His fighters would think better of him for it, or at least they’d trust even more to his will and his strength. Conal, though, would never forgive himself.

  He might do it. I didn’t think he would but he might, and it would kill his soul. Cold iron within: what we dreaded most. I had to try this for him, and I had to do it for Raineach. Stupid. It wasn’t as if Raineach or indeed Uilleann would ever care again.

  ‘It’ll be next to impossible to block and concentrate on climbing,’ remarked Reultan.

  Catriona’s fingers stilled on my spine, trembling.

  Damn the woman. I rolled my eyes. ‘I’m also aware of that.’

  ‘So don’t even try,’ she said coolly. ‘I’ll deal with it.’

  Hesitating, I eyed her mistrustfully. ‘You can do that?’

  ‘It won’t be easy, but I suggest you trust me. You haven’t really got an option.’r />
  ‘I don’t care who your mother is, you can’t break into the mind of every fighter on those battlements.’

  ‘You’re right: I can’t affect them all. But I can do it to you. The only thing is for me to block your mind.’

  ‘Let you,’ I said slowly, ‘block my mind?’

  She shrugged. ‘Take it or leave it.’

  I did not like the idea of Reultan being anywhere near my mind, let alone messing about with it. Catriona’s hand lay on my back like a warning, but Reultan was right: I didn’t have a choice. ‘All right. You get me killed, I swear I’ll come back and haunt you.’

  ‘I quite believe it, but you won’t scare me. I shall throw wine goblets through your wailing insubstantial ghost. Now you’d better get started. You’ll have to take your time. As far as their eyes are concerned, you’re on your own.’

  As she stalked off, Catriona slipped her arms round my waist. ‘I hate her.’

  ‘Know the feeling.’

  ‘Is she telling the truth? Will she protect you?’

  I put an arm round her shoulder. ‘Don’t know. I’d better get on with it anyway.’

  ‘You’re cold.’

  ‘I’ll soon warm up.’ All the same I put my arms round her and let her body heat soak into me. Her face was pressed against my neck. Must be getting dirty. I didn’t mind. She didn’t seem to either. Still, even through the mud I could feel her face was wet.

  ‘You’ll make me streaky,’ I said.

  Her jerky laugh was that little silent gasp she used to make when she was mute. ‘Please come back,’ she mumbled.

  ‘I love you,’ I said. And then the moon slid behind a wisp of cloud, and I had to make myself pull away.

  Conal and Reultan and Aonghas were watching me. As I turned towards the dun and took a breath, I felt something like sheet ice slam down across my brain. I winced. It felt so strange I curled my bare toes into the coarse damp grass, just to ground myself in reality again. And then, while the moon hid its face and dark shadow patterned the machair, I ran.

  37

  I’m under no illusions. I know what got me across the machair without twenty arrows in my ribcage. Undoubtedly I couldn’t have done it without Reultan, but that would not have been enough. And my fieldcraft is good, but that wouldn’t have been enough either. Not without the help of Calman Ruadh’s men.

  I ran low and fast, half-crouched, darting from shadow to shadow and flattening myself against the earth at any movement on the parapet. I wore only trews, mud, and a dirk at my waist. My head was already beginning to throb with Reultan’s intrusion, but that was a pain I could ignore. At least I didn’t have to worry about maintaining a block of my own against searching hostile minds. Adrenalin screamed through my veins, and I had that feeling again of being naked and flayed. Any of the guards on the parapet could turn at any moment, look my way, but they didn’t. Some of it was luck. Most of it was arrogance. They knew they’d won.

  Two of them turned and leaned over the parapet. I lay in a scrape of earth, still as a hare, watching them as they bellowed insults at Conal and his men. There was laughter behind them, and another figure was dragged up to the parapet wall, hands bound, a rope round his neck. I was glad that at least it was an adult figure, because they looped the rope round a buttress of stone, wrestled him to the edge, and lowered him slowly. The man kicked and struggled, choking on the end of the rope in the moonlight. It lasted a long time, and he died to the sound of their jeers, but it’s a pity he couldn’t appreciate how much his death helped me. I got to the base of the dun wall while the moon lit his death struggles and Calman Ruadh’s fighters hooted their derision at Conal. Nobody looked at a shadow moving across the machair into the deeper shadow of the dun.

  I sat with my back against the dun wall and looked at the moon for a while. I needed to get my breath back, and I needed to think. I was surprised at how afraid I was.

  ‘Smaller one next time, Cù Chaorach!’ I heard Calman Ruadh’s voice echo across the machair. ‘Keep your distance.’

  I held my breath till it hurt, waiting for him to shout The girl’s as good as dead and so’s your sneaking brother, but there was only silence, apart from occasional laughter and a muffled weeping from within the dun. Conal must have tried a feinting move, or even an advance. The death of the prisoner had been nothing to do with me, unless he’d done it to distract them. They hadn’t seen me. Don’t be such a damn coward, I told myself.

  This wasn’t the keep wall. I’d climbed this a hundred times or more. No-one could see me. No-one could see me. What was I scared of? Not seeing Catriona again? Dying now and leaving her to live and die without me? Abandoning her to Calman Ruadh and his men? I hoped Conal would have the sense to cut her throat before she was taken. I hoped he’d have the time.

  Now I needed to stop thinking.

  I wiped my palms on my trews and ran them over cold remorseless stone. I knew this stone, it was hacked out of my land, the blood and sweat of my ancestors ran through it like veins of quartz. The stone was fine. It was mine. My fingertips found a crevice; my toes found another. I climbed.

  I hadn’t bargained on how much my head would hurt. Reultan’s block was like ice against my brain. Halfway to the top I had to stop and hang there like a desperate spider, grinding my forehead into the wall to make the stinging stop. I wondered if she was doing it deliberately. For long moments I couldn’t see for the pain, and I twisted my forehead against the stone till the skin broke. At least it took my mind off the terrible throbbing pain inside it, but now there was a trickle of blood running into my eyebrows, and in seconds I was having to blink it out of my eyes.

  Voices above me. I could hear every word, not that any of it was any use. It was guard gossip, casual and cruel. Three fighters, I realised, pressing myself flat against the wall, pain screaming in the joints of my fingers and toes. The sound of them was so clear they must have been leaning over the wall. And then the voices faded, and footsteps rang above me, and the dreadful pain in my head eased.

  Reultan. She must have seen the guards moving in my direction.

  ~ Thanks, I managed to tell her.

  There was no answer.

  The stone was better cut and dressed towards the top, and it was that much harder to find purchase. It was still a familiar climb, and if I hadn’t been cold, and scared, and half-blind with blood and darkness, it would have been easy. It was the stone of my land but I did not want its harshness to be the last thing I felt beneath the palm of my hand. I tried not to think about Catriona’s skin, the silky bristle of her hair, the bony beautiful shape of her skull. I tried so hard not to think about them that my right hand found the flat ridge of the parapet before I realised how high I was.

  I didn’t know what was above me, but there was no warning bolt of pain from Reultan. Taking the deepest breath I ever took in my life, I hauled myself up and over the edge of the parapet, and flopped to my belly in its shadow on the battlement.

  Already I couldn’t believe my luck in being up here and not being dead yet. I thought Reultan might leave me to my own block now, but she didn’t. I suppose it helped Conal know where I was, and besides, the pain of her intrusion had dwindled again to a dull ache.

  The gate itself was well-guarded, but not against me. The sentries around the perimeter walls were more sparsely placed, and certainly the nearest one to me was not expecting to be taken from behind.

  I slit his throat and held him in an embrace like a lover till his blood had leaked out of him, then lowered him silently to the ground. No point clamping my hand over his mouth: it wasn’t as if he could speak, and if you’re quick the shock stops them calling with their mind. As he slumped, I saw his face, and cold horror flowed down my spine. He was barely older than me.

  He fought for Calman Ruadh, I thought as blood slammed in my ears. He fought and killed for Calman Ruadh. I shut my eyes, opened them again, waiting for the sickness to pass. This fighter was older than the little girl, older than Raineach’s stepc
hild. Older than her.

  Not quite twice as old.

  He fought for Calman Ruadh. He was at war and so was I. More conscience and I would fail. Swiftly I turned from him, and ran.

  At a flight of steps that led down to the first courtyard, I slithered down the ten-foot drop where the steps joined the wall. That’s where I got luckiest. There was a small room just off the courtyard, no more than a cramped space with a shelf and a cot where guards could grab a brief sleep between spells of duty when the dun was under siege. It was occupied now, though not for its intended use.

  Sorcha was a tough bitch who had joined in beating me more than once when we were children. She had hair the colour of a polished horse chestnut, and eyes that seemed to hold every colour of the moor. Right now they were more like a moor on fire, and she was glaring such hate at her attacker I was surprised he wasn’t wincing. I dare say she’d have been breaking his face if her hands weren’t bound. Now I had my conscience silenced. They were not young. They must know right from wrong. Yet they did not just kill for Calman Ruadh; they tormented for him.

  I was glad Sorcha’s attacker was preoccupied: it made it stupidly easy for me to kill his companion, who was waiting his turn in agitation. She watched me do it, and she never let on, never blinked, her face never altered its twisted mask of rage and pain and despair. What a girl. I liked her for the first time. I reckon she probably liked me for the first time too, especially when I laced my fingers into her surprised attacker’s hair, pulled his head back, and dug my blade hard into his throat.

  She spat out his blood and grinned. ‘Never thought I’d be glad to see you, shortarse.’

  I took her shoulder and pulled her up before she had time to refuse my help. ‘Watch your mouth or I’ll put you back.’ Holding her against me, I sawed through the cords binding her wrists. She was tense as her bonds had been. I half expected her to bite my shoulder.

  ‘Aye, right.’ Sorcha flinched with pain, then, as if furious with herself, made herself stagger to her feet and drag her trews and shirt back into place. Her trembling hands were mottled and swollen, but she clenched and unclenched her fists till the circulation was back and the shaking stopped. I had to admire her; she must have been hurting. Her eyes glittered with furious tears and there was a blackening bruise down one side of her face. I was shocked: this was not a weapon of war with the Sithe and never had been, but Sorcha must have been a damn sight angrier than I was. Two now-ownerless swords were propped in their scabbards just inside the door, so she took one and drew it. Even I couldn’t watch what she did next.