Susan King - [Celtic Nights 03]

by The Sword Maiden

  "All of us are changed," Micheil, another of Margaret's brothers, said. He had grown into a tall and quiet-spoken young man. "Some of us went to France, like Lachlann and Parian and William, in good faith to fight a war that was not ours. The rest of us stayed here—Simon and Andra, Fergus and I, and the others—to be betrayed by our own king. Our lands are lost, our old chief gone and our young chief in prison, our good name taken from us. How could any of us be the same?"

  Eva nodded in sympathy. With their lives torn asunder, her kinsmen had sent their families to safety, then banded together, hiding in the hills to fight those who had taken over their lands by king's grant. They would not give up those lands easily, nor would they accept the wrongful forfeiture of them.

  "The MacKerron smith is not one of the MacArthur dispossessed," Iain Og pointed out. "He has no allegiance to us. He is a king's man from Perth—even if he grew up a lad in Balnagovan."

  "His family have been smiths near Loch Fhionn for generations," Fergus said. "We were all children together."

  "And we were with him in France," Parian said, nodding to William, his twin; they were similar though not identical. "I will trust him, no matter his message." William nodded.

  "And I," Andra echoed. The youngest of the renegade MacArthurs at nearly sixteen, with light brown hair and a slender build, he had turned a youthful taste for mischief into a talent for clever spying whenever the king's men rode out on patrol.

  Simon ran his thumb along his whiskered chin. His dark hair gleamed in the sunlight. "Eva, what do you think? Is Lachlann for us or against us?"

  "Ask him yourself," she said stubbornly.

  "No matter what his message, or his intent, nothing can keep us from our business," Simon told the others. "We will win back our rights, and protest the wrong that was done to our people." His kinsmen nodded grim acknowledgment of their shared purpose.

  "Raids in the night will not do that," Eva said.

  "You seem to think Colin will solve all our troubles," Simon said.

  "And you believe attacks will gain back our rights and save Donal," she returned bitterly. The dispute was old between them.

  "Green Colin will not do it," Simon snapped. "You set great store by his promises, yet we see no result."

  "Donal is still alive," she pointed out. She looked away, sighing. She and Simon argued so often lately that she felt as if she faced a man of stone with a stranger's face rather than the easygoing brother she once had known.

  "Perhaps Colin truly loves the girl and means well," Micheil suggested. "Who could resist our Eva?" He winked at his cousin.

  "Bah," Simon growled. "Colin loves her island. He kept her dowry lands, too, after the forfeiture, and put his kin there in place of the dispossessed MacArthurs."

  "A shame those lands have been so short of cattle and sheep lately," Fergus drawled. "Raiders are a persistent problem, I hear. Or is it that livestock wander in their sleep?" Andra laughed, and Fergus grinned. "We will get rich if we continue to take such fine fat cattle to the Lowland markets."

  Eva frowned, well aware of their activities after dark. "I beg you to be cautious. Stealing from Colin's kin will not help our clan's cause."

  "And we beg you again to reconsider the marriage," Simon answered. "There are other ways to win back our lands."

  "Why do you think I bruise myself learning swordplay? I have my own rights to consider," she said. "You will not fight for Innisfarna, and I understand that. It is not part of your inheritance, but came to me through my mother, and you have other concerns. Innisfarna is my trouble, and I must solve it."

  "Alpin wants to turn you into a warrior maiden to solve it. That is as foolish as waiting for Colin," Simon muttered.

  "Foolish? Have you seen the girl fight? She is not bad," Micheil said. "Colin will run for cover when he comes home."

  "He will not, because Eva hates to fight," Simon said. "I do not think she will do it when the time comes."

  Though she scowled at him, she knew there was truth in what he said. She enjoyed the grace and the power of wielding the sword, but she could not bear to hurt anyone, nor did she want to risk being hurt herself.

  "And there is the Sword of Light to consider," Fergus said. "It must be protected, or all Scotland will fail."

  "You should be listening to stories at your mother's knee, young one—and not wasting our time with fantasies," Iain Og muttered. "Eva, if you draw a sword on your new husband, make sure you use it on him," he added. "That will end the trouble."

  "She would not slice an apple with that thing, for fear of harming the apple," Simon said.

  "You cannot just wave it about and scare Green Colin off your isle," Parian told her. "We have seen war, girl. It is not so easy to win back lands lost to the enemy. Be careful."

  "I mean to show Colin that I will not give up my privilege as guardian of Innisfarna," Eva answered. "I alone have the right to the isle. I will marry him if I must, but I will not let him have my isle."

  "Do not sacrifice yourself for us. We can sacrifice ourselves on our own, if we have to," Simon said sarcastically.

  "Oh, Simon, please, let there be peace between us again," she said wearily. He looked away, sighed, and did not answer.

  "If you two are finished squabbling," Parian said sternly, "we have more immediate problems. Our best hope is rebellion."

  "A fine and brave word," Eva answered. "And meaningless if it takes your lives and leaves your clan with nothing gained and Donal dead too! There are but fourteen of you, with too few weapons or armor!"

  "Fifteen, if we can trust the smith," Parian said.

  "Sixteen, with Eva," Fergus said. "Seventeen, with Alpin."

  "Seventeen is still just a handful," Eva pointed out.

  "There have been insurrections all over the Highlands since the arrests at Inverness," Simon reminded her. "Each small rebellion is a pocket of fire. If those flames come together, they will make a great blaze."

  "We have something we did not have before," Fergus said. He smiled.

  "A master weaponsmith!" Andra said, grinning.

  Simon whistled low. "True! That could make the difference for us. Lachlann has the knack of making good weapons."

  "Does he have the knack to turn away the king's forces, and change the king's mind?" Eva asked. "That is what you need."

  "We could take Innisfarna and make it our stronghold," William suggested.

  Simon nodded. "I have been thinking that very thing."

  She shook her head. "The legend says—"

  "Hang the legend," Iain Og said irritably. "Women's tales. A faery princess and her magical sword! Hah! I say we arm ourselves and take Innisfarna. That solves Eva's trouble."

  "Listen to me," she pleaded. "I will show my sword and show Colin that I am not afraid of him—and prove to him that the legend has power."

  Iain Og snorted in disdain. William shook his head. "Dreams, cousin," he said. "There is only one way to use a sword if you want results."

  "Eva, what we are doing may come to real war someday," Simon said earnestly. "Real battles. We need that swordsmith. Find out which way his loyalties lie. You are a woman, and he is a man. Use that to gain his help for us."

  She lifted her chin. "I will not use wiles."

  "Knowing him, I would guess that he would not mind if you did," Simon murmured.

  Parian grinned. "If Eva would wed the blacksmith instead of Colin, we would have the smith's loyalty for certain—and his skills!"

  "Oh, I like that," Iain Og said in his booming voice.

  "Interesting," Simon mused, watching his sister.

  "Ridiculous," Eva muttered, though her heart pounded. "That would gain you nothing! He has no influence to help Donal!"

  "At the very least, it would gain you a better man than Colin," Parian told her, while his twin brother nodded.

  Simon huffed impatiently. "Marry the blacksmith or bed him, make his dinner or mend his plaid. Whatever you do, find out what he intends, and where his loyalt
ies lie, quick as you can."

  "What if he means harm to you?"

  "Convince him over to our side," Simon said. "You can be quite charming when you control that temper of yours. If Lachlann is not the king's man, then he is our man. As it should be."

  "And if the weaponsmith is with us, we will soon be an army," Iain Og said.

  * * *

  Lachlann poked through the scrap iron piled beneath a canvas in a back corner of the spacious smithy. He had discovered several thick rods of cast iron and two fat ingots, their crude quality suited only to making pothooks and heavy chains. He shifted part of a broken plough, its iron reusable, to one side.

  Against the wall he found a bundle of wrought-iron rods of a finer quality. He remembered leaving those there himself, iron purchased from the ironmonger across the loch, years ago. The canvas had protected it from rust, for the most part, although some spots had developed, but heating would destroy that. Good iron could be made into small knives, axe heads, kitchen utensils, latches, and so on. Lachlann nodded with approval as he searched the pile.

  Several worn horseshoes were stacked haphazardly on the floor, and more dangled from nails embedded in the wall. The iron shoes could be reshaped to fit other horses, or the iron could be heated and remade into a variety of items.

  Only the best iron could be made into steel to form weapons and sword blades. He frowned, rubbing his jaw as he considered what lay at his feet. Good weaponsmithing required quality materials. Wrought iron, refined by an ironmonger, could be made into steel, but cast iron was too full of impurities to be used.

  Lack of materials could be corrected, he thought, but lack of ability could not. His long-held dream of swordsmithing might have come to an end; he was not yet sure. Though he had skill and talent, the smithing of steel depended on eyesight. Nuances of color in heated metal told the smith a great deal. If his vision was faulty, the weapons he crafted could be flawed. If a faulty weapon broke, it could bring about the death of its owner.

  He rubbed his fingers over his eyelids. Ever since his injury, colors were sometimes dim, shadows deeper, and erratic flashes of light erupted without notice. Someday, he knew, the weakness in his eye might worsen into blindness; at best, it would never improve. He could never be the swordsmith that he had once dreamed of becoming.

  His experiences as a smith in Perth had proved to him that he was still a capable blacksmith for horseshoes, nails, pothooks, door latches, and the like. Cherry red was a color even he could see easily. Working the black metal was little challenge for him now, and he enjoyed the work well enough.

  Working the white metal—steel—was different. The sheer magic of mastering the light-bearing metal had fascinated him as a boy, and still held him in its thrall.

  Ancient tradition gave blacksmiths the privileges and the mystery of magicians. The ability and the courage to bend hot metal to their will made smiths essential and well respected in their communities. They kept their secrets carefully guarded. And now Lachlann feared that he would never be able to fully use the knowledge and traditions he had learned from Finlay.

  Hearing men's voices in the yard, he looked up from his musing, and strode across the smithy to open the door.

  Several men, armored and bearing swords and weapons, filled the yard between the smithy and the stable. Lachlann frowned and walked outside.

  He glanced toward the house. Last evening, Eva had returned from her wanderings so late that Lachlann had helped himself to food from Mairi's cupboards earlier, and set up a simple pallet for himself in a corner of the smithy. Hearing the dogs barking quite late, he went to the door to see light in the windows of the house. This morning, he had arisen just after dawn, but again Eva was gone. Now, at midmorning, she had not yet come back.

  He strode forward as two men walked toward him, an old Highlander in a plaid, his white hair bright in the sun, and a brawny blond soldier in a steel cuirass, tunic, trews, and boots. The old man raised a hand in salute.

  Lachlann lifted a hand, too, grinning. "Failte, Alpin MacDewar, and how are you?" he called in Gaelic.

  "Failte, gobha—greetings, smith! Welcome back! It is good to see you again, looking hearty and all in one piece, and not so bad for three years of warring!" Alpin grinned, showing crooked teeth and the same gruff charm that Lachlann remembered. Smiling, he clasped the gnarled old hand, amazed, as he had always been, by the sheer strength in Alpin's knotty grip.

  "Gobha, this is Sir John Robson, the king's man," Alpin said in Gaelic. "He speaks the southern tongue, so I hope you have not forgotten it, after all the French in your head now. Gobha means 'smith,'" he told Robson in English, loudly, as if the man were partly deaf.

  Lachlann held out his hand to Robson. "I am Lachlann MacKerron," he said in Scots English. "Balnagovan is my property by tenant's agreement, although I have been gone a long while."

  "John Robson, captain of the king's garrison at Innisfarna Castle," the man answered. "Alpin told me you were newly arrived from France."

  "And I said you are a fine craftsman, and a man local to this village," Alpin added in Gaelic. "He is a good gobha," he added loudly in English for Robson's benefit.

  "We are pleased to have a smith so close," Robson said. "There is a fellow in Glen Brae, but he isna so competent."

  "That fellow likes drink and dislikes hard work," Alpin muttered in Gaelic to Lachlann.

  "We need a good deal of smithing from time to time," Robson continued. "Just now, some of the horses need shoeing, and our harnesses and gear need repair. Are you trained as an armorer or a weaponsmith?"

  "Name the task, and I will see what I can do."

  "He is doing it all," Alpin added proudly. "Steel and iron, he is doing it all."

  "A weaponsmith? Indeed, how useful," Robson said.

  "I have done some of that in the past," Lachlann said. "But materials for good weaponry are not easy to come by." He frowned at Alpin, hoping to curtail any further boasts.

  "For now, two of the mounts in there need shoeing—the bay mare and a brown garron," Robson said.

  "I will check the others," Lachlann offered.

  "Good. I noticed some rust on the harness fastenings too. If you could tend to that soon, I would be glad to pay you for your trouble. Some of the men have weapons in need of repair. I will have those collected and brought to you."

  Lachlann nodded. "That I can take care of, as well. What is your business this day, armed and saddled and ready for war?" He gazed past Robson at the men who guided horses out of the stable.

  "Their business is trouble," Alpin rumbled in Gaelic.

  "We ride out on patrol looking for rebels by king's order."

  "Ah," Lachlann said, "so you know where they lurk?"

  "Nae yet, though 'twill change if they continue to raid the lands in this glen. We keep the king's peace in the region. A messenger arrived the other day with news," Robson went on. "The king sent a man to Argyll to speak with the MacArthur rebels. Would you know aught about that?"

  "I am that man," Lachlann said.

  "Ah, I knew it," Alpin commented in his native language. Lachlaan slid him a glance.

  "Then you know these rogues yourself," Robson said.

  "I do, and 'tis why I am instructed to speak to them myself, and deliver the king's message to their leader. But I confess I canna do so until I know where they are."

  "Luck to you, then. Not even the rebel leader's sister, Lady Eva, knows where they hide. Nae doubt you met the lady who stays in the house over there."

  "I have spoken with her. I know her from years past."

  Robson lowered his brows. "And where are you staying, sir?"

  "In the smithy. Eva MacArthur owns the house, and has been sharing it with my mother—surely you are aware of that, sir."

  "Aye. But be careful. Lady Eva's betrothed is a powerful man, a Campbell. When he returns, he willna take a kind view of a man sharing this property with his beloved."

  "His beloved," Lachlann said curtly, "is sa
fe here, if you imply otherwise." He narrowed his eyes.

  "The gobha loves her like a brother," Alpin said. "Is it not so?"

  Lachlann glanced at him. "How else would it be?"

  "Very well," Robson said. "You can help me, then, by watching out for her. I am appointed to protect her, but it is difficult when she willna stay at Innisfarna."

  "I heard she didna feel she could stay there."

  "Some rogues in my garrison lacked manners, but they have been disciplined for it. She could come back to the castle, but she is a stubborn young woman and willna return."

  "You canna expect her to accept protection from men who hunt after her kinsmen."

  "For certain, she is not liking that," Alpin muttered in English. Robson glanced at him, but seemed unbothered by Alpin's comments. Lachlann could tell that the man knew Alpin well.

  "More than MacArthurs raid in Argyll, but they are the most troublesome of the rebels," Robson said. "We ride sentinel often to prevent more cattle being stolen and barns burned. Their raids grow more frequent. If we ever meet the rebels, it will go ill for them. You are a king's man, sir. If you would like to arm yourself, mount up, and ride with us, we would welcome a man who knows the region."

  Lachlann frowned, glancing at Alpin, who raised his white brows high, but for once said nothing. "I might do so soon."

  "You do have a message to deliver to the rebels. You will want to be with us when we find them," Robson said.

  "I prefer to meet them alone, without a host of king's men."

  "Understood, though I urge you to be cautious. Report to me when the king's message is delivered, if you will." One of the men in the stable yard called out, and Robson waved. "Good day, smith."

  Lachlann nodded, arms folded, while Robson strode away and mounted the dark destrier saddled and waiting for him. The king's men, more than a dozen in all, turned as a group and pounded out of the stable yard and across the meadow.

  He looked at Alpin. "Where is Eva?" he asked abruptly.

  "How do I know? I am not her keeper. She might be with Margaret," Alpin said. "Good to see you, smith, and we will talk again soon. When your foster mother comes back to Glen Brae, I will fetch you for a boat ride. I must go now, and ferry those three over the water," he said, pointing at two knights and a small blond boy, a page by the look of him, who stood in the stable yard. He strolled away, and the boy ran toward him.