He was vaguely aware that all eyes turned toward the door, and no one answered him at once. He turned to see that Lìli stood in the shadows of the hall, wringing her hands. She didn’t speak, and for an instant, she didn’t seem able to make herself enter the room, though thankfully Aidan didn’t read any guilt in her vivid blue eyes, only dread and confusion. That fact eased him somewhat. He didn’t want her to be involved in this.
Lìli lingered in the doorway.
Even before she saw who it was in the bed, she feared the worst, realizing it must be one of Aidan’s kin to have been brought within the crannóg. Even after her husband waved her inside the small room, she hesitated.
His eyes did not accuse her, but the energy in the room was black. Lìli was very sensitive to the auras of others, for she was often sustained or diminished by them.
Una stood at the bedside, mumbling in the old tongue as she traced circles upon the boy’s forehead. “Mother of all, we are One,” she whispered. “Cease his pain, gi’ him none.”
By the light of a single fat pillar that was seated in an iron brace above Keane’s bed, Lìli spied a glimpse of his bloodied face, barely recognizable for the swelling.
If they would allow it, she might be able to help. She had worked very hard all her life to become more than simply a lovely face—the victim of some silly curse. She was well versed in the simples, but she had also studied the old ways and even had a rare manuscript of Byzantine medicines brought back by her grandsire from the Crusades.
“May I help?” she asked.
Lael’s head turned in her direction. “I believe ye may have helped quite enough already!”
Aidan threw up a hand. “Enough! She has been with me all this night.”
“Aye, and what of her companions?”
Aidan’s gaze swept up to meet Lael’s, one brow lifting. “What of them?”
Lachlann shook his head, denying the accusation. “They have all been accounted for all day and all night as well. Between the lot of us, we havena let a one out of our sight.”
Aidan peered up at his sister, his voice brooking no argument. “Never make accusations without proof, Lael.”
“Somehow I know they are responsible!” Lael persisted. “Keane is not a clumsy dolt, Aidan! He has climbed those bluffs a hundred times and more!”
Aidan turned to wave Lìli into the room again, peering up at his sister, his mouth set in grim lines. “Nevertheless, I’llna allow ye to gainsay me. Show me proof, or gi’ my wife the respect due her.”
Lael threw her hands into the air. “Ach, ye’re thinking with your willie no’ your head, Aidan! One night spent in that witch’s arms and already she’s turned your brain to mash!” Clearly angry, she marched past Lìli and out the door, bumping Lìli’s shoulder angrily.
Lìli said nothing. She let the girl pass, and all the while Una listened quietly, watching everyone. Now she too urged Lìli to come closer to the bed. This time Lìli did as she was asked.
At the sight of Keane up close, she gasped. The left side of his head was distended and purple. His left eye was swollen closed and his hair was caked with blood. More blood was seeping from his nose.
“The injury to his head is grave,” the old woman said softly. “I dinna believe he cracked his skull, but he has lost much blood. Come,” she demanded. “Your healing skills are far greater than mine.”
Lìli wondered how the woman could possibly know such a thing.
Una merely smiled as though she’d read Lìli’s thoughts, and waved her closer still. “Take a look, lass. Tell us what must be done.”
Lìli hesitated, uncertain. She looked to Aidan first, to be certain he approved. Once he nodded, that was all she needed to know. As though she were suddenly possessed by someone else, she immediately set to work. Gone was her apprehension, all her timorous thoughts. In her place was the healer who had seen far worse than a boy with a bloodied head. She had seen a husband with an arrow through his eye, clear through his skull. She had sawed off arms and legs and had watched babes die whose bodies were covered with bulbous. She was hardly squeamish. She demanded hot water, blankets and needle and thread. She ordered the hefty Lachlann to help her strip Keane’s clothing, and she urged her husband out of the way, making mental notes of all the herbs she must retrieve from her chest.
Aidan watched his wife work, marveling in the sudden change in her demeanor. She was suddenly far bossier than both Lael and Una put together. But he realized she was trying to help and she clearly knew what she was doing.
There was little he could do here but be in the way, so he left his brother’s care to Lìli and to Una, bidding Lachlann to come along once he was through divesting Keane. Finding Sorcha worrying in the hall, he sent his youngest sister into Keane’s room as well, determined now to find out what had happened to his brother.
Lael was standing out upon the pier as though to bar the entrance within to any who might dare try. Her back was rigid and tense, and he made himself known as he came up the walk behind her, lest she spin about and cleave him in two with one of her angry blades. Her eyes slayed him though her hands remained clenched at her sides. “How can ye leave that woman with our brother?” she demanded at once.
“That woman is my wife and ye’d best come to terms with it.”
“Ach, Aidan! How can ye trust her?”
“Una trusts her,” Aidan countered, “That is enough for me.”
And yet it wasn’t, he realized, for if that were truly the case, he would not have sent his sister Sorcha into the room to watch over them. Despite that he had witnessed with his own two eyes what Lìli could do—what she had been willing to do for a stranger on the first night of her arrival—he still did not trust her explicitly.
Doubts crept into his head, but he shoved them away.
On the beach, the bonfire raged, and many of his kinsmen lingered, despite that the revelry had long ceased. Now it seemed they were huddled about the fire, simply waiting for word from within.
Aidan ordered Lachlann who walked out of the crannóg, “Set guards upon the hall, then escort our guests to their beds. Assign as many men as can be spared to guard their door. Wherever they go—whatever they do—I want to know. I dinna want any o' them pissing without my knowledge!”
“What of the maid Aveline?” Lachlann asked.
“The siùrsach as well!” Aidan snapped, slipping past his sister. “You come with me, Lael!”
Grudgingly, his sister left her post and followed him down the narrow dock. With his sword, he snuffed the torches one by one as he passed, leaving the crannóg in utter darkness save for the faint light that emanated from within. From the shore, unless you knew precisely where the dock entrance was, it was impossible to find it without revealing your presence to the guards. “Where are we going?”
“To inspect the pool where Keane was found. I would know from whence he fell—and how.” And aye, superstition or nay, some part of him must know if he could hear the Weeper’s wail. He could not bear to lose Keane now.
He was just a boy.
Sensing Aidan’s distress, Lael’s temper eased, trusting him to do what he must. She grudgingly admitted, “I too was watching the Scots. ’Tis true enough what Lachlann says. They were all accounted for, but one of them could have slipped away during the games?”
“Unless we can prove it,” Aidan persisted, “we cannot risk the consequences were we to accuse one of David’s men.”
“Since when do you care about alliances with David?” Lael asked, keeping pace behind him as he left the dock.
His eyes cut through the darkness, spearing her. “You mistake me, Lael. I care no’ one whit about alliances with David or anyone else. But I do not intend to bring war into this vale. There is too much to lose, lest ye forget?”
The stone.
They both understood that’s what he was speaking of.
It had been their duty all these years, not to rise above other tribes, but to safeguard the stone, for inasmuc
h as it held the power to unite nations, if it fell into the wrong hands, its possession would only lead to more bloodshed. Many would covet it, only one could truly wield it.
Lael fell into silence at his side.
Chapter Twenty-Two
With Sorcha and Una’s help, Lìli cleansed Keane’s wound as best she could, then stitched it and applied salve. As she had for Duncan, she burned juniper to ward away infection in the air, and then she sent Sorcha after vin aigre. Leaving Una alone with Keane, she went after her medicines herself, wholly aware of how close she had come to being discovered last time. Particularly now with suspicion hovering like a shadow over them all, she could not risk that someone might discover the ring. Returning to the room, she overheard a snippet of conversation from the hall.
“Mayhap the one to follow me, Sorcha, will not be you.”
“Lìli? But she's Aidan’s—”
“Aye, but I had a husband once, too.”
They might have said more, but Lìli came hurrying through the door, mindful that she could not waste any time, even for eavesdropping where it might aid her. But she wondered what Una could have meant. As she prepared her herbs, she couldn’t help but consider the old woman with a husband and children and the image completely escaped her. Somehow, Una seemed as ancient as time itself. But that was a ridiculous notion, for she was clearly flesh and blood—why would the woman lie? If she said she’d once had a husband, then certainly she must have had a husband.
One thing was certain, however: If Keane died, Lìli would not be the only one to come under scrutiny. So whatever she could do to prevent it, she must. And as soon as she had a few moments to herself, she must find a place to better hide the ring until she had need of it. She didn’t dare consider the simple truth... that she would not use it. God’s truth, if she had wondered before tonight, she no longer did. She could no more murder Aidan—or any other human being—than she could allow this boy to die. What that meant for her own son she didn’t know, but as she stitched the cut on Keane’s forehead, she realized the truth.
There must be some other way.
When she had done everything she knew to do, save one last thing, she hesitated but a moment. She had recognized the strange gestures Una had made when she’d first come into the room, and knew the old woman would not question what she was about to do. But this was not a thing she risked doing before others—certainly not before her father or Rogan. And yet she trusted both Sorcha and Una to understand that she meant Keane no harm. It might be little more than ceremony, but where there were lives at stake, Lìli would employ all avenues available to her, even those of a more spiritual nature.
She sat down on the bed beside Keane, placing a small candle she’d found in Keane’s room on the right side of the boy’s bed. And then peering back to see that both Una and Sorcha were watching her closely, she nevertheless placed her hand, palm up, and closed her eyes to concentrate, visualizing bright white light forming within her hand—the light of healing—drawing out all pain, impurity and injury. Behind her lids, she concentrated hard, forming the brightest glowing. After a moment, Lìli’s hand began to tingle and she turned it upside down and covered the wound upon Keane’s head. And then concentrating again until she felt the light wane, she then closed her fist and placed it over the unlit candle, and whispered, “I consecrate this candle as a tool for healing.” Then she lit the candle and without daring to turn to look at the expressions upon the faces of her audience, she whispered, “Mend as the candle burns, sickness end and health return.” She took a pinch of rosemary from her sack, sprinkling it onto the candle flame. The flame popped, surging and burning black for an instant before burning true once more.
For a long moment, not even the sound of breathing breached the silence in the room, and then Una whispered at her back, “Lo... the child I once cursed has become a blessing. Well done, Lìli. Well done.”
Aidan discovered little evidence by the pool.
As best he could determine, it appeared to him that Keane had somehow fallen from the edge, just above the gully where the water flowed strongest. There was a bloodstain on a rock nearly fifty feet up, but hitting it would have placed Keane squarely in the water at Aidan’s feet. From there, Aidan searched the immediate bank and found a trail of blood leading from the edge of the pool to the spot where his brother’s body must have been recovered.
Lael had not been the one to find him. By the time she had rushed to the loch, Lachlann was already carrying him away, but she knew whereabouts Lachlann claimed he’d discovered him lying unconscious.
His sister had climbed to the cliff top to inspect that area as well. She peered down at him now, with one hand upon her hip, her lithe form silhouetted by the half moon. In her left hand, she held up a torch that illuminated one side of her face, wreaking havoc with her angry features. She was a hellion, his sister, and Aidan suspected she would never soften enough to wed. But if she ever did wed, poor soul the man who must deal with her. “D’ ye find anything?”
“Nay. Not even a scuffle. He must have gone straight down with nary a stumble.”
Aidan swept his own torch across his brother’s blood where it soaked the ground. The torch roared as it passed, casting spots before his eyes, but he saw well enough to note that there were no scuffles here either—naught save what appeared to be his brother’s struggles to reach higher ground. He must have been aware enough to get this far, and must have lost consciousness once he’d climbed safely out of the pool. That gave him hope.
“What now?” Lael shouted down at him.
Aidan shrugged. “Now we hold the bluidy Scots in their huts til Keane awakes.”
“If he wakes!” Lael countered.
“Aye, he will,” Aidan reassured her, though he knew not why. For reasons he could not explain, he somehow sensed Lìli would see it done.
Or mayhap it was simply a brother’s hope.
For what remained of the night, Lìli watched over Keane. She, along with Una and Sorcha all sat waiting for him to reopen his eyes. Finally, Sorcha was brave enough to ask, “Will my brother live, Lìli?”
The worry in the little girl’s tone gave Lìli a pang of grief. She peered down at Keane’s face, wondering what it must be like to have brothers and sisters who loved you so much. She must believe it wasn’t much different from the way she felt about her son, but she could not find that same affection in her heart for her parents.
“I canna say,” she told Sorcha honestly, “but I think he will.”
Because of the bruising, it was difficult to determine whether a healthy color had returned to the boy’s face, though it seemed to her that his movements had increased since she’d come back into the room. He was wincing every so oft now, and twitching his brows as though in pain.
“When my brother awakes, he will tell us what happened,” Sorcha said with conviction.
For her part, Una merely grumbled, shifting in her chair as though she struggled with her private thoughts. She lay her staff across her lap. “Let us hope, for once, your brother was simply a clumsy dolt!”
Sorcha nodded, and Lìli nibbled her lip, praying to God the old woman was right, and that Rogan had naught to do with this.
God help them all if he did, for she knew Aidan would kill him... and for her part, after what they had shared, she could suddenly not bear the thought of him looking at her with anything less than the tenderness he had shown her tonight.
Fully dressed, Rogan sprawled upon the bed they had given him, staring out the chimney hole in the thatch ceiling. It was dark outside.
These people lived little better than peasants. Their homes could all be burned with little enough effort and without any loss. The trouble was, he would never leave the vale alive if he burned them down. There was only one way out of this vale, and their weapons and horses had been confiscated upon their arrival.
The dirty bastards had herded him here, as though he were little more than a dumb goat. All three men, along with the priest, h
ad been shoved in behind him, and although they hadn’t locked the door, he could hear them standing guard outside. He had no idea how many there might be, for the only window in the hut faced the west, and it was shuttered with a man guarding it from the outside. But no news was good news, in truth.
It seemed the boy lived for the moment. He knew they had discovered his body, and knew they suspected foul play, but he also knew Aidan dún Scoti was smart enough not to execute guests in his home without evidence. It would hardly be much different from the atrocity Padruig had committed when he’d supped at their tables as friends, turning on them in the middle of celebration.
Besides, Rogan sensed Aidan dún Scoti’s honor was far too great to kill an unarmed man. If he found Rogan guilty, he might give him a sword, and even if they cut him down after, Rogan vowed to take a few of the bastards to hell with him first. He was as skilled a swordsman as any.
However, if he died, he stood to gain nothing, so he considered another plan.
The priest was asleep in the chair, snoring. The old fool had probably not slept since they’d arrived for he was a cowardly dolt who could scarcely bear the sight of his own shadow. The Pecht priestess—if that’s what she was—had given the prelate a knot upon his pate and a cut on his chin that made him look like a twelve year old lad fresh from a fight. If he was sleeping now, it was only because his energy was depleted. Nay, he could not cast blame there, for the man would reveal aught he knew with a simple threat. That he had not done so already was a miracle equal unto the birth of Christ.
Of the other three men, one was David’s spy in much the same way Aveline must be his once he was gone. He could lay the blame there, he supposed, but that man was no fool and Rogan would prefer not to match wits with anyone at a time such as this.
Of the remaining two, one was a bigger lout, and though he’d been with Rogan the longest, that might actually work in Rogan’s favor, for he would understand precisely what Rogan would do to him if he dared to challenge him. And the man had nowhere to go—though he might prefer to take his chances with Aidan.
Highland Fire (Guardians of the Stone) Page 19
