Den of Wolves
Page 1
About Den of Wolves
Feather bright and feather fine
None shall harm this child of mine
Healer Blackthorn knows all too well the rules of her bond to the fey: seek no vengeance, help any who ask, do only good. But after the most recent ordeal she and Grim have suffered, she knows she cannot let go of her quest to bring justice to the man who ruined her life.
Despite her own struggles, Blackthorn agrees to help Lady Flidais take care of a troubled young girl, Cara, while Grim travels to Cara’s home at Wolf Glen to aid her wealthy father with a strange task – rebuilding a broken-down house deep in the woods. It doesn’t take Grim long to realise that everything in Wolf Glen is not as it seems – the place is full of perilous secrets and deadly lies.
Back at Winterfalls, the evil touch of Blackthorn’s sworn enemy reopens old wounds and fuels her long-simmering desire for retribution. With danger on two fronts, Blackthorn and Grim are faced with a heartbreaking choice – to stand once again by each other’s side or to fight their battles alone.
The thrilling and poignant conclusion to the award-winning Blackthorn & Grim trilogy.
Contents
Cover
About Den of Wolves
Dedication
Character List
Chapter One: Bardán
Chapter Two: Cara
Chapter Three: Blackthorn
Chapter Four: Bardán
Chapter Five: Grim
Chapter Six: Cara
Chapter Seven: Blackthorn
Chapter Eight: Bardán
Chapter Nine: Grim
Chapter Ten: Blackthorn
Chapter Eleven: Bardán
Chapter Twelve: Grim
Chapter Thirteen: Cara
Chapter Fourteen: Bardán
Chapter Fifteen: Blackthorn
Chapter Sixteen: Grim
Chapter Seventeen: Blackthorn
Chapter Eighteen: Cara
Chapter Nineteen: Grim
Chapter Twenty: Cara
Chapter Twenty-one: Grim
Chapter Twenty-two: Bardán
Chapter Twenty-three: Grim
Chapter Twenty-four: Blackthorn
Chapter Twenty-five: Cara
Chapter Twenty-six: Grim
Chapter Twenty-seven: Blackthorn
Chapter Twenty-eight: Grim
Chapter Twenty-nine: Blackthorn
Chapter Thirty: Cara
Chapter Thirty-one: Bardán
Chapter Thirty-two: Blackthorn
Chapter Thirty-three: Cara
Chapter Thirty-four: Grim
Chapter Thirty-five: Blackthorn
Chapter Thirty-six: Cara
Chapter Thirty-seven: Blackthorn
Chapter Thirty-eight: Grim
Chapter Thirty-nine: Blackthorn
Chapter Forty: Cara
Chapter Forty-one: Blackthorn
Chapter Forty-two: Grim
Chapter Forty-three: Cara
Chapter Forty-four: Blackthorn
Chapter Forty-five: Bardán
Chapter Forty-six: Grim
Chapter Forty-seven: Blackthorn
Chapter Forty-eight: Blackthorn
Acknowledgments
About Juliet Marillier
Also by Juliet Marillier
Copyright page
For my grandchildren
May they grow strong as the oak. May they be flexible as the willow. May they blossom like the hawthorn.
CHARACTER LIST
This list includes some characters who are mentioned by name but don’t appear in the story.
At Wolf Glen
Cara
aged fifteen
Tóla
her father, landholder at Wolf Glen
Suanach
(soo-a-nakh)
Tóla’s wife, Cara’s mother (deceased)
Della
Tóla’s sister, Cara’s aunt
Alba
Cara’s personal maid
Gormán
chief forester
Conn
assistant forester
Bardán
(bar-dawn)
a wild man
Dáire
(dah-reh)
his wife (deceased)
At Winterfalls
Blackthorn
wise woman and healer
Grim
her companion
Cass
Blackthorn’s husband (deceased)
Brennan
Blackthorn’s son (deceased)
Oran
prince of Dalriada
Flidais
(flid-is)
his wife
Aolú
(ay-loo)
their son
Deirdre
(dee-dra)
Flidais’s maidservant and companion
Mhairi
(mah-ree)
maidservant
Nuala
(noo-la)
maidservant
Donagan
Oran’s body servant and companion
Aedan
Oran’s steward
Fíona
Aedan’s wife, housekeeper
Brid
(breedj)
cook
Niall
farmer
Eochu
(okh-oo)
stable master
Eoin
(ohn)
man-at-arms
Garalt
man-at-arms
Lochlan
chief man-at-arms
Emer
(eh-ver)
Blackthorn’s young assistant
Fraoch
(frech)
village smith, Emer’s brother
Scannal
miller
Cliona
sheep farmer
At Longwater
Fann
a local woman
Osgar
her brother
Ross
her husband
Ide
(ee-deh)
mother of Fann and Osgar
Luíseach
(lee-sakh)
Ide’s sister-in-law
Fedach
Luíseach’s son, aged fifteen
Eibhlín
(ev-leen)
a young woman
Corcrán
a young man
The Swan Island men
Ségán
(seh-awn)
leader of the Swan Island men
Cúan
(koo-awn)
Art
Earc
(ark)
Caolchú
(kehl-choo)
Cionnaola
(ki-neh-la)
Lonán
(loh-nawn)
Others
Master Saran
Master Bress
lawmen
Mathuin
chieftain of Laois
Lorcan
king of Mide
Cadhan
chieftain of White Hill, Flidais’s father
Branoc
baker
Conmael
a fey nobleman
Oisin
(a-sheen)
a druid
Brígh
(bree)
And not forgetting:
Ripple
a well-trained hound
Bramble
a bad-tempered terrier
Sturdy
a cart horse
Mercy
a fine mare
Willow
Tóla’s favourite riding horse
1
~Bardán~
He’s curled in a ball, shivering, under a piercing white moon. He’d forgotten how bright the moon was, how its light could go right through a man, cold in his bones, searching out what was hidden deep. Go away, he breathes, arms up over his head, knees to his chest, trying to be invisible. Leave me alone. But the light seeks him out, finding a way through the high canopy of the beeches, through the rough blanket of bracken and fern he’s scrambled together, through the rags of his clothing, right inside him. Into his mind, tangling his thoughts. Into his heart, probing his wounds. It’s been so long. How long has it been? How long has he been away?
An owl cries, eerie, hollow. In the undergrowth, something screams. Something dies. Stop, he whispers. Don’t. But nobody’s listening. His words fall into the quiet of the night forest and are lost. He’s lost. The cold moon will kill him before he can find his way. The way back to . . . to . . .
A fragment comes to him, then it’s gone. Another piece, and another. A story . . . but the meaning slips away before he can grasp it. Shivering body. Clattering teeth. A man . . . A man building . . . A man making a house, a strange house . . . He can feel the wood under his hands, his crooked hands . . . Long ago, so long ago . . . Was there a rhyme for the building, a charm, a spell? Crooked hands. Crooked yew. He makes the words with his lips, but there is no sound. Blackthorn, ivy and crooked yew.
He can’t remember much. But what he remembers is enough, for now. Enough to keep his heart beating; enough to keep him breathing through the cold night, until morning. The beech tree will shelter him; she will spread her strong arms over him, shutting out the chill eye of the moon. And when the sun rises and the long night is over, he knows where he will go.
2
~Cara~
The forest knew everything. News passed on a breath of wind, in the call of an owl, in the small pattern of a squirrel’s paw prints. The trout in the stream learned it. The lark soaring high above saw it. The knowledge was in the hearts of the trees and in the mysterious rustling of their leaves. It was a deep-down wisdom, as solemn as a druid’s prayer.
She never talked about it. Not with Father, not with Aunt Della, not even with Gormán. She’d learned long ago that if she spoke of that great knowledge people thought she was being foolish or fanciful. That didn’t matter. What mattered was saying it to the trees, over and over, so they knew she was their friend and guardian and could hear their slow voices. She spoke to each of them in turn, in a whisper, with her body against the trunk and her cheek pressed to the bark, as if she and the tree shared the same beating heart. Rough oak, smooth willow, furrowed ash, every tree in the wood. I will protect you. I will guard you. I give you my word.
The promise wasn’t foolish or fanciful. It made perfect sense. One day the holding at Wolf Glen would be hers to watch over. Mother was dead. Father would never marry again. There was nobody else to inherit the house, the farm, the forest. All of it, and all the folk who lived and worked there, would be hers to care for, hers to look after.
Father didn’t talk about the future, even now Cara was in her sixteenth year. But she knew he expected her to marry someday and produce an heir. She let herself dream, sometimes, about what might have been if she had not been a girl and the only child. She could have become a master wood carver. She could have spent all day making creatures and chests and chairs with fine decoration, toys for children, platters to hold fruit, spindles and cradles and walking staves with owls on them. Or she could have been a forester like Gormán. Gormán had been her friend since almost before she could walk. He had taught her the properties of different woods. Sometimes she would open up her special storage chest and get out the collection of little animals she’d made over the years. She loved them all, from the rabbit she had crafted from pine at six years old to the owl she’d coaxed not long ago from a well-weathered block of oak. The owl had its wings lifted ready for flight, and when Cara looked at it she imagined spreading wings of her own and flying off over the treetops, wild and free. When she had held each of her little creatures in turn, stroked each, spoken softly to each, she would shut them away in the chest again.
Soon, she knew, Father would start looking for a prospective husband for her. Father and Aunt Della had set their expectations high, hoping for a chieftain’s son. But wouldn’t that mean she would have to leave Wolf Glen? That could not happen. She would be like a sapling pulled up roughly, roots and all, then shoved into barren ground where it could not thrive. She would turn into a dull shadow of a woman whom nobody could possibly want as a wife. And who would look after the forest if she was not here? Her father loved Wolf Glen as she did, but his love was tinged with a darkness she did not understand.
Some girls were already wed at fifteen. Some were mothers. But that was not possible for her. It was unthinkable. If she married, how would she have time for any of the things that mattered? There would be no time to hear the many voices of the forest, no time to watch the patterns of leaves and light, no time to breathe the crisp air, no time to feel the weight of a fine piece of wood in her hands, seeing in her mind the forms that lay within. What if the husband her father chose for her did not understand these things? What if she tried to talk to him and her words suddenly vanished, the way
they did sometimes when she was talking to Father or Aunt Della? The suitor would think her a half-wit, and Father would be furious, and that would make it even more impossible to get words out.
Perhaps she could refuse to wed unless the man loved the same things she loved. Somewhere, surely, there must be at least one other person like her. If she could summon the right words, maybe she could persuade Father to wait awhile. Some women married and had babies when they were quite old, twenty or even five-and-twenty. Her maid Alba had told her so. There was plenty of time. Years.
Or so she thought, up till the day the wild man came to Wolf Glen, and everything changed.
She’d been out by the barn, showing Gormán a drawing she’d made for a carving of a squirrel. He’d promised to look out for the right piece of wood but warned her it might take some time to find it. ‘Off you go, then,’ he’d said in his gruff way. ‘I’ve my big axe to sharpen, and I don’t want you anywhere near while I’m doing it, young lady.’