Conor spent a fair amount of time turning the vial over in his hands, wondering what it meant. It had been locked away, which meant that it was not meant to be a swift end in the event of a capture. If he’d planned to use it for himself, which Conor suspected he had, that meant he was afraid, and for good reason. Somhairle had seen an entire fortress annihilated by the druid’s experiments, yet he survived. What about him had caused Niall to leave him alone?
Conor dropped the vial back into his belt pouch, shrugged on his sword, and strode out of the chamber. He didn’t stop when he hit the great hall but instead proceeded to the dungeons.
The smell hit him immediately, bad enough in small doses as it drifted throughout the upper floors of the keep, but so strong up close it made him gag. He went to the last tiny cell—the one in which Meallachán had been kept—and squatted down beside the bars.
Somhairle didn’t open his eyes, but he obviously sensed Conor’s presence. “Are you going to threaten me again?”
“Not this time. What I want to know has no strategic importance.”
Somhairle turned his head and looked him in the eye. Conor expected malice, but all he saw was a cold, deep emptiness.
“Couldn’t sleep, could you?”
Conor lowered himself to the ground beside the cell and leaned against the stone wall. “No.”
“This place does that to a man. The screaming.” He gave Conor a chilling smile. “Even when it’s silent, it’s there. In the stones. Waiting.”
“You supervised the experiments.”
“Some of them.”
“Why?”
“The most capable man is the last to die.”
Conor’s skin prickled. There was something unearthly about the conversation—a lack of emotion in words that should be fraught with it. Somhairle could feel emotion, Conor knew, because he had seen fear. He fished out the vial and held it up. “What is this?”
Conor was sure he wouldn’t answer, but he only smiled. “Hemlock.”
“For yourself?”
“For myself. For others. Poison does not differentiate. It’s fair. Unlike the human heart and mind.”
“The most capable man may be the last to die, but he still dies. So why are you here?”
Somhairle didn’t answer. He just stared at the ceiling of the cell. “The funny thing about torture is that it can make a man admit to anything, say up is down and believe it. You said that, didn’t you? But it’s purifying, those thoughts that come right before death. The things men say when they want pain to stop, they’re telling. They appeal to your humanity, your compassion, all the things they still want to believe exist in the world, as if that’s their last chance to prove it.” He turned his head. “Pain is a mirror.”
“What did you see, then? What do you want to believe still exists in the world?”
“Self-interest. I don’t need to believe. I know.” Somhairle sent him a knowing smile. “Your kind doesn’t believe in torture. It’s your weakness. It always has been. Expedience, aye, but in duty to the greater good.”
“Then why did you tell me what I wanted to know?”
Somhairle’s grin widened to show a row of crooked teeth. “I already told you. Because you wanted revenge for what was done to you. Information was just an excuse.” The smile turned feral. “Sometimes the mirror goes both ways, doesn’t it?”
Conor stood abruptly and dropped the vial back into his pouch. He wanted to believe that the man was mad, but in reality he was simply amoral. He’d said it himself. He did what he needed to do to save his own skin, to achieve his own ends.
That wasn’t what Conor had done. Not at all. The information he gained from him was vital, but there was only so far he would have taken things.
He tried to shut out Somhairle’s laughter, but it followed him all the way up the stairs.
As soon as day broke, Conor gathered the men together in the great hall, twenty-two warriors who looked only slightly more rested than he felt.
“Our goal today is to clear the chamber of the bodies before they can cause disease.”
“Or permanently foul the fortress with the stench,” Ailill muttered, looking less than pleased by the job.
“Indeed. Ailill, you can be in charge of finding the handcarts to transport them. Our best bet is to wheel them down the tunnels and burn the bodies in the canyon. Best to confine any potential . . . mess . . . to the lower levels.”
The looks passed around showed exactly how the men felt about those prospects. Larkin spoke up. “If we’re going back into the pass, won’t we be vulnerable to the sidhe again?”
“I have an idea for that. In the meantime, I need six men on watch, and the rest in teams of five to clear the chamber.”
Conor sorted them out quickly—those on watch far more pleased than the others—and then retreated to his chamber. Larkin’s question highlighted the bigger concern he’d been mulling. If his men had been susceptible to the sidhe in the passes, the reinforcements from Ard Dhaimhin would be in even more danger now that the spirits had been deprived of their victims.
Conor took the stairs to the upper floor two at a time and staggered as the corridor swayed around him, the effects of little food and no sleep. Once they cleaned the storerooms, they could assess their supplies. He was counting on the hope that the fortress had stored up food for the cold seasons.
Up in his borrowed chamber, he retrieved his harp case and then returned to the hall, where he pulled up a chair. Let this work, he thought, partly a plea to Comdiu and partly a reminder to him to focus through his exhaustion. He sat, adjusted the strings that had already gotten out of tune again, and then closed his eyes to visualize the passes that connected the High City and Ard Bealach.
Blue fire danced along his skin, searing but not consuming.
Conor jolted upright with a gasp. It had taken that little, just closing his eyes, to doze off and be drawn back into the nightmare. He wiped his sweaty palms on his trousers and laid his hands against the strings. He couldn’t sleep. He couldn’t be drawn back in. He would be of no use here, and there was far too much for him to do to crumble.
The pass. The long stretch of road that connected the edge of Ard Dhaimhin’s domain to the downward slope of the mountain range. What they needed was a corridor, a tunnel of magic. When the notes rang from the harp, they took similar form to the song he had played before, now so natural that he didn’t think about anything but his need. In his mind’s eye, he used the notes to bend the magic through space, sending it rolling like a flood through the canyon to where it met the edge of Ard Dhaimhin’s domain. It felt like a sigh when the edges of the ward met and melded together into one large, misshapen carpet of golden light. He opened his eyes, satisfied. It was done. And even more surprising, it had been easy.
He returned the harp to its case and the case to his chamber, looking longingly at the bed before he returned to the catacombs where the men continued to work. They had almost completely finished relocating the bodies outside, where they would incinerate them upon the pyre. It would be like a smoke signal to anyone in the area, but there was nothing to be done about that. The craggy topography made digging a mass grave difficult, not to mention the manpower it would consume from their limited resources.
When he encountered Larkin returning with an empty handcart, the man stared at him with a slight air of awe. “You did something again. I felt it.”
“Aye. The men coming to join us should have nothing to fear from the sidhe.”
“That easy?”
“That easy.”
Larkin seemed to be thinking, debating. “Why haven’t you done this elsewhere? Gone around the towns and played wards around them?”
It was a legitimate question. It wasn’t as if the idea hadn’t occurred to Conor, but the risks had as well. “I’m the only one left who can play the wards, especially now that Meallachán is dead. The only reason I dare do it here is because we’re secure behind walls and the druid can’t pass through
our defenses. Out in the open, though, it would take only a well-paid assassin to kill me—or a well-aimed arrow.”
Larkin nodded slowly. “You’re too valuable to our efforts to lose. It’s a shame we can’t protect the entire island.”
It was. Niggling guilt started to creep in, but Conor shut it out. Leadership may bring the privilege of delegating the most unpleasant tasks, but it also brought the necessity of making hard decisions. It made no sense for him to risk everything to help individuals when his larger responsibility was to end the threat all of them faced. Wasn’t it?
By the end of the day, the unpleasant task had been completed: the bodies burned on a great pyre, the putrescence scrubbed from the chamber with lye and water. The faint smell of corruption lingered, but it was at least bearable on the lower level again. In the root cellar, they even managed to find vegetables and salted meat, which two brothers turned into a nourishing stew for supper. They ate in shifts with the change of the watch, Conor offering what encouragement he could muster. Then he retreated to his chamber once more.
When Conor called out to Aine, she was waiting for him. Conor. Thank Comdiu. It’s late. What’s wrong?
Nothing’s wrong. The fortress is secured, bodies disposed of. He struggled to form the words in his head. The weariness was too deep, his sorrow over all that had happened too great. He was swiftly sliding into numbness and exhaustion.
Conor, try to rest. I know it’s not pleasant—
Pleasant? Try torturous. Literally. He gave a harsh laugh. The fact that the dreams weren’t real—that the torture had never been real—made it no less vivid in his mind.
They have selected Nuada to command the fortress. He commanded a céad of archers here at Ard Dhaimhin.
I know him. He’s capable.
Aye. He and another fifty men will be there in a fortnight, and then you can come home.
Right. Home. He rubbed his temples with his fingers and flopped back on the bed. They shouldn’t have the problems that we had on the way. He filled her in on what he had done with the harp earlier that day. It felt so distant and unimportant now.
That’s incredible! We will be able to move freely. Do you think you could do it—
In other places? No. I’ve tried before. Aine, I’m exhausted. Can we just speak tomorrow?
A long pause. He felt her hurt even though she tried to keep her reply cheerful. Aye, we can do this tomorrow. You might like to know, though . . . the baby is kicking. I can feel it from the outside now. Riordan felt his grandson move today.
That’s wonderful. He said the words in his head, but there was no real enthusiasm attached to it. He couldn’t generate the emotion. I’ll be home soon to feel it myself.
You will. Conor?
Aye?
Please, just . . . don’t do anything drastic. I know you think you’re being rational right now, but you’ve seen and experienced things no man should have to. At some point, you’re going to have to talk—
At some point I will, just not now. There is a job to be done. Tomorrow, Aine. He slammed the door shut on his mind as she had taught him, though he suspected she could still find a way in if she tried. What had she seen that prompted the lecture? Was she just sensing his despair and weariness? Or had she seen the thing that he had kept hidden but unforgotten?
He took the vial from his pouch and set it on the stool beside the bed. Tiny. Innocuous. Dangerous. Yet it somehow made him feel better having it there while he rested. His body was too exhausted to pace the floor for another night, but his mind quailed at the idea of closing his eyes. He would just stretch out and ease his muscles for a bit before he found other occupations for the night.
The minute his body hit the horizontal, he was asleep.
Pain. Blood. Screaming. All his own. A quiet voice that managed to be chilling instead of soothing. That was someone else’s, even though he couldn’t figure out who it belonged to. He strained against his bonds, blood and sweat chafing his skin beneath the ropes.
This is just a dream. This isn’t real. You can wake up now.
Except he couldn’t.
Aine gasped awake, curling around her belly to protect her baby from another blow. Only then did she realize that she was safe in her bed at Ard Dhaimhin.
It had only been a dream.
She pushed her wet hair away from her forehead and rolled onto her back, drawing in deep breaths to flush out the fear that remained. It had been a dream, but not her own. Conor’s.
The memory of the things she had relived along with him hit her at the same time her stomach decided to give up its pretense of being settled, and she barely made it to the chamber pot. She’d thought she’d known what he’d been through.
She’d had absolutely no idea.
Aine slumped back against the wall, welcoming the cold of the stones as it seeped through her shift and cooled her feverish body. She’d left her mind open to Conor for this very reason, but she’d never thought she could get dragged into his dream. He’d even known it was a dream, but try as he might, he hadn’t been able to break free. And tied to him as she was, neither had she.
Dear Comdiu, I pray Your peace upon us. No wonder Conor was so edgy and irritable. He was trying to block out the memories of the sidhe’s glamour while trying not to fall asleep. Take these memories. Or make them livable.
She finally pushed herself off the floor and walked in a cramped shuffle back to the bed, her muscles screaming from what must have been a clenched position most of the night. Then another pain hit her, a tightening in her belly.
Birth pains.
“No no no,” she murmured, stretching out on the bed immediately. “It’s too early.” She was only five months along, much too early to be having labor pains. If the baby was born now, he or she had no chance of survival. She had assisted in too many early births, seen too many children born unformed before their time. It could not happen to her child.
She breathed deeply and counted in her mind so she knew how close the pains were coming. If they increased in intensity, she would worry. If they settled, they might just be a result of the night’s terrifying experiences. Stress could induce this effect in pregnant women.
Just when she thought she was safe, another one hit her, weaker than the last, but still enough to make her shift uncomfortably on the mattress. As soon as it passed, she threw her shawl over her shoulders, thrust her feet into shoes, and peeked out into the hall.
It was still early enough that no one stirred on the upper floor of the keep, even though the light coming through the windows was already tinged the blue of early morning. As expected, two men still stood guard outside Morrigan’s chamber. She nodded to them, trying to act as if her disheveled appearance were perfectly ordinary, and then knocked on the door.
After a few moments, a sleepy-eyed Morrigan answered. “My lady?”
“May I come in?”
“Of course, my lady.” She stood aside and shut the door behind her. Aine noticed that instead of a shift, she was wearing her long man’s shirt and boots. Did she sleep with shoes on? Why on earth would she do such a thing?
“My lady?” Morrigan prompted.
“Oh.” Aine swallowed and focused her scattered thoughts. “I need a favor.”
“Before sunrise?” Morrigan returned to her bed and sat on the edge. “Sounds like an illicit request.”
“Not illicit. Just . . . secret. Surely you realize I wouldn’t have come to you if—”
“If you weren’t desperate. Aye, I guessed that much. What is it? I will help if I can.”
“I need you to go to the healer’s cottage and get some herbs from Murchadh. Cramp bark and blazing star, enough for a pot of tea.”
Morrigan’s eyebrows lifted and an expression of alarm appeared. “Are you having problems with the baby, my lady?”
“I don’t want to take any chances. Morrigan, you can’t tell anyone it’s for me.”
“There’s nothing to be ashamed of here, my lady. Why hide it?�
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“Because nothing remains secret here for long. If it’s you, they’ll ignore it as a matter of modesty. If it’s me, they’ll send a messenger to inform Conor that I’m ill. And he has far too much to worry about to be concerned with me and his child.”
Morrigan seemed to be considering the matter. “Don’t you think Conor has the right to know that there might be something wrong with his child?”
“And if there is, what could he possibly do about it? Worry along with me? If and when there is truly something to be concerned about, I will let him know. But for now, please . . . just help me. And remain silent.” Aine winced as another pain hit her, stronger this time. Even though she tried to hide it, Morrigan’s eyes narrowed.
“That was another one, wasn’t it? All right. I don’t like it, but I’ll help you.”
“In return for my help someday?”
“I didn’t say that. After all, this is, in a sense, my niece or nephew we’re discussing.” Morrigan gave her a tiny smile. “But, aye, some reciprocity is implied in my assistance.”
“If I can without betraying my husband or my king. Will you go now, please? Before there are too many people about in the village?”
“All right, all right. Wait for me in your chamber. I’ll bring it to you when I’ve gotten it. What do you suggest I tell the guards?”
“Don’t worry about them. I’ll take care of them.” She gave Morrigan a little bow of her head. “Thank you.”
“Aye, I know. Now go so I can get dressed.”
Outside, Aine gave a vague explanation that seemed to satisfy the guards, then returned to her bed, where she lay on her side while she prayed. For herself and for the life of her unborn child. For Conor and his traumatized mind. For this whole convoluted war they were fighting, an island-sized game of King and Conqueror where they continually moved pieces around as threats. All of it, out of her control. All of it, a never-ending danger in the back of her mind.
The Sword and the Song Page 19
