His eye sparking gold, Branndair raised his head, his jaws opening in a knowing grin. I knew when I was beaten, so I grinned back.
HANNAH
‘I don’t suppose it occurred to you to ask me,’ said Rory. Perched on the top rail of the paddock fence, he was rubbing oil into a bridle like he wanted to erode the leather altogether.
‘No,’ said Seth. Stripped to the waist in the summer sun, he hammered on a fencepost as I stared at his tattoo. Conal had one the same, Eili said. Only Conal’s was presumably not distorted by a traitor’s flogging.
Nobody else was working on the fence. Three men and a woman were hacking pretend lumps out of each other, sword-practising in a roped-off section of the courtyard; Sulaire the cook was butchering a deer carcass in the open air, cheerfully drenched in blood to his elbows. Branndair was darting between his cast-off scraps and three kids who had nothing better to do than rub his tummy and pretend to run away.
I got the feeling the rest of the clann were delicately avoiding Seth and Finn and Rory.
As for me, Seth hadn’t met my eyes since breakfast. He was avoiding me, the treacherous miserable coward. But I watched his every move, almost every second: mending fences in the sun when he ought to be dead. And my father should be cantering that black horse round the arena. My father, not the black-haired bitch who’d stolen Rory’s.
What right does she have to your father’s horse?
Taghan had said that; Taghan, with her quiet smile and her green eyes that saw everything. Eili had brought her to me, had leaned back silent on the balcony wall, knowing she herself had said all she needed to say.
What right did she have to your father’s love? Taghan had asked me, turning her dagger in her fingers. The picture of Conal and the baby Finn lay between us, so that my own father stared resentfully at me. Finn MacAngus is the girl Conal was fathering when he should have been a father to you. And how did she repay him?
By getting him killed. I’d heard the whole story by then.
Taghan inclined her head, lips quirking. Seth was the true betrayer, but Finn left Cù Chaorach even before he did. She abandoned the man who brought her up, and all for the empty flattery of Kate NicNiven.
I had my first twinge of doubt then. I thought she was captured? I thought they took her?
And she stayed of her own free will. Seduced by Kate, and for a few sweet words. My brother went to Kate out of belief and honour, centuries before Finn was born. And when the fickle bitch changed her mind at last, she sent Seth to kill him. My big brother, Hannah. Finn didn’t turn her coat in time to save Cù Chaorach – Taghan gave Eili a lingering look – but Seth was in plenty of time to kill Feorag.
Taghan’s voice was so low and calm that when Eili finally spoke I nearly jumped out of my skin.
There are some who say Seth has paid for what he did to your father, Hannah. There are some. But no-one believes Finn has paid.
I glanced from one woman to the other, alarmed.
Come, now. When Eili tried to be soothing, it was like the madness burned through her like a visible thing. Her eyes were embers. We don’t want her dead. We want her gone. And so do you.
Taghan laid down her dagger then, right on top of the photograph, and clasped her hands.
I never knew my brother as I should have done. I was so young when he went over to Kate. I never agreed with what he did, but I knew why he did it. I’d have liked the chance to talk to him. She touched her fingers to her temple. Instead I felt him die.
Eili came round behind me, laid her hands on my shoulders, bent her lips to my ear. Why should Seth have Finn, Hannah? When Taghan never had Feorag, and you never had your father?
Why indeed. You won’t hurt her?
We’ll send her away, that’s all. We’ll send her away so she can never come back. Just make sure she comes to us. Eili glanced at Taghan, who was sliding her polished blades one after the other into her belt. Get Finn away from Seth, and bring her. I know the best place. The only place. That’s all you have to do, Hannah. We’ll take care of the rest.
I shook my head. Finn won’t just come. Why would she come with me?
There’s only one way to make sure she does. Taghan smiled up at me. She’s bound to Seth. She has responsibilities to him, and to his. Do it.
It’s not as if we’ll hurt her, said Eili.
Did I honestly believe them? Maybe not completely, but I believed them enough. Perhaps I didn’t want Finn dead, but I certainly didn’t want her happy.
And she looked far too happy now, here, despite the atmosphere. There was a shine in her eyes that was not a bit like the insane glow of Eili’s, and the looks she cast Seth made me want to throw up.
‘I see, Father. You didn’t think you should ask me if you were planning to bind.’ Fiercely Rory rubbed the bridle’s cheekpiece. ‘So did you think you might tell me, then?’
‘I’m telling you now,’ said Seth.
The black horse shook its arched neck as it cantered past, massive hooves sending up duststorms. Rory shot Finn a hateful glare, but too late to connect, so he turned it on Seth instead. ‘Don’t you think it’s my business who you sleep with?’
‘No.’ Seth wrenched out a length of rotten wood and took a splinter out of his finger with his teeth. ‘No, Rory, I really don’t.’
Rory examined the bridle’s browband, picking at a loose piece of stitching. ‘Funny how things change. You never used to let them come between us. You never stayed the night with any of them. I used to wake you up at dawn, remember? I used to crawl in beside you. You were always there. You were always in your own bed.’ He raised his voice. ‘Even when I knew fine you hadn’t started out there.’
He’d turned up the volume as Finn rode by once more. She didn’t react, except to shoot him a look of understanding. I hated her even more.
Seth slammed a mallet into the new fencepost, then shoved his hair out of his eyes with a forearm. ‘I’m not letting anybody come between us now, Rory. Nobody’s trying.’ He gave me a direct stare and said through his teeth: ‘Well. Finn isn’t.’
‘Right. Now that’s out in the open, anything else you haven’t told me?’
‘Nothing you need to know.’ Seth sucked his bleeding finger. At last he glanced my way, and I stared levelly back.
He seemed thoughtful, but he didn’t try to read my mind. Too much on his, I thought contemptuously, and just the one thing as well.
Beside Seth, at the gap in the broken fence, the black horse halted, snorting and pawing the sand, and Finn slipped off its back. I couldn’t look at her. If I did I might scream, That’s not your horse, you thieving bitch. Finn was scowling at me, but I was blocking my mind the way Eili had taught me. It wasn’t hard; it came easily and naturally, and Seth in particular was easy to block. I knew why that was. He didn’t want to look, didn’t want to know.
‘You know, Rory,’ said Seth, ‘if you’re at a loose end there’s plenty needs doing around here. There’s ditches need clearing down in the lower fields.’
Rory bit his lip hard enough to hurt. ‘I’m your son.’
‘What does that mean? You’re too good to clear ditches? Because you’re not.’
‘No,’ Rory spat. ‘It means your love life’s your business, but I’d have liked to know before Eili.’
For a long time no-one spoke. Explain that to him, I thought with an inward grin.
Getting his breath back, Seth rubbed his temples. ‘Eili only knew because she…’
‘Because she what? Go on.’
‘Because she pried,’ Finn interrupted.
‘Pried, did she?’ Rory’s sneer gave him a distinct look of his father. ‘How devious. How underhand. How very Finn MacAngus.’
Seth hissed through his teeth. ‘Watch that mouth, sunshine. You’re not too big for a skelping.’
‘I think you’ll find I am.’
‘Then you can get your arse to the armoury and find yourself a practice sword. This arena, five minutes.’
‘Gladly, since
it’s your answer to everything.’ Rory kicked a stone viciously, sending it spinning past his father’s ear. Seth didn’t dodge, only bared his teeth as Rory turned and slouched towards the armoury.
I smirked; Seth glowered at me. Finn said, ‘That went well.’
‘If I could give him a spell in somebody else’s army, he’d be out of here.’ Seth rubbed his face.
‘The trouble is,’ said Finn, ‘he’s right.’
‘Oh, not you too.’
‘I’ll talk to him.’ She sounded as if it would kill her. I could dream.
‘Don’t let him give you a hard time.’ Seth seized her hand and kissed it brusquely.
I had no intention of leaving Rory to a tongue-lashing from his father’s live-in slapper. Ignoring Seth’s growl of warning, I ran after them, but my dignity took a bit of a knock when I almost fell over Finn, who had come to a dead halt in the stone alley.
‘I realise you two are joined at the hip,’ murmured Finn, ‘but I want to talk to Rory.’
‘I doubt he’ll want to talk to you. He hates you.’ I liked the effect that had on her face, so I followed it up. ‘What’s it like?’
‘What’s what like?’
‘Shagging a traitor.’
I was delighted to hear Finn’s breath catch in her throat. I was not quite so delighted when her lips thinned and the hand at her side balled into a fist. I hadn’t thought much of Finn. I certainly hadn’t been afraid of her. Not till now, not till I saw the crackling silver spark in her eye. I slewed my gaze away, but that was even worse, since my eyes lit on her knife-belt.
‘Don’t look so nervous,’ breathed Finn. ‘You’re a child.’
‘You wish. If I was eight, you might scare me.’ I didn’t even convince myself.
‘You scare me, you little gossip-swamp. You’ve got one side of a story in your head. That’s dangerous.’ The way she leaned in, all conspiratorial, was alarming. ‘Eili’s had a chat?’
‘She’s told me about Seth. What kind of a man he is.’
‘You have no idea.’ Finn’s lips thinned. ‘Let me state the obvious for you. If it sounds too bad to be true, sweetie, then it probably ain’t true. Go figure.’
‘Seth killed Eili’s lover.’ I was seething at Finn’s sarcastic pity, but I didn’t want to provoke her too far. I hadn’t seen her in a mood like this.
‘No. No.’ Finn rubbed her temple with her knuckles. ‘Seth didn’t kill Conal, none of us did. Clever planning killed him. And his own temper, and loving Jed and me too much to leave us to our own stupid devices. The woman who ordered him dead, and the man who gutted him. Kate NicNiven and Nils Laszlo killed him. Nobody else.’ She grinned fiercely, and I saw tears in her eyes. ‘What would you care?’
I licked very dry lips. ‘I…’
‘I do care, you see. I knew him, you didn’t. I loved him like a father. I loved him like a brother. I loved him like Seth loved him. Conal wouldn’t want your pious indignation,’ she spat. ‘And I think he would like our Eili to get a life.’
A fist of ice closed round my heart. In that moment I hated Finn like I hated Seth. More. Oh, I’d like to see her gone, all right; and Eili was wrong. I’d like to see Finn dead.
I took three steps back from her, turned on my heel, and walked away; I wasn’t going to waste any more hate on amateur bitch-fests. I was better than that.
So was Eili.
FINN
I shut my eyes. A lump of self-loathing rose in my throat. Hannah had no right to hate Seth on Conal’s behalf; that was true, but I’d gone too far and I knew it. And Rory was still in the armoury, waiting to have a go at me, and I’d been dreading it even before that scene with Hannah.
What did I know about children? What did I know about teenagers? I didn’t even know the ones I grew up with. I didn’t grow up with them. I stayed on my own, antisocial. I spent all my emotional energy mourning Conal and my grandmother, and missing Jed and Seth. I grew up with Faramach, with horses, with the constant hungry longing to be back where I belonged.
If I didn’t watch myself, I’d turn into a misanthropic grouch like Seth. Conal would turn in his… in his… No, he didn’t have a grave. His gathered bones in a hillside hollow, that was all, and teethmarks on the bones...
I shut my eyes, still unable to face what had become of him, tradition or no tradition. I never had come to terms with the images that haunted my imagination. Maybe I should have stayed on Brokentor with Seth all those years ago, endured the awful weeks of Conal’s death-ceremony.
Or maybe I wasn’t cut out to be Sithe at all. Perhaps my mother had succeeded in severing me from them. Trouble was, I couldn’t go back to my mother’s preferred world, even if I wanted to. I didn’t have a choice any more. I’d made my choice, and the point where my two paths had diverged was already in the past, irretrievable. I’d chosen a Sithe life, and maybe a Sithe death, but most importantly I’d chosen Seth. And now I was stuck with him.
I smiled.
In the armoury Rory was testing the string on a longbow, one eye shut as he drew it back taut. It was aimed right at me; I was glad it wasn’t loaded. ‘Um, Rory,’ I said.
He lowered the bow. ‘Well, if it isn’t half the new double act.’
‘That’s your father and me,’ I said. ‘Alone and Palely Loitering.’
He sighed out his contempt. ‘The unfunny half.’
‘I’m sorry,’ I said.
‘You’re not.’
‘No. Course not.’ I shrugged. ‘That isn’t what I meant. I’m only sorry you’re upset.’
‘Too right. I’m not to be upset under any circumstances. I’m for keeping in the dark, so they can feed me shit.’ Grabbing a sword, he yanked it so carelessly out of its sheath he almost cut himself.
My gut felt cold. ‘In the dark? How?’
‘Am I the only one in the dun who didn’t know?’ He turned the blade and ran his fingertip lightly over the edge. ‘Did people snigger at me, or did they shake their heads and suck their teeth? You know, when I was little and smitten with her?’ His voice was conversational but it sent icy sensations up my spine.
‘Who – why would they do that?’
‘I always knew Eili didn’t like me much, but I was crazy about her.’ Rory had drawn a thin line of blood on his fingertip, and he sucked it thoughtfully. He looked exactly like Seth, emotionless, as if it didn’t hurt at all. ‘I thought it was just the way she was. And now it turns out she hates me, and she hates my father enough to hurt him every night for the whole of my life.’
It was like a hard jab in the belly. Gossip might be rife in the dun, but the business between Eili and Seth had been unspoken and unSeen for more than a decade. Whether they approved or whether they didn’t, not one of the clann would have told Rory; I knew that as well as I knew anything about them. Who in God’s name would have been malevolent enough to tell him? For a long moment I was breathless and speechless.
‘Rory…’
‘Do they think my father’s stupid or do they think he’s a masochist? I mean, why does he keep her with him? Just to pull the wool over my eyes?’ His eyes burned. ‘Or does he like it?’
‘Oh, you are your father’s son.’ I was suddenly angry with him and with Seth too. ‘All that passion, and you so like to pretend you’re dead inside. What is it with you two?’
‘What makes you think it’s your business?’ Rory chewed his knuckle hard. ‘Oh, yeah, I forgot. You’re his bound lover and I have to put up with you and your stupid questions for the rest of his life.’
I took the sword from his unresisting fingers and sheathed it. I would have liked to touch his shoulder but I didn’t dare. ‘You think I like Eili being around him? I didn’t know about it either, Rory. If we’d known it would have made things worse.’ I rubbed my temples. ‘Look, when she’s with him, at least she’s in his Sight. Eili saved his life, Rory. At least she didn’t leave him to die. I was there, and believe me, she wanted to.’
‘She saved his life at a price.’
‘But your father’s loyal to her because of Conal.’
‘Then he’s a fool,’ spat Rory.
I slapped him before I had time to stop myself. It was only a light stinging slap on his cheek but when he looked back at me his eyes burned bright and silver, sheened with tears.
I swallowed hard. ‘Don’t you dare. Don’t you dare call your father a fool!’
Rory ground his knuckles into his scalp. ‘They keep me shut up in here and they can’t even tell me the truth.’
‘Yeah. They lied to me when I was your age. It’s wrong and stupid and it only leads to trouble. But keeping you in the dun, that’s to keep you safe. You know Conal died trying to protect you. Your father nearly did too.’
‘It was my father handed me over to the other side,’ Rory said savagely. ‘He was a traitor, and don’t you dare hit me again. You think I don’t know that story? He abandoned me before I was born and when he got me back, he gave me to Kate NicNiven.’ His voice faded as he finished his sentence, as if it was the first time he’d said it aloud and it had done for him.
‘Your father thought he was doing the right thing. He was wrong but he didn’t mean to do wrong.’ I dug my nails into my palms. ‘And he’s paid for it!’
‘Yes, and he won’t be finished paying till he’s dead!’ shouted Rory.
‘She could have demanded his execution after Conal died, but for your sake she didn’t–’
‘My sake? I don’t think so. She had her project. You never had to see it, did you?’ The hate in his eyes made me flinch. ‘Want to See it, Finn?’
He flung his hand to my forehead, and I wasn’t fast enough to stop him. As he shoved his memory into my mind I felt his pain etching itself into my own face. He did it with an easy, casual skill, the memory sharp as a honed blade.
Seth on all fours. His mouth open in a voiceless scream, his back impossibly twisted, the puncture marks glowing so red and angry they might be on fire. Propping himself up on his hands as the pain faded, only to stare straight into his son’s eyes. His three-year-old son, wide awake and watching him.
Wolfsbane: 3 (Rebel Angels) Page 16
