They walked the rest of the way in silence, coming down off the escarpment and onto the relatively flat herd trails of the Dal Riata. Deglan had made this journey many times over the last year and every time he found himself wishing for a sturdy riding toad beneath him. Another vow made, but this one he kept. Never again, not after Bulge Eye.
So, with a sweaty back and cramping legs he led the coburn into Glengabráin, chief village of the Dal Riata. He was welcomed warmly, though he noticed the coburn received several dubious stares. Sir Corc weathered the looks with his usual stoicism, but Deglan kept an eye on Bantam Flyn. The squire was eager for a fight, though he tried to hide it. Relations between the Valiant Spur and the Dal Riata were strained enough without Flyn spilling blood over a few mistrusting glares.
Deglan made his deliveries quickly, relating instructions when necessary and administering examinations when needed. His assessment to Banyon Deaf Crower was more than simple grousing; the Dal Riata truly were a hale breed. Humans had always seemed a bit uncouth from Deglan's perspective, but compared to the mortals of Airlann, the clansmen of Albain were downright barbarous. They dwelt in rude, one room huts with only the most rudimentary stonework. In the exceptional heat of Spring most of the children scurried about naked, but Deglan had seen them go barefoot even in the colder seasons. Their crops, and therefore, their diet were limited, yet they thrived, seeing themselves though famine and illness with a resilience Deglan had quickly come to respect.
Despite their doughty self-reliance, the Dal Riata still benefited from his presence. A Fae healer was welcomed even in the most superstitious human settlements. Deglan's herbcraft had saved more than a few lives since he took up residence in the Roost, his services required more often amongst the clansmen than with the coburn. Like the knights, the Dal Riata were fighters. Less trained, less well armed, but no less brave, and they shared a common threat.
The plague of the gruagach.
The poisoned livestock and blighted crops were hard enough, but the fear, the ever present fear of a loved one being taken, used as a mask for a murderer, that took the greatest toll. Deglan could see in the eyes of the men, aye and the women as well, the helpless frustration of having an enemy they could not fight. The same look Deglan had seen in countless humans when their children fell ill, he saw now in every adult member of the clan. Powerless, desperate, willing to sacrifice anything for the lives of their offspring.
The gruagach were a sickness; entering unseen, a silent assailant, the infected ignorant of the danger until the symptoms arose and by then it was too late. Ugly death followed swiftly. The clansmen could not combat the skin-changers with any more success than they could disease. But Deglan could. It took a careful patience to wage war against invisible foes. Fevers. Malignancies. Gangrenous wounds. All had to be allowed to run their course and faced in a mad game of careful timing. Treated too soon they would return, too late they would kill. Deglan had stared down illness and injury unblinking for thousands of years, he would be damned if a bunch of shape-changing assassins would make him flinch now.
His rounds complete and his satchel now empty, Deglan led the coburn away from the village, following the bank of Loch Halket. He strolled for a ways, until the village was lost from sight. Looking out over the water, he spied a few Dal Riata fishermen, drifting in their currachs, well out of earshot.
“These people have suffered much,” Deglan said, not taking his eyes off the boats.
“And only we three know the reason,” Bantam Flyn said. Deglan looked up, but the young coburn's words were directed at Sir Corc. “Unless you revealed all to the Grand Master?”
“No,” was the knight's only reply. Deglan could tell by Flyn's expression he already knew as much.
“Pocket's secret must be kept,” Deglan said. “But we cannot continue to allow the gruagach free reign.”
“The Roost is nigh inaccessible now,” Flyn declared. “Guards posted. The clansmen kept at a distance. Iron about every neck.” A thought crossed the squire's face. “Except yours. Deglan, how do they ensure you have not been replaced?”
“Iron affects me as it does all Fae,” Deglan said, rolling up his sleeve to reveal a bandage across his inner forearm. He pealed back the linen, showing them the strip of burned flesh underneath. “I submit to voluntary exposure every fortnight.”
“Earth and Stone,” Flyn swore softly, causing Deglan to smile. It was a gnomish oath.
“Besides,” he said, covering the burn once more. “A gruagach can assume your form, but that is all. It will not possess your knowledge or your memories. That is why they must be careful who they replace. Any of those shape-changing bastards would have to know a master herbalist's skills if they wanted to kill me and have none be the wiser.”
“You burn, they burn,” Flyn said carefully. “Forgive me, Deglan, but that proves nothing. You could still be one of them.”
“No,” Sir Corc said sharply. “A gruagach will revert to its true form when exposed to iron.”
“Actually,” Deglan told them, “the lad has a point. All the precautions in the castle and they are still succeeding, still killing. I do not think they are changing.” The coburn stared at him quizzically. Deglan motioned to the collar of nails around Flyn's throat. “Remove that hideous thing and toss it here.”
Flyn hesitated, looking to Sir Corc for guidance.
“No need for permission,” Deglan grumbled. “Toss it here.”
Slowly, Flyn removed the collar, stalling a moment longer before tossing it down.
Deglan caught the collar in his bare hand, keeping his eyes fixed on Flyn. The first thing he felt was an unpleasant itching in his palm, then his throat became hot and scratchy. He felt a flush course through his body and his eyes began to water freely. Focusing, Deglan grit his teeth against the bile that rose in his mouth. Molten fluid filled his ears and a roaring that forced his eyes shut. Breathing became difficult as his airway constricted. The contents of his guts soured, threatening to spill stinging down his legs. The itching in his palm was quickly turning into a burn as the first muscle spasms wracked his spine. With a hiss, Deglan let go, dropping the metal onto the wet rocks at his feet.
Staggering over to the loch's edge, Deglan bent and dug his fingers into the cool, yielding mud. He felt the rocky grit in his hands and opened himself to it, asking the Earth to mend him. The roaring fled his ears and air passed unhindered into his lungs. He spat the foul contents of his mouth into the water and rose, returning to stand before the coburn. They looked down at him, the squire with concern and amazement, the knight with a puzzled frown. Deglan held up the hand he used to grip the iron, palm forward, fingers splayed. There was no mark upon his flesh.
“I am eight thousand years old,” Deglan said, his voice raw. “Or near enough as to make little difference. And I held that iron for what, half a minute? Fae can withstand the touch of iron for brief periods. The older we are, the greater our will becomes to resist it. The shape-changing gifts of the gruagach have always given them more resilience to iron's effects. It is said their lord, Festus Lambkiller, has completely overcome the aversion.”
“You think the lord of the gruagach is in the Roost?” Flyn asked.
“I think,” Deglan replied, “we are being preyed upon by some very old and very cunning skin-changers. They have not yet moved in force against the Order, it is not the gruagach way and it profits them nothing. They have been waiting.”
“Waiting for me,” Sir Corc said grimly. “The gruagach who tried to take Pocket in Black Pool knew me by name.”
Deglan nodded his agreement. “Now that you are returned, it is only a matter of time before they move against you.”
“Then we need to strike first,” Flyn declared.
“To do that, we would have to know the identities of every skin-changer in the castle,” Sir Corc said.
“Exactly,” Deglan said, giving both coburn a pointed look.
Flyn was the first to understand. Realization slow
ly dawned on the strut's face and he produced a smile. “You know who they are.”
“Do not go slapping me on the back yet,” Deglan scolded the young squire. “With skin-changers nothing is certain.”
“If you have a plan, Master Loamtoes, we would hear it,” Sir Corc said.
“Iron may be the Fae's only weakness,” Deglan told them, “but in our strengths we are also vulnerable. The gruagach may look like anyone they wish, but there is one mortal trait they cannot emulate. They do not succumb to illness. They are never sick.”
“Clever gnome,” Sir Corc said approvingly.
“Well I have not been idle for a damn year!” Deglan told him. “I have kept account of every person I have treated for any malady since my arrival, also noting those who remained healthy. There are certain herbs which will cause a human to become quite ill, but are harmless to Fae-folk. These I have slipped into the food and drink of those I suspected to be gruagach. Sometimes I was wrong, but slowly I cobbled it together. Whether through nature or my own meddling, four of the castle servants have remained free of all ailments.”
“The servants,” Sir Corc repeated. “Not our brothers in the Order?”
“No,” Deglan admitted. “You coburn may be mortal, but you are not as susceptible as humans to illness and poison. Your blood is thicker and you are damn hard to kill, traits I am hopeful have kept the gruagach from trying to replace any of you.”
“Hopeful,” Flyn said. “But we cannot be certain.”
“We cannot,” Deglan agreed. “Which is why I have not gone to the Grandmaster with my findings.”
“Lackcomb is no gruagach,” Sir Corc said and Deglan heard a tinge of annoyance in the knight's voice.
“Perhaps not,” Deglan conceded. “But who would he first confide any information I provided him?”
“The Knights Sergeant,” Flyn answered readily.
Deglan looked back at Corc. “Can you vouch for all of them, Sir? Because if even one of them is a gruagach, all could quickly go to ruin.”
Sir Corc said nothing, his silence voicing his assent.
“I needed to wait for your arrival,” Deglan continued, “for allies that I could trust, before confronting those I suspect. The four servants for certain, but it is possible there are more. If I know the gruagach, they will only take open action with all their numbers. If we face the four, we will draw out the rest. But anything we do, we do alone. It is your decision, Corc.”
The knight removed himself a few paces and thought for a long moment. Deglan watched him stare at the stony shore, recognizing the look of an old warrior weighing his options and not liking any of them. At last, he walked back to them.
“Tell us, Master Loamtoes. Who are the four?”
Deglan took a deep breath. “The tanner's apprentice, Aonghas, and the mason's boy, Earc. Both gruagach. That lass in the laundry who cannot speak, she is one too. Muirne is her name. And the chronicler, Ingelbert Crane.”
FOUR
Flyn gave the ropes a final, cautionary pull. They were tight against the strain of so much weight, creaking slightly as he strummed the tension with his fingertips. He was not much of a craftsman and had been forced to work quickly. The Knights Errant were arriving with more regularity and soon the castle would be filled with armed coburn. The gruagach would need to make a move soon. Feeling confident his knots would hold, Flyn plucked his torch out of a decaying sconce and descended the tower stairs, stopping at every landing to look up and inspect his work.
This drum tower was one of the oldest in the castle, all but forgotten and rarely visited. The rotting stairs hugged the curve of the wall, leaving the center of the tower a wide, yawning shaft. There were six landings along the creaking spiral, one near the top leading to the battlements, another several turns down that held a door to a connecting gallery. The remaining landings housed doorways, now sealed with masonry, which once led out into the Upper Bailey and long abandoned corridors within the curtain wall. The foundations of the tower went deep and the base level was home to a final passage that wound around in the dark, leading eventually to the Under Hall for those who knew the way.
The Roost was an ancient citadel, built atop the indomitable crag in the earliest days of the Order, when the elves still guided the coburn in the ways of honor, combat and service. The original keep was long enveloped as the stronghold grew over the centuries, reflecting the might of the Valiant Spur in its prime. This drum tower, no doubt, was once a key point in the elder defenses, now choked out of use by the bloated maze of fortifications it helped spawn. Flyn was surprised the servants had not used it to store grain.
Reaching the end of the stairs, he hopped down to the rough floor of the base level, craning his neck upwards to view his work from the very bottom. His efforts were lost to distance and shadow. Perfect.
The torch was near its end, but the fat lamps he had left burning at the bottom still had life. Flyn dropped the guttering shaft and took up his water skin, taking a long drink. He was not much for honest labor, though setting a trap for your enemies was neither honest nor honorable. It was not how knights fought and the plan had troubled Sir Corc, but Deglan had put him to ease with his usual eloquence.
“Skin-changing bastards are the fathers of trickery. I say we shag 'em with their own prick. And smile all the while!”
Flyn laughed aloud at the memory.
The cranky old gnome had been right about the castle servants. The lads apprenticed to the tanner and the mason were never far from Sir Corc, though he made it easy on them. Every castle servant was required to have a coburn escort, so Corc had arranged to be Deglan's permanent guard and the two spent as much time holed up in the infirmary as possible, making it simpler for the gruagach to watch them. For his own part, Flyn had volunteered to ensure the safety of the mute laundress, enjoying the irony for a few hours before giving her the slip, as planned. It was fortunate he had established a habit of shirking his duties years ago, lest the Knights Sergeant and his fellow squires wonder about his absence. Still, it had not been easy gathering the needed materials and hauling them into the tower unseen, but he used the forgotten passages of the castle to his advantage.
Flyn was more worried about being discovered by the Knights Sergeant than the gruagach. The skin-changers he could fight, but not the discipline of one of the senior knights. He would not be much of an ally to Corc and Deglan if he was relegated to scraping gong out of the garderobe shafts as punishment for leaving the laundress unguarded. And he could expect no more special dispensation as tourney champion, either. While the Grand Master had not made any official pronouncements, Flyn was destined for two more years squiring, at least. His only hope to avoid that fate lay in the success of their plan.
It was not only for himself that he plotted with such pains, however.
Flyn looked to the base of the stairs. There, under the musty timbers of the first landing was a small curtain and behind that curtain, a home. A former home. Flyn took one of the fat lamps and approached the stairs, keenly aware he had wanted to do this since entering the tower, but avoided it until his work was done. He had to crawl on his knees and free hand, struggling to maneuver between the support beams, in order to reach the curtain. Careful to keep the flame of his lamp away from the cloth, he pushed the hanging aside. The light fell upon a tight space created by the tower wall and the scaffolding of the stairs. Within, a small bronze brazier sat, long cold. The rats had made merry with the straw-stuffed feed sack that once served as a bed. Nailed to a stair beam across from the bed hung a tattered map of Airlann.
Flyn had hoped it would be difficult to imagine Pocket here, sitting alone beneath the stairs. The image, however, was easily, painfully conjured. The boy had oft spoke of this place, a haunted longing creeping into his voice and face. Flyn had not known of this tower outside a vague perception of its location, much less Pocket's lonely nook within. He had once asked Moragh about the place. The former mistress of the Roost's kitchens had smiled sadly, the e
xpression only affecting half of her palsied face. She gave him clear directions, starting from the kitchens, of course. It was mere curiosity then, but when the time came to choose the site for their ambush, Flyn had insisted it be here. There was a pinch of poetry to it. If the gruagach wanted Pocket, they could come here, to the place he once dwelt alone and often afraid. The place he was forced to hide because he was shunned and feared by the castle's human servants on account of his changeling blood.
They had given Pocket a new home, he and Sir Corc, Moragh and Napper. The thought of the skinny, old cat made Flyn smile, realizing now that Pocket had rarely sat beneath these stairs alone. The pair remained inseparable, the ratter at Pocket's heels or in his arms everywhere he went. Fishing had become the boy's principal interest, though there were few other choices on the island. Flyn fashioned several wooden swords and often invited the boy to learn swordplay. It was half lark and half drill, but Flyn got the distinct impression that the little gurg, once so enamored of knighthood and all its trappings, was merely humoring him. It was a more solemn Pocket that emerged from the sickbed, with nary a hint of the sorcery he had wielded in the moments he wore Jerrod's cursed iron crown. He had calmed the Unwound in those moments, commanded them back to the torpid slumber that kept them from covering Airlann in blood. He had restored Flyn's life in those moments, his and Corc's along with several others. In those moments, the child was the most calamitous being to walk the Tin Isles in a thousand years. That was difficult to imagine, given the boy's gentle nature and tragic beginnings.
He was a changeling, an unwanted get, hated by his human kin, but loved still by his mother, in whose veins the blood of the Goblin Kings survived. Beladore, descendant of Jerrod the Second and his son, the Gaunt Prince, duped like so many mortal women, into the arms of a gruagach wearing her husband's face. A husband who then tried to slay her misshapen child and would have, if not for a wandering warrior, a Knight Errant of the Valiant Spur. Sir Corc the Constant. The knight had continued to watch over Pocket in the years that followed, mostly from a distance, but the gruagach closed in, intent on obeying Festus Lambkiller's command that all gurgs be returned to him. Corc took Pocket away from the Roost, to better protect him, ignorant that the boy's human blood was a direct link to the Goblin Kings of old.
The Errantry of Bantam Flyn (The Autumn's Fall Saga) Page 6
