The Dawn Stag: Book Two of the Dalriada Trilogy

by Jules Watson

‘I still don’t know her name,’ the man admitted, stifling a smile. ‘But your lord called her Agricola’s whore.’ His eyes darted to the young female faces behind Rhiann. ‘Begging your pardons.’

  Though her darkest fears had prepared her, still Rhiann flinched. Samana, here! Her traitorous cousin, who brazenly seduced Eremon just after he and Rhiann were wed. Rhiann hadn’t loved Eremon then, or he her, but it still hurt … Goddess, did it hurt.

  ‘Go now,’ Rhiann ground out, tucking her wet, cold hands into her sleeves, ‘and take hold of her and bring her to me here, slung over your shoulder if need be!’

  The leader of the men grinned, and bowed his head. ‘Yes, lady.’

  And that was how Samana arrived, screaming curses and batting the shoulders of the warrior who carried her, until he flung her on the damp ground right at Rhiann’s feet.

  Despite her anger, Rhiann was shocked at the change in Samana. Always so perfectly bathed and oiled and groomed, her black hair had long ago escaped its braids and lay wild and tangled about her shoulders. Her dress was so encrusted with mud that the original colour had been obscured, and her bare ankles and wrists were scratched and bruised. She’d stopped cursing as the wind was knocked out of her by the fall, yet now she looked up at Rhiann from all fours, her dark eyes alight with fury. ‘You!’ she spat. ‘You cannot treat me this way! I am a queen—’

  ‘You are a Roman slave,’ Rhiann cut in, straightening her spine, ‘and when you betrayed your own people you gave up any nobility that we would recognize here.’

  Samana merely hissed in rage and frustration and said no more, pulling herself into a crouch. Rhiann stared down, a distant part of her appalled at Samana’s appearance and this uncharacteristic loss of composure. The way Samana’s eyes drooped at the edges, her snub nose and dusky skin all combined, as Rhiann knew well, into an alluring and languid beauty. Yet that sensual potency had been muddied by the desperation Rhiann saw in her face now.

  At another time, perhaps this knowledge would have drawn forth pity in Rhiann, for she also had known desperation and great fear. But no longer. She had no room for such feelings even in herself now, for her heart was too scarred to admit them.

  ‘I would advise you to get up,’ she told Samana. ‘We will not carry you.’

  Samana flung up her chin with ill-disguised hate. ‘Then leave me here, cousin. I will be more trouble to you than I’m worth, I promise. Your husband could not get any information from me, and neither will you!’

  At mention of Eremon, Rhiann’s skin went completely cold, and the fingers folded in her sleeves tightened. Samana had supreme powers of seduction. She had been with Eremon, probably alone with him. He was no doubt still hurt by Rhiann’s revelation. Had Samana enticed him again? Did he touch her?

  Stop it!

  With an effort, Rhiann gained control over herself and slowly uncurled her arms, standing tall. She would not give Samana power over her. But what was she supposed to do? Eremon said Rhiann would know, but she didn’t. What she wanted was to be as far from Samana as possible. The revulsion was so strong it was tangible.

  Perhaps she should send Samana with these warriors back to Dunadd, to be held prisoner there. Or better yet, with some of Nectan’s men, for Rhiann was sure they would never succumb to her wiles. And yet, it was a long journey. Eremon had given Samana into Rhiann’s safe keeping, and she could not risk her escaping. Nor did she wish to lose the protection of any of Nectan’s men.

  Eremon! Rhiann allowed herself a brief flash of anger at the position in which he had put her. But there was no time for that now.

  ‘So, cousin,’ Samana taunted, her eyes flashing. ‘How inconvenient for us both. Your prince must be playing a joke on you.’

  ‘Be silent!’ Rhiann raised her palm before Samana’s face, and to her relief, it was steady. ‘I will deal with you later, Samana. For now, we must seek shelter.’ The rain was showing no signs of lightening, and it would soon be dark. Rhiann glanced calmly at Nectan. ‘Let us push on to the next dun.’ Then she gazed down at Samana. ‘It seems you will be our guest for a short time, until I decide what to do with you. You can make that painful for yourself, or relatively pleasant. It’s up to you.’

  Yet Samana was either speechless with rage, or she’d decided to regain her dignity, for she said nothing more and gave no more trouble, walking along behind the horses with her guards as they made for the head of the pass.

  The bout of rain was just as cold and uncomfortable on the other side of Alba, yet Calgacus and Eremon agreed that it was fortuitous, providing cover and opportunity for another rapid strike attack. For after the culling of the horses and oxen, the Romans had not turned back, but kept to their northwards line of march.

  As Eremon sat sharpening his sword, he wondered to Calgacus if this foolhardiness stemmed from the fact this army was not led by Agricola. ‘Perhaps this new commander seeks to prove himself,’ he pondered, looking out from his shelter at the raindrops, pounding the path into mud. He tossed the whetstone in his hand, brushing the surface of the smooth granite with his thumb. ‘Perhaps he fears to be seen as cowardly.’

  Calgacus agreed, warming one hand around a bronze cup of hot mead. ‘It is time to split our forces once more, then. If we begin a barrage of harassment – short raids from the glens – we may not kill many, but we will instill greater fear.’

  ‘And fear,’ Eremon added, resting his blade across his crossed legs, ‘may make our new commander do something foolish.’

  They leaned in together over a crude map drawn on smoothed bark with charcoal.

  The Romans, moving more slowly now with fewer beasts to draw their baggage wagons, had crossed the Dee river and were now following the course of the Don. And here, the Albans gained the advantage of terrain once more. For the mountains descended into lower hills on the plain, their courses broken and unpredictable. To keep far from the hills, the Romans would have to detour to the east, away from their more direct northern path. This, Eremon surmised, they were unlikely to do. To keep to their chosen, faster route, they would have to come within reach of the high ground once more – and the Alban camp.

  ‘I think they still hope we will face them in open battle,’ Calgacus remarked, picking up a chewed hawthorn twig and resuming the cleaning of his teeth.

  Eremon nodded, grating the stone down his blade edge with short, practised strokes. ‘And they may keep hoping. Yet I agree that we must show ourselves more now. Numbers of Roman dead are not important – the aim is to goad this commander and his men into making an error.’

  They looked at each other, and then out of the tent at the rain, which was now being blown slantwise. The surfaces of all the little puddles were puckered with heavy drops and slews of wind. ‘Mud,’ Eremon said thoughtfully. ‘Rain and mud are no friends of the Romans.’

  Even though the Decantae seemed supportive of the alliance, it was the first night in a new tribal territory, and Rhiann knew they must all do well at convincing the chieftain of their cause. So with a heavy heart, she took extra time with her appearance, dabbing the ruam dye automatically on her lips and cheeks, settling the cold, heavy torc around her neck, the bracelets on her arms.

  Rhiann had decided to question Samana afterwards, and as she emerged from behind the bedscreen in her jewellery and fine dress, she was glad, as her eyes fell on her cousin, that she had thought to wait. Rhiann’s finery, and the power that always rose in her with each retelling of their tale, would make her more able to deal with this strange situation.

  Since their arrival, Samana had sat unmoving by the fire in the guest lodge under the watchful gaze of two of Nectan’s men, for Gerat and his warriors had returned to Eremon and Calgacus. Yet as Rhiann passed behind Samana now, she detected a faint trembling across her cousin’s shoulders, and unconsciously Rhiann took a step to the side and quietly turned to go.

  As she neared the door, however, she heard a rustle, and Samana suddenly rose to her feet in her mud-stiffened skirts. ‘Whatever you�
�re trying to do with these visits, it won’t help,’ she hissed.

  Abruptly, Rhiann halted and turned. And that was when she understood the quivering of Samana’s shoulders, for her cousin’s eyes were pits of hatred, lit with a rage that burned like live coals. ‘The Romans are too strong, and always were,’ spat the Votadini queen. ‘You picked the wrong side, cousin. You and that prancing boy of yours.’

  ‘It seems you were once unsure of that, Samana.’ Rhiann struggled to keep her voice even. ‘I recall you tried, unsuccessfully, to make Eremon join you. So you’ve had second thoughts since you turned traitor, and will do so again, no doubt.’ She paused. ‘Once a traitor, always a traitor. I wonder if that has occurred to Agricola yet?’

  Samana’s eyes burned brighter, and her mouth twisted into some kind of smile. ‘You speak of second thoughts, Rhiann, and perhaps that’s why I left your own lord’s bed so warm. Could it be Eremon has had his own second thoughts – about you?’

  The blow was physical, and Rhiann could not hide its force. ‘That’s not true.’ She endeavoured to contain the sick hurt that turned in her belly. ‘You’re a liar.’

  Samana’s smile curved with a feverish triumph, and she took a step closer to Rhiann, clenching her hands by her sides. ‘I saw it in his eyes, Rhiann, how you’ve let him down. You failed him, didn’t you? His body told me when it joined with mine.’

  The gasp escaped Rhiann’s tight throat, and she clamped her lips harder, striving for calm. She knew it wasn’t true, it couldn’t be.

  But couldn’t it? something deep in her whispered. You wounded him … he has been away from your bed for many moons. She hated herself for even thinking such thoughts, but Samana was wielding a potent weapon of which even she was unaware. Memory.

  Two years before, when Eremon followed Samana to the Roman camp, Rhiann took the rye spores to observe what he did. Her spirit saw him and Samana together then, their bodies thrusting in urgency. And once seen, such things could never be forgotten.

  Rhiann hadn’t loved him then, but she did now. No matter how, in her dazed grief, she’d denied them to herself, her feelings for Eremon had retreated, but not gone away. They’d merely contracted to a glowing coal beneath her numbness, and though she surrounded it with ice to keep the hurt at bay, she could not extinguish that warmth. It pulsed at times, catching her unawares, and now, faced with Samana’s threats, it was strengthening, yet bringing with it a rising panic.

  Samana took another step closer, her wide smile fuelled by the anguish Rhiann could not hide. ‘Yes, Rhiann, he kissed me like a starving man. He suckled me. He buried his face between my legs—’

  The crack of Rhiann’s palm across Samana’s face shocked them both, as well as the guards, who took a step forward, their hands on their daggers.

  Samana gasped and held her reddening cheek. ‘So you do love him,’ she said, and laughed.

  Rhiann’s chest was heaving, and her eyes stung. Not only for Eremon, but also for the burning sickness that had arisen with Samana’s words; how her images drew the dark spectre of Maelchon into Rhiann’s throat and mouth, the memory of his touch on her breasts. It was all mixed up together again. Eremon. Maelchon. Her own desires. Her body. Hers.

  ‘Your life’, she murmured, ‘is under my control. And you will show me respect, as well as my husband, for he will cut your Romans into pieces.’

  Her cousin only stared at her with that maddening smile.

  With trembling legs, Rhiann barked at the two guards. ‘Do not let her leave this room. Do not talk to her or listen to her, or let her out of your sight, even to pass water. Do you understand?’ Rhiann saw them nod, but would not meet their eyes, for she was ashamed at her loss of control. Drawing the fine clothes around her, she swept out of the door without looking back.

  Yet as she sat in the chieftain’s hall that night, the sweet voices washing over her, she could not blot out the conversation.

  Eremon hated Samana. He would never touch her. He would never do that to Rhiann. Her logical mind knew it, but …

  Wouldn’t he? that voice whispered again, in the pained shadows of her heart. And she remembered the deep hurt she had seen in his eyes. Wouldn’t he?

  CHAPTER 49

  As they continued north Nectan took charge of Samana himself, ensuring that she was kept well away from Rhiann, even when they stopped at night.

  Yet he couldn’t blot out the sound of her imperious demands, as she sat straight in her saddle with her chin high, glaring around at them all. She grew louder and more disruptive the more she was ignored, until Nectan at last lost patience and gagged her mouth. Where before their party had been lively, with the girls singing and chattering, now an uncomfortable silence settled over them all, unrelieved by the return of the sunshine.

  At the end of another hard day in the saddle, Rhiann was hunched lower over Liath’s neck, angry with herself. Samana’s lies should not have affected her so much. She had wielded the most potent of weapons, yes, but Rhiann had faced many things these past years. Look at what she was facing now! She shouldn’t let her personal feelings get in the way of her task, yet they were.

  And Rhiann realized that some of her strength and fierce drive must therefore be faltering, and it frightened her. For she still did not want to face what lay on the other side.

  The northern hills and sky had been washed clean by the recent rains, the heather glittering with drops of moisture, the winding paths cut by rivulets that ran down from the bare rock peaks. As they passed a small, dark loch lying in a deserted valley, Rhiann watched an osprey arrow into the water after fish, barely conscious of Fola nudging her horse up beside her.

  ‘Sister,’ Fola whispered. ‘We can’t go on like this. What will you do with her?’

  ‘I don’t know.’ Rhiann sighed and glanced ruefully at Fola. ‘She had a … connection … to Eremon. She uses that to hurt me.’

  ‘But this connection must be long severed.’ Fola said it as a statement, not a question, and when Rhiann did not answer, she added hotly, ‘How can you listen to her poison?’

  ‘It is more complicated than that … but … I’m being a coward, aren’t I?’

  Fola shook her head. ‘You? Never. Yet it is clear something must be done.’

  Rhiann straightened her shoulders. ‘I will try to get some information from her – Goddess knows that’s the only reason Eremon could have sent her! Perhaps this time, with you nearby, our joint presence will get me further than before.’

  Fola nodded thoughtfully. ‘Perhaps you can convince her that her loyalties lie with her people.’

  Yet Rhiann’s only answer was the bitter curve of her mouth.

  The dun they came to that night was on the western borders of Decantae territory, near to Calgacus’s own fort. The chieftain already supported the alliance, and had sent some of his own men to join the Caledonii king.

  ‘Word of your approach has gone before you, lady,’ the chieftain said, on greeting her in the yard before his hall. ‘You should rest, bathe and eat.’

  Rhiann thanked him and accepted the offer of rest for the others, but that was not what she had in mind for herself. While the Sisters went into the hall to eat, Rhiann asked Nectan to bring Samana into the guest lodge, empty of everyone except she and Fola, who waited behind a bedscreen.

  Samana was still gagged, but strove to look defiant as Nectan gestured her towards one of the hearth-benches. She resisted, until Nectan was forced to push her to her knees on the earth floor, none too gently.

  ‘She will listen to no one,’ he grumbled to Rhiann. ‘By the Mother, let me imprison her on the most barren of the rock islands, out in the sea. There the wind can carry her voice away altogether!’

  At his words, Rhiann noted the flash of Samana’s dark eyes. She feared imprisonment, then, and that was useful information. Rhiann nodded at Nectan to remove the gag, bracing herself for Samana’s rage.

  It was not long in coming. Samana practically spat the gag out, her eyes sparking. ‘Ho
w dare you treat a tribal queen like a common thief – me, a sworn priestess, a king’s niece! How dare you!’

  Rhiann regarded Samana calmly from a hearth-bench on the other side of the fire, as Nectan retreated to stand with his back to the door. ‘As I said, you forfeited all right to those titles through your treachery, Samana.’

  Samana narrowed her black eyes. ‘You, my cousin, love to clothe all your words in ideals such as honour and treachery, when you’re nothing but a jealous chit who can’t satisfy her man, and objects when someone does it for her!’

  Rhiann absorbed the blow without flinching, prepared this time. ‘I’m not interested in your lies, Samana. That rock in the sea beckons you … ah, yes, I see how you fear it. So tell me what I want to know, and we may be able to come to terms.’

  ‘I come to terms with you?’

  Rhiann breathed out through her nose in the priestess way. ‘Under pain of banishment, I expect you to tell me what you know of Agricola’s forces, his plans, and the disposition of his men. Then, we may allow you to be kept in the manner to which you are accustomed, in a secure but adequate dun.’

  Samana barked a laugh. ‘Then I add stupidity to your sins, cousin. Do you seriously think I would tell you anything?’

  ‘Have you forgotten who is in control of your fate here?’ Rhiann snapped, then cursed herself for losing her temper.

  Samana’s thin, elegant brows arched high. ‘Your prince never got any information from me, either, Rhiann. And he tried more persuasive means.’ The small, pointed tip of her tongue slid out of her upper lip.

  Rhiann dug her fingers into her palms, out of sight in her lap. ‘If you repent of your treachery, we will keep you alive and safe until this war is resolved one way or the other. If you won’t, I have no choice but to send you far away.’ She leaned forward. ‘Far from jewels and furs and warmth and ease, far from news and tales and music and every diversion you prize so much.’

  ‘You have no right!’ Samana struggled to her feet, her hands still bound behind. ‘I am a queen of a powerful tribe. You break every kin law there is. My people will seek vengeance—’