Daughter of Darkness & Light

by Shannon Drake

  A light formed, but Aileen still held Mary, though it appeared she was wrestling with herself, trying to keep the blade at Mary’s throat.

  Kyleigh spoke an enchantment, swiftly, desperately.

  “Freedom from an evil hold

  Let the prisoner be bold,

  Speak of freedom and thus it will be,

  Harm to the enemy where he holds thee.”

  Aileen started to scream; she dropped Mary.

  The knife was turning on her.

  But she quickly rebounded, screaming, “God of evil, darkness, god of hell, bring forth fire!”

  The earth in front of Kyleigh and Rowan began to shake. It was breaking up. Rowan sheathed his sword in a second, reaching for Kyleigh before she could fall into a crevice.

  Then, a fire erupted before them, bursting here and there from out of the ground. But Aileen had misjudged her actions; the kindling in the wagon went aflame.

  The horses bolted; the wagon lurched out, trampling several of Brogan’s men. Screams of pain, and those of fury went up.

  All were enraged.

  And ready.

  Someone let out a battle cry, and the mounted knights and foot warriors were upon one another again.

  The men from the fortress were woefully outnumbered.

  And when Rowan had reached for Kyleigh, Brogan had scampered away in the gray smoke from the first explosion of fire.

  Rowan drew his sword again, managing to do so in time to parry a blow from a heavyset attacker, throw him off, and move forward.

  “Kyleigh! Stay behind—” he began, but she merely pointed the sword and a man coming hellbent at them with a mace flew backwards.

  “Stay with me!” he said.

  Col was near, too, Matthew, Gareth, and many of Padraic’s Celts.

  “We are outnumbered, badly!” Col cried.

  And they were. Bit by bit, Brogan’s men were forcing them back toward the moat.

  But when Rowan began to fear that the women and children left behind in the fortress would have no protection and the battle would be lost, he heard a cry rise above the frenzy.

  And then screams...

  And more screams.

  Padraic! Padraic and the small legion of Celts he had taken through the forest. They had come from behind, and now Rowan’s men were being squeezed between the two forces, and they had no where to run.

  The battle ensued. Pikes and spears were thrown and thrust with horrid ends. Arrows flew and swords and knives clashed and the sound of steel against steel was as endless as the blood that flowed over the earth.

  But in the end, Brogan’s men were dead or had managed to disappear desperately into the forest.

  And Padraic and Rowan met up in the center of the battlefield, embracing briefly, stepping back in relief.

  And then looking over the field of the dead and dying.

  “All of our men! We take care; we take time. We find all our men! And search for Brogan’s body, though I believe that whatever happened here, he was for himself above all else, and he has escaped. Leave no man of our on the field. We will build great fires; one for their dead.” He hesitated. “Another for our dead!”

  Kyleigh was still at his side. He knew that she was horrified. Battle was horrible.

  The screams of the dying were horrible.

  She looked at him, eyes glazed with the sickness she was feeling, her mouth opening, but not working at first.

  Then something changed, and she said frantically, “Mary! And Alistair!”

  She turned to run hard back for the fortress.

  The drawbridge had been lowered when the tide of battle had turned and the mounted men had ridden out, now to collect the bodies of the dead and to carry the wounded back to care.

  He tried to catch her, but she was moving as if she possessed the winged feet of a god. He caught up with her in the courtyard; she was looking frantically from place to place.

  Her cousin Taryn found her, catching her, and holding her hard. “Kyleigh, this way, come, Mary is resting in your bed.”

  Kyleigh nodded and followed Taryn and Rowan did the same. They reached the great hall in the main tower and went bounding up the stairs.

  Kyleigh rushed into the room.

  Rowan held by the door.

  Mary lay there with Alistair, blood seeping from a bandage wrapped around his head, knelt bedside, holding her hand.

  “Mary!” Kyleigh whispered.

  “We must pray,” a voice said softly. Rowan saw that Father Peter was standing near the foot of the bed. He crossed himself and said the words of a prayer softly.

  Kyleigh sank to her knees as well by the bed. Taryn did the same.

  And Rowan joined him.

  So many lives had been lost.

  But he had to pray with Father Peter, pray desperately that they did not lost this special life.

  At last the good Father finished his words.

  Alistair looked across the bed at Rowan and Kyleigh. “She is out there,” he said. “She is still out there! The wretched creature who cried and received our kindness and good will! We took her in; we believe in her! And she did this to Mary. I could not stop her! She seized an anvil and smashed in my head and then...she did this to Mary! She must be found. Dear God, she must be found, and she must be stopped!”

  Chapter 14

  In the days that followed, some of the injured recovered.

  Some died.

  Rowen and the men of Kenzie went over the battlefield, seeking any other injured, finding the dead.

  And the dead.

  Brogan was not among them, Rowan told Kyleigh.

  He did not invade the sick room but anxiously asked Kyleigh about Mary. He was grateful, she knew, that Mary steadily recovered.

  No more grateful than Kyleigh. She feared that being who and what she was had brought about the injuries to Alistair and Mary. And yet, she could not have changed it. Nor had she been wrong to force the battle.

  Except that Brogan had lived.

  And Aileen, too, had escaped. In the chaos, no one knew how. Aileen had power; she had caused the earth to erupt, and in doing so, she had saved Brogan. But the invader Brogan had failed, and he would not have the power for such an assault again, if ever.

  Kyleigh seldom left Mary’s side, choosing to create beds on the floor in the room for her and Alistair to be there through the days and nights.

  But she took time on the day after the battle when several of Brogan’s men, injured to various degrees, were brought back to the fortress.

  They were brought first to the main hall. Rowan was then seated at the round table with Col, Lucas, Matthew, Gareth, Padraic, and several of his men.

  “Why are they here?” Matthew demanded. “They meant to kill us; we should have finished them on the battlefield.”

  One of the injured men, a youth who scarce grow a beard, sobbed softly on a pallet.

  “That was Brogan! We feared him; we saw what befell those who did obey his orders. I beg you...I was not among the men who killed the women and children as we rode east. Perhaps Brogan thought a boy could not kill a babe, I do not know. But...the men...Brogan’s men. A few, yes, believed him. Believed that we must kill everyone. But...”

  Kyleigh saw a man on the floor next to the boy and she walked over. It was one of the burly men who had taken her by an arm when she had been captured.

  He was the man who had tried—without his companion seeing—to make her journey a little less painful.

  She turned to look at the men gathered at the table.

  “I believe he is speaking the truth. Lord Rowan of Kenzie is not Brogan. We do not kill for pleasure here.”

  “What do we do with these men then?” Col asked, frowning.

  “That man—there,” Kyleigh said, pointing to the burly fellow. “He tried to lift me when I was supposed to be dragged. He gave me what kindness he could.”

  “Please!” the boy begged.

  “We heal them, and we set them work,” R
owan said.

  “But they—”

  “Lord Rowan is right,” Padraic said, standing and walking over to Kyleigh. “We do not behave as Rowan did. We kill on a battlefield. But we are not beasts in a forest. We are men.”

  “So, say you all?” Rowan asked, looking around the table.

  “We shall see their mettle when they can stand,” Padraic said.

  The boy who had sobbed and begged for his life could not stand. The wound on his leg was severe.

  But he crawled to the round table and lowered his head before Rowan. “I swear to you, I will serve you loyally until the day I die.” He looked around at the others. “I will clean the stables. I will scour whatever filth there be anywhere within the fortress. I will repay the gift of my life!” he swore.

  “What is your name, boy?” Rowan asked him.

  “Warrick.”

  “Well, Warrick, we shall see. First, see that these men are removed to the east tower and cared for there,” Rowan said. He hesitated a minute. “We still hold the man Kellen in the dungeon. He should be brought out to help care for these men.”

  “Rowan—” Lucas began worriedly.

  “The man told us the truth.”

  “And in his truth, Kyleigh was captured,” Gareth said.

  “There had to be an end!” Kyleigh said.

  “And we are still ending it!” Rowan said. He stood, looking at Kyleigh. “We will not fall to the depravity of the enemy; I believe that we will find work for these men among us. I do not believe that they will go back to Brogan—they know that he will kill them if they don’t follow his every word. Col, Padraic, Gareth—ride with me. We shall make our way deeper into the forest and search for any sign of Brogan and Aileen. I do not fear men who followed Brogan out of fear—Brogan, however, must not seek out others to use so recklessly.”

  Kyleigh watched them go and went back up the stairs to be with Mary. She had Alistair leave them so that he might find himself a few moments privacy and perhaps something to eat with a friend.

  Mary slept peacefully; she drank a special herbal tea to help her sleep and heal.

  But Kyleigh still chose not to leave her.

  She had never finished reading the book that Padraic had given her and to wile away the hours, she read it to the end, and then read it again, and learned several of the enchantments.

  She thought she may never need them.

  They had lived in peace many years, but it remained true that since the departure of the Romans and their legions, there had been incursions on the island. But as with her village, those who had been Angles had settled in, along with those who had long ago or not so long ago been Saxons or Frisians or Jutes.

  Or Romans.

  They had come first in the year 43 A.D. under the Emperor Claudius, and in about fifty-five years they had completed the conquest, building forts and fortresses, roads and more. Emperor Hadrian had begun his wall against the warring and savage northern tribes in !22 A.D., and in 142 A.D., the Roman Emperor Antoninus Pius had ordered the construction of another wall, further north, the Antonine Wall.

  Hadrian’s wall, built of stone with fortifications along the way, still stood strong, while the second wall, built with some stone but more comprising of trenches and wood, had been breeched soon after the Romans began their departure.

  She knew all this, of course, because of Father Peter. The Romans, except those who had married and found families and homes among the conquered people being deserted, had been gone long before her birth.

  And now...

  She prayed that they had been right. That mercy was in truth stronger cruelty.

  Not even Father Peter had been certain.

  She had helped, yes. But Rowan was a powerful and great leader and the fortress at Kenzie was strong.

  And Rowan and Padraic had formed a bond.

  Their land should be safe, but...

  “Daughter!”

  She heard a voice.

  The voice she was coming to know and to love.

  “Merlin!” she said softly.

  The mist was in the room; Merlin slowly took shape in that mist.

  “You were there, were you not?” she asked.

  “In the power of the sword,” he told her. “But you learned much on your own.” He gazed toward Mary. “You must know that you, and you alone, saved Mary. You did well. You did not just use magic, but common sense, and there is no magic that can save a man or woman when no sense and thought and wisdom are used. I am...” His voice trailed for a minute, and then he said, “I am proud to be your father, though Alistair deserves that title. I am proud to have given you what is in me; I am grateful that they gave you all that was within them.”

  She smiled and nodded. “And, as I said, I am grateful you are my father.”

  “And not Mordred.”

  “And not Mordred.”

  Merlin smiled again, but his brows knit with worry.

  “There was a child, Mordred’s child, and it was not you. I fear it is Aileen. She has power. Not as great as yours, but, well, not to be arrogant, neither Morgana nor Mordred ever had my power, and magic ran in your mother’s people, too. But she is still out there. It is a miracle that you saved Mary from her clutches. If I had but seen more clearly...”

  “I never liked her,” Kyleigh admitted. “But I fought against it. I was—jealous.”

  “Well, it is wrong to think someone is a traitor because of jealousy, yes,” Merlin said. “But your jealousy did not make her innocent, either. Her story was good; I know of the husband and father she spoke of—brave knights, both. I do not think that she is the woman she pretends to be—which makes me fear for the widow and daughter of the brave knights slain.”

  “You believe that Aileen killed her to become her?” Kyleigh asked.

  Merlin nodded solemnly.

  “You must take grave care. She must be found,” he said. “I know of Brogan, too. And he is right about one thing—revenge makes for a powerful enemy. She will seek to hurt you in any way.”

  “She has run—no one can find her.”

  “She may not have your power, but she is a sorceress. She will be back. I will try to watch over you. But my strength is escaping my crystal endures only so long. You must be careful.”

  Kyleigh nodded. “I will. Thank you.”

  He hesitated. “I am proud. And you have a father’s love.”

  She smiled. Maybe she could give it to him—and not take it from Alistair.

  “And you have a daughter’s love,” she told him.

  She heard the door opening; Merlin disappeared as Alistair returned to the room.

  She met him with a hug. Then she turned to the bed and touched Mary’s forehead. She was cool to the touch, and not suffering from the fever that would mean the wound at her neck had become infected.

  “She sleeps,” Alistair said. “The men have returned.”

  “And...”

  Alistair shook his head. “They have not found Brogan or Aileen. Perhaps you should go down. Rowan is in the great hall by the hearth, and he looks weary.”

  Kyleigh nodded, kissed his cheek, and hurried out the door and down the steps.

  The great hall was empty other than Rowan and she hurried to him, putting her arms around him. Since the battle, with Mary hanging so precariously to life at first, she had spent little time with him and none of that alone.

  “Mary is—”

  “Resting well,” she told him.

  “Then—”

  “Alistair believes that I need to say something that will make you less...weary.”

  “I am frustrated. I do not want him free on our lands,” Rowan said. “Or Aileen. When she first came here...Kyleigh, she was sent ahead, I believe, before Brogan landed with his invaders. She was sent to become one of the villagers, and when the village was attacked, she was in no danger! It was her time to come here and make sure we saw her as a sad creature, worthy of our care and concern. And we gave it to her.”

&nbs
p; “She fooled us all,” Kyleigh said. “And I...”

  “Yes?”

  “I was so afraid you cared for her!”

  He smoothed back her hair. “Emerald eyes and fiery hair! And, of course, you were entirely wretched to me.”

  “I was not!”

  “You do not obey well.”

  “I do not obey at all!” she said laughing.

  “As I have seen,” he said. “Do you need to hurry back—”

  “I do not.”

  “Good!”

  She was startled when he swept her off her feet and headed for the stairs. She ran her fingers through his hair as he carried her and looked at him with a curious smile.

  “I think that Alistair meant that I should talk to you.”

  “Then we should talk!” he told her.

  She laughed and then caught herself for they passed the door to her room where Mary now slept as they headed to Rowan’s chambers.

  Once there, they quickly shed their clothing, smiling, teasing, and laughing at the effort. They fell on his bed together naked, and she marveled just at the feel of his skin, of the strength that emanated from him, and the heat. He touched her gently, and with passion, and his lips teased the length of her. She could not return his liquid caresses quickly enough.

  “We should talk,” he whispered against her throat.

  “Talk,” she murmured, writhing against him.

  “I love you,” he said.

  And she started, clinging to him suddenly.

  “That is talk,” he said. “I love you. It is also truth.”

  “Could it be?” she whispered. “I love you.”

  He smiled and thrust within her, and what she had thought was beautiful before seemed to compound, and yet...

  Later, when he lay beside her, he said, “I hope that Alistair will be pleased.”

  “Rowan! What? Alistair is the father who raised me. I do not think that—”

  “I believe that he will be pleased when we announce that we will be married.”

  She jerked to a sitting position. “Rowan, I—”

  “You will be my wife, right?”

  “But Rowan, you are lord. You are supposed to marry—”

  “I am lord here. And therefore, I will marry who I choose.”

  “But your people—”

  “Will be pleased. But, of course, you do need to agree.”