You’ve brought me this far, merciful Comdiu. You’ll have to create the opportunities. This won’t be easy.
The last time he had prayed that kind of prayer, he had fought Liam to a draw. This time, he had to win.
On the second day, Conor began to see signs of life and commerce: oxcarts carrying goods to and from the fortress or men on horseback. They paid him no attention, other than to avoid him, and sometimes not even then. He smiled to himself, buoyed by the unexpected discovery. If his fading ability worked as well in the open as it did in the forest, he might just have found a way to breach the fortress unnoticed. He still needed physical entry, though.
Late that afternoon, an opportunity presented itself. One of the carts that had passed him earlier now listed dangerously on the side of the road, its cargo of apples partially unloaded. A gray-haired man struggled to lift the cart while a young girl watched.
“Need help?” Conor asked as he approached.
The man jerked his head up and surveyed Conor warily. “Depends. You a wainwright?”
“No, but we might be able to get you to Glenmallaig and have it fixed properly. I assume that’s where you’re going?”
“Aye,” he said slowly. “You?”
“The same. I’ve a message to deliver, and I’m tired of walking.”
The man relaxed. “What happened to your horse?”
“Bandits.” Conor pointed to the stitches in his scalp and said, “Villager fixed me up, but horses aren’t that easy to come by. Shall we get this wheel off?”
Between the two of them, they lifted the wagon enough to remove the wheel from the axle. Fortunately, nothing was broken. The iron cap had worked free, letting the wheel slide off at an angle.
“You happen to have a hammer?” Conor asked. The man shook his head. “A rock it is then.”
In the end, the fix took less than an hour, including loading the apples into the cart. The man and the girl climbed onto the buckboard, and Conor hopped onto the back. “You mind?” he asked, holding up an apple.
“Help yourself. I’m Breck, by the way, and this is my grand-daughter, Airmid.”
“Cahan,” Conor said.
“Much obliged to you, Cahan.”
Conor drew his sword baldric over his head and stashed it out of sight among the bushels. With any luck, the gate guards wouldn’t question his presence. Maybe they’d just assume he was another orchard hand.
“Where you coming from?” Breck called over his shoulder. Conor pretended not to hear him, and the man didn’t ask again.
Facing backward on the cart, he didn’t notice their approach to Glenmallaig until they began to slow. Conor shivered. Three years away had done nothing to diminish the dread the fortress cast over him, and knowing Aine was a prisoner inside only intensified the feeling.
He schooled his expression to boredom as the cart approached the open drawbridge, even though he felt sure the guards could hear the frantic thump of his heart. The cart rattled across and then stopped. While Breck stated his business to the warrior at the gate, another guard walked the length of the cart. Conor concentrated on making himself as uninteresting as possible. For a long moment, the guard paused, then strode back to his partner. Conor let out his breath in a rush when the cart lurched forward again. He’d done it.
He had no intention of testing his anonymity, however. As soon as they entered the courtyard, Conor grabbed his sword from its concealment, hopped off the back of the cart, and faded into the shadows of the inner wall.
From here, he could survey the entire fortress, as well as the armory and the kitchen. Guards stood watch, but there were far fewer than he had expected. With the king campaigning, perhaps there was little to guard. Besides, who would attack? Calhoun was wholly occupied with the siege on Lisdara, and all of Tigh’s other enemies had been vanquished.
A servant emerged from the fortress with a wooden tray, headed to the kitchen. Perfect timing. He would be able to slip in unnoticed when the watch changed. Unfortunately, he still had no idea where Aine was being held, and he couldn’t search every chamber in the keep.
Conor lounged against the wall and studied the other men while he finished his apple. Their numbers might be fewer than expected, but discipline was as strict as ever. Each man stood at attention, no casual conversations, nothing to eat or drink, their eyes taking in the movements of everyone in the courtyard. Getting into the fortress would be far easier than getting back out.
He closed his eyes and took a long, deep breath. He had come too far to give up because their escape route looked less than ideal. You brought me here, Comdiu. I’ll trust You to make a way.
True to his estimation, only a half hour passed before men appeared in the courtyard to relieve the day watch. Conor tossed aside the apple core and strode casually toward the keep’s back entrance. The guard at the door looked him over as if trying to place him, but he did not stop him as Conor entered the lower corridor.
He concentrated on blending in and followed the man in front of him at a discreet distance.
“Evening, Artagan,” his quarry said to a passing guard.
“Better hurry, Naoise,” Artagan said with a grin. “It’ll be your head if you’re late again.”
Naoise shot back a particularly colorful oath, which made Artagan laugh. Conor filed away the names as a plan began to form.
The guard made a sharp left turn and started up the stairs to the corridor that encircled the top level of the fortress. Conor waited until he reached the top before he ran up the stairs and burst into the hallway.
“Naoise! Glad I caught you!”
Naoise turned and frowned as Conor approached, pretending to be out of breath. “They want a guard on the girl’s chamber tonight. I’m supposed to take your post.”
“Under whose orders?” the guard asked, scowling.
Conor stared at him in disbelief. “Whose do you think?” Naoise still looked unconvinced, so he shrugged. “Fine, go ask if you don’t believe me. Or I can go back and say you have better things to do.”
He surreptitiously sized up the guard as the man considered. Naoise was middle-aged, with a layer of fat covering muscle, but he outweighed Conor by at least a hundred pounds. Regardless of which way this conversation turned, Conor would have to kill him. The idea sickened him, but he had little choice. He only hoped the man would lead him to Aine first.
Naoise swore again. “Fine. Doesn’t matter to me if I stand here or there all night. Just tell Sloane to get his assignments straight instead of sending his errand boy.” He looked Conor over with a smirk. “Riocárd must be hard up for men if he’s drafting from the nursery.”
Conor played his role and scowled at him, but inside, he was stunned. Riocárd was still in charge here? That explained the level of discipline from the guards on watch. It also meant they would be as diligent and well-trained as ever. Naoise chuckled at his own joke and ambled down the hallway toward the guest chambers.
Conor waited until he stopped before a room and strode toward him, drawing his dagger. His guts twisted, but it was too late to change his mind. As Naoise turned, Conor drove the dagger under the guard’s ribs and into his heart, then eased his bulk to the floor. He couldn’t look Naoise in the eye as the man’s life ebbed away. He cleaned his hands and blade on the guard’s clothes and found he was trembling.
Focus. If he could not overcome his revulsion, he and Aine would die. He couldn’t leave the guard here for someone to find. He sheathed his weapon and tried the door latch. It gave easily.
But the room was empty.
So much for his plan. He shouldered open the door and dragged the body inside, then kicked the door shut with his foot.
“Conor?”
His heart leapt into his throat as Aine slid from the shelf bed. Her eyes drifted to the dead man and then back to his face. He steeled himself for her expression of horror, but she only launched herself into his arms. “Thank Comdiu you’re alive. I prayed you would come . . .”
/> Conor buried his face in her hair and allowed himself one blessed moment of relief. She was alive. He had found her. He held her at arm’s length, searching her tearful face for some evidence of her ordeal. “Are you all right? Have you been hurt?”
“No, I’ve been treated kindly. But we have to hurry. Diarmuid may already know you’re here.”
“Diarmuid’s at Glenmallaig?” Conor’s blood surged. The sorcerer was so close. He could put an end to this, avenge the deaths of Labhrás and his mother, perhaps even give Calhoun a chance . . .
And if Diarmuid killed him instead? What would happen to Aine?
“Conor, please.”
He met Aine’s eyes, simultaneously heartened and terrified by the trust he saw there. He kissed her gently. “No matter what happens, remember I love you. Quietly now.” He took her hand, opened the door, and stepped out into the empty hallway.
They made it only a few feet before a robed, tattooed man stepped into the corridor. Sorcery, thick and invisible, twined around their legs, halting them in midstep.
“Well, well,” the druid said, his booted feet scuffing the floor as he approached. “You chose love over duty after all. Come to rescue your fair maiden, just like a bard’s tale.” He caressed the word bard with a mocking smile. “I certainly hope you’re a better musician than rescuer. Seems the Fíréin have been careless in their training since my departure.”
Anger flared at the taunt, but Conor forced it back down. “I was about to say the same about your house guard.”
Diarmuid chuckled. “Merely for show, my boy. Nothing happens here without my knowledge. I sensed you the moment you broke the perimeter. You Balians are so . . . bright.” The druid cocked his head as if listening. “Speaking of which, here comes another one.”
Mac Eirhinin rounded the corner on cue. Conor felt rather than heard Aine’s sudden intake of breath. He checked another flare of fury against Aine’s kidnapper and used the druid’s distraction to test the bonds of sorcery that held them. They were as impenetrable as mortar.
The Faolanaigh lord ambled toward them, a slow smile spreading across his face. “You captured them. I’m so pleased. It would have been a shame to let our prize escape so easily.” The way Mac Eirhinin’s eyes caressed Aine from head to toe uncorked Conor’s carefully contained anger once more.
“You’re a traitor,” Aine hissed, loathing thick in her voice.
Mac Eirhinin’s expression hardened, and he turned to the druid. “You’ve got what you wanted. The boy is here. I hope you mean to honor your agreement now. I have plans for her.”
“So do I,” Diarmuid said.
Mac Eirhinin’s smile faded. He looked at Aine, and his expression softened a degree, giving Conor a glimpse of the feeling he had tried to hide in Abban’s camp. Then his gaze traveled to Conor and changed again, but not into hatred or even dislike. Resolve. He gave a barely perceptible nod and flicked his eyes toward the stairwell.
Before Conor could make out his meaning, a dagger appeared in Mac Eirhinin’s hands. He spun and plunged the blade into the druid’s body.
“Go!” Mac Eirhinin shouted, wrenching the blade free. “Get her out of here!”
The bonds wrapping Conor and Aine evaporated. Conor drew his sword, pulling Aine behind him toward the stairs, but he couldn’t help looking back. Mac Eirhinin crumpled to the ground just as the sorcerer sank down beside him in a crimson pool.
They took the steps downward at a breakneck speed and emerged into the lower hallway in time to meet the first guard. Conor ran him through before he had time to draw his weapon and pulled Aine onward.
The warrior at the back exit must have heard the short confrontation, because he was waiting for them. Conor blocked the incoming thrust, then two more. The man was skilled, but compared to the Fíréin, only passably so. A slash to the body took him to the ground.
They burst through the door into the cool night, and for a moment, Conor thought they were free. Then three more guards rushed through the door behind them.
“Do you know where the stable is?” he asked Aine over his shoulder.
She nodded, her eyes wide with fear.
“Go there. Bridle a horse. I’ll meet you.”
“But—”
“Go!” Conor shouted as the guards charged. He didn’t have time to see if she complied before steel clashed against steel and then just as quickly met flesh.
As the first of his three opponents fell before him, he thought he read uncertainty in the others’ eyes, but they pressed forward anyway. They too were skilled, but he defeated them without their weapons finding a target.
“Conor!”
Aine tore around the corner of the stable atop a bay mare, bridled with a rope lead. Conor sheathed his bloodstained sword and leapt up behind her. One arm enwrapped her waist, and the other took the lead from her hand as he spurred the horse toward the exit. Abruptly, he reined the mare to a skidding stop.
The drawbridge, open only a few minutes earlier, was closed.
Aine let out a choked cry, but Conor’s mind whirred, working out an alternate plan. Glenmallaig had been his home, and foggy as his memories were, he knew the bridge was not the only way out.
He wheeled the horse and kicked her into a full gallop. More guards poured into the courtyard to intercept them and then dove out of the way of flying hooves. Their escape route loomed ahead, nearly invisible in the twilight: narrow steps carved into the inner surface of the battlements.
Conor slid from the horse and helped Aine down. He gave her a push in the direction of the steps. “Up there! I’ll be right after you.”
She scrambled up the steep stairs, using one hand to clutch her skirts out of the way and the other in front of her to keep her balance. Conor glanced back at the approaching guards, gauging whether he and Aine could reach the top before their enemies caught up to them. Perhaps, but the steps were far too narrow to turn and fight. He would surely end up with a sword in his back. He had no choice but to meet them here on level ground.
Conor counted five in the dim light. When they saw he intended to face them, they spread into a half circle. He drew his sword and took a moment to steady his breathing.
Now would be an excellent time for another miracle.
The peculiar calm settled over him immediately. Time slowed and stretched as it had when he fought Master Liam on the crannog. He circled left, bringing his opponents into line so he could face them one at a time.
They assumed he would take the defensive. Instead, he charged.
The first man was wholly unprepared. One ineffective block, and Conor’s blade cut through his middle. He did not even pause before meeting the second, who fell just as quickly. He fought the third and fourth without any conscious thought, carried by instinct and reflex.
The last he underestimated, based on the marginal abilities of the other four warriors. Too late, he realized the man’s hesitation came not from intimidation or lack of skill, but careful calculation. Conor barely managed to parry his attack, and the tip of the blade sliced across his upper arm. A warm rush of blood soaked his left sleeve.
The pain broke his focus, and he blinked in recognition. “Riocárd?” Even knowing Galbraith’s champion was in command of the fortress, he hadn’t expected to meet him here among his guards.
“Do I know you?” Riocárd asked, unwavering.
“Apparently not.” Conor launched another attack, but the warrior deflected or avoided the blows altogether. With a pang of dismay, he realized Riocárd’s skill matched his own.
They continued to trade offense and defense, both men seeking an opening, the mistake that would lead to a killing blow, and finding none. Riocárd had been among the most proficient of Tigh’s swordsmen when Conor was a child, and time had done nothing to diminish his abilities.
Aine now crouched atop the battlements. Archers would pick her off from a distance in mere seconds. He had to end this. He could not leave her unprotected atop the wall.
�
��I thought you would have recognized me,” Conor said tightly as their swords clashed again. “I’m told I resemble my father.”
Confusion, followed by recognition, rippled across Riocárd’s face. “Conor?”
In that moment of surprise, Riocárd wavered, and Conor seized the opportunity. He feinted, drawing Riocárd’s guard open, and delivered a straight thrust to the body. Shock registered on the champion’s face.
Conor withdrew his blade, and Riocárd crumpled to the ground. He stared in disbelief for several seconds, breathing hard, until Aine’s shout alerted him of still more danger.
Archers rounded the corner, arrows already nocked. Bowstrings twanged as he clambered up the steps toward Aine. The first arrows missed their mark and bounced away at his feet, but they would not be so lucky the next time.
“Where do we go now?” Aine asked.
Conor looked over the side to the moat, at least twenty feet down. “We jump.”
“I can’t swim!” she cried, but Conor’s weight already bore them off the wall to the murky waters below.
CHAPTER FORTY-ONE
The cold water knocked the breath from Aine’s lungs, and she plummeted into the moat like an anchor. Shock stunned her into immobility. Then her lungs started to burn, and she flailed against the pressure of the muddy water. Her skirt tangled around her legs, hampering her unschooled attempts to thrust upward.
She broke the surface long enough to suck in a panicked breath before her sodden dress pulled her under again. Then strong hands grabbed her and pulled her back up. An arm encircled her chest, just barely keeping her face out of the water.
“Stop fighting, or you’ll drown both of us,” Conor said in her ear. She stilled her movements and let him tow her to safety. He pushed her up against the bank, and she scrambled for a handhold while he levered himself up beside her.
She lay on the ground for a moment, panting and blissfully happy to be alive. Shouts rang from Glenmallaig’s courtyard, followed by the cranking of the drawbridge’s huge gears.
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