Then the odor of char grew stronger, and between the trees, he saw a clearing and the conical shape of three charcoal-burning mounds, as large as small houses, from which smoke drifted.
As he emerged from the trees he saw a man and a woman in the clearing. Both were small and shriveled and gray, as if the constant overhanging smoke had withered them. They watched him silently as he dismounted and tied the horses to a tree.
"I told you he would come, and here he is," the woman said, nudging the man forward.
"You are a MacKerron," the man said. "I know the look of your kin. You have been here before, but not for a long while. And your father was here, too, long ago. I am Leod."
Lachlann took the little man's grimy hand. "Leod, greetings. I remember you. Years ago, I would come here with Finlay MacKerron to buy charcoal. He always said that yours was the best quality and made the best steel."
"The best, of course," the woman said, scurrying closer.
"No one can make good steel without our charcoal. We cut the trees and burn the wood in secret ways," she confided. "You are not Finlay's son. The other one was your father. Look at him, Leod, he is the one." She jabbed him with her elbow.
"I know who he is, Nessa," Leod said, sounding irritated.
"And you have the look of his mother, too," Nessa whispered loudly. "Blue eyes, blue eyes, cousin to a king," she sang, and smiled up at Lachlann, so short and hunched over that she scarcely came to his waist.
"What?" Lachlann asked, a little startled by her behavior.
"Your mother," she said. "She had the same bluebell eyes as you have, and she was a cousin to the king. Not that her Stewart blood saved her, or avenged her. But there are kings and faeries in you. Good blood in you." She kept smiling at him.
"You knew my mother?"
"She was a kind beauty, and her love a fine dark man—oh, so handsome, that one! And you have both of them in you."
"Tell me what you know of them."
"Is it charcoal you want?" Leod asked. "Or is it truth?"
"Both," Lachlann said. "J came here to ask you what happened to my parents. Mairi said you might know. And I will buy charcoal—the best you have, for the best steel."
"Ah, he will be making faery steel soon," Nessa said, nodding sagely. Leod scowled at her.
"Go tend the fires, Nessa, or we will have nothing but ash and soot. This man wants the best charcoal we can sell him. Go." He turned back to Lachlann. "We cut the wood and burn it carefully, tending it for weeks at a time to make our charcoal pieces. Those huts there are still burning inside, but I have some of our best new-made charcoal for you."
Lachlann watched as Nessa went toward one of the huts, using a long stick to poke at the embers buried beneath the pile that stood higher than her head. "I can give you as much charcoal as your packhorse can carry and as much as you can barter me for smithing work, or food, or even coin. How much do you want?" Leod asked. "And how much truth do you want?" he added.
Lachlann blinked. "Three sacks for now, and I will pay in smith work or coin, either one. As for the rest... tell me as much truth about my parents as you know."
Leod nodded, rubbing his whiskered jaw. "You do have the look of Tomas MacKerron, that dark faery blood—black and tall he was, like you, with eyes like silver. He was a good smith for the finest faery blades."
Lachlann looked at him cautiously. "Finlay told me of a tradition for that sort of thing among MacKerron smiths."
"More than tradition. You wanted the truth. Tomas MacKerron made faery blades, and he was killed for them."
"If you knew this, why did you never seek me out?"
"Finlay knew. And it was your place to seek me out, and so you have," Leod said. "I will tell you now, but I would not carry tales then. There are those who would not like it. I stay out of business that is not my own. I am but a charcoal burner."
"Leod, if you know who killed my father, and why, tell me.
"Nessa and I were there that night, bringing a load of charcoal to Tomas," he said. "He lived just over the hill—that way. You can see the ruin of the smithy and the house, near the great charred oak on the north hill."
"What happened?" Lachlann asked.
Nessa came back, lugging a huge sack of charcoal nearly as large as she was. She dragged it past her husband, who only watched her. Lachlann stepped toward her to help her lift it, but before he could get to her side, she had hefted it onto the packhorse. Smacking dust from her hands, she marched back.
"Well," she said. "Tell him, you old fool. I would have told you myself, young man, but the faeries would not let me."
"They—what?"
"Them, there," she said, pointing. "The little ones watching you. They would not let me tell you. Said it was yours to learn, and when you were ready, you would come to us."
Lachlann looked where she indicated, but saw only a pine forest. Nessa apparently saw more, for she waved and giggled. "There they are," she said. "They are glad you finally came. It is about time, they say. Listen. 'Time, time,' they are singing... 'time the smith made his faery sword.'"
He stared at her, then turned back to Leod. The old man smiled as if there was nothing odd in his wife's chatter. "What... ah, what happened that night, Leod?"
"It was the old one," Leod said. "Old Murdoch Campbell."
"Colin's father?" Lachlann asked quickly, recognizing the old laird's name.
Leod nodded. "He came to the smithy where your father was working after dark. 'Come out, gobha,' Murdoch said, and he held a sword upright." Leod deepened his voice and reached up with his arm, acting out what he had seen. "'Ho, gobha, this is not the sword I ordered from you. Come out, smith, and give me the faery blade I paid for!' And Tomas the gobha came out, wiping his hands on his apron, with his pretty wife at his side."
Nessa hurried forward. "And then the smith spoke again," she said, as if eager to take part. "'I made you a good battle sword, Murdoch. Now go away. You are drunk again,' your father said to him," she recounted, lowering her voice to a masculine pitch.
"'But I want a faery blade. Give it to me, or you shall have this one between your ribs!'" Leod said, swaggering and waving his arm like a mummer at a fair as he played Murdoch Campbell.
"'Go away, Murdoch Campbell, and leave my husband alone. You always talk of faery blades when the drink is upon you!'" Nessa said. "And then your mother shooed him with her hands." She gestured and minced. "She was graceful as a faery girl."
Lachlann stared, both entranced and horrified by their strangely comedic behavior.
"Did Murdoch kill my father?" Lachlann ground out.
"Staggered near off his horse, he did, drunk as that man was." Leod spoke, while Nessa mimed a stumble. "He always talked of faery blades when the uisge beatha was upon him. He even came to me. He wanted a faery sword, you see, for he had dark ambition in his hard old soul. He knew he could win that island in the great loch if he had such a weapon." Beyond them, Nessa waved her arm high as if she held a sword.
"He what? Do you mean Innisfarna?" Lachlann asked.
"That old fool wanted Innisfarna," Nessa said. "Murdoch tried to wed the girl who owned it, but she married the handsome chief of the MacArthurs and gave him three lovely babes." She smiled. "Murdoch always craved that island, for he thought if he held that, he would hold Scotland in his power, beyond the king's control. The faeries told me he could not have it. Not for him, that place. Not for him." She peered closely at him.
Lachlann stared at her as if he had been struck. "So," he said, half to himself. "His son Colin wants Innisfarna too."
"That may be, I do not know," Leod said. "But I remember that Murdoch demanded the faery blade from your father, and Tomas said he could not help him. Quiet of voice and strong of spirit was that young man. 'Leave us be, Murdoch!' Tomas said, and he sent his wife inside and faced the old man alone."
"'Aileen, my love, go inside with you!'" Nessa said.
Leod turned. "Go get the blade," he told Nessa. She turned and hasten
ed into a little hut set apart from the charcoal-burning piles, which Lachlann presumed was their home.
"What happened then?" Lachlann asked.
"Murdoch sat upon the horse and threatened, but your father was not afraid of him. Old Murdoch swung the sword, drunk as he was, and caught Tomas in the chest." He shook his head sadly.
Lachlann was grateful that the old man did not act that out for him. He was not so sure Nessa would have held back from it, however. "He killed Tomas then and there. And he told his son to set the smithy on fire," Leod went on.
"His son?" Lachlann asked. "Colin was there?"
Leod nodded. "Murdoch told his son to do it, but he begged his father to leave. The old man was so drunk he set the place alight himself, using the torch that he carried in the dark, and he and his son rode off."
"You saw this?"
"I did not," Leod said. "Nessa saw it, and came running for me. By the time we got back, the smith was dead, the smithy and the house were on fire, and his beautiful wife, oh, she was gone too, taken by grief and by the smoke. I ran into the house and grabbed up the babe—you, Lachlann MacKerron—and I took you to Finlay and Mairi at the other end of the loch. A long journey and, oh, such a sad night." He shook his head.
"Leod, I owe you thanks for trying to help my parents. And I owe you my own life."
"You do," the old man agreed easily.
Lachlann shoved his hand roughly through his hair. "Why was this withheld from me? Was nothing done about their deaths?"
"Murdoch died not long after that—fell from his horse, they say, drunk again. With your father's murderer dead, who else was there to blame? Though Finlay judged Colin harshly in his own mind for it, I think. The son tried to stop the father, though he did run like a coward with him."
Lachlann pressed his fingertips against his eyelids. "Was the sheriff told of all this?"
"Finlay told him. It was not pursued. Smithies catch fire easily. Tomas's body was burned, and no one saw the wound. Only Nessa." Leod shrugged. "And no one believed Nessa but me, and Finlay! Some think my wife is a little mad," he whispered.
She came back, dragging a long leather sheath along the ground. "The faeries want you to have this," she said, and handed it to Lachlann.
He drew out a beautiful sword, shining and perfect, with a hilt of polished bone and a cross guard ending in quatrefoils. The lower part of the blade below the cross piece was etched with a tiny emblem. Lachlann peered closer.
"A heart," he said. "For MacKerron, as Finlay and I always used... but this one has a small 'T' in the center of the heart."
"Tomas MacKerron," Leod said. "He made this blade."
Lachlann hefted it in his hand, raised the tip, which caught the sunlight. "Is this the blade that Murdoch—?"
"Not that. This one your father made for himself. I took it out of his house when I rescued you. I knew one day you might want it, and I kept it for you. This is a faery blade."
Lachlann looked askance at him. "How do you know?"
"Feel the power in it," Leod said.
Lachlann turned his wrist slowly, arcing the blade to the ground, back up again. The sword sliced through the air with a whistle finer, sweeter than any he had ever heard. A delicate shiver began in his arm and spread throughout his body, and suddenly the blade felt feather-weighted and full of sunlight.
"It is beautiful, whatever it is," Lachlann said.
"Tomas knew the secret, and he had the knack," Leod said. "Finlay knew the method, but he could not make a true faery blade. He was a fine craftsman, but your father was an artist of the sword, had the making of them in his heart, see. You are Tomas's son, and you have the knack. I see the spark in you."
Lachlann stared warily at him.
"You know the secret already," Leod said. "But to make the blade sing, you must have the knack. What did Finlay tell you?"
"Air, earth, fire, and water must mingle in a faery blade," Lachlann answered. "That much I understand—those materials are part of all blademaking. He also said that it required the pouring on of light and a magical blessing. He told me more, but he was weak and could not tell me all of it. Not that I could use it, even if I understood."
"Oh, you can. You have the spark," Nessa said. "Ask Leod."
"I know the blessing," Leod said. "Air, earth, fire, water, and the rest."
Lachlann looked at him in surprise. "You?"
"I taught it to your father," the old man said. He held out his right hand, which was bent and disfigured, the fingers fused together by the scars of old, devastating burns. "A smith I was, once, and cousin to your father and Finlay. Leod MacKerron, I am called. I will teach you the charm of the MacKerron smiths."
* * *
With his father's sword and sheath secured to his saddle, and his head and heart full of what he had just learned, Lachlann rode back to Balnagovan, leading the packhorse loaded with sacks of charcoal. Although deep in thought as he crossed the long meadow, he heard the commotion in the smithy yard before he saw it.
Several soldiers were in the stretch of land between the smithy and the stable. Some of them were clustered in a circle, laughing heartily. In their midst, two men competed to lift an old anvil that sat near the smithy doorstep. Lachlann dismounted in the yard and stood watching, shaking his head, half laughing as John Robson came toward him.
"I have been scraping mud from my boots on that anvil for as long as I can remember," he told Robson. "And these fools are trying to lift it. Have they nothing better to do?"
"They are waiting," Robson said.
"For Alpin and the boat? Or for the horses to be saddled? Where is Ninian?" He looked around.
"Hiding in the stable," Robson said. "His father is back."
Lachlann felt the shock of that news in his bones. "Colin Campbell? Where is he now?"
"Inside," Robson said, "with Eva."
He was halfway across the yard before Robson finished speaking.
* * *
"When will King James release Donal and pardon the others?" Eva asked Colin.
He held up a condescending hand. "When Innisfarna is proven to be mine, then Donal will be free. I will travel to the royal court to remind the king of his promise. Your kinsmen will benefit within the king's conditions."
"What conditions?" Eva asked again, for Colin had not yet answered that query directly.
"Exile," he said. "The MacArthur men must leave Scotland and go elsewhere-—France, Ireland, or Denmark will take them in. They can never come back."
She stared at him in shock. "Never? That would kill them! Their souls are here in these hills."
He shrugged. "It is their bodies you asked me to save. Let a priest tend to their souls. This is the only bargain I could arrange for your kin."
"One that takes Innisfarna from me and leaves my clansmen without rights or homes."
"It leaves them alive," he enunciated, leaning toward her.
"You wanted that. I will let you visit them wherever they go. The French favor the Scots, but the Irish are savage—your kinsmen might be more content among them." He came toward her, hands out. She stepped back, and he pulled her away from the hearth. "You will burn yourself. Come here." He kissed her, his mouth moist and ale-rich.
She pushed him away. "Why are you so set upon marrying me? You do not care about my kin, and you could find a wife with a dowry and a powerful family. Tell me why you want me."
"You are lovely, and I am fond of you. And your father was an old friend."
Regarding him suspiciously, she suddenly realized the truth. It rang in the silence between them. "You argue for my clan's pardon, and accept an impoverished bride, only to own Innisfarna. But why should the island matter so much to you?"
"It is not the island, but my devotion to you," he insisted.
"My kinsmen will never accept exile. They will refuse this bargain—and I will refuse to hand the isle into your keeping."
"Then you should all think of Donal. It is an awful fate, to be beheaded.
You do not want to condemn him to that—"
"Stop!" She backed away, suppressing a sob.
He came toward her with heavy steps. "And your kinsmen will be hunted down like wolves and slaughtered," he hissed.
As he advanced, she heard a knock on the door and saw the latch move. Expecting Ninian or Robson, she glanced up to see Lachlann loom in the doorway. She felt immediate relief.
"Who the hell are you, walking into a private house?" Colin demanded.
"I am the smith, and this is my house. Eva MacArthur is a guest here," he said, gazing at her as he spoke. "Eva, do you need me?" he murmured.
"I do," she said. "Stay, please."
He walked inside, and the air seemed charged with lightning. She felt the power of it in keen waves.
"Smith, eh?" Colin asked. "I have some tasks for a good smith. Are you skilled in making weapons?"
"Of course," Lachlann said. "I am a MacKerron."
"I should have realized," Colin said, narrowing his eyes. "I knew the MacKerron smith at this end of the loch, but I heard he died. He fostered a son... I had forgotten. He trained you in the craft, then."
"He did," Lachlann said calmly. "I am the son of Tomas MacKerron, who smithed near Strathlan... when he was alive."
Hearing the low and dangerous tone in his voice, Eva looked at him sharply, noting the pulsing in his jaw, the fisting of his hands. She could see that he restrained himself, keeping under tight control.
"Ah," Colin said. "That was a tragedy."
"You ought to know," Lachlann said.
Colin paused, then slowly smiled. "How fortunate that a MacKerron smith is at work on Loch Fhionn again. If you have your father's talent, perhaps you will do some work for me."
"My work comes at a high price," Lachlann said.
"Well worth it, I am sure."
Eva watched them, sensing at any moment that one or the other might strike, though both stood still.
"I need a sword," Colin said. "A special one. But I must be sure that you have the talent to make it."
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