Bloodstone

by Gillian Philip

  Eili tipped back her head and gave a hoot of genuine laughter. ‘In your dreams, you dirty big waste of a blade.’

  Cuthag still wore a grin, but it had lost some of its glee and taken on an edge of anger. ‘Watch your mouth, bitch.’

  ‘And you,’ I put in, ‘bitch. So why aren’t you with them? Oh, yeah, that’s right. Sionnach doesn’t let you tie his hands first.’

  Eili shot me a cross look, but her mouth twitched. Cuthag’s mouth tightened, his grin gone.

  ‘Well,’ said Eili. ‘I can’t see Laszlo making it back any time soon. Shall we just agree to differ? I won’t let on, you know. I won’t tell him you failed to catch us.’

  Cuthag smirked. ‘You won’t have to.’

  Eili jerked her head in Finn’s direction. ‘This one’s handy with a throwing blade.’

  Finn was managing to smile, her blade catching the starlight prettily.

  Cuthag laughed. ‘That child? It doesn’t even have a name!’

  Branndair snarled, and thoughtfully I put my finger to my jaw. ‘I gave you the hiding of your life when we were ten. I didn’t have a name then.’

  Cuthag curled his lip, and jerked his head at Jed. ‘That boy, now – he has a name. And he’ll be dead by midnight.’

  I was on the point of answering when the boy did it himself. ‘Says which wanker?’

  If I hadn’t been focused on Cuthag and his pal, I’d have smiled. I knew that feeling: the anger chasing out the fear. And more fear chasing it straight back in.

  ‘Relax, everybody.’ Eili drew the blade of one of her swords slowly along the other, so that they sang a high note. ‘One, two, three blades. I think you’re outnumbered, Cuthag. That’s never suited you, so let us pass.’

  The note of Branndair’s growl changed abruptly, and I tensed. The shadow to our left might have been no more than rhododendron foliage, so lightly did it move. I sensed the excellent block only at that moment: oh, clever. Flipping my sword, I thrust it backwards.

  The blade made a soft scraping sound as it plunged into flesh. I brought it forward again, a steel glint streaked with darkness.

  There was a stuttering suck of breath; I let myself glance to the side. The woman regarded me with bitter loathing. But the sword in her hand hung useless; she couldn’t lift it, not now. As she fell to her knees and then toppled face forward to the ground, her head banged against Jed’s foot. He made a strangled sound of horror, but loud enough for only me to hear.

  ‘Okay.’ I wiped the bloody blade on the roan’s shoulder, making it whicker with hunger, then pointed it at Cuthag. ‘Now you’re outnumbered.’

  Cuthag exchanged glances with his colleague on the horse.

  ‘We don’t want to fight,’ said Eili. ‘We can all go home tonight if you stand to the side.’

  Cuthag gave the farmer’s corpse a spiteful kick and backed towards the rocky side of the gully. ‘You’d better ride hard, you upstarts.’

  ‘Not a problem. And you can wait here for Cù Chaorach. He’s going to love your way with innocent farmers.’

  ‘Aye,’ growled the man on the horse. ‘We learned it from him. Isn’t that right, Murlainn? From your sainted brother.’

  I recognised him, now, too: one of the late unlamented Fearchar’s men, from our days as Kate’s henchmen. He met my eyes, challenging, and I could say nothing. I was aware of Finn’s tension, her still uncomprehending silence, and most of all, of the blade in her grip, steady now and very threatening.

  Eili’s breath hissed through her teeth. ‘Get out of the way. I said I didn’t want to fight. I didn’t say I wouldn’t. Back. Further.’

  ‘Run then, little deer. Run and see if we catch you.’

  Without the horses we might have had it, for all our arrogant bluff. But the dapple grey and the blue roan paced carefully between the two men, snaking their heads and baring teeth; the men’s horses shied and snorted and backed, afraid. This time Eili rode ahead, watching Cuthag with loathing; so I could see how he looked at Finn.

  His pallid glittering eyes stayed on her, all hate and contempt and something else more frightening. I saw her suppress a shudder; Cuthag saw it too, because that little smile of his was back. I studied his face as I rode. When we were five yards, ten yards past, he went on eyeing her; I turned to see. His malice was cold, a tangible thing.

  Eili sheathed her swords in an easy double arc and carried Finn away at a swift gallop. I turned the roan a little, so that it danced sideways for a few paces, and I could still keep my eyes on Cuthag and his pal. Nodding at me, he dropped his block, and I heard his hissing threat.

  ~ I can wait.

  Mila’s boy was at my back, I reminded myself, so I clenched my teeth and resisted the temptation to ride back at him.

  Besides, he was already pulling himself nimbly onto his horse, and the hoofbeats drummed, and even my pride could be hedged about with prudence. Eili yanked Finn forward to sit in front of her, reminding me to do the same for the boy. He yelled, but he was too shocked to fight me.

  Something bright flew past us as we burst out of the rhododendron tunnel: a thrown blade that shuddered into a stunted tree. Eili swerved and dodged. The next missile thwicked into the ground a few yards ahead; Cuthag’s pal had a bow, then. I swore.

  Branndair was a black streak, taking his own route. Trusting his instincts, I let him. Eili’s grey swerved, racing for the next belt of trees, and as we followed it I felt the breath of another arrow on my cheek. As we hit the first trees, side by side and almost touching, I heard Eili grunt and she lurched forward. Then we were into the copse, faces slapped and slashed by branches.

  On the far side we broke out into boggy land before plunging into a river. That gave the horses a new lease of energy, and they wheeled and headed upstream, flying through the water as birds would cut through the air. After that there was no catching us, and the pursuit fell away.

  Eili didn’t halt, though, and I rode hard in her wake. She turned the grey towards the far bank of the river, letting it leap clear in a fan of spray, but it was a long time before she let it ease back to a canter, then a brisk walk. Jed tugged my t-shirt.

  ‘She’s hurt,’ he whispered.

  ‘She’s fine.’ I was still seething. ‘Sonofabitch, I knew Cuthag was going to do that.’

  ‘No, she’s been hit.’ He whacked my shoulder blade in frustration. Eili was reaching back to tug something from her upper arm, then fling it away. A bloody-tipped arrow.

  ‘She’s not okay! Stop!’

  Finn was white. ‘Eili—’

  ‘He said I’m okay,’ she snapped. ‘Stop fussing.’

  Jed shut up. Now that the danger was gone he’d be far more terrified than he was at the time. His imagination was playing out all the possibilities of what might have been, I knew that. Kept him quiet. He didn’t throw up, though, or start whining about going home.

  Eili was gripping her wounded arm, her face contorted with pain. ‘Good acting back there, both of you.’

  ‘Thanks,’ said Jed shakily. ‘You two and all.’

  ‘Heh. You noticed.’ She lowered Finn from the horse, then jumped lightly to the ground.

  ‘How’s the arm?’ I asked, as Branndair materialized at my side. I rubbed his neck fur fondly.

  Eili peeled back the edge of the clean rip in her sleeve. There was a mess of blood, but no hole now. ‘I told you, it’s fine. Leave it. Which way, Seth? This has really screwed us up.’

  ‘Can we go back?’ Finn suggested.

  Eili guffawed. ‘Aye, good idea. Not. Sionnach and Cù Chaorach will find us, don’t worry.’

  ‘And Leonie?’

  ‘She’ll be fine.’ Eili tutted. ‘Don’t be such a worryguts.’

  ‘Ha,’ I said. ‘Maybe we should have kept the old bat with us. She’d have sorted the tosser of the millennium, proper and permanently.’

  Finn snapped, ‘Leonie’s not as old and decrepit as she looks, is she?’

  ‘You’re not still moaning about that?’ Eili
shrugged. ‘She puts on an amazing glamour. Old pro that she is. You should be proud of her.’

  ‘She’s a con artist and a liar.’

  Eili was nonplussed. ‘Well. What she did was for your own...’

  ‘Now, I’m not sure whose good it was for.’ Finn’s eyes burned. Not with tears, I decided, or not exclusively. If she let rip with the force of her anger, Eili and I were going to know about it. ‘But I’m pretty sure it wasn’t mine.’

  ‘Don’t be too hard on her,’ said Eili after a pause. ‘Your grandmother isn’t decrepit, but she’s at least as old as she looks. And she wouldn’t dare defy Stella. None of us would.’

  I snorted.

  ‘Well.’ Eili rolled her eyes. ‘Except you, Seth. But you’d do it for fun.’

  ‘And a scrap,’ I said mildly. ‘You know what I think. It’s a crime, and you’ve all let Stella get away with it. Spoilt bitch that she is.’ I met Finn’s eyes. ‘Because you’re all scared of her.’

  ‘Too right I am,’ laughed Eili.

  For all her skill, I didn’t think Eili quite sensed what she was dealing with. And quite suddenly, I realised that didn’t matter, because Finn was too clever to take it out on her. Hurriedly I formed a protective block, because it would be me who got it in the frontal lobes, if she decided to lash out, and from the homicidal look on her face, she was considering it.

  But she was in control for the moment. Definitely clever.

  ‘Tell me about my mother,’ she said, and her voice was perilously calm. She was watching me as she said it, but I wasn’t going to rise to that. I’d said enough.

  Eili shrugged. ‘Your mother used to be fierce. Brave as six hounds. You tell me what happened. Maybe breeding turns your brain to mush and your heart to a sponge.’ Bitterly she murmured, ‘I wouldn’t know.’

  What was it about that Fionnuala child that made me want to hurt her? It wasn’t as if she’d ever heard the stupid ramblings of that soothsayer, not even from Leonora, not in the face of Reultan’s strictures. All the same, I did hurt her. She was, after all, thinking of doing me actual bodily harm.

  ‘Stella’s heart has never been anything but stone and cold iron. Eh, Finn?’

  I expected her to go for me, but instead she sagged, so miserable and defeated she looked close to tears. Jed looked as if he wanted to kill me.

  ‘Why’d she lie to me? Why did you all lie all this time?’

  ‘Nothing to do with me, Dorsal. Neither are you.’ I shrugged. But I couldn’t quite look at her, because I was under pressure from unaccustomed shame. Oh, leave her alone, you bastard.

  Eili laughed, rescuing me. ‘Stella wants you to be normal. She forgets that blood will out.’

  ‘In many senses,’ I muttered.

  ‘Seth, quit it—’

  Hooves thudded on the earth behind us, and I glanced round at the big horse. Well, thank the gods for Englishmen with good timing. ‘You lost them?’

  ‘Yep,’ said Torc, riding to my side. ‘We lost them. Piece of piss. You had trouble?’

  ‘A bit. We lost them, too. They talked too much.’

  Torc laughed. Holding onto him, Leonora smiled at Finn, but Finn didn’t smile back. She was refusing even to turn her head towards her grandmother, so maybe she hadn’t noticed how tired she was. Because Leonora did look very, very tired. The old fraud wasn’t acting for once. That was un-faked age and exhaustion. Unease tightened my spine.

  Eili must have realised it too. ‘We’re not going much further.’ Eili nodded at a strip of trees that darkened the paling horizon, tapering out to a glimmer of sea. ‘We’ll stop there.’

  I folded my arms, let the roan paw the earth. ‘What does Leonora think?’

  Eili hissed, and her jaw tensed. ‘That’s where we stop. We don’t move again till Cù Chaorach finds us.’ Her voice was brittle with anger. ‘And to hell with Leonora’s orders.’

  ‘You’re looking good for a dead man.’

  Sionnach laughed and hugged me. ‘Murlainn. You don’t change.’

  ‘It’s part of my charm.’ I clapped his scarred cheek lightly.

  ‘Where’s Cù Chaorach?’ The edge of impatience in Eili’s voice was like a honed blade.

  ‘Can’t locate him.’ Sionnach slewed his eyes away, angry and ashamed. He wasn’t accustomed to failure at tracking.

  ‘Cheer up,’ I said. ‘The atmosphere’s like a snowstorm for some reason. It’s all white noise. You know that.’

  ‘I know that. I don’t have to like it.’

  I shrugged, uneasy myself. ‘Ach, he’ll be fine, Eili. You know Laszlo’s a challenge, even for our hero.’

  Eili smiled tightly and turned away. I winked at Sionnach, and he grinned.

  ~ It’s true, Murlainn. He’ll be running rings round Laszlo.

  I knew that. He was my brother, my captain. I trusted him not to die. ~ Your sister isn’t really worried either. We know why she wants him back.

  Sionnach gave a sharp bark of laughter, earning a suspicious glower from his twin.

  If Leonora was much closer to the sea she’d be sleeping on the beach, but at least we’d found a high patch of woodland and Torc had started to build a fire. Jed was watching him, huddled into his thick jacket, but Finn stood apart, staring out at a broad strip of moon-frosted machair and the range of dunes beyond it. After that there was only the sea: I could smell it, and the distant islands, and the woodsmoke of the fire, and the coarse cropped turf of the machair. I could almost smell the moonlight. Hairs rose on my neck, and suddenly I was in love with the world again.

  Feeling conciliatory, not to mention sorry for her, I sauntered up to where she was ripping sea-pinks savagely from a rocky outcrop. ‘You’re okay? You did fine back there.’

  She shivered. I resisted the urge to put an arm round her shoulders.

  ‘That man. Cuthag.’

  ‘He scared you?’

  Stupid question. She took her time answering it, and fair enough.

  ‘He didn’t scare me. He just...’

  ‘Walked on your grave.’

  ‘Danced on it, more like. Stamping down the earth. I could feel it.’

  I was glad she couldn’t see my shiver. ‘He’s just a thug. Don’t sweat the small stuff, Dorsal. And he’s very small stuff.’

  She wasn’t sweating. Very calm, very cool, she was. ‘And he’s representative, would you say? Cuthag?’

  ‘Dorsal, you make my flesh creep. Of some people round here, yes.’

  ‘What are you telling her?’ asked a voice behind me.

  Gods, Leonora’s sudden appearances could still make my blood freeze. I hated that about her, among many other things. But I didn’t get a chance to snap back.

  ‘Why? What shouldn’t he be telling me?’

  You know those places where the earth’s fire comes close to the surface? You can see the carapace cracking, feel the heat building. That’s the image that came into my head, and I knew she would break one of these times. I hoped I wouldn’t be around when she did.

  ‘I don’t trust him to tell anything well.’ Casting me her witchiest glower, Leonora put an arm round the girl. It was the unthinking ease of love, and it riled the devil inside me.

  ‘I don’t trust you to tell anything.’ I was so snagged in my own long-suppressed frustrations, I suppose, Finn’s didn’t register with me, though I could sense the heat building, that compact little ball of fury that starts in the base of your spine and intensifies as it reaches the nape of your neck. I could feel an echo of it myself. But I was angry too; angry enough to run off at the mouth. ‘Looks like I’ll have to tell Finn why she’s such a nonentity. Nobody else will.’

  ‘Seth!’ snapped Leonora. There was a touch of panic in her fury.

  ‘The Veil, Dorsal, is why nobody takes any notice of you. It’s a filter between you and the full-mortals. Not only are you so different you’re downright weird, you’re instantly forgettable. And you always have been.’

  Leonora pulled me round to face her, and
gave me a stinging blow across the face.

  Fair enough. I put my hand to the mark of hers, stunned into reason. Damn, the woman had a fierce strength, even now.

  I waited to get a slap from Finn, too, but she only stood there, staring emptily at her grandmother.

  ‘Don’t bother slapping him,’ she whispered.

  ‘He had no right—’

  ‘Well, I do!’ she yelled. ‘I thought it was me. I thought I was a pointless person. I thought I was a nobody. I thought it was my fault!’

  ‘Finn, I’m...’

  ‘Don’t you dare tell me you’re sorry,’ she hissed. ‘Because you don’t mean it. Do you?’

  She couldn’t contain it any more. I should have seen it coming, we all should, because her eyes looked about to burn up, like boiling mercury. She let it rip, and the missile of fury struck Leonora smack on the forehead.

  Finn blinked and shouted with pain, clapping her hands over her eyes. Leonora stumbled forward to one knee, and I caught her arm to stop her hitting the ground. She looked shocked to her core, but she didn’t look scared, and the pain in her eyes wasn’t all physical. Eili and Sionnach and Torc were running to us but they halted, silenced by shock. I watched Finn with fascination.

  She’d hurt Leonora, really hurt her. I wondered how she’d deal with that – how Leonora would, for that matter. She’d lashed out at me before – not quite so effectively, I must admit – but never Leonora. What was it I’d said to Conal? That the Rooney girl was a start? Finn certainly seemed capable of worse. Right now, though, the cold fire in her eyes was gone: all used up, and she looked too empty even for misery.

  ‘Well, thanks for taking that bullet, Leonora. Feel better now, Dorsal?’

  Finn turned on me. ‘Like I could be bothered hurting you!’

  ‘Thanks for that sentiment, Dorsal.’

  ‘Stop calling her that, you freak!’

  Jed’s fists were tightly balled and his teeth were clenched, but Eili’s sudden stillness was a lot more alarming than his fury. Oh, this was all going too far. I touched her arm, shook my head at her.

  ‘Nah, Eili. It’s a... figure of speech. He’s not the mob type. He’s got a mind of his own in that hot little head. I expect he’s had to grow one, since his mother lost hers.’