The Forgotten Kingdom

by Signe Pike

  “I am a Wisdom Keeper! We are not to be harmed,” she shouted. Frowning, he reached to grab hold of her, and she lashed out, thrashing and kicking. They tumbled onto the rocks, the raider’s bulk falling on top of her, and Angharad beat at his ribs, struggling to break free. Then Angharad heard the raider exhale as if he’d been kicked. He cursed and leapt to his feet, leaving her prone upon the rocks. A spear pierced his torso, thrust by a warrior somewhere in the fog. The raider’s face hardened as he gripped the wood, yanking the spear from his side and flipping it toward the guard running at him, impaling him in the throat.

  Run, you fool, her instinct commanded. Two guards lay dead. But her legs would not obey her. The raider dropped to his knees, his face in a grimace.

  Angharad’s mind raced. “Your lord is wounded!” she called out, scrambling to her knees beside him. This man was a noble, and likely their leader. If she saved him, they might spare the priestesses from harm.

  The spear had pierced his armor, and blood was already darkening his tunic. “You are losing blood quickly. We must get you to the settlement,” she said, pulling back his armor to better see the wound.

  “Leave it!” he shouted, struggling to get up. Pictish was not his native tongue.

  “Stop struggling. You make it worse,” she snapped, reaching for his arm to help him stand. She hoisted his arm over her shoulder, gripping his wrist. He smelled of sweat and seawater. “Sweet Gods, you are heavy,” she grunted as he leaned upon her shoulder.

  In the fog, Angharad could see only a few paces ahead, and she sucked in a breath as she stepped on the body of a fallen guard, his fingers curled into the earth as if he’d been crawling along the ground.

  “Stop this madness. We are Keepers. Are you blind to our robes? Tell your men not to harm us. Tell them now!”

  The raider only frowned. Angharad turned to look at him in disbelief, jabbing her elbow into the seeping source of his wound. He gave a strangled cry, glaring at her sidelong, but shouted something in Goidelic.

  He was a Scot, then. A Westman.

  “There, ’tis done! We will not harm you,” he said.

  Angharad shook her head as she dragged him along the beach, body after lifeless body appearing in flashes of suspended horror from the fog.

  Dead, dead, all of their guard, dead.

  “These warriors were our friends,” she admonished him. “They were only doing their duty.”

  “What man is not duty-bound?” he answered.

  Angharad scoffed, searching the whiteness for Ariane. Straining, she caught sight of her standing nearer to the trees, where the fog had begun to shift, moving off to sea.

  “Are you hurt?” Ariane demanded.

  Angharad shook her head. “But this man is wounded, and he is their lord,” she said.

  “Take him to the temple. I will be there shortly,” Ariane said.

  As a sudden gust of sea wind thinned the fog over the rocky crescent of beach, Angharad made out thirty men or more, sodden from the sea, plundering the fresh corpses of the Cruithni on the beach.

  “You Westmen are monsters. You show no respect.”

  “Now, that isn’t true. We show them the same courtesy they offer us.”

  Angharad pulled him along the path as his men surrounded the priestesses, ushering them in a line toward the settlement in the wood.

  They arrived at the wooden temple, and Angharad slipped from beneath his arm, offering no more aid.

  “Enter,” she said, nodding to the temple door.

  As he stepped into the room, she forced him to meet her eyes. “Why have you come?” she demanded.

  The raider looked back, defiant. Incensed, Angharad searched him.

  She saw boats, many boats, charging fast across the water. Blood at the broch that belonged to King Cendalaeth. Bodies strewn everywhere.

  “You raided Cendalaeth’s broch,” she said in alarm. “Tell me. Is the king dead?”

  The man did not answer, but something told her it had been by his hand.

  “Bridei will kill you for this,” she said.

  The man pressed his hand to his wound. “Not if I kill him first.”

  It was the way that he said it. His eyes told a story, but Angharad did not wish to search him any further. They would treat his wound and then he would go.

  “Artùr.” A tall, dark-haired warrior strode forward, stopping at the sight of the raider and his wound.

  “Artùr,” Angharad echoed, eyeing his torque. “You are the son of Aedan the Scot! King of Mannau and Dalriada?”

  The man gave a perfunctory nod. Artùr did not seem pleased that Angharad had known him. But who did not know of him? Aedan and his many sons, the men of Gabrahn, were among the bitterest enemies of the Cruithni. Bridei had killed Aedan mac Gabrahn’s father, begetting a blood feud.

  Now Artùr stood before her. And Angharard had aided him! What in the name of the Gods had she done?

  She scarcely had time to consider it before Ariane stormed through the temple door and the men drew their swords.

  “How dare you lift your weapons in such a place?” she reprimanded them. “Sheath your blades and do not raise them to me again.”

  They looked to Artùr and he said, “Go on, do as she says.”

  “Who else among you is wounded?” Ariane demanded.

  Artùr’s face reddened when no others came forward. Angharad felt his deep stab of shame.

  “You have forced a sanctuary here, but I will grant it only for the wounded,” Ariane said. “Two men may stay with you. The others must go.”

  Artùr glanced at the dark-haired warrior. It seemed they could understand each other without speaking.

  His brother, Angharad thought.

  “I need only one man. Cai will stay.”

  The warrior nodded.

  “Cendalaeth is dead,” Angharad said. Ariane closed her eyes a moment, then opened them, eyeing the men. It was dangerous, each moment they lingered. And they could not shelter thirty men at the temple. There was no place to hide them.

  “Our king is dead, and your boats are full of plunder stained by the death of our people. Have your men bring in our dead before they depart. And you will not forget the kindness we have shown. Do you understand?”

  Artùr met her gaze. “Aye, that’s fair. I’ll give my word.”

  The raiders worked hurriedly to carry in the dead from the beach, then gathered round Artùr as he spoke in low tones. With the fallen Cruithni laid out, the priestesses began washing their wounds clean, scarcely looking up as the raiders strode from the temple and set sail back to Dalriada, leaving Artùr and Cai behind.

  “Remove your armor and tunic and lie upon the table,” Ariane instructed Artùr, then turned to Angharad. “You will help tend him,” she said.

  “Surely I am of better use elsewhere.”

  “Cendalaeth is dead, and we shelter his murderer,” Ariane replied. “Even now all the warriors of the Orcades will be scouring the coast. I need you to tend him because you are gifted at all you turn to, and we must see him gone.”

  “Of course. I will do it,” Angharad said. She pressed a linen to the wound to try to stanch the blood, and Artùr winced. “You. Cai,” she said. “Press the wound while I fix a poultice.”

  Ariane nodded. “Good, then. I must go quickly to the broch. The women and children will be frightened, and they deserve to know of the dead.”

  The dark-haired warrior Cai did as Angharad bade while she prepared a poultice of fern root, bog myrtle, and moss, then packed the wound.

  “Little more than a graze,” Angharad said, though it was quite grisly. “You are lucky it did not pierce deeper. You would surely be dead.”

  She had scarcely wrapped the clean linens over Artùr’s shoulder and round his ribs when Catrin burst through the temple door. “Bridei’s men! His warriors are coming!” she said.

  The priestesses who yet tended the dead looked to Angharad in alarm. She cursed, yanking off her blue robe and thrusting it
at Cai. “Here, put this on. And you”—she turned to Artùr—“lie there and feign the death I wish had found you.”

  Artùr frowned but lay flat once more, eyes closed in a semblance of eternal sleep.

  “Draw up your hood.” She motioned to the priestesses. “Cai. Turn your back to the door and help me tend him.”

  Just then the temple door opened, and three of Bridei’s men strode in. At the sight of the dead scattering the temple, they stopped, tapping two fingers over their hearts.

  “We would find the men who have done this,” Bridei’s man said. “Did any see which direction they fled? Did any stay ashore?”

  “Nay,” Angharad said. “They pushed off from the bay; we saw nothing more as we were tending the dead. Their families will soon come, and we would have them cleaned so as not to frighten the children.”

  “Well enough.” He nodded. “But you are now without guard. Men from the mainland will arrive in five days’ time. Can you keep safe enough ’til then?”

  Angharad nodded.

  The man looked round the oil-lit temple. “We will leave you to carry on your prayers for the dead,” he said. And ducking in apology, they left.

  Artùr and Cai kept motionless until the warriors’ footfalls retreated. Then Cai offered his hand and pulled Artùr to sitting. Angharad steadied her breathing.

  “Why did you land on our shore? Was your lust for blood not satisfied by your slaughter at Cendalaeth’s broch?” she asked.

  “We were separated from our fleet in the fog on the Eynhallow Sound. We wouldn’t harm priestesses, despite what you think,” Artùr replied.

  “Oh? But you will chase them like hounds?”

  “I didn’t wish to have villagers summoning the guard. If you hadn’t screamed, I wouldn’t have chased you.”

  “Who would not scream at the sight of raiders appearing out of the sea?”

  He looked at her a moment, then tipped his head as if conceding her point.

  “Come. You cannot stay here. The families will soon come to sit with their dead.” Angharad led Artùr and Cai to the hut she shared with Catrin. “I suppose you must stay here, unless our Lady Priestess says any different. Catrin and I will bed elsewhere.”

  “I would not send you from your beds,” Artùr said.

  “You are not well enough to travel,” she told Artùr. “A journey by boat may kill you. There’s no helping it now. Stay here. We will bring food when we can.”

  The next morning Ariane sent Cai to aid in the washing to earn his sanctuary while Angharad returned to change the dressing on Artùr’s wound. Her fingers were cold, and he stiffened as they brushed against his bare chest.

  “Aye, go on, then,” he said, and Angharad unwound the linen. Artùr’s torso was impressively muscled, and she tried not to notice the smoothness of his skin beneath her fingers as she gently removed the dressing.

  “How many winters are you?” Angharad asked, curious.

  “Twenty-two. And what of you?”

  “Seventeen.”

  “Ah. Seventeen.” He studied her. “You ken my name, yet you’ve not told me yours, Lady Priestess.”

  Angharad looked up. “I’m not yet a priestess. I am only a novice.”

  “Lady Novice?” He squinted at her, waiting.

  “My name is mine to keep,” Angharad said, though not unkindly.

  He allowed a smile. “My father’s first wife is a Pict, as are two of my brothers. I ken their ways well.”

  “Is this why your father wars against Bridei? He would have one of his own sons upon the throne?”

  “We war against Bridei because he is a pestilence. He murdered my forefather, Gabrahn, and does not cease in raiding our land. He wants Mannau for his own, and Dalriada, too. Until Bridei is dead, we will never know peace.”

  “And what would you do with peace when you and your family are so crafted for war?”

  Artùr considered it. “I cannot say. Study the Songs, perhaps.”

  Angharad laughed, then regretted it. “You would study the Songs?” she asked carefully.

  “Every lord studies them, but Songs cannot win a kingdom.”

  “Stories are a different sort of survival,” Angharad said.

  “Aye, I agree.”

  “I’ve brought a clean tunic,” she said, passing it to him. “It belonged to one of our guard.”

  Artùr nodded in thanks, but Angharad’s eyes lingered on his bandaged wound as he pulled the tunic awkwardly over his head.

  “It was my fault, wasn’t it?” Angharad asked. “Your wound. You were sheltering me on the beach. I didn’t realize, but you were trying to shield me from all the flying points…” She trailed off, waving her hand, and Artùr’s mouth turned up at the corners.

  “Nay. The spear may’ve struck me wherever I stood.”

  Angharad shook her head, meeting his eyes. “It would have struck me. I should have thanked you.”

  He lifted a brow. “Go on, then, I’ll wait. I’ve nowhere where else to be just now.”

  “Thank you,” she said earnestly.

  “Aye.” He cleared his throat. “Well.”

  Cai stole a fisherman’s boat by night and hid it in the brush. Over the next few days, Angharad and Artùr fell into a comfort as she visited the hut to tend him. But as the day approached when Bridei’s men were due to arrive, Artùr’s wound was not yet healing as it should.

  “Each time I come in, you are pacing,” Angharad said. “You must do as I say and lie back and rest or you will not be sound enough to journey home.”

  Artùr looked up as if he’d forgotten Angharad was near. She felt the confinement in him, his frustration. He was frantic as a caged beast.

  “I can take it from you, if you’ll let me,” Angharad said softly. “So you might find some sleep.”

  Artùr stopped pacing, his eyes on hers. “How?”

  “Come. Sit before me.”

  Artùr sat upon a stool. Now that he was so close, Angharad wished she had not offered. It would link them, she knew.

  But Artùr could not heal if he would not rest. Angharad took a steadying breath and lifted her hands, looking into his eyes.

  As their gazes met, a sensation passed through her, a rush or a quickening, as if she had drunk too much ale. She looked away.

  The sensation was penetrating, unsettling, awakening. It was too strong. Too much. But the path Angharad walked was a crooked one, and she knew better than to see this man, Artùr, as only a man. Look deeper, she told herself.

  Her interest in Artùr distracted her. She understood then that the goddess had sent this man so that Angharad might learn to better command her own skill. This was why Ariane had demanded she tend to him.

  “Close your eyes,” Angharad said.

  Artùr hesitated, and Angharad realized Aedan’s son did not have the luxury of vulnerability. She had encountered others like that, mostly warriors, mostly men.

  She would have to show him the way.

  Angharad placed her hands gently on either side of his head. The goddess was a mother tending to her child. A priestess’s body was merely a vessel. Artùr’s lashes settled upon his cheek at her touch, his breath growing even. When Angharad next looked down, Artùr the little boy sat before her. His eyes, though closed, were blue pools of innocence.

  Look how the world had worn him.

  Now he had a spear wound in his side and armor leathering his heart.

  She drew it into her body, the discomfort rocking her in waves. She yielded to it, allowing it in.

  Artùr let out a sigh. He opened his eyes, looking into hers. “Thank you, Lady Priestess,” he said.

  She smiled. “I told you, I am only a novice.” She risked a glance at him, then said it before she might take it back. “Angharad. That is my name.”

  “Angharad,” Artùr said. His voice was quiet, and Angharad was taken aback by the tenderness beneath it.

  Linked. She had known it. There was nothing for it now. Their gaze held new meaning
.

  “Where did you learn that skill, Angharad?” Artùr asked.

  “From a priestess in Fortingall, but also from my uncle. When I was a young girl, I left my mother and father to train with him,” Angharad said. “He used to take the tears from me, some nights, when I was weeping.”

  “He was a Wisdom Keeper?” Artùr asked.

  “He was. Lailoken was his name.”

  Artùr looked at her, blinking. “Lailoken, you say?”

  “Yes. But then I was lost from him, and…” Angharad bowed her head, the weight of it too much a burden after Artùr’s strong healing.

  But Artùr’s face was full of wonder. “Angharad! Of course! You’re Lailoken’s young niece,” he said.

  “You know my uncle?”

  “Aye,” he said. “I ken your uncle well.”

  “And he is yet living?” she asked, astounded.

  “Aye. And he’s never forgotten you. He speaks of you all the time.”

  Angharad’s head was spinning. “However did you meet?”

  “Have you not heard of the raid on Clyde Rock?”

  “What raid?” Angharad’s eyes widened. Her mother and father! Her brother and her sister! “Tell me. You must tell me, Artùr!”

  “Aye,” he said calmly. “The raid of Aedan mac Gabrahn on Clyde Rock? It’s been six winters since, but your uncle aided in it. That’s how I came to know him. I’m sorry to be the one to tell you.”

  Six winters ago! Eachna had never told her, even if she’d known. “Please, I must know. Were any of my family harmed?” she demanded.

  “Ach, no.” He frowned as if to reassure her. “Warriors all.”

  Angharad nodded, mind racing. “And where is my uncle now?”

  Artùr hesitated. She could sense her uncle’s whereabouts were a secret he kept close. She looked at him, beseeching. “Please.”

  “Well enough. Your uncle is in exile in the Caledonian Wood. He’s settled on the land of a chieftan called Archer, should you ever need to find him.”

  “Thank you,” she said.

  “Aye.”