Before she left the room, she bent over him and softly touched her lips to his forehead.
“I willna let you down, Hall O’Donar. I pledge it to you by the lives of the Seven. I will find the scrolls, and I will return to you.”
And woe unto any who thought to stand in her way.
Twenty
HOW LONG HAD he been lost and wandering in that strange place?
Freakish shadowy figures populated the landscape Hall had traveled, an alien world unlike any he’d traversed before. Though it might not have been Niflheim itself, it had to have been close. Of that he felt certain.
Hall opened his eyes, searching for any memory of the place in which he found himself. A bedchamber, that much was clear. But whose bedchamber was the question.
Memories began to return, slowly at first, in bits and pieces so strange, he doubted their reality. Likely they were figments of his imagination, born out of the madness that had held him in its grip. Excruciating pain. Heat beyond human tolerance as if he’d traversed a land of pure, unrelenting fire.
And through it all, like a cool respite from the torment, Bridget MacCulloch had filled his dreams.
Only it couldn’t have been Bridget. The phantom that had appeared in his delirium had worn nothing more than a thin white shift, her every enticing curve outlined by the flickering fire behind her. Her hand, soft and cool when she’d touched him, bore exotic markings unlike any seen in this world for many centuries.
It would make sense that he’d dream of Bridget, even as his mind distorted her visage. Since dreams were the only place where he could claim her for his own, it was unlikely he’d ever be able to banish her from his dreams.
His mouth felt half its normal size, as if his tongue were swollen and made of paper. He was thirstier than he could ever remember being in the whole of his life. And that was a very long time, indeed.
He swung his legs to the side of the bed and sat up, waiting until his head quit spinning before he attempted to stand. It took two tries to make it to his feet and stay there.
This was good. He was standing. Standing, but naked as the day he was born. With a great effort, he pulled the top blanket from the bed, wrapped it around himself, and headed for the open door.
The melodious sound of someone singing reached his ears, the beautiful notes of a woman singing to herself as she worked. A soothing, tinkling, rippling cascade of music floating on the air that took him back to another time and another place. A Faerie glen where his mother had taken him as a child . . .
Orabilis!
He remembered now. Bridget had brought him here for the Faerie healer to work her magic.
Since he was standing on his own two feet, apparently she’d done exactly that, leaving him in the debt of not one but two Faeries.
Two Faeries and one beautiful, stubborn Pictish princess.
As he entered the main room of the little cottage, his grumbling stomach announced him before his words could.
“Oh!” Orabilis turned with a little squeak of surprise and the air shimmered around her, obscuring her for an instant. “Well, look at this. Patience has paid off. It would seem my potions worked after all. Welcome back to the world of Mortals, my young friend.”
“Thank you, my lady. I am in your debt.” Hall dipped his head in a deferential little bow.
“Indeed you are, Hall O’Donar. Indeed you are. You and yer rather determined companion both.”
“My debt to you is my own, not Bridget’s.” He would not have Bridget held accountable for the Fae’s services to him. The last complication Bridget needed in her life was a Faerie seeking repayment for something she didn’t owe.
“True. And Bridget’s debt to me is hers.” Orabilis smiled and held up a bowl freshly dipped from the simmering pot beside her. “I was just about to eat. Stew? Some meat and broth will do wonders for you after all these days without food.”
Again his stomach rumbled and he accepted her offering, taking a seat at the heavy wooden table. The first bite was so heavenly delicious he allowed himself a second to enjoy it before pursuing Orabilis’s argument.
“What is Bridget’s debt to you?”
“Her business, and none of yer own. Now, eat yer stew like a good lad. Bread to go with that? I’ve some nice cold goat milk, for after yer meal, if you’d like.”
She held out a chunk of what appeared to be freshly baked bread and he accepted, forcing himself to wait for his next bite until she was seated across from him with her own bowl.
Of all the conversations he might have expected her to start, the one she chose was not among them.
“What will you do with the Beast once you’ve captured it?” Orabilis glanced up at him from her bowl, a half smile curling one corner of her mouth. “If you succeed in capturing it, that is.”
In truth, he hadn’t actually given that as much thought as it deserved.
“Return him to his prison in the scrolls, I suppose. Like the Elves who originally put him there intended.”
The old woman nodded thoughtfully, as if to herself. “But where will you keep him and his scrolls? Surely you can see now, after the debacle with Torquil, this is a burden not safe in the hands of any Mortal.”
He tended to agree with her, but the final decision, ultimately, was not his to make. There were powers beyond him that would decide the Beast’s fate.
“When the time comes, I will do what needs to be done. That’s the best I can promise.”
“Fair enough.” Orabilis put down her piece of bread and tapped her fingers on the table as if debating what she wanted to say next. “You do realize Fenrir has the ability to destroy the weave of the world as we know it. The future, as well as the present, lies at risk should you fail. And even if you succeed, how you succeed and what you do after carries that same burden of risk.”
Why was it the gods never saw fit to save him from the agony of Faerie gibberish? The inscrutable nature of their warnings, their inability to say what they meant in a straightforward manner, always grated upon his nerves.
Still, this particular Faerie had saved his life, so he wouldn’t argue with his hostess. He would simply change the subject.
“Is Bridget not taking her meal with us?”
“She is not.”
Orabilis flashed her innocent Faerie smile and Hall’s stomach knotted with the sure knowledge that something was very wrong.
“Is she out tending to the animals?”
Orabilis’s brow wrinkled a bit more than usual as she considered the question. “She is not tending to our animals.”
Word games. The Fae simply couldn’t help themselves, perhaps the least attractive of all their annoying habits. They played with language as a child played with toys.
Hall laid down his spoon and the warm bread, taking a moment to consider exactly how to ask the questions that would get her to tell him what he wanted to know. The direct method was usually best when it came to communicating with a Faerie.
“Where is she?”
Orabilis steepled her hands, tapping her fingers together slowly. “I am no sure exactly where she might be by now.”
By now. A flaw in her choice of words, which, thankfully, should speed up this blighted process.
“Then tell me this: Where has she gone?”
Because Bridget was, without question, gone. He could feel her absence as a great empty spot in his world. A great empty spot that he didn’t like one little bit.
The old Faerie took another bite, savoring the food before answering. “Now, there’s a question I can answer. Our determined lass has gone after the scrolls she believed necessary for your survival.”
“What?” Hall burst up from the table, sending his chair crashing over backward. “But you didn’t need the scrolls. I’ve recovered just fine without them.”
“As I told her you very well might, given time. But it seems she’s no a patient lass. She wasn’t willing to risk my being wrong.”
“And you just let her go? B
y herself?”
Unbelievable! Orabilis had to know how dangerous it would be for Bridget to leave the protection of Rowan Cottage.
The Faerie shrugged, as if they discussed nothing more serious than a misplaced garment. “Young girls these days. Not a drop of patience in the lot of them. They make up their mind and there’s simply no talking them out of it. She wanted to go, she went. What’s an old woman to do?”
“What’s an old—” Hall clamped his mouth shut when he realized he’d been reduced to sputtering. After a deep breath to calm himself he tried again. “Why didn’t you stop her?”
Orabilis snorted her disbelief. “Who am I to stop the last daughter of the House MacUlagh, descended from the Ancient Seven who’d ruled the land when not even—”
“Enough!” Hall’s own patience, normally quite extensive, was at an end. “I’ll hear no more of your nonsense. How long has she been gone?”
“She left here two days ago, armored with her people’s symbols of protection and destiny, seeking one she called Mathew. Seeking the Elven Scrolls of Niflheim so that she might ensure your recovery.”
Two days’ head start?
“By Thor! I’ll need food and provisions so that I might leave right away. Traveling quickly enough, I just might catch up with her.”
Orabilis motioned toward him with her spoon. “You’ll likely want clothes, too. Just a thought. Yer things are cleaned and folded in the corner of the bedchamber.”
With his face as hot as if the fever had never left, Hall turned his back on the Faerie, fighting to keep his anger in check as he left. The sound of her satisfied chuckle followed him until he slammed the bedchamber door.
Quickly, he dressed and returned to the main room to find her packing a large bag for him.
“I’ll saddle my horse and return for that shortly.” He couldn’t abide wasting any more time. “And then I’ll be on my way.”
“There’s no point in yer being in such a hurry. What’s to be will be. It’s no within yer power to change Bridget’s fate.” Orabilis tipped her head to one side, her gaze piercing him. “Or is it?”
How could she be so uncaring about the woman who had risked everything to save him? “It’s Bridget’s safety we speak of. Her life. The dangers stalking her are beyond her abilities.”
Again the old woman chuckled. “And what of it? What’s happened to your Northman’s fatalistic view of life? Where’s all yer standard blether about the weave already having been woven and the Norns determining what’s to happen to all of us?”
“To hell with the Norns,” he growled. “I live outside their tapestry and, believe me in this, I won’t allow Bridget to succumb to harm. Not even that which she brings upon herself.”
To his surprise, Orabilis laughed out loud. “Oh, lad, it does my heart good to hear you speaking from that half of yer ancestry.”
“What do you know of my ancestry?” he asked, suspicion building. She had recognized his name that first night. She had known of his people, and where they came from.
Orabilis continued to gather items and stuff them into the bag, not looking in his direction. “More than you might think. I knew yer mother. She was quite a talented healer in her own right. And every bit as hardheaded as you are.”
“And my father, did you know him as well?” If that was the case, then she knew the whole of his secret.
“I did indeed. A disappointing wastrel who proved himself to be much more trouble than his poor mother ever deserved. And definitely more trouble than yer poor mother realized when she ran away with him.”
Unable to dispute her description of his father, Hall nodded his acceptance of her words and left the little cottage to retrieve his horse, old feelings of bitterness bubbling within his chest.
His father had deserted his family so long ago, Hall had difficulty in recalling his face. A self-involved coward, he had refused to carry out the tasks required of him to aid Mankind and had forced the burden upon his son.
Only someone with intimate knowledge of Hall’s family could have described his father so well. But whether Orabilis knew who—and what—they were was another matter. This was a secret he guarded closely.
With his mount saddled and his sword on his back, Hall led the animal to the front of the cottage, where Orabilis waited to hand to him the bags of provisions she’d prepared.
“You’ll want these, too,” she said, holding out her hand to reveal the goat carved from rowan wood he’d worn around his neck and a small cloth bag. “Remember to keep the jewels covered once you leave the protection of Rowan Cottage.”
“Thank you,” he mumbled, embarrassed that he’d lost his temper with the old Faerie who’d saved his life.
She reached out with her gnarled fingers to pat his hand. “Go on yer way confident in the knowledge that it is yer own free will that guides what happens from this point forward, no the aimless weavings of three old women who sit under a tree.”
He dropped the necklace over his head and secured the bundle of jewels inside his pack, then tied the pack to his horse. Finally, he turned back to face her.
His fury wasn’t with her, and she didn’t deserve to be treated as if she’d done something wrong. Especially not after all she’d done for him.
“I apologize for my behavior and for my anger.”
“You’ve no need to apologize to me.” Orabilis tightened the ends of the shawl she wore around her shoulders. “But you do need accept that yer anger is but a mask for the true emotion you refuse to acknowledge.”
“And what emotion might that be, Faerie? Since you seem to know me so well.”
“One of the most powerful emotions of all, my young warrior: fear. I suspect it may be a stranger to you, but you’ve met it now. It’s the beast curling in yer stomach and threatening to crush yer chest. Can you deny the fear you have for Bridget MacCulloch’s safety?”
He refused to snap at her bait. He also refused to lie. And denying her assertion would be a lie. It was fear holding him within its mighty clutches. Fear of what might be happening to Bridget at this very moment, and every moment he delayed.
“I will find her. I will see her safe,” he said, as much to reassure himself as anything.
“Even if yer actions anger the Norns themselves?”
He would not allow Bridget’s destiny to be determined by three old women who spent their days under a tree, weaving the tapestry that ensnared both their worlds.
Foot in his stirrup, he straddled his mount and prepared to leave. No matter what the cost, he would not be deterred from the path he had chosen.
“The Norns may chafe over my actions as they will,” he declared.
“Just as the Norns still chafe over Thor’s pompous little demigod mating with a Fae, yes?”
Hall dipped his head in a respectful farewell and turned his horse west to carry him outside the ring of rowans surrounding Orabilis’s home. Any question he’d had about how much she knew of his family was answered.
His secret was a secret no more.
Twenty-one
THE BOY WAS a day ahead of her. Two at most.
Brie rubbed the ashes from the cold fire pit between her fingers, then stood and dusted off her hands.
Mathew and his companion were clearly idiots. How they could make so little effort to hide their tracks, knowing they were being hunted, was beyond her. No matter their youth, they should have known better.
Unless they didn’t understand that they were being hunted.
“In which case yer even bigger fools than I thought,” she said.
It felt good to hear a human voice again, even if it was her own. It distracted her from the dark what-ifs haunting the corners of her mind. What if she didn’t find the scrolls? What if she did, but was too late to save Hall? What if . . .
“Concentrate on the work at hand, Brie,” she encouraged herself. “Dinna dally in the land of what-if. There lie the traps that suck yer will away.”
She walked slowly around the
campsite, studying the ground for any other signs.
Two sets of footprints, so it was likely that Mathew and Dobbie still traveled together.
She moved farther out from the fire, squatting to examine her latest find.
Hoofprints.
Now there was a different concern. Mathew had left his mount behind when he’d run away. She knew, because she’d held its lead all the way to Rowan Cottage.
She continued to study the ground, finding at last the clue she’d sought: hoofprints over the footprints.
Someone other than her followed the two young men.
The proof marked the ground around her, and made the hair on Brie’s neck prickle as if someone watched her from the trees. But that was impossible. She’d just come through those trees and no one had been there.
All the same, she stood and scanned the site one last time, peering into the darkening gloom of the woods, working out her next decision.
She wouldn’t be able to make it much farther tonight. The last rays of the sun had already begun to disappear behind the western horizon. This spot certainly wasn’t her preference for a place to set up camp. With open ground on all sides, it wasn’t easily defensible. No running water nearby. No ready shelter should the rain return.
But it did have one big advantage: Torquil’s men had already come and gone. If she continued to ride in the dark she might overtake them, and that was not a prospect she found the least bit appealing.
When she met up with them, she’d prefer it be at a time of her own choosing. A time when she’d have the upper hand.
So this spot would have to do for tonight.
She gathered kindling and placed it on one side of the original fire pit. The cold made a fire necessary but, considering how close the men she trailed might be, she’d keep it small. It would be foolish to draw attention to herself.
Once her fire was built, she prepared her meal. Dried meat and hard bread. She rationalized that the lack of water made cooking difficult, but in truth, cooking had never been her strong suit. Her best efforts rarely produced any outcome other than a lumpy porridge on a good day and a burned pot on all others.
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