Chosen by Fire

by Harriet Locksley

  The air thrummed with the leaping, swirling music of drum and pipe, harp and fiddle. It was a cloud of the smells of ale, flowers, sweat and roasting meat. The room was alive with dancing figures. Kaetha hovered at the back of the tavern, sipping her ale, watching.

  It was Aedan and Mairi’s wedding ceilidh and, naturally, they were leading the dance, their faces aglow with happiness. She thought of the woman Aedan had met with in secret weeks before. Perhaps he’d given her up. Maybe the marriage would work.

  It was good to see the Morays there, all but Jean who, late into her pregnancy, found herself too tired to attend. Kaetha had seen next to nothing of the family for weeks. Her father and Mairi stopped her from working at the smokehouse. They even forbade her from going to help Finola move in with the Morays, despite it being her idea, as a way to help keep Finola safe. Rorie had his back to her and was talking animatedly to someone. They probably haven’t even missed me, she thought.

  Life had felt as though it was shrinking around her and the only thing that got her through was the knowledge that she’d be leaving soon, forcing her world to expand again. She’d had to stay to see her father marry, leaving sooner would have hurt him. It vexed her that she hadn’t worked out how to free the Baukan but she couldn’t stay indefinitely on the chance that an idea would come to her.

  Rorie’s eyes meeting hers jolted her from her train of thought. The music and chatter was too loud. Had he asked her to dance? He lifted his hand and she placed hers in it, her face growing suddenly warm. His other hand was a gentle pressure on her waist. She laughed and danced, finding herself thinking of nothing but the music and Rorie.

  When she was too tired to dance anymore, Kaetha took a seat in the corner next to Finola. They watched, laughing as Rorie’s arm was grabbed by a surprisingly strong seamstress named Muireal who thrust and whirled him through them next dance.

  “It’s been a long while since I last saw you,” said Finola.

  Kaetha looked down when some of the townsfolk she didn’t know shot Finola and her stony looks.

  “The people on our side who are here tonight outnumber those fearful of our magic,” said Finola. “I’m sure we’re safe, though perhaps we shouldn’t be seen talking together for too long.” She clutched a carved wooden charm which hung around her neck. “It’s a protection charm,” she said when she noticed Kaetha looking.

  Finola sat with a heavy stillness, as though her usual light energy had been stolen. Her eyes darted, following the motions of the dance.

  “Can’t you—?” said Kaetha. “Don’t you want to dance?”

  “The wounds are much better, thanks to Cailean’s poultices, but some went deep. They’re still tender with sudden movements.”

  “I’m sorry—” A lump swelled in Kaetha’s throat. “I’m sorry you went through that. I wish I could have stopped it.”

  Finola dropped her voice. “What you did . . . the sparks, his hand . . . I know it was you. You put yourself at risk to defend me. Thank you.” She squeezed Kaetha’s hand before getting up. Kaetha sat alone, feeling the curved grooves of the protection charm Finola had left in her palm. Whilst grateful for her kindness, she had no faith in the charm’s power. She thought it would be more dangerous than helpful if it was found in her possession by the wrong people.

  She pocketed it surreptitiously, her eyes fixed on the musicians. Alan Sangster took up his harp, thrusting the fiddle into Donnan’s hands. He frowned as he ran his fingertips over the strings, like he was caressing someone’s face. He caught Kaetha’s eye, then took up the fiddle, joining in Alan’s tune. He carried himself differently as if the music lifted away all his cares. A smile spread over Kaetha’s face as she clapped along, wondering at this talent that he’d hidden from her, watching him play as if she was seeing him for the first time.

  Aedan had seen Donnan too and was grinning broadly. Then something caught his eye and he froze, a shadow passing over his face. Through the window, Kaetha glimpsed a slight figure in a dark cloak, face concealed under its hood, and she knew it to be the woman from the secret meeting weeks ago. The woman slipped out of sight.

  Aedan smiled and chatted, masking his discomfort well as he worked his way across the room. When most people were distracted by Muireal’s solo display of spins, leaps and kicks, he slipped through the door.

  Kaetha found herself actually feeling sorry for Mairi. How could they ever be happy if this affair continued? ‘Morwena was better off without me’ he’d said to her once. She’d often wondered what he’d meant. Would he try to see this other woman in secret whilst he was married? Was that really the kind of man he was? She decided to follow him.

  Hushed voices came from the alleyway at the side of the tavern and she pressed herself against the wall near the corner of the tavern. How could you, she thought. On your wedding day.

  “How else was I to get your answer?” whispered the woman. Her voice was familiar, though it was too hushed to recognise.

  Aedan gave an exasperated sigh. “Fine. I’ll send it,” said Aedan. “But I have others to think about as you well know. . .”

  “Why are you out here, Kaetha?” said Donnan. She came back to the doorway where he stood with a puzzled expression. “A new dance is starting. I wondered if you—”

  Then Rorie appeared, taking her hand again. “Come on, lass. That’s not how we ceilidh around here. Come and dance some more.”

  She glanced back once more in her father’s direction before going back inside, masking her confusion with what she hoped was a carefree smile.

  “Dance with Elspet, Donnan. She’s expecting you to ask her.” She smiled as Donnan’s cheeks went pink. Rorie led her into the centre of a ring of dancers where they were clapped and cheered as they danced. Aedan took up his place beside Mairi as if he’d never been gone. Rather than taking Kaetha’s advice, Donnan joined in the tune, sawing his bow feverishly over the strings, so fast that Alan and his musicians struggled to keep up.

  Then it was Aedan and Mairi’s turn to dance in the ring. Kaetha was clapping along with the others but stopped to rub the back of her neck. Her smile dropped. She knew that the prickling on her skin wasn’t from the heat of the room or an insect bite.

  Music and laughter dulled, the sound of her own breathing rushing in her ears. The roaring fire in the circular stone hearth at the far end of the room drew her gaze. The fire was brighter than before. A Faydrake. She sensed its presence in the flames and, more than that, she realised now that she recognised it. As she looked at it, she felt a familiar, warm, welcoming glow inside her, the same feeling she’d often experienced at the Morays house. She shivered, despite the heat of the room. There’d been a Faydrake living in the Morays’ house and she’d never realised. Had they?

  She made her way towards it, with each step sensing its presence with more clarity. With a gust of her Air magic, she linked to its mind and its name came to her.

  “Leusith,” she whispered.

  I’ve found you, breathed a silky, feminine voice in her mind. I’ve found you – she of Fire and Air. You have named me. Can you hear me now?

  She gave the barest nod.

  She needs help. Flames flickered and flared. The baby comes early. Her strength fades. You must get help.

  She nodded again, knowing that she needed to get to Jean. She scanned the room for the other Morays. Rorie was dancing with Mairi, Cailean, rather reluctantly it seemed, with Ishbel Urquhart and Elspet and Dermid were singing with Donnan. She couldn’t tell them without risking people overhearing and being suspicious of how she got this information. If it came to it, could she deliver a baby on her own? Panic pulsed through her – she’d never even been at a birthing before.

  Then she wondered, if she could hear Leusith’s thoughts, perhaps she could send thoughts back to her. She closed her eyes and let the sounds around her recede as if she was floating far away from them. Feeling a stillness settling in her mind, she focussed on her message.

  Leusith, find Nannie Hatto
ck in the monastery. Tell her too, if you can without being seen. I’ll fetch her to help me. The sooner she’s ready, the better.

  I will look for her. And with that, the fire sank lower, sizzling fat dripping from the roasting pig above it.

  Just outside the tavern, she paused. A hand fell upon her shoulder.

  “Is something wrong?”

  Donnan looked worried.

  “I just need some fresh air,” she said.

  “I’ll come with you,” he said.

  As they walked down the high street, the low sun cast a rich glow around them, slicing through the break in the dark clouds, making Donnan’s brown hair glint like gold. Soon it would be dusk, in between light and dark. Kaetha shuddered with the fear that, for Jean and the baby, they might be in a place so close between life and death.

  “Donnan, I can’t explain how I know but Jean Moray is having her baby right now and needs help. I couldn’t tell the other Morays then as people would wonder how I came to know of it.”

  “And how did you?”

  “Never mind that. Will you do something for me?”

  He looked at her questioningly. “Of course.”

  “Go to the monastery and get Nannie. Bring her to the Morays’ house. I’ll go straight there.”

  He nodded. “Watch your back,” he said, scanning the street.

  “I will.” She hurried towards Fisherman’s Row. Luckily, it seemed that Murdo and his henchmen had other places to be this evening.

  Reaching the house, she heard a groan of pain.

  “Poor Jean,” she said. Then she wished she hadn’t said her name. A snatch of Jean’s thoughts hurled themselves at her like a rock. No – Not when I’m alone – Please. She gripped the doorframe, Jean’s panic feeding her own.

  Jean was hunched over the table, eyes tight shut, arms tensed, fingers pressing into the wood as if she was trying to cut through it with her nails. Exhaling slowly, her straining ebbed like a receding wave.

  “I’m here to help you, Jean,” she said, shocked at the fear she saw in the woman’s face. Flames leapt in the hearth before her and Kaetha knew that Leusith was with them.

  “Little one’s coming too soon.”

  “Nannie’s on her way. Don’t worry. We’ll look after both of you,” she said, trying to sound confident.

  Jean paced the room, waiting for the next contraction to take its grip. Kaetha set a pan of water over the fire, gathered blankets and cloths and rummaged through Cailean’s box of herbs. Fortunately, some of the pain relievers remained from his treatment of Finola after she’d been flogged. She ground together opean with panseng root and lavender to ease pain, strengthen and calm.

  “Whisky,” said Jean, pointing to a cupboard.

  Kaetha found the whisky jug and poured a generous dram, stirring in the crushed herbs. Jean downed it in one.

  There was rosemary amongst Cailean’s herbs. Nannie had taught her that rosemary bound the past with the future, symbolising the connection between generations. It was good luck in a birthing room. She bound some sprigs with string, making it into a necklace which she placed over Jean’s head. Jean barely noticed as mounting pain seized her again and she cried through clenched teeth.

  Kaetha had one hand on her shoulder, the other stroking her back as she muttered words of encouragement, wishing she knew what else to do. The door creaked open and she sighed with relief as Nannie strode in with an air of control, telling Donnan to wait outside and stop anyone from coming in.

  As the wave torture subsided, Jean let Kaetha help her to the floor. Then each part of Jean’s body tensed again, bracing against floods of pain which broke upon her one after the other with little respite now.

  “Not much longer,” said Nannie, “you’re doing fine, Jean. Kaetha, you’re my eyes and hands, I’ll tell you what to do.”

  Darkness had thoroughly set in by the time the baby was introduced to the world. The room was lit by expensive beeswax candles which Nannie assured them the monks wouldn’t miss. The hearth fire blazed heartily. The room sang with an ethereal glow, as though Leusith wished to caress the baby with her light. The soft gold shone through the room, catching on each fine hair on the baby’s head, on each eyelash, on each fingernail of her pink, clenched fists which punched at the air as she cried.

  “She looks ready for a fight,” said Kaetha, before opening the door onto the sight of anxious faces outside.

  “You have a sister,” she smiled. “Another daughter, Dermid.”

  “A little lassie.” Suddenly her feet no longer touched the floor – she dangled in the air, swept up in a hug by the proud father. The Morays filed inside, dripping with rain. Elspet hugged her so tightly, it was hard to breathe. She was surprised to see Mairi rushing in too.

  “I got here as soon as I could after I heard,” her new stepmother said. “Are they alright?”

  “Mother and daughter are fine,” said Kaetha.

  “But why wasn’t the midwife called?”

  “She lives across the other side of the town. Jean needed help quickly. Besides, Nannie may be blind but she has more experience than any midwife.”

  “How did you find out she was in labour?” Mairi asked.

  Rorie came over to them then. “Would you like to see her, Mairi?”

  Kaetha leant against the wall and rested her head on Donnan’s shoulder. Her heavy limbs ached and her heart was still pounding. The baby had stopped crying now and opened her eyes which were like deep pools reflecting an evening sky. Her tiny hand had one of her father’s fingers in a fierce grip.

  “Perhaps we should leave them to themselves now,” suggested Donnan.

  “Aye, we should go.” Kaetha turned to Mairi but she didn’t appear to have heard them. She was gazing at Jean and the baby, smiling softly, her eyes shining in the candlelight. “Mairi, we’re going now,” she said.

  “Right, aye, of course. You two go on, I’ll walk Nannie back to the monastery shortly.”

  “It’s funny,” said Kaetha as she stepped out into the rain, “but I feel like I could do anything after that.” Donnan laughed at her, then gasped as a bolt of lightning cut through the sky. It was Kaetha’s turn to laugh. “You’re not frightened of a bit of lightning are you?”

  “No,” he said defensively. “It just took me by surprise.”

  “You do know how unlikely it is to strike a person?”

  “Aye, but it could kill you if it touches you.”

  She froze. “I’ve had an idea.”

  “What?” A swell of thunder growled in the distance as they began the uphill walk into the town.

  “It might just work,” she said, half talking to herself. “There’s something I have to do, Donnan. Something using magic.”

  “What? But if Murdo finds out— What can you have to do that’s so important?”

  “I can explain on the way. I need to fetch something.” She stopped. “Or I can do it alone. You obviously disapprove.”

  “I disapprove of you taking unnecessary risks, aye, but I know I’m not going to dissuade you. I’m coming with you, whether you like it or not. I want to make sure you don’t get caught.”

  “Good.” They stumbled in the dark, winding through side streets and common land, eventually reaching Nannie’s cottage at the edge of the woods.

  “How are you supposed to find it?” said Donnan. “I can’t see a thing.”

  “I know my way around.”

  Donnan swore as he walked into a bucket which clattered, sloshing water over the floor.

  “Donnan!” she growled. “Just wait by the door.”

  She circled the room, brushing her hands over boxes and jars. She would feel it if it were close, she felt sure of that. But she was wasting time at the shelves; Nannie wouldn’t put it somewhere so accessible. She strode across the room, cursing the table leg as she bashed her hip against it. How Nannie got about without seeing her way, she had no idea.

  “You alright?” Donnan didn’t keep the laughter out of his v
oice.

  “Shut up.”

  Kneeling down by a nook in the wall, she heaved a basket of logs to one side. Feeling the rough fibres of a pile of blankets, she shoved them out of the way too, causing a wooden spindle to roll across the floor.

  “Try not to break anything,” said Donnan, tutting.

  She ignored him. Her fingers found the grooves of a wooden box. Opening it, she took out bundles of yarn and felt the small wooden boxes and cloth-wrapped bunches of ingredients underneath. “Belladonna, hemlock, mandrake root,” she said, remembering where each were kept.

  “I can’t sense it,” she said, feeling deflated. “The elf-shot can’t be here.” Then, in one corner, she felt the cold, hard edges of a small metal box. As soon as she prised open the lid, she felt the hum of the elf-shot’s power in the air and laughed. “Got it!” Snapping the box shut, she suddenly felt nothing from it again. The metal was blocking its power somehow.

  The wind rustled through the grasses and shook the tree branches as they reached the small copse at the edge of the common.

  “Eugh!”

  “What?” asked Kaetha.

  “Cow pat.”

  “That would be Queenie.” But before Kaetha had time to laugh at him, a fork of lightning ripped through the air, illuminating a tree, jagged whips of light searing its trunk and branches. They were knocked backwards, thudding into the wet ground as clouds roared and bellowed at one another in the sky above.

  “Are you alright?” Donnan asked, tossing aside the branch that had been flung at them.

  “Aye,” said Kaetha. She laughed and gripped Donnan’s arm as an idea came to her. “I think this was fate.”

  “Well fate’s got something against me then, that’s for sure,” Donnan mumbled.

  Kaetha felt for shards of branches, gathering only those which emitted a whiff of smoke.

  “What are you doing?”

  “The wood carries the power of the bolt that struck it,” she said.

  As they drew closer to the Baukan rock, the storm rolled away behind them and the moon was unveiled in a patch of starry sky over the sea. With no sign of anyone on the beach, they walked on.