Beyond a Darkened Shore

by Jessica Leake

  Sleipnir’s ears pricked forward as Leif exited the stable astride a beautiful dapple-gray stallion—my father’s warhorse. The horse was temperamental and difficult to ride with everyone but my father, but Leif handled him easily, the horse as calm as a kitten.

  “You’ve chosen well,” I told him as our horses greeted each other nose to nose. “That is Abrax, my father’s charger.”

  Leif gave him a pat on the neck. “I chose him because he was the only one in the stable who seemed eager to leave.”

  I smiled. “He is almost as bad a warmonger as Sleipnir.”

  “They’ll have their fill of it soon,” Leif said. “We should leave now. Are you ready?”

  I glanced back at the keep longingly. “My sisters . . .”

  Leif reached across the horses and touched my leg. “They’re safe, and you’ll ensure they’ll stay that way.”

  I knew he was right; knew that every moment we remained brought Sigtrygg ever closer. “Warriors,” I shouted, “we march to Dubhlinn.”

  Leif spurred Abrax on, and the undead men immediately began their silent march. Sleipnir danced in place, eager to move, but I couldn’t stop myself from turning back to stare at my father’s castle one last time.

  “Ciara, wait!” a voice cried then from the right side of the bailey. Branna and Deirdre ran toward me, and I immediately threw myself from Sleipnir’s back.

  I caught Deirdre in a firm embrace, the hairs of her fur-trimmed gown tickling my cheek. Branna wrapped her arms around my middle as tears pooled in her eyes. “Máthair said you’d been exiled! She said you attacked Áthair and ran off with the Northmen, but we knew it couldn’t be true.”

  “It is true, Bran,” I said, feeling as though I would be sick. “I can’t explain right now . . . but all of Éirinn is in danger.”

  “Áthair . . . ,” Deirdre said, biting her lip as though holding back her own tears.

  I touched her cheek. “I know, Deirdre. I’m so sorry. And I’m sorry I was leaving without seeing you—”

  “Máthair has lost herself,” Branna said, almost fearfully. “She won’t let any of the men bury Áthair. She won’t even let us leave the keep, but we saw you from our window.”

  “I’m so sorry, Bran. I would stay here with you if I could,” I said, tears stinging my eyes at the fear in hers.

  “Please don’t go,” Deirdre said, her voice so quiet compared to Branna’s.

  “I must. With Áthair gone, and no heir to the throne, King Sigtrygg will have no opposition. He will come for Mide, and I won’t leave your fates in his hands.” I hugged them again, each in turn, wishing I didn’t have to let go. I touched Deirdre’s pale blond braids, remembering not long ago when her hair was only a few soft wisps. “I love you both so much.”

  “I love you, Ciara,” Deirdre said, her voice thick with sorrow.

  “Avenge our father,” Branna said, her hands curled into fists.

  I hauled myself astride Sleipnir once more. “I will,” I promised. “I love you both. Stay safe.” After one last glance at my beautiful sisters, I touched my heels to Sleipnir’s sides, and he surged forward.

  I will return, I promised myself, and I will never let Mide be threatened again.

  The army marched tirelessly, and though the sun’s rays burned overhead, Sleipnir and the men never perspired nor seemed to fatigue. When Leif and I stopped for water, none of the undead partook in it, nor did Sleipnir. My father was as silent as the rest of the men, though perhaps his dark eyes blazed a little more fiercely.

  It tortured me to think that Branna and Deirdre were being left behind—possibly in danger—but I knew the best way to protect them was to first stop Sigtrygg, and to continue our quest. It was time the raider king of Dubhlinn was called to task for his crimes.

  It was when the sun had already reached its peak and was moving closer to the horizon that everything changed. Sleipnir nearly unseated me by rearing, and the men who’d been marching silently forward suddenly drew their weapons. Though I strained my ears, I heard nothing but the wind.

  A rocky field lay before us, and beyond that, craggy hills. “Do you think they sense Sigtrygg’s men?” I asked Leif, whose own eyes were scanning the horizon warily.

  Abrax snorted and shook his head, but it seemed he was only responding to Sleipnir, who danced in place with eagerness. I freed my sword and Leif did the same.

  We continued forward, straining for any sign of an oncoming army. It wasn’t until we had trotted for several miles that we heard them in the distance: horses.

  “We have the advantage,” Leif said. “Get to the next hilltop and we will ambush them there.”

  “Onward,” I told my undead warriors, barely able to restrain Sleipnir from charging forward.

  When we reached the top of the hill, Leif and I took the forward-most positions. My army fanned out and stood silently at attention, their swords drawn.

  “Will Sigtrygg be with them?” I asked Leif.

  “He loves nothing more than to raid, and he’ll want to be present to take your father’s throne.”

  Your throne, the Morrigan’s voice whispered inside me. “I want him dead,” I said, my hand tightening on the grip of my sword, “but we should capture him first. We need to know about his alliance with the jötnar.”

  “Take over his mind to loosen his tongue,” Leif said, with a curl to his lip, “and then he should be executed. He doesn’t deserve to die in battle.”

  “I make no promises,” I said through my clenched jaw. “Once I have what I need from him, I may not be able to help myself.”

  Just then, riders on horseback crested the next rise, saw us waiting, and charged. The shouts of Sigtrygg’s men contrasted heavily with the eerie silence of my own army. “Hold,” I said, as much to Sleipnir as to the warriors. “We’ll pick them off as they climb the hill.”

  The first two made the climb; Leif lopped off the first man’s head, and my sword bit into the other’s chest. Still more and more men came, but not nearly as many as our army. Sigtrygg had brought perhaps thirty men in all, as though he had not expected much resistance. And why should he? He’d killed or enslaved most of my clansmen.

  But then I saw the true reason he’d brought so few men: the horse-faced jötunn from Dubhlinn—the one who’d nearly killed us—was with Sigtrygg’s army. Though Leif had sliced through his ankle, he appeared without injury. With an ally like that, they wouldn’t need many men to defeat us.

  The horse-faced jötunn was growing before my eyes, and I knew it wouldn’t be long before he was the size of an oak tree.

  “Leif!” I shouted, and he glanced back at me. I jerked my chin toward the jötunn. I had a moment where fear threatened to disable me in its icy grip, but I shook it off. No, the outcome of our battle this time would be much different. We would not be defeated by this giant.

  Some of Sigtrygg’s men broke past us, and I watched my army make quick work of them. They moved with the same unnatural speed Leif had; they tried to block the blows, but the undead men’s swords pierced them before they could even fully raise their arms. They fell with hoarse shouts, while my warriors remained ever tight-lipped.

  I wheeled Sleipnir toward the closest group of my army. I needed them to focus their efforts on the jötunn. With hand on sword, I pointed with the blade toward the horse-faced jötunn. “Bring him down,” I said to my army.

  Eleven of them responded immediately, surging down the hillside like a shadowy fog.

  But before I could follow them, two of Sigtrygg’s men rushed me. While I brought my sword down upon one, Sleipnir attacked the other with such ferocity, my breath caught in my throat. With his ears pinned down and teeth bared, he seemed more wolf than horse. Even the shape of his teeth had changed: no longer broad and flat for clipping blades of grass, but with long, pointed canines. He sank his teeth into the other man’s arm, tearing the flesh down to the bone. The man’s screams were terrible, and I swung my sword in an arc, slicing his throat just to end his su
ffering.

  When I searched for the jötunn again, I was awestruck to find him on the ground. The giant rolled and writhed in an effort to dislodge my undead clansmen who crawled all over him, stabbing him repeatedly with their swords.

  I thought of how the monster had once held both Leif and me in his hands, how I’d truly thought in that moment that we would die, and then I glanced down at my phantom horse. What had he endured after we’d left? They’d killed him and ripped apart his corpse. As if reading my thoughts, Sleipnir charged toward the fallen giant.

  But before I could vault down and end the monster, Leif appeared.

  His face twisted in fury, he plunged his sword straight through the jötunn’s heart. The giant writhed one last time and then was still. With arm muscles bulging, Leif yanked his sword free again. He met my gaze from across the field, chest heaving. But that look said so much: his men who were slaughtered had been avenged.

  My undead clansmen immediately moved on to the remaining human soldiers, and I followed.

  “Sigtrygg!” Leif shouted, and I followed his line of sight to Sigtrygg astride a dark gray charger. In contrast to his plainly armored soldiers, the king wore robes trimmed in fox fur, a small circlet of gold upon his head. Rage boiled up in me at the sight of him, and Sleipnir threw back his head and trumpeted a warning.

  Before Leif could charge after him, more of Sigtrygg’s men attacked, dividing Leif’s attention. I was on my own.

  I didn’t even need to touch my heels to Sleipnir’s sides—he galloped toward the king without prompting, his ears flat against his head. Sigtrygg was pale—he knew what I was capable of—but he raised his sword to meet mine.

  Our blades rang out across the field. Sleipnir took a chunk of flesh from the gray charger’s neck, and its screams added to the brutal cacophony.

  Despite my training with Leif, the king was still the superior fighter, and he would have knocked me from Sleipnir’s back had he not met my gaze with his. I reached out with my mind and latched on to his, forcing him back.

  “How are you alive?” he demanded through gritted teeth, even as his mind struggled against mine. “They found no trace of you. Mide should be mine!”

  But he thought of much more than Mide. I saw designs on the rest of Éirinn, on the Northman lands beyond, and farther. All of this, because of an alliance with the jötnar.

  Shock and disgust warred within me as memories flitted through the king’s head: the jötnar coming to him, offering him the chance to take over the known world with them. Offering him the chance to be the king of so much more than Dubhlinn.

  “You brought one jötunn with you, but what of the others? What of the ones that have been free to roam Éirinn?”

  He refused to answer, so I ripped into his mind until he was screaming for mercy.

  “Where are they?” I demanded again.

  This time, he didn’t dare refuse me. “Their leader called them north. He is preparing to move his army as one.”

  “You have betrayed us all by joining forces with creatures who will burn Éirinn to ashes. You will never be king of Mide.”

  He struggled pitifully against my hold, and I smiled grimly.

  “I will defeat you in battle, and then I will take your crown for myself, pagan. It’s time a Celt ruled Dubhlinn again.”

  The king surprised me by laughing. “We are alike, you and I. You should admit the truth: you want my kingdom for yourself.”

  Vengeance had been my primary motivation, but there was something that stirred within me at the mention of his kingdom, a burning ambition I’d never known I had.

  “You called me pagan, but you are no better—what is this spell you have cast over me if not dark magic?”

  His point seemed to reverberate through my mind. With my undead army around me, and as the daughter of the Morrigan, how could I sneer at those considered pagan when I was no better? With an angry shove, I released his mind.

  He landed on his back, his sword thrown a few feet away. I dismounted in a rush and stalked toward him. Sigtrygg struggled to stand, no doubt dazed from his hard fall.

  I kicked his sword toward him. “Pick it up,” I said in a growl. This was a duel, and I wouldn’t cheat by using my mind control on him. He would die fairly—by my blade alone.

  As soon as he picked up his sword, I attacked. He would have been skilled had he not been greatly weakened already by my mental attack, and my thirst for vengeance made my sword swing true. He parried two of my swings, even kicked me back with a boot to my abdomen. But on the third, my sword sliced open his chest. Even with blood spilling out of the wound, he continued to come at me.

  He swung again, but I knocked his sword aside and kicked powerfully. He fell down again with a mighty crash and did not try to rise. I stood over him with my sword raised. “I will show you no mercy, just as your men gave none to my father.”

  I pierced his heart, and his eyes bulged as the blood spilled upon the ground.

  Leif strode over to his side and spat upon the ground. “May you never enter Valhalla.”

  We watched as he shuddered once and then was still.

  I turned to see the fate of his other men, and a chill went through me. My undead warriors had defeated them all—messily. They stood above the carnage as remorseless as stone.

  A noisy crunching came from behind me, and I turned to find Sleipnir devouring one of the fallen soldiers, his teeth easily tearing into the flesh. Blood covered his nose and mouth, frighteningly unnatural. A low groan of horror escaped me.

  The battle had drawn carrion birds, and they flew round and round above us, waiting their turn for whatever was left. Leif stood at my side, his face a stony mask. Abrax pressed close to him, as though seeking comfort from the horror before us.

  “What have I done?” I whispered.

  18

  After Sleipnir had his fill, he walked toward us, blood dripping from his mouth and splattering his legs and chest. Abrax danced away from him nervously. Even I had to steady myself. I felt like crying; what had I done to my beautiful horse? But then again, he was a savage beast now, fit for the daughter of one of the most vicious ancient beings Éirinn had ever known.

  If he was aware of our fear, he showed no sign of it. He shook himself like a dog and twitched his tail, and if it hadn’t been for the blood and gore upon him, he would have been just as he always had been. I held out my hand to him, but Leif pushed it down with a shake of his head.

  “He won’t hurt me,” I said, both to myself and to Leif.

  Sleipnir lowered his head to be scratched, and I let out my breath. After rubbing the soft hair under his forelock, I hauled myself astride. The undead warriors stood once more at attention.

  Leif strode over to Sigtrygg’s body and retrieved his sword and crown. He presented them both to me, and I raised an eyebrow questioningly. “You’ve killed Dubhlinn’s king. The city is yours.”

  Yes, affirmed the voice inside me, as the burning ambition took hold again. There was much good I could do taking it from the hands of a half Northman many despised for his constant raids on neighboring kingdoms. “Bring it with us for proof, then, but I will not wear such filth upon my head,” I said.

  He nodded approvingly and hid the circlet away in his mantle. Once astride Abrax, he said, “We should travel until nightfall, though I suspect it’s only the two of us who will require any rest.”

  My eyes shifted from the carrion birds, which now fought over the remains of Sigtrygg’s army, to my own motionless warriors. After such a frightening display, I almost wished I could send them back from whence they’d come. If it hadn’t been for the thirty men and terrifying jötunn they’d slaughtered as easily as sheep, not to speak of the countless battles ahead of us, I would have.

  “Onward, then,” I said.

  The undead marched behind us at a swift, ground-eating pace, and the mere thought of them behind me tensed all the muscles of my body.

  We might have won this battle, but as I glanced
back at the undead men following me, I knew the greater war was to come.

  I hoped the terrible price I’d paid for my army would be worth it.

  The wind howled, scattering embers from our campfire. By nightfall, we’d made camp north of Dubhlinn, perhaps a day’s march away from the city. Though my belly was comfortably full from the brace of rabbits we’d feasted on, the eerie sight of the undead army standing in the darkness like silent sentinels chilled me bone-deep. Leif sat beside me before the fire. He was close enough that I could feel the warmth coming off him in waves, and yet much too close for comfort. For some reason, I couldn’t stop thinking of a conversation I’d once overheard between my father and mother, one to decide my fate as a woman. I was already sixteen and had not been brought up as the future lady of a house, nor had I any womanly skills, save sewing. My mother had asked my father what would become of me; should they not begin a search for a suitable husband?

  “Ciara is too powerful for any man to take her as a wife—too unpredictable,” my father had said. “He will either attempt to break her spirit and die trying, or hate and resent her for being stronger. She is a warrior, not a maiden. Better to concentrate your efforts upon Branna and Deirdre, raise them to be great ladies of our clan.”

  I’d never heard my mother’s response, for I’d clutched my chest and raced to my room before the sob could escape my throat. It was a terrible thing to have my fate decided without my consent, without even a single word of input, but even that wasn’t as painful as my parents’ consensus: that I was too repulsive for marriage.

  But not long after, I came to realize my father had given me a gift. Girls of my standing had two paths in life: marriage or the nunnery. My father had opened a third path to me, one where I could live my life with all the freedom of a man. The only cost was that it came with the soul-sucking burden of loneliness.

  And now, my father was mere feet away as I sat willingly next to a former enemy. Although after everything I’d done, it seemed to be the least of my crimes.