by Ken Hood
"Larder? I saw no larder! Fasting purifies the soul." The acolyte beamed cheerfully over his spectacles.
"My tastes run more to cannibalism. Shall we draw lots?"
A shadow darkened the doorway. "Oh it's you, is it?" roared a new voice. "I might have guessed."
Everyone jumped, except Rory, who rose, beaming amiably. "All good spirits be with you, Father Murray."
"Trouble! You always bring trouble." The newcomer lumbered forward into the pale flicker of the lantern. He leaned on a thick, gnarled staff, moving as if his joints hurt. He was old and gaunt, even skinnier than Hamish — it must run in the family. His faded, waterlogged plaid revealed arms and legs like twigs. His face was a craggy construction, all nose and high cheekbones and protruding jaw, its weathered texture visible through wispy white whiskers. Streaks of silver hair had escaped from under his bonnet, plastered to his face by the wet.
Hamish's mouth had fallen open and his eyes showed white all around the irises.
"Trouble is the lot of us mortals, is it not?" Clearly, Rory was intent on being insufferably angelic. "You know the Reverend Father Lachlan of Glasgow, of course. You will also recall that my name is Rory of Glen—"
"Your name is Trouble!"
"Thank you. Rory of Trouble, I must remember that. I am also happy to present—"
"Who are you fleeing from this time?" The old man's voice creaked like Iain Campbell's mill. "I saw you running to hide down by the road. Who was that after you? Where are they? English, I'll be bound, ready to hang you at last. Outlaw!"
Rory sighed. "I am so sorry to disappoint you, Father. Yes, we were pursued. No, they were not Sassenachs. Most of them were not mortal. They were demons, led by a notorious hexer."
The keeper thumped his staff on the muck-littered floor. "Balderdash!"
"Father Lachlan?"
"I'm afraid he speaks the truth, Father."
Obviously Father Murray's worst suspicions had fallen short of the mark. For a moment he just chewed, his craggy face writhing as if about to fall apart from sheer outrage.
"Shira itself diverted them and thus gave us refuge," Rory said sweetly. "I suggest you check with it before you order us out of here. Now, may I present—"
"Where's your gear, huh? No victuals, no bedding? I suppose you expect me to provide those? You think you'll empty my larder and burn up all my firewood to dry yourselves? I'm an old man to be chopping firewood while young ne'er-do-wells take whatever they fancy without thought of payment…"
The angrier he grew, the wider became Rory's smile.
"Firewood shall be no problem, Father." He waved a languid hand in Toby's direction. "The boy there will chop all you need. Food, yes, we shall be happy to take advantage of your renowned Glen Shira hospitality, and money we do have — this time." He jingled his pouch. "We shall amply replace what we eat. Now, I am trying to introduce you to your kinsman, Master Hamish Campbell of Tyndrum."
The fearsome old man rounded on Hamish, who backed away a pace and said, "Cousin?" in a thin whisper.
"Kinsman?" the keeper barked. "Not close! Neal Teacher's youngest? Very distant kin! What're you doing running with these rebel dogs, boy?"
Hamish shot an agonized glance at Rory, then at Toby. "I had to leave the glen for a while… Father."
"Fleeing from demons?"
"Er… Well, no. From the Sassenachs, sir."
"Ha!" Murray Keeper glared triumphantly at Rory. "Now we draw closer to the truth?"
"I am always truthful, Father! Last but most certainly not least…" Rory held out a hand to Meg.
As she stepped forward to the lantern, the old man recoiled with a startled cry. "A woman!" His expression of horror suggested that this was the worst news yet.
"Correct! And none other than the famous Lady Esther, youngest daughter of the Lord Provost of Lossiemouth, whose fabled beauty is the toast of Scotland. She takes after him, as you can see. My lady, may I present Murray Campbell, keeper of the Shira shrine? Do not be daunted by his rough exterior, for it conceals a natural shyness and… Oh, he's gone! Hurrying off to prepare a feast for you, I expect."
CHAPTER FOUR
With Rory barking orders, the pilgrims located another habitable cottage and set fires in both to warm them. They swept the floors and plugged the windows with makeshift basketwork shutters of ferns and branches. Rory repeatedly denounced the hermit as a slatternly miser; Father Lachlan's efforts to defend him were notably half-hearted. The only furnishings they could find were a few rotted heaps of ferns, which nobody fancied. Rory himself went off to confront the old man; angry shouts echoed through the glade. He returned with a tight jaw and a threadbare blanket for Meg.
Leaving her to manage as best she could, the men resorted to the other cottage to toast themselves and wring out their plaids. No matter that the blaze Rory had built would have roasted a team of oxen, those bulky wool garments would never be dry that night.
Toby smeared Granny Nan's salve on his various scrapes. His back, Rory informed him acidly, was one enormous bruise from the broadsword's bouncing. He could have guessed that.
Four bare men knelt around the fire, smelling strongly of wet. In the golden firelight, Father Lachlan was soft and pleated, Hamish lean as a board. Rory was all taut muscle, but the reddish hair on his chest failed to conceal a purple bruise there. He scowled when he saw Toby admiring it. Rain beat down on the trees and dripped steadily into a lake of mud in one corner. Someone yawned. Then they all did.
"Don't go to sleep yet," Rory said. "Aren't you hungry?"
Hamish brightened. "The keeper will feed us?"
"He said he would. I showed him gold and he twitched like a dowser's twig." Rory sighed and glanced sideways at Father Lachlan. "Don't judge all holy men by Murray, lads. Father Lachlan is more typical."
The acolyte sighed. "But no more worthy. He has dedicated his life to serving the spirit. Loneliness is a burden."
"He was probably nuttier than a squirrel's hole when he started!" Rory heaved himself upright. "What harm does a keeper like that do to an immortal? What twisted ways of thinking does he teach it? What dubious ethics? Tell me that!"
"The spirit has known scores of keepers and will know plenty more."
Rory did not pursue the argument. "Let's get dressed. Then we'll collect Lady Esther and go see what our host has prepared."
The others rose also and began to drape themselves in wet plaids, all moving stiffly.
"One bright spot in the gloom," he continued cheerfully, "is that Master Hamish will not be bored this winter. The Reverend Murray has never been known to give anybody anything before, but I am sure he will give his willing and industrious cousin more than enough work to keep him busy till the heather blooms. His wages—"
"I'm not staying here!" Hamish howled.
"Those were your father's orders, were they not?"
"Yes, but—"
"Must obey one's parents!" Rory said sternly. "So mine are always telling me, anyway. Here you are, here you stay."
Father Lachlan chuckled. "You're not afraid of hard work, are you? Joking apart, my son, Master Rory is right. Our mission is fraught with considerable risk. You will be safer remaining here."
Hamish turned a stare of abject horror on Toby.
Zits! Toby had given his word to the tanner, but not to the teacher. The boy was not his concern, and the men were undoubtedly right — this was no outing for juveniles. On the other hand, he had made some glib promises to Hamish himself. He had not meant them to be taken seriously, but he had said the words. Now Hamish was going to throw them back in his face. Hamish was going to appeal to friendship.
Where was honor? Where was friendship? A true friend would grit his teeth and tell the kid to be sensible about this… Hamish was not his friend, anyway. He had no friends. He didn't need friends, right? He certainly didn't need Hamish, and Hamish did not need him and his troubles, whatever the kid thought at the moment.
But a man must stand by his word, and
the expression on the lad's face would make a demon weep.
"Father?" Toby said. "How many books does the keeper own?"
The acolyte looked at him in bewilderment. "I don't recall seeing any. Why?"
"In that case we may have a serious problem! If Master Campbell is deprived of books for more than two days, he starts having fits. He twitches. He foams at the mouth."
"That's too bad!" Rory snapped. "He can just foam."
"Really? When you were fifteen, Master Glencoe, if someone had told you that a stalwart young Highlander like yourself must stay out of danger by settling in here to work as an unpaid lackey for a deranged miser — how would you have reacted?"
Rory frowned, looked at Hamish, then Father Lachlan, Toby. "I'd have cut out his guts and strangled him with them! Why do you ask?" The familiar silver twinkle was back in his eyes, but for once he was smiling with Toby and not at him, seeming almost likable.
Toby smiled back. "Just curious. Why don't we go and see what's for dinner?"
Hamish beamed relief and gratitude at his hero.
The keeper's idea of a meal turned out to be scraps of stale bread, raw onions, and one boiled egg per customer. He distributed the salt himself in tiny pinches. Rory restrained his tongue, but he threw the whole log pile on the hearth and handed out a second round of onions from the net of them that hung from the rafters. Had there been anything else edible in sight, he might have pirated that, too, but there wasn't. The hermit glared murder at him.
His cottage was no larger than Granny Nan's, more sparsely furnished, and a great deal dirtier. The host sat on his own tottery chair, Meg on the straw mattress, and the others spread themselves around the open hearth. The only light came from the fire; books were conspicuously absent. The little room was thick with smoke. Toby's eyelids grew impossibly heavy. Meg sank back on the pallet and went to sleep.
The keeper clearly detested Rory, probably with good reason, and yet seemed wary of him. He was respectful to Father Lachlan, ignored the youths, and never once glanced in Meg's direction. As the urgent crunch of onions died away, though, he straightened up on his chair and demanded to know what the supplicants wanted of the spirit of Shira.
Father Lachlan looked to Toby for permission. Toby shrugged sleepily. The acolyte told the story, but without mentioning how he and Rory had become involved, or where they had come from.
Murray Campbell's haggard face reddened steadily. When the tale ended with the miracle on the trail, even that did not mollify his anger. "You have led evil to this holy place!" He sprayed spit in his agitation. "You risk even Shira itself! Four demons, you say that hexer controls—"
"I think you slander the spirit!" Lachlan said sharply. "It has already shown that it can overrule her forces."
The hermit turned a glittering gaze on Toby. "If that was its doing! But if this man is one of the hexer's creatures which has somehow managed to escape from her compulsions, then he… it… may have contrived that evasion, not Holy Shira."
His voice was deep and strident. Father Lachlan's was shrill and squeaky, yet it carried more authority.
"You argue in circles, brother. First you fear that the hexer's four demons may endanger the spirit, and then you fear that one demon is stronger than the four. I have faith that Shira is invincible here at its shrine. I do not believe this young man is possessed anyway. I am gambling my life and soul on that. Remember that Valda's army is in disarray. Two of her creatures' husks are dead, so she must soon find new bodies to reincarnate those demons, new victims. If she wishes to bring her full power to bear, she must bottle them instead, even bottle all four of them. This will take time — several days, I hope."
"And while she is doing that, she will be vulnerable to attack by the spirit," added Rory, who had been staying unusually quiet in the background.
Murray swung around to glare at him. "You must leave as soon as you have visited the shrine, my lord!"
"Oh, no! We have used up half your winter supply of firewood. My stalwart retainer there will need two or three days to chop you a replacement — won't you, Longdirk?"
Toby decided he enjoyed the rebel's humor when it was not directed at him. "I don't dare sleep, so I may as well chop wood all night."
The hermit scowled as if believing he was serious.
"I am sure you can sleep safely here, my son," Father Lachlan said. "And sleep sounds like an excellent idea."
It did indeed. Hamish's head was nodding. Toby's jaw would not stay closed. Even a wet plaid on a dirty floor would satisfy him tonight. Let the rain beat on the trees and drip through the dilapidated roofs! Let the logs crackle and smoke. He would sleep soundly if Valda danced naked round the cabin blowing a bugle…
"Wait," Rory said softly. For once the silvery eyes seemed deadly serious. "I have a question. Perhaps you holy men can answer it. But first… Tobias, you said that the woman in your dream spoke to you as a lover?"
Toby stopped yawning. He glanced apprehensively at the bed, but Meg seemed to be asleep. He nodded.
"And she called you by name, but not your own name?"
"That's correct. I can't remember what it was."
"A woman's name? Was it by any chance… Susie?"
A cold shudder ran fingernails down Toby's back and suddenly he was wide awake. "Yes! Yes, I think it was!"
Rory frowned. Everyone was waiting expectantly, even Hamish.
"Here's my question, then, Fathers. When a man is possessed, what happens to his soul?"
"It is still there," Father Lachlan said, "imprisoned with the demon."
"Always?"
Keeper and acolyte exchanged glances.
"Perhaps not always." Father Lachlan adjusted his spectacles. "I have heard of cases where the demon was exorcised but the husk remained inanimate and soon died — as if the mortal soul had gone. When that might happen, I don't know. Would it be displaced at the moment of possession, or expelled by the exorcism? I can't venture to guess. I can't even guess how one could find out. Why? What are you implying?"
"Bear with me!" Rory stretched and made himself more comfortable, raising his knees to lean his arms on them. "I shall have to tell you a story. Could 'Susie' be the name of a demon?"
The acolyte displayed signs of annoyance. "Anything could be the name of a demon — who ever speaks with them? In the lore, they are identified by the names of the places they are thought to have been collected, but I'm sure that is mostly guesswork. In common parlance, to say that you know a demon's name means that you know how to conjure it, but that is not a name in the usual sense, just the formula by which that particular demon is controlled, the words of command."
"Quite," Rory said, evidently satisfied. "Well… the story. It's quite long — perhaps it should wait until another day? No? As you please. Well, when I was a mere cub, even cuter than I am now, I was carted off south as a hostage. I know I talk like a Sassenach. I can't help it — I spent my childhood in England. That's why I hate the bast — scum… so much. Part of the time I even lived at court. I knew Lady Valda."
CHAPTER FIVE
No one said a word. The fire crackled, the trees thrashed in the storm, but no one spoke.
Rory yawned, enjoying the reaction. "Not intimately, of course, much as I… I never spoke with her, and I'm sure she didn't know I existed. I knew her only as one of the ranking courtiers and the most beautiful woman in the land. Men drooled as she went by. The palace floors were permanently soaked. The rugs rotted. Unfortunately, I was at a very impressionable age. I swear my whiskers grew in two years early because of her. You can't begin to imagine how I suffered."
"Get to the point!" old Murray growled, looming over the guests clustered around his hearth.
Rory looked up at him with bland stupidity, an effect spoiled by the golden flames dancing in his silver eyes. "Why? We have all night to talk."
The hermit stretched out his large and horny feet to toast at the fire. "Then I shall narrate the circumstances of your last visit to the spiri
t."
"Demons, no! Not in front of these innocent young gentlemen!" Rory did not seem very worried, though. He rose. Yawning, he stepped over to the bed and turned the free end of the blanket to cover Meg. He came back to the fire and settled again on the floor with the other three, closer to the fire than before. He grinned, admitting that he was playing tricks with them.
"All right, I'll get to the point. The point is that I was at court when Valda was banished. Now that was a very curious affair! It has never been properly explained.
"I'd spent years taking dancing lessons on an estate near Guildford, in Surrey. A group of us were brought to court at Greenwich in March 1509, to learn some civilized manners. Edwin was still king then. Edwin was a big man. Not big like our bareknuckle friend here, although he was beefy enough — big in the sense of domineering. He could be cruel and ruthless, but he was never mean. Edwin might stamp you into the ground, but he wouldn't knife you first. He was a bugle of a man — loud, resolute, overbearing. Early in his rule, he'd been suzerain for a while, and I think he did a fair job of satisfying the Tartars without grinding the peasants of Europe too badly. He fell afoul of some political infighting. The Khan deposed him and appointed the king of Burgundy in his place, but I don't think that had anything to do with Edwin's performance.
"His son Bryton was much the same sort of hard-riding, hard-wenching, crude-but-rather-likable ruffian. Another bugle, but not quite as strident. The middle son, Idris, was quieter, devious, persuasive. A violin, maybe.
"Then there was Nevil. Nevil's mother was Queen Jocelin, Edwin's second wife. There's no question she dabbled in gramarye, and it was generally assumed that she'd snared the old boy by putting a hex on him. Potentates usually keep mistresses, you see, and he didn't. When a top dog does nothing in the nighttime, that's always regarded as curious behavior. No matter… Jocelin still had a sexual glow to her, and the old rascal certainly seemed content."
Toby smothered a yawn. Everyone else appeared to be far more engrossed in this irrelevant rigmarole than he was. Hamish's eyes were big as mushrooms. He wouldn't find this in any book.