Ruadri (Immortal Highlander, Clan Skaraven Book 3): A Scottish Time Travel Romance

by Hazel Hunter

  Bhaltair rubbed his brow. “Gone to where?”

  “We dinnae ken, but she didnae cross our boundary wards, so I imagine she used our sacred grove.” Fingal hesitated before he said, “More I must show you at the cottage.”

  The headman accompanied him to the settlement, where Cora stood waiting outside their home. She looked pale and tired but forced a smile as she greeted Bhaltair.

  “At first I thought Oriana left us to join you,” Cora said as she accompanied them inside. “Fingal went to check her room for a note, and…well, you look cold. I shall make a warming brew.” She hurried off to the kitchen.

  Bhaltair had never seen the druidess so flustered. “What has the lass done now?”

  “Much you didnae ken, I think,” his old friend said, nodding at their dining table. On it sat Oriana’s open satchel, a bundle of garments, a comb and a pair of slippers.

  He went over to examine the possessions. “You took out her things? Why?”

  “I noticed a small bulge in the bed and found the bag stuffed beneath the ticking. When I pulled it out it felt over-heavy,” Fingal explained as he went over to the table. “I left the cause of it that I found inside, beneath the false bottom.” He reached in, removed a panel of leather, and gestured for the older druid to look for himself.

  Suddenly Bhaltair didn’t want to see what it was, and sat down heavily. “She’s young, Fin, and so distressed over Gwyn’s murder by the famhairean. I’ve done almost naught to train her while demanding too much work. Whatever she’s hid, ’tis my fault.”

  “I think no’,” the headman said, and took out a long, double-edged ritual dagger, placing it gently before him. Then he produced a large vial half-filled with a murky liquid and uncorked it before setting it beside the blade.

  Neither should have been in Oriana’s possession.

  “Your acolyte carries a ritual killing blade,” Fingal said softly. “The like I’ve no’ seen for many centuries.”

  “Gods,” Bhaltair breathed as he stared at the archaic weapon, which had a curved, patinated hilt covered in protective glyphs. Among them had been carved tiny crescents layered together like the scales of a serpent. The pounding ache in his knee and the sorrow clenching his heart intensified as he picked up the blade. His hand grew stiff and cold as the death that clung to it touched his flesh. “This belonged to Barra Omey.”

  Fingal drew back from him. “Barra the bone-conjurer? How? She fled Scotland more than fifty years past.”

  “Aye, ’twas that or face the conclave.” He put down the dagger and rubbed his throbbing hand. “’Twas this very dagger she used for her ritual sacrifices. I’ve read the archive scrolls on her ruling. She always carried it with her.”

  “Then how could Oriana have it?” the headman asked, looking perplexed now.

  “Someone makes evil use of the lass.” Cora brought a steaming cup to Bhaltair, and used a linen to pick up the dagger and vial and put both back inside the satchel. “Take this away, Husband. I’ll no’ have that murderess’s belongings poisoning our home.”

  “I’ll set it by the woodpile.” Fingal stuffed the rest of Oriana’s possessions into the satchel and carried it outside.

  Cora sat down across from Bhaltair. “My husband had gone to the well long before the conclave ruled against Barra. But I became an acolyte the same year she fled justice. The herbalist who trained me spoke much on the evils she did. She sought to resurrect those she killed with that blade.” She gave him a direct look. “Could your lass be her daughter?”

  “’Tis unlikely. Barra never mated. If she did after she vanished, she would have been my age at the time of Oriana’s birth.” Bhaltair took a sip of the spicy cannel brew and warmed his hands on the sides of the cup. “Mayhap the lass found the dagger by chance. She wouldnae ken what it was.”

  “Aye. ’Twas likely sitting in a meadow somewhere, just beside a vial of the most powerful sleeping potion concocted by druid kind.” Cora reached to touch his trembling hand. “I’ve seen that you have much affection for the lass. But we’ve proof now that she’s drugged you, and from what Fingal has said, often. She carries a killing blade. If she meant to end a master like you, Bhaltair, the only manner in which she could would be while you slept.”

  He met her concerned gaze. “If ’tis true, then why do I yet breathe? And why would she leave behind her satchel?”

  “I reckon she meant to return in secret and have us believe she never left,” Fingal said, joining them. “I put defenders around the portal when we found the lass missing. One of them came to say they just saw her emerge from it.”

  “I must speak with her at once.” Bhaltair shoved his chair back and stood. “Where do you have her?”

  “As soon as she spied our men she leapt back inside.” The headman caught his arm as he hobbled toward the door. “You cannae try to follow her.”

  “I dinnae fear an untrained speak-seer who pretends herself a bone-conjurer,” Bhaltair snapped. “What shall she do when I confront her? Invite Gwyn to scold me?”

  “You dinnae ken who Oriana may have channeled,” Cora countered. “’Twouldnae be difficult for a druidess as powerful as Barra to persuade the lass to do her bidding.”

  “But why then plot against me? I didnae serve on the conclave when they ruled against Barra,” Bhaltair said slowly. “I spent that spring in the west, training gifted ovates from three tribes in the crystal arts. By the time I journeyed back she had already fled. ’Twas all done without me.”

  “Did your path ever cross Barra’s?” Fingal asked.

  What Bhaltair knew of the bone-conjurer had come from the conclave’s archives, and grim recounting of the circumstances by some of his friends among the ruling elders. According to them Barra had despised tribal life, and had gone into seclusion as soon as she completed her training. That solitude allowed her to practice her blood rituals in secret for many years before she had been exposed.

  Now that he thought on it, if she wished to be alone, then why did she keep trying to resurrect her victims?

  Such abhorrence of druid life seemed completely alien to him, much like Oriana’s intractable hatred of the Skaraven, whom she blamed for Gwyn’s death. Since he had failed to convince them upon awakening to challenge the famhairean, perhaps she held him responsible, too.

  He looked up at Fingal. “I shallnae pursue her alone, but we must find her.”

  A horn blew an alarm outside the cottage, and Fingal went to sweep aside the window covering and look out. His expression turned grim. “Cora, go and help gather the young and old, and take them to the portal. Bhaltair, with me.”

  His wife embraced him quickly before she hurried away.

  Bhaltair followed the headman out of the cottage to see the tribesmen arming themselves with scythes. Only the most serious threat to the settlement would compel every druid to take up their blades.

  “Do the famhairean attack?”

  “Someone does,” his friend replied, his young features darkening.

  A pale-faced ovate trotted up and handed a scythe to Fingal. “The defenders warn that many mounted warriors approach, Master Tullach. They bear blades ready, but they dinnae wear the McAra tartan. They wear many, and all different.”

  Bhaltair shook his head as another druid offered him a scythe. “I shallnae need it, lad.”

  He accompanied Fingal and the armed tribesmen out of the settlement and into the evergreens bordering their boundary. There they stood in the shadows and watched as a large group of immense warriors with swords drawn rode toward them. Bhaltair recognized the ancient attack formation as well as the many, different-colored tartans worn by the clansmen.

  “’Tis the Skaraven,” he told his friend. Had Brennus felt it necessary to bring with him a warband simply to end him? Bhaltair was almost flattered. “They’ve no grievance with the Sky Thatch, so they come for me.”

  Fingal tried to stop him, but he tugged free and limped out to meet the chieftain, who as always rode at the front of his
clan. Bhaltair halted when Brennus drew close enough for him to see his wet, scorched garments, and the dark fury of his expression. Something terrible had obviously happened to the chieftain, and it seemed the blame had been put on his head.

  Bhaltair could cast a spell with enough power to knock the chieftain off his saddle and fling him across the fields, but knew of none to defeat a warband of immortals. Since his actions might result in harm to the Sky Thatch, he elected to tuck his hands in his sleeves and wait to be attacked.

  A spear buried itself in the ground next to his boot, the shaft quivering as if impatient to be hurled again. The clan shifted their mounts so that they presented a narrower target while readying for a charge. Behind him Bhaltair could feel the Sky Thatch preparing as well. The air grew thick with unseen waves of leashed brute force and summoned magic—and he in the very center of it all.

  This had not been caused by the rift between the Skaraven and the McAra.

  The chieftain hoisted himself up, flipped over his stallion’s head and landed before Bhaltair, yanking the spear from the earth. “Your trap failed.”

  Now Bhaltair saw the blood rimming the jagged tear in Brennus’s tunic, and traces of the same on his face, but held onto his composure.

  “I dinnae ken your meaning, Chieftain.”

  “I escaped before the flames consumed the inn.” He brought up his sword and poised its honed tip a whisper away from Bhaltair’s neck. “’Tis the final time you work your trickery on me.”

  A fire at an inn…that likely was the inn at Aviemore, where he’d often met with Ruadri. He knew it to be shuttered since the sudden death of the innkeeper’s wife.

  “I set no trap for you, lad,” Bhaltair said, and felt pain and a warm trickle run down his neck. “I worked no trickery. You’ve been deceived.”

  The sharp cry of a raven shattered the air as blue light glowed beneath the chieftain’s tunic.

  “Dinnae lie to me again.”

  “I came directly here from the McAra’s castle, walking beside my lame mount,” Bhaltair said, and lifted his chin. If the man wished to end him, he would not resist. “I’ve gone nowhere else.”

  For a moment he thought the furious chieftain might ignore his words and take his head anyway, and then Brennus bellowed, “War Master, counsel.”

  Cadeyrn’s streaked hair whipped away from his stern face as he came to stand beside them. “Tell me all that you have done since leaving the McAra this morn.” The war master watched without blinking as Bhaltair repeated his story for him, and then said to Brennus, “I see no sign of deception.” He leaned forward and drew in a deep breath. “His robes smell clean, and he hasnae smoke or singe marks on him.”

  “More trickery,” Brennus insisted. “He called out to me, thrice.”

  “But you told me that you didnae see him once, and a voice may be aped.” The war master’s shrewd gaze shifted to the druids standing ready before he regarded Bhaltair again. “Flen could go anywhere to escape our vengeance. Why return to this settlement, where we knew him to be? When the defenders sighted us, why did he remain, and come to meet us? I stand with you, Chieftain, but I believe him.”

  For a moment Brennus’s arm bulged with knotting muscle, and then the chieftain slowly lowered his sword. “Then ’twas treachery meant to end us both,” he said, his tone gruff.

  “’Twould seem that,” Bhaltair said, feeling the flush of relief a moment before the cold sweat of dread inched down his spine.

  For he now knew where Oriana had gone this morning: to Aviemore, to kill the Chieftain of the Skaraven.

  Chapter Eighteen

  SEEING THE EMPTY settlement left Ruadri feeling so bitter that he might as well have been chewing on spotted thistle. The only reason the entire tribe would have left their homes would be to gather for their solstice ritual in the glen. He sensed it had already begun. He could feel the celebratory magic spreading out around them. The powerful spell would never be completed. In a few moments the Romans would pour into the glen to attack and slaughter them.

  Like the dwindling smoke rising from the cottage chimneys, all their efforts to warn the Wood Dream had been wasted.

  “I don’t understand.” Emeline turned around slowly, peering at the vacant cottages. “Everything pointed to this being why we were brought here. We were supposed to save them.”

  For the first time Ruadri wondered if that were true. They had completely failed, yet nothing that had happened since they’d arrived in this time had helped them. It almost seemed as if the Gods had meant to keep them from preventing the massacre.

  Emeline faced him. “How far away is the place where they’re holding the ritual?”

  “Too far,” he said tonelessly. “We cannae reach it on foot before the Romans do.”

  She reached for the base of her throat, and then dropped her hand. “We have to do something.”

  Did they? Slowly his hands knotted at his sides. He didn’t care that he had been made mortal again, or that he might be trapped in this time for good. He’d been born to both. The miseries inflicted on him he saw as his due, for the very first act of his existence had been to kill his own mother. But he had risked Emeline’s life to come here and save the Wood Dream. Emeline, who had been brutalized and afflicted by the mad druids. Who put her faith in him even knowing him a traitor. Who had urged him on when he would have given up.

  Emeline, who deserved none of this.

  Ruadri felt rage unlike any he’d ever known seeping into the hollowness inside him. With this cruel ruse the Gods had finally asked too much of him.

  “Look,” Emeline said, tugging on his hand and pointing toward a vegetable garden. “Our horses have come back. We can ride to the glen.”

  He went with her to catch the grazing mounts, but stopped her from climbing onto her saddle. “I shall go and do what I may. You must wait here for me.” When she started to protest he took hold of her shoulders. “Hundreds of peaceful folk shall die there by the blade. Do you no’ ken how it will be, to feel their horror and pain?”

  “I’m stronger now, I can…” She suddenly choked and doubled over, clutching at her abdomen.

  “’Tis begun.” Ruadri held onto her and turned his head toward the distant sound of screaming. The skinwork on his forearms turned white and burned like flaming ice. He had never wished to kill, and that, too, had been taken from him. “I must see to the Romans. I’ll return for you when ’tis done.”

  Keeping her away from the massacre was the only kindness he could offer her. As Ruadri mounted his horse and rode for the glen, a strange peace settled over him. In his boyhood Galan had always derided him for avoiding violence and refusing to inflict harm. He’d had to threaten him with death to force him to fight as a warrior as well as a druid. He’d thought him weak and heartless, and entirely unworthy to bear the name Skaraven.

  Ruadri would at last do his evil sire proud.

  The sounds of killing and terror grew louder as he rode through the forest to the glen. He caught glimpses of young druids running toward their settlement, chased by Romans with bloody swords. Every tree he passed had gone still, as if turned to stone. A strangeness in the air bit at him like a swarm of tiny, vicious insects, and birds began dropping from the sky. At the rim of the trees the surface of the tribe’s loch went as flat as ice, soon pocked by the bobbing bodies of dead fish.

  A wet, rusted iron smell filled his lungs as the stench of death came to greet him.

  His blazing forearms lost their heat as Emeline and her mount appeared beside him. Tears streamed down her white face, and she shook so much he thought she might fall to the ground. Ahead he saw the Romans and druids in the glen, and reached for her reins to stop both horses.

  “You cannae go any nearer,” he told her flatly. “’Twill be too much for you to bear.” When he began to dismount she lunged at him, knocking them both to the ground.

  “Neither can you,” she said, sobbing the words into his chest. “Please, listen to me. It’s the giants.
They’re coming alive. They’re coming for the Romans. Ruadri.”

  The ground beneath them trembled, and behind them trees fell by the dozens. Something massive was coming toward them from the settlement, something that stood nearly as tall as the very tops of the oldest oaks. Ruadri sensed dangerous enchantment spreading out in a shadowy cloud all around the movement, and Emeline released a terrible cry.

  A wooden giant smashed into view, its carved features splintering as it opened a cart-size maw. The roar that came from the totem’s gaping mouth stripped the leaves from every branch around it in a flurry of tattered green. It swatted aside a massive oak, stepping over the quivering roots with the huge blocks that served as its feet. Ruadri rolled with Emeline to avoid being crushed, and then gathered her up and ran out of the path of the other giants that followed.

  He saw the grove of trees heavily draped with golden mistletoe, where the Wood Dream had fashioned an altar of rubbed oak. There he ran to take shelter under the vines.

  “God in heaven,” Emeline whispered.

  Gleaming berries pelted them as the living totems burst into the glen. The Romans froze and gaped at the giants advancing on them. One of the mounted soldiers shouted and recklessly charged at them. A huge hand slammed down upon them to crush both man and horse together. When the horrific mangle fell to the ground it sent the blood-soaked attackers scattering in every direction.

  Ruadri had killed many Romans, but that had been on the battlefield, against armed men intending to end him. Here was nothing but pure butchery.

  “I saw Hendry and Murdina swimming in the loch when I rode past it,” Emeline told him in a shaking voice. “They were splashing each other like children. They’re not doing this.”

  Everyone had assumed that the famhairean had been brought to life by the mad druids, but the towering totems had done so on their own. Ruadri realized that the Wood Dream had not simply carved warrior statues to frighten away invaders. They had imbued them with magic to defend the settlement against attack.