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The stranger tilted his head to one side and Liddy caught an intense blue stare before his hood obscured his features. ‘The gate is locked at owl-light each night. They do not allow anyone in or out. During the day, everyone entering or leaving is searched. Thorbin, Lord Ketil’s current representative, is cautious. There is resentment on the island.’
‘You are one of the Northmen,’ she said, hearing the faint traces of the heavy Northern accent, but laced with the slight lilt of her native tongue. Normally Northmen growled their words, making it difficult to understand them. ‘But you speak my language better than most. Unusual.’
‘You are a Gael.’ He looked her slowly up and down, from the bottom of her travel-stained gown to the top of her couver-chief from which a few tendrils of hair kept escaping. Again she resisted the urge to hide the birthmark. ‘Most Gaels take better care of their women rather than simply providing them with a large dog before sending them to bargain with one of the most notorious men in the North. Have you considered what he will do to you when you lose?’
Liddy kept her hand on Coll. He couldn’t have guessed about the necklace, could he? Using her knife on him would be possible, but he would have to be closer. She would have one chance and the point where his throat met his shoulder was her best option. The quickest way, according to her late husband, who had liked to boast of his expertise in battle.
Her body went numb at the thought of killing a man, any man, but particularly this one who seemed so full of life.
‘Most men would think twice about tangling with my dog,’ she said instead. ‘They will let me go once I’ve finished my business. They will be men of honour. They will keep the promise Lord Ketil made to my father.’
The words rang even more hollow to her ears than before. But if she lost this slender hope, she might as well turn back. She had to believe this miracle was possible and that she lived for some reason beyond a cruel joke by God. It had come to her that perhaps she had been spared so that she could do this thing—rescue her father and brother and somehow atone for her part in the twins’ death. She had tried so hard to rescue them.
‘I’ve seen dogs die before. A pity. He seems like a good and faithful animal.’
‘I’ve seen men back away from him before.’ Liddy wrenched her mind from the day shortly after the twins’ deaths when she’d encountered the Northmen on the track which ran along the headland. Coll had guarded her well that day.
The man shrugged and Liddy became aware of the strength of his shoulders. ‘You throw them a bit of meat and they are happy. Instant friends. Dogs have a simpler view of life.’
Liddy crossed her arms. This Northman might think he knew dogs, but he didn’t know Coll. ‘Not my dog. My dog distrusts strangers, Northmen in particular.’
His eyes flashed an intense blue. ‘I’m hardly one to refuse a challenge.’
‘You may try, but you are bound for disappointment. I know my dog. He is an excellent judge of character.’
He reached into his pouch and held out a piece of dried meat. A slight keening noise filled the air.
Coll, the traitor, took it from the man’s fingers with only a heartbeat of hesitation. The man reached down and stroked Coll behind the ears. Coll completed his surrender by lolling against the man.
‘Not all Northmen.’ The voice slid over her skin as if he had stroked her hair instead of Coll’s ears. ‘But maybe he senses that I could be a friend and an ally. You would do well to trust your dog’s instincts if he is such a good judge of character.’
‘I stand corrected and it is duly noted. I will not make that mistake again,’ she said through gritted teeth. Anyone would think that she was some sort of maiden from a convent who had never experienced men and their ways, rather than a widow. ‘Coll, come here.’ To the man, she said, ‘I will bid you good morning and be on my way. I’ve urgent business with Lord Thorbin, who will uphold the law once the truth of the matter is explained.’
Coll instantly bristled as if embarrassed by his actions and slunk away from his new friend. Liddy caught his collar and began to walk away with determined steps.
The man seemed to take the hint and let her go without a protest, but she felt his eyes watching her with a speculative glint.
Liddy hurried her pace, rounded several bends and went off on a different track. The trees were closer and the air silent. She turned her head to one side and her feet faltered. Trees with bodies hanging from them like overripe fruit blocked her way. She wanted to run, but her legs refused to work. Instinctively, she turned away as her stomach revolted. Coll began to bark in earnest.
‘Lord Thorbin sacrifices women to the gods,’ the man said behind her in a low voice. Coll’s howls immediately ceased. ‘He takes positive pleasure in it. He never does anything important without making one human sacrifice. Are you still certain about continuing on with your quest?’
‘How do you know it was him?’
His eyes became narrow slivers of blue ice. ‘I’ve seen his work before.’
‘And the women? Who were they?’ Liddy whispered, pulling Coll closer. A distinct shiver ran down her spine. This man was intimately acquainted with Lord Thorbin’s work.
‘Slaves who were freed before they were sacrificed. Lone women without families to protect them or women whose families had abandoned them.’ His mouth twisted. ‘Sacrifices must be made with a free will, lest the gods get angry. How much choice they actually had...well...they were slaves. Sometimes there are worse things than dying free.’
Liddy put her hands on her knees and tried to breathe. The heathen Northmen might believe such things, but she knew it to be false. Those women were murdered for no good reason. How could she appeal to the honour of a man who murdered women like that? Her idea seemed more and more naïve, but she had to do something. Pretending her mother could cope was wrong. The barren fields were a testament to that. ‘I thought those were tales from the priests to scare people.’
‘Do you want me to cut one down and show you? Do you truly want to risk disturbing the dead?’
Liddy regarded the grove again and one of the bodies seemed to reach towards her. A scream welled up inside her. She wanted to run but her feet had turned to blocks of stone. ‘I...I...’
He grasped her elbow and turned her firmly from the gruesome sight. The simple touch did much to calm her. ‘Where I grew up, people normally avoided these sorts of places. Stay on the well-trodden path. It takes longer, but mingling with the dead is rarely a good idea.’
‘I can see why some might go that way, but my time is short.’ Liddy wrenched her arm away. Didn’t he know that she had no luck left to lose? ‘The dead are incapable of harming anyone. I must reach the stronghold in good time for the assembly. My voice will be heard. It will not be said that I was turned away because I arrived late. Going through that grove saves precious time.’
Her heart thumped as she said the words. She had to hope they were true. To take the other way would add another half-day to her journey and she had to get to the stronghold in time for the assembly. She couldn’t do anything for the dead, but she could do something for the living.
‘What do you plan on doing with this dog while you speak with Lord Thorbin?’ He held out his hand to Coll again who gave it a quick lick. ‘Thorbin has as little time for dogs as he does for women. He has disliked dogs like yours ever since he was a boy and a dog bit him. Of course, Thorbin had beaten the dog with a stick, so it was understandable.’
Liddy abruptly stopped and turned back to the man. He knew far too much about Lord Thorbin’s habits for her liking, but he also did not appear to fear him like so many did on this island. ‘Is it any business of yours?’
He shrugged. ‘I like your dog. He has character, but such a dog might be used as a weapon to attack Lord Thorbin. Thorbin might use you bringing your dog as an excuse to take you into slavery and to put the dog to death. What better way to get the gold he requires than to acquire slaves?’
She tucked her chin more firmly into her shoulder, the better to hide her cursed mark. In her ignorance, she’d nearly condemned Coll to death. ‘But you know of a way that might work, one which wouldn’t lead to Coll’s death.’
‘There might be, if you are brave enough. We could be allies, you and I.’ He jerked his head towards the trees. ‘Better than ending up somewhere where you most definitely don’t want to be.’
A prickle crept down her back. She tried to dismiss it. It was no more than her priest or her mother had warned her before she set out yesterday.
Liddy raised her chin and repeated the same speech she had given her concerned mother. ‘I will succeed. I will make Lord Thorbin listen to reason. His overlord’s sacred oath must have meaning. He will honour it or be damned in the eyes of his war band.’
The man stilled. ‘Do you have a token of Lord Ketil’s esteem? Or merely the words of your father, who is now imprisoned?’
‘Yes, I do.’ Liddy dug into the pouch which hung from her belt and withdrew the ring her father had forgotten when he left home. ‘A ring Ketil Flatnose personally put on my father’s finger.’
She took quiet satisfaction from the way the man leant forward and the intensity of his gaze increased. That would teach him to mock her.
‘Why did your father leave it at home rather than taking it with him?’
‘His fingers had grown too fat and he took it off months ago.’ She placed it back in the pouch. ‘In his haste to rescue my brother, he must have forgotten about it, but I remembered and searched for it. Our priest told me that it would not make a difference, but I know it will.’
‘You chose not to listen to your priest. My mother was a Gael and I know how headstrong you Gaelic women can be.’ He gave Coll an absent stroke on the head. ‘A pity, but it will take more than willpower to defeat Thorbin and get your family back.’
Pity from him? From a Northman? What sort of fool did he take her for? She knew what form a Northman’s pity often took. She’d seen the burnt farms and the slain men. And then there were the sgeula-steach tana adhair, the women who had vanished without a trace. Fewer now that the Northmen had control of most of the islands, but every year one or two were still stolen.
‘So your father was a Northman. Your poor mother,’ she said instead. ‘She is the one I pity.’
He tilted his head to one side. ‘Why do you say that?’
‘I presume she was born free, captured and remained a slave to the end of her days.’
‘You know nothing about it.’ His voice dripped ice. ‘You are the one jumping to conclusions. Perhaps I should leave you to your well-deserved fate, instead of trying to help you.’
‘But it is what happens. The women are taken and no one sees them again. These woods, hills and fields are chiselled in my soul. I will return to them a free woman. I will not die in a foreign land or become like one of those bodies in the wood.’ Liddy tightened her grip on Coll and hoped the man would overlook the trembling in her hand. She knew what happened to women when they were taken by Northmen, and how some had escaped after a ransom was paid. The necklace was something to bargain with and could get her home, if the ring failed. ‘I will not be a slave nor will any of my family.’
‘All for a matter of honour?’
‘If you like. We Gaels take our honour very seriously.’ She belatedly put her hand over her birthmark, her badge of shame.
‘My mother proclaimed she was the daughter of a king.’ His mouth twisted. ‘I later learnt that nearly every second woman makes such a claim.’
‘What happened to her?’ Liddy let out a breath. She was glad that she hadn’t told him of her parentage and that her father used to be a king before the Northmen came and settled. Islay had many kings then, too many as they always quarrelled and far too many men had died.
‘She was freed before she breathed her last.’
The impulse to ask if her body had hanged from a tree in a sacred grove threatened to overwhelm her, but one look at his face made the words die on her lips. For once she swallowed her words. ‘Who freed her?’
‘I did. I freed her from all torment. It was what she desired most in the world.’ He put his hand on his sword and his cloak fell away from his face. The shaft of dawn light which pierced the mist showed her companion to be one of the handsomest men she had ever seen. His golden hair fell to his shoulders, his lips were full, but his other features were hard. His eyes betrayed a steely determination. Here was no ordinary warrior. There was something about the way he moved and the set of his jaw. He was used to being obeyed. A leader of men.
‘Who are you?’ she asked and then regretted it. Her late husband always proclaimed that her tongue would get her into trouble, one of his milder rebukes. ‘If I agree to join forces with you, will you actually help me instead of lulling me into a false promise?’
She hated that hope grew in her breast. She should know by now that these things only happened in the bards’ tales. There was no one she could depend on, particularly not a cloaked Northman. Thrice cursed, her brother-in-law had called her after Brandon’s funeral. Meeting this Northman, rather than having an uneventful journey, proved it.
‘Give me your name,’ she said when he continued to stare at her. ‘Your true name, rather than a ridiculous nickname like the Northmen often go by. Give it or we shall never be allies.’
‘Sigurd Sigmundson, a traveller like yourself who hungers after justice.’ He tugged his cloak, hiding his features again. His cloak was more threadbare than hers. And yet somehow she couldn’t believe it was his. There was the way that he moved. And she had a glimpse of the sword underneath the cloak. It was far too fine for a sell-sword to use.
‘You mean to pass into the compound unnoticed. That is why you are wearing that old cloak,’ she exclaimed. ‘I mean you must be, otherwise you would row your dragon boat up Loch Indaal and land beside the stronghold.’
Sigurd Sigmundson reached towards her. Liddy took a step backwards and half-stumbled over a root. Coll gave a low rumbling in the back of his throat and Sigurd’s hand instantly dropped to his side.
‘Why would I want to conceal my identity?’ he asked, tilting his head to one side. She caught the sweep of his lashes and again the piercing blue stare.
‘Because the other way is the surest way to end up stuffed in a barrel and sent back to Ketil. Even where we live, we’ve heard rumours about how Thorbin treats his enemies.’ She covered her mark with her hand. ‘My late husband was a warrior. You move with a warrior’s gait, not a beggar’s. If you wish other people not to notice, then you should shuffle rather than stride. Free advice.’
He bowed his head. ‘What are you going to do with this knowledge of yours? Do you wish me ill?’
‘As long as you mean me no harm, it is none of my concern. Once my business with Thorbin is satisfactorily concluded, you may do as you will with him.’ She paused. ‘I, Eilidith of Cennell Fergusa, have reasons for wishing this. He is no friend to my family. But I go first.’
He was silent for a long while. She felt his gaze roam over her body. It had been a long time since a man had looked at her in that appraising way. She tightened the cloak about her figure, hoping it hid most of her curves. She had few illusions about her beauty. Her figure was passable, her mouth too large and her hair was far too red. Flame-coloured, Brandon had called it when he courted her. One of his few compliments.
‘I have come to complete the task Lord Ketil set me,’ he said with a wave of his hand. ‘This task comes before your quest, Eilidith of Cennell Fergusa. Thorbin answers for his crimes and then you find your father and brother. Provided they haven’t been executed as traitors.’
White-hot anger flashed through her. Who was he to condemn them? He had no idea of her story or how her father had sought to protect their clan from the worst of the invaders. ‘My father gave his pledge to Lord Ketil Flatnose the first time he travelled to this island. My brother was but a mewling babe at the time. The tribute has always been paid. No one has ever accused my father of treason...until now.’
Liddy shook her head. She refused to think about the pitiful state of the fields, barely tended in the summer sun. According to her mother, her father had hidden the seed and the gold before he left. Without fresh seed, they stood no chance of having a good harvest and making the tribute.
She gritted her teeth. ‘If necessary, I will go to Lord Ketil and remind him of his sworn oath to my father.’
She hoped he wouldn’t hear the lie in her voice. The last thing she wanted to do was to travel on the sea. The thought of being on the open sea, out of sight of land, terrified her.
‘Will you indeed?’
‘What other option do I have?’
Sigurd regarded the small woman who stood in front of him. The faint light showed him that Eilidith’s hair was auburn, not black as he’d first imagined it. Like the sun setting on a clear summer’s day. The butterfly-shaped mark under her lower lip took her face from bland to intriguing.
She’d shown courage to come to this place with simply a large dog for protection. The only other women he could think of who would have done such a thing were his mother and Beyla, the woman he had given his heart to back in the days when he thought he had a heart. Beyla had chosen safety over their passion, and his half-brother, the man who was now jaarl over this island, Thorbin, over him.
‘I believe you could travel to Ketil and demand justice, as is any ring bearer’s right,’ he said to distract his thoughts from unwanted memories. ‘But Thorbin might have a great reluctance to see a prize like you go. Have you thought about what you might do then?’
She thumped her chest, like a warrior, rather than a lady. ‘I gave a sacred vow that I will see my father free or perish in the attempt.’
Sigurd stood straighter. Had his mother been like that once? Strong and resolute instead of jumping at shadows as she’d done during the last few years of her life? ‘The world would be a poorer place if you died. You obviously have a family who care about you.’
She lifted her head and assessed him as if he were a prize bull at the market. ‘Does Thorbin fear you or someone else more?’
‘Thorbin’s long-delayed day of reckoning has arrived. It gives me immense pleasure to know that I will be the one to ensure it happens. I, too, have a vow I want to see fulfilled.’
Islay was the lynchpin in Ketil’s strategy for the Western Isles. He who controlled Islay, controlled the lucrative trade between Ireland and Alba. All the sea roads flowed past this island. Because of the whirlpool north of Jura, the quickest way to transport goods was overland. Thorbin’s rule had begun a year ago last spring. At first Thorbin’s star flourished and Sigurd had despaired of ever finding a way to avenge his mother, but Thorbin’s tribute had been short at Yule. In the early spring Ketil had sent a man to investigate. When he returned, pickled in a barrel with an insulting message, Ketil finally lost patience with his protégé and ordered Thorbin to return to explain himself. It was Sigurd’s task to deliver the message and ensure Thorbin returned to face the accusation.
Sigurd had spent the last week scouting out the stronghold, coming up with a plan, once he realised sailing up the strait and landing his boats was doomed to failure. His half-brother was no one’s fool. It was obvious that he considered himself immune from retribution. But he’d also taken precautions. The bay was heavily guarded as well as all entrances and exits to the fort.
He felt sorry for this woman’s plight, but in all likelihood her brother and father were already sold or dead. She and the ring she carried, however, were tools he could use.
‘I have learnt that things rarely happen by chance. Our paths have crossed for a purpose,’ he said carefully, aware she had not answered him. ‘Let us fulfil that purpose. Let us together hold Thorbin to account.’
Her jaw became mutinous and her blue-green eyes flashed, becoming like the summer sea after a storm. ‘Why should I trust you, Sigurd Sigmundson? Why are you not going to be exactly like every other Northman? Exactly like Lord Thorbin?’
He ignored the flash of anger at being likened to his half-brother and forced his voice to sound placating, as if he were trying to soothe a nervous horse. He had to give her some reason to make her trust him. ‘We knew each other when we were children. I know his strengths, but also his weaknesses. It is why Lord Ketil gave me this task. I am the only man who can defeat him, but to do that I have to get close to him.’
Her neat white teeth nibbled her lower lip, turning it the colour of the dawn. ‘And you can save my family when you defeat Lord Thorbin?’
‘If they are on Islay, I will. If not, I will go to Ketil and personally lay your claim at his feet.’
‘Why are you suddenly willing to help me?’
‘To prove to you not all Northmen are the same. I remember my debts and I keep my vows.’
She tucked her chin further into her shoulder, hiding the butterfly mark. ‘I need some time.’
Sigurd carefully shrugged and pretended indifference as he handed the dog his last piece of dried meat. The dog put his paws on Sigurd’s shoulders and licked his face with his great wet tongue.
‘Coll, bad dog!’
The dog instantly sat, licked his chops and looked hopefully for another piece.
‘Your dog believes in me. He wants me to save you. Will you join forces with me?’
She bent her head and spoke to the dog before she held out her hand. ‘I may regret this, but we join forces until the time comes for the alliance to end.’
He closed his hand about her slender fingers and resisted the urge to pull her close and taste her mouth. Eilidith of Cennell Fergusa was a tool to be used, not a woman to be enjoyed. He never mixed business with pleasure. He reluctantly released her and stepped away, being careful to keep his face blank. He had discovered the perfect weapon to crack open Thorbin’s fort and destroy him. He would fulfil the vow he’d made as he watched the glowing embers of his parents’ funeral pyre.
‘You will be glad you listened to your dog.’
