“I can find a bit of rope,” Ruith said loudly.
Master Oban opened his mouth and looked at him in horror. He then scrunched up his face and frowned fiercely as he turned away from silk and concentrated on velvet.
Sarah closed her eyes and smiled to herself, for more ridiculous reasons than she wanted to admit. She was warm, for a change, she was safe, a truly novel feeling, and she was, for the first time she could remember, leaving the untangling of her mane to someone else.
“You must have had sisters,” she said with a sigh.
“One,” he agreed quietly. “Once.”
She turned around to look at him so quickly, she almost pulled the hair he was braiding not only out of his hand, but out of her head. She winced. “I’m sorry. I didn’t think.”
He shook his head with a faint smile, then put his hand atop her head and turned her back around. “You needn’t tread carefully around me.”
“Nor you, me.”
He began to brush again. “I think I disagree. You have too many knives on your person for me to dare.” He paused. “You’ll have to show your knives to my grandfather when we’ve a bit of privacy. He might be able to translate the runes that I cannot.”
She looked at his grandfather, who was deep in discussion with Franciscus, then shook her head. “He looks old enough to be your brother, nothing more.”
“He never takes dessert.”
She smiled. “Liar.”
“I’m not,” he said promptly. “As he said himself, he’s quite careful about his diet. I think his youth is due to all the time he spends out of doors, but I could be wrong.”
She suspected there was more to Sgath’s youthful face than an avoidance of sweets, but what did she know? Her mother had been ancient for as long as Sarah could remember.
She closed her eyes again and listened to Ruith discuss with a silent Oban the appropriate color of ribbon for a woman on an important quest, listened with half an ear to Sgath and Franciscus discuss the location of their favorite taverns, and did her best not to fall asleep.
In such peace and safety, it was difficult.
She could have sworn Ruith had just put his hands on her shoulders and told her he was finished before she heard shouts and felt herself be yanked up to her feet and set aside very gently.
Actually Ruith shoved her behind him so hard she went sprawling, but she supposed she was grateful for it when she sat up and saw what was making an absolute wreck of their camp.
“Ruith!”
She watched Ruith catch his sword that Franciscus had managed to snatch from the wagon. He drew, turned, and almost found himself skewered by a monster that stepped through the fire as if it didn’t feel it at all. The others scrambled out of the way. The dogs screamed in terror. Or perhaps that was Ned. She honestly couldn’t tell and it seemed a little strange that she was obsessed with determining the truth of it.
Better that than watch the battle going on in front of her.
Sgath had somehow laid hands on Ruith’s bow and quiver of arrows and he was using them well against what had become a trio of trolls. Franciscus proved to be a more than adequate warrior as he took on the third of the attackers—or at least it seemed so until Sarah realized that the alemaster’s axe was no match for a troll with seeming inexhaustible strength and inhuman speed. She found herself with one of the knives Ruith had given her in her hand. When it came to hunting supper, she was better with a trap, adequate with a bow and arrows of her own that were at least a third smaller than what Ruith used, and rather handy with a knife.
But those were rabbits or the odd overfed quail. These were far beyond her experience. In the end, she supposed there was nothing to lose but Franciscus’s life, so she flipped the knife to hold it by the tip, then flung it with all her strength into the third beast’s eye.
It screamed as if a hot poker had been thrust into its skull.
Ruith turned to look, then tripped and went down. Sarah gasped, but she could offer no aid, nor, seemingly, could anyone else. She tossed her other knife to Ruith, who caught it, shook the sheath off it, then thrust it upward into the chest of the beast who had tripped and fallen over onto him.
The shrieks were deafening.
She ran over and started to pull the monster off him. She had help. Seirceil was frail, but surprisingly strong. Other hands soon joined in and within moments, Ruith was freed. He sat up slowly, wincing. Sarah looked down at him in horror. The front of his tunic was drenched in blood.
“Ruith—”
He shook his head sharply. “Not mine, don’t worry.” He accepted his grandfather’s hand up. “I think perhaps we should carry on.”
“I think we should carry on separately,” Franciscus said, resting his axe against his shoulder. He handed Sarah back her knives, cleaned and bearing no mark of their recent activity. “I’m not sure how to say this politely, Ruith my lad, but those creatures weren’t interested in anyone but you.”
Sarah looked at Franciscus in surprise. “What are you saying, then?”
He looked at her. “They were coming for our wee swordmaster there. Didn’t you notice?”
“I’m embarrassed to say I was too busy trying to keep myself alive to notice anything but how best to do that.”
Sgath laughed and began to clean used arrows on the greening grass. “I fear my answer is the same as Mistress Sarah’s.” He looked up at Franciscus. “But I think you have it aright. They weren’t interested in me.”
“I’m not certain I wasn’t just the easiest target,” Ruith said, panting. “Perhaps we should try an experiment. I’ll take a different route and we’ll regroup in a handful of days and see who has survived.”
Sarah wasn’t sure what was louder, Seirceil’s hound’s yipping or Ned’s squeaking. She couldn’t say that she wouldn’t be happy to be free of both.
Franciscus only laughed and went to collect his charges. Sarah stood there, clutching the knives Ruith had given her and feeling them very warm in her hands. She looked down in surprise and saw firelight glittering along the edges of the blades she hadn’t managed to yet resheath.
Firelight that wasn’t being reflected from the pile of smoldering coals ten paces from her.
“We need to go now.”
Sarah tore her attention away from what she held in her hands in time to see the look Ruith gave his grandfather. Sgath tried to lift Ruith’s tunic, but Ruith shook his head sharply.
“Leave it. Let’s go.”
“Don’t be a fool, Ruith—”
Ruith started to argue again, then sighed. He pulled up the edge of his tunic himself, then cursed. The blood he wore was most definitely more of his than he no doubt wanted to admit to.
“Did one of them stick a knife through you?” Sgath asked in astonishment.
“Just a wee nick,” Ruith said dismissively. “I’ve gone soft.”
“Aye, in the head,” Sgath said. “We need—”
“To find someone with magic, aye, I agree,” Ruith said. “As I have none, we’ll have to search—”
Oban elbowed Ned aside. He pushed the sleeves of his courtly robe up to his elbows, took a firm grip on his wand, and waved it over Ruith, scattering what Sarah could have sworn were fat black-and-yellow bumblebees.
But the blood was gone and the wound closed. Ruith didn’t look much better, but he also was no longer sporting a hole in his side. He smiled at Oban, complimented him on the added delights they’d enjoyed with that bit of healing, then went to collect his weapons.
Sarah watched him carefully. He moved more easily, but she just couldn’t believe that was all there was to it. She thought about that whilst she commended Castân to Ned’s care, bid farewell to the mages, then turned to Franciscus for a final word.
“That didn’t heal him,” she said bluntly.
Franciscus looked at her, clear-eyed. “Then I suppose you’ll have to see to it.”
“You know I cannot,” she said in a very low voice.
“Sa
rah, my sweet gel, I know nothing of the sort,” he said, though he was a terrible liar and exactly what he knew showed quite plainly on his face. “You’ll find what you need along the way, perhaps,” he offered. “Put him to bed and tend him. I know where your lad is making for. We’ll wait for you there.”
She nodded, because she could do nothing else. She collected her gear, such as it was, and walked over to find Sgath saddling Ruith’s horse for him. She ducked under Ruith’s arm and pulled it over her shoulders.
“Lean on me,” she commanded.
“I’m we—”
“Lean on me, you fool,” she whispered harshly. “Now, do you need me to ride with you to keep you in the saddle, or can you manage that?”
“A beautiful woman with her arms around me for as long as I look feeble,” he gasped. “I think I’ll drag the entire affair out endlessly.”
“Shut up.”
“Does that mean you’re reneging?” he managed.
Sarah looked at Sgath, who didn’t appear nearly as lighthearted as his grandson. He helped Ruith up into his saddle, then looked at her.
“Can you hold him?”
She nodded without hesitation. “How far?”
“How fleet are your horses?”
“How much speed can your grandson bear?”
Sgath smiled briefly, then gave her a leg up. “Follow me. We’ll be there by dawn if we make haste.”
She nodded, wrapped her arms around Ruith’s waist, and pulled him back against her. He wouldn’t lean, though.
“I might fall off and ruin my visage,” he panted.
“You have an overinflated opinion of the fairness of your face.”
“All the more reason to stay awake longer so you might point that out a time or two more.”
She would have attempted something else to take his mind off the wound that had started to ooze again—she could feel it—but she couldn’t. She was more worried than she wanted to admit—and not just about Ruith’s side. He had it aright.
Those monsters weren’t coming for her, they were coming for him.
She wondered what an unmagical swordsman who’d lived for two decades in the mountains of a county that all sensible men avoided could possibly have done to attract such creatures.
And there she had thought finding Daniel was going to be the most dangerous part of the journey. She realized now just how wrong she’d been.
Sixteen
Ruith had had better journeys to Lake Cladach.
He supposed the only thing to be grateful for was that he honestly didn’t remember much of the current one. Sarah had shaken him awake several times, which meant he’d slept away most of the night, and she had held him close, which he wished he had paid more attention to, and she had managed to keep him on his horse after they’d stopped long enough for his grandfather to dismount and catch him before he fell off and truly did do damage to his face.
“Herbs, sir?” Sarah asked, following hard on Sgath’s heels.
“You’ll find a variety of things down by the lake, my dear,” Sgath said, grunting a bit as he set Ruith on his feet. “Don’t lose yourself, though. Sunrise is near, but the woods are still very thick.”
Ruith looked blearily at Sarah. “Take him at his word and be careful, though I’m more worried about you becoming enamored of the surroundings and forgetting to return.”
She put her hand on his back. “You talk a great deal for someone in such pain.”
“I’m not in such pain,” he said, and that was true. He was past pain. He was in absolute agony. Whatever had been on that creature’s knife had done more than a usual bit of damage. Either that, or Oban’s spell had been less useful than he’d dared hope it would be.
He watched Sarah walk off, then leaned heavily on his grandfather as they made their way to the house. It would have been very strange indeed to consider that he was walking where he hadn’t in a score of years and never thought to again, but he was far too busy thinking on whether or not he would manage to survive the day. He jumped when a fire leapt to life in the hearth, then looked at his grandfather.
“Perhaps you shouldn’t. She thinks I have no magic.”
“I gathered that,” Sgath said dryly, “but I didn’t imagine that included me.”
Ruith pursed his lips. “I did tell her that my parents had magic, so I suppose she might assume you have a bit, but that doesn’t fit in with your persona as a simple fisherman, does it?”
“I could be a modest mage,” Sgath said with a bit of a shrug. “One of those lads too humble to make a fuss.” He frowned. “I’m not sure I understand why your Sarah hasn’t healed you.”
Ruith caught his breath as he stepped wrong, then had to concentrate on simply walking for a bit. He paused at the doorway to one of the bedchambers and looked at his grandfather.
“She cannot. She’s the witchwoman Seleg’s daughter, but she apparently has no magic.”
Sgath looked at him in surprise. “Why not? Seleg is—”
“Was—”
“Very well, she was very powerful. Her daughter should have inherited some of that.”
“You would think so, wouldn’t you?” Ruith said, clutching the doorframe to keep himself upright. “Could we discuss this later? I think I might be ill soon.”
“You don’t look good,” Sgath agreed, “which begs the question about where your magic is and why you didn’t have it to use to protect yourself.” He frowned. “I sense only an echo of it.”
“Didn’t I tell you about it last night?” Ruith asked sourly.
“I thought I was having a nightmare. Now, come over here and lie down, lad, before you fall there.”
He shook his head. “I’ll ruin the bedding. Just let me sit and bleed on that chair over there.” He was appalled by how hard he was leaning on Sgath, but there was nothing to be done about it. He sank down onto a hard wooden chair and leaned back with a ginger sigh. “I didn’t expect this.”
“I have the feeling, son, that you could say that about many things,” Sgath said. He sat down on the bed and smiled faintly. “So, first things first. What am I to do with this hole in your side?”
Ruith winced. “Admit to a little power, if you must.”
“I don’t see that you have a choice,” Sgath said, “or you won’t last until morning. I would like one answer, however, just to set my mind at rest. What did you do with your heritage?”
Ruith met his eyes steadily. “I took it all, every last drop of the magic I possessed, shoved it into a well inside myself, and shut it all in with a spell of concealment I stole from Uachdaran of Léige.”
Sgath closed his eyes briefly. “I suppose I understand why.”
“Just so you know, I had help with the appropriation of that bit of magic.”
“Let me guess,” Sgath said, pursing his lips. “Miach of Neroche convinced you it was something you both needed to round out your ever-growing collection of things you shouldn’t have memorized.”
Ruith managed a smile. “I convinced him, for a change. I imagine I shouldn’t admit how often that was the case, lest my lily-white reputation find itself sullied.” He looked up at the sound of a footstep. “Here is Sarah.”
“I’ll see to it.”
Ruith closed his eyes and surrendered gratefully to events he wasn’t responsible for controlling. He listened to his grandfather and Sarah discuss herbs and healing and the fact that she had never in her life imagined such a beautiful place as what she could see from Sgath’s front porch. Ruith suspected he might have slept for a bit because he woke to the feel of cold air on his side, followed by cold fingers on his skin.
“See?” she said quietly. “There is something there. Some thread of something ... wrong.”
“I can’t see anything.”
Ruith opened his eyes to find them both kneeling in front of him, peering intently at his side. Sarah looked at Sgath.
“That black thread of something there,” she said, touching Ruith’s skin near the
wound. “ ’Tis barbed and covered with drops of something I don’t know how to name.” She looked at Sgath. “Poison, perhaps?”
Sgath shook his head. “I have no idea, my dear, for I can’t see it at all. But my sight isn’t as clear as yours.”
Sarah studied Ruith’s flesh for a moment, then drew forth one of her knives.
“Are you going to finish the job?” Ruith asked, feeling faintly alarmed.
She met his eyes. Her face was full of what another might have called determination, and that no doubt in spite of the fact that her other hand resting on his knee was trembling. Determination, apprehension, and no small bit of plain fear.
“I’m thinking on how that creature screamed when it encountered my knife in his eye,” she ventured. “I wonder what this knife would do to that thread if I were to try to pull it from your flesh?”
“Leave me shrieking in pain?”
“We’ll try just the same,” she said, looking closely at his side. She reached out and touched what looked to be nothing.
Ruith felt a white-hot strand of pain flare, then disappear. Sarah cut off her sleeve and stanched a new flow of blood.
“Interesting,” Sgath said, sounding more interested than he should have been. “And what, Sarah my dear, is that horrible business on your arm?”
“Nothing,” she said dismissively. “It was much worse before Ruith made me a poultice. I need to find a mage to tend it properly, I think.”
“Hmmm,” Sgath said, “well, perhaps you’ll find one in your travels—and rather sooner than later, if you want my suggestion. I might have something in a cabinet that might serve you until that happy day. Now, shall I be about healing this lad so he can have a nap? I’ll take you for a walk and show you all the best spots for catching lake trout, if you’re interested.”
“Only if I can try my hand at it using one of the lures you have poked into your hat.”