Chapter 18
Scáthach didn’t decide to go because he’d kissed her. Or at least that’s what she told herself . . .
* * *
On the short journey back to Dunscáith, Cuchulainn didn’t knowingly hold himself apart from the Shadow Guard. Rather it was a subconscious act, much like how a wounded animal slinks away to lick its wounds and recover—or die alone without tainting the group.
He didn’t want to taint the group with the invisible wound still bleeding inside him.
Scáthach treated him no differently. He appreciated that, even if he didn’t fully believe her. How was he supposed to believe she still saw him as she had before? Before she’d stepped into that room and found Aife straddling him. Before she’d seen him so helpless, so broken, so badly used.
Uathach had also been there, though she hadn’t seen as much as Scáthach. He hated that Uathach had been there at all, but it didn’t eat at his spirit. It hadn’t been Uathach he’d imagined when Aife had told him she would be who he most desired.
Cuchulainn remembered little about that terrible night.
There were big black places in his memory.
He knew Aife had used his body. He could not remember how many times, but he recalled the painful pleasure of being aroused over and over and over again.
Cuchulainn wished he didn’t remember that part.
How could it have felt pleasurable when she forced him? He hadn’t desired her!
He shook his head, trying to rid himself of even the small pieces of that night that weren’t smothered in blackness.
Tabiti trotted to him. It was dusk and they were close enough to Dunscáith that any of them could have found their way home. Tabiti’s smile flashed white in the twilight.
“Guarding our rear?” she asked.
“Yes,” he said, though he hadn’t realized he’d fallen back to the very rear of the Shadow Guard.
“Thank you for saving Amage,” Tabiti said.
He looked at her, surprised by the strain in her voice. “You need not thank me. I’m glad I was there. Glad you were able to get her to safety.”
“If she had died, I’m not sure how I would have gone on.”
Cuchulainn understood the strain in her voice then. The bond between Tabiti and Amage was strong. Breaking it would also break Tabiti. “That is not something you need to think about,” said Cuchulainn. “She will heal.”
Tabiti nodded. “Yes, I know that logically, but my heart, my spirit, they are still wounded by how close I came to losing her.”
“They will heal just as Amage will heal,” said Cuchulainn.
Tabiti nodded again and then cleared her throat. “Cu, may I tell you a story?”
His brows went up. “Of course.” He gestured around them at the sleepy, rolling hills their road wound between. “We have time, and I like a good story.”
“Well, this one is more nightmare than bedtime story.”
“Now I’m intrigued.” He expected Tabiti to grin. Instead she drew in a long breath and on the exhale began to speak.
“It was many years ago. All the way in distant Scythia I’d heard of the great warrior Scáthach, Queen of Shadow, and her school at Dunscáith.” She glanced at him. “Do you know of my people?”
He nodded and smiled. “Yes. Warrior women who choose to live, fight, and love without men.”
“Well, yes, but some Scythian warriors take men to their beds to reproduce. We send the boy babies to their fathers and keep the girls.”
“I’d heard that. You’re a country of mighty warriors who are well respected.”
“We are. I am the youngest daughter of our queen. I loved my home, my mother, my four older sisters—but as I became an adult, I began to feel adrift, useless. I would not inherit the crown. And I didn’t want it,” she added quickly.
“I could have commanded a unit of warriors, but my older sisters would always outrank me and command the army. Whether valid or not, I felt lost in a crowd.”
“Understandable,” said Cuchulainn.
“When word reached Scythia of Scáthach and her warrior school, I petitioned my mother's permission to travel to Skye to be trained by her. My mother is a wise queen. She also understands her daughters.”
“She granted you permission?”
“Yes, and gave her blessing for me to find my own path. The journey was long. I crossed the land of the Gauls, forded the channel to Briton, and then traveled north to Alba. Finally, I took the ferry we used today and crossed to Skye.
“It was not far from here that the attack happened. I’d traveled with a Scythian guard until we reached the ferry.
Then I sent my countrywomen back as the safety of the Queen of Shadow’s isle is well known.
” She paused and chewed her lip. “I’ll admit that I was eager to send my countrywomen away.
I wanted to walk this new path by myself, and to do that I needed to arrive at Dunscáith alone to prove myself worthy to Scáthach.
” She snorted. “I was very young.” She glanced at him and added. “About your age.”
His snort echoed hers, and then he added, “You said attack?”
Tabiti continued. “Yes.” She glanced around them and jerked her chin toward the craggy hills to their right.
“There’s a stream not far from here. It runs from those rocky hills.
Were it light you could see the water. I knew I was not far from the castle.
I decided to wash and change into the formal clothes I’d brought to wear to present myself to the queen in my finest.” She stopped speaking then.
Cuchulainn glanced at her, wondering if he should ask a question so that she’d continue, wondering at the tightness in Tabiti’s jaw and her furrowed brow—easily seen, even in the dusky light.
He was trying to think of what he could say when she continued.
Her voice lacked all emotion. It was as if she reported something that had happened to someone with whom she had no connection.
“I was in the stream. Naked. They caught me. There were six of them. Norse raiders. They took my weapons and my clothes. Then they came for me. I fought them with my teeth, my hands, my feet. I killed one of them. I bit him. Ripped his throat out as he pressed me to the ground and forced himself into me. The other five learned from him. They tied me down. Put a noose around my neck. If I moved to bite another one of them, or to struggle at all, the noose would tighten, and I would choke myself.” She wiped a hand across her face.
“For a long time afterward I wished I’d struggled harder. ”
“No.” Cuchulainn almost spat the word. “You survived. That is what is most important.”
“I know that now. Then I wasn’t so sure.
The truth is they would have probably killed me had Scáthach not come upon us.
She killed them. Cut all five down so quickly, I didn’t fully understand what was happening.
I was—” Her words broke off, and she had to clear her throat and take several breaths.
“I was not myself. I tried to fight her.” Tabiti raised her gaze to meet his.
“Somehow she got through to me, calmed me, and then she brought me to Dunscáith and helped me heal.”
“Scáthach is good at that,” said Cuchulainn.
“She is and my body healed. My spirit, though. That took a lot longer to stop bleeding, festering.” Tabiti shook her head. “I blamed myself for so long. Too long.”
“But you were naked and alone against six warriors. You could not have stopped them. You were not to blame.”
Tabiti pulled her horse to a halt and Cuchulainn stopped with her. “You were wounded, drugged, and bound. Alone. You could not have stopped what she did to you. You were not to blame.”
They sat there, staring at each other until Cuchulainn finally said, “Scáthach told you?”
“She didn’t have to. I recognized the wound to your spirit.”
“How did you stop blaming yourself?” he asked slowly, as if it was difficult for him to speak the words.
“I forgave myself—for sending my escort away, for leaving the path, for bathing, for abandoning my weapons on a rock with my clothes, for not being big enough or strong enough to defeat six men with my hands and teeth. It seems silly when I say it now. I shouldn’t have needed to forgive myself for any of those things because I did nothing wrong.
” She drew in a deep breath, then asked him, “Do you know why you were captured by Aife’s men? ”
“Yes,” he said bitterly. “So that I could service Aife like one of her breeding stallions.”
“No. That is why Aife set her men after you,” Tabiti said.
“You were captured because you chose to shield Amage and me from their arrows so we could escape. Had you not protected us, you could have easily gotten away. Instead you did not dive into the safety of the loch, and Aife’s men were able to capture you.
Cu, you did nothing wrong. You are not to blame.
Forgive yourself for whatever your mind is whispering that you should have done differently.
Stop punishing yourself. When you do that, you will be able to leave what she did to you in the past.”
Cuchulainn said nothing for several minutes. Finally he spoke again. “Thank you. I will remember what you have told me.”
Tabiti echoed his earlier words. “You need not thank me. I’m glad I am here. Glad if I can help guide your spirit to heal.” Then Tabiti clucked to her horse, and they trotted after the Shadow Guard.
Cuchulainn wished he could stay at Dunscáith with these warriors who were as talented as they were honorable. He wished it so very much.
* * *
It was near midnight when Cuchulainn knocked on the door to Scáthach’s chambers.
“Come!” she called from within.