Chapter 24
Will you allow the berserker to sleep now?” Scáthach had asked Sentanta.
“That is my intention,” Cuchulainn said.
She’d said nothing more, though he saw understanding in her eyes. He’d been grateful she’d not pressed him for a more definitive answer, but she knew. The sadness reflected in her understanding gave her away.
It gave him away, too.
* * *
They harnessed Chance and loaded the chariot as the cocooning fog dissipated. Before Cuchulainn guided the stallion to the road, he pulled the chariot to a halt and gazed silently back at their empty campsite.
Scáthach slid her arm around his waist. “It was a good place to camp.”
He draped his arm around her shoulder. “It was better than good.” Cuchulainn kissed her before reluctantly releasing her and calling to Chance, “Hup, boy! Let’s get back to the road.
” When they reached the road, Cuchulainn turned the stallion toward the wall of stormy gray that blighted the horizon.
“So it’ll just continue to get colder?” Cuchulainn asked as he wrapped his cloak more tightly around him.
“Yes, but when I call the shadows to us, they’ll help with some of the chill. A little like the fog has done for us every night,” Scáthach said.
“Do you have any idea how long it’ll take us to get to wherever it is we’ll find Curruid?”
Scáthach grinned wryly. “All I know is that Curruid will be found within the Winterlands, but shadows know everything. They’ll guide us. I don’t expect it will take them long to lead us to the monster, especially as they will be able to sense my desire to pass through the realm quickly.”
As they drew ever closer to the wall of gray that marked the boundary of the Winterlands, they talked less and less, both lost in thoughts of what the realm would hold. Scáthach wasn’t afraid, though she knew the things they would see would be terrible. She was sad.
The Queen of Shadow tried to shake off her melancholy.
But the cause of it drew closer and closer.
She’d told Cuchulainn nothing but the truth.
The shadows would lead them quickly to Curruid, and once they found the monster, she and Cuchulainn would make short work of harvesting its rib.
Their quest would be over and they would be returned to Dunscáith.
She glanced at Cuchulainn. He would leave then.
She was too old and too wise to fool herself into believing he would defy his father and change his destiny.
She knew him well enough by then to understand him.
Sentanta might have been content with a fisherman’s life; Cuchulainn never would be.
Cuchulainn was a warrior, the Hero of Ulster, a man to whom others looked for protection and for the acts of glory that made their lives richer.
When their quest ended, so too would their time together.
“What is that?” Cuchulainn’s question interrupted her thoughts.
Scáthach blinked and then followed his pointing finger.
They were close to the wall of gray. Between them and the roiling wall of clouds and fog and eerily shrieking winds was a large creature—a beast that walked on all fours.
Its coloring was wolf-like, but it was considerably larger than wolf-size.
“Is it one of your mother’s bears?” Cuchulainn asked when she didn’t respond.
“It can’t be. None are allowed here in life, and in death their spirits are joyously welcomed to the Summerlands.
” They trotted closer. A rolling growl came from the beast as its thick muzzle lifted and it scented the air.
It turned to face them, and Scáthach grimaced in disgust. The beast was all wrong.
Its body was misshapen with too many cords of thick muscles.
Enormous claws caused its gait to be strange, and it gouged the ground with every step, leaving a path of torn earth in its wake.
Its red eyes bulged. Its head was half crushed—blood and gore dripped from the terrible wound.
The creature curled back its lips to expose overly long, sharp fangs as its scarlet gaze focused on them.
“It looks like a monstrous dog,” said Scáthach.
Cuchulainn’s body stiffened. “Lugh’s balls! It’s him.”
Scáthach looked at Cuchulainn. His face had gone the color of sour milk and he stared wide-eyed at the beast that was now stalking down the road toward them as it continued to growl.
“Him? You know that beast?” she asked.
He nodded. “It’s Culann's hound. The one I killed when I was a boy and was then saddled with this name. What is he doing here? He wasn’t a bad dog. He was only doing his job and he didn’t look like this. He was large, but this creature is—”
With a fierce snarl, the dog—in death more monster than hound—attacked.
“Hup! Chance!” Cuchulainn steered the chariot around the hound, whose massive jaws snapped the empty air. “Ha! Go!” He gave the stallion his head and the chariot shot down the road as the hound gave chase.
“If you enter the Winterlands, I will call shadows to us,” Scáthach spoke hastily as she peered back at the hound that hunted them.
“But he’ll follow us,” said Cuchulainn.
“Yes, but he won’t be able to see us, so he won’t be able to attack us,” said Scáthach.
Cuchulainn shook his head. “No. That hound doesn’t belong in the Winterlands. He doesn’t belong here, either. He did nothing wrong. We have to help him.”
Scáthach’s brows shot up. “Sentanta, that isn’t a guard dog. That isn’t a good dog. That creature isn’t even a dog anymore. Help him? I think we need to help ourselves and get away from him.”
Cuchulainn’s gaze went from her to the creature pursuing them. His eyes widened. “You’re right. That isn’t the hound I defeated. He’s been changed.” Cuchulainn turned the chariot to face the beast, studying him intently as he stalked closer and closer.
“Sentanta, we need to move. That thing will attack Chance and then us. Chance is already dead, so he’ll reanimate. We are not dead. Yet. If your hound kills us, we stay dead.”
Cuchulainn passed the reins to Scáthach.
“What are you—”
“Get me close enough to the dog that I can make the leap from the chariot onto him,” he said, already positioning himself with his hands on the lip of the cart. This chariot didn’t have a leather loop for his foot, but with his speed and strength he didn’t need one.
Scáthach took the reins and got Chance under control. “Why are you doing this?”
“Look at him. Really look at him,” Cuchulainn said as he grasped the lip of the chariot more firmly, his gaze never leaving the beast that drew ever closer to them.
Scáthach focused on the creature that used to be a hound—and she saw it. “I didn’t expect that!”
“Neither did I,” he said.
“I’m going to guide Chance past him, quickly,” Scáthach explained. “And then I’ll swing the chariot around and flank him so that you can leap onto his back.” She glanced at Cuchulainn and added, “You should know that dog isn’t here because of anything he did. He’s here for you.”
“No! That can’t be. I killed him years ago. It’s unjust that he’s been here all that time—miserable and rage-filled—waiting for me. That’s an agony. I know what he feels! It happens to me.”
Scáthach expertly guided the stallion around the slavering, snarling beast, who raced past them as she cued Chance to make an inhumanly quick turn. “He’s become a berserker.”
“Yes! I don’t understand how or why, but I know it must be because of me! It isn’t right, Scáthach.”
“Then let us set it to right,” she said. “Ha, Chance! Catch him!” The chariot shot after the beast. Before the creature understood that they had turned and were racing after him, Scáthach got the cart close enough. “Now!” she shouted. “Leap!”
Cuchulainn hurled himself through the air with all the strength, balance, and poise of the son of a sky god. He landed on the creature’s back. Scáthach kept the chariot with Cuchulainn and the beast, though she was careful to stay out of range of the creature’s teeth and claws.
The beast jumped and spun, twisted and snarled, trying to dislodge him, but Cuchulainn found the thick leather collar that was still around the creature’s neck and held on as he clamped his legs firmly around the beast so that he could not be shaken off.
“Can you get a hand free? Use your dagger!” Scáthach shouted.
“No! I won’t hurt him again.” The beast tried to crane his head around so that he could rip open Cuchulainn’s legs, but the warrior was faster and stronger.
Holding tightly with his legs, he unbuckled the beast’s leather collar, and the next time the slavering mouth reached back, trying to sink his teeth into Cuchulainn, the Hero of Ulster caught his muzzle in the looped collar and pulled it tight.
Then, using all of his god-touched strength, Cuchulainn kept pulling so that the beast’s head stretched back as it snarled through pinioned lips.
The beast couldn’t keep racing forward or bucking and spinning with his head arched back.
It slowly staggered to a halt where it stood, trembling with rage as it roared through Cuchulainn’s hastily constructed muzzle.
Scáthach pulled the chariot to a halt, soothing Chance. The whites of the stallion’s eyes showed as he snorted at the slavering beast, but he calmed quickly when she murmured reassurances to him, and then she returned her attention to the berserker dog and his rider.
“Now what?” she called to Cuchulainn.
The muscles in Cuchulainn’s arms shook with the effort it took for him to keep the beast under control, but he grinned at Scáthach. “Well, how did you get through to me when I was in a berserker rage?”
Scáthach shrugged. “I appealed to the humanity I knew was still within you. You heard me, but only because you wanted to. Why should he want to hear you?”