Chapter Fifteen #2
Anice did stumble into it, the hem of her skirt catching fire from the still-burning candles scattered in a ring around the thing’s
curving arms.
“Aggggh!” she wailed, freezing.
“Here!” Gelis yanked a linen off the nearest table and dropped to her knees to swat at the flames with the bunched cloth.
“ ’Tis out already — dinna fret.”
Pushing to her feet, she grabbed Anice’s arm, pulling her deeper into the throng, away from the candelabrum fire and the two
men.
Busy slapping at the smoking rushes with their plaids, they had the flames nearly under control, and — more urgently — across
the hall, the Raven still bellowed, his angry voice sharp against the tumult.
“Dear saints, what has — aaiieee!” Gelis leaped aside as four of the castle dogs sped past, nearly knocking her down.
Righting herself, she shoved back her hair and grabbed up her skirts to rush forward again, pushing and pressing through the
tight- packed throng.
“Ronan!” she called, finally seeing him.
Just gaining the dais, he tore up the steps to that raised platform, the dark fury on his face closing her throat.
Ronan! She tried to cry out again, but her voice emerged as a rasp, her chest so tight she could hardly breathe.
Panting, she clasped a hand to her breast and looked on in horror as he raced across the dais, murder in his eye. Valdar and
the others were already on their feet, but they sprang back from the table, shock on their faces as he whipped out his sword,
raising it above his head.
For one horrible moment, Ronan held the brand high and stared down at the rich viands spread across the pristine white linen.
A great platter of roasted stag haunch hadn’t yet been touched, but the bread and ale clearly had.
As well, more than one cup held dredges of his grandfather’s prized Gascon wine.
And someone — or perhaps all of them — had done great justice to Hugh MacHugh’s excellent cheese pasties.
Ronan’s heart twisted and a terrible fear ripped his innards.
Pray God he wasn’t too late.
Then, with all the rage inside him, he brought down his sword, swiping the glittering blade the full length of the high table.
Food, wine-and-ale cups and ewers, everything flew to the floor with a deafening clatter, the crash plunging men into silence.
Spinning around, he raised his blade again, this time searching the packed hall. Some still-hoping part of him willed that
he’d only just made a fool of himself and that when he met his supposed betrayer’s eyes, he’d see only surprise and innocence.
But then he spotted the man.
And his entire stance was one of wariness.
His face blanched with guilt.
“Sorley!” Ronan jumped down from the dais, his sword flashing. “A reckoning!”
“You’re mad!” The guards captain backed away, hands in the air. “Whatever you heard is untrue.”
“What makes you think I’ve heard aught?” Ronan advanced, the other man’s slip sealing his fate.
As if he knew, Sorley’s own blade appeared in a quicksilver move. “Ooh, aye, your time has come, Raven,” he snarled, vaulting
over a bench, his sword already slashing.
Ronan met his arcing swipe, the two blades sliding together with an ear-piercing screech. “Aye, my time is nigh,” he hissed,
“but no’ how you mean it!”
His muscles straining against the guardsman’s strength, he drew on his own reserves and flung him back, lunging before the
other could gain his balance.
But Sorley recovered as quickly, bringing up his sword and springing forward, their blades clashing again and again. Men pulled
back benches and tables, forming a watchful ring around them. From the corner of his eye, Ronan saw Torcaill raise his slachdan druidheachd at the edge of the circle.
The long wand gleamed bright silvery-blue as the ancient raised his voice, chanting out his protection.
Sorley saw him, too, and laughed.
“Dare needs more than an old man’s mumblings,” he sneered, his blade stabbing. “Only your blood will cleanse it!”
Ronan grunted and fought off the other’s furious slashes. The ringing of steel and his own blood roared in his ears, blotting
out all else.
His ribs blazed with unbearable heat, the muscles in his arms and shoulders on fire. The pain in his left foot slowed him,
making it ever more difficult to hold his own against the guardsman’s attack.
Somewhere a woman screamed — Gelis? — and the terror in her cry gave him a burst of strength.
“Cuidich N’ Righ!” he yelled her war slogan, his blade clanking and scraping against Sorley’s.
With renewed zeal, he claimed the assault, yelling and slashing and driving the other back. They circled and feinted, then
circled again, swords thrusting and clashing, their gazes locked and heated, both panting with exertion.
Sweat dripped into Ronan’s eyes, stinging and blinding him, but he didn’t dare blink. Instead, he leaped backward and then
spun around, raising his blade high for a deadly, two-handed swing.
But Sorley whirled as well, a bright splash of red streaking around his middle even as Ronan’s sword sank deep into his shoulder,
sliding against bone.
Sorley’s eyes bulged and his own blade fell from his hand. He clutched his stomach, the blood gushing there spilling over
his hands and onto the rushes.
“A Highlander ne’er betrays his own,” Ronan panted, sickened by the sight of his own steel plunged deep into a kinsman’s breast.
He stared at his erstwhile friend, some detached part of his mind wondering why a shoulder cut bloomed so fatally red around
the guardsman’s waist.
And then Sorley toppled face-first onto the rushes and he saw.
Gelis’ s — nae, Hector’ s — sgian dubh raged hilt-deep from the guardsman’s back.
The boy stood at the edge of the throng, staring round-eyed at the little blade’s horn handle.
“He j-jumped onto it,” he spluttered, shaking his head. “I was only holding it and h-he leaped backward and then whirled round.
I didn’t mean —”
“To be sure, and you didn’t.”
Gelis.
Her face pale, but her eyes shining, she was suddenly at the lad’s side. She pulled him against her, stroking his hair and
crooning. Shielding his eyes as Ronan did what he must, flipping his kinsman onto his back and then bracing his foot against
the dead man’s chest to free his blade.
He tossed the sword aside and dropped to his knees, reaching to shut Sorley’s eyes, but before he could Gelis cried out and
slumped to the rushes.
Ronan jumped back up, scooping her into his arms and clutching her against him, but she fell anyway, twirling and tumbling
through icy darkness.
Down and down she fell, the loud buzzing in her ears blending with her scream and the distant sound of a man calling her name.
Then — as before — she slammed to a halt, this time landing on something hard and cold.
Stone, or tight-packed earth, it cradled rather than hurt her. But the darkness was suffocating. Impenetrable and cloying,
it swirled around her like a great black shroud, pressing ever closer until she was sure her lungs would burst from lack of
air.
Gelis.
The man called her name again, his voice deep and much louder now.
Then suddenly the blackness lightened and receded a bit, but she still found herself in a small, cramped place, airless and
cold.
She shivered and drew up her knees, chilled by the spinning gray mist and the surety that this was a place forsaken and damned.
Sculpted of stone and silent as the ages, its emptiness reached for her, clinging tight and grasping, as if she was its sole
salvation.
Then he was there.
Kneeling as he’d been just before her fall, though — as before — his gold neck torque was missing, and his well-loved features
seemed just a bit different — not quite those she knew so well, yet still achingly familiar.
The streaming raven hair was the same, thick, glossy, and skimming his shoulders, just as his eyes blazed with an inner heat,
though she knew instinctively that the passion burning there was not for her.
This man wasn’t the Raven.
And his needs, though passionate, were . . . others.
A burning desire that went deeper than this world, calling to her from a great, great distance even though he knelt on bended
knee before her, his outstretched arms so close she could have grasped his hands.
If she could have moved her own.
But she could only stare, her heart thumping wildly, and the icy gray mist holding her firmly in place, not letting her move
or even cry out.
He loomed closer then, kneeling directly before her, so close she could smell the cold, damp must of ancient earth and stone
that clung to him.
Again, she shivered, his chill sweeping her, seeping deep into her bones.
His stare pierced her, seeming to search her soul as a large stone appeared in his hands. Gray, round, and absolutely ordinary,
it nevertheless managed to glow and pulse, its heat singeing her.
“I beg you . . .” His voice rang in her ears.
No longer kneeling, he bent over her, his stone cradled against his chest. “Free the raven,” he pleaded, the words seeming
to catapult her into the air, sending her spinning upward and away from him.
Free the raven . . .
She heard the plea again and again, the three words accompanying her as she spiraled ever higher until, at last, she began
falling again, once more hurtling through darkness, but this time landing on something soft and warm.
Her eyes snapped open and he was still there.
He leaned over her, looming close, just as he had a moment before, but his stone was gone and the bright glint of gold shone
at his neck.
They were no longer in the tight and musty confines of a cold stone-lined room. Now she lay secure in the enclosed silk-and-furred
safety of her own dark oaken four-poster.
But her breath hitched and through the gap in the bed’s brocaded curtains she spied at least a dozen fine wax candles flickering
in iron wall brackets.
The Raven’s bedchamber, she’d bet her life, though she searched the shadows, needing to be sure.