Chapter 9
Bloody Linen
Brendan walked quickly, head down, lost in his own thoughts.
What were ye thinking, lad? Why did ye do that?
He shouldn’t have kissed her. It was beyond foolish. What had he hoped to achieve? It had only confused things. It had confused her, and she didn’t deserve that.
She certainly deserves better than me.
He was glad she was back at the convent, at least. If he knew the Abbess at all, she would keep Freya safe and sound inside for a while, until the ruckus in town died down.
It would be safest for the convent and the town if Freya moved on, but he knew the Abbess would want her to be safe, and she would put Freya’s safety over their own.
That was just the sort of woman she was.
He hated how relieved he was, knowing that Freya would be in town for a while longer.
His increased pace sent a sharp stab of pain through his side. Wincing, he stopped in a patch of moonlight and lifted up his shirt.
Earlier, when one of the soldiers had swung a sword at him, the very tip of it had sliced across Brendan’s stomach. It was only a skin wound, barely a finger’s length, and would itch and scab over within a day or two. Nothing to worry about.
He was lucky, of course. If the man had been only a few inches closer, it was likely that the sword-swipe would have disemboweled him.
I’m due a few pieces of good luck, though, he thought moodily, letting his shirt fall back. Even if I’m unlucky in love.
The shirt, of course, was ruined. The tear made by the sword might be sewn up, but Brendan had never been good at scrubbing blood out of clothing. If he was lucky, he might reduce the stain to a faint pink mark.
He would need to avoid town for a while, and avoid Ned’s pub permanently.
Although, would it have to be permanent?
Surely, Ned could be talked around. If Brendan could dig up some money from somewhere, that might go a long way towards smoothing things over.
He didn’t drink in pubs very often, but Ned’s was a convenient place, and the barkeep was probably the closest thing to a friend he’d had in quite a while.
He began to walk on, hunching up his shoulders against the rain. From here, the route home would cut straight across the forest, following one of the main pathways. Of course, the roads were generally very quiet after dark, and now it seemed almost deserted.
An uneasy prickle started up at the back of his mind. The forest seemed very quiet; no animals chirping, no birds fluttering in the trees, not even an owl hooting or a mouse-rustling.
He slowed his steps, straightening up. His heart was thumping, and he couldn’t work out why.
Up ahead, there was a roundish clearing, illuminated well by the moonlight.
It was the only way forward, on account of highly dense undergrowth on either side.
Brendan was only a few steps away from it. He swallowed thickly.
Then the undergrowth moved, just a little, despite the fact there was no breeze.
He exhaled once and turned to run.
He wasn’t fast enough.
Men exploded out of the undergrowth at either side of the clearing.
He counted six—no, seven—men, all carrying clubs, and one or two with swords.
He made it a few feet back up the path before one of the men hurled himself at him, tripping him up and bringing him down.
In an instant, he was pinned down, ribs groaning under the weight of his attackers.
“Well, well, well,” came a nastily familiar voice, a touch muffled. “We meet again, lad.”
With an effort, Brendan twisted to look up, and saw the soldier from earlier, the one who’d torn off Freya’s wimple. His voice was muffled because his jaw and cheek were horribly swollen from where Brendan had punched him, and he was probably missing a tooth or two.
Even though it was a terrible, terrible idea, Brendan grinned.
“Ye look better than before, if I do say so myself.”
The man snarled, dropping to one knee, sure that his friends had Brendan pinned down well.
“Ye can talk smart now, laddie, but this isn’t over.
Ye see, I think that lass with ye was the girl they’re looking for.
I see that she’s not with ye now, and that cursed witch of an Abbess wouldn’t let us search the convent, but her security won’t last. Can’t prove a thing, she said.
I should have fetched her a clout on that smart mouth of hers.
Things are changing, and when they do, that convent is going to burn from the eaves down.
In the meantime, ye are going to be very helpful, aye?
Going to tell us everything we want to know, and more.
And then, at the end, ye are going to give me and my pals a good old heartfelt apology. How does that sound?”
Brendan strained his muscles, trying desperately to break free.
“I think ye sound like a madman,” he snarled.
The man drew back, chuckling. “I think ye sound like a man stuck in a corner.”
Without warning, he drew back his foot, and drove a vicious kick into Brendan’s side. It was so unexpected, he let out a grunt, his body flinching. Pain spread across his side, sharp and insidious. The cut on his stomach flared painfully, and he felt fresh blood dribble down his side.
“How did ye find me?” Brendan gasped, thinking of nothing beyond buying time. Buying time for what, he could not have said. “Just wandered around the forest looking for me, did ye?”
The man smiled broadly. “I am glad ye asked. Ned, step forward, won’t ye?”
Brendan’s heart plummeted into his boots. An eighth man shuffled forward, head down as if in shame, and he knew who it was even before he stepped out of the shadows.
“Ned, man,” Brendan whispered, locking eyes with his old friend. “What did they give ye to sell me out for?”
Ned wouldn’t look at him, dropping his gaze straight away. “I needed coin for the repairs,” he mumbled. “And they threatened to wreak more havoc. It’s yer own fault; ye take the same route home.”
Thank the gods ye don’t know where my home is, Brendan thought, misery flooding sourly through him. And thank them, too, that Freya wasn’t with me.
“Off ye go then, lad,” the man said dismissively, waving a hand at Ned. “Stay out of this, aye?”
“Ye… ye’ll not really hurt him, will ye?” Ned asked, voice quavering a little. “Ye said—”
“Shut up!” the man aimed another kick at Brendan’s stomach, then another. He felt blood pour down his side, hot and itchy.
Ned came forward, holding out his hands. “Lads, please…”
“Get him out of the way!”
Two of the men pinning Brendan down released him, turning towards Ned.
Finally, he thought, gritting his teeth against the pain. Brendan yanked an arm free, driving an elbow back into the face of the man scrabbling for him.
One down.
Then he was on his feet, pulling out a knife from his belt. Another man tried to snatch it from him, but Brendan punched him in the throat. Two down.
The fair man lurched for him again, and Brendan seized him by the neck, shoving him against the wall.
“Ye had better kill me,” the man spat. “My name is Fergus McDall, and if ye don’t kill me now, I’ll kill ye the next time I see ye.”
Brendan bared his teeth.
I could kill him. I’ve killed men before.
And then what? When they drag him before the authorities, they’ll have a real crime to accuse me of.
I’m not this man.
He shoved the man aside—Fergus McDall, as if he was likely to remember that—and plunged into the undergrowth.
There were shouts and curses behind him, and the sound of pursuit. Brendan’s whole torso was aflame with pain, and sticky blood was now making its way down his leg. He didn’t dare look down. Damage had been done, that was clear. His breath came hard, and his vision was blurring already.
If it had been a simple test of his speed against theirs, Brendan would have lost. His strength was fading, and he could hardly breathe, let alone run. But this was his forest now, and he knew it like the back of his hand, come day or night.
The sounds of pursuit had been gone for a while by the time he staggered onto his own land. It would have been sensible to hang back and hide, waiting to make sure he was not being followed, but he knew deep down that he didn’t have the strength.
Ned doesn’t know where I live, so they don’t know where I live. Does it matter, though? They’ll find me eventually.
And when Laird Grahame finds out where I am, it’s all over. All over. All of this will have been for nothing.
The grimy, low-ceilinged house that served as his home was all dark, no lights on in the windows. No one was waiting up for him. He stumbled inside, collapsing onto the hearth. The house was cold, of course, the kitchen fire long since gone out and left to cool.
He kept his eyes closed, even as padding paws approached. A wet, soft nose nudged his forehead.
“I’m sorry, Argentum, I can’t play with ye tonight,” Brendan rasped. “I’m… I’m not well. Just got to sleep a wee bit, then I’ll put on the fire and get us something to eat, eh? Eh?”
Then the darkness closed in.
When Brendan woke up, more time had passed than he’d expected.
The door, which he’d left swinging open, let in the chilly gray light before dawn, along with gusts of icy wind and a speckling of snow.
Lying in front of the hearth, Brendan was half-frozen with cold.
Argentum curled up alongside him in a tight ball, cold and miserable.
The dog’s ears pricked as Brendan stirred, and his tail thumped lazily on the ground.
Brendan had been beyond foolish, acting the way he had.
What sort of fool am I, stumbling noisily home in the dark, not even checking to make sure I wasn’t followed? And then leaving the door open for any wild beast to wander in.
It’s wild beasts of the human variety which worry me the most.
There was no time to lie and wallow, however. There was work to be done. Brendan began to push himself up into a sitting position, but a stabbing, sickening pain knocked him back. He flopped back, gasping, and memories of his injury came flooding back.
The neat cut, nothing to worry about. Fergus’ kicks. Blood, dripping sticky down my skin.
He risked a glance downwards. His leather jerkin covered much of his torso, but when he gingerly pulled it aside, he saw that the linen shirt underneath was almost completely red.
All around his waistband was red, with stains running down his trousers.
The red climbed up over his stomach almost to the center of his breastbone.
So much blood, he thought dizzily, fear tasting cold and acrid in his mouth.
Beside him, Argentum whined.
“Nothing to fret about, laddie,” Brendan gasped, but his voice was uneven with pain. He finally managed to sit up, resting his back against the cold stove, and carefully pulled back his shirt.
It was stuck to his skin, and came free with a sickening squelching noise and fresh flares of pain. Brendan had to bite back a moan of fear when he saw the wound underneath.
The clean cut of before, done with a clean sword and ready to scab over entirely, was gone.
It had split open with the kicking he’d received, a jagged cut around the length of his forearm.
It wasn’t deep, which was a mercy; otherwise Brendan might now be trying to put his own organs back inside himself.
However, the edges would struggle to knit together, and the wound still bled and oozed.
That wasn’t the worst of it. Sweat, dirt, and even mud had made its way into the cut, he could see the debris. Picking it all out would be a hellish, painful nightmare, and even that might be too late. Already, the edges of the cut were inflamed red, hot and sore to the touch.
He let the shirt fall back. It was obviously ruined now.
“Well, lad, this isn’t good,” he whispered softly, and Argentum whined again, butting his head against his arm. “But we’ve been in worse scrapes, eh? I’m not alone, anyway. I’ve got ye, laddie, haven’t I?”
Sensing kind words, Argentum’s tail thumped on the ground and let out a short bark.
“Ye are right,” Brendan murmured, biting back a groan of pain. “I can’t just lie here and wait to die, can I? Up we get, then.”
In one movement, not giving himself time to edge upwards and think about the pain, Brendan hauled himself up into a crouching position, and then up onto his feet. The pain hit him like a wall, making his vision blur, and he sagged against the counter, groaning aloud.
Bandages. Bandages, dressings, stitches. But before any of that, it needs cleaning.
Usually, he would go out to the well to fetch clean water, and use that to rinse out the wound, before dipping some cloth in alcohol and using that to do a more thorough, painful clean.
He knew that he’d never make it to the well in this state, let alone back again with a bucket of water. His hands were shaking beyond control, and it seemed almost laughable that he’d be able to do much to clean his own wound.
Crawling across the kitchen, leaning on the counter, Brendan aimed for an opened bottle of whiskey.
It was bad stuff, sour and strong, but better than nothing.
He pulled out the cork with his teeth and spat it out, not caring where it went.
He took a long, slow slug —for courage, he told himself—and then, gritting his teeth in preparation, he poured the rest of the bottle over the wound on his side.
The pain was immense, jolting him backwards and making him cry aloud. He drummed his feet on the stone floor, as if that would do anything, and Argentum barked and bounced around at the noise, clearly distressed.
Once the red haze had faded, Brendan glanced down at the wound. His heart sank. While some of the blood and dirt had been washed away, some still remained. And when it came to bloody injuries, the first few hours were crucial. Allowing the wound to sit could let infection set in.
He grabbed a piece of gauze, intending to dab at the wound, but the blood loss, exhaustion, and pain was too much, overwhelming him.
He knew he was going to faint in the instant before darkness claimed him, and so Brendan took the liberty of lowering himself to the ground before he could hit it at full force. Argentum, thinking that they were playing, frisked over to him, barking and jumping, diving on him and licking his face.
Brendan smiled faintly at his frisking dog, raising a shaky hand to pat his head.
“If I die here, and nobody ever knows,” he mumbled, “I reckon ye would eat me, wouldn’t ye?”
Argentum tilted his head, not understanding.
“I wouldn’t mind,” Brendan admitted. “At least I’d be good for something in the end.”
And then that was it. Darkness closed in, and he knew no more. That last thought in Brendan’s conscious mind was a name, ringing out clear as day.
Freya.