Chapter Fourteen
Svanna, praying to any god who listened that the pair had been found unharmed and were now here, or if not precisely here, very close, linked her arm with Rand’s. ‘We show a united front, no matter what.’
He smiled down at her and patted her hand. ‘Thank you.’
Several of Rand’s men milled about the yard, talking in low voices, but no one else. When Svanna and Rand entered the yard they stopped talking and shuffled their feet.
‘What is this all about?’ Rand asked in a measured tone but she could feel the tension in his arm. He had guessed as well as she did that their absence from the yard was not good news. ‘Have you found them? Bring them to me.’
‘My lord.’ One of his men brought a horse forward with a bundle of bloodied clothes. ‘We discovered these neatly folded under an oak tree down by the fork before the Emlagh Bog. I fear for Lord Thorarinn and Lady Rhiannon.’
‘Did you find any horses?’
The man shook his head. ‘No horses. Just the cloak.’
Rand held out his hand and the man put the cloak in it.
‘I’ve seen Lord Thorarinn wear that cloak many times, my lord. No mistaking it. He’d never willingly abandon it. He used to tell that story about the time in Constantinople…’
Rand gave the briefest of nods. His throat worked up and down, but no sound emerged. Svanna patted his back, but he moved away.
‘Do we know who did this?’ Svanna asked, realising that he was struggling. He gave her a grateful look. ‘Is it a notorious area for thieves or bandits if it is near a peat bog? Remember I am a stranger here.’
The man who had carried the cloak shuffled his feet. ‘I assume it was bandits, my lady.’
‘We haven’t had them here in a good few years,’ Rand said. ‘One good thing I have done.’
‘Must be a new lot. You ain’t been around here lately, what with the King’s business and all, my lord. Meaning no disrespect, sir.’
Rand raised a brow. ‘Why do you think bandits? Why not men from the North?’
‘We found a North-made sword quite near to these bloodied clothes,’ another man piped up.
‘Why would bandits leave an intact sword?’ Svanna said, tilting her head to one side. ‘A good sword is hard to come by, normally the last thing anyone leaves and the first thing people take.’
Rand gave her a curious look. ‘My lady speaks true. Why would bandits leave any metal?’
The questions swarmed in his head like bees around honey. If no bandits existed in that area but Thorarinn had run into difficulty, who was he meeting? Why had it gone sour?
‘Perhaps they were disturbed, my lady,’ the man answered with a frown. ‘We found the corpse of a heavy-set man in the undergrowth, but no one we recognised. Maybe he was from the North.’
‘Did anyone think to bring the dead man?’ Svanna said.
‘What good would have that done, my lady?’
‘What good? All the saints and angels preserve me!’ Rand thundered. ‘Where did you leave your brains? My cousin is injured or possibly dead.’
Svanna put her hand on her hip. ‘I’m trying to help. The corpse is important. If we can work out who he is, we might be able to figure out where your cousin and his bride are.’
‘I didn’t mean you, Svanna. This lot bring my cousin’s cloak but leave this corpse.’
The man flushed. The other men still shuffled their feet. ‘We wanted to get back here as quickly as we could. If there were bandits about, we didn’t want to stay. We had a quick look round, like, but no other bodies, no nothing.’
Rand’s scar throbbed and he appeared to be clinging onto his temper. ‘You found a Northern sword, but didn’t think to bring that?’
‘We brought the sword.’ The man gestured to one of the others, who proudly carried it over.
Rand turned it over. ‘Kaupang or Agthir, Svanna?’
‘Did this corpse have any markings on his face?’ Svanna asked, trying to keep some sort of order. ‘Can you remember that much?’
The man’s mouth dropped open. ‘What sort of markings, my lady?’
‘Hatchet marks on both sides of the face, for example. Or filed teeth?’
The man’s brow furrowed. ‘Come to think of it, there were markings but I didn’t look in his mouth.’
‘Who do you think it is, Svanna?’ Rand asked in an undertone.
‘I’ve seen a sword like that before,’ she said. ‘It belonged to the eldest of Drengr’s sons, purchased two warring seasons before in Kaupang. When I last saw him, he was heavyset and sported a series of hatchet marks on his face. He had filed his teeth as well.’
Rand put his hands on the top of his head. ‘Why would he be this far North? Why would he and his brothers risk a war with Máel Sechnaill? Outlandish tales help no one.’
‘There is my theory…about Rhiannon and Turgeis.’ She concentrated on the sword’s hilt, trying to keep a smooth face. ‘Go and retrieve the corpse and have a look around. Maybe the pair are hiding.’
‘You read my mind.’
‘Take plenty of well-armed men,’ she said. ‘We’ll be fine here.’
He rolled his eyes. ‘The day I can’t handle myself…’
‘Is the day you flee from Agthir,’ she said, concentrating on keeping her hands from shaking. She hated that the pressure to get this right kept increasing because the possibility of Rand looking at her with disgust or disdain if she was wrong was too terrible to contemplate.
Rand started laughing as his men watched open-mouthed. ‘You’re going to ensure I always remember that.’
‘Any reason to forget?’
‘The intervening years have increased my expertise.’
Svanna made a noise in the back of her throat. ‘They and their father bested you once, Rand. Don’t allow your arrogance to get the better of your caution.’
She waited, knowing that she risked provoking his temper when she had little idea of how he’d react.
‘What are you going to be doing?’
She tilted her chin upwards. Her fingers itched to demonstrate her value. A small part of her wanted him to be proud of her, even if he’d never love her or want more than a strategic marriage from her.
‘Ensuring this household is ready in case Turgeis arrives in your absence.’
‘Turgeis doesn’t have a death wish.’
Svanna kept her smile firmly in place. ‘When you return, Birdie and I will accompany you to Tara and you can personally ensure our safety. The high king must know of this outrage without delay.’ She willed him to agree with her. ‘Unless you have a better idea.’
He gave a sudden smile, one which demanded a true smile in return from her. ‘When I return, we need to speak. There is much I want to discuss…about us. About Birdie.’
Svanna’s stomach went into knots. Inadvertently, she’d built dreams where she shouldn’t.
Tantalisingly, she’d caught a glimpse of what her ideal life with Rand and Birdie could be like.
She wanted to be valued instead of being the second-best, but her wishes had a way of failing.
‘Tackling one situation before attempting another works.’
He put his hand to her cheek. ‘Until then.’
After he’d left, she realised that he hadn’t kissed her goodbye.
He deliberately had not kissed her goodbye.
Her heart ached at the knowledge that her small dream was unlikely to be fulfilled.
She smiled wryly. When would she learn that believing in impossibilities was the surest way to get hurt?
Concentrating on practicalities was the only way to keep safe.
Rand must never know about her growing feelings for him, because she refused to take the risk of being that vulnerable.
* * *
After riding hard and trying not to think about Svanna’s suggestion about taking Birdie with them when they went to Tara, or how much he wanted to be a real family with her, Rand dismounted and surveyed the clearing, which was off a narrow and disused track.
The signs of disturbance were everywhere.
But no sign of Thorarinn or Rhiannon or indeed the corpse.
It made little sense why Thorarinn would choose this route, unless he was truly attempting to escape by going the arduous route to Dubh-Linn. Rand shook his head at the folly.
Was Thorarinn running towards something or away from it? Either way, he was moving towards danger. Why hadn’t he trusted the defences Rand had put in place at the ringfort?
Rand examined a pile of leaves, but he suspected any tracks were muddled by his men.
‘Bandits, my lord?’ one of his men called out.
‘A funny sort of bandit who can defeat a band of Northern warriors.’
‘We only found one body.’
Rand clung onto the shards of his fraying temper. The ride out to the clearing had been more arduous than he’d expected. More than a dozen times, he’d discovered things he wanted to speak to Svanna about and get her opinion on. ‘If you’d brought said body with you, we would be further on.’
‘Over here in the ditch. I’d have sworn that it was in the centre of the clearing before.’
Rand marched over to the ditch. The body did appear to have been dragged there.
He turned the body over. The features of one of his tormentors stared up at him.
Rand could clearly remember his fist slamming into his stomach while he protested that he had no idea what they were talking about and that he was meeting a serving girl, Svanna.
He hated that he had blanked that out. He had not meant to, but he had inadvertently caused Svanna to suffer.
‘Svanna was right.’
‘My lord?’
‘The eldest son of Drengr took an incredible risk. Why?’
‘Spying out a route for an invasion?’
‘Thorarinn knows,’ Rand said through gritted teeth.
He also suspected Thorarinn knew far more about that long-ago attack in Agthir.
A vague memory surfaced of Thorarinn confessing about receiving gold in exchange for information about Ingebord, the gold that had helped them escape.
Bile rose in his throat at the consequences of those actions, even if Thorarinn hadn’t deliberately meant to hurt Svanna.
‘Show me where you found the clothing.’
The man pointed to the base of a large tree. ‘All folded nice and neat.’