Chapter 3 #3
"Of course. We'll find her once we know who the miscreants are." Brodie's heart ached for their losses. Ten females in total had been taken.
"How?" Harcus asked, his voice desperate and his lined face haggard. "We did not see who captured them." Two of this somber man's grown but unmated daughters had been abducted.
How could Brodie boost their morale? "You're learning to be skilled fighters, so you can guard the females well. You'll nay allow them to abduct more." He had no guarantees, but he would do all he could for them. He might even have to train the females in self-defense.
"Aye, but will we ever see the ones we lost again? Will I ever see Imogen again?" Near overcome with grief, Daavar shook his head.
Brodie could not answer that, in truth, but he would endeavor to find the females.
"We have no notion when the brutes will return," Ronin snarled, his scowl fearsome and his blue eyes dark.
"I still wonder if another selkie tribe abducted them for wives." After choosing a coarse gray schist whetstone from the wooden case, Brodie pressed the blade's edge against it, then moved it in a circular motion, creating a rasping sound.
"Nay, lad." Scarth shook his head emphatically, his silvery beard swaying.
"We have gatherings every spring with the other selkie tribes from the islands, all the way to Shetland, and those without mates can find one.
Among our kind, stealing a wife has always been grounds for war.
And we have not had a war in centuries."
Brodie well knew they maintained an oral history passed down for many generations from the ancient past.
"We are normally peace loving," Harcus said, his voice deep and raspy. "But they are forcing us to take up arms!"
"I ken it." Once the nicks were out of the blade, Brodie used the fine white Scotch snakestone to smooth it. "But whoever is doing this is nay peace loving. They are vile devils."
They all nodded, grumbling their complaints.
"We've had to change all our customs and routines because of these outlaws." Ronin leapt up and paced. "We're getting little sleep."
"Staying in seal form for longer periods of time is stressful for the females. They need balance and rest, but they have been exhausted," Scarth said.
"Not to mention terrified," Ronin muttered.
Brodie used a leather strop to polish the blade he'd been sharpening. "You are all resilient. And I'm helping you to grow stronger and more cunning." Brodie rose and tied his long hair back with a leather strip. "Come. Grab a sword. We'll practice."
After picking up his sword, targe, and dirk, Brodie headed toward the cave's exit.
A small brownish-black bird with a white rump flew out ahead of him.
What was a storm petrel doing in the cave?
Trying to snatch some fish scraps? The bird disappeared behind the massive black crags that protruded from the white sand beach.
The sun glared off the azure water, near blinding him.
"I'm determined to thrash the bastards," Daavar growled.
"You're learning quickly, my friend." Brodie considered him one of the best fighters so far.
At the beginning of their training, he'd had the men practice their stances and footwork on the hard-packed wet sand at low tide. Now, 'twas time for something more difficult.
The sparkling dry sand squeaking under his feet, Brodie strode farther up the beach.
When the raiders attacked, the selkies would need to fight on this unstable sand, so they'd best get used to it.
Since selkies were always barefoot in human form, and they used their toes far better than humans wearing shoes or boots, they were fast mastering the footwork.
Selkie men were naturally muscular, especially the younger ones. But even the chief, the eldest of this tribe and equivalent to a human in his fifties, was practicing with them and growing more bulked up. They knew full well 'twas a life and death struggle they must all invest time and effort in.
Most selkies were left-handed. All the men present carried a leather-wrapped sword in their dominant hand and a sheathed dirk and targe in their non-dominant.
They'd enjoyed learning lunges and feints, such as how to distract an opponent with the sword's tip while stabbing toward the foe with a dirk hidden behind a targe. They thought it clever. But he warned them that all Highlanders fought that way.
He had taught them the inside and outside guard stances early on, and they had been pairing up and practicing switching between the two, plus blocking each other's strikes with the sword's basket hilt.
Now, he taught them how to come out of that block to execute a cut to their opponent's head or neck over the top of their blade.
Brodie had been learning these skills for a lifetime, and he knew the selkies couldn't master them in a matter of weeks. To their benefit, they were dedicated and determined.
A few minutes later, a movement near the huge black rocks protruding from the beach drew Brodie's attention.
The creature had been larger than a bird.
Had it been a seal or a human? Was something hiding behind the stone?
He rushed forward to check. The storm petrel darted from the ground and flew out over the sea.
What the devil? They built nests in rocky crevices in spring, but nay in October.
In fact, they should've already migrated south by now.