21 #3
Slowly Amber drew away from Duncan and slid from the bed, unable to bear the agony of touching him any longer.
With hands that trembled, she removed her amber pendant and placed it across the coiled metal of the war hammer that had given Duncan his name.
She reached out to him one last time, but did not touch him.
“God be with you, dark warrior,” Amber whispered, “for I cannot be.”
MEG looked across the table at her husband.
Their cold breakfast of bread, meat, and ale lay largely ignored on the trestle table in the great hall.
Dominic was leaning back in his chair, eyes narrowed.
The fingers of his right hand drummed softly on his thigh in time to the haunting tune Ariane was playing on a lap harp.
Simon carved another slice of venison, poured some ale into a dainty goblet, and set both in front of Ariane.
“Leave off making the harp weep and eat,” he said tersely.
“Again? I feel like a goose being fattened for a feast,” she muttered.
But Ariane set aside the harp and began to eat. It was easier than arguing with Simon when he had that determined look in his eyes.
“Have you dreamed, Meg?” Dominic asked abruptly.
“Yes.”
“Glendruid dreams?” he asked.
“Yes.”
The fact that Meg said no more told Dominic that the dreams had been unhappy…and that they had offered no solutions. The backs of his fingers stroked her cheek.
“Small falcon,” he said in a low voice, “I must find a way to give Blackthorne peace. I want our child to be born into a time and a place not torn apart by war.”
Meg kissed Dominic’s palm and watched him with eyes made luminous by love.
“Come what will, Glendruid Wolf,” she whispered, “I will never regret bearing your child.”
Ignoring the others in the room, Dominic lifted Meg into his lap. Golden bells braided into her hair shivered and chimed. He held her close, whispering his love.
After a time, the haunting cry of the harp resumed, beautiful music describing all the shades of sadness.
“What a cheerful gathering,” Erik mocked as he entered the great hall, his peregrine on his wrist. “Do you play often for funerals, Lady Ariane?”
“That is one of her lighthearted tunes,” Simon said.
“God save us,” Erik muttered. “Leave off, lady. You will have my peregrine in tears.”
The peregrine in question flared her wings briefly before she settled to watching the gathered humans with inhuman curiosity.
“I would have expected you to be with Duncan,” Dominic said, “driving Learning into his thick skull.”
“My sister tried a more certain method,” Erik said, smiling slightly. “She went to Duncan last night.”
Dominic’s smile was an exact reflection of Erik’s. “That explains their absence at morning chapel.”
“Aye.”
“Did it help my quest for peace?”
Erik hesitated. Then he shrugged. The peregrine shifted restlessly on his wrist, making silver bells on her jesses ring.
“Something has changed,” Erik said. “I can sense it. But I don’t know what.”
“Permit me to educate you,” Cassandra said from behind Erik.
The quality of the Learned woman’s voice brought a hush to the room.
Erik stepped aside, allowing Cassandra room to pass. He saw that her normally braided and concealed hair was loose, a seething silver glory rippling freely over her scarlet cloak. Ancient silver rune stones glittered in her hands.
The peregrine flared her wings again and gave a keening cry.
“You have just come from casting silver runes,” Erik said, his voice toneless.
There was no answer. None was needed. The hammered silver markers in the Learned woman’s hands spoke for themselves.
“What did you learn?” Erik asked.
“More than I wished. Less than I hoped.”
Cassandra walked until she stood in front of Dominic and Meg.
“Witch of Glendruid,” Cassandra said formally, “do you dream?”
A single glance at Cassandra’s silver eyes brought Meg to her feet.
“Yes,” Meg said. “I dream.”
“Will you share your dreams?”
“A scream the color of amber. A darkness being torn apart like tough cloth, one fiber at a time.”
Cassandra bowed her head for a moment. “Thank you.”
“For what? There is neither comfort nor answer in my dream.”
“It was confirmation I sought, not comfort.”
Meg gave the older woman a curious look.
“When my emotions are involved,” Cassandra said calmly, “I have to be wary of casting the silver stones. Sometimes I see what I wish rather than what is.”
“What did you see?” Meg asked. “Will you share it?”
“The amber prophecy is complete. She has given her heart and her body and her soul to Duncan.”
“You didn’t need to cast the silver stones to see that was coming,” Erik said.
Cassandra nodded agreement.
“Then why did you cast them?” Erik asked. “They are not to be used lightly.”
“Aye.”
Silently Cassandra looked from Erik to Dominic. Then she looked at no one at all.
“Erik, son of Robert,” she said. “Dominic, Wolf of Glendruid. If you go to war now, it is because you wish to. Amber is no longer your excuse. She has—”
“What are you saying?” Erik interrupted roughly.
“—removed herself from your masculine equations of pride and power and death.”
“What has she done?” Erik demanded.
“She gave her amber pendant to Duncan.”
The peregrine shrieked as though its blood had turned to fire.
But even the falcon’s scream couldn’t drown the chilling scream of masculine rage that came echoing down the keep’s great hall from above.
Cassandra tilted her head as though savoring the sound. Her smile was as cruel as winter.
“Duncan’s suffering has begun,” she said softly. “Amber’s soon will end.”
Dominic looked from the Learned woman to Erik.
“What is she talking about?” Dominic demanded.
Erik simply shook his head, unable either to speak or to calm his falcon’s wild cries. He looked as though he had been struck by a mailed fist.
Another scream of anger echoed. Before it ended there were horrible sounds of smashing and clashing and rending, as though a battle were being fought in the lord’s bedchamber.
“Simon,” Dominic said, coming swiftly to his feet.
“Aye!”
Side by side, the two brothers raced up the stone stairway to Duncan’s bedchamber. What they saw there made them pull up short in the doorway.
Duncan was a man possessed. Naked but for two amber talismans, he stood with the battle hammer in one hand. His lips were drawn back from his teeth in a grimace of pain or rage or both in unholy communion.
With a lunge, he ripped covers from the bed and flung them into the hearth. Smoke bloomed sullenly, then burst into savage flames, burning even higher than before.
The hammer whistled and hummed in a deadly blur, driven by the mad power of Duncan’s arm.
The hammer descended, a wooden table exploded, and he kicked the pieces into the fire.
Then the hammer sang again, cutting circles around Duncan’s head, its moan in ghastly duet with his scream of fury.
The bed frame was smashed to kindling and fed to the ravening fire.
Dominic had seen men like this before, in the heat of battle, when the leash was slipped on all that was human and only rage remained.
“There will be no reasoning with him,” Dominic said softly to Simon.
“Aye.”
“We have to take him before he turns on the people of the keep.”
“I’ll get some rope from the armory.”
Dominic drew his sword. “Don’t be long, brother.”
He was talking to himself. Simon already was sprinting toward the staircase.
Very quickly Simon reappeared with a coil of rope in his hand. Dominic was waiting in the doorway, his heavy black mantle in one hand and his sword in the other. As soon as he saw Simon, he sheathed the sword.
“When I tangle the hammer in my mantle,” Dominic said, “get enough rope on Duncan to hold a bear.”
Just as Dominic started forward, he sensed Meg coming up behind him. His arm shot out, barring her from the room.
“Stay back,” Dominic said in a low voice. “Duncan is in a berserker’s rage. He doesn’t know anyone right now, least of all himself.”
The hammer moaned and whipped through the air. Wood shattered like pottery. The chest was destroyed in a single blow and kicked into the fire. All that remained was a smaller chest and a wardrobe.
As soon as the hammer began to circle again, Dominic struck. His mantle fouled the hammer. Before Duncan could jerk it free, Dominic dove at him low and hard, sweeping Duncan off his feet. He landed with a crash that drove the breath from his body.
Even that wasn’t enough to subdue Duncan. If it hadn’t been for Simon’s quickness, Duncan would have shaken off the attack with the strength of the madness that had claimed him.
But in the end, the two brothers finally managed to truss Duncan like a fowl for the spit.
Duncan gave a last, terrible cry and strained against his bonds until his face was dark. Even his great strength wasn’t enough to throw off Dominic, Simon, and the ropes that bound him. Slowly the violent tension began to leave Duncan’s body.
Breathing heavily, Simon and Dominic wiped sweat from their faces and came warily to their feet. Duncan lay unmoving, his eyes open, staring at nothing. Dominic retrieved his mantle and spread it over Duncan’s nakedness.
“Now, Meg,” Dominic said. “He knows you best.”
“Duncan,” Meg said softly. “Duncan.”
Slowly Duncan’s head turned until he could look at her.
“Meggie?” he asked.
“Aye, Duncan. What is wrong?”
The last light of madness left Duncan’s eyes, leaving no light at all.
“Gone,” Duncan said simply.
“What?”
There was no answer.
Meg came forward and knelt by Duncan’s shoulder. Gently she stroked the hair back from his sweat-drenched forehead.
“Amber?” asked Meg. “Is she gone?”
“The light…” A shudder went through Duncan’s big body. “She took the light with her, Meggie.”