Chapter 15
That night seemed never-ending. Sentanta struggled to think, to see, to comprehend exactly what was happening to him. Scáthach was there—and then she was not.
The drink. It did something to him. Blurred his vision. Addled his mind. Cocooned his body from reality.
But what was real? His befuddled mind only understood two things. He desired Scáthach more than anyone. And so he clung to the second thing, the words she spoke over and over and over . . . I am she and she is me.
* * *
“It was a trap!” Tabiti shouted as she and Taog carried Amage from the little boat to the shore.
“Cuchulainn?” Scáthach asked. Beside her, Uathach rushed into the water to meet them.
“Th-they s-set the trap for Cu.” Amage trembled with shock and pain, but her gaze was clear. Tabiti had broken off the end of the arrow, but the arrowhead and part of the shaft were still embedded in the back of her thigh.
“They took him,” added Tabiti.
A chill skittered through Scáthach. “Did he not call the berserker?”
“He tried,” said Tabiti as they placed Amage gently on the bank. “They cast a weighted net over him so that he couldn’t dive to safety in the loch.”
“The berserker can tear a man apart with his hands. He can definitely rip open a net,” said Scáthach.
“Yes, and he would have, but they did not come at him with swords and spears and arrows,” said Tabiti. “They pinned him to the ground and then beat him unconscious with clubs.”
“Oh, goddess!” Uathach gasped. “Is he alive?”
“I believe so,” said Tabiti. “I watched as much as I could. They stopped clubbing him when he went limp, and then they dragged him to the wall and hauled him up and into the fort.”
“Th-they s-said it.” Amage wrapped her arms around herself, trying to stop the violent shivers that had overtaken her body as she spoke through chattering teeth. “S-said to kill th-the women and t-take Cu alive.”
“But why?” Uathach asked.
“Perhaps Aife means to trade him for something or someone of value,” said Tabiti. “Like you.”
Uathach scoffed. “My mother would not be so stupid.”
“No, I would not, but Aife doesn’t know me so she doesn’t know that capturing one of my students will only ensure she will not hold him or Dùn Dòbhrain long enough to attempt a trade,” said Scáthach.
“Make a litter!” she called to the Shadow Guard.
“We need to get Amage back to camp and tend her wound.”
“Queen Scáthach, if I may.” Taog bowed his head. “My wife is a bonny healer, known in these parts as a true wise woman. Our cottage is just around the bend there.” He pointed to the south, away from the islet. “It would be my honor to take Amage to my home and care for your warrior.”
“Thank you, Taog. Your offer is much appreciated,” said Scáthach. She turned to Tabiti. “You may go with her.”
“And what will you do?” asked Tabiti.
“Return to camp and ready the guard to attack the fort at dusk.”
Amage took Tabiti’s hand. “G-go with the queen. Save Cu.” She looked up at Scáthach. “He s-saved us—shielded us with his b-body while they rained arrows at us.”
“He did,” said Tabiti. “And he was wounded.”
Amage looked up and met Scáthach’s gaze. “W-we didn’t w-want to leave him.”
Scáthach crouched beside Amage and Tabiti. “Of course you didn’t want to leave him. I know that. He knows that. And we’ll get him back. Alive.”
Scáthach stood. “Taog, can you take Amage to your wife and then come back here when it is fully dark? I have need of your boat one more time.”
“Aye, Queen Scáthach. My boy and I will gladly return.”
“You have my gratitude. Ask a boon of me, and if it is within my power I will grant it you,” said Scáthach. As she turned away, Iain ran to her.
The boy bowed low. “My queen! Would you consider training me?” He straightened and added, “I know I’m just a fisherboy, but I want to learn. I want to be a protector like you. Like Cuchulainn. Like Tabiti and Amage.”
Scáthach smiled and touched his cheek. “It is not important what you are now. It is important what you have a passion to become. Yes, Iain, son of Taog, the boon I owe will be fulfilled when you are of age and come to Dunscáith. I will train you to be a protector.” Her gaze slid from the boy to the old fisherman.
“With your father’s permission, of course. ”
“He has it as well as my blessing,” said Taog, his cheeks flushing with pride as he smiled at his son. “Now, laddie boy, let’s get our warrior loaded back into the boat and take her to your bonny mum.”
* * *
After the sun slid silently behind the Isle of Skye, a chill wind blew over the loch, bringing a thick shroud of mist that hovered over the water like spirits of the dead, creeping into the fort and the pine-covered hills, coating everything in a gray silence through which even the sound of the loch lapping against the shore was muffled.
Scáthach stood with her back to the loch.
Taog and Iain had beached the little boat and waited.
She faced the Shadow Guard. All were mounted and ready to ride to the fort.
The thick fog allowed them to follow the same route around the loch she had taken earlier; it would conceal them until the guard was literally at the castle bridge.
Uathach stood at her side. Tabiti was mounted at the head of the guard.
“My aunt Cliodna, Goddess of Waterways, is with us tonight,” Scáthach told her warriors, lifting her voice to slice through the muffling fog.
“She sends concealment. Ride to the fort bridge and wait for Uathach’s sign—the opening of the great front doors—and then attack.
The last count of Aife’s men was given me by Geirr of Lethra. He numbers them at two hundred.”
“Two for each one of us. Easy odds,” said Tabiti.
“Aye!” shouted her Shadow Guard, their fierce grins showing white through the gray mist.
“The only trap we know of was the one they sprang on Cuchulainn,” said Tabiti.
“But keep your wits about you and your eyes sharp,” said Scáthach.
“We don’t truly know what awaits within the fort.
” The Queen of Shadow stepped forward, closer to her guard.
Her eyes flashed with anger, though her voice remained calm.
“By sunrise Aife’s army will be destroyed.
They have ambushed us on our own island, put a price on my head, wounded our people, killed Cynwrig, and captured Cuchulainn.
For their crimes they will not be shown mercy.
Shadow Guard, destroy them!” She raised a fist into the air.
“Aye!” her warriors shouted.
As mist consumed the echoes of their voices, the roar of a bear sounded from the woods, wrapping around them as if the beast would ride beside them to the castle.
“My mother’s creature adds his voice to ours. Even from Valhalla Béfionn supports us. Remember that with her blessing, the great brown bear also adds his strength to ours,” said Scáthach. “Béfionn is with us in spirit!”
“We will remember, Queen of Shadow!” vowed Tabiti. “To victory!”
“To victory!”the guard echoed. And then Tabiti kneed her horse, and the guard followed her to be enfolded in mist.
Scáthach and Uathach had already loaded their poles and weapons into the little boat.
Dusk had settled into night and the fog was so thick that they didn’t need to conceal themselves in the bottom of the boat.
They shoved off from the bank, and Taog and Iain rowed into the center of the lake.
Once there, they lifted their oars as the old fisherman tried to get his bearings.
Even far out on the loch the fog was so thick that it shielded the lights of the fort from them.
Uathach sat beside her mother on the aft bench. She leaned into Scáthach. “You should help him find the way to the fort. If not, we could be out here most of the night, rowing impotently in circles as Tabiti and the guard wait restlessly for the doors to the fort to be opened.”
“Help him?”
“Your nursemaids know the way to the fort,” Uathach said.
“Oh! Of course.” Scáthach untucked the dagger from the leather sheath around her waist. She cut a small line in her forearm and then leaned over the side just far enough that she could submerge the wound in the loch.
She glanced up at Taog and Iain, who watched her with open curiosity.
“I’m calling for navigation help,” she told them.
They said nothing but kept glancing from her to the seemingly endless fog, swiveling their heads back and forth until they reminded her of owls.
It didn’t take long before the calm loch rippled and the silver of scutes and dorsal fins split the water as huge sturgeons swarmed around the boat, butting against it and forcing them forward and toward starboard.
“By all the gods, what are those?” Iain’s voice wasn’t much more than a terrified squeak.
His father smiled, picked up his oars, and motioned for his son to do the same as he bowed his head quickly to Scáthach and said, “They’re sturgeons. Friends of Béfionn, and thereby also friends of our Queen of Shadow. Row with them.”
Guided by ancient sturgeons, the boat glided through the water.
“That was wise of you to remind me to call the sturgeons.” Scáthach let her fingers trail through the water as the boat moved smoothly forward.
When Uathach didn’t reply, she really looked at her daughter.
Uathach’s face was pale and her expression masked. “Uathach?”
When her daughter met her gaze, Scáthach saw anxiety in her eyes that hadn’t been reflected in Uathach’s face or voice—though the anxiety was very familiar to her. “You’ve had a second vision.”
Uathach nodded.
Scáthach knew if her daughter’s vision had to do with the outcome of the battle at the fort, Uathach would tell her, and as she hadn’t spoken of it, the vision must be personal, or . . . Scáthach felt a chill in her blood.
“Is it Cuchulainn? Is he dead?”
Uathach quickly shook her head. “No. I would have told you immediately had I seen that.” She paused. Her brow furrowed and she combed a hand through her lion’s mane hair. “I’ve been trying to understand what I saw. It doesn’t make sense.”