Prologue
The tiny hamlet sat two leagues away from the Calvin Castle as the crow flies, but the Castle’s physician and apothecary were not crows.
The two men had to ride over grassy mullachs and around rocky denes until they reached the obscure settlement, and the journey took them two days to accomplish.
They had brought a healer with them, but the elderly woman was to act more like a nurse than a colleague.
She followed behind on a mule, the chest containing her herbs and powders strapped to the back of the sturdy animal’s saddle.
The two men judged the woman to be lagging a few miles behind them, which brought them no concern.
“The crone is too wizened to attract the attention of any ravisher,” the physician reassured his traveling companion. “And besides, if we slow our pace to match hers, the chances of us findin’ anyone alive in Coinneach fades with every passin’ moment.”
News of the outbreak of a sweating fever at Coinneach had reached the Calvin Castle the day after Sunday rest. The guards had pushed past the great hall sentries in their eagerness to bring their laird the news.
“Laird Calvin, there sits a man at our gates. He brings news from Coinneach: a great sweatin’ sickness is sweepin’ through the crofts, sparin’ neither man nor woman, bairn or child.
The messenger begs for ye to send the apothecary an’ the physician to them. ”
Laird Calvin stayed seated on the great hall stone dais. His rheumatism was acute this morning.
“Well, what are ye thinkin’, lad! Bring the fellow in an’ let’s hear his story!”
The guards looked at one another and then at the laird. “Laird!” one of them said. “We dare no’ even let the poor man in the gates. He’s sweatin’ an’ shiverin’ fit to shake the blood out o’ him!”
The counselors and merchants’ wives seated in the great hall all gasped and pushed away from the guards, fearing they were already contaminated.
The head guard scoffed. “Are ye gowk?! We bade the poor fellow keep his distance. Col here threw the man his water bottle, telling him to keep it an’ be gone.
Why d’ye think we’re guards? We’re no’ just standin’ at the gates as an adornment, ye ken!
There are darker, more deadly things than brigands out there in those northern mountains! ”
The other guard, Col, stepped forward. “The gates have been bolted in case others follow in this man’s wake. But it does nae change the truth o’ the matter—the hamlet o’ Coinneach pays the Calvin taxes, an’ that means we are beholden to sendin’ them aid!”
Laird Calvin did not hesitate. “Well, lads, I pay me physician an’ apothecary handsomely because of situations such as this. Go rouse them from their cogitations an’ tell them to hie forth to Coinneach.”
The learned gentlemen hailed from Inverness but made the trip to Calvin once or twice a month to treat and consult the more wealthy members of the clan.
The master physician and master apothecary were not best pleased with the news they were to set forth immediately to go render aid to a hamlet’s dying inhabitants.
“Och, I dinnae like those odds, Master Physician,” the apothecary told his cohort. “Belike the contagion is deadly besides the fact that everyone will most probably be deceased by the time we get there.”
The physician sucked his teeth in a contemplative fashion. “Should we take our time on the road? Hopefully all the folk will be dead by the time we get there?”
The apothecary looked gloomy. “What's the use? The contagion will have spread out into the miasma and lie lurking there for its next victim by then, an’ ye can be sure that Laird Calvin will want some sign or report to show we did indeed make the journey.”
The two men had been sent south to study medicine and anatomy at the finest universities in Edinburgh.
The only problem with all the knowledge they acquired there was that it stopped them from caring about their clan in the same way someone who had spent every moment of their life surrounded by their family and loved ones would care.
“I’ll be damned if I go there without a beak mask! But we only have one.”
The two men looked at one another, each preparing to make his case as to why he should be the one to wear the face mask with the long pointed beak. The beak-like appendage of the mask was meant to be stuffed with herbs to prohibit deadly miasmas from entering the user’s mouth and nose.
“Have we even got herbs to put in the mask snout?” the physician asked his friend.
A cunning smile came over the apothecary’s face.
“Aye, I do. No’ on me, ye ken; I always send out auld Iona to collect me herbs for me.
Which brings me round to suggestin’ a very clever plan.
What say we take the auld healer with us an’ send her into the hamlet first? To check if there are any survivors.”
And so it was that the two learned gentlemen asked Laird Calvin if they might take Mistress Iona Calvin with them to Coinneach.
“So that both of yer trusted advisors can observe the effects of the illness firsthand, Laird, with the crone as our witness.”
Laird Calvin waved his hand impatiently.
“I dinnae care who ye take with ye, gentlemen! Just get going afore there’s no one left alive!
The messenger expired while ye were both closeted away in yer chambers like two frightened auld mares!
The fever is deadly. Ye must see yer ways to findin’ a cure before it’s too late. ”
So, when Mistress Iona Calvin came trotting over the hilltop that overlooked Coinneach hamlet, she found the physician and apothecary at the bottom of the hill, comfortably encamped and already boiling some water to make themselves some porridge.
Iona smiled grimly. “I’ll thank both of ye gentlemen to give that water to me.”
Not bothering to wait for them to say aye, she threw a handful of herbs into the boiling water, hefted the cauldron off the tripod, and walked down the lane into the small hamlet.
“Stop! Ye must wear the beak mask an’ the cloak!” the men shouted after her.
Iona made them a rude sign with her hand without bothering to look back and began kicking open doors.
A fetid stench rose up into the air. Even Iona, who was used to dealing with death, had to summon all her courage to continue. They had arrived too late. Every single inhabitant was dead. The only sounds came from the villagers’ cattle and fowls.
Thanks to those two cowardly dawdlers taking their time on the road!
Iona wasted no time in releasing the horses and other cattle from their stalls and pens.
She found seven milch cows, five milch goats, and two ewes.
The animals were crying with discomfort; they needed milking.
Iona roped the milch animals together and drove them to the edge of the village, where the men were waiting.
She handed them the rope. “Here, make yerselves useful an’ milk these poor animals. I’m goin’ back to set the broody hens free.”
The horses and hens were wandering up and down the streets, eating whatever they could find as Iona lifted the latches on the pens, releasing the kine from their byres.
It was mid-spring. If they did not stray too far up the mountains where the likelihood of a lightning strike increased, the animals would survive comfortably until Laird Calvin managed to send a shepherd to collect the stray cattle.
The milch animals must return with them.
The poor beasts would find it easier to walk once their udders were empty.
A thin, weak cry sounded above the bellows and lowering of the cattle. Iona froze. She was a wise woman, a healer; she believed in spirits returning to their old homes, especially if death had come too soon for the lost soul to realize.
The crying increased. It sounded furious and very much alive. Iona went to the stables and found a ladder propped against the hayloft. She climbed up, and the crying got louder.
A wee bairn was lying in the hay, screaming fit to raise the roof. The bairn had a shock of bright red hair, and Iona put its age at no more than one year old.
“Wheesht now, ruadh!” she said, using the universal name for “one with red hair.” She brought the bairn close to her chest and undid its swaddling.
“Och, wheesht! Ye’re a wee girl, Bean Ruadh.
” Iona used the word for a red-haired girl this time.
“Yer mither did ye a great kindness puttin’ ye all the way up here, ye ken, because it looks like it saved yer life.
” She could tell at once that the child did not have the fever because she was icy cold.
“We must swaddle ye next to me bosom to get ye nice an’ warm again, bairn.
” Iona unwrapped her arisaid and tied the child tightly against her chest. “There now. Ye’ll be bonny an’ blithe once we get some milk into ye.
Ye’re nearly auld enough to be drinking out of a cup! ”
Iona searched through the hay and found a small wineskin made of leather. She sniffed the contents.
“Och, so yer mither thought to provide ye with a wee firkin o’ milk. Bless her heavenly spirit.”
The hamlet consisted of fifteen crofts. There were no merchants or shops; it was just a little settlement built close to the sea. Everything they had needed for a happy life was there—everything except a healer or a wise woman.
Patting the small child tied to her chest, the healer withdrew a wooden spoon from her pocket, dipped it into the cauldron of warm herbal water, and fed the child a few spoonsful. The bairn quietened down and fell into a deep sleep.
“Aye, Bean Ruadh, rose hips and lavender will have that effect every time. Sleep deep an’ wake to a happier life.”
Iona walked back through the hamlet. She kicked open every door and could see at a glance every occupant had been dead for at least two days.
She tramped back to the encampment with a weary expression on her face.
“Gi’ me a torch, gentlemen.”
She held out her hand after dropping the cauldron contents out onto the grass.
The physician handed her a long torch he lit off the fire, saying no words except, “Are ye quite sure all the kine are out the byres?”
Iona nodded, then turned to walk back to the hamlet. Outside every croft, she set the thatch alight before moving on to the next little home.
The flames leaped up and began to burn the straw with hungry, crackling licks that soon became a roaring furnace of fire. The two men watched as the woman tramped back to their camp.
“What have ye got in yer arisaid, auld woman?” the apothecary wanted to know. “Is it gold? Because if it is, I want my share of it.”
“If ye weigh up yer riches in heaven, man, then it is gold.”
Iona hugged the sleeping bairn closer to her as she walked further up the hill. She watched the wee hamlet burn until there was nothing but the stone walls left. Then she walked down to the camp to fetch milk.