The Hawthorn Oath

Chapter 1

Aoife reached into the thicket, stomach twisting as a reminder that she hadn’t eaten in two days.

Thorns caught at her sleeves, tearing the thin fabric, and scratched across her arms. The crowberries were deep purple, soft under her fingers, overripe and difficult to pick without destroying them.

She withdrew a handful and winced as a thorn grazed her wrist, the pain nothing compared to the hollow pull in her stomach.

She popped one into her mouth. The sweetness hit her tongue, sharp and rich, almost too rich after days of hunger. She ate another, and another until the ache faded, then picked the rest with care, working between the barbs, the juice turning her fingers purple.

Old cuts ridged her palms. Thin white lines charting her history. The one on her thumb from a knife slip while making dinner, three on her palm from bark that cut deep while climbing, and a dozen others besides. Her nails were broken from digging roots out of hard soil.

She gathered as many berries as she could, tucking them into her satchel, lining them with moss so they wouldn’t be crushed against the apples.

She straightened, brushing dirt from her hands, and took in the woods around her. Brambles and ferns tangled the paths between mixed growth of oak, ash and hazel. Mushrooms pushed up through the damp earth. The air smelled of leaf mould and rain.

The early afternoon sun was high in the sky. Light dappled in narrow streams through the canopy, catching on the pale undersides of leaves. She had a few hours to go before home, a few hours to herself. A magpie cawed in the trees above, cutting through the stillness.

Aoife enjoyed the hush of the forest, the peace that came from nature and from pretending that the trouble men created didn’t exist.

As she walked, she switched the satchel to the other shoulder, its weight a comforting reminder that her siblings would eat tonight.

Yesterday, Aoife hadn’t had time to forage.

Eoin and Maire had eaten a handful of beans each, while she and her father had gone without.

She’d spent the day with a woman in labour.

The mother had wept when the baby was born, not from joy. From fear. How would she keep it alive?

Since the murreroot crop failed, no one was willing to sell or share what little food they had. A simple loaf of bread cost ten times last year’s prices.

The apples weighing the satchel down had come from a barter.

She’d spent the better part of that morning gathering the plants needed for a poultice for Bonnie Mineor’s nephew and the rest trudging the six miles to Dromdara under an unusually hot autumn sun.

The boy had been sick for days, and none of the treatments suggested by the healers his father sent for had helped.

She’d spotted the large apple tree at the back of the property the moment she arrived and hoped it still bore fruit, at least enough for Cormac’s family and hers to eat that night. She hadn’t been disappointed.

Movement in the undergrowth caught her attention.

It didn’t trouble her, but her hand shifted to the dagger at her hip just the same.

Her father had made it for her twelfth birthday.

It was simpler than his usual work. His swords were among the finest in the country; soldiers and lords came from far and wide to commission them.

But they paid in coin, and you can’t eat coin.

An enormous black form emerged from between the trees. “By the Shee,” she muttered to herself. She couldn’t have reached the top of its head with her arms outstretched and standing on her tiptoes. It loomed over her, dark and terrifying.

She froze, heart hammering. Her father’s lessons came in flashes: don’t run from wolves, bare your teeth at dogs, create loud noises around bears. This was none of those; this was an Athraith.

The creature was almost horse-like, with long hair, black as pitch, covering its head and body. If it weren’t for the glint of light reflected in its eyes, she wouldn’t have been able to make them out.

The villagers spoke of the Athraith with fear or wonder. They were intelligent companions of the Sheedar, sent as an omen. The Athraith’s appearance around the village preceded building collapse, lost animals, illness and even death.

To Aoife, it was majestic.

Her hand rested on the hilt of her dagger. The Athraith hadn’t moved. It continued to stare at her, a perfect mirror of the way she was looking at it.

It was assessing her, calculating its next move.

Recognition disarmed her fear; it was as startled to see her as she was to see it.

She lifted her hand away from the blade, holding both palms up to show the creature she was not a threat.

It tilted its head as though trying to figure her out.

Then she gestured to her satchel before reaching in and retrieving an apple.

The animal snorted. Aoife held the piece of fruit out, and it lowered its head, breath warm against her skin as it took the apple from her palm.

The air split as a thin, eerie cry cut the silence.

Her stomach tightened. The same sound rent the air the night her mother died. The banshee, heralding death. It clawed at her chest, worse, longer and louder than she’d ever heard it. A hundred voices crying out at once, discordant, wailing, weeping.

The Athraith jerked, ears flattened to its skull. Its nostrils flared, drawing breath with a harsh snort. It pawed the earth, stamping and tossing its head, black hair lashing. The sudden violence of it made Aoife’s chest tighten.

She took a step backward, then another, palms open, trying to make herself small. The beast’s eyes rolled white as it shook itself, muscles bunching.

With a thunder of hooves, it bolted, galloping past her so close that the rush of its body whipped her skirts and left her breathless.

When the woods fell silent again, Aoife stood rooted, heart thudding, until the echo of hooves and wails alike faded.

By the time she emerged from the trees, the sun had dipped westward.

She’d arrived at Farmer Gowra’s fields, the first of them barren now.

Only months earlier they had been thick with the short green shoots of murreroot, a cheap, filling crop, and the staple of Inis Morra for as long as anyone could remember.

Even its name belonged to the land: Morra and murre had grown from the same old word, root and country bound together.

Within weeks, the plants blackened where they stood, row after row. No one knew why. The diseased crops were yanked from the soil, but the rot crept on regardless. By harvest, the blight had spread across the island.

The feldgrain, so prized by the Eldrossi Empire, remained untouched.

She passed a farm hand harvesting a field of it now, loading it onto carts and sending it away.

There were soldiers from the Empire supervising.

Several carried single-shot rifles alongside their standard-issue swords, a show of strength and of wealth.

Soldiers of the Eldrossi Empire occupied every county, but only the wealthiest landowners could afford to provide them with rifles.

Half of the soldiers had the golden eyes of the Eldrossi. Others had faces like hers and the dark eyes of Inis Morra.

The food on the carts would feed their village for weeks. Instead, the village was left scrounging for scraps. Surely the empire didn’t know how bad things were. They couldn’t. She feared they wouldn’t make it through the winter, any of them. No one would meet their quotas then.

In the distance, a crow called, harsh and lonely. It carried across the fields like a warning. The Athraith had long ago vanished into the woods, but its shadow lingered in her mind. A sign of something to come, but what, she didn’t yet know.