Eowain leaped from his horse and pulled the door to the house-wagon. The three ladies and their servants shaded eyes with hands. "What is it?" His aunt squinted at him. "Why have we stopped?"
"Eowain?" Eithne rose and came to the doorway.
She wore a rust-colored bodice of linen and curvilinear patterns, trimmed in black, and a dress with her red, gold, and sable tartan. Bands of hack-silver encircled her upper arms. A cunningly-twisted golden torc with wolfs-head knobs rested about her slim throat. The scent of mountain lilacs washed over him.
Relief rose in Eowain like the floodwaters of the Gasirad in springtime.
He offered his hand. "Yes, it's me."
She put her small hand into his larger one, and stepped down out of the wagon. She held her skirts up out of the mud and took a step toward him. She glanced at her father and watchful guards. "Thank— Thank all the Gods you're well, Your Grace." She dropped a maidenly curtsy.
"I should say the same! I have, in fact. All the way from Gluín Hill. You're unharmed?" One of her sleeves was torn open. A linen bandage showed through the gap. "What's this?"
She waved it away. "Merely a slice, my lord. Nothing to concern yourself. The Lord-Drymyn and Lady Alva were... attentive."
He looked to her father. Ciaran gave him a nod. Eowain took that liberty and inspected the wound. A clean and proper field dressing. He commended the two drymyn.
"We're no strangers to war, away on our mountain." Lady Alva stepped down and sketched a courtesy.
"So Medyr tells me." He appraised Eithne with new eyes. "I heard you took three of the villains yourself with naught but a belt-knife."
She raised her chin. "They caught me unsuspecting last time. I swore on my grandfather's honor, I'd never let that happen again."
He couldn't suppress his grin. "Nor should you, Lady. I am—" He looked to her father, back again, and chose his next word with care. "—Impressed."
His voice sounded gruff to his own ears. He cleared his throat. It wasn't the best word to describe what stirred his blood. He wanted to pull her off into the bushes and embrace her. But it was the most appropriate word he could muster in polite company.
She must have seen something in his eyes. Her green eyes glittered at him. She dropped another curtsy and averted her flushed cheeks. "What of you, my lord? You are— uninjured?"
He nodded. "Aye. Weary to the bone, but well enough for all that. I chased across the whole country after you."
"I wouldn't have worried you so, but the Lord-Drymyn thought it best to send no further message, lest it be intercepted."
Eowain put a hand on Medyr's shoulder. "You did the right thing. You had no way to know by which trail I'd come, or where the brigands would have spies."
Tnúthgal reined his mount to a stop. "It was his idea as well that she should travel in the wagon and in secret, rather than a-horse, as she wanted."
His cousin seemed sour about that. No doubt, such secrecy does not accord well with your own plan. Eowain commended Medyr again. "Under the circumstances, I'm sure it was the wisest thing to do."
Eithne's face grew distraught. "Oh, but now that you're here, my lord, I hope you'll permit me to ride again. I do prefer the open air to the—" Her eyes flickered toward his aunt. "To the close quarters of the wagon. It's so... dark and stuffy in there."
He could imagine the horror. "So long as it please your father...?"
Lord Ciaran agreed it did.
"Yes, it would please me well for you to ride. I shouldn't want to let you from my sight again, now that the matter at Gluín Hill is settled."
His cousin's face remained placid.
"I'm glad to hear that you taught the Cailech a lesson, Your Grace." Tnúthgal's tone was the soul of courtesy.
"Are you sure it's wise the lady travel openly, Your Grace?" Medyr furrowed his brows.
"I'm sure my cousin and I can put ourselves between the lady and any harm that might befall her." He looked to Tnúthgal. "Isn't that right, cousin? You are coming with us all the way to the Vale, aren't you? I'll need your strong arm on the road, and men of my own blood to prepare me for the rite of marriage." Then he added, "I can think of no one I would want closer to me."
Something passed across his cousin's face, but he bowed in the saddle and Eowain lost sight of it. "Of course, Your Grace. I'd be honored."
Medyr struggled with a smirk.
"It's settled then. The lady will ride." Eowain noted the disappointment on his aunt's face. No doubt distraught to lose her captive audience. The relief of Eithne and Alva was palpable.
But, they agreed it was best if the women dressed and armed themselves as men. Eowain left the ladies to arrange themselves.
"Now, let's have some words with Lord Feoras." Eowain rode with Tnúthgal and Medyr back to the van-guard.
As soldiers will do, many of his soldiers took the opportunity to close eyes and catch up on sleep. Eowain saw enough watchful men to please him and give any lurking bandit pause. Between the men he himself had assigned, the lady's own security detail, and Tnúthgal's men, their company must have numbered some seventy or eighty men.
I'll have to arrange more supplies and mules at our next stop. After Monóc Hill, they'd move north into the kingdom of Ivea, where their welcome would be uncertain at best, and supplies not to be counted on. A pause at Monóc would also give his brother and bodyguard time to catch up.
Lord Feoras was still lashed to his horse.
"Cut him down." Eowain felt grim. Scar-faced Gaeth and barrel-chested Mahon pulled Feoras from the saddle. They lashed him to a nearby tree.
Eowain dismounted.
Medyr and Tnúthgal joined him. Eowain addressed his question to them. "What makes you think Lord Feoras knows so much?"
Medyr considered the silent lord. "He's not a cowardly nor a weak man, Your Grace. He served your father in the King's Company, and he's been no stranger to policing banditry. At least, not until yesterday."
Medyr raised his eyebrows and spread his fingers wide. "When suddenly, poof! Away went his own guards on an insignificant errand. Then the lord absented himself on a pretext."
Eowain regarded Feoras. "Sent away his guards and absented himself on a pretext? Then what?"
Medyr brought the merchant Corentin to recall—in his foreign way—how the hall was suddenly empty save for the acolyte, the Lady Eithne, her father, and himself. "It was the kitchen staff. We were attacked by cooks." The merchant sniffed.
Medyr went on. "Neither the lord nor his men materialized to defend against our attackers. We found him after the fact, locked in a cellar. Two of your men battered down the door with a timber to ferret him out."
Feoras sneered. "I told you, I don't know anything. I was as surprised as you. Three of the bandits tried to jump me. I was unarmed. Locked myself in the cellar, it was all I could do to stay alive."
One of Medyr's brows rose on his forehead. "And when we announced ourselves that all was clear?"
Feoras looked sheepish, studied the ground at his feet. "How was I to know you didn't have a knife to your throat? It could've been a trick."
Eowain nodded. "I see." Yes, I see right well. That man had put his bride and his advisor and all his men at risk. All the worry and weariness of the last two days boiled suddenly through his blood. "How..." His throat choked on his words. "How— dare you?" The words hissed out.
Tnúthgal raised a restraining hand. "Your Grace, I would counsel—"
"You will counsel nothing, cousin." Eowain moved closer to Feoras. "Why? Why would you betray me?"
"I—" He seemed to realize the dire strait he was in. He swallowed hard. "I swear, my lord. I— I wouldn't betray you. I didn't betray you." He spat at Medyr. "Anyone who says I did is a villain, and a bastard, and a knave, and a rascal!"
Eowain growled. "I've never known the Lord Medyr to say any untrue word. I ask you again and for the last time, my lord. Why would you betray me?" He pulled a long knife from his belt and held it before Feoras's face. "Next time, I will not ask, but take the answer from your screaming tongue."
His eyes flickered from the knife to Eowain's face to the two men behind him. "I— I—." He swallowed hard. "Please, my lords!"
"Do not look to me," replied Medyr. "I have not so much courage as to defy this king."
"Last chance." Eowain pressed the blade to Feoras's cheek. A long, thin line of blood appeared.
"Be merciful, Your Grace. Abate your rage, I beg of you! Abate your rage!"
"I'll carve half a grin on your sniveling face is what I'll do!" Eowain snapped the dagger across his face, splattered red across the green spring grass.
"My lord!"
Eowain whipped Feoras with the hilt of the dagger, punched him in the stomach with a balled fist. Feoras choked twice and vomited.
Eowain pummeled at the man. He couldn't stop himself, even if he'd wanted to. And he certainly had no such desire.
"My lord!" He blinked once, at the small, gentle hand that restrained his arm. Again, at the fair face, the copper-red hair, the green eyes. "My lord, forgive me. That is enough, I think."
Feoras was a bloody ruin before him. Eithne, in riding clothes and a jack of hardened leather, stayed his hand.
He shuddered, shook his head, turned away from them. Even in war, he had rarely known such a rage. He put hands to his face and pulled down, felt the taut stretch of his own skin. Then he was master of himself once more.
"Alright. Yes." He nodded to them.
Eithne's face was stern. "No doubt he deserves every stroke, Your Grace. But mercy now, and bid him speak."
"Aye. Aye, you're right." He took another steadying breath. He lifted the lord's broken face. "What would you say now?"
The man could naught but whisper. "Cael," he hissed. "Cael the Viper." Feoras spit teeth on the ground. "He'll dog your every step, he said. Dog you til he gets her." Feoras sneered at Eithne. "And then the things he'll do to you, you Fiatach bitch." He grinned drunkenly through bloody teeth. "Wish I could live to see it."
Eowain smacked him. "You will not speak to her. You will not look at her, as you value your life."
He spit blood. "What life? You bastard son of a poxy whore. You'll not let me live."
"How many? How many men does Cael have?"
"More than a hundred. Hard men. Harder than you." He jerked his chin. "And a hard-on for her."
"Where? Where is their camp?"
He hissed at Eowain. "Everywhere." He looked all about. "He's Kârn of the Wood, he is."
"Why? Why would you do this?"
"To keep her damned bastards off our throne." He snarled like a beast at bay. "Do you know how many sons I've lost, suppressing the north? Do you? Five. FIVE! Never trust a Fiatach. Never trust a Gwynn." He spit blood at her.
Eithne's hand went to her face, came away with blood and bile on her fingers. Her eyes narrowed.
In a flash, her dagger with the dark yellow schorl on the hilt was at the lord's throat. Her voice hissed. "Call me what you will. But insult my clan once more, sir, and I'll gut you from nave to chops. In that, my lord, you can most surely trust."
—33—