ALPIN’S PARTY RODE to the northeast, and when they crossed the river it was not through a ford but by way of a precarious plank bridge set high above a place where the water narrowed between rocky banks. The horses were blindfolded and led across each in turn. It seemed an ideal spot for an enemy to spring a surprise,
but Faolan did not comment on that. He kept his ears open and his mouth shut.
The pace was swift. By the third sunrise the anticipated engagement with the Blues was imminent. Alpin’s men were not saying much, but there was a look in their eyes that Faolan recognized: these hunters had scented blood. Nobody offered him a weapon with which to defend himself, and he did not ask for one. Instead,
he devised strategies against the very real possibility that Alpin had brought him along so he could dispose of him out of Ana’s view.
Your bard fell in battle, my dear. His fighting skills were, as one might expect, somewhat less than adequate.
They came upon the Blues in a clearing by a stream. The approach was on foot, in silence. In this terrain a mounted attack would be chaotic, the advantages
of height and speed outweighed by the enemy’s ability to flee into thickets and copses, to dodge and weave where the horses could not readily follow. They had left their mounts at some distance. Faolan had rather hoped to be given the job of keeping an eye on them but Alpin, with a savage smile, had bid him come on with the mean. “We’ll give you something to make songs about, bard!” Still no
offer of dagger or knife.
Once it began, there was no time to think of songs. The attack was swift and bloody. The party of Blues, caught off guard in a makeshift encampment, put up a spirited defense, but they were no match for the swords and clubs, the thrusting spears and knives of Alpin’s troop. The forest clearing was full of alien sounds: the grating of metal on metal, the gurgle of a man
choking to death in his own blood, the scream of another who had lost a hand. Faolan did his best to follow the action while pretending to cower behind a tree, grateful that his drab servant’s clothing made him unobtrusive.
The sounds changed after a while, with less of the screaming and grunting of injured men, and more of the systematic sound of sword or spear driving downward as Alpin’s warriors
finished off the stricken remnants of the foe. Faolan saw the chieftain of Briar Wood lift a fist high in the air and call out a victory shout of some kind; and then came a sound that made the hairs rise on his neck. From all around them came the thud of running footsteps. The clink and jingle of metal closed in under the trees. Reinforcements had arrived.
There was only one way to go: upward
and out of reach. Faolan jumped, gripped a branch with both hands, and swung himself less than gracefully into the beech tree that had furnished his cover. He was only just in time. A shrieking battle cry broke out on every side as a new party of Blues, he estimated twenty or more in number, charged from the woods with spears at the ready.
Alpin’s men had already formed a tight circle, weapons
held outward. They were no barbarian rabble, but a disciplined fighting force; it was no wonder the Gaels sought him as an ally. Faolan shifted on his perch, peering out between the delicate new leaves of the beech. He freed a hand; one must be prepared for whatever might come. If necessary he would climb higher. There was no reason why a bard should not possess a modicum of athletic skill.
For some time Alpin’s small band held off the attackers, but the men of Briar Wood had nowhere to go; any of them who broke from his comrades and ran at the circle of Blues would be mown down instantly. The Blues were angry. The clearing was strewn with the bodies of their comrades, slaughtered in the first attack. They would not leave off until they had had their recompense in blood.
Under such
circumstances, a bard should remain quietly in the tree and let things unfold. He should wait until Alpin’s men grew weary and started to make mistakes, then watch them being butchered in their turn. Do nothing; watch Alpin die. Take Ana home … It was not possible. The treaty must come first. So, take action. Save Alpin. Win himself approval, and with it the freedom to seek out information, which
was, after all, his job. He did have one small tool at his disposal …
Unwittingly, Alpin assisted him. The chieftain of Briar Wood, red-faced and sweating, was holding his heavy sword before him two-handed and shouting taunts at one of the Blues, a thickset, ginger-bearded fellow.
“Taken to assaulting innocent travelers now, Dendrist? That was my wife you nearly killed down at Breaking Ford!
That was her escort your thugs set upon! You’ll pay for that miscalculation, and pay dearly! Nobody slights Alpin of Briar Wood!”
The Blues leader was standing a little behind his men. His own sword was sheathed. It seemed he was content to let his underlings do the dirty work for him. “Wife? What, another one?” he mocked. “Lucky she drowned, then. Better a quick death in the water than the sort
of fate wives meet in that godforsaken pile you call home. You can save your rhetoric, Alpin. I lost ten men of my own in that flood. By the way, I heard there were two girls in that party of travelers. Who was the other one, a wife for your brother?”
Dendrist’s men greeted this with derisive laughter. Alpin gave a snarl of pure hatred and lunged forward with the sword. One of the Blues jabbed
with a spear, Alpin moved back out of reach. Thus far, his anger had not overruled his common sense.
“That what you’re teaching your son there?” Alpin challenged, eyeing the young man with the spear. “How to send innocent women to their deaths, how to fight battles with cheap taunts? No doubt he’s growing up in the image of yourself, Dendrist, a black-hearted coward with nothing in his head but
a petty greed for what’s not his own. A weasel of a father; a stoat of a son.”
The young man thrust again, this time somewhat wildly. Alpin was standing quite still now, and the men had hushed as well, awaiting a response. Faolan seized the moment. He drew out the item he had hidden in his boot before they left Briar Wood, narrowed his eyes and threw.
The young man sagged to his knees, dropping
the spear. In an instant, Alpin’s sword was in the hand of the man next to him, Mordec, and Alpin himself had Dendrist’s son pinned in front of him, a knife across his throat, while blood seeped from a wound in the young man’s shoulder to dye his tunic an alarming shade of crimson. The youth’s face was gray with shock.
“How about a deal?” Alpin asked calmly. After one brief, astonished glance
up toward the beech tree, he had not looked at Faolan.
Dendrist took a step closer; his own countenance was somewhat pale. “Let him go!” he commanded. “Your men have nowhere to run to! You’re outnumbered and outplayed. Let my son go!”
“Now why would I do that? Notice how he’s bleeding. You’d want to get a physician for that, or at the very least a bandage to stem the flow. And you wouldn’t want
to take too long about it.”
“Alpin, you scum—”
“I’ll finish him off quickly if you prefer. I have the means here, and I’ve a knack for this. See?” The knife scored a thin red line on the boy’s neck, and he drew a shuddering, squealing breath.
“You wouldn’t dare!” Dendrist’s voice was distorted with rage and fear.
“Try me, Dendrist. Am I known for holding back? No, don’t order your men to attack.
Do that, and I’ll be obliged to slit the boy’s throat right away so I have both arms free to defend myself. Gods, this is an untidy business; I’m all over blood. Now, about that deal.”
“You swine, Alpin,” Dendrist muttered. “Set your terms, just let the boy go. By all that’s holy, you’ll pay for this.”
“You take him, you leave, you go off and see that he’s tended to,” Alpin said. “You don’t
send half your men back to slaughter us the moment our backs are turned. You don’t start running my men through as soon as I let the boy go. You don’t have time for that, not at the rate he’s bleeding. Have I your word?”
“You have my word,” Dendrist said through gritted teeth. “Now release him.”
“Order your men to put up their arms and take five paces back. Give us clear passage out of here.”
Alpin’s grip on the young man had not slackened, nor had his troop’s defensive ring of weapons lost its discipline.
“Do as he says.”
The men of the Blues muttered oaths and flashed furious looks as they sheathed their weapons.
“Release my son!”
“Not quite yet,” Alpin said. “I don’t think I trust you, Dendrist. Give me two of your men. We’ll take them and the boy with us as far as Beacon Rise;
then we’ll move on for home and your fellows can bring your son to you. That limits the opportunity for dirty tricks on your part.”
“He could be dead by then!” Dendrist shouted, his eyes on his son’s face, from which the color had drained alarmingly.
Alpin smiled. “And then won’t you regret that you took so long to make up your mind? Now, how much longer do you want to continue this entertaining
interchange?”
“Domnach, Omnist, go with him. My son’s safety is paramount. We’ll wait for you at the Deeprill crossing. I’ll send a man ahead for healers. Now go, you!”
The circle of Blues drew back still further. Alpin and his men moved out, maintaining a defensive formation, the injured boy supported by two of the Briar Wood warriors. He would not bleed to death. Faolan knew that, and he suspected
Alpin did as well. The position of the injury meant a spectacular amount of blood initially, but as long as it was stanched soon the boy would likely make a full recovery.
Now the Blues were on one side of the clearing and the men of Briar Wood on the other, heading off under the trees, their rearguard backing away with spears still pointed at the enemy. Faolan cleared his throat; all heads turned
toward him, and a Blue with a bow reached for his arrows.
“Ah,” Alpin said easily, “we almost forgot our bard. Come down, Finian. It’s all over now.”
Faolan swung down and walked across to Alpin’s group, assuming the unsteady gait of a man in a state of shock after witnessing his first battle. He was somewhat relieved that nobody laughed. As Alpin’s party, accompanied by the designated Blues,
headed off in the direction of home, Dendrist’s men were beginning the grim task of gathering up their fallen comrades. Alpin’s act of revenge would surely spark retaliation later, forcing the chieftain of Briar Wood to respond in kind once again. Folk said it was in the nature of the Caitt to feud thus; today, Faolan had seen for himself that it was true.
At the place where the horses were tethered
Alpin called a halt, and they cut away the young man’s tunic and shirt to examine the wound. Erdig pulled out the weapon still lodged in the lad’s shoulder, and a man who seemed to know what he was doing applied a pad of linen and a tight bandage. The boy gritted his teeth, making no sound. It seemed they bred them hardy in the north.
Alpin was holding the bloodstained weapon in his hands and
frowning. He looked up, and his eyes met Faolan’s.
“That’s one of our own kitchen knives,” Mordec said in surprise. “See your mark on the handle, my lord?”
“Given to me for use at table,” said Faolan, making his tone a little unsteady. “I didn’t expect to be using it thus.”
“It’s somewhat sharper than we usually keep them,” Alpin observed.
“I’d no tools for mending the harp, my lord,” Faolan
said. “A musician can’t keep his instruments in order with a blunt knife.”
“And where does a bard learn to throw with such accuracy?”
Faolan attempted a nervous laugh. “I surprised even myself, my lord. I’m astonished that my contribution was of service. To tell you the truth, I just shut my eyes and … well, threw.”
There was a ripple of laughter from the men. Alpin grinned, but his eyes were
shrewdly assessing. “Well, you’ve given yourself something to make a song about when we get home. Now, is the lad strapped up? Erdig, he can ride in front of you to Beacon Rise. These fellows will have to run if they plan to come with us. Then it’s on homeward. I’ve a comely young woman waiting for me now, and an itch that’s demanding to be satisfied.”
Faolan felt a profound wish that he had
aimed a little differently and sent the knife straight into Alpin’s throat. Save for the unfortunate fact that, had he done so, they’d probably all have been slaughtered, the thought of that had great appeal.
“Good throw, bard,” one of the warriors said. “Eyes shut? Hardly.”
“If that was sheer luck,” Mordec said, “I’ll eat my horse blanket. It was quite a distance.”
“I hate to admit it,” said
the other man, “but the mealymouthed musician here just saved all our lives.”
THEY REACHED THE place called Beacon Rise before the sun was at its peak. Dendrist’s two men, on foot, had been left far behind as Alpin’s party rode on. Dendrist’s son was unceremoniously dumped from Erdig’s horse and staggered away to collapse onto the rocks by the track. He was sheet-white, tight-lipped,
silent.
“Tell your father,” Alpin said, “that it’s time he learned to keep his hands off what’s mine: land, stock, women. He should know by now that I’ll take payment in kind.” His dagger was in his hand now; he dismounted and strode over to the young man. “If my wife-to-be had indeed drowned, your father’s men would not find a wounded boy here, but a lump of meat with the name of Alpin of Briar
Wood carved into it. She survived, therefore you live. This time.” The knife was a handspan from the lad’s face, and rock steady. Faolan held his breath. “As it is, you’ll be waiting alone. I hope they get here soon; you’re bleeding through your bandage. Come, men! I want to be halfway to the bridge by nightfall. I won’t lie content until we’re back across our own border.”