Dawn of the Golden Promise (38 page)

At this moment, her own life had value to her only as it provided a kind of weapon—a weapon to ensure the protection…the
deliverance…
of her son and stepdaughter.

And so as the beast came for her, crazed and more dangerous than ever in his rage, she risked it all—her strength, her sanity, her flesh, her life—in one last desperate attempt to stop him. Something deep in her spirit cried out a great, impassioned plea to God and all His angels, and sent it roaring up inside her to explode into a deafening battle cry as she rushed headlong against her enemy.

Through glazed eyes and a cloud of pain, Annie saw Finola raise the piece of harness high above her head, leaving herself open and vulnerable to the knife.

Finola gave a terrible scream, and the harness slashed down with a singing blow over the madman's head just as he charged her.

Annie rubbed her aching throat as she watched, breathless.

The man roared in agony but didn't go down.

Wheezing, gasping, Finola attempted to evade the thrust of the knife by hurling herself to the floor and rolling off to the side, then scrambling on her knees into the open track between the stalls, only a short distance from the back of the stable. She pushed herself to her feet, glanced behind her, then looked toward the stable door.

Stunned, Annie thought for an instant that Finola was about to desert them, was going to run out the stable door, leaving her and Gabriel behind.

But as she gradually regained her senses, she grew angry with herself for even thinking such a thing. Finola would never abandon them, never!

As Annie watched, Finola turned to face the madman. Her clear blue gaze, usually so gentle, now blazed with fury. Her long hair was tossed and tangled, hanging in wild disarray about her face. She stood as if daring the man to advance: legs planted wide, teeth bared, the piece of harness still looped about her wrist.

A fire burned out from her, and she looked for all the world like one of the wild warrior women of the ancient legends.

Annie felt a surge of wonder and pride as she witnessed Finola's courage. But her elation was short-lived. With a piece of harness as her only weapon, even a warrior queen would have little hope of defeating such a formidable enemy.

She tried to haul herself up off the stable floor to help, but was struck by such a sickening wave of dizziness she reeled and fell back. Weak beyond belief, she could do nothing but lie in the dust and pray.

Trembling, Finola saw that her attack had only fueled the madman's rage. Snarling, growling like the mindless beast he had become, he lunged at her, flung himself on her. He threw her to the ground and fell onto her back, pressing her face down into the hay-strewn floor. At any moment, the vicious knife blade would slice into her flesh. But she would not give up.

As she struggled against the weight of the madman on her back, Finola's mind flashed to the family she loved. She thought of Gabriel, her tiny son…and Aine, the stepdaughter she had come to cherish as if she were flesh of her flesh. She thought of Morgan, and her heart wrenched with a great sorrow. She prayed that somehow God would deliver her loved ones, that they would not fall victims to this monstrous savagery.

Darkness was fast bearing down on her. Still she struggled, trying to throw him off, covering her head to ward off the attacker's blows.

When the howling and snarling rose to a clamoring din, a roar so thunderous the stable walls seemed to pound and shake, she felt the instant of her death had surely come. If this were the end, she would go down fighting. The last image before her eyes would be her son, and the last word on her lips would be the name of her Savior. She lifted her head out of the dust…

Suddenly, through the veil of her tears and the blur of her pain, she saw a brindled gray thunderhead explode through the open hay doors at the back of the stable and come flying toward her.

For one chilling moment she thought the murderer at her back had been, after all, Satan incarnate, and that he had called up his fiendish minions to finish her off. She saw the bared fangs, the snarling mouth, the eyes, savage and blazing with fury, barreling down upon her, and knew an instant of utter, mindless panic.

And then she saw that it was no hellish demon roaring toward her, but instead their own Fergus, the wolfhound.

The madman was still upon her, but his blows had abruptly ceased.

Instinctively, she began to scream the blessed wolfhound's name, over and over again, like a litany.

“Fergus…Fergus…Fergus!”

She felt the man-beast roll off her back, his savage growls cut dead. There was a final bleat of terror, then a howling, inhuman scream of agony.

Wrenching around, Finola watched in stunned disbelief as the massive wolfhound, great chest heaving, buried his snarling, tearing jaws in the madman's throat. He gave one violent shake, and in an instant the stables were silent.

Less than an hour later, the wolfhound had been ordered away from his kill. He lay panting near the back door, removed from, but keenly mindful of, the shrouded body nearby. The great beast's eyes were solemn but alert as he kept watch.

Only Sandemon and Sister Louisa remained in the stables. Tierney Burke and Jan Martova had been sent to fetch the law and a death cart. Lucy Hoy had taken the
Seanchai
's daughter and small son to the house, where they would receive the care they needed.

After recovering from the shock, the
Seanchai
had insisted on taking the mistress Finola to the house. Although she had obviously suffered a cruel battering and appeared to be nearly prostrate with exhaustion, she remained adamant in her insistence that she did not need medical attention; only with great reluctance and to ease her husband's concern did she finally agree to summon the surgeon.

Sandemon held a lantern aloft as he stood looking down over the covered body at his feet. Across from him, Sister Louisa clutched her hands at her waist.

Her wimple was askew, her habit rumpled and dusty. Her voice, when she spoke, sounded uncommonly thin and tremulous to her ears. “Is it sinful, do you think, to feel nothing but relief at the death of a man like this? I should feel despair at the loss of his soul, but I find myself consumed with relief instead.”

Sandemon considered her words in silence, his eyes still downcast. “Even an evil man,” he finally said, his voice quiet, “is not without choices. A man chooses the way he will walk, whether the way of life, or the way of death. This man chose death.”

Sister Louisa shuddered. “I cannot help but think there has been a terrible…
justice
done this night.”

Sandemon nodded, saying nothing. But knowing the taciturn man as she did, Louisa was fairly certain he had already had the same thought.

“He would have silenced our Finola for all time,” she said, not without anger.

“Instead, it is
he
who has been silenced,” Sandemon completed her thought. “We do not always see justice done this side of heaven,” he went on, his expression thoughtful. “Much tragedy and horror seem to go unpunished, and we question why. Yet God has promised that evil will not go unavenged forever, and we know He is true to His Word.”

Slowly, he raised his eyes to hers. “Tonight, in this place, I think justice has been done: delivered, it would seem, by a wolfhound.”

Inexplicably, Louisa felt that something was still unfinished, undone. Words remained unsaid, questions unanswered. But there
were
no answers, no final words at such a time. Why, then, did she feel so unsettled, so…dissatisfied?

“I will not pretend to be sorry, you know,” she said to Sandemon. “I don't believe for a moment that our Finola would have lived had
he
not died.”

Again the black man inclined his head in agreement. “I have no real sorrow for him either, I confess. Only for our Lord, whose heart must grieve that one of His creation, intended for love and a life of faith, should choose wickedness and destruction instead. And yet…”

Louisa looked at him sharply, ready to rebuff any attempt on his part to wax philosophical or inject a note of compassion into the situation. She was depleted entirely, incapable of rational thought, and she was not feeling the least bit charitable.

The black man lowered his eyes to the lifeless form on the ground between them. In the flickering light of the lantern Louisa saw that the night's ordeal had also taken its toll on Sandemon. The strong features, the regal bearing, showed telltale signs of strain and fatigue.

“One cannot help but wonder,” he said, “what sort of torment or evil, what nightmares of his own, he might have endured that had a part in making him…what he was.”

Louisa stared at him, resisting the unbidden, unwelcome emotion she sensed pressing in on her. But despite her restraint, another feeling now threatened her grim satisfaction that justice had been served. It was something more than understanding, yet less than genuine mercy, and she would fling it away…if only she could.

“As you said,” she pointed out, thinking to extinguish the unwanted stirring of emotion by ignoring it, “even a wicked man has choices. This man clearly made the wrong ones.”

Sandemon lowered the lantern slightly. “But are not some of us blessed with loving people in our lives to
help
us make our choices? People who teach us how to choose what is good, what is best?” He stopped. His eyes took on a distant expression, as if he had retreated to another time or another place.