Rising From the Ashes: The Chronicles of Caymin (31 page)

Caymin lay huddled in Péist’s chamber in the sett, his egg still buried under its enchantments. She had set a protective barrier around the sett, but she knew Enat would be able to get through. She doubted it was strong enough to keep Diarmit out.

Broc and Cuán had asked no questions when she crawled into the sett earlier in the day, unable to stop crying. Night fell, but the badgers did not hunt, choosing instead to stay near her, Broc pressed to her side as her cubs nursed. Occasionally Broc nuzzled her cheek as she lay with her face buried in her old cloak.

Eventually, she slept. She was startled awake by the hissing of the badgers who surrounded her, their fur on end.

“It is I, Enat.”

Caymin sat up and laid a calming hand on Cuán.
“I knew she would come.”

The badgers grew silent, but stayed crowded around Caymin while they waited for Enat to squirm down the tunnel into the chamber. Caymin conjured a flame and set it afloat.

Enat crawled into the chamber and sat. She allowed the silence to stretch on before finally saying,
“I don’t need to read your thoughts to know how angry you are with me.”

Caymin stared at the white stripes on the head of the cub nearest her. She could not look Enat in the eye.
“You knew. From the beginning, you knew.”

“Not from the beginning. I did not know until we got here and washed your cloak and I saw the design woven into it.”
Enat closed her eyes and lowered her head.
“I should have told you then, perhaps, but I didn’t know how.”

“Ivar knew.”
Caymin’s eyes shot daggers.
“The morning he came to the cottage and thought I was sleeping. He saw it and asked if I knew. That is why you told me to keep my old cloak safe in the cottage
 
–
you did not want Gai to see it. You both lied to me. You have lied to me for a year.”

Enat nodded.
“Yes.”

“Why?”

“There were many reasons.”
Enat waited until Caymin unwillingly raised her gaze.
“The most important reason is that Gai is not his father or his brother.”

“But he is like them! We have seen him shoot innocent birds. Beanna told me he was harming animals in the forest. His clan burned my village and killed my father. They took my mother prisoner and left me to die. And you defend him.”

Cuán sat up at these words, a low growl in his throat.

“No,”
said Enat.
“I’m not defending him. Nothing defends what they did to your village and you. But Gai was but a babe himself when they attacked. He is not to blame. Caymin, I told you once that Gai was an empty vessel, capable of being filled with either good or evil. You reached out to him, befriended him when the others thought he had attacked Fergus.”

“I was a fool,”
Caymin said bitterly.
“A fool to think he did not do it. He is the one who attacked Péist. He is the one Péist feared. I know it. I will never trust him again.”

“And me? Will you trust me again?”

Caymin lowered her gaze again, unable to bear the sadness in Enat’s eyes.

When Caymin didn’t respond, Enat said,
“My cottage is open to you whenever you are ready to come back.”
She turned and crept back up the tunnel.

“Little one?”
Broc whickered, placing her front feet in Caymin’s lap and reaching up to nuzzle her cheek. Caymin wrapped her arms around Broc and buried her face in the soft fur as she cried again.

For three days, Caymin stayed with the badgers, living as she had before. The storm had passed and the weather gentled, heralding the spring to come.

She foraged with the clan, unwilling to admit that the food available this time of year was lacking. The badgers, with their strong claws, tore through the frozen earth to find grubs and worms where they hid, sleeping their way through the winter. Caymin could only find the few dried up berries left on bushes. She went to the clearing where they had planted the year before, but the scattered leftover apples and turnips she was able to find had rotted and were not edible.

Her stomach was empty and complaining as she crept back into the sett. The young cubs crawled into her lap. They still nursed, but were eager to nibble on the bits of berry she had brought with her.

“Caymin?”

She heard Daina’s voice echo faintly down the tunnel. She didn’t answer.

“Caymin? We know you’re in there.”
This time Cíana called so that the badgers could understand as well.
“Come out or we’re coming in.”

Caymin glanced at Broc who gave her a push with her snout.
“Go, little one. Talk to the two-legs.”

Reluctantly, Caymin crawled up the tunnel. She emerged, wincing at the sunlight coming through the trees, to find Cíana and Daina sitting near the entrance to the sett.

Daina held up a small bag. “We brought you and your clan some food.”

Caymin opened it and looked inside to find oatcakes and meat and cheese and bread. She hungrily stuffed an oatcake into her mouth. “Thank you,” she mumbled.

“How long are you going to stay here?” Daina asked.

Caymin shrugged. “I do not know.”

“Gai left.” Cíana watched her with narrowed eyes as she delivered this news.

Caymin’s head snapped up. “He left?”

“Yes.”

Caymin suddenly found the woven pattern of the bag very interesting. She stared hard at it as she said, “Because of me?”

“You and the message from his brother.”

“We’re sorry,” said Daina softly. “About your family. We didn’t know.”

“Why are you sorry?” Caymin asked, puzzled.

“Because it causes you pain,” said Cíana. “I think Gai was sorry as well.”

Caymin’s expression hardened. “He should be sorry.”

Cíana leaned forward. “It was horrible for you to find out that way, but Gai isn’t the one who hurt you and your family.”

Caymin thought about Enat saying the same thing.

Daina laid a hand on Caymin’s knee. “Our circle feels as if it has broken. We miss you.”

“What are you going to do?” Cíana asked.

“I… I do not know.” Caymin felt lost. Just as when she’d become angry for the first time, she was unfamiliar with the things she was now feeling. She had no words to explain and didn’t know how to resolve the turmoil inside her.

Cíana got to her feet and Daina followed.

“Tonight we celebrate Imbolc,” Cíana said. “We hope you’ll come and join us. We’ll leave you now.”

Caymin watched them go, feeling almost worse than before they came. She crawled back down the tunnel. She reached into the bag and handed out nuts and bits of dried meat to the cubs.

Broc came to her.
“What will you do, little one?”

“I am not sure what to do.”

“Enat has been kind to us.”

“But she lied to me.”
Caymin wrapped her cloak around her, fingering the embroidered head of the wolf.

“I do not tell my cubs they may be hunted by two-legs, or die at the teeth of wolves,”
said Broc.
“They have much to learn and many things to fear. There will be time enough for them to know these hard truths. Perhaps Enat is the same. Perhaps she withheld this knowledge from you because you had much to learn, and she knew there would come a day when it was right to tell you about the ones who attacked your village.”

Caymin looked at her shadow in the darkness of the sett.
“You think I should go back?”

“I think you should listen to what Enat has to say about why she did not tell you, and then you can make your decision. But think on this
 
–
if you do not go back, where will you go and what will you do? Do you know enough yet to leave?”

Caymin reached out to stroke Broc’s silky coat.
“You have always been wise.”

“We will go with you if you leave,”
said Cuán.

“No!”
Caymin sat up straight.
“You and Péist are safe here. I cannot put you in danger again.”
She took a deep breath.
“I will go back. I will learn what I must to stop Timmin and protect you all.”

CHAPTER 21

The Traitor Revealed

C
aymin lay on her bed, ashamed to admit how good it felt to have a soft, warm mat under her. She listened to Enat’s breathing nearby and found it comforting.

They had all welcomed her back as they gathered around the fire in the village for Imbolc, but Gai’s absence felt like a gaping hole in the celebration, more so than when Méav and Fergus and Ronan left, because they had left when they were supposed to. She had a hollow feeling in her stomach every time she thought of Gai – partly her continued rage at what his father’s warriors had done, and partly a feeling of unease over how she had accused him.

She turned on her side and watched the dying flames in the hearth.

“You can’t sleep?”

Enat’s voice startled her. She sat up as Enat got out of bed and went to the fire.

“Neither can I,” said Enat as she added a block of peat and prodded the flames.

Caymin joined her at the hearth.

“I’m glad you came back.”

Caymin glanced at her, studying her face, the fine wrinkles visible in the dancing light from the fire. Enat turned and met her gaze. For long heartbeats, they stared into each other’s eyes.

“You trusted me,” said Enat. “You believed that I would care for you, look out for you, do what was best for you. Like Broc and Cuán did.”

Caymin blinked. “Yes.”

“And it feels to you as if I betrayed that trust by not telling you the cloak belonged to Gai’s clan.”

Caymin could no longer meet her eyes. Tears stung her own as she looked again at the fire. “Broc told me there are things cubs do not need to know when they are very young, that there is time later when it is right to tell them those things.”

Enat smiled. “I’ve always respected the wisdom of animals, but I suspect Broc is wiser than most of the two-legs I know.”

She heaved a heavy sigh. “I didn’t know how to tell you, Caymin. When I saw the cloak, and the symbol on it, I hoped that somehow, it was a mistake, that somehow Gai’s clan wasn’t involved. But then you went on your spiritwalks, and you saw what happened.” She rubbed her brow. “War between clans is a sad truth of our land. If we could unite under one king or queen, if we could accept one another’s beliefs… but we’re fragmented. We have many kings, and we have many gods and beliefs, and they each think they’re the true and right one.”

“Like Timmin?”

Enat nodded. “Like Timmin. And like the monks who fear the old ways. Not all are like that, but the ones there are stir up tensions and fuel the wars.”

They sat side by side, staring into the flames.

“Did you feel anyone trying to push into your thoughts tonight?”

Caymin shook her head. She bit her lip to keep from blurting out that she didn’t expect to with Gai not there.

“How is Péist?”

“He sleeps.”

Enat sighed again. “I can’t see what, but something else is stirring. I feel it. And I feel that Péist is tied to all that is happening.”