Soon the sun was streaming through the pine boughs, warming everything it touched. Neala and Irial shed their cloaks. When the sun shone in Ireland one took advantage of it, no matter how brief. Though he threw his cloak open wide, Tyr kept it on. Neala felt sort of bad that he couldn’t relax and enjoy the beautiful day. But they couldn’t risk coming across someone and having them recognize him for what he was.
In the middle of a conversation about going for a swim Irial fell silent, sat up straight, and tilted her head. Her energy buzzed with an anxiety that put Neala on edge and made her want to reach for her sword, which she hadn’t brought. A curse escaped her. How could she have left it behind? Bren’s dagger was in her boot but would it be enough? Tyr stared hard at Irial and his hand strayed to the hilt of the sword on his back. At least he was prepared.
“Riders are approachin’. Six of them,” Irial said.
The forest around them was void of any energy signatures besides plants and small animals. Neala did her best to feel instead of see, searching for the pressure that the energy of people put off. Finally she found what Irial had sensed. Six riders were coming from the east.
“I don’t hear anything,” Tyr said.
“Trust her, they’re comin’,” Neala whispered.
Tyr shook his head. “I have excellent hearing. Nothing is coming.”
“Tyr please, just do as she says.”
He gave her a long look then shrugged and put his hood on. When she turned away from him Neala found Irial looking at her with a raised eyebrow and pursed lips. She would have asked what the look was for but the riders were nearly upon them. The pressure of their approach increased. Beneath Neala, Dubh’s muscles started to bunch. He snorted and tossed his head then started pawing.
She patted his neck. “Easy boy.”
The riders stepped out of the trees, two to their left, and two to their right. They were on sleek horses meant for swift travel. Dressed in leather armor and carrying weapons didn’t exactly lend them a friendly air. Their expressions were very friendly though, too much so. Hungry eyes crawled all over her and Irial. Doing her best to ignore them, Neala concentrated on searching for the energy of the two missing riders.
“It would be in yer best interest to leave us alone,” Irial told them.
Her voice was so filled with power that it pulled at Neala’s own. The fiann around them didn’t seem to notice. One of them pushed his horse forward a step. The way the others looked to him made Neala wonder if he was their leader. A flick of his head flung black hair out of his eyes. Energy as slippery and rank as he looked pulsed around him. He ran his tongue across his thin lips and grinned at Irial.
“I disagree. Leavin’ a feisty, young lass like yerself alone would not be in my best interest at all,” the man said.
In the trees ahead of them Neala could feel the energy of one of the missing riders. The other was hiding behind them. They were surrounded. She cursed herself again for leaving her sword behind. How could she have been so daft and reckless? Could they take on all six of them? She wasn’t sure.
“Ye’d do well to listen to her,” Neala said, doing her best to sound more confident than she felt.
One of the other men laughed. It was a wicked, cackling sound that set Neala’s nerves even more on edge than they already were.
“Two feisty lasses. Oh this is going to be fun,” the cackling man said.
The others laughed. The sound made Neala’s skin crawl and flared her anger. They started to close in and fear mixed with the anger, causing her power to surge to the surface. She wanted her sword so bad. A dagger would get her up close and personal with these creeps and that was exactly where she didn’t want to be.
“Yer escort is a quiet one. Good, maybe he’ll be a smart lad and stay out of this,” the leader said.
“Unless he wants to join in the fun,” the cackling man said with a laugh.
Tyr tensed and Neala caught a flash of his furious blue eyes from within the hood of his cloak. By the way he shook she could tell he was using a lot of restraint and that it wasn’t easy for him to hold back. In her wildest imaginings she had never thought a Dane would be stressing over protecting her virtue.
Irial held her palm out to the leader of the fiann in a placating gesture. “This is ridiculous. We should not be fightin’ among ourselves with the enemy upon our shores.”
The man grinned again, looking slightly crazed as his eyes traveled Irial’s body. “Fightin’ with ye is not my intention,” he said.
Leather creaked as Tyr reached up and wrapped his hand around his sword hilt. Tense energy snapped and popped around him. It was muted—the energy of a normal human—but tumultuous nonetheless. He wasn’t the only one. Neala wanted to carve that look off the leader’s face.
The sound of steel sliding out of leather drew her gaze to Irial. In each of her hands she held a dagger with a long, curved blade. Neala caught a glimpse of writing in the old language carved at the top of the blades. They had to be Bren’s handiwork. Irial’s energy spiked and the blades started to glow purple. The sight of her power swirling around the weapons surprised Neala a little. The power was great, but it was calm and controlled. How the girl could maintain so much control Neala had no idea. Her own power felt like it would blow her apart at any moment.
“Relax, focus. This will be a breeze,” Irial told her.
Her words slid over Neala like warm rain and soaked into her skin. It calmed her and instilled a powerful confidence in her that made her believe she could do it.
As she reached into her boot for her dagger, the fiann sprang. Steel clashed around her when both Tyr and Irial engaged their attackers. A rider charged Neala. She clung to Dubh’s back as he reared and struck out. The offending horse shied away, dumping its rider into the ferns. Somehow Neala managed to hang on to both Dubh and the dagger.
A gurgling sound drew her attention to where Tyr was fighting to her left. At the feet of his gelding a man flopped about, clutching his bleeding throat. The terrible noise was coming from him. Tyr was on the back of his gelding engaged in a fierce sword fight with the fiann leader. A touch of Neala’s leg guided Dubh out of the way. But he moved too fast, throwing her off balance. Her fingers tore free of his mane and she tumbled to the ground.
Dagger still in hand, she jumped to her feet and moved out of the way of several sets of scrambling hooves. To avoid getting between Tyr and his mounted opponent, she stepped back. Her foot caught on something and she went sprawling. Instead of hitting the ground this time she landed on a body. A cry escaped her and she scrambled off it, hands and cloak now slick with blood. Her back slammed into the flanks of a horse. She tried to leap away but her head whipped back as if her hair was caught on something. It started to pull, sending pain shooting through her scalp. She wasn’t caught on something; someone had a hold of her.
“Back off lad or I’ll break her neck,” a voice yelled from above her.
The black and white gelding backed up eagerly when Tyr pulled back on its reins. The fury in the Dane’s eyes told Neala he wasn’t about to give up. He had stepped back right in between two more riders who both leveled swords at him. No matter how fast he was, there was no way he could block an attack from both of them. Neala’s throat felt like it was shrinking and her heart pounded as if it was trying to escape her chest. She couldn’t let him die because of her clumsiness.
“Focus on their weapons Neala! Ye can do it!” Irial shouted.
She had to fight the impulse to turn and look to Irial for support. There was no time for her to be needy. If she didn’t do what Irial said, then someone she cared about was going to die, probably herself as well.
Neala stretched her arms out toward the men to either side of Tyr. Her power built within her as she focused on their swords. The pressure made her body feel like a damn that was on the verge of bursting. She let it go, guiding it down her arms and out her fingers. The dagger in her right hand glowed brightly.
The green and blue energy shot out like lightning. It slammed into the two swords, sending them flying. It struck with so much force that it tore the man’s sword from him. His fingers were left bent at unnatural angles. Both men shied away.
Reaching above her, Neala blindly slashed at the man who had a hold of her hair. The blade hit something solid. The tension pulling her head back released. She spun around and found herself less than a foot from a man on a horse. Blood poured from a deep gash on his left arm and he cursed colorfully. Anger filled his eyes as he drew his sword back in preparation to strike. But Neala was faster. She stabbed him in the thigh and leapt away before the sword could come down on her. Clutching his wounds, he turned his horse and tried to flee. Irial stood in his way.
The strong pulse of Irial’s power told her that she could more than hold her own. But Tyr’s energy was harder to read and she had to know if he was all right. She turned to see two horses trotting away from him. Their riders lay at the feet of Tyr’s gelding. Tyr’s chest heaved with labored breaths and his sword dripped blood, but otherwise he looked fine. The horrified look in his wide eyes made Neala rethink that assessment.
Though he wasn’t wounded, he definitely wasn’t fine. The source of his horror was all too clear. Those bright blue eyes were fixed on her. To be the cause of such a look stung more than she was prepared for.
“Tyr, I…” her voice failed her.
She was going to say she could explain, but really she couldn’t, not in any way that would make him feel better.
“No time Neala. We’ve got to get out of here before that man brings back more,” Irial said.
Neala turned toward the sound of her voice and the comforting feeling of her power. Her dark red hair had come loose from its braid and now flowed over her shoulders like blood. Sitting atop her horse with curved daggers still in hand, she looked like a warrior maiden out of one of Bren’s tales. Two bodies lay near her, one was still twitching. The third must have gotten away.
Dubh’s big head pushed against Neala’s side, a comforting presence amidst so much death and chaotic energy. An argument was heavy upon her tongue but she swallowed it down. No matter how much she wanted to explain things to Tyr, she knew Irial was right. Now wasn’t the time and this wasn’t the place. Besides, she wasn’t going to argue with her Rector. She sheathed her dagger and jumped onto Dubh’s back, not caring if Tyr saw the small use of her power. It hardly mattered. He knew what she was and now he knew what she could do.
23
They parted ways with Irial at the edge of Neala’s land. For close to half a candlemark Neala had nothing to listen to but the bleating of sheep. The silence from Tyr became too much to bear.
“We’re not monsters ye know. We’re just different,” she said.
He turned to look at her and there was an acceptance in his eyes that she hadn’t expected. Until then she hadn’t realized how much his opinion meant to her. The realization disturbed her but not as much as it would have several days ago.
“I know.
We
are,” he said as he returned his gaze to the field before them.
“Don’t include yerself in that. Ye’re nothin’ like the others,” she told him.
The way he fought to protect them today had more than proved that to her.
A crooked smile void of any humor pulled up at the corner of his mouth. “Aren’t I? I killed just as readily as they would.”
The bitter tone of his voice betrayed his pain and made Neala feel terrible. He didn’t want to be a warrior and he had killed for her.
“No, no ye’re not. Ye did it to protect Irial and me and that makes you noble,” she said.
She wanted so badly to make him stop his horse and force him to look at her. Tyr had one of those expressive faces that made it hard for him to hide what he was feeling. One look and she would know, and she really wanted to know. The need was so strong she almost reached out and grabbed his arm but she was afraid of his reaction.
“I’m many things, but noble is not one of them,” he said.
“Yes tis. Ye had to kill for us, I’m truly sorry for that,” she said, hating how her voice broke.
His throat worked as he swallowed hard. He dropped his head and blond curls fell down and hid his face from her. The urge to see him became so strong that her power flared up and reached out. With a shake of his head, the black and white gelding Tyr rode upon stopped. The horse’s energy pushed against hers and she realized she had made him stop. Tyr didn’t seem to notice. He turned and gave her a look that made her heart thump harder. It was a mixture of love and fear, and it was all for her.
“I’m not sorry at all. I’d do it again in a heartbeat,” he said.
Had she heard him right over the sound of the blood rushing in her ears? For the first time in as long as she could remember she had no idea what to say, so she just stared at him like she was daft.
He shook his head and looked down at his hands, but he didn’t turn away. “I know I’m not supposed to care about you but I do and I can’t help it. I don’t want to help it.”
Tears burned Neala’s eyes and heat rushed to her cheeks. “I care about ye too,” she admitted in a whisper.
She reached over to touch his arm and he jerked away like she was on fire. Regret filled his eyes. It couldn’t make up for his reaction. She felt like she’d been punched in the chest. The weight of his gaze was too much. Picking up the reins, she kicked Dubh into a trot and left Tyr behind.
“Neala I’m sorry!” he called after her.
She didn’t slow Dubh down until there was a bit of distance and a few sheep between the two of them. The last thing she wanted was for the boy who was supposed to be her enemy see her cry over him.
24
Nightfall seemed to take forever to arrive. Getting out of the house wasn’t hard. Not even her ma argued when she had said she was going out. She hadn’t told them what happened but it had been impossible to hide the fact that she was shaken up. She was pretty sure Tyr wouldn’t even notice her absence. After returning and helping her get the sheep corralled he had gone into his room and hadn’t come back out.