The Swordswoman Collection

Chapter 14

Stark against a brilliant sky, snow tipped the conical mountain that dominated the surrounding hills, with a hint of mist drifting across the lower slopes.

"Schiehallion," Bradan said quietly, "the sacred mountain. We avoid that like death and the deepest pit of hell."

"I have heard of it," Melcorka said. She looked across the intervening hills, a saw-toothed range that extended for scores of miles to the sacred peak. "Have you been there?"

"Never," Bradan said. "It is not a place to visit. The Daoine Sidhe, the People of Peace, are not people you wish to visit." He pulled her away. "They ask you to stay one night, and you are there for eternity."

Daoine Sidhe"Are they so hospitable?" Melcorka asked, with a wry smile.

"Have you heard the tale of the two pipers?" Bradan asked. "Two pipers were travelling to the north from a wedding in Dun Edin, and they met a beautiful young woman, a bit like yourself."

"I"m not beautiful," Melcorka denied.

"Oh yes, you are. Don"t interrupt my story, please."

Melcorka looked away without smiling.

"Oh, she was beautiful, fresh as grass on midsummer"s day, with a neck like a swan, eyes the colour of a spring morning, with skin as clear and soft as a week-old baby and hair like ripe corn cascading to her shoulders." Bradan tapped his staff on the ground. "A bit like yourself."

"I have black hair," Melcorka said.

"You have indeed," Bradan agreed. "I was just making sure you were still listening."

"I"m still listening." Melcorka forced a little smile.

"This beautiful woman, much like yourself save for the colour of her hair, gave a smile that would charm the birds from the trees or the sun from the sky. She told the two pipers that she was going to her sister"s wedding, but she had no music to complement the mead and ale. The pipers sympathized, of course, and offered their services."

"Pipers have a way of offering their services when mead and ale are available," Melcorka said and held up her hand in apology for interrupting again.

Bradan continued: "“There is ale,” repeated the woman, for she knew the way to the hearts and minds of a piper, “and mead and whisky.”

"The pipers were even keener than before, and they accompanied her to the wedding, smiling at her jokes, admiring the way she walked and falling in love with her at every turn of phrase and every smile of her lips."

"Men are like that," Melcorka said, "in the beginning."

"Some men are like that in the beginning, and stay like that until the end," Bradan said quietly.

"So they say," Melcorka said. "I have not met a man like that."

"Maybe you have not, and maybe you have," Bradan said. "Shall I continue with my story?"

"Yes please, Bradan. Tell me about this beautiful corn-haired woman who looked nothing like me and these two men who fell in love with her, but who will not remain faithful."

"She took them to a grassy mound in the centre of a circular clearing. In the middle of the mound, there was a door of the finest wood, which she opened without touching it, and she led them downstairs to an endless underground chamber where the bride and the groom were waiting with a hundred guests and a hundred more. The guests all cheered when the pipers came, for what is a wedding without a piper? And they lauded the pipers with mead and strong drink and all the food they could eat. There was music, and there was dancing and feasting sufficient to make Castle Gloom"s feast a snack for a pauper, and the pipers played the dark hours of the night away. In the morning, their smiling host gave each of them a gold coin for their trouble and set them loose in the world."

"Mead and ale and whisky, a corn-haired maiden and a gold coin add up to heaven for one piper or two," Melcorka said.

"And a story-teller who is allowed to tell his tale without interruption is also happy," Bradan said.

"I am sorry, Bradan," Melcorka looked penitent, so Bradan continued.

"When the pipers emerged from the mound, the world had changed. They walked back to their clachan to find it vanished, with all the houses mere lumps in the heather and only the wind for company. The graveyard was filled with stones bearing the names of the family and friends they had known as young men and women, and people they spoke to looked at them strangely. Eventually, they found a priest and related their tale, but the gold coins they produced had turned to acorns, and as soon as the priest intoned the words, “Jesus Christ”, the pipers both crumbled into dust. Only one thing gave a clue, and that was when they mentioned the date. Both pipers had known Saint Columba in person."

Bradan stopped and looked at Melcorka. "Saint Columba died four hundred years ago, and I was told this tale by that very same priest in the flicker of a peat-fire flame in the spring of last year."

"So what happened?" Melcorka asked.

"The woman who was nearly as beautiful as you was a princess of the People of Peace. She had beguiled the pipers with her charm – as you can do – and lured them into Elfhame, the realm of Faery – which you will never do."

Melcorka no longer objected to the compliments. "How long were they in Elfhame? You said just one night."

"And that is the power of the People of Peace," Bradan told her seriously. "They can alter time and shape, so what the pipers experienced as a single night was centuries in the world of men." He looked out to the west. "So I avoid the People of Peace and the lands around Schiehallion. It is best not to meddle with that which you do not understand."

Melcorka nodded. "I will remember that," she said solemnly, although in her heart she had no great love for the world of men or anything to do with men.

Yet when they walked on, with the wind dragging dark clouds pregnant with snow, Melcorka remembered that Bradan had complimented her throughout the telling of his tale, and she hid her smile. The hurt of Douglas was easing, but it still tore at her, and she was not yet ready to forget.

The whispering was in the wind and the rustle of the heather. It was there and not there, heard and not heard. Melcorka looked around her, trying to place from whence the sound came, but she saw nothing that should not be there. Yet she knew that somebody was near them, talking without speech. There was a memory within her of a voice without a source, and she listened with a prickle of excitement laced with apprehension.

"You are tense." Bradan read her mood.

"It is nothing," she said and welcomed his slight touch on her arm.

They moved on, down from the snow-line and on into a sparse forest with trees spaced far apart, stunted by the chill, twisted by the ever-present wind of the hills until they resembled a thousand different shapes of devils and monsters and angels. Northward, stride after stride they moved, hour after hour, until that strange time in the gloaming when light merges with coming dark and woman cannot distinguish the tangible from the intangible. Shapes were vague in the distance; trees softened by the pinking sky of dusk and the calls of bird sweetened the easing of the day.

The movement was sudden and swift before them, a blur of grey-brown and the gleam of light on teeth.

"By St Bride!" Bradan said softly. "Wolves!"

"Only one." Melcorka grasped her sword.

"Only one and his friends," Bradan said. "Look! They are chasing someone."

Melcorka saw the long, lean and hungry shapes that flitted between the trees. She saw one, then another and finally a score of them, racing each other in their haste to feast. In front, gasping, ran an old man dressed in brown rags, with bare feet and a grey beard. He carried a badger-skin bag in both arms.

"They have him," Bradan said. "He will never get away."

"We can help!" Melcorka scowled as Bradan put a restraining hand on her arm. "Let me be, Bradan."

"There are a score of wolves at least," Bradan said. "If we leave them, they will eat the grey-beard and we will escape. If we interfere, they will eat the grey-beard and us as well, and we will not escape. I do not wish us to end up in the belly of twenty wolves."

The leader of the pack was fifteen paces behind the old man. Its jaws were wide, with a pink tongue protruding from the side and a thread of saliva drooling to the ground. It was huge, two-thirds the size of a full-grown man, grey and cunning with age, backed by young pretenders to its position and a host of female followers desperate to eat the helpless human they hunted.

"No," Melcorka shook her head. "We cannot sacrifice that old man just to save ourselves."

"He is dead whatever we do." Bradan spoke without emotion. "It is probable that his village put him out because he was of no use, or perhaps he is a survivor of the Norse."

"Stay here if you will," Melcorka said, "or run away if you want. The choice is yours."

"You cannot defeat an entire pack of wolves," Bradan warned, but he spoke to a space that Melcorka had already vacated.

The old man"s eyes were wide with fear as he glanced over his shoulder. The wolves were closing, one giving a long, blood-chilling howl.

"Here! Look at me!" Melcorka ran forward, swinging Defender around her head. "Here, wolves. Come to me!"

Three of the female wolves turned away from the old man and launched themselves at Melcorka. Two were young, with hollow eyes and slender flanks that told of poor hunting over the winter. The third was older and more devious; she held back until the younger two were committed to the attack, and then slunk around the side to take Melcorka from the rear.

Once again, that feeling of power surged through Melcorka. She sliced right and left, cutting the young wolves in half even as they leapt. "There"s for you!" she yelled, then felt the hot breath of the older wolf on the back of her neck, dropped to the ground and raised her sword so the wolf landed on the blade, sliding down in a howling welter of blood.

As Melcorka rose, twisting Defender to free the blade of the now-dead wolf, she saw the old man fall under the leader of the pack. "I"m coming!" she yelled. "Hold on!"

The male wolf lifted its muzzle in a snarl of triumph and its lips curled back to reveal vicious white teeth. Jumping over the b****y bodies of the females, Melcorka thrust Defender into the body of the male. It gave a high-pitched squeal and coiled to bite at the sword, just as Melcorka twisted the blade within the animal. It howled again, jerked and died. Melcorka kicked it aside.

"Get behind me!" she yelled, stepping between the old man and the wolves. "Get behind me!"

The man"s eyes were wide. "You are after my gold." He was so dazed that Melcorka had to push him to relative safety with her foot.

"If you value your life, do as I say!"

"You just want my gold," the old man said in a cracked whisper.

"We don"t care about your gold," Melcorka snapped. "Get behind me where you are safe!"

"I"ve got him," Bradan said. "You concentrate on the wolves and leave the old fellow to me."

"I thought you were scared!"

"I am scared!" Bradan shouted. "So, will you please chase these wolves away before I die of fright?"

Some of the pack had already left after the death of their leader. The bold remained; the ones in whom hunger or the desire to kill was more powerful than fear.

"You"re not getting my gold!" The old man hunched up, holding his badger-skin bag close to his chest.

Melcorka took a deep breath and touched the old man on the shoulder. "It"s all right, father. We have no use for gold. We are only trying to save your life."

"You can"t have it!" the old man shouted.

"If they come on the flank, let me know." Melcorka swung sideways, keeping the wolves at bay. They backed off, growling, their teeth white and vicious.

"Don"t worry. You will hear me scream!" Bradan lifted his staff.

"Move back slowly, take the old man with you." Melcorka backed away, hoping for somewhere she could shelter or at least put her back to a wall. The wolves followed, slavering, growling, heads low as they searched for an opening in her defence.

"There"s one coming on the left!" Bradan warned.

Melcorka fell into a crouch and swung her sword low and wide, trying to guard the flanks as well as her front. She saw the lean shape rise, ducked to the side and hacked at it; missed as it shifted aside, recovered and swung a powerful backstroke that chopped off its two front legs. The wolf howled and fell, trying to drag itself away. The other wolves fell on it in a cannibalistic frenzy, jaws crunching on still-living bone as the wounded animal screamed in agony.

"Now, turn and run," Bradan shouted, "while they are occupied!"

"No! They will just come after us." Rather than retreating, Melcorka ran forward. With all the wolves busy eating their companion, she killed two before the others even noticed, then bent low and gave a sideways swing that cut the legs off two more. The remainder turned and fled, howling.

"Now we are safe." She wiped the blade of Defender clean on the back of one of the dead wolves. "The survivors have plenty of meat here."

"Let"s get this old fellow out of the night…" Bradan looked around. "Where is he?"

"What?" Melcorka scanned the trees, "I can"t see him. You didn"t let the wolves get him, did you?"

"No, of course not." Bradan tapped the end of his staff on the ground. "There is something not right about this, Melcorka. One minute he was here and the next he was gone and no sign of him." He looked at the ground. "There are no footprints, either, or anything else."

"Maybe he was scared that we were after his gold," Melcorka said.

"Maybe he was, and maybe he wasn"t." Bradan did not try to suppress his shiver. "Wherever he is, he does not want our company, and I don"t want his. Come on, Mel, let"s get out of here."

"Mel? I have never been called that before."

"Come on!" Grabbing hold of Melcorka"s sleeve, Bradan dragged her behind him.

They moved quickly, putting as much distance between themselves and the wolves as they could before nightfall and found a relatively secure place backed by a sheer stone cliff.

"Gather sticks," Bradan said. "Quickly. We need a fire to keep any prowling predators at bay."

They created a fire and huddled close to the flames, coughing in the smoke.

"I want to get out of these hills as quickly as possible," Bradan said. "There is a creature here that I have heard of – a large grey man."

"And a small grey-bearded man with a bag of gold." Melcorka curled up near the fire with Defender at her side. "I wonder who he was."

"You meet strange things on the road sometimes," Bradan said. "Sometimes, it is best to accept them as mysteries, put them to the back of your mind and walk away. Today is one of these times."

Melcorka looked over to him. "You came to help me even though you were scared."

Bradan shrugged. "I nearly ran away and left you alone."

"There is a long step between nearly and action," Melcorka said. "Thank you, Bradan."

"Try to get some sleep." Bradan looked away. "It is a longer step before we reach Fidach."

"Mel," she said softly, unaware that he was still listening. "I like that."