Healer (3 page)

Cutting the silk ribbon confining the long braid of her hair, she shook her tresses loose. The regal cloak unfurled about her shoulders as she placed the ribbon on his pillow, remembering his joy in losing his fingers in her dark tresses. It was almost over … all but the final words she had for Tarlach O’Byrne.

Joanna neither blinked nor flinched as the keeper of the bolt gave way, splintering the solid oak frame. With a calm she never dreamed possible, she rose and turned to face her destiny. The terror outside the chamber burst in with Tarlach O’Byrne at its head.

“Your husband is dead, woman.”

Though Joanna cringed inwardly as he raised the severed head of her beloved Llas, she struggled to show no sign of her shock at the sightless eyes that had once burned bright with life and love or the drip of blood that had short moments before pumped through her husband’s veins. The dream had prepared her. Still, she was grateful for the bed between them bracing the slight buckle of her knees.

Tearing her gaze away, Joanna met that of Llas’s murderer, and her horror-curdled blood became as glacial as her demeanor. “So I shall soon join him, sir.”

There was no hint in this monster of the smitten warrior who’d once pledged his love to her. Tarlach’s nostrils flared like those of a Pictish bull, and his chest heaved beneath the bloodstained crest of pledging hands on his breastplate. Truly the demon of envy had eaten away at his heart and soul like an insidious cancer.

“So you shall …” He licked blood spatter from his lips and smiled as though he savored the taste. “After—”

“After I’ve had a word with you, Tarlach O’Byrne.”

“I’ll have more than a word with you, ye coldhearted wench.” With a snarl of contempt, Tarlach tossed aside his bloody trophy. “Bring in the lad, men.”

Joanna swayed. The blade she hid within the folds of her gown pricked at flesh just below the cage of bone protecting her heart as Tarlach’s son, the young heir of Glenarden, stumbled into the room ahead of the man’s henchmen. Joanna had been at Ronan’s birth, sent for in desperation when complications set in. She recalled stroking the baby boy’s thick tuft of dark auburn hair, watching the color come to his cheeks with the life the good Lord breathed into him. Today his wild hair was black compared to his shock-blanched pallor. A nasty gash lay open across his peach-smooth face, bleeding scarlet beneath a wide, terrified gaze. Had the man no conscience, that he would expose a child to such carnage?

“God’s mercy, Tarlach. Your son can be no more than six, and already he bears the scars of your bitterness and greed.” Joanna resisted the natural urge to run to the lad and gather him into her arms. There was naught she could do for the child but pray that God would heal him of his demon father’s scars.

So it will be,
a familiar voice, a conviction beyond understanding, assured her.

“The lad must learn how to deal with the witchery of your likes,” Tarlach shot back.

“The same
witchery
that saved him?” When would people like Tarlach ever learn?
“The secret things belong unto the L
ORD
our God,”
Joanna quoted,
“but those things which are revealed belong unto us and to our children for ever, that we may do all the words of this law.
To do good for our fellow man in the manner of Christ,” she explained.

She’d wonder to her last breath how anyone could call the knowledge of nature’s healing properties
witchcraft
. Witchcraft was but its destructive fruit, the use of knowledge for harm or self-glorification, rather than giving the Creator credit for creation’s properties.

“Ye did no good to me, Joanna lass. You—”

Suddenly the room flooded with a light from the nursery. A soldier carrying a smoking, blazing torch stopped just inside the adjoining door. “There’s no sign of the bairn, milord,” he said. “We’ve searched all the rooms.”

Tarlach fixed a glare on Joanna.

When had his left eye begun to stray?
the healer within her wondered.

“Where is the whelp?” he bellowed.

“In God’s hands.”

Brenna was safe. Llas was with his Maker. Joanna was but a few words from joining him. Tarlach started toward her, his axe raised in threat.

Now
, she thought,
and God forgive me.
Joanna felt the sting of the dagger as it broke the yielding flesh just beneath her rib cage. There was naught left to do but fall upon it.

Tarlach swore as the torchlight glanced off the metal of the knife. “What manner of trickery is this? You seek to lure me close, then sting me with that?”

“The only sting you will know will be that of the vision God has given me. The Gowrys seed shall divide your mighty house and bring a peace beyond the ken of your wicked soul.”

Joanna fell upon the bed, the blade thrusting into a heart already dead with grief. It was then that she saw him. Llas, whole and magnificent, had waited for her, reached for her. Joanna clasped his hand and turned in the brilliance that surrounded them. It bore them up and away from pain, loss, and hatred forever.

“No!” Tarlach leapt forward, realizing what Joanna had done. She would not rob him of this last pleasure. He’d not let her go. But to his horror, instead of leaving his hand at the throw, the axe took on the weight of a great stone, bearing his arm down to his side.

What witchery was this?

Joanna lay upon the bed, silent as death, yet the bite of her words assaulted his left arm with a thousand pinpricks, rendering battle-hardened muscles useless. The axe dropped harmless to the floor with a thud. Nay, she’d not do this to him. By sheer will, Tarlach dragged his unaccountably heavy legs to where the woman lay and turned her upon her back with his good arm.

Below her breastbone, scarlet spread on the pure white of her embroidered chemise in a circle from the jeweled hilt of the buried blade. Pain surged through his body from the same spot, as though she’d impaled him instead of herself. The invisible blade ripped through his right side and up into his brain. God’s mercy, it felt as though his blood would burst from his temple, all but blinding him in its fierce rush.

How could Joanna lie so calm and lovely in the midst of this ugliness? How dare her lips tilt in mockery of him? Why, he’d hack her beautiful face into oblivion.

The Glenarden meant to reach for the dagger in his belt, but his rage turned on him as he had his onetime friend Llas. It took Tarlach unaware, slashing the air from his shuddering chest, denying him the use of every muscle. It was her … the beautiful, serene witch lying on the bed beside him. She’d cast one last spell.

“Father!”

Tarlach tried to answer his son, to call for his men, but all that emerged from his throat was a gagging, gurgling sound. Spittle seeped down his chin. His tongue rendered as useless as his arm, he drifted away from the clamor surrounding him. All that remained before oblivion claimed him was the memory of the last words from lips he’d once worshipped.

The Gowrys seed shall divide your mighty house and bring a peace beyond the ken of your wicked soul.

Chapter One

Glenarden, Manau Gododdin, Britain

Twenty years later

Although cold enough to frost one’s breath, the day was as fair as the general mood of the gathering at the keep of Glenarden. The only clouds were those breaking away, fat with snow from the shrouded mountains—and the ever-present one upon the face of the bent old man who stood on the rampart of the gate tower. No longer able to ride much distance, Tarlach O’Byrne watched the procession form beyond.

Clansmen and kin, farmers and craftsmen—all turned out for the annual hunt, but they were more excited over the festivities that awaited their return. In the yard about the keep, gleemen in outlandish costumes practiced entertaining antics, delighting the children and teasing the kitchen servant or warrior who happened to pass too near. Great pits had been fired. On the spits over them were enough succulent shanks of venison, boar, and beef to feed the multitude of O’Byrnes and the guests from tribes in the kingdom under the old king’s protection.

Below the ramparts, Ronan O’Byrne adjusted the woolen folds of his brat over his shoulders. Woven with the silver, black, and scarlet threads of the clan, it would keep the prince warm on this brisk day. A fine dappled gray snorted in eagerness as Ronan took his reins in hand and started toward the gate. Beyond, the people he would govern upon his father’s death waited.

The youngest of the O’Byrne brothers rode through them, unable to contain his excitement any longer. “By father’s aching bones, Ronan, what matters of great import keep you now?”

Were the pest any other but his youngest brother, Ronan might have scowled, deepening the scar that marked the indent of his cheek—the physical reminder of this travesty that began years ago. Alyn was the pride and joy of Glenarden, and Ronan was no exception to those who admired and loved the precocious youth.

“Only a raid on the mill by our
neighbors,
” Ronan answered his youngest sibling.

His somber gaze belayed the lightness in his voice. The thieves had made off with Glenarden’s reserve grain stores and the miller’s quern. Ronan had already sent a replacement hand mill to the mistress. But now that the harvest was over and the excess had been sold, replacing the reserves would be harder. It galled Ronan to buy back his own produce at a higher price than he’d received from merchants in Carmelide. This was the hard lot he faced—this farce, or hunting down the scoundrels and taking back what was rightfully his.

Every year on the anniversary of the Gowrys slaughter, Tarlach insisted that the O’Byrne clan search the hills high and low for Llas and Joanna’s heir. But instead of going off on a madman’s goose chase after his imagined enemy—a mountain nymph who was rumored to shape-shift into a wolf at will—the O’Byrnes manpower was best spent ransacking and burning one of the Gowrys mountain settlements in retribution, for they were undoubtedly the culprits. It was the only reasoning the Gowrys thieves understood—burn their ramshackle hovels and take some of their meager stock in payment.

Even so, taking such actions only stalled their mischief for a little while. Then it was the same thing all over again. As it was, Ronan had sent trackers out to mark their escape route, lest the wrong camp be destroyed.

“Can I ride after them on the morrow with you?” Alyn’s deep blue eyes, inherited from their Pictish mother, were alight with the idea of fighting and possible bloodshed—only because he’d never tasted it firsthand. “After the Witch’s End?”

Disgust pulling at his mouth, Ronan mounted the broad and sturdy steed he’d acquired at last spring’s fair.
Witch’s End
. That’s what Tarlach O’Byrne had dubbed the celebration of the massacre that had made him an invalid and driven him to the brink of insanity. In the old chief’s demented thought, he’d brought justice to those who had betrayed him and stopped an enchantress forever. Sometimes, as on this particular day, it pushed him beyond reason, for it was a reminder that there was one thing left undone. The heiress of Gowrys still lived to threaten Glenarden … at least in his mind.

“The mill raid is no different from any other raid and will be handled as such,” Ronan answered.

“So I can go?”

“Nay, return to your studies at the university.” The hunt for a nonexistent witch was one thing, but Gowrys were skilled fighters. “’Twould suit a Gowrys naught better than to send a son of Tarlach earthways with an arrow through your sixteen-year-old heart.”

“So you and Caden will go after the brigands.”

Alyn’s dejection rivaled that of Tarlach’s, except the youth’s would be gone with the next change of the wind. The older O’Byrne’s would not leave until his last breath faded in the air.

Ronan opened his mouth to assuage the lad when a downpour of water, icy as a northern fjord, struck him, soaking him through. “Herth’s fire!” Startled, his gray gelding danced sideways, knocking into the door of the open gate. “Ho, Ballach,” Ronan soothed the beast. “Easy laddie.”

“Take that, you bandy-legged fodere!” a shrill voice sounded from above.

“Crom’s breath, Kella, look what you’ve done,” Alyn blustered, struggling to control his own spooked steed. “Called my brother a bandy-legged deceiver and soaked him through.”

Wiping his hair away from his brow, Ronan spotted the cherub-faced perpetrator of the mischief peering over the battlement, eyes spitting fire. Lacking the ripeness of womanhood, Kella’s overall appearance was unremarkable, but she surely lived up to her name with that indomitable warrior spirit, bundled in the innocence of youth. It was an innocence Ronan had never known. The daughter of Glenarden’s champion, Kella O’Toole was like a breath of fresh air. For that Ronan could forgive her more impetuous moments.

“And for what, Milady Kella, do I deserve the title of a
bandy-legged fool
, much less this chilling shower?”

Kella gaped in dismay, speechless, as she took in Ronan’s drenched state. But not for long. “Faith, ’twasn’t meant for you, sir, but for Alyn! ’Tis the likes of him that finds the company of a scullery maid more delicious than mine.”

Ronan cast an amused glance at his youngest brother, who had now turned as scarlet as the banners fluttering overhead.

“Ho, lad, what foolrede have ye been about?” Caden O’Byrne shouted from the midst of the mounted assembly in wait beyond the gate. Fair as the sun with a fiery temperament to match, the second of Tarlach’s sons gave the indignant maid on the rampart a devilish wink.

“’Tis no one’s business but my own,” Alyn protested. “And certainly not that of a demented
child.
”

“Child, is it?”

Ronan swerved his horse out of range as Kella slung the empty bucket at Alyn. Her aim was hindered by the other girls close at her elbows, and the missile struck the ground an arm’s length away from its intended target.

“I’ll have you know I’m a full thirteen years.”

“Then appeal to me a few years hence when, and if, your God-given sense returns,” the youngest O’Byrne replied.

Ronan moved to the cover of the gatehouse and removed his drenched brat. Fortunately, the cloak had caught and shed the main of the attack. Already one of the servants approached with the plain blue one he wore about his business on the estate. Irritating as the mishap was, his lips quirked with humor as his aide helped him don the dry brat. It wasn’t as princely as the O’Byrne colors, but it was more suited to Ronan’s personal taste.

It was no secret that Egan O’Toole’s daughter was smitten with Alyn. With brown hair spun with threads of gold and snapping eyes almost the same incredible shade, she would indeed blossom into a beauty someday. Meanwhile, the champion of Glenarden would do well to pray for maturity to temper Kella’s bellicose manner, so that his daughter might win, rather than frighten, suitors.

Then there was Alyn, who hadn’t sense enough to see a prize in the making. Ronan shook his head. His brother was too involved in living the existence of the carefree youth Ronan had been robbed of the night of the Gowrys bloodfest.

“So, are you now high and dry, Brother?” Caden O’Byrne called to Ronan with impatience.

Ronan’s eyes narrowed. Always coveting what wasn’t his, Caden would like nothing better than to lead the hunt without Ronan. Would God that Ronan could hand over Glenarden and all its responsibilities. But Caden was too rash, a man driven more by passion than thought.

“Have a heart, Beloved,” a golden-haired beauty called down to him from the flock of twittering ladies on the rampart. Caden’s new bride spared Ronan a glance. “Ronan’s had much travail this morning already with the news of the Gowrys raid.”

“Had he as fair and gentle a wife as I, I daresay his humor would be much improved.” Ever the king of hearts, Caden signaled his horse to bow in Lady Rhianon’s direction and blew his wife a kiss.

“No doubt it would, Brother,” Ronan replied.

There was little merit in pointing out that the ambitious Lady Rhianon had first set her sights on him. No loss to Ronan, she seemed to make his more frivolous brother a happy man. The couple enjoyed the same revelry in dance and entertainment, not to mention the bower. Too often, its four walls failed to contain the merriment of their love play. Neither seemed to care that they were the talk of the keep. If anything, they gloried in the gossip and fed it all the more.

Battling down an annoying twinge of envy, Ronan made certain his cloak was fast, then swung up into the saddle again. Alyn’s problems were easier to consider, not to mention more amusing. “Is your wench disarmed, Alyn?” Ronan shouted in jest as he left the cover of the gate once again.

Beyond Lady Kella’s tempestuous reach for the moment, Alyn gave him a grudging nod.

Ronan brought his horse alongside his siblings, facing the gatehouse of the outer walls, where Tarlach O’Byrne would address the gathering. Like Alyn’s, Caden’s countenance was one of eagerness and excitement. How Ronan envied them both for their childhood. He longed to get away from the bitterness that festered within the walls of Glenarden. His had been an apprenticeship to a haunted madness.

Tarlach straightened as much as his gnarled and creaking joints would allow. “Remember the prophecy,
shons
of mine,” he charged them. He raised his withered left arm as high as it would go. It had never regained its former power since the night he’d tried to attack Lady Joanna of Gowrys. Nor had his speech recovered. He slurred his words from time to time, more so in fatigue.

“The Gowrys
sheed
shall divide your mighty house … shall divide your mighty
housh
and bring a peace beyond
itch
ken.”

Ronan knew the words by heart. They were as indelibly etched in his memory as the bloody travesty he’d witnessed through a six-year-old’s eyes. The quote was close, but whether Tarlach’s failing mind or his guilt was accountable for leaving out
“peace beyond the ken of your wicked soul,”
only God knew. If He cared … or even existed.

“Search every hill, every glen, every tree and shrub. Find the she-wolf and bring back her skin to hang as a trophy in the hall, and her heart to be devoured by the dogs. Take no nun-day repast. The future of Glenarden depends on the Gowrys whelp’s death.”

At the rousing cry of “O’Byrne!” rising from his fellow huntsmen and kin, Ronan turned the dapple gray with the group and cantered to the front, his rightful place as prince and heir. He didn’t believe the girl child had survived these last twenty years, much less that she’d turned into a she-wolf because of her mother’s sins. Nor did he wallow in hatred like his father.

A shudder ran through him, colder than the water that had drenched him earlier. Ronan looked to the west again, where thick clouds drifted away from the uplands. May he never become so obsessed with a female that his body and soul should waste away from within due to the gnawing of bitterness and fear. Superstitious fear.

On both sides of the winding, rutted road ahead lay rolling fields. Winter’s breath was turning the last vestiges of harvest color to browns and grays. Low, round huts of wattle and daub, limed white and domed with honey-dark thatching, were scattered here and there. Gray smoke circled toward the sky from their peaks. Fat milk cows and chickens made themselves at home, searching for food. Beyond lay the river, teeming with fish enough for all.

Glenarden’s prosperity was enough to satisfy Ronan. Nothing less would do for his clan. The tuath was already his in every manner save the last breath of Tarlach O’Byrne … though Ronan was in no hurry for that. Despite his troublesome tempers, Tarlach had been as good a father as he knew how, breaking the fosterage custom to rear his firstborn son under his own eye. A hard teacher he’d been, yet fair—equal with praise as with criticism.

“You are the arm I lost, lad,” Tarlach told him again and again, especially when the drink had its way with him. “The hope and strength of Glenarden.”