The Boar Stone: Book Three of the Dalriada Trilogy (18 page)

Straightening his shoulders, Cahir looked into the shadows behind his chair. ‘And you, chief druid, what do you say to this news?’

Darach stepped forward slowly, his staff marking the floor rushes with each scrape. He bowed stiffly. ‘My lord, ours is a difficult position.’ He extended his swollen fingers. ‘On the one hand, the treaty has increased our trade and wealth. On the other,’ his fingers clenched into a fist, ‘the Romans have ever been the enemy of the druid brotherhood, for they yearn to exterminate those beliefs that threaten theirs. To remain Dalriadan, with all we hold dear, we do not want to become like the Carvetii, with Roman towns and teachings and language and ways obliterating their own. Rome has killed our Maetae and Novantae brothers: if we allow them any more of a foothold in this land they will use it to wipe us out.’ He looked at his king. ‘Plainly you must attend this council and weigh up what comes out of it. All I can tell you is what is in the stars: they foretell a great shifting of the power in this land. That is all I know.’

I could have told him that
, Cahir thought bleakly.
The Romans will conquer and all will be lost.
He raised his face. ‘Thank you,’ he said, the weariness in his voice overriding all emotion. ‘I thank all of you for your succinct analysis of our position.’

And with that, to everyone’s evident surprise, Cahir took up his cloak and left his hall.

Chapter 17

A
s Minna was passing the hearth-fire the next day, Clíona caught her. ‘We start the salting of the beef today and we need all hands, girl, even yours.’ She rarely used Minna’s name.

‘But … I don’t know what to do.’

That elicited a triumphant smile. ‘You soon will.’ Clíona’s deceptively soft, blue eyes gleamed with satisfaction. ‘Slave or no, you might think you’re something different with that
learning
of yours. But if we don’t salt, we starve when the long dark comes. No one’s exempt from that.’ Her gaze flicked up and down. ‘Not even you.’

Later, hands crusted with salt, Minna thought Clíona’s explanation had left out some details. In an open-sided shed and with a biting wind off the sea, she had to grit her teeth as she plunged her icy hands into water and then took up more strips of frozen beef, pressing them into saltpans and barrels of brine. The shed steamed with the women’s breath, and hummed with their chatter. Outside, the yards were a sea of bawling bulls and tossing horns, the air split by the shouts of the cattlemen.

Minna’s hands were soon stinging, her eyes smarting. Keeva was tossing jests back and forth, and the women laughed at her quips, faces bright, noses streaming.

In the afternoon, a bronze horn brayed from the direction of the village gatetower. Excitedly, the women clustered in the yard around a small fire, warming their hands. Soon streams of warriors came hurrying past, belting on weapons as they made for the gate. The horn bellowed again.

Keeva caught Minna’s puzzled look as she stood on the edge of the yard, shivering. ‘The king and his warband are going south to the council on the Wall,’ she said, casually offering Minna a cloth to clean her bloody hands.

Startled, Minna took it. ‘I know.’

When Keeva raised one brow, she steadily met her gaze. ‘I heard about it from the gallery.’ As the maid’s eyes began to twinkle, she added, ‘When I was in bed.’

For a moment Keeva didn’t react, then she laughed, her black braid bouncing on her shoulders. ‘I was listening from my pallet, too. They think we have no ears when they speak of important things.’ She cocked her head. ‘I heard something else, too, about a certain cut one of the cubs is sporting on his hand.’

As Minna’s face flamed, Keeva grinned. ‘I did something similar when I got here, though it was a meat-knife, or boiling water, I can’t remember. Now they know only to grope when I want them to. Ha!’

The horn sounded a third time. Keeva glanced at Minna and seemed to arrive at a decision. ‘Come with me up on the walls. It’s fun to see the men ride out.’

Surprised, Minna could only nod, and followed Keeva up to the ramparts. They were pushed aside by warriors clutching spears, thundering down the stairs to the ground. Below, others were leading horses out of the gates. The river meadow was in chaos. Women were stamping their feet in the cold, scolding their men, while the riders checked saddle packs and fastened cloaks. Children ran around under the stallions’ legs, unafraid.

Far away across the teeming crowds, Minna saw Cian standing with Ruarc’s black horse. She gripped the points of the stakes.

Last night she had found him in the alley behind the stables, nursing a black eye with a cold cloth. The more she tried to convince him to ignore the taunts, the angrier he became, as if he would be betraying himself not to fight. Foolish male pride!

‘I have already been allowed out of the dun many times,’ she argued. ‘If you don’t react, eventually they will ignore you, and you can move around unnoticed.
Then
perhaps we have a chance.’ She didn’t dare say the word
escape
aloud.

His face had been hidden from the starlight by the shadow of the ramparts. ‘I won’t bow to anyone.’ His voice quavered with suppressed fury. ‘So make an end of it there, Tiger. There will be winter feasts soon, when they drink all night and sleep all day. I’ll figure out something for us then.’

Confused by his coldness, she clutched his arms. ‘Cian,’ she whispered. ‘Why won’t you listen to me? Or tell me why …’ She trailed away.
Tell me why you’ve changed
, she wanted to say. But then, she realized, perhaps she had never really known him anyway. A veil had fallen over his face. He hadn’t even told her he was leaving with Ruarc today.

Was that because … Her eyes bored into him from afar. Would he try to escape? Surely he would! He would run, as soon as he was close enough to the Wall to attempt it. Her heart beat slowly in her throat. He would, he must – but he couldn’t! She wanted him to be safe, freed from this imprisonment
she
had wrought with her impulsiveness, even though he had insisted it was his doing. But if he left, she was alone.

All the while Keeva chattered, but Minna stood as still as a statue, her hands gripping the stakes until her knuckles were white.

Desperately, she stared over the clusters of spears until her eyes were caught by a flash of sun from the king’s helmet where he sat on his horse, gazing out over the river. Above his head, the red and white boar banner cracked in the wind, as if taunting her. She resolutely moved her attention from that, too, pushing all thoughts of it down.

I have no loyalty to anyone. I look after me, and me alone.
Cian had told her this right from the start, and she hadn’t listened, because she was searching so hard for her own belonging. She thought about the desperation in his voice when they last spoke …

‘And that’s why I won’t tilt my head at a warrior!’ Keeva was pointing scornfully at all the gilded youths strutting around in their armour, prancing their horses in skittish circles so people had to race out of the way. ‘They ride off to war, and you don’t know when you’ll get them back. Now, a blacksmith’s lad is another thing altogether. Hardworking, brawny.’ She grinned wickedly, swinging back on her heels, clinging to the palisade.

‘
Could
you marry a warrior?’ Minna asked faintly, trying to concentrate on Keeva, though her voice wavered.

‘Could, but wouldn’t. They’d have a mirror stuck to their face all the time! They’re so full of themselves. They think a flashy sword will make a girl open her legs and there’s no need to
woo
her.’ Keeva’s smile turned sly. ‘Nothing to stop you bedding them, though, no laws about that either way. Dunadd’s full of men; even you can take your pick. Farmers, herders, potters, smiths, slaves,
kings.
Aye, some of the girls have even had
him
, though a queer time they have of it, I hear. All fire and no warmth.’

Now she had Minna’s attention and laughed at her shocked face. ‘You have that Roman thing, don’t you? You get so embarrassed about any mention of the bed-furs. I saw a Roman priest speak in the port once. He had a fit when I asked him how much sex Christians were allowed to have, and on what days.’

Minna drew a breath, wanting to strengthen this fragile thing. Knowledge was safety to her, anticipation and defence. And Keeva knew everything. She kept her eyes on the crowd. ‘I heard the king would allow no priests. I’m surprised he let the man get away alive.’

The maid’s black eyes slid sideways with a new respect. ‘He barely did. The king came down to the port and the man fled like his own devil was after him.’

The trumpets now all skirled at once, and the whole mass of men began to flow away to the south, hooves clattering, horses snorting, warriors shouting at each other as the horseboys and shield and spear-bearers trotted alongside.

Cian’s black head merged into all the rest, and though Minna stared hard after him, everything blurred in her eyes.

Keeva had cut her hand during the salting and the wound grew inflamed. Minna saw her wincing as she ground grain and tentatively offered to salve it with yarrow.

That morning she had seen Brónach ride out with her pack, disappearing again, as the old woman often did for days at a time. She thought it would be safe to duck into the healer’s house, grab what she needed and slip out. After all, Brónach was even letting her prepare some of the plants now, grinding, infusing and steeping herbs beneath the chill of that grey gaze. And the cut did look serious.

Keeva’s eyes gleamed at the thought of sneaking into that lady’s mysterious house. As they strode through the cold afternoon along shadowed paths, she murmured to Minna, ‘She’s the king’s aunt, you know.’

Minna nodded, head down into the wind, and Keeva leaned even closer. ‘She was a princess, would have been married off to some foreign king. But then,’ her voice dropped, ‘it was clear she was barren. Never got her moon bleeding
at all.
She’s been the healer ever since, though, as you’ve seen, children aren’t her favourite thing. The women have to force themselves to go to her with their bairns, and their own womb troubles.’

They both listened for a moment at Brónach’s door to be sure she was not there, then pushed up the hide. Only when they straightened did they realize the house was not empty after all.

The young noblewoman Minna saw the first day over the fence, who gazed at her so boldly, was tucked up in the sickbed, her golden hair fanning over the pillow. ‘I beg your pardon, lady,’ Minna said hastily. ‘I just came to get a salve.’ She turned to Keeva. ‘Wait outside and I’ll bring it,’ she murmured. The maid nodded and, with a glance at the lady in the bed, slipped back out.

As Minna turned, the young woman sighed and hauled herself up the pillow. She had a broad face, her freckles standing out like gobs of butterfat in whey. ‘I was awake anyway, despite the Lady Brónach’s potions. Do what you need to do.’

Nervously, Minna moved to the workbench and began sorting the jars.

‘What happened?’ the woman suddenly asked, watching her with that same bold curiosity.

‘Keeva cut her hand salting the meat, lady.’ She sniffed one of the pots and put it aside.

‘You know green-craft? You, a slave?’

The woman was blunt, but the frankness in her eyes drew an answering pride from Minna before she could stop her tongue. ‘I was captured by slave-traders, I was not born so.’ She raised her chin. ‘My grandmother taught me.’

‘Ah, Roman healing.’

Minna couldn’t explain that the song of the plants she heard in this room bore no relation to her upbringing at all.

The young woman was looking down now at her fingers, twisting the sheets. ‘And what you will put on it, it helps the pain?’

Yes.’ Minna glanced at her from the corner of her eye. As she drew in the scent of the plants by Brónach’s workbench, they whispered to her again, as a murmur in her heart.
She has trouble with her womb.
Minna lifted the lid on a basket of bandages and said evenly, ‘Are
you
in pain, my lady?’

She thought the woman would put her in her place, and for a moment those proud eyes did flash. But then the girl blew out her cheeks and folded her arms. ‘I am in pain every full moon. I come here but the Lady Brónach says there is not much to be done. She rubs my belly with something that smells awful; sometimes it helps a little, that is all.’

Minna glanced apprehensively at the door, as if Brónach might arrive back at any moment. But she was torn, for she had glimpsed in this girl’s face not only pain, but fear. This was about children – or the lack of them. ‘The difficulty is with your … woman courses?’ she ventured at last.

The patient rested her head on the pillow, closed her eyes. ‘Everyone thinks I’m weak.’ She bit her pale lips. ‘But I am only just married, and my man’s mother and his sister watch me. They all expect … well, they sneer at me behind my back, I’m sure of it.’ This admission seemed to cost her in pride.

Minna darted another glance at the door, the scents of the herbs clouding her nose. Then her eye fell on the niche that usually held the statues of Brónach’s goddesses. Only the healing goddess was there, her small face lifted with compassion.