Chapter 51

The great hall hummed along with activity until nearly dusk. Ebon’s wound was tended and cleaned and Kruzurk’s poultice applied. Another big pot of stew was shared all around. After that, exhaustion quickly spread until most of the group found a place to sleep next to the big hearth. Muck volunteered to stand the first watch at the Scurry gate and with Ean out searching for Olghar that left Daynin and Sabritha the chance to be truly alone for the first time since Abbotsford Priory.

“You said before that there’s another big hearth in the upper keep,” Sabritha whispered. “One where we could—perhaps—lay out a blanket to sleep—uh—by ourselves?”

Somewhat taken aback by the pointed suggestion, Daynin answered, “Yes, of course. There’s a bed, too. I’ll get a scoop full of coals to start the fire. If you’ll bring that big candelabra over there, I’ll show you the way.”

Though his body was tired beyond anything he had ever experienced, Daynin’s mind flooded with images of her body. He could barely contain his anticipation. Trailing behind Sabritha all the way up the main stairwell, he wished, for once in his life, to have had more training in the manly arts. Every step with his eyes on her shapely backside reinforced a growing desire for her, while at the same time building a wall of doubt that he might not know what to do and when, should the moment of his entry into manhood arrive.

“Left at the top,” he guided her. “That long hall with the tapestries, that’s where we’re going.”

Reaching the last step, Sabritha turned left and stopped. She waved the candelabra slowly from side to side as they walked on, marveling at the richness of the woven wall ornaments. “Oh Daynin, these are so beautiful—more beautiful than anything I’ve ever seen.”

Daynin pried his eyes off her swaying waistline to once again appreciate the family heirlooms. “My mother brought those from Edinborough. They cost my father a year of fealty to the McTavish clans in their wars down south, but he always said the glow it gave my mother was worth every day of it.”

“I’m surprised they survived the fire,” she said, her voice trailing off to a near whisper.

“They wouldn’t have, but they were in storage at the time, so the walls could be patched with new mortar. I guess the Caledonians didn’t find them, else those thievin’ bastards would have burned ‘em or taken ‘em along with everything else they stole.”

Sabritha turned on her heels, the candelabra suddenly shining bright in Daynin’s eyes. “There is so much history here. That means a lot to me, since I never had a real home. You’ll have to tell me more. Especially about your mother.”

“Aye,” Daynin said, taking the lead. “With the Saxons gone, we should have ample time for that, whilst we rebuild the rest of the keep. Wick has done most of the hard work, but there’s plenty left to do.”

“Which room?” she asked.

“This one. T’was always a place I could’nae enter when I lived here as a boy. If you get lost up here, just remember it’s the one with the double doors.” Daynin shoved the doors apart and was surprised that the room not only had a blazing fire going already, but that someone had left his mother’s wooden tub sitting in front of the hearth, ready for a bath. “Maybe the squire has been busy up here, eh?”

“Ohhhh my!” Sabritha purred. She twirled twice around in the middle of the room, admiring the well adorned chamber. “God, Daynin, this is beyond anything I ever imagined. It is so warm and comfortable—I feel so—so—at home!”

Without thinking, he blurted out, “You are home—that is, if you want it. And—no requirements—that is—you don’t have to uh . . .”

For the first time since he had known her, Daynin began to see the softer side of the woman. Never before had she let her guard down to the point of admitting she wanted to be with him. The very idea made his head spin. He felt warm all over—very warm in fact. He spun about and tossed the scoop of coals into the fire, then turned back around. Sabritha had stepped so close to him, he could almost count her eyelashes.

“Uhmm—I should—uh—go get some more wood, I guess.”

She placed the candelabra on the edge of the tub. Removing the scoop from Daynin’s hand, she dropped it on to the hearth, both her hands sweeping upward to cup his face in her palms. “I want it, plowboy.” Looking deep into his boyish eyes, she added, “I want it all, and I will give you whatever you want in exchange.”

Tempted to kiss her, Daynin’s mind reeled once again. He felt his heart pounding like a tabour drum. His knees began to weaken and strangely, his ears rang so loudly, he could hear nothing else. He could see Sabritha’s lips moving, though he had no idea what she said. She leaned up on her tiptoes to kiss him, not once, but several times, starting at his lips, his chin, each cheek and again on the lips. He could feel her hands wandering where no others had ever touched.

The room really started spinning then. Be a man, his brain cried out, to no avail. His hands and arms swept around her, more to keep himself balanced than anything else, while his senses regained their composure. She wants me! Oh God, is this real? How could I be this fortunate?

Realizing that Daynin had suddenly turned from lively to leaden, Sabritha guided him toward the bed. “Are you all right?” she asked, helping him slide out of her arms and onto the cot.

Daynin slumped back and shook his head like some dullard just come from a clan drinking fest. “Dizzy,” was all he could mutter.

Sabritha helped ease his legs up onto the bed, then began loosening his tunic and breeches. “You need rest and I need a bath. Get some sleep, plowboy,” she said, soothingly. “Our new world begins tomorrow.”

* Askival *

Unused to the strenuous climb up Askival’s face, Ean McKinnon finally had to stop for rest. With only the barest hint of moonlight to guide him, he realized now that finding his old chert cave in the dark might have been a foolhardy venture. He sat down on a big boulder at a familiar spot where the upward trails split, scanning the north slope for any signs of the priest.

“Hellooooo!” he called out. Only his own echoes answered.

Rather than turn back, Ean trudged on, thinking the priest must surely have a fire going. Just then, a rustling on the trail below caused him to draw his sword. “Come on out, ya bloody Saxon dog.”

A dog of another kind answered with a hearty, “Wooof, wooof.” Thor had come back to find his master.

“Well, I dinnae know who you are, boy, but if ya’ve a mind for company, we’ll climb this bloody rrr-ock together. Maybe you can find this priest I’m to retrieve, eh?”

Thor rushed past Ean, charging up the trail like he had been raised on Askival. He led the clansman straight to Olghar’s cave, though Ean would hardly have recognized the place on his own.

“Hellloooo!” he bellowed again.

This time, a faint reply seemed to come right out of the mountain. “Here—I’m here—in the cave—I can’t see.”

“Bloody hell, mahn—did the mountain fall on ya?” Ean asked, as Thor went to work digging in the rubble.

“Yes,” the faint voice replied, “in a manner of speaking.”

Moving some bigger boulders aside, Ean helped Thor wiggle his way through a crack in what used to be the cave’s mouth. He could hear the happy reunion inside. “I’m Ean McKinnon. I’ll have ye out, quick as a marten’s mouse.”

Shoving more debris down the slope, Ean finally opened a hole big enough for the priest to crawl out of. With Thor in the lead, the two men began their slow descent down Askival. All the while, Olghar filled Ean in on Kruzurk’s great adventure from Abbotsford to Rhum.

“So, you’re the one that caused the big ‘boom’ we heard eh, priest? You put the fear o’ god into those bloody Anglish, wager that.”

“I was a priest—in Russ, where I hail from. Now, I am just a beggar, seeking a warm place to sleep. I’m happy I could help, though I must admit, I had no idea the dazzle would make so much noise.”

“Sleep, aye,” Ean replied. “For what you did for us, you’ll never want for a bed old mahn, long as I have anything to say about it. That is, if ya’ve a mind to stay here on Rrrr-hum.”

“Yes, thank you. I would like that. Thor will appreciate it, too. You are very kind.”

“Just don’t be settin’ off any more of that drizzle or whatever it was. You nearly shook the keep to crumbles.”

Olghar laughed out loud for the first time since his blinding. “Not to worry—the dazzle is all gone, but I know how to make more, should we ever need it.”

* Kinloch Keep *

Early the next morning, Daynin awoke with his right arm numb. The smell of clean hair told him why. Sabritha’s head lay across his arm, her back neatly fitted against his front as though the gods had molded them into a single being while they slept. And indeed, he actually felt that way. She was a part of him now and he belonged to her, forever. His heart, his soul, his honor and his home—he had pledged them all to her in a single act of submission.

Now, with a new day upon them, Daynin realized he had no regrets for his actions. He lay there, his mind lazily replaying every image, every detail of his bath and the most intimate and wonderful night of his life. Through sleep deprived eyes, he could still see Sabritha’s beautiful shoulders draped in an ebony tangle of hair, all wet from the bath with the roaring fire beside her. When she stood up to rinse herself, he had come fully awake, facing the tub and unable to make his eyes turn away. Her intimate curves, the perfect outlines of her back, even the creases on the backs of her knees all seemed so perfect.

She was perfect. The night had been perfect. And with her guidance, he had been perfect as well. He closed his eyes to savor the memory, to lock it in his soul where no one could ever take it from him.

A sudden and unexpected bam—bam on the chamber doors ripped Daynin from his reverie. In the blink of an eye, the doors were flung open by men with drawn swords. The Duke’s heraldry flashed in the boy’s eyes. Blood and screams erupted everywhere. He tried desperately to fight back, but his arms wouldn’t move. He heard someone say his name, then yell it a second time.

“Daynin! Wake up, boy. Get some clothes on ya for pity sake,” Ean growled. “We’ve work to do and it’s already past first light.”

Daynin shook his head, realizing Sabritha had gone. “Where is she? Where’s Sabritha? What’s happened to her?” he begged.

From the far corner of the chamber, Sabritha spoke up. “You were dreaming, plowboy. If you’d had a sword in your hand, I might have had no head this morning.”

Ean cast the woman a skeptical look, turning his attention back to Daynin. “That trrr-easure needs to be put away and those paid who warrant payment. Then there’s that bloody giant of yours, who’s makin’ a frightful nuisance of himself. I got the priest, by the way, whilst you was up here breakin’ in yer bed last night. There’s lots of commotion about that cursed stone and its disposition. I cannae begin ta tell what the deuce that magician and his crew are goin’ on about, so you best be takin’ care of that, as well. And if that ain’t enough, someone needs to be out shootin’ us some breakfast.”

“Yes, grandfather,” Daynin moaned. “I’ll take care of it. Tell the others I’ll be down soon.”

“Och! I’m to be your messenger is it?” Ean raised a hand to feint a smack on Daynin’s bare backside, adding, “You’re none too big for me to be takin’ a sea reed to, ya know, even though you’re the new laird of this keep. Remember that.”

Sabritha stifled a laugh from her corner, all the while continuing to comb out her long black hair. After Ean closed the door, she said, “I can see right now, this place is never gonna be dull.”

Daynin rolled out of the cot and tiptoed across the cold flagstone floor. Though he was completely nude, he felt no shame whatever, standing behind Sabritha and running his fingers through her sable locks.

She reached back and touched his fingers, allowing her hands to wander over other parts of his naked flesh. “Hmmm,” she whispered, “I guess I can’t call you ‘plowboy’ anymore, huh?”

He leaned down over her head and kissed her with all the passion and love he had learned the night before. She kissed him back until finally, she pushed him away and said, “Enough of that, for now, highlander. You promised me a sunrise, remember?”

Epilogue

Aboard the Dionysis, Ranulf had taken to his new position as fleet commander with the relish of flies to a milk pail. Though not a skilled seaman, he still managed to get Plumat’s army off the beach at Rhum and headed south for home. In the reeve’s mind, a three ship armada made him at least the equal of Plumat, so he took every opportunity to pay back his former commander with deception, dishonesty and disdain. Ultimately, his petty, small mindedness might well cost him dearly, but for now, he was, at least in his own estimation, the king of the ocean sea.

Though a beaten man, Geile Plumat had enough anger in him to sustain him for a long time to come. He had already determined that the island of Rhum would someday be his eggshell to crush at will. That vision would motivate Plumat in weaving and wrangling his way back into Duke Harold’s good graces, that he might eventually craft a plan to seize Rhum and destroy it. That is, if he lived long enough.

For Duke Harold’s part weeks hence, once he had Plumat’s detailed account of the disaster in hand, the mere mention of Rhum and the Blackgloom campaign would send him off into a chalice-throwing rage. Fortunately for Daynin, the Duke would soon have much bigger enemies to consume his energies, though the death warrants for the boy, the woman and the magician still very much remained in effect.

Meanwhile, all over Scotia, word spread rapidly of the new laird in power at Kinloch. Speculation about this potential new Regent of Rhum possessing great wealth, energy and wisdom began to circulate south to the whole of Anglia and as far west as Ireland. Even the Drimnin loremasters heard about it, bringing a broad smile to a certain diminutive little monk.

Back at Abbotsford Priory, the novitiate wasted no time in walling up Brude McAlpin’s tomb, including the remainder of the Blackgloom bounty. They left no door or other sign of what the sepulcher contained, choosing instead to seal the contents for all time behind a simple brick facade.

And what of Brude and the Scythian Stone? Ah, that’s a tale too long herein to tell. But rest assured, this tome is but the end of the beginning for Daynin McKinnon and his friends. The rest, as you will no doubt see, is a story still being told ‘round many a campfire where heroes and heathens abound.