Hearts Blood - Juliet Marillier

My work. Just as well she did not know the reason I had worn the motley garment made from women’s magic. Just as well she did not know what work awaited me in the library this morning. I needed answers, and time was short.Today I would use the obsidian mirror.

My heart raced. A clammy sweat of dread made my hand slip on the latch as I closed the inner door of the library. Which document to use? Did I really want to see the host unleashed, the bloody mayhem of that attack on Farannán’s household, with its rending and devouring? Try that, and I would no doubt learn once and for all that there was no taming the host. If there had been an account of the experiment itself, that would have been my choice, but thus far I had discovered no record of it, only accounts of the time leading up to that fateful All Hallows, the breathless anticipation and tense preparations, then Nechtan’s flat observations, set down considerably later, on the aftermath of his failure.

I walked across and shut the other door, the one that opened onto Irial’s garden. I stood at the window awhile looking out and trying to steady my breathing. I wanted to stay right where I was, gazing on the lovely place that Irial had made in the center of his dark world. But there was no time.

Back at the work table, I crouched to open the chest. There was only one item in it: the cloth-wrapped bundle that was Nechtan’s mirror. I lifted it out. It did not feel like a dead weight, but alive, vibrant, dangerous. I set it on the table beside me, still shrouded. My fingers refused to choose a document. I closed my eyes, took a leaf and turned it face up before me. I drew back the covering that concealed the dark mirror. In the light from the window, the creatures wrought on its rim blinked and stretched, waking to another revelation.

Something rouses him from his reverie. Not a sound, not a movement. He’s alone in the workroom with only the wretched grimoires for company. Nonetheless, his hackles rise; he’s alert suddenly, not to danger, to ... what? Something’s wrong; something’s happening that he must stop. He’s gone, a voice whispers in his ear. She’s taken him away.

He strides across the dim chamber to the door, wrenches uselessly at the handle, remembers the bolt, slams it open, takes the steps three at a time.Along the hallway, out the tower door, across the garden in the gloom of a wet autumn afternoon, slipping on fallen leaves, yelling for his serving people as he goes.

Down the hill, whispers the voice. Down the path.You may yet stop them.

He’s quick on his feet, fit and strong despite all those years hunched over his books. It helps him now. He spots Mella from a vantage point halfway down. She’s moving slowly; she has the boy by the hand, and her maidservant walks in front with a bundle under her arm. Conan is hanging back, dawdling.

“Make haste, Conan! Quickly!” Mella’s voice trembles with fear.“Come, I’ll carry you.”

As she stoops to lift the boy, Nechtan gives a little cough. Mella turns, looks back up the hill. Her face blanches; her eyes go wide.

“Not another step,” says Nechtan. “Release my son’s hand. Do it, wife.”

As he hastens towards her down the winding track he clicks his fingers, and in his mind he summons what he needs.The dark forest darkens further. Swirling forms manifest beneath the trees.

Mella’s running, the child in her arms. The maidservant is almost out of sight, further down the path.

“Halt!” Nechtan roars, and Conan starts a thin wailing.Why hasn’t the boy’s mother taught him self-discipline? This is a future chieftain of Whistling Tor. “I said halt!”

Mella trips; she and Conan go sprawling on the wet path. The cries become shrieks. In a few long strides Nechtan is beside them. He reaches down, seizes his son by one arm, hauls him to his feet. “Be silent!” he orders, and when Conan does not seem to understand, he gives the child a shake. Conan clenches his jaw; the screams turn to stifled whimpers. The boy has some backbone, after all.

Mella rises to her knees. She clutches her son around the waist, holding on grimly. “Let him go, Nechtan!”

Nechtan’s grip tightens on the child’s shoulder. He eyes his wife with displeasure. Now she, too, is crying, ugly red eyes against skin pasty with fear.

“Where were you going?” he inquires.

“Away. Away from this cursed place! Nechtan, let Conan go!”

She seems unaware of the things that are gathering around them, the rustling, shadowy beings that people the woods on either side of the track.

“Answer me, Mella.Were you leaving me? Did you intend to quit your responsibility as lady of Whistling Tor without a backwards glance?”

Her lips tighten. “I’m taking my son to my mother’s home in the north. That such a visit seems impossible to you is an indication of how much is wrong here.”

“Ten days’ journey.With a single maidservant. On foot.”

Silence from Mella.

“This is no visit,” Nechtan says.“You’re leaving me.You have no intention of coming back. Confess it! Don’t lie to me!”

His wife lifts her chin, foolishly defiant.“No woman in her right mind would come back to this foul place, or to such a husband. God knows, I’ve done my best to stand by you, to keep things going while you let loose an evil you had no idea how to control, while you left your people and your lands to fall into ruin and made your neighbors one by one into enemies. I won’t see my son’s future blighted as well.”

“On one point you are correct,” he tells her, exerting considerable effort to make his tone cool.“You’ve outlived your usefulness here at Whistling Tor. Go, if that is your wish. I need no wife.” It’s been years since he took her to bed, and there are few servants left for her to manage. He’ll be glad to see the last of her dreary figure around the place. She can go to her mother’s and be done with it. He won’t set the host on her. He owes her something; she did give him his son.“As for Conan,” he adds, wanting to be quite sure she understands,“he’ll do perfectly well without you. It’s time I took a hand in his upbringing.”

“No!” Mella breathes.While it’s clear she expected him to try to stop her, she has not seen this coming.“I’m not leaving him here with you! You are not fit to raise a child. Let him go!” Her arms are locked around the boy; she tries to drag him bodily from Nechtan’s grasp.

“Take your hands off my son, you’re hurting him. He’s the future chieftain of Whistling Tor. He’s not going anywhere.” Nechtan wrenches the child from her, lifts him to his hip and steps back. “How could you travel so far with the boy anyway? Where would you lodge? Who would take you in?”

There is a moment’s silence; then Mella says, “Today we go only as far as Silverlake.”

He can’t have heard correctly. “What did you say? You cannot believe that Maenach—Maenach—would shelter you.”

Mella gets to her feet.“I know he will. I’m not the one who is reviled and despised by all our neighbors, Nechtan. Maenach and Téide have offered refuge for me and my son any time we need it. We’re leaving now. Give Conan to me.”

He sees it in a flash. His wife is part of the whole thing, the whole outrageous plot to undermine him, to turn his life to ashes and his dreams to darkest nightmares. Somehow she’s exchanged messages with accursed Maenach or that mealy-mouthed wife of his. His neighbor, not content with damning Nechtan’s name throughout all Connacht, intends to steal his only son.

The fury rises in his heart, a red tide engulfing him. His arm clamps tight around Conan. He backs away, raising his free hand.

“Conan!” Mella’s voice is wild now, the harsh call of a crow.

“Mama!”The child starts to struggle. “I want Mama!”

Nechtan sees only darkness, defiance, betrayal. He gestures, and in his mind he gives the order: Now. The host comes forth.

To give her due credit, Mella faces them with courage, stepping away from Nechtan so that her son cannot be caught up in her punishment. She holds the boy’s gaze and mouths something to him, perhaps I love you. Be strong. The host moves in, rending, tearing, biting, consuming utterly.

Nechtan uses his free hand to shield Conan’s eyes as he carries the boy up the hill. “You’ll be chieftain of Whistling Tor one day,” he murmurs to his son. “Believe me, you’ll endure far worse than this.You’ll learn how it feels to be alone. All, all alone.”

A little creak from the garden door. I started violently, tearing my gaze from the mirror, where the hideous images were already fading to nothing. Anluan was standing very still just inside the doorway.

“You’re using the mirror.” His tone was wounded, incredulous.“You’re using it without me.”

I couldn’t stop shaking. “They killed her,” I whispered. “Nechtan’s wife, Mella. He made them kill her.When she tried to leave with Conan, he . . .” I put my head in my hands.

Footsteps; Anluan came to stand beside me. A faint rustle as he drew the cloth back over the mirror.“I can’t believe you tried this on your own,” he said. “Why?”

Hysterical laughter welled up in me and turned on an instant to tears. I could not answer. I felt him sit down on the bench beside me.A moment later his good arm came tentatively around my shoulders. In a heartbeat I turned, wrapped my arms around him and buried my head against his chest. I felt a shock run through him, but I was past caring. He lifted his weaker arm to complete the circle. The warmth of his embrace soaked into me, a powerful charm against the dark things. I could have held on forever.

“You weren’t here,” I said. “But I wouldn’t have asked you anyway—you said yourself how dangerous it is for you to be close to Nechtan’s thoughts. Oh, God . . . Anluan, he tore Conan out of Mella’s arms. He ordered them to kill her.That little boy was no bigger than my ghost child, five years old at most.”

“Shh,” said Anluan. His arms had tightened around me; his mouth was against my hair. “Shh, Caitrin.There’s no need to tell it now.”

“I have to tell it, I have to say it. It wasn’t just what happened to Mella. I saw them, amongst the host, before they attacked her . . . Anluan, Eichri was there. Rioghan too. Our friends, our trusted friends.”The two of them had stood there with the rest, waiting for Nechtan to give the word, their faces impassive. Waiting to kill. It made a mockery of my hope for the future.

“It was long ago, Caitrin. Nearly a hundred years. Didn’t you say they were obeying Nechtan’s order? If I ordered them to kill, they would do it. That is the nature of their bond with the chieftain of Whistling Tor.” His fingers were against my neck, under my hair, which had escaped its ribbon and was hanging down my back and over my shoulders. I could feel his heart thumping under my cheek. “They are not evil men. They are good men trapped by the curse.”

I took a deep breath, then made myself draw back. I could feel how dangerous this embrace was, how wonderful and perilous. Despite my distress, I felt his touch all through my body. “I’ve missed you,” I said. “I needed to talk to you. I want to help you.”

“I’ve been much occupied.” He too had withdrawn, edging along the bench away from me, but our hands were still clasped. He was avoiding my eyes. “Not good company. I didn’t want you drawn into this, Caitrin.You came here to do a skilled job, and you’ve done it well. I didn’t want you involved in this situation with the Normans.”

“I am involved,” I said, fishing out my handkerchief and wiping my eyes. “It’s all the same thing, the host, the documents, the household at Whistling Tor, the Norman threat. I may only be hired for the summer, but I’ve made friends here, Anluan. I care about what happens. And . . . well, I suppose you can guess that I’ve been using the mirror in the hope it may lead me to a counterspell.”

“Been using? You’ve done this more than once since that first day?”

“Only one other time, and it didn’t help much. I’ve been through almost all the documents and I can’t find anything about the experiment itself. I’ll keep looking, of course. I promised the host, and . . . Anluan, will you tell me what you’re planning to do? Can we talk about it?”

He released my hand and got up, moving to stand by the window with his back to me.“A man isn’t supposed to admit to being afraid. I am afraid—afraid for my household, for my people, for all who dwell on the hill and in my wider territories.Afraid for you, Caitrin.There, I’ve said it. From the day you wrote that you wanted to help me, I’ve watched you try to do just that. I’ve seen how hard you work, and I’ve seen you look for the good in everyone, no matter what their flaws and weaknesses. Even in me. If I speak to you of my fear, I know you will not think ill of me.” He drew a deep breath. “I owe you an apology. I shouldn’t have shut you out. But . . . you’d been hurt when you came here. I hoped the summer would allow you to heal, to become that person you said you’d lost.” He turned; what I saw on his face made my heart turn over.“I can’t let you be hurt again,”Anluan said.“I can’t be responsible for that. I thought, if I dealt with this crisis alone, perhaps . . . But I was wrong, I knew it from the moment I opened that door and saw you with Nechtan’s mirror. The look on your face filled me with . . . with feelings I have no names for. So yes, I will talk. But first I want to show you something.” He reached out a hand.“Will you come?”

“Of course.Where?”

“Not far.”

He led me out through Irial’s garden and across the grounds to the south tower. I was shaky on my feet, the mirror vision still clinging close. I sensed the presence of the host, watching, waiting. I gripped Anluan’s hand tightly and tried to pretend that the ghostly presences of the hill were not all around us. If Rioghan had taken part in that act of slaughter, if Eichri had turned against a woman who wanted nothing for Whistling Tor but a return to peace and rightness, what hope had I that the whole host might change its nature?

“I should never have come here,” I muttered as we reached the steps up to the tower door. At exactly the same time, Anluan said, “I should never have let you stay here.”

We stopped walking. Our hands still clung.

“I didn’t mean that,” I said.

“This is no place for you.”

But you are here, and I want to be with you.

“I and my past are not fit company for anyone,” Anluan said, as if he had read my mind.

“I don’t share your opinion,” I told him shakily. “You are my friend, Anluan. I have nothing but admiration for your strength and the way you have faced your difficulties.You know I wouldn’t lie to you.Your past is full of sorrow, yes, but perhaps it’s time to change that.” He had said something about change himself—that much changes in a hundred years. Perhaps what I had seen in the mirror did not negate my theory about the nature of the host, but reinforced it.

“I didn’t like to see you using the mirror, Caitrin. Promise me you won’t do it alone again.”