Chapter Two - Mercy

Maisie began to moan, an unearthly sound which filled the small hut and made Eithne’s heart heavy. She was certain Xander would have no sympathy for her plight unless she offered up an incentive. He was busy devouring the rabbit stew with a bent spoon, one arm clamped firmly around her waist.

“Please,” she begged. “Let me go to her. I think she’s dying.”

There was a clatter as he dropped the spoon on the table. “No tricks,” he warned, releasing her.

Cuddling the child, she could not help but notice the drool on Morgan’s face. His eyes were closed and she fancied she could sense his pain.

A shadow fell across her. Eithne raised tear-filled eyes to his. “I fear I was too late,” she said.

“You give up far too easily, girl,” Xander said. “Am I right in thinking there’s a well outside? Some water may revive them. For sure it will ease their passing, should it come to that. Solid food was never going to work.” He put his hands on his hips. “What are you waiting for?”

She found a dipper among other assorted utensils in the far corner of the dwelling and ventured outside. The sun was high overhead and somewhere she could hear a kitten’s distinctive cry, high pitched and plaintive, reminding her of a newborn babe’s.

Eithne brushed that thought aside. Thinking about Joel would bring her naught but misery and she needed to be strong now that her father was gone. Just to be certain it wasn’t polluted she tasted the water and found it passable and, if anything, slightly warm.

Rushing back inside wasn’t an option given her precious burden. Eithne had tried throughout her eighteen years to do everything right and that extended to the smallest task. She minded her steps, not wanting to encounter an unexpected stone or flinch at the sight of a scurrying field mouse. The hut was on the very border of the village and closer to the cow pasture than the barley crop.

Her low-heeled shoes were new and now stained with more than just dirt. Eithne knew who to blame for that. She was trying her best to ignore the horrible smell of burning, though the black smoke rising in the distance told its own story. The silence was almost eerie and she began to wonder at the lack of screams.

What had happened to the other women? Surely they hadn’t all perished in the battle?

Someone was blocking her way. It was the guard, Alain.

“It’s best this way,” he told her.

“No!” she screamed, flinging the dipper at him and taking to her heels.

He gave chase and she could sense him gaining on her all the time. When she’d received that message from her old nursemaid’s son to stay put, Eithne hadn’t known what to make of it at first. Hal claimed he had received word from her brother, Ephron, after two long years of absence. Bessie’s son also assured her she wouldn’t be harmed and she’d been foolish enough to believe that.

Blaming her older sibling for this new threat to the safety of the realm had been all too easy given his past perfidies. Yet, if Xander were to be believed, it was nothing to do with him. The invader-turned-conqueror was obviously acquainted with Ephron; those jibes about her weight were all-too familiar.

She had to escape or suffer the fate of Lily, her cousin abducted by a Duke from across the water. Marriage had not been an option after she returned, disgraced and choosing to take the veil.

The helmeted foot soldier who had turned up to guard her unexpectedly and was obviously in league with the enemy cornered Eithne close to the church.

“You could let me go. Tell him I sought sanctuary in there,” she panted, staring him down in the way which used to make her misbehaving ladies-in-waiting quail.

Alain was made of sterner stuff. Or was he just afraid of the man holding all the power?

“Can’t do that, my lady,” he said. “I have my orders.”

“From whom?”

Playing the haughty princess didn’t cut it either.

“The conqueror, of course. Xander pays well. He knows what it’s like to be a mercenary.”

“Talking about me behind my back, Mellow?”

Eithne’s panic level spiked sharply.

“Eavesdroppers seldom hear anything good about themselves,” she said, finding a spark of courage from somewhere. Fleeting, maybe, but she hoped her late father would be proud.

Given what had happened between him and her lady mother, she had felt duty bound to show him by her own shining example that not all women were selfish, vain creatures who refused to even open a book. As for being unfaithful, that was a moot point given that her one betrothal hadn’t lasted long enough to be worthy of the name.

No other suitor had ever come calling after that and she had often wondered if Lucas had spread malicious rumours about her.

Between him and Ephron, she really had no chance.

“Mellow knows better than to bad mouth me, even to my future slave.”

“I’ll never submit to the likes of you,” she declared, eyeing the distance to the church and calculating her chances.

“Don’t even think about it, Princess,” Xander said, as if he had read her mind. He began tossing a dagger high into the air only to catch it and send it back skywards. The repetitive action mesmerised her. Until he continued, “It will not help you and may endanger anyone who tries to aid you. Know this, I am no respecter of religion.”

“You would harm a priest?” she gasped.

“If he stood between me and what I wanted. There is no such thing as sanctuary in my world.”

“Oh yes, I forgot. You belong to a fraternity of godless cutthroats.”

“That’s hardly fair,” he chided. “Someone’s got to dig their graves and I doubt you’d be up to the job.”

“Did you really have to – to snuff out their lives as casually as if you were dousing a candle?”

She was upset now, all over again, for two bairns she hadn’t even known. Aye, bairns, her old nursemaid’s word.

“They’re better off dead.”

His tone of voice was different now, less cocky; unreadable.

“That wasn’t for you to decide,” she protested.

“Tough,” Xander said. “Get over it. I have.”

There was just something in the way he said it which told her that was a lie. A conqueror with a heart? She must be dreaming.

“Words must be said.”

Eithne nodded, as if agreeing with her own statement.

“Is this your way of saying we need the priest?”

“Not necessarily. I – I’ll improvise.”

There was a tense silence during which the guard looked between her and his boss.

“Fair enough, Princess. But make no mistake, once the sanctimony is done, you belong to me. Say it.”

“I won’t.”

“Then I’ll raze the hut to the ground.”