The Staff and the Blade: Irin Chronicles Book Four (9 page)

He was so lost in his thoughts he almost didn’t see the girl. In fact, he didn’t see her at first, he heard her. A whimper like a pup. A catching breath and a hiss of pain.

Damien caught sight of her as she crested the hill.

“Kirsten?”

The young healer stumbled when she heard her name. “Brother Damien…” Her voice caught in a soft sob before she could say more.

Damien ran to her, catching her before her legs gave out. “Sister, what has happened?”

She’d been attacked, but by what, Damien could not understand. Her clothes were torn and her face clawed, but he could see no bites on her legs when he lifted her skirts. Her ankle was bruised and swollen, but no other mark was on her. There were no predators on the island to speak of. Even a wild dog didn’t seem likely.

“Kirsten, what did this?”

She started crying and her tears mixed with the claw marks on her face, causing her to wince.

“Not what,” she said. “Who.”

“Who?”

Still crying, she forced out the words between hiccuping breaths. “Ann. Ann and her sisters. In the human village. I was… I was checking the baby. She only gave birth two weeks ago, but everything was normal. I was just there to check the baby. I’ve been to the house with Mother before.”

Damien lifted her and whistled for the dogs. They trotted over, their tongues hanging out, and followed him as he walked swiftly to the village. The sheep would have to wait. “Was the babe healthy, Kirsten?”

“She was fine. Fine! But then Ann, she… I don’t know what happened. Her sisters blocked the door and Ann said cruel things. She called me unnatural. That her milk was dry and it was my fault. That I wanted her babe to die so I could seduce her husband. It was madness.”

No, it was a poison that he’d hoped the islands would escape. He’d heard the humans whisper in Aberdeen, but on Orkney they called his sisters
spae-wives
and wisewomen. The Irina still practiced their healing arts among the humans when singers in other parts of Europe had drawn back from their calling years before for fear of human ignorance and superstition.

“Damien, Ann and her sisters called me…”

“A witch?”

She nodded.

He forced himself not to curse. Cursing wouldn’t solve anything, but something needed to be done and he doubted Einar was up to playing politics. No, this would be a job for Henry.

“They clawed at my face,” she said, touching her cheek as if she still couldn’t wrap her mind around the violence that had touched her. “I think they wanted to blind me. Why would they do that, Damien?”

“Because they’re ignorant and afraid.”

“Ann was sweet to me before. She thanked me for coming to help deliver the babe. It was her first.” Kirsten winced when he shifted her.

“Almost home, sister.”

“Why would she do this?”

His heart broke. Kirsten was such a little thing and had lived a sheltered life. She’d never seen an Irina burn or drown at the hands of humans. Never seen a scribe out of his mind with grief taking vengeance in the worst way. This was why the calls for isolation were growing louder. The days of peaceful coexistence with the human population of Europe were coming to an end because of the fear of witchcraft and of any women of learning.

“Almost home,” he said, hoping his calm would seep into the girl. He brushed a spell over her sweaty forehead, watching the faint gold glow as her breathing evened out. “Easy, Kirsten.”

The last thing they needed were otherwise peaceful scribes and singers of Orkney making out for the humans in anger. Relations could be salvaged. Their haven could remain. But only if cool heads were in charge.

“Kirsten?” Mirren’s voice rose from the doorway of her cottage. “Kirsten!”

“Remember,” Damien whispered. “Calm.”

The brave girl nodded and took a shuddering breath.

“What’s happened?” Mirren came running. “Did she fall? Why isn’t she walking?”

“Twisted ankle.” Damien ducked under the doorway and searched for a place to put the young woman. “Her bed?”

“Here.” Mirren parted a curtain that divided the room. “She’s not here much anymore. She has her own cottage. What happened?”

Kirsten said, “It was Ann.” She glanced at Damien. “I think she must be unwell, Mother. She accused me of witchcraft. Her milk has dried up, and she might be running a fever. I checked on the baby, but I couldn’t check her because she and her sisters…”

Mirren’s eyes blazed. “She did this to you? The scratches? The bruises?”

“I twisted my ankle trying to get away. I fell on the way back. It hurt so much, but I didn’t want to ask anyone in the human village for help. Damien found me on the road.”

Mirren was cursing low under her breath, and Damien put a hand on her shoulder. “You know the moods that sometimes strike new mothers. Ann could be ill, Mirren.”

“And her ignorance would be fed by her mother,” Mirren spit out. “The girl’s mother didn’t even want us to help her give birth. But the husband’s family is traditional. I delivered him myself—well, they assume it was my own mother, of course. The young man—”

“He wasn’t there, but Ann accused me of seducing him.” Kirsten looked confused. “Why would I seduce her husband?”

Damien put a hand on her head. “Don’t try to make sense of it, sister. The woman wasn’t well in her mind.”

Mirren heaved a sigh and poured boiling water into a deep pan. “This hasn’t happened in many years.”

“But it has happened before,” he said quietly. “We must keep calm heads.”

Mirren nodded and set to tending her daughter. None of the cuts on her face were serious and with Mirren’s tending would heal quickly. Her swollen ankle would mend. Kirsten’s father, Bernard, was a sensible, steady scribe who would listen to reason and not overreact.

It was Einar whom Damien was worried about. Einar had been making noises lately about the Irina working so closely with the humans on the island. He tried to keep Sari in the village instead of letting her help the local farmers. Tried to keep Ingrid from trading her herbs in Kirkwall.

He would say it was for safety, but Einar wasn’t a man who trusted females. His mate, Agnes, was a capable woman, but the clinging sort, and Einar made the mistake of thinking his woman was the model of all others.

Bypassing the longhouse, Damien walked to the library and hoped Henry would have some ideas. Because Einar needed to be controlled, and Damien’s memories were still too stained with horror to have much perspective about humanity.

CHAPTER SEVEN

B
Y
the time Sari heard about the attack on Kirsten, the episode had taken on the ring of legend. Like any news in a small, peaceful village, details were exaggerated until Kirsten hadn’t faced three angry women but a whole village of rioting humans bent on her destruction.

They want to burn the singers.

The humans are going to try to take the village.

Einar has a heavenly blade stored under his house.

Someone from the Irina Council is traveling to Orkney.

Damien is scribing
talesm
to ready himself for war.

Sari pulled off her work gloves and tied her hair back in a quick knot before she walked to the library. Rumors of her friend’s ordeal had come to her in the fields where she was working on the barley harvest with half the village. Mostly the non-gossiping half.

Still, news had come at midday with the meal, and Sari had run to Mirren’s house, then left in relief when she learned that Kirsten was sleeping and the worst of her injuries were nasty scratches and a sprained ankle that was already healing.

Sari was hungry, but she didn’t want to hear gossip in the longhouse. It was likely Henry would have some kind of rations in the library, so she decided to go there.

The fact that Damien would also be there only briefly touched her mind.

My lovely one. My dearest.

She could still feel his hands. Feel his mouth at her neck and on her breasts. Sari shoved the thought away. Trouble like Kirsten’s could quickly spiral if the right steps weren’t taken to smother rumors about witches and curses. She didn’t need to think about Damien’s mouth just then.

“Henry?” She pulled open the door of the library and walked into the dim room. Her eyes had barely adjusted when she saw Damien walking toward her. “Oh Damien, I—”

He stopped her words with a deep, thorough kiss that bent her back and stole her breath. He wrapped an arm around her waist and put his other hand at the side of her neck, brushing his thumb over her hammering pulse as he tasted her. He took his time, and when he drew away, her eyes were crossed and her knees were weak.

“Hello.” He licked his lips as if tasting the memory of her mouth. “I thought you were in the barley fields today.”

“I was.” Sari was still wrapped in his arms, and Damien showed no intention of letting her loose. “I heard about Kirsten.”

“She’ll be fine. Henry and I need to speak to Einar before he does something foolish.”

“Good luck with that.” She glanced down at their bodies pressed together. “Are you going to…”

“Kiss you again?” His hands rose to her cheeks. “I’d be happy to,
milá
.”

And he did, teasing her mouth playfully with the tip of his tongue and nibbling at her lower lip. She could feel him smiling against her when she put a hand on his chest and pushed him back.

“I was going to ask if you were going to let me go,” she said, trying to sound cross. “Don’t you need to speak to Einar so we don’t have a riot?”

“I like kissing you more; the day is suddenly much brighter.” Something fell in a crash from down the hall and Damien shrugged. “And Henry is putting on his boots.”

Something crashed again.

“Does he need help?”

“If he does,” Damien growled, “someone else can help him.”

Sari wriggled out of his arms and started toward the hall, but Henry emerged, his spectacles askew but his boots on.

“Ah, Sari!” He smiled. “Isn’t it awful about Kirsten? Poor girl. We’re going to talk to Einar. Try to calm the situation.”

Sari straightened Henry’s spectacles. “Try to talk sense into your friend. Tell Damien he can’t grab me whenever he likes and kiss me. Especially when the village is in crisis.”

Henry looked confused. “Are you doing that now?”

Damien said, “As often as possible.”

“I thought you were trying patience. You said something about a campaign of attrition.”

Sari’s mouth dropped open. “What?”

Henry’s eyebrows rose. “Damien did point out—quite correctly—that it worked well against the Mongols in Hungary.”

Damien said, “I decided that a more direct forward assault was called for.”

Sari narrowed her eyes. “And how did that work against the Mongols?”

“Not well.”

“There’s a lesson to be learned there.”

Henry patted her back and made for the door. “This is entertaining, but we really need to go stop Einar from riding to the village without us. That man is not known for his tact or discretion.”

Damien swooped down and stole one more kiss before she could respond.

“That was a stealth attack,” he whispered, biting her earlobe. “In case you were wondering.”

※

“It’s not been so blatant as what happened to Kirsten,” Ingrid said later that night in the longhouse after the evening meal. “But it’s been there.”

“Talk of witchcraft?”

Ingrid nodded. “I hear it in Kirkwall. At the market. The humans here… they’re a traditional sort. They’ve not felt the conflict between their human faith and our magic in the past. Wisewomen were always here. The men, they don’t notice as much.”

“Too dangerous?” Sari had come in from the harvest to hear that Henry, Einar, and Damien had gone to the neighboring village where Kirsten had been attacked. They had not yet returned, and Sari was trying to distract herself from worrying.

Damien didn’t need her worry. He was a warrior.

“Weakness invites violence,” Ingrid said. “These villagers see us the same as their human women and they dismiss us. Don’t understand why we speak up with the men or sit on the village council here. We’re strange to their eyes. Add our magic to that as well, and…”

Sari nodded. She wasn’t ignorant of the growing unease between humans and the Irin people. There was a reason she’d been raised in a small village in the country. Even in larger cities, Irin families kept to themselves. It wouldn’t do to have the men questioned when they went out hunting Grigori. It wouldn’t be wise to have the healers and scholars scrutinized.

“Our mandate has always been to help humanity,” Sari said quietly. “Protect them.”

Ingrid shrugged. “At the risk of our own safety? You know what has happened in the Catholic countries. The fear overwhelms reason.”

“They speak of locking us up,” Sari said. “I had a letter from Tala that said there is talk in Salamanca of forcing singers, mated or not, into communities away from humans. Locking them out of scribe houses and libraries.”