The next day Daniel rose early, intending to help his father, but he discovered that Alan had already left.
“He went into town,” explained his mother. “I think he wants to get more lumber so he can take you up on your offer.”
“I guess I’ll take the sheep out then,” Daniel said agreeably.
He noted the wagon’s absence when he got to the barn, which made sense if his father intended to bring back a substantial amount of wood. He smiled to himself, he really intends to get the most out of me that he can. The thought made him feel good.
After helping his mother with a few of her morning tasks, he took the flock out, moving them toward the pasture closest to what was now the ‘Tolburn’ house. He knew it wasn’t the most ideal spot, since some of the other fields they used were more lightly grazed at the moment, but if he were only going to be home for a few days he wanted to spend them as close to Kate and Seth as he could.
“Dad can take them to the other fields after I leave,” he told himself.
He spent the morning getting better acquainted with Lacy. She was a smart dog, and her nose had already told her that he was her master’s son. She had accepted him quickly, but they were still becoming friends.
Around noon he stopped and ate the lunch his mother had given him before bringing out his cittern and playing a song. Blue skies and warm wind seemed to smile upon him. It felt as if the whole world were conspiring to show him its affection.
Seth appeared a short while later, walking up the hill hand in hand with a much smaller person.
Daniel felt a sense of apprehension, a sudden nervousness as he suddenly knew who it was. It was a little girl with his friend, and after their conversation the day before he knew that it must be Brigid. It was his daughter.
“Well, one of them anyway,” he said to himself.
More for his own benefit than anything else, Daniel continued playing as they climbed the hill. The music kept him calm and eased his anxiety. Finishing the song he had been playing, he switched to a merry tune that was popular for dancing, the ‘Fisherman’s Daughter’. It was also one that he could easily sing the words to, for the notes were all within his vocal range.
The song told the story of a young woman who lived by the sea with her parents. In the beginning she meets a sailor, but by the end her love convinces him to give up the sea and become a fisherman, like her father. Unlike many similar songs, it had a happy ending and a lively melody.
Seth and Brigid sat down beside him while he finished playing. When the song was done the little girl began clapping. “That was pretty,” she said with an innocent grin.
“Brigid, this is my friend I was telling you about. His name is Daniel,” said Seth, introducing them.
“Nice to meet you, Brigid,” Daniel told her.
Suddenly shy, the girl looked down at her feet, but not before Daniel caught a flash of blue eyes beneath dark hair. “Hi,” she said softly.
She’s gorgeous, he thought, feeling his heart clench. “Did Seth tell you that he, and I, and your sister were all friends when we were little?”
Brigid nodded at him, and Seth gave him an apologetic shrug. His eyes conveyed a message, be patient.
They sat together quietly for a few minutes until at last Brigid’s curiosity got the better of her. Moving closer, she plucked at one of the strings on Daniel’s instrument. She glanced up at him nervously when the sound was unexpectedly loud.
“It’s alright,” he told her. “Would you like to learn how to play it?”
Her eyes brightened, and she nodded at him.
He spent the next hour showing Brigid how he fingered the frets in order to play certain chords. Her arms weren’t long enough, and her hands weren’t very large, so it was too difficult for her to press the strings along the neck while strumming, so they worked in tandem. He would show her where to press, and she would use both hands, one to support the neck while the other put pressure on the correct strings. Once she had the position, he would run his fingers across the board, and she would laugh at the sounds.
“Let me do it,” she told him, indicating his strumming hand.
I should have thought of that first, he chided himself. She moved over, and they switched jobs, he would fingers the chords and when he nodded, she would strum. It was still clumsy but they were able to play an awkward, halting melody that way.
“I need to get some things done,” Seth told him. He had been a silent observer through most of their interactions. “Do you want me to take Brigid home with me, or…”
“I don’t mind if she wants to stay,” said Daniel, feeling a sense of awe that she might be left in his care for even a while. “I can bring her by before I take the flock in this evening. Assuming she wants to stay, that is.”
“Brigid,” said Seth, “Would you like to stay with Daniel for a while? I need to go home.”
She had already forgotten the two of them, distracted by the novelty of Daniel’s sheep dog. She was crawling forward through the grass toward Lacy, as if she meant to sneak up on her. Of course, Lacy was already well aware of the girl hunting her, but she pretended not to notice.
Seth glanced at Daniel, remarking, “They get so wrapped up in their heads that they can’t hear anything sometimes. Make sure you keep a close eye on her.”
“I will,” assured Daniel. “Thank you,” he added with emphasis.
The girl had reached the dog, and Lacy was game enough to leap into the air with a yip of surprise, as though she hadn’t seen the child stalking her. She circled the girl, barking excitedly and pretending to nip at her. Seth snatched the little girl up, and Brigid shrieked excitedly.
“I’m leaving you here with Daniel,” he told her. “Is that alright?”
She nodded, barely paying attention as she wriggled in his arms, trying to find some way down so she could get back to the dog.
He placed her carefully on the ground and turned away, “She’s all yours then.” Waving, Seth started down the hillside, heading home.
The next few hours were a revelation for Daniel. He watched as Lacy taught her how to herd sheep, circling to keep stragglers from getting too far from the flock. Then they played a chaotic version of tag, girl and dog chasing each other in turn. Daniel was too absorbed with watching them to even play his cittern, but when they tired of that game, he brought it out again and played a lively tune while Brigid skipped.
Or is she dancing? He wondered. The girl’s movements were too disordered to be sure, but it hardly mattered, for she was enjoying herself.
Later, tired and sweaty despite the cool breeze, Brigid sat down, leaning into him. He talked to her, studying her hair and dirty face, marveling at the sparkle in her eyes while she answered him enthusiastically. According to her, Lacy was probably the bravest dog in the world, and certainly the smartest. Before he knew it, she had fallen fast asleep.
Not daring to disturb her, he gave Lacy a nod and a command, making sure she knew to warn him if the sheep needed him. Then he lay back and relaxed, watching the blue sky even as he pondered the miracle of the small girl nestled under his arm. He measured each breath she took, and his heart seemed to slow, trying to match her rhythm.
***
His mind drifted lazily while the clouds sailed past. No longer quite awake, he wasn’t asleep either. Daniel was in the place between asleep and awake, a place where the spirit meets reality and dreams begin, and where they return to die when finished. There he felt at peace, as though he were part of something greater. The world was alive, and he was a small but happy piece of it. The heart of the earth was beating beneath him, dreaming of things too large for his small mind to comprehend.
A small figure was running, coming uphill toward him. It was a curious animal, racing awkwardly on two legs. Four would have been a better choice for that sort of terrain. His mind came into better focus, and he knew then that she was human, and humans only used two legs. I’m a human too, he thought idly.
“Oh, it’s Kate,” he heard himself say, and then he felt the world fall into place. He was having trouble understanding the state his mind had been in, but that hardly mattered now. Kate was winded, trying to run up a hillside. She wouldn’t be making such haste unless she had a good reason.
Sitting up he nudged Brigid, “Wake up, it’s time to head back to the house.”
She sat up, looking around blearily and rubbing at her face. “Mmmhh hmmm,” she answered.
“Climb onto my back, and I’ll give you a piggyback ride,” he told her.
It didn’t take much to convince her, Brigid loved piggyback rides. As soon as he knelt, she hopped on, stretching her legs around his hips and wrapping her arms around his neck and shoulders. “Go!” she commanded.
He couldn’t help but chuckle to himself at that, and so he dutifully took off. Moving downhill at speed was tricky, especially with a child on his back, so even though he made haste, he was careful not to take risks. He met Kate halfway down.
“What’s wrong?” he asked her, even more worried when he saw her face.
“It’s your dad,” she answered, heaving to catch her breath between each word. “He’s hurt.”
“Where is he?”
“At my house,” she replied. “The men from the town brought him back.”
“The men?” he asked suspiciously.
She nodded, but she was still too out of breath to elaborate.
“I want you to follow me back with your sister,” he told the girl on his back, easing her around and helping her down. Brigid nodded in agreement and took Kate’s hand.
“Daniel, wait!” shouted Kate as he began to run.
“You’ll have to catch up,” he told her. On his own now, he shielded himself and used one of the tricks he had learned in the arena. He extended and shaped the shield beneath him, forming it into a large concave disk. From his arms, he sent out long pole-like extensions, using them to push himself downhill, and he began to slide, skidding at ever increasing speed.
Once he was in motion he didn’t have to worry about propelling himself, he just used his arms to push and shove to either side, to guide his disk around obstacles too large for him to slide over. It was a wild frenzied way to travel downslope, but it was far faster than the alternative. Since the disk beneath his feet was attached to his body shield, it was impossible for him to fall free, so balance wasn’t an issue.
Stopping, now that would be a greater concern.
As he neared the bottom, where the river and a number of jagged rocks awaited, he changed the shape of his disk, widening and flattening it to create more resistance. That alone wasn’t slowing his descent enough, though, so he began to send long streamers of force out behind himself, grasping weakly at small trees and rocks without trying to grab on to them too forcefully.
That made the difference, and by the time he reached the river he was moving at a pace comparable to a fast walk. He shifted the shape of his shield then, changing the extensions from his arms into long claw-like appendages. The disk beneath him vanished, and he began using the shield around his feet to create stilts, projecting them outward to give him a boost with each step upward.
Climbing toward what he still thought of as the ‘Sayer House’, he surged upward in long bounding steps while the claws extending from his arms reached out to brace and balance him. He was able to ascend almost as quickly as he had flown down the other slope.
His magesight had already found his father, long before he was close to the house. Alan Tennick lay in the back of his wagon, his body still and his breathing shallow. Seth was with him, easing a towel under the back of his head. A bucket stood to one side, filled with water. It looked as though he planned to use it and a second cloth to clean some of the blood and dirt away.
Why is he still in the wagon?
Daniel knew it was a bad sign. His father had to be badly hurt if Seth didn’t want to try to move him into the house. He covered the remaining distance in a frantic rush.
Seth was startled by the odd manner of his arrival, but he pushed his shock aside, “They brought him just a few minutes ago…”
Daniel was already in the wagon, examining his father, his magesight probing within and without. Years in the arena had taught him much about basic anatomy. He had learned to seal wounds and stop bleeding arteries when necessary, and he had spent a lot of time exploring the inner world of his body. He was by no means a great healer; the She’Har that tended to wounded victors could manage feats of healing that seemed to be nothing short of miraculous.
If you won and survived long enough for them to reach you, they could restore you from almost any wound. After a quick examination, he immediately wished that one of them was here.
Alan’s ribs were broken in several places, and one fragment had lodged in his left lung. His right femur had snapped, and the thigh was purple with bruising from whatever had broken it. One of the larger veins there had ruptured and was causing the leg to swell. His father’s face was dark and swollen so badly that if he had been conscious, he would have been unable to see. The lower lip had been cut through by his teeth, but somehow his nose remained unbroken.
Alan Tennick had been beaten within an inch of his life.
In fact, given a short period of time, he might not survive. The injury to his lung might prove fatal by itself, and the leg could lead to dangerous complications later on, assuming the bleeding stopped before it killed him.
“Who did this?”
“I’m not sure,” said Seth uncertainly. “Mr. Stiles brought him back, along with John Hedger, but I don’t think they were in on it. I think they were trying to help.” Mr. Stiles was the town blacksmith, a fairly decent man as far as Daniel knew, and one without any reason to hate him. John Hedger was Billy Hedger’s father, but aside from fathering a bad son, Daniel didn’t think he had any reason to hold a grudge either.
Kneeling beside his father, Daniel closed his eyes; they would only distract him from his task. “Seth, I’m going to need to concentrate for a while, so try to stay quiet. Keep the water and towels handy. When I’m finished, we’ll move him into the house.”
“I don’t think we can, Daniel. Look at his leg!”
“Trust me,” said Daniel, and with that he shut out the outside world, focusing purely on what was occurring inside Alan Tennick’s beaten and bruised form. The lung needed his attention first, and he used his mind to remove the bone fragment and reseal the lung before it got any worse. There was some blood in it already, but he wasn’t sure how to get it out without creating more problems, so he left it alone.
He wanted to realign the bones and fuse them together, but the bleeding vein in his thigh was more urgent. He stopped that temporarily, until he could find the other end of the torn vessel and reattach it. Sealing it off would have been enough, but he knew that it would make it much more painful later if he didn’t reestablish the pathway for blood flow.
Alan began to move a bit, moaning as Daniel’s activities began to become more painful for him.
He ignored that, ready to use his aythar to hold Alan still if necessary. Then he began realigning the ribs, getting them into their proper positions before fusing them together. Apparently that was an exceedingly painful operation, for his father began to thrash wildly. Using his power, he restrained the older man forcefully, locking him rigidly in place.
Alan tried to scream, but his damaged lung and broken ribs made it impossible for him to do more than let out a soft airy howl. Daniel ignored it and continued fixing the ribs. Seth, meanwhile, had taken a seat on the ground. The sight of Alan Tennick helplessly screaming in half-silence while Daniel worked on him had made him light-headed.
Daniel finished the ribs and then removed the excess blood from his father’s leg before closing up the torn skin and muscle there. Once that was finished, he went over the older man from head to toe; closing every small cut and abrasion, making sure his skin was whole and unbroken.
He could do nothing for the swelling, and Alan would still have a long painful recovery, but he wouldn’t be crippled. Daniel released the restraints on his father and motioned Seth to bring up the wet towels. “Let’s clean him off.”
Kate had arrived by then, a wide eyed Brigid beside her. “How is he?” she asked.
“He’s going to be sore as hell for a few weeks, but I think he’ll be alright if he doesn’t get a fever,” said Daniel. “He would have died, though. They beat him half to death, Kate.” As he spoke he created a shield under his father and lifted him into the air, moving him gently toward the house.
Kate ran to open the door, and Seth followed him, wide eyed.
Once they had him settled into the bed in what had once been Kate’s room, Daniel headed back outside.
“Where are you going?” asked Kate. The alarm in her voice was poorly hidden.
Daniel ignored her, and Seth went with him. “There’s never been any trouble like this before, Daniel,” said his friend. “Things were tense, but nobody ever did more than curse or swear.”
“They probably found out I came back,” said Daniel. “They might be hoping I’ll come to town.”
“Don’t you even think about it, Daniel Tennick!” said Kate from behind them, her voice loud and commanding.
Daniel glanced at her over his shoulder before meeting Seth’s eye. “I’m sorry,” he told them, and then he began to walk toward the road.
“I’ll come with you,” said Seth.
There was no hesitation in his old friend’s voice, and the pronouncement sent a shiver through Daniel’s heart. He had been alone for so long that he had forgotten what friendship meant. A painful lump formed in his throat, but as much as he yearned to accept the offer he knew he couldn’t.
“No,” he replied. “I don’t want them associating you with me any more than they do already. It might cause you trouble in the future. I couldn’t forgive myself if something ever happened to you or Kate.”
“Piss on that,” said Seth with venom in his voice. “What they did wasn’t right.”
Kate put her hand on her husband’s shoulder, “He’s right, honey.”
The familiar gesture and the easy endearment, ‘honey’, sent a twinge of regret through Daniel. That could have been me. He started walking again.
“You shouldn’t go either, Daniel,” she said sternly.
He didn’t turn around, “It’s too late for that.”
“They’re probably all waiting for you. That’s what they want you to do!” she yelled as he got further away.
“You know how much I like to make people happy,” he answered sarcastically.
“What are you going to do?” said Seth loudly.
“I’m going to hurt them,” said Daniel in a tone almost too low for them to hear. I’ve had five years to learn all about pain. If they think they know how to hurt me—they’re about to discover the real meaning of the word.
“That won’t make anything better!” shouted Kate.
Something in her tone finally made his anger flare, and he stopped, turning for a moment. “I don’t give a damn. Hurting people is the only thing I’ve ever been good at.”
Her reply was quiet, without hope, but his ears caught it anyway, “That’s a lie.” There were angry tears on her cheek, and Brigid was watching her, unsure why she was so upset. Kate hid her face against Seth’s shirt to conceal her anguish.
Dappled sunlight from the late afternoon sun ran over his shoulders and flickered through his hair as Daniel followed the road to Colne. He walked alone except for his anger, but it stayed close beside him, whispering words of death and vengeance in his ear.