The men are coming.
Berawald was jolted awake by that sharp voice, his heart pounding with alarm. He looked around but saw no one except the spirit who had urged them to go after David, and he realized the voice had been in his head. It took him a moment to clear the last vestiges of sleep from his mind. She had forced herself into his head, urgency cracking the wall that now sheltered his mind from the constant chatter of the dead, and he was not sure he liked that.
“Where are they?” he asked, hoping she would give him a reasonable, clear answer, something spirits were not usually very good at.
They are near the outside opening. They will find it soon. Save the lad.
“How many of them are there?”
More than ye can fight. Save the lad, she urged again before she faded away.
As he leapt from the bed and began to dress, Berawald suddenly realized what was holding the spirit of the woman here, or at least part of the reason she lingered. She had been unable to save the life of her own child. Guilt was but one of the tethers holding her in the land of the living. He hoped that by helping to save David’s life she would finally find some peace, but he began to doubt it. She had already saved David’s life once and yet she remained, haunting him.
Grabbing up Evanna’s clothes, he shook her awake. “Get dressed. Our enemies are close to finding this place.”
“Ye have seen them?” she asked as she took her clothes from his hands and hurried to dress herself.
“Nay, our ghostie told me. She watches over the lad.” After buckling on his sword, he grabbed her by the shoulders and gave her a brief, fierce kiss. “Gather a few of your things and wait for me at that passage I showed ye. I will get David.”
Evanna nodded, forcing herself to obey as he ran from the room. It was hard to leave David’s safety in someone else’s hands, even Berawald’s. Every part of her cried out to run to her brother and get him to safety herself, but she resisted that call. She would only get in the way, and, even more dangerous, slow them down in their attempt to escape. Having become painfully knowledgeable about the need for a swift escape, she knew Berawald’s orders were the ones she had to follow. It did not stop her from praying for success with every step she took, however. She also promised herself that if she heard even the faintest sound of trouble before David and Berawald joined her, she would go to help them. When Berawald had first shown her the way out, he had told her that no matter what else was happening she was to get herself to safety and never look back. That was an order she knew she could never obey.
Berawald was not surprised to find the ghost at David’s bedside. She looked both frightened and frustrated. He suspected she was cursing her inability to just pick up the boy and run. He did not care to think of the many ways she might haunt him if he did not get David away from the men about to invade his home.
“David, wake up,” he said, gently shaking the boy. “We must leave now.”
The speed with which the boy woke, fear darkening his eyes, pinched at Berawald’s heart. He knew life was hard for nearly everyone, that one could not always keep the innocent safe from death, pain, or hunger, but he wished he could banish the fear in David’s eyes. He would, however, make the ones who put it there pay dearly.
“Have the bad men found us?” David asked as he climbed out of bed and began to dress.
“Aye, I fear they have,” Berawald replied as he shoved a few of David’s things into his small bag. “I had thought that I had hidden the other bo—men—weel, but something has brought their companions here.”
“Mayhap they came looking for the other men.”
“Verra likely. Ready, lad? We have to move quickly and quietly.”
“I can be quick and verra quiet.”
Berawald suspected he could be and that thought made him sad. As he led David out of the small bedchamber he had given him, he pretended not to see the boy wave farewell to the ghost. At some time David would have to learn the truth about him and the MacNachtons. Berawald could only pray that the boy took the news as well as his sister had.
“I think we need to move faster,” whispered David. “I can hear the men in the passage coming this way.”
Sharp hearing, Berawald mused. Yet another MacNachton trait. “They willnae find us, lad. Trust me.”
“Aye, I do.” The moment David saw Evanna he ran up to her. “They have found us again, Evie.”
“I ken it. Be brave, lad,” Evanna said, quickly hugging her brother and kissing his cheek. “Berawald has a way for us to get out of here unseen. They willnae get us.”
“Ye and the lad go first,” Berawald said, keeping an eye on the entrance to the tiny room they now stood in. “I will take up the rear. There are no turnoffs so ye dinnae need to fear ye will take a wrong turn or get lost if I fall behind and cannae tell ye where to go. Just move quietly and carefully. There are loose stones upon the path that could trip ye and a few low spots.”
Taking David by the hand, Evanna moved to the far end of the little room where the bolt-hole was cleverly hidden by the angle of the walls and Berawald’s supplies. “Dinnae fall too far behind,” she said, and then slipped into the passage that would lead them away from their enemies.
Berawald waited until he was certain the pair were well inside his escape route. He then began to quietly back toward it himself. He was just inching into the opening when he heard the men enter his great hall. Holding himself as still as the stones surrounding him, he fixed all of his attention on their voices and hoped he would hear something useful before he had to flee. Any hint of what the men sought, planned, or knew could prove helpful.
“Curse it!” bellowed one man. “They arenae here!”
“But where could they go? This is a cursed cave,” growled another man. “They didnae come by us as we came in.”
“They cannae do that, can they, Duncan?” asked yet another man, unease creeping into his slightly boyish voice. “They cannae make themselves like the mist or the fog, can they?”
“Dinnae be any greater fool than ye already are, Will,” said the first man who had spoken, one Berawald assumed was Duncan. “There has to be another way out of here. Start looking.”
“But where could they go?” asked Will, repeating the question the second man had asked. “He is one of them. Ye saw what he did to our men. Jesu, Duncan, he ripped out poor Robbie’s throat. He must be one of the stronger demons, one of them MacNachtons.”
“Of course he is, lackwit. I am nay surprised the women wouldnae be as strong as the men. Women are weak by nature. And the wee lad isnae grown yet. I mean to see that he ne’er reaches his manhood. And that lass has to pay for cutting me. I dinnae mean to let the bitch die easy once I get my hands on her.”
It took all of Berawald’s willpower to stop himself from rushing out there to confront Duncan. That man was definitely the leader and the greatest threat, but most of Berawald’s rage was because of what the man had threatened to do to Evanna. When a man said he would not let a woman die easy, there was only one thing he could mean. Duncan meant to debase Evanna, to force himself on her, and for that thought alone he would die.
“Are ye sure she is even still alive? Ye caught her good with your sword, nearly gutted her.”
“Nay good enough, for she kept running with the lad, didnae she? Weel, soon she will have too many wounds to heal from, just like her cursed mother had.”
“There may be others of their ilk on this land.”
“Fine, then we will be able to cull the herd. Find that cursed bolt-hole! Now!” he yelled at the men Berawald could hear moving around his home.
Berawald slipped farther into the passage and then hurried after Evanna and David. As best he could judge from all the sounds and voices he had heard, there were at least twelve men tearing apart his home. There would be others standing guard outside, perhaps even a few searching the area all around for signs of a bolt-hole. Far too many men for him to deal with. The wisest thing he could do now was to get Evanna and David to Cambrun. Then his kinsmen could help him rid their lands of this scum.
“The ghostie is with us,” whispered David.
Struggling to move as swiftly and silently as she could, Evanna glanced behind her. The ghostly woman stayed close behind David. The spirit was obviously trying to protect this child as she had not been able to protect her own. Touched by that though she was, Evanna would rather have seen a broad-shouldered Berawald with his sword and all those knives she had seen him tuck into his clothes.
“Aye, I see her. She frets o’er ye, I think,” she said.
“I wish Berawald would hurry.”
“So do I, loving. So do I. If only because the only place he told me to go after getting out of here is Cambrun, his clan’s keep. I have ne’er been there and dinnae ken them at all.”
“They would help Berawald if he was in trouble.”
“Which is exactly why I will do just as he told me to.” That and the fact that David was still in danger, but she would not add to her brother’s fear by saying so. “Now, we had best hush.”
“But we are talking verra softly.”
“E’en a whisper can carry a long way in places like these.”
Evanna kept leading David along, thanking God that they could both see so well in the dark and wondering just how long this passage was. At times it narrowed and at other places she had to bend down to clear the low ceiling. She suspected Berawald nearly had to crawl through such places and that might be why he had not yet reached them. Such things would also slow down any enemy who followed them into the passage. They were also slowly climbing upward, which meant that they would come out somewhere above Berawald’s cave. She could only hope there were none of her enemies waiting up there for them.
“The lady says someone is coming,” whispered David.
Even as she turned, drawing her knife from the sheath she had strapped to her arm, she asked, “Ye can hear her?”
“Aye. I decided to let her talk to me and so she does. She whispers in my head. She says Berawald comes.”
“Thank God. I had begun to fear he had decided to face those men on his own.”
A moment later Berawald appeared and Evanna sighed with relief as all the tight fear inside her eased. It was foolish, for they were still in a lot of danger, but seeing Berawald alive and unharmed gave her the strength to keep the fear of their enemy at bay. She idly wondered if David noticed how Berawald eased his body past the ghost, but the boy just smiled at him.
“There are near to a dozen men searching for our wee bolt-hole,” Berawald said, keeping his voice soft. “With so many looking they may weel find it soon. We must keep moving.”
She nodded and started moving along the passage again. Compared to how silently Berawald moved, Evanna began to think she sounded like a herd of oxen stomping over the rocky floor of the tunnel. He did not urge her to be any quieter, however, so she decided she must not be doing as poorly as she had feared.
“Do ye think there are more outside the cave?” she asked.
“There is a verra good chance there are, but we will worry about that if and when we meet up with them,” Berawald replied.
“The sun hasnae set yet.”
“I ken it, but it is close to the time it does so. If no one is outside when we reach the end of this passage, we will judge how bright the sun is before we step outside. We may have to hide in here for a wee while. After all, we gain naught by going out into it too soon and making ourselves too weak to run or fight.”
“True enough. Is it Duncan?”
“Aye. Ye didnae tell me ye had given him a good wounding. He was complaining about that.”
Evanna grimaced. She could tell by the hard anger shading Berawald’s voice that Duncan had been bellowing out his usual threats. Trying to fulfill them had been his downfall the last time he had grabbed her. It had allowed her to stab him. Unfortunately, after being in the sun for so long that day, she had been too weak to take swift advantage of that and it had given him the chance to cut her with his sword.
“He nearly caught me that time,” she said, “but he was alone so I still had a chance to save David. I took it.”
Berawald could all too easily picture what had happened and it made him ache to kill Duncan. He admired Evanna’s courage and her skill with a blade, but he did not want her to have to depend on either for her safety. Not anymore. Whatever else happened, he would make sure that Duncan did not survive this time.
When they finally reached the end of the passage, Berawald cursed. Even with all he had placed in front of the opening to hide it, the light seeping in told him that the sun had at least an hour before it had set enough for them to go outside. He could tolerate that last half hour of sunset without becoming too weak to fight, but he would become almost useless if he spent a full hour in it. He had been hoping that they would at least discover some thick, dark clouds had swept in to cover the sun.
He moved as close to the opening as he dared and listened carefully. Assured that no one waited outside their bolt-hole yet, he waved Evanna and David back into the deep shadows. For a moment he considered sending Evanna and David ahead, for they could endure the late afternoon light, but he quickly cast that idea aside. The sun might not weaken them as it did him, but it would make them both all too visible to their enemies. He sat down, his back to the wall, and silently signaled for them to do the same.
“How long do we wait?” Evanna asked as she sat down next to do him.
“I can venture out in a half hour or so, when the sun is but peeking o’er the horizon,” Berawald replied, silently cursing the weakness that held him back and put them all in danger.
“Then we will wait.” She took his hand in hers and closed her eyes, slowly caressing David’s soft curls when he settled down beside her and put his head in her lap. “I dinnae understand why they come now or came last night when they are so certain that we avoid the day because we are demons.”
“Either they dinnae ken how the sun affects us, that it actually could be used as a weapon against us, or they are fools.”
“’Tis probably a wee bit of both.”
“Aye, and when Outsiders fight Outsiders, attacking in the dead of night can give the attacker a big advantage. These men may nay be able to change their ways.”
“What will happen if they follow us to Cambrun?”
“My kinsmen will kill them.”
Evanna winced but did not protest. It would be a bloodbath if all of his kinsmen fought as Berawald did, yet she could feel no true remorse for what she might be leading Duncan and his men into. They had killed her parents and wanted to kill her and David. The only way to stop them was to kill them. She just hoped she did not have to watch.