Visible Light, page 25
Caith sat, bruised and sullen, winded. He bowed his aching head against his hands.
"Welcome home," the phooka said.
Caith looked up and glowered. For a long time there was silence.
A scream shuddered through the thick door, a man's voice and not yet a man'sCaith flinched at hearing it and then he hardened his heart to it, thinking on the Sidhe Nuallan. "You knew, "he said to Dubhain shuddering when it came again, more horrid than before." It's all a sham. Isn't it?"
"Of course it is." Yet another cry rang through the halls at some distance, a man in deepest agony.
Dubhain looked that way, uncommon sobriety on his face.
"Dubhain. Dubhainfor the gods' sake, what's in Nuallan's mind, to come here like this?"
Silence.
"He's in trouble, isn't he? Dubhain?"
"Oh, never." Dubhain dusted his hands and, blithe as he had begun, his voice quavered as the cry rang out again.
"Can you do something?" It was not love that made Caith ask. It was humanity, all unwise and simple- minded; he knew it, and yet the sound It came again, and they both winced." For the gods's ake phooka, can you do something?"
"The wards" The phooka fretted and paced back and forth, dark within the light he himself cast. He was naked now, dusky-skinned, his hair falling black and thick about his shoulders, his eyes glowing murky red. "Oh, Nuallan loves a joke, he does, and this one is quite rich, is it not? He's come to see the revenge. To keep his word to you."
"Get us out of this."
Dubhain stopped his pacing. Another scream shuddered through the air and Dubhain wrung his hands.
"The wardsthe wardstheymuddle things."
"You mean they work? Nuallan can't get out?"
The phooka said nothing.
"He's testing me, Sliabhin is." Caith got to his feet, staggering as he did. "Using RaghallachNuallan.
It's for my benefit, all thisO gods. "There was another scream. Caith tried the door again and again, at last turned his shoulders against the rough wood and stared at the twin red gleams that glared at him. Still another cry echoed beyond their dark." Maybe he's laughing at them all the while. But I don't care for your jokes, phooka. Do something. I've got a brother in this place, remember? Where is he? Listening to that? 'He laughed, a brief, strained laughter. "O gods, you do love a joke. But this is enough, phooka enough!"
"Be still, man," Dubhain hissed, sinking down on his haunches and hugging his arms about himself. The red eyes gleamed, feral and terrible, glowing alternately brighter and dimmer as scream after scream echoed up the dark. "Be still. He'll give up soon, Nuallan will. Even his humor doesn't carry to this."
It went on, all the same, and on, and on.
"The wards" Caith said.
"Fair Folk," said Dubhain.
"What does that mean?"
"Nuallan's of the Fair Folk. He says wards aren't that much against him."
Caith crouched down in like position, facing the boy-shape in the dark. "He says."
The phooka said nothing. Dubhain's face was not good to look on, nor his eyes good to look into.
"My brother, phooka. You bargained. Do something. Find him. Where is he?"
"Patience," the phooka whispered at last, a voice so still it seemed to chill the air. "Patience, mac Sliabhin."
It was long that Caith waited, crouched there with his arms clasped about his knees and shivering. The wailing died and began again. "Phooka," Caith said.
"Hssst." The look that fixed on him was dire and distraught. "What will you pay for it?"
"Pay for it? It's your friend down there!"
"There's the boy," the whisper came back; the red eyes looked into his with sudden keenness as if Dubhain had been somewhere and now came back to him. "I know where your brother is. What will you pay?"
"Curse you, you've already bargained for that answer, for all I've got!"
"Your scruples, man. I told you you had that left to trade."
"What do you want?"
"I'll tell you. If we survive this. When I go, hold to me." Dubhain shut his eyes till only the merest slits gleamed fire.
Suddenly it was the black horse rising to its feet, a scrape of hooves on the stone, the surge of a large equine body. Caith scrambled to his feet and in the scattering and gathering of his wits seized it by the mane and swung up to mount it in that low-ceilinged room.
The door was like mist about them as they passed, like nothing at all; and abruptly it was not the horse- shape, but the boy, and himself tumbling to land on his feet with his hand on Dubhain's naked shoulder fingers still tangled in Dubhain's hair. "Let go," the phooka said. "Follow me."
They padded along the hall, down the dark stairs, quiet and quick. Quietly and quickly they pushed open the door on the hall and the guards there turned suddenly to see what had broken among them, a desperate man and an improbable black horse that swept to the far door scattering men like leaves before its rush of wind and storm-sound.
A sword fell loose. Caith seized it up and hewed his way in Dubhain's wake, turned with his back to the doorway and the phooka and at once found himself beset by five of Sliabhin's guards.
He swept a furious stroke in the doorway, taking one in return, beating blades asideducked under one and thrust for a belly. A sword came down at him while his was bound and he sprawled aside against the door frame, in worse and worse trouble, but he got that man's knees as he fell in the doorway and stabbed up at the next guard as the rest of him fell in reach, expecting a blade down on him in the next moment.
A black sudden shape swept him over, as the phooka sent the surviving pair screaming in retreat up the inside stairs.
Then the horse-shape turned and changed as it twisted like black smoke into the boy-shape, into Dubhain who reached for him and drew him to his feet.
Caith caught his balance against the wall and turned for the door and the second, downward stairs. There was no time for thought, no time for anything. He ran the stairs down into the hold as a black shape drifted past him straight down the drop off the landing, a dire thing with burning eyes and the rush of wind and cold about it. Down and down it went, showing him the way as it coursed the hall below.
Other guards came at them in the lower hall. Thunder cracked outside, shaking the stones. The phooka laughed like a damned soul and flickered out of man-shape and in again about one luckless guard; and that man wailed and gibbered and fell down, eyes open and staring. Caith battered down the guard in his own path, not troubling to know whether that one or the other lived or no. He broke clear. Dubhain was by him, running now, having settled on human shape after all.
"Take us there," Caith breathed, seizing Dubhain by the hair.
"You're heavy," Dubhain complained. "Heavy" The phooka was panting now, even running on bare human feet. "This way" It was Dubhain that faltered, the red light in his eyes dimmed as he caught his balance against the wall. "The wards, manI cannotmuch farther, much oftener. Hastebe quick."
Stairs gaped ahead of them, going downward yet again. Caith turned then, with a wild suspicion of betrayal. "My brother" he said. "Not Nuallanhang Nuallan: he can save himself."
"Go on," said Dubhain. "We keep our bargains."
Caith spun about and went, trusting the phooka to guard his back. Light showed below as he made a second turning of the narrow stone stairs, and yet no one barred his way. He descended in haste, turned suddenly, feeling his back naked.
Dubhain was gone. Caith cursed and wiped his face, shaking; then taking a fresh grip on the bloody sword, drew a whole breath and kept going the only way he knew now to go.
The tumult above had died. There were no more screams from below. He heard thunder rumble, distant from these cellars, above him. A torch at a landing was the only light, and that was scant and guttering in a sough of wind down the stairwell.
But beyond that lighted corner the stairs took another bend, onto a wider scene, onto a hell of torchlight and torment in the cellars of Dun Mhor.
They saw him as he saw thema dozen men, Sliabhin& Swords were out, waiting for what should come on them from the commotion above.
Motion stopped thenall frozen. There was a wooden cage, and in that a smallish, half-starved dark- haired boy; there were chains, and in those chains Nuallan hung in Raghallach's red-haired likeness, next a reeking brazier and its irons. Nuallan had burns on his naked body, burns and bleeding wounds and no sense within his eyes.
"Sliabhin," Caith said ever so quietly, with everything in ruinshis last and furtive hope of home, of wholeness for himself. He felt sick and fouled, forever fouled, from his origins to this hour, this bloody dreadful truth beneath the floors of Dun Mhor. "Father mine& You know I'd have believed you? You should have spoken me fair, you know. Is this my brother? Brianis it you?"
There was silence from the boy in the cage. Whether the waif heard at all he could not tell from the tail of his eye. Swords were poised all about the room, his, theirs, every sword but Sliabhin's own, that stayed within its sheath. An oil pot bubbled softly and sent up its acrid, stinging reek. An ember snapped. The air stank of burned flesh and dust and sweat.
"I've killed your men upstairs," Caith said, baiting them all. Such a crime as he had come to do wanted anger, not horror, not blood as cold as his ran now." I've killed every one I could reach and I've driven off the rest. There are no women here. None I've seen. No small ones. Nothing. It's a fortress of bandits father, this house of ours& How did my mother die? A suicide, I've heard."
Sliabhin's face twisted. "Shut your mouth."
"After she found out what she let in. After she saw what you did. She had some scruples left. Even I had scruples left. But you have none, and I've given mine away. Why didn't you call me home long agoto your loving care? Haganwas nothing to what you've done here. Nothing."
"Listen to me, Caith." Sliabhin took on a tone of reason. He moved closer, among the swords. "This whelp's no son of minenot this one. Hers and hisnot mine. I'd still have taken him in, for her sake.
But young Brian-lad wouldn't have it. Gaelan taught him to hate mehis son. Hers. He hates like Gaelan. He has Gaelan's look about him"
"Take your sword. I'm no murderer by choice. Not like you. But I'll kill you one way or the other. I swear I will."
"He's not my son." You are."
"Are you sure? Could we ever be sure?"
That touched home in Sliabhin. Caith saw it, the long, long hate, the madness. "Boy," said Sliabhin, "I kept you up theresafe in Dun na nGall. Safe, all these years. Gaelan would have killed you, do you know that?"
"The way you're killing his son? No. I don't know that. I don't know anything you say. Ever. Boy.
Brian "Caith moved near the cage, shifting ever so carefully." I'm your brother, Brian, hear me? I've come for you. I'll try to get you out of here."
There was no response. Perhaps the boy had passed beyond all wit. Caith reached with his left hand through the bars without looking, the sword in his right hand, his eyes upon Sliabhin and his men. He felt a hand grip his then, a small hand all thin and weak and desperate. In the same moment Sliabhin's men shifted like so many wolves in a pack.
"You face me," Caith said softly, looking Sliabhin in the eyes. "Come on, man, draw your sword. What's one killing more?"
A small shake of the head. "I'd not kill you."
"Why not? I'll wager you were never surenever sure which of us was yours; or if either was. Or ever will be. Isn't that what eats at you? Oh, aye, you loved my mother. You wanted her to yourself, even more than you loved herand still you'll never know."
Steel hissed its way to light. Sliabhin drew, quietly.
"That's what I wanted," Caith said. He disengaged his left hand with a gentle tug. The boy clutched at it a second time, hampering him. But beyond Sliabhin the Sidhe Nuallan had lifted his head, and watched it all unfold with a gaze bright and perilous as fire.
Nuallan's chains suddenly fell, still locked, and clinked against the stone as Nuallan-Raghallach stood free and unfettered, as he burned like daylight in the murk of the cellar. Panic broke among the men.
Some turned toward one of them, some toward the other, in utter confusion; but Caith stood his ground whirled when he had won a scant moment and slashed and kicked at the cage the bars of which had begun to bud and leaf inexplicably and to swell and burst their bindings. "Come out!" Caith shouted at Brian, turning to hold the rest at dubious swords' point, having now to circle to keep stalkers from his flank and from the boy. What the boy did then he could not know. His eyes were all for Sliabhin, for his purpose, for what he had come to do.
"Nuallan," Caith said hoarsely, desperately, "the boy. Dubhain promised."
Light burst. The Sidhe was not where or what he had been; Nuallan was beside him like a glare of light while men flinched and shielded their eyes. There came a boy's faint sob. "I have him," Nuallan said. "I leave youto solve it allmac Sliabhin."
Then was darkness, or the parting of the light, as if light had gone out in his soul as well and left him only the horror, the men, his father closing on him, having one hate now and one focus of their malice.
Caith seized the brazier one-handed, overturned it across their path, hurling red coals and irons across the planks. He kicked a bubbling oilpot and its tripod after it and fled, up the stairs.
"Dubhain!" Caith cried, desperate, half-prayer, half-curse. Steps rang close behind himhe whirled spitted the man that came at him in the torchlight, and gazed on Sliabhin's dying face.
"Patricide," said Sliabhin, holding to Caith, clutching at his clothes, at the tartan of Dun Mhor," patricide twice as damned as I."
Caith freed himself, hearing the shrieks of burning men below, seeing the whole stairwell flared up from beneath, aleap with flame and horror. A burning man raced up toward him, mad with pain: that man he killed over Sliabhin's corpse, and turned, gasping for breath, to race stumbling up the stairs, sword in hand.
Other guards were coming down. Caith met them in the hellish light, hewed past them, one and the other while they were still amazed at what came at them, dark amid the glare of fire. He trod on their bodies and ran, up into the hall, toward the door, where two more guards made their rush at him.
One he killed, and rushed past the other out into the drizzle and the glare of shielded torches. All about him the alarm dinnedhelp, fire, assault!
"Kill him," someone shouted. "Watch the gate!" Another.
Caith ran; that was all he knew to do. He ran splashing through the rain-soaked yard with his side aching and blood binding his hand to the hilt of his sword. Before him he saw the gates were sealed; and in front of those gates a shining rider sat a horse whose mane itself was light. The boy Brian was a shadow in that rider's arms.
"Nuallan!" Caith cried.
He did not expect help. He stumbled forward and caught himself as the horse leapt into motion away from him and passed through the sealed gates as if they had been no more than air.
"Brian! Brother!" It was all his hope fleeing him, in Sidhe handsin their hands, who could bargain a man's soul out of his body. The Sidhe had no pity in them.
"There he is!" Someone shouted behind him. Caith gave only half a look and ran along the wall, trapped whirling to kill a man as he went, still dealing murder with the tears mingling with the rain on his face and blinding him. He loathed all that he had done, loathed all that he was, all his bargains with fate and the Sidhe; and still he went on killing those who wished to end him. He ran, and they hunted him along the wall by the stables.
"Alive!" Someone screamed, full of hate. "Take him alive!" That put a last burst of speed into him, rawest desperation to evade the corner they drove him for.
The beat of hooves sounded at his right as if it were coming from somewhere far, and a cold wind blew on him, and a black horse crossed his path, moving slowly like a dream, its eyes gleaming red within the darkness. It offered him its back; it wanted him.
That was the bargain, then. It was better than Dun Mhor offered, the phooka-ride, that should end in numbing cold water, some lightless riverbottom, to drift among the reeds. Caith clenched the black thick mane in his fists and flung himself astride the phooka, felt it stretch itself to run in earnest and saw the wall coming up before thembut it was only mist about them when they met it.
They were away then, with the wind rushing past them. He heard the phooka hoofbeats like the beating of his heart, felt the spatter of the mist like ice against his face and his neck and his arms. On and on they ran, and the cold went to his bones. When he looked over his shoulder he saw an orange glow, a jagged ruin, that was Dun Mhor, which was all his hope and his hate and every reason that had ever driven him.
It sank in ashes now.
He laid his head against the phooka's neck, buried his face in the darkness of Dubhain's mane and let the black Sidhe bear him where he would, having had enough of blood, of fire, and of life. The rain washed him, soaked him through till he was numb; leaves and branches began at last to sweep over him, passing like the touch of hands and the memory of rain as wet leaves brushed his hands and head.
Abruptly he was falling, falling; but as before it was not a stream that met him, but solid ground, an impact that drove the wind from him.
Caith sprawled, dazed, and it was a moment before he could get his arms beneath him and lever himself to his knees, expecting phooka-laughter and phooka-humor and all the wickedness they could do.
Sidhe-light broke about him, a pale glow. Sidhe stood all about him, bright and terrible Fair Folk. One was Nuallan; and there were a score of others. Their horses waited beyond the circle, themselves an unbearable light in the darkness.
A small boy lay among them, sprawled unconscious on the grass at their feet and, seeing that, Caith found his strength again and tried to get up and go to Brian; but he could not. Nuallan moved between and a chill came on Caith's limbs that took the strength from his legs. He got to the Sidhe all the same and grasped at his shining cloak: but it passed through his fingers and he fell to his knees.
