Night Visitor (13 page)

Smokey whined sharply, alerting them even before they heard the slight rustling overhead, that the cat was departing. Though they peered closely, no sign of the feline was to be had anywhere in the leafy branches that shivered overhead. There came a tiny shower of silvery sparks and then there was only calm.

“He’s gone. Just disappeared,” Taffy marveled.

“Aye. ‘Tis their way.”

Dejected at being deprived of his toy, Smokey wandered off to nose a stand of gorse.

“What is that you have there?” Taffy asked, looking away from the empty bower and noticing
the reverence with which Malcolm handled a sliver of moon-bright silver.

“ ’Tis my reed,” he answered cheerfully, opening his sporran and dropping the needle inside the pouch. “It means I shall play the pipes again. And what is that bit o’ fancy mongery there?”

“These are brass knuckles. They’re for fighting,” she said, slipping them over her fingers in demonstration. She mimed a blow at Malcolm’s chin.

His elevated brows arched higher.

“Ye’ll break ye hand hitting out like that. Donnae be bending yer wrists so. And, Taffy lass, ye need tae be learning yer metals. This isnae brass. ‘Tis very pure silver.”

“Well, no. These knuckles are sterling silver, but most are brass or lead. But look! Something has been added. These symbols here. They look like writing. Do you know what they mean?”

Malcolm leaned closer and then laughed softly.

“Aye. They mean
trickery.
I think the still-folk approve of yer weapon.”

“This is faerie writing?” she asked, awed. “They actually write things down?”

“Aye, nobody has a flawless memory and they do live a long while. Now come, we’d best away whilst we have the dark and solitude tae travel in. These burned out Campbells will be back
soon enough, and have the black-bitch’s men wi’ them.”

“Malcolm, will we ever see the faeries, do you think?” she asked, carefully stowing her decorated weapon deep in her pocket.

“I pray not.”

“Why?” she demanded, rather startled at his vehemence. “Aren’t they fair and handsome? And they’ve been friends to us, haven’t they?”

“Well, lass, they have been friends after their own fashion.”

“But…Malcolm, I don’t understand. What do you mean? Are they not like in the stories? Beautiful and slender and tall?”

“Aye, that they are. Just like the stories as tae their appearance. Only they are not fair like Sassenach folk. They are tall, and dark, and favor green clothing. They have pointed ears, too,” he said, tapping the side of his head before taking her hand to lead her away from the copsewood. “But the still-folk who dwell in this part of the hielands are something o’ a mixed blessing tae us just now. They’ve kept us safe from the Campbells and offered us their own food—all that ye might have the
sight.”

“The
sight?
Like visions?”

“Nay. Eyes! The ability tae find their paths through the woods in the darkness.” Malcolm waved his hand overhead, reminding Taffy that they were conversing beneath a night sky.

“But?
That isn’t bad though. I needed to be able to see. So what else have they done that makes you uneasy? There’s something more, isn’t there? Something that has troubled you since we left the cave. I wish that you would speak plainly about it, for I can sense you fretting, more and more with every hour that passes.” She laid a soft hand upon his arm.

Such powerful persuasion she carried in one small hand. Malcolm studied her calm but determined face for a moment and then nodded.

“I’ll tell ye then, for mayhap it is better that ye know. I donnae understand all their thinking, but the still ones didnae help us get away from the Campbells out o’ Christian charity. They never die, lass. Remember always that they have no reason to love mortals. Of a rare occasion they may be taken wi’ one of our kind, but man has been their enemy since first we met, and the first spear of iron spilled faerie blood.”

“I see.” Taffy looked down at her boots, contemplating them for a moment before reluctantly asking: “Then they might betray us later on?”

“Nay!” Malcolm sighed and looked up at the sky, the moon had passed its zenith and was setting. He tried to find a way to explain the nebulous doubts that troubled his mind. “I believe that our circumstance is something like this old tale of the midwife.”

“A parable?”

He nodded.

“Aye, a parable. Once, there was a midwife fetched tae aid in the birth o’ a fairy lady at the hinder end o’ the harvest time. It was the
oidhche shamhna
—All Hallow’s Eve—a time o’ great magic. She saved the mother and bairn a deal o’ pain and as it was a night of special power, she was offered a reward by the grateful husband. Kenning that they were of the still-folk of
Tomhnafurach,
she shrewdly asked that her gift be the ability tae always bring babes live intae the world, and that the gift pass tae her children when she was gone.”

“That seems a fairly selfless ambition. Can the faeries really do that?” Taffy asked, her voice half hopeful and half afraid.

“Aye, they could on the
oidhche shamhna.
But they didnae wish tae grant this tae the woman, so they did a humbuggit. The woman thought tae one day have a daughter tae be a midwife. But though she had only sisters, and the sisters had only female babes, yet she herself had only sons. And as they didnae become midwives she was eventually in despair o’ having wasted a wish.”

“And it was the faeries’ fault that she had no daughter? They did this so that they wouldn’t have to keep their word to the woman?” Taffy demanded, with a growing mixture of unease and disapproval.

“Aye, they spelled her that she would have no
daughters tae become midwives, for they wanted no more people born near
Tomhnafurach.
But they didnae fail tae keep their word.” Malcolm half-smiled, his tone laced with irony. “The sons always birthed living sheep and cattle.”

“Well, I—” Taffy froze in place, suddenly aware that something was missing.

“Malcolm, where is my camera?”

They looked about swiftly on the shadowed ground, under the shrubs and even up in the trees, but Taffy’s camera and tripod were nowhere to be found. The only thing they discovered was Smokey, who had fallen into a deep, unnatural sleep and was hard to rouse from it.

“Oh, Malcolm!” she cried, truly distressed at the loss of her camera and Smokey’s groggy state. “They’ll bring it back, won’t they? They are just curious about it? Wake up, boy, come on now. There’s a good dog! They didn’t hurt you, did they?”

“Sure they will, lass. They brought back everything else. No doubt they were, as ye say, curious. Or perhaps wished tae decorate it for ye.”

Malcolm kneeled down by the sleeping hound and laid a hand over his eyes. Muttering something under his breath, he pulled his hand up sharply. Smokey blinked once and then scrambled to his feet growling.

Taffy stared, too tired to be amazed.

“But, Malcolm, I meant to take photographs…” she trailed off, realizing that though she had had every opportunity, she had not thought once to use her camera. Why was that? Was she so distracted by what was happening to them that she had simply forgotten?

Or was this more faerie glamourie being practiced on a human because they did not want her, for some reason, to have a record of her time with Malcolm.

“Give me that pack,” she instructed urgently, pulling the sack away from Malcolm and searching for her precious photograph of Duntrune.

The thin boards were easily found at the side of the pack, but not trusting that evidence alone, she opened them up to be certain the plate remained within.

It brought her immediate relief to see that Malcolm’s ghostly image was still there and untouched by any added faerie art.

“Thank heavens!” Taffy closed the boards back up and returned them to the pack. “I thought that they might have taken this away, too.”

Malcolm shook his head and reslung the pack.

“Ye worry o’er strange things, lass,” he said, but his smile was kind. “Have ye not the very flesh o’ me right tae hand?”

“Yes.” It took an effort, but she returned his smile.

“Are ye prepared then tae depart?”

“Yes. I’m sorry about the delay. I just—well, it’s the only picture I have of you. Perhaps the only one I shall ever have.”

Her soft words penetrated Malcolm’s amusement.

“Aye, so it is.” It would be something for Taffy to show the bairn. Without thinking, he broke his own rule of silence about their uncertain future by adding: “I wish that I had such an image of ye tae keep.”

“We’ll make one,” Taffy promised. “I think I can find everything I need to develop the plate here. Thank heavens I have an older, simpler kind of camera! Well,
had
an older camera.”

Seeing her renewed frown, Malcolm answered lightly: “We’ll speak o’ the matter to the next moggie we see. Ye’ll have your picture box back soon, Taffy lass. Meanwhile, we’d best be off.”

Even as he finished speaking, a shadow passed over the land followed by a sudden chill. Looking into the sky, they could see a bank of dark clouds riding low beneath the yellow moon. In its train there came a sighing wind, which played some unpleasant auditory tricks with tree tops above them.

Taffy was beginning to recognize what elements made up an unnatural storm.

“I suppose this is a hint that we should be leaving,” Taffy said, feeling more than a little annoyed
at the further evidence of manipulation of their world by the unseen still-folk.

“The Campbells are coming,” Malcolm answered, taking her arm and urging her to speed. “The rain will hide our scent from the hounds, but we must find shelter afore the first light.”

Taffy looked up at the densely wooded slope they were climbing and found a dark thicket set with boulders that looked strikingly familiar.

“Another cave?” she asked with a sigh.

“Aye. I’m sorry, lass. There would have been a soft bed for ye this morn, but the damned Campbells have other plans for our day it seems.”

But the cave, when they reached it, was found to be rather different from their previous lodging. It was not actually a cave at all, but proved to be the start of a long tunnel running due south, like an arrow pointing the way to Kilmartin.

The passage was narrow and somehow unpleasant, and Taffy hesitated outside the opening. It reminded her of the barrow where she had first encountered the faerie door and she knew it to be uncanny.

In the distance, she heard a mournful howling. Normally, such an alarming noise would have spurred her into the shadowy recesses without a thought, but Malcolm’s rigid posture and Smokey’s sudden whining made her assess the relative dangers with great care.

Lightning sheeted out of the sky, hitting
nearby boulders with a blow that shook the very stone beneath their feet. The acrid stink of burnt rock filled their nostrils.

“Damn yer twisty minds,” she thought she heard Malcolm mutter as the thunder rolled over them.

He ducked inside and began forging through the blackness. With only an instant’s delay, Taffy followed. Smokey continued to whine, but a second sheet of fire at the mouth of the cave, followed by a watery torrent violent enough to have been conceived at sea, convinced him to enter the tunnel, too.

None of them saw the enormous tusked boar that charged into the wood they had just vacated, but Smokey sensed him, and the beast’s scent set him to growling.

A nameless foreboding grew in Taffy’s breast as they went deeper and then still deeper into the mountain. This tunnel definitely reminded her of the barrow she had entered in order to reach Malcolm. There was that same feeling of blankness, a lack of earthly time and space. Smokey’s continuing low growls from the blackness behind her did nothing to lighten her mood.

Ahead of her, came Malcolm’s voice. “Lass, watch yer step now. There is a stair.”

Taffy wasn’t sorry to have Smokey’s familiar head pushed beneath her chilly hand. The gloom about them was nearly complete, even for her
new vision, and she was barely able to make out the steep, narrow treads of the stair hewn into the gray rock.

Whose feet, she wondered, had these steps been designed for? Why had anyone burrowed downward into the heart of the stone hillock?

“Nearly there, lass,” Malcolm said comfortingly. “I see light ahead.”

So did Taffy.
Daylight.
Full eastern sun.

“How can this be?” she whispered, the hair furring on her arms at this further display of magic.

Malcolm did not answer, but she sensed his perturbation as they left the tunnel behind.

It was very different on the other side of the hill. They stepped out into a fall day, crisp and sunny. They were surrounded by heather, but the blossoms had long since pulled in upon themselves and rained their faded cast-off petals upon the ground.

A tiny stream gushed from a gash in the rock face, its waters a pure, icy blue that sparkled in the morning sun. A few colorful seedheads, the remains of some summer wildflower, nodded cheerfully as stray waterdrops splashed over them. Tufts of gold lichen and green moss decorated the nearby stones and there was a patch of emerald grass where they might rest in comfort.

It was all very beautiful and peaceful, but Taffy
found herself shivering, her previously boundless strength drained in an instant.

Immediately, Malcolm’s arms were around her, holding her close until the worst of the chill left her quaking body. She knew from the faded sounds of his breathing that he had turned his head to the north, watching, waiting, listening for sounds of pursuit or any other danger.

“It was night,” she whispered into his sark. “And it was raining.”

“Aye, love, it was,” he answered soothingly, looking down at last and laying a cheek against her wayward hair. “And it was a nasty shock for the still-folk tae send us. But bear up a wee bit longer, lass. ‘Tis time tae eat and then we shall rest for a spell. Ye’ll feel more yerself after sleeping.”

“Shall I? Truly? Or will they just make me believe that this is so? Because the still-folk could do that, couldn’t they?”

Malcolm was slow to answer.