The argument was a waste of breath. Toby was not about to lose his temper and neither of them would ever change the other's mind. "That's true — I am no man's son. So I'm free to make my own decisions, aren't I? I can think what I want, not what my Pa tells me to think. I will never be King Fergan's man, Master Glencoe."
"We'll see about that." The rebel smiled thinly. "Again I tell you: there are no neutrals in this war."
Toby rolled over, facedown, and went to sleep — for the first time…
CHAPTER SIX
It had begun again. He was in darkness — utter, total, impenetrable darkness, as if he had sunk to the bottom of the bog. He was in silence. It always began with darkness and silence.
He could not move. His hands were behind him and his feet apart, as they had been in the dungeon. He could breathe, so he was not in the marsh. He was vertical, but he could feel no floor under his feet or wall at his back, no shackles binding his limbs. He was not conscious of cold or pain, but he was aware he had no clothes on. He floated in nothing, and waited.
The first time, or the first few times, he had assumed that he was dead. He hardly remembered the first times, except through a vague certainty that he had been here before, that this had happened before. There was someone else here also. Someone was hunting for him in the darkness, wandering, searching. At times he could hear her. She was calling to him, calling him by name; the name she was using was not his name, but he knew that he was the one she sought.
Soon the light… Yes, the light was coming now. It began as a very faint milky glow, no more than starlight glimmering on ghostly mist-shapes all around him, with darkness beyond. It grew brighter, but slowly, very slowly, while the filmy haze writhed, grew more definite, then faded again, dancing and twirling in endless variations of shape, glowing in indefinable colors like the lights a man saw when his eyes were closed. His were open. He caught occasional glimpses of a dark and shiny floor, perhaps water, but it was a long way below his feet. He sensed the huntress gliding to and fro. He saw no shadows — how could he, when he himself was the source of the light!
The first few times, he had awakened screaming when he had realized this. Yes, he was asleep, but the vision was real, and dangerous. Demons could take men in their sleep. Sleep was no defense. To waken would be to escape, but he could not force himself awake, and he was in peril.
Wherever he was, wherever this nothing-place might be, he was being hunted in it. She could not find him — indeed, she seemed to be more visible to him than he was to her — but she could make him reveal himself. The light was her doing. He shone in the foggy darkness, and as his glow brightened she drew closer, her voice became clearer.
As the unmeasured time crept past, as his silvery glow brightened, he sensed that other essence — moving, searching, seeking him, calling him. Not his name, but a name meant to be his, and other words in a tongue he did not know. Yet their meaning grew clearer: Lord? Beloved? Master?
This was worse than before. This was the first time he had made out words. What was that name she was calling?
The danger was becoming more imminent, the huntress questing ever nearer, a pale and sinister presence in the mists. Beloved, why do you hide from me? He wanted to run, to flee to the ends of the world, and he could not as much as blink. He was alive, for his heart was beating. He burned brighter.
Waken, fool, waken!
The hunter, a huntress, Lady Valda, of course… he could see her wandering through the roiling mists, searching. Why could he not awaken, as he had awakened the other times — screaming and sweating, but unharmed? She had never come so close in the earlier dreams… approaching, receding, returning. Blurred in the fog — pale arms outstretched, delicate hands feeling in the mist, dark hair, white body. His heart thundered faster. Each return brought her nearer to where he was and revealed more detaiclass="underline" dark eyes, red lips, the great round nipples, the fascination of the black triangular patch that he tried not to see and could not ignore. There were stories. Young men had dreams, but no dream could equal what he saw now. Oh, the beauty of her!
She had seen her quarry. She peered, frowning, as if barely able to make him out, or dazzled by his brilliance. Her lips moved, her red tongue stroked them. She approached, heading straight for him, not walking, just floating, shining brighter in his radiance.
Waken, waken! The dream had never gone this far before.
He could not swallow, could not move except for the beat of his heart. Dum… Dum… Faster than before. His body was responding to hers. He felt desire as he never had.
There was no wound in her breast. Her breasts were perfect, her body was perfect — her limbs, also. There was not a mark on her anywhere. Her flesh was alabaster, with faint blue veins under the skin. He could see the texture of her nipples, her lashes, the tiny hairs in her eyebrows. He was aware of her perfume, as he had been in the dungeon.
She smiled. She was close enough to touch or be touched. Beloved! Lord! I have found you. I have come to you. Speak to me.
She waited eagerly. Waited for what? He could not move to seize her in his arms. He could not compel his lips to curse her. She drifted closer, until her breasts were almost touching his chest, until he could feel her warmth. The scent of her was maddening. Her dark eyes stared directly into his, but watering as if his brightness pained them.
"I restored you," she whispered. "See the fine young body I found for you, my love, my adored master! What pleasure we shall have together with it! What joys will it bring us?"
Her fingers touched his chest as they had in the dungeon. He could not feel them — not quite. Soon, though? He shivered, and felt the shiver. His arms were coming around. She was drawing him into her world, making him real to her, making them real to each other. He blazed like a sun and she basked in his warmth, yet he shivered convulsively.
"Where did you go, my love? You have already traveled farther than I expected. I have searched and searched. But I have you now. Will you not return to me, my love? There is nothing to fear. Rhym cannot know."
The ghostly fingers stroked his cheek, his neck, his flanks, and their touch was almost, almost perceptible — swansdown, gossamer on his skin.
"So strong, my love! What shall we call you?" Scarlet lips pursed in a coy smile: "Shall I call you Longdirk? Why do you not yield to me? Do you not know what I have suffered these long years? Suffered to bring you back to me?"
Valda, glorious, irresistible, beauty to drive a man insane…
Triumph! "I have you now!" she cried. Her fingers caressed his cheek, and this time they were warm and smooth. His body came to life at her touch. His arms fell free, reached out to take her. She leaned her lips forward to his, her hair brushing his shoulders.
The apparition changed. It shrank, darkened, writhed. Hair became scant and silver, the skin shriveled, the breasts sagged. Wounds and scars and hideous…
He screamed. He awakened.
PART FOUR
Over the Hills and Far Away
CHAPTER ONE
The long, long night was over. Toby shivered as he adjusted the folds of his plaid. Daylight seeped through a swampy gray sky. A rising wind promised rain and combed a steady shower of leaves from the wasted foliage of the trees. The glen was less than a mile wide, its sides rising steeply to vanish in cloud, but dawn had told him which way was west, so he knew his road to Dalmally. He needed no further guidance from Master Rory MacDonald of Glencoe.