The Ironhand's Daughter

'You even kept it dry. My thanks to you, wizard. I feel a whole man again.'

Taliesen ignored him and turned to the sleeping Sigarni, taking her long, slim hand into his own.

Swirling his cloak around his shoulders, Fell stepped out into the rain-drenched night.

*

Sigarni stood silently by the grey cave wall and listened as Fell and the old man spoke. She could hear their words, see their faces, and even -though she knew not how - feel their emotions. Fell was frightened and yet trying to maintain an air of male confidence. The old man -Taliesen? - was tired, yet filled with a barely suppressed excitement. And lying by the fire, looking so sad and used, she could see herself, wrapped in the rapist's red cloak, her face bruised and swollen. I am dying, she thought. My spirit has left my body and now only the Void awaits. There was no panic in her, no fear, only a sadness built of dreams never to be realized.

Fell took his bow from the old man and walked from the cave. Sigarni tried to call out to him but he did not hear her. No one could hear her, save maybe the dead.

But she was wrong. As soon as Fell walked out into the rain the old man looked up at her, his button-bright eyes focusing on her face. 'Well, now we can talk,' he said. 'How are you feeling?'

Sigarni was both surprised and confused. The old man was holding the hand of her body, yet looking directly into the eyes of her spirit. It was disconcerting.

'I feel... nothing,' she said. 'Is this what death is like?'

He gave a dry chuckle, like the whispering of the wind across dead leaves. 'You are talking to a man who has fought back death for many centuries. I do not even wish to speculate on what death is like. Do you remember the waking of your spirit?'

'Yes, someone called me, but when I opened my eyes he was not here. How is this happening, old one?'

'I fear the answer may be too complicated for an untutored Highlander to understand. Essentially your body has been so brutalized that your mind has reeled from thoughts of it. You have entered a dream state which has freed your . .. soul, if you will. Now you feel no pain, no shame, no guilt.

And while we talk your body is healing. I have, through my skill, increased the speed of the process. Even so, when you do return to the prison of flesh you will feel - shall we say - considerable discomfort.'

'Do I know you?' asked Sigarni.

'Do you think that you do?' he countered.

'I can remember being held close to your chest. You have a small mole under the chin; I know this.

And in looking at you I can see another man, enormously tall, broad-shouldered, wearing a buckskin shirt with a red wing-spread hawk silhouette upon the breast.'

Taliesen nodded. 'Childhood memories. Yes, you know me, child. The other man was Caswallon. One day, if God is kind, you will meet him again.'

'You both saved me from the demons - out there by the pool. Gwalchmai told me. Who are you, Taliesen? Why have you helped me?'

'I am merely a man - a great man, mind! And my reasons for helping you are utterly selfish. But now is not the time to speak of things past. The days of magick and power are upon us, Sigarni, the days of blood and death are coming.'

'I want no part in them,' she said.

'You have little choice in the matter. And you will feel differently when you wake. In spirit form you are free of much more than merely the flesh. The human body has many weapons. Rage, which increases muscle power; fear, which can hone the mind wonderfully; love, which binds with ties of iron; and hate, which can move mountains. There are many more. But in astral form you are connected only tenuously to these emotions. It was rage and the need for revenge which saved your life, which drove you on to wear the Red. That rage is still there, Sigarni, a fire that needs no kindling, an eternal blaze that will light the road to greatness. But it rests in the flesh, awaiting your return.'

'You were correct, old one. I do not understand all you say. How do I return to my flesh?'

'Not yet. First go from the cave. Walk to the pool.'

She shook her head. 'There is a ghost there.'

'Yes,' he said. 'Call him.'

Sigarni was on the point of refusing when Taliesen lifted his hand and pointed to the fire. The flames leapt up to form a sheer bright wall some four feet high. Then, at the centre, a small spot of colourless light appeared, opening to become a pale glistening circle. It glowed snow-white, then gently became the blue of a summer sky. Sigarni watched spellbound as the blue faded and she found herself staring through the now transparent circle into her own cabin. She was there, talking with Gwalchmai. The conversation whispered into her mind.

'Who was the ghost?' asked the image of Sigarni. 

'Go and ask him, woman. Call for him.'She shivered and looked away. 

'I can't.'

Gwalch chuckled. 'There is nothing you cannot do, Sigarni. Nothing.' 

'Oh, come on, Gwalch, are we not friends? Why won't you help me?' 

'I am helping you. I am giving you good advice. You don't remember the night of the Slaughter. You will, when the time is right. I helped take the memory from you when I found you by the pool. Madness had come upon you, girl. You were sitting in a puddle of your own urine. Your eyes were blank, and you were slack-jawed. I had a friend with me; his name was Taliesen. It was he-and another- who slew the Slaughterers. Taliesen told me we were going to lock away the memory and bring you back to the world of the living. We did exactly that. The door will open one day, when you are strong enough to turn the key. That's what he told me.'

Now the circle shrank to a dot and the flames of the fire returned to normal. 'Am I strong enough to turn the key?' she asked Taliesen.

'Go to the pool and find out,' he advised. 'Call for him!'

Sigarni stood silently for a moment, then moved past the old man and out into the night. The rain was still hammering down, but she could not feel it nor, strangely, could she hear it. Water tumbled over the falls in spectacular silence, ferocious winds tore silently at the trees and their leaf-laden branches, lightning flared in the sky, but the voice of the accompanying thunder could not be heard.

The huntress moved to the poolside. 'I am here!' she called. There was no answer, no stirring upon the water. Merely silence.

'Call to him by name,' came the voice of Taliesen in her mind.

And she knew, and in knowing wondered how such an obvious realization should have escaped her so long. 'Ironhand!' she called. 'It is I, Sigarni. Ironhand!'

The waters bubbled and rose like a fountain, the spray forming an arched Gateway lit by an eldritch light. A giant of a man appeared in the Gateway, his silver beard in twin braids, his hair tied back at the nape of his neck. He wore silver-bright armour and carried a long, leaf-bladed broadsword that glistened as if it had been carved from moonlight. He raised the sword in greeting, and then sheathed it at his side and spoke, his voice rich and resonant. 'Come to me, Sigarni,' he said. 'Walk with me awhile.'

'You spoke to me in Citadel town,' she said. 'You urged me to flee.'

'Yes.'

'And you fought for me when I was a child. You slew the last Hollow-tooth.'

'That also.'

'Why?'

'For love, Sigarni. For a love that will not accept death. Will you walk with me awhile?'

'I will,' she said, tears brimming.

And she stepped forward to walk upon the water.

CHAPTER VI

DESPITE THE EXCRUCIATING pain flaring from the empty eye-socket, the Baron Ranulph Gottasson enjoyed the awestruck and fearful expressions of the men before him. Idly the fingers of his left hand stroked the carved dragon claws on the arm of the ornate chair. Sharp they were, as they gripped the globe of ebony. The men waited silently below the dais. He knew their thoughts and, more importantly, their growing anxiety. They had failed - the woman who had robbed him of his eye was still at large. The Baron leaned back on the high carved chair and stared balefully down at the twenty men before him, his single eye blood-shot but its gaze piercing.