THE CROWD DRIFTED away, many of the men muttering in disappointment. They had come to see the Battle Eagle butchered, and instead had seen their own warriors humiliated.
Eithni watched them go before she stepped into the fighting ring and crossed to Donnel’s side.
“Shall I take a look at him?” she asked, glancing down at Gurth’s purple face. Tears of rage and pain streamed down his cheeks.
Donnel nodded, his expression unyielding. The rage had not yet left him either. “Be careful though,” he rasped.
Eithni knelt beside Gurth and examined his throat. After a few moments she looked up, meeting Urcal’s gaze across the ring. “His wind pipe isn’t crushed,” she told him coldly. “He’ll live … although he might have problems with his voice for a while.”
Urcal held her gaze for a heartbeat before nodding. He then nodded to two men who had remained behind. “Take my cousin back to his alcove.”
The warriors obeyed, grabbing the barrel-chested warrior under each armpit and dragging him away. Meanwhile, Eithni rose to her feet and stepped close to Donnel once more.
“So, Urcal,” Donnel said after a long pause. “Do you honor your agreement? Will there be peace?”
The Boar chieftain folded his arms over his broad chest and grimaced. “Aye. I’m a man of my word.”
“You’re a healer?” A woman’s voice, interrupted them. Modwen stepped forward, her pale face taut. Eithni saw the desperation in her gaze when Modwen met her eye.
“I am,” Eithni replied. “Why?”
“Silence, Modwen,” Urcal growled. “This isn’t the time.”
The chieftain’s wife whirled to face Urcal, high spots of color staining her pale cheeks. “Your son is dying. If this woman is a healer, we need her help.”
Urcal’s face turned thunderous although despair flared in those midnight blue eyes of his.
Eithni stepped forward, her gaze flicking between the two of them. “Your son is ill?”
Modwen nodded, her eyes gleaming. “Aye, Varar went to his furs with a fever three days ago … and hasn’t risen since. The fever is getting worse.”
Eithni did not hesitate. “Can I see him?”
“Aye,” Modwen stepped away from her husband and bid Eithni to follow. “Come with me.”
The lad lay in a small alcove on the top floor of the broch. His private space sat at the edge of the wide space his parents occupied, next to the one where his elder sister slept.
One look at Varar’s flushed face, the way his body twitched under the furs, and Eithni knew she had come not a moment too soon. She ducked into the alcove and knelt next to the boy. He was around three, a handsome lad with a mop of dark hair and a face that reminded Eithni of Loxa’s. The warrior would have looked like this boy at the same age.
Shaking off the unwelcome memory of Loxa, Eithni reached out and placed a hand on Varar’s brow.
He’s burning up.
“Can you help?” Modwen spoke behind her. Eithni glanced over at the woman’s worried face.
“I will try,” she replied. She hated to give false hope to the loved-ones of those she tended. The truth was that the lad was in a bad way. He was no longer conscious, and the fever was now taking hold of his limbs, making them shiver and jerk.
“I need herbs,” Eithni informed the chieftain’s wife. “Meadowsweet, Woundwort, Boneknit, or Elderberry—do you have any of these?”
Modwen gave a swift nod. “I will be back soon.”
The woman disappeared, leaving Eithni alone with Varar in the alcove. Next to the furs was a bowl of water and a cloth. Eithni wet the cloth, wrung it out, and started to bathe the boy’s feverish body. She needed to lower the fever, or it would consume him in no time at all.
Eithni wished she had her healer’s basket with her—yet it had been left behind at The Gathering Place. The herbs, powders, and tinctures in it had taken her over a year to gather and prepare. She hoped that the chieftain’s wife would be able to find the herbs she needed.
Modwen returned a while later, flushed and sweating, carrying a basket of herbs. “I’ve found them,” she gasped.
Eithni took the basket, her heart lifting when she saw that Modwen had indeed found everything. She got to work, using a pestle and mortar to crush the herbs. She then mixed them with water and drained the juice through a fine cloth into a cup.
With Modwen’s help, she raised Varar up into a sitting position and held the cup to his lips. They could only give him a little at a time, otherwise they risked choking him—and Eithni was loath to waste any of the drink. She waited patiently, giving him the contents of the cup bit by bit, knowing that each swallow was doing him good. Eventually the cup was drained.
“What now?” Modwen asked, hovering anxiously at Eithni’s side. “Is there anything else you can do?
Eithni nodded. “I need cold freshly drawn water and a new cloth. We must continue bathing his body.”
Modwen hurried away, returning with cold water she had just drawn from the well outside. Then she took her place opposite Eithni, and together they began to bathe Varar’s body.
What followed was a long day and an even longer night. Urcal visited once or twice, a silent grim-faced figure in the doorway. He said nothing, his gaze riveted upon his son’s face, before he eventually left Eithni and his wife to tend Varar.
Exhaustion swept Eithni up in its clutches. Modwen brought her a meal, and at one stage Eithni drifted off to sleep, leaning up against the stacked-stone wall of the alcove.
She did not see Donnel although she knew he would be nearby, waiting for her.
The night was the worst part of their vigil. In the darkest hour—the time when only owls and wolves are awake—Varar’s breathing grew shallow, and his pulse fluttered at the base of his neck.
“The Mother watch over him,” Eithni whispered. She could feel The Reaper nearby—as she often did before someone died. A chill settled over the alcove, and the cresset on the wall opposite flickered.
Eithni clenched her jaw. “You will not take him,” she whispered.
She leaned forward and wiped a cool cloth over his fevered brow, murmuring the healing charm at the same time.
With my hands I heal
With these herbs
With these words
By the Hag’s cauldron
By the power of the night.
Evil and pain fight.
The charm is done, so mote it be.
Eithni repeated the charm three times before sitting back, her gaze settling upon Varar’s pale face.
She worried that she had been brought to the lad too late—that the fever had dug its claws in too deep—but Varar mac Urcal did not die. He was strong, and when the first rays of dawn light filtered in from the tiny window above their head, the boy’s eyes fluttered open, fixing upon Eithni.
The eyes were midnight blue, like Urcal’s—like Loxa’s.
“Who are you?” he croaked. “One of the Fair Folk come to take me away?”
Eithni favored him with a tired smile. “No, my name’s Eithni. I’m a healer. We nearly lost you.”
“Varar!” Modwen burst into the alcove, joy spreading across her face. “You’re awake!” She fell to her knees beside her son, her eyes gleaming with tears.
A shadow fell over them then, and Eithni glanced up to see Urcal standing there, lines of worry etched upon his heavy-featured face. “Welcome back, lad,” he rumbled.
A strange sensation settled over Eithni. She had imagined Urcal as a man incapable of tenderness and compassion, yet she now saw that was not so. The four tribes of this isle had more in common than differences; yet because they had all lived in isolation for so long, it was easy to turn your neighbor into your enemy.
Hadn’t she thought that the people of The Eagle were her enemies once?
Eithni rose to her feet and gathered her things. She would leave Urcal and Modwen with their son.
Emerging from the alcove, she crossed the rush strewn floor and made her way downstairs. There she found Donnel seated by the great hearth, his fingers wrapped around a bowl of stew. One of the older women was fussing over him like a broody hen. “You'll need that arm seen to,” she clucked. “That's a deep cut.”
Donnel nodded, his face lined with fatigue and worry. “I will … thank you.”
Relief lit in his eyes when he saw Eithni approach. His gaze then searched her face. “Did the boy survive?”
Eithni nodded. “He’s awake … the worst is over.”
She sat down upon a stool next to Donnel, gratefully accepting the bowl of stew the woman passed her. Around them the inhabitants of the broch were going about their morning chores. Women were kneading bread at the tables and plucking fowl for the noon meal, while warriors broke their fast with bread and stew before going outdoors to work.
Eithni took a mouthful of stew, her belly growling as she did so. It was delicious, and she was starving. When she had devoured half the bowl, she looked up to find Donnel watching her with a half smile curving his lips.
Eithni froze. “What? Have I got something on my face?”
He shook his head, his smiled widening. “No, I was just reflecting on what an incredible woman you are.”
Eithni glowed under the compliment although she tried to mask her pleasure with a scowl. “It would take such a woman to put up with you,” she replied. “Coming here was a terrible idea. I can’t believe we’re still breathing.”
He raised an eyebrow. “I told you to trust me.”
“Aye, and I did. I just didn’t expect you to have to fight four armed warriors with your bare hands.”
Donnel huffed. “I’ll admit, I was worried for a few moments. I should have realized Urcal wouldn’t fight fair.”
Eithni shook her head, exasperated. “He did his best to kill you,” she reminded him. Her gaze went to Donnel’s left arm. The wound had stopped bleeding, but the woman’s comment earlier was right. It needed tending. “Let me take a look at that.”
“Don’t you want to check on Gurth?” Donnel asked. “I think I hurt him badly.”
Eithni gave him a narrow look. “The man would have cut you in half with that sword of his,” she replied. “I think he can wait.”