The Blight of Muirwood

For Colvin Price, the Earl of Forshee, never came.

CHAPTER TWO:

Jon’s Leering

Lia wrestled with her emotions, even though she had determined in advance to master them. The Bearden Muir was different, yet the same – oppressive, haunting, thick with memories that could not be banished or tamped down. Standing over Jon Hunter’s grave, she fought down the urge to sob, to scream, the desire to undo everything she had done so long ago. It was a year since his death, a year since that awful Whitsunday fair. A year wearing hunter boots, hunter leathers, dealing in a hunter’s errands. She bit her lip, willing the memories to dull, the emotions to fade. Jon had died because of her.

Leaves and brush choked the small glen where she and Colvin had buried him beneath a pile of rocks. Had he died at the Abbey, his bones would have been interred in an ossuary and laid to rest with the Aldermaston’s blessing. She stared at the Leering stone the Aldermaston had carved, a stump-like block, hewn with a man’s bearded face on it, reposing, silent. She and Martin had finished digging a small hole for it at the head of the rock mound and set it firmly in place, kicking dirt in to fill the gaps. Their mule would have an easier journey back to the Abbey now that its weight was gone. At least the beast was relieved of its burden. Lia wondered if she ever would be.

“He was a good lad,” said Martin sternly, brushing his hands together. He sniffed and grimaced, controlling his emotions. “We will greet him again, you and I. In the next life. In a fair country where no knaves can do him harm. Where no blood is ever spilt.” He stopped and wiped his nose, but his eyes were dry and full of fire. He brooded with anger constantly, his temper shorter than even the Aldermaston’s.

Lia fidgeted with the leather bracer tight against her forearm. “I will be ashamed to face him.”

He snorted. “Did you loose the arrows that slew him? No. Did you murder mastons and spill their blood? No, by Cheshu! There are debts we all owe, Lia. But you owe him nothing for what happened. You paid your fair share in recompense, learning the ways and doing his work, which he can no longer do himself.”

Lia closed her eyes. The memories were still bitter. “If I had known then what I know now. The mistakes we made crossing the swamp. The risks we took without realizing it…”

He grabbed her arm and forced her to look at him. His finger jabbed near her nose. “It is a cruel fact, child. Wisdom comes after the moment when it is most needed. I have warned you of the doom of Pry-Ree. We failed to learn from the changing times. Failed to act when we should have acted. Instead, we were crushed, our princes butchered like hogs. So what have you learned from this journey? Hmm? If you were Jon in that moment, what would you have done differently? Knowing what you know now.”

“I do not know, Martin,” she answered, jerking her arm away from his crushing grip.

The blue fire in his eyes blazed hotter. “You do know.”

“He trained with you for much longer.”

He snorted and spat.

Anger flushed her cheeks, but she kept it from rising to her voice. “What do you want me to say?”

He pointed at her again. “Only the truth. He was a hunter, yes. He was trained, yes. But you know as much as he ever did. I have never trained a boy or man who learns as fast as you do. From rabbit snares to naming all the little insects in the wood. You know them all and remember it the first time.”

Lia wanted to shut the door on her thoughts, but she could not in time. The whisper was there. It was always there. The pulsing of the Medium, giving her thoughts and teasing hints. It probably frightened others how quickly she knew things. What they did not know was how the Medium taught her with silent whispers. She grit her teeth, because she did not want to speak it.

“Say it, Lia!”

Her body trembled, flushed and overflowing with emotions. She was afraid of the truth. Which was perhaps the very reason the Aldermaston had sent her back into the Bearden Muir to settle the Leering and face the past.

Martin stepped even closer, his nose poking up at her. Even though she had grown more the last year and he only came up to her chin, his force of personality towered hers. “Say it, Lia. Cast out the shadows you cringe behind. Say it.”

Her voice was barely a whisper. “He was careless.”

“Careless? Yes! Can you taste that word? It tastes like ash in your mouth. It should. Have I not taught you this when you first started to train with me? The hunter is patient. The prey is careless.” He stormed away from her, stamping his boot in the muck. He spat. “An elk returns to the same place of water because it is the place of water. A patient hunter waits in the bushes. Waits until the elk is thirsty. That way, he has a clean shot. The closer he gets, the better aim. But a man is not an elk.” He tapped his finger on his forehead then pointed to the mound of stones. “He was careless.”