Calgaich the Swordsman by Gordon D. Shirreffs Read Free Book Online

gathered up Calgaich’s tunic and trousers from the altar and began to dry the garments. It was better to keep busy than to think of past memories, which she had held at bay till now. Of her parents and brother murdered in the bloody raid by the Scotti as they swept down the Ordovician coast. Of her betrothed felled by one of the last flying spears as he bade his men flee before him. And better yet not to dwell on what the future might hold for her beyond the first nights of Calgaich's lust, before he tired of her. She did not dare to look beyond the flickering circle of firelight for fear of what she might see, and yet it was the lurking unseen that put the fear of the unknown, so rank in that place of horror, into the very marrow of her shapely bones.

CHAPTER 3
    Calgaich walked across the lichened courtyard flagging toward the nearby hill-slope. The cold rain slanted down in a fine misty drizzle. The fitful wind had died away and the sea boomed faintly in the distance. Calgaich worked his way up the hill-slope to a great outcropping of rock like the dislocated bones of a giant skeleton, until he found a series of shallow caves formed by overhanging slabs of rock. The bottoms of the caves were thickly layered with comparatively dry bracken. He nodded in satisfaction and started back up the hill until he reached the crest.
    The wind started in again, switchtailing back and forth as though uncertain about which way to blow. Calgaich stopped short with distended nostrils. The faint, bittersweet smell of woodsmoke came to him on a shifting of the wind. He leaned on his spear and peered into the misty dimness toward the distant hills and the head of the sea loch. There was no sight nor sound of humanity in the great gloomy glen that probed deeply into the hard belly of the looming mountains. He had vague recollections of being somewhere in this area on a raid when he had been very young. Perhaps it had been his first raid, but he wasn’t sure. Whoever lived in this area would hardly be out on the prowl on such a foul night, and it was unlikely they would come near the barrow at night in any case, much less in day light.
    Calgaich returned down the hill and gathered armloads of the dry bracken, which he carried to the barrow and deposited just within the entrance. Then he returned to the top of the hill. He thrust his head forward to peer and sniff into the dimness like a stalking wolf until he was satisfied that there were no humans about the area. Still, it bothered him that someone dwelt not too far away.
    He came softly down the hill and paused near the rock outcropping. Something moved at his feet, and from sheer instinct he stamped his foot on a small creature. He heard the dying squeak of a hare. Something ran over his feet and he struck out with the butt of his spear to pin another hare to the ground. He bent and twisted its neck. A third hare leaped from shelter and sped down the slope. Calgaich whirled and poised the war spear. The hare cut sharply to the left but the tip of the blade spitted it to the ground.
    Calgaich grinned in the dimness as he walked to where the spear still quivered through the body of the hare and into the soft turf. “Poor sport for you, my brother,” he consoled the spear.
    He carried the limp hares into the barrow. The fire had burned down to embers. He looked about for the woman. “There is food here to be cooked,” he said to the shadows.
    Cairenn came out slowly. Calgaich's face cracked into a grin. She wore his tunic, which reached below her knees. The folds of the material did little justice to her figure.
    Calgaich flung down the hares. “Skin and prepare them,” he ordered.
    “I don't know how,” she admitted, looking with distaste at the dead animals at her feet. “I was never a serving wench.”
    “And highborn, I suppose?” he asked sarcastically.
    “Yes, fian,” she said, raising her eyes to him, remembering a time when she was not a slave.
    Calgaich grunted. He knelt