Anne Bishop - The Pillars of the World

“It wasn’t long. I had to wait for the biscuits.”

Neall stiffened. He leaned back and stared at her in disbelief. “Biscuits?”

“I thought they would be more practical than bread and stay fresher so that we could—”

“You baked biscuits?”

Ari’s mouth began to set in that stubborn line he knew well. Ignoring it, he grabbed her hand and pulled her toward Ahern’s house. “Let’s just see what Ahern has to say about this.”

“Neall!”

The sun stallion snorted, stamped one foot in warning.

“Back off,” Neall snapped. “If she was one of your mares, you’d nip her for this.”

Ahern was pacing the yard, looking grim enough to subdue even the stubbornest witch.

“She was baking biscuits,” Neall said as soon as he was close enough he didn’t have to shout. Although he was shouting loud enough to have several of the men peer around the buildings to see what was going on.

“Neall!” Ari pulled back, digging in her heels.

As Neall turned, the sun stallion butted him hard enough to break his hold on Ari’s wrist. He and Ari ended up sitting in the dirt, staring at each other between the legs of an angry horse.

Another horse snorted. The sun stallion bolted a short distance, then reared.

Neall looked over his shoulder. Not another horse, but someone no horse would disobey.

“That one must have a bit of the dark horse bloodline in him,” Ahern said. “They aren’t cowed by anything.” He walked over to Ari and held out a hand to help her up. “Biscuits are a fine idea. With some cheese and some of that jam you make, it’ll do for a midday meal tomorrow.”

“That’s exactly what I thought,” Ari grumbled, brushing herself off.

“But the boy’s been worried about you—and he has reason. The Black Coats have arrived in Ridgeley.”

Ari paled.

Neall scrambled to his feet. It hurt to see her eyes so full of fear, but he couldn’t afford to make it sound like something they could dismiss.

“Now,” Ahern said, sounding calm but implacable. “You’re going to stay here. Neall will go to Brightwood for your things. When he returns, the two of you are leaving. The horses are fresh, and that will give you hours of daylight to put some distance between you and the Black Coats.”

“I can’t leave yet,” Ari protested. Her eyes filled with tears. “I can’t . I’m not ready. I haven’t said goodbye.”

“Ari, there’s no time,” Neall snapped.

She looked at both of them, her hands spread in appeal. “I’ll run back. It won’t take long. But I need to do this.”

Neall wanted to scream. She hadn’t seen those men. She hadn’t felt those men. How could he make her understand? “By the Mother’s tits, Ari—”

“Don’t you speak of the Mother that way!”

“—who is there to say goodbye to?” Neall demanded. “Morag? If she’s there when I get there, I’ll tell her. If not, when you don’t return, like as not she’ll come here and Ahern can tell her.”

Ari looked at him with eyes that were suddenly far too old. “I would like to say goodbye to Morag,” she said quietly, “but that’s not the reason I have to go back.” Ari reached for his hand. Her fingers curled around his and held on. “I have to say goodbye to Brightwood, Neall. I have to let go of the land. If I don’t, it will always feel unfinished.”

Neall sagged, defeated. If Ari always looked back on this day with regret, what kind of future would they have? Brightwood would always stand between them. He looked at Ahern, hoping the older man would have some argument against this, but Ahern just stared at the distant hills.

“All right,” Ahern said reluctantly. “You go back. You say your goodbyes. But you do it quick—and then you get in the cottage and stay inside until Neall comes for you. The warding spells around the cottage will protect you, but they won’t help if you go beyond the cottage walls.”

Ari seemed about to protest, but she caught herself and simply nodded. She picked up Merle, handed him to Neall, and said, “You’d better shut him up somewhere so he doesn’t follow me ho—” She pressed her lips together for a moment. “Back to Brightwood.” She gave the puppy one last caress, then turned and ran.

“Come on,” Ahern said. “We’ll shut him up in the gelding’s stall. He’ll be fine there for now.”

Neall hugged the squirming puppy, but it was the man he looked at. “I’ll miss you.”

Ahern shook his head. “Don’t look back, young Neall. You go and don’t look back.”

“That philosophy the Fae live by makes it very easy not to take responsibility for anything.”

Ahern didn’t speak for a long time. Then, “There are times when it’s an arrogant fool’s excuse. But there are other times when it’s simply the wise thing to do.”

Adolfo drained his wineglass. The tavern didn’t offer the same quality of wine as Felston’s wine cellar, but it was sufficient. “We have fortified ourselves for the difficult tasks to come.” And at the baron’s expense . “Let us go to Brightwood and capture the foul creature who lives there so that we can bring her back to the baron’s estate for questioning.”

“Questioning?” Felston glanced around the inn and lowered his voice. “There’s no need for questioning. You have my daughter’s statement and the confession you got from the Gwynn woman yesterday.”

“I have those confessions,” Adolfo agreed, watching the baron pale at the significance of those words. Yes, the baron was going to be most generous when it came to settling his account. “But the witch must confess to her crimes. She must admit her guilt. She must have time to regret the harm she has done. Therefore, she will be taken to the room at your estate my Inquisitors prepared for such questioning, and she will confess.” And then she will die .

Morag paused at the edge of the meadow, watching the wounded mare graze. Ari must have taken the other horses to Ahern’s. She looked to the west, wondering if she should go to that hill where the wind always blew and tell Astra that Ari was leaving.

Astra.

Something had been nagging at her, trying to catch her attention. But meeting Morphia and then trying to persuade the dark horse to gather his courage and go down the shining road again had pushed it aside. Now . . .

Astra. What was it about Astra?

The Fae are the Mother’s Children. But we are the Daughters. We are the Pillars of the World.

Aiden had mentioned something about the Pillars of the World.

The answers are in plain sight, if you choose to look for them.

I want to ask him if he would bring the journals over to his house. I don’t want them left here. . . . My family’s history. Brightwood’s history, really.

“Hurry,” Morag said, pressing her legs against the dark horse’s sides. He galloped across the meadow, right to the kitchen door.

Sliding off his back, Morag threw the kitchen door open. “Ari?” When she got no answer, she closed the door and hurried to the dressing room adjoining Ari’s bedroom. She’d seen the glass-doored bookcase the other day when the sun stallion and the dark horse had played “tease the puppy,” but she hadn’t thought of it since.

She opened the glass doors and pulled out the last journal on the right.

I am Astra, now the Crone of the family. It is with sorrow that I have read the journals of the ones who came before me. We shouldered the burden and then were dismissed from thought — or were treated as paupers who should beg for scraps of affection. We have stayed because we loved the land, and we have stayed out of duty. But duty is a cold bedfellow, and it should no longer be enough to hold us to the land .