Jack Whyte - The Saxon Shore

"The question is, what do we do now?" I added, seeing that he was not about to speak. "I could tell you about this, with Shelagh's help, but we can't tell the others, not about a dream, with nothing to back up my fears. They'd think me mad, or worse, a sorcerer or demon of some kind."

He glanced at me, his eyes empty. "I don't care what they think, we have to turn around; go back."

"How, Donuil? Think, man! Feargus is your father's man and won't heed you. He knows you didn't want to leave, and that Athol ordered you away. Feargus will not turn back. He has his duties clearly in his mind. If he turns back, he risks losing the weather and perhaps the chance to sail again. His task is to drop us in Britain and then make all speed up the coast to bring your father's galleys back, for he cannot afford to assume the other ships will win through Liam's forces safely. And anyway, what would you tell him? That your Outlander friend has had a dream in which your own brother, the Lord Finn—who might even now be a hero, dead or victorious in this morning's fight—has played ignobly, plotting to murder his own brother, and his father next? Feargus would throw me overboard before he would permit me thus to sow the seeds of rebellion! He could never believe such things from a stranger's dream. We must do something, I know that, but we cannot turn about."

Angry at my words, unwilling to listen, but unable to deny the truth in them, Donuil had turned away, freeing his arm from Shelagh's shoulders and showing me the breadth of his back as I spoke. Now, suddenly, I saw him straighten, his whole body tense and alert as he gazed towards Feargus's galley surging ahead of us. He turned again, his gaze, keen now, going over my shoulder to the line of land still edging the horizon to the west. Then he broke free, pulling my right hand free of the rail and rushing back partway towards the stern, where he leaned outward, peering down. Satisfied of something, he spun and came back to us, ignoring the curious stares of the others. When he reached us again, his eyes were glowing, alight with decision.

"The boat," he said, smiling ferociously at Shelagh. "It has a sail, and oars. We're still in sight of land. I can be back home by tonight, even alone, and I'll land in darkness, unseen."

"I'll come with you."

"That you will not!" he said. "I'll have my hands full, and I need my wits about me. I won't be able to do what I might have to do if I'm concerned about your safety." He raised a hand, stopping her angry retort before it could emerge. "My love, I'm not saying you could not help me . . . I am saying that if I have only myself to worry about, I'll be better off and more able to react however I must." He turned to me. "Take her to Camulod, Caius. I'll join you there come spring, or even sooner. The galleys they are building to carry Liam's animals will cross before then. If I'm successful, I'll come with them."

"And what if you fail?" The question, asked by Shelagh in a cold, dead voice, quelled even my chaotic thoughts.

Donuil stopped and looked at her, then smiled and reached with a cupped hand to caress her cheek. "I won't fail, my love. I can't. I have two sons to father, don't you remember?"

She stared at him, still angry, then smiled, slowly, a tremulous, trusting smile, and the moment hung there between them. I coughed, to break the spell.

"What will you do, once there?" I asked him. "You have no way of proving anything."

He reached beneath his cloak, loosening the blade of his long cavalry sword in its sheath. "I'll do whatever seems right at the time," he answered. "I'll confront Mungo first, though, to his face, alone, just him and me."

"That might not be wise. I think you had better tell your father first what you suspect."

"Hmm . . . Perhaps. . ." He hesitated. "Tell me, you said my brother's mouth was filled with blood in your dream, and you wiped your blade clean on his cloak. Did any splash on you?"

"Blood?" I stared at him, trying to remember. "I don't know, but then I didn't look down at myself. My eyes were all for the man I had killed."

"Then it might have? Blood might have stained your clothes?"

"Aye. There was blood in plenty. Some might have splashed on me. But. . ."

"But what?"

"I saw it only in the lightning, Donuil, and there was no storm last night."

"No, Cay, there was no storm, but there was murder done, and if my brother had red blood in him, it would have spilled, storm or calm, regardless. The whoreson Rohan might be stained, or might have taken off his bloodstained clothes. He might have hidden them, if he did, but he'll have had no time to burn them yet, not with MacNyalls attacking." His eyes moved from me to Shelagh and back. "If blood is there, I'll find it, and then I'll carve his fat carcass and feed it to my grasping brother Fingael." He looked around him again. "I have to leave. Each oar stroke sets more distance to reclaim." Exuding a confidence that I had never seen in him, he stooped and kissed Shelagh, a long, lingering embrace, and then he gripped my arm as though I were now the neophyte and he the commander. "Take care of her. I'll see you soon."

He spun and left us, adjusting his sword and armour as he strode to the stern, where he set two seamen to hauling in the rope securing the small, sail-equipped rowing boat the sailors used for everything too petty for the larger galley to achieve. As soon as the tiny vessel was alongside, he climbed over the side and leapt down into it, then cut the rope that tethered it to us. Free of its line, the boat responded instantly to the pull of the water, falling away behind us at a startling pace as Donuil fought, leaning into the tiller, to bring its nose around to meet the waves that threatened to engulf it. Everyone had watched his passage the length of the galley, but until he swung his leg over and dropped from sight into the boat, their interest had been mere curiosity. Now Dedalus and his group surrounded me and Shelagh.

"What's going on?" Dedalus asked for all of them. "Where's Donuil off to?"

I held up my hand, bidding him wait as we watched Logan's galley ship oars, the banks of sweeps rising to the vertical, the vessel ceasing all forward motion as Donuil's boat approached it. As he came close alongside, someone threw a line, and he secured it to his boat, so that the small vessel swung in under the larger's side. I could see Logan leaning over, shouting, but could not hear his words. Presently, I saw movement behind Logan, and four armed men swung themselves down, one after the other, to join Donuil. As soon as they were safe, he cast off again and the tide swept him behind the galley, out of our sight. Moments later, Logan's oars dipped again and his crew began to pull. By the time it had moved far enough to reveal Donuil's craft again, the little boat had hoisted sail and was scudding away towards the distant land. I turned then to the others.

"Donuil had to leave," I told them. "There was something he had to do, some business neglected in the heat of leaving." They stared at me as though I were twitting them.

"We had guessed he had to leave," Ded said.

"Well then," I smiled. "What more can I say?"

He shook his head, and his eyes flickered briefly towards Shelagh. "Well," he sighed, "it must be a matter of great import for Donuil. If such a matter had been mine to deal with, no matter who else thought it important, I would have set the world on end to save the doing of it for a better day. I'd have to be an older man than he before I'd tend to anything if it meant leaving my love on a ship bound for another land."

I relented slightly, for the sake of Shelagh, nodding my head in acquiescence. "Some information came into his possession, something I knew and he did not. . . something I told him with no anticipation of how he might react. He chose to leave and rejoin his father." That was as close to the truth as I could come without admitting to my dream and opening a full Pandora's box of troubles. I looked from face to face, seeing the friendship there and feeling guilty for my reticence.