Page 22 of The Washwoman at the River’s End

The man appears completely unaffected, giving me nothing but an icy glare that says more than any words could.

That he is in control here.

Breathe, I remind myself, but the world spins around me, my mind racing.

The man turns, grabbing an apple from his bag and feeding it to the horse before unclipping the other bags from its side. There’s a bedroll, along with what looks like a tent, several weapons, and a sack of food.

“You’re staying here?” I ask, my eyes darting around, looking for some other reason he might be pulling out so many supplies.

“Do you ken other uses for a tent?” he spits.

I don't know if I'm blinking. I don't know if I'm even breathing. I’m stuck, frozen in a horrific, endless moment in time.

The horse whinnies as she’s set free to graze on the riverbank, and only then am I pulled out of my shock enough to notice the six golden stripes on the hilt of the sword strapped to Brennen’s back. A Dìdeanair’s sword, adorned to show he is a general of the highest order. And then at the base—a skull—a symbol that he serves Cailleach above all else.

A pit bigger than my fist forms in my stomach, and my eyes flick to his left wrist, where I suspect a dedication dàn will mark his skin. Just as I thought, the Cutter’s sigil—the Fate who sentenced me here—stares back at me, just below what looks to be a dàn of truth.

I was once dedicated to her, too, before I was sentenced here, and any dàn that adorned my skin were stripped from both my body and my mind.

I turn around, needing a moment to think. To calm my racing heart, but the hair on the back of my neck stands on end at the feeling of his eyes on my exposed back. That same hatred I’d felt as he neared only grows, pressing outward until I wonder if it will wilt the trees.

“Tell me why you’re here. Why did the Fates send you?” I whisper, unable to calm my racing mind.

His footsteps approach from behind, and the air crackles between us as he leans forward. His breath tickles my neck when he speaks. Too close. “The Cutter assigned a guardian to you to ensure you don’t escape. But as to why I’m here,” he pauses, leaning even closer until his lips nearly touch my ear, his voice dropping to a deep, deadly rumble. “I said I wasnae going to hurt you. But I am going to find a way to kill you.”

7

BRENNEN

“To kill me?” she breathes, her hand settling on her sternum. “Why would you want to kill me?”

I ignore her, my arm jamming into her shoulder as I return to my things. The oath on my palm burns like fire, and I pointedly turn my back on her false shock. I willnae be fooled by the lies coming from her pretty mouth.

Yanking my tent from my rucksack, I toss it onto the rocks, the thud echoing through the glen, and try to pay no attention to the unease creeping through my blood.

I shouldn't be so on edge. Ban-dia a’ Bhàis has upheld her end of our bargain.

But the woman staring at my back is nothing like I expected—the cursed, decaying monster with lifeless grey skin and claws for fingers, or a hag with dagger teeth and long, greasy hair hanging in strings to her knees—and it’s thrown me off kilter.

I’d been prepared for both iterations and anything in between. But this? The terrified woman with hair the color of rowan berries and a face so ethereal that, despite the split lip and bruised temple, it looks as if it was crafted from morning dew and starlight? She is nothing like the stories mothers tell their children to scare them into behaving.

It had startled me when I first saw her appear through the trees, so wholly human, so fair and bonnie. Disgust churns in my stomach that I’d noted her freckles or gentle eyes at all. Her smooth skin, the color of a lily. But hadn’t the queen warned me of exactly this?

She will try to tempt you with her sorrow. Will tell you gorgeous, enchanting lies and prey on the kindness in your heart.

I keep the Cutter’s warning in the front of my mind as I unfold my tent.

It doesnae matter what the woman looks like. Beautiful things can kill you just as well as the ugly. Easier, even, because they surprise you. A bolt of lightning in the night. A gilded sword at your throat.

The Washwoman may appear weak and incapable of violence, but I willnae be fooled. She is a killer.

The evidence is right in front of me in her blood-stained palms. In the shackle around her ankle, so tight, her skin has begun to grow around it.

It looks agonizing, but there’s a reason she’s imprisoned this way.

I watch her as I get out the rest of my things, forming my plan.

Check the wards surrounding the river meant to keep her contained, should she somehow escape her shackles. Examine her chain. Ride to Dalbàsail for supplies. I’ll need to talk to the villagers to learn what they know of the Washwoman. Someone must know why she cannae be killed, and I will do whatever it takes to find out.