Page 48 of Darach

“I never saw his face, but he’s slender, and about this tall.” She dropped her hand in below her shoulder to give him a visual approximation. “He has an odd laugh, high-pitched and excited, like a young boy’s. He also had something on the back of his left hand––a large patch of discoloration, dark blue with white streaks. It looked like a botched tattoo.”

“’Twas a Carack birthing mark.” Luthias’s expression darkened. “Did he move oddly, lurching when he walked, as if crippled? Was his head dented, as if missing a large piece of his skull?”

“He wore a hood that covered his head, but he’s not disabled. He’s strong and agile, and moves very fast.” Charlotte forced herself to recall the moments she had spent close to her stalker. “His breath stank of whiskey, and he also smelled like he hadn’t bathed in a while. He kept talking about hunting and being a hunter, as if his victims were animals instead of people. He called me ‘my precious’ and spoke with no accent until he got angry, and then he sounded exactly like you and your men do. Does that sound like anyone you know?”

“Aye, mayhap.” The laird appeared puzzled now. “Callum never permitted his youngest brother, Fyn Carack, go among other folk or to battle. I’ve no’ seen the man, but ’tis long rumored he possesses a stunted body and feeble mind. They call him the master hunter, but that ’twas by Callum’s command. He spends each day in the forest chasing game, but I’ve heard he’s brought naught back to the clan for centuries. He’s useless to his clan.”

“That’s because he’s doing other things with his kills.” Emery removed her gloves and set them aside. “I’ve seen precision disarticulations like this in some of the remains we found in the sheltering cave. Get out the parchment, honey. We need to let Struan Carack know that Fyn is probably the bone cobbler, which means he murdered Athdara and Callum, and tried to kill us. You should also mention that he could be hunting and killing people from both clans now.”

While they were talking Charlotte quietly excused herself and walked toward the garrison hall. Darach and Taveon were out there hunting the madman who would someday become her stalker, Charlotte thought, and they had no idea what he could do. She doubted the guards would let her leave the stronghold to go and warn them, and then thought of what Elder Sgur had told her about the passage by the forge leading under the walls and out into the forest.

I don’t have to ask the guards.

* * *

Darach advanced slowly toward the base of the ridge, checking the trees on either side of him before he reached the spot Taveon had indicated. There he found drag marks on the ground, and followed them up to what appeared to be a narrow rockslide. The moment he reached out and touched the stones they should have slid away; instead they remained in place. He took hold of one rock and tugged, and the planks of wood to which the stones had been glued fell over onto the ground. That revealed the entrance to a narrow space, from which the stink of rot came.

“Wait,” Taveon said as Darach started to go inside. “’Tis mayhap another trap.” He bent and picked up a stone, and tossed it into the space. It clattered against rock and something within fell with a strange hollow thud.

He looked down as a knob of bone rolled out of the shadows. “’Tis another of the bone cobbler’s hiding places.”

Darach found a fallen, sturdy pine branch, and used his dagger to cut a split in one end. Wedging a pine cone wrapped in browned needles in the split, he set it alight with his firesteel. He then held the makeshift torch inside the space as he and the war master stepped inside.

Neat stacks of bones sorted by type lay within, along with balls of twine and candle stubs set atop flat stones. The narrow cave extended back some distance, and flickers of light revealed the silhouettes of more bone piles, but no sign of the assassin. The blackened cave floor sparkled with tiny bits of a white crystal, which Darach guessed to be strewn salt.

“’Tis where the demented bastart fashions his gruesome trophies.” Taveon kicked one of the bone piles, which fell over and revealed a small bundle of cloth.

Darach picked it up and unwrapped a small chest. Inside lay a locket, two thick braids of red hair bound in ribbon, and a small ring carved from horn, as well as enough gold coin to feed a family for a year or better. “He didnae keep only bones as trophies, Brother.”

The war master took out the finely-made locket, which had been set with tiny crimson and green stones, and opened it to reveal the painted miniature of a golden-haired woman clad in blue and black tartan. “Stolen from some noble’s lady, mayhap.”

“Or ’twas never delivered. Athdara Martin set jewels in such baubles for the Carack.” Darach replaced the locket and handed him the chest. “We must track him to where he hides now before we lose the light.”

“I’ll show this to the laird, and gather more men for the search.” Taveon tucked the chest under his arm. “Mistress Walsh truly didnae wish to leave with the guards. You should take a moment to find and reassure her.”

On the way back to the stronghold Darach kept watch for any sign of the assassin while pushing away thoughts of what might have happened if he’d fallen into the trap. It seemed the bone cobbler wished him dead, but he could not fathom why he’d been chosen as a target. Luthias or Taveon would easily command the garrison in his place; even Camdyn could take over his position. The only thing that set him apart from the rest of the clan was his finding Charlotte and the Fire sword, and becoming her protector.

With me out of the way mayhap he reckons he could get to her with ease. But why should he want her?

Darach recalled everything Charlotte had told him about the killer in her time, and how he had demanded she give him the sain just before the blade had transported her back through time. He glanced at the weapon in his hand. Only a MacRoss or a Carack would know that the Fire sword had been enchanted by Prince Ross, so how could someone born seven centuries in the future discover such?

Charlotte’s fairytale book.

He stopped Taveon just outside the gates. “The bone cobbler, he trapped Emery and the lairds in the barn, and set it afire, aye? And killed Athdara to stage her death. All to start a war between the clans.”

“So we reckoned.” The war master frowned. “What matters that now?”

“Charlotte may ken something the sick fack doesnae wish revealed. His aims, his schemes, something.” Darach thought for a moment. “’Twill be in the story that ’twas written in that book she illustrated.”

“Emery said Charlotte hadnae finished remaking the book. I’ll go up to the map room, and collect what she’s done thus far,” Taveon said. “You must speak with her at once, and bid her tell you the story.”

Darach ran into the stronghold, finding Duine and some of his younger sages gathered in the great hall, but no sign of Charlotte. After sending the guards out to scour the lists and gardens for the intruder he went to ask the sage where she had gone.

“Mistress Walsh went to the infirmary, Chieftain,” the master sage said, his voice shaking slightly. “She wished for some reason to see the bodies of the dead.”

As he hurried through the passages, sending every guard he found out to aid in the search of the grounds, Darach thought of what Charlotte had told him about the madman in her time. She must have known something that she wished to confirm by looking upon the victims.

Why didnae I ever ask her tell me the story?