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Prologue
A bitter wind rattled against the shutters and howled down the tavern’s chimney, making the fire gutter. Silas didn’t really notice, for he was so very hungry. Instead, he watched the man sitting in a dark corner, far away from the fire, the one who had paid for his supper in silver, his sporran heavy with it. Could be rich pickings here if he was lucky.
He sauntered over, a little the worse for drink.
‘Are you heading to Sgathach Dun then?’
‘That is what you just heard me say to the innkeep, is it not…with your eavesdropping?’
The stranger’s voice was calm, friendly even, though it was hard to judge as his face was hidden by his plaid, which he had pulled up to form a hood over his head.
‘I meant no disrespect, but.…’
‘I trust I am on the right road for the castle,’ interrupted the man.
‘Aye ‘tis a few hours ride, but the roads are treacherous and ‘tis a foul night, so you’ll be going at first light?’
‘No, I will press onwards tonight.’
‘Are you sure you want to be going there at all?’
‘Why wouldn’t I?’
‘It makes my skin crawl to think of the place, especially on All Hallows’ Eve.’
‘Get to your meaning, and quickly.’
‘Evil bides at Sgathach Dun and all around it.’
The stranger relaxed back into his chair, and there was a hint of amusement when he spoke. ‘What is your name, good fellow?’
‘Silas, and yours?’
‘Ah, you don’t need to know that.’ A gust of wind caused the candle to flicker on the table, and Silas looked fearfully behind him.
‘It’s just the wind,’ said the stranger. ‘Now you have obviously come over here thinking I am an easy mark from whom you can scrounge food and ale with a tall tale, so if I purchase that for you, I expect you to intrigue me in return. Are we agreed?’
‘Tis no tale, ‘tis the truth, and awful it is.’
The stranger beckoned the innkeeper to bring ale and bread and cheese. ‘Go on,’ he said. ‘I will prepare to be impressed.’
Silas cleared his throat and began. ‘Many years ago, the Laird of Sgathach Dun took a wife, by force, ‘tis said. She hated him with a vengeance, and so she took a lover to spite him. But the Laird of Sgathach Dun loved her as much as she hated him, and he was a powerful man, a brute of a man, one capable of terrible violence. Desperate to flee her husband, she convinced her lover to run away with her, but on the eve of their escape, she was betrayed by a servant. They were discovered not far from the castle and dragged back. Her husband ignored her screaming and begging and pleading for mercy. He got his men to take hold of her lover and then he killed him before her very eyes. Tore his heart, still beating, right out of his chest.’
Silas paused for effect. ‘Then he placed the heart, oozing blood, into his wife’s hands, and do you know what he said? ‘Here’s your love, take it.’
The stranger sighed as the ale and food arrived.
Silas took a loud swig of the ale and rammed bread into his mouth, gulping it down to ease the gurgling hunger in his stomach. ‘That is not the worst of my tale,’ he said, through mouthfuls of food. ‘Driven mad by a devilish rage, the Laird dragged his wife down into the bowels of the castle and threw her in a hole in its walls, ordering his men to entomb her within it so that she could never leave him, dooming her to a slow, agonising death by starvation. They began to brick her in, but before they could finish, she cursed her husband, and a powerful curse it was too, conjured by grief and pain, from the pit of hell itself. She swore that if he killed her, then Satan’s demons would rise, with the stench of a thousand rotting corpses, and drag him to damnation and all his issue going forward.’
‘A grim prophecy,’ said the stranger with a sickly smile.
‘Fearful of this fate, the Laird gave her one last mercy,’ continued Silas. ‘He strangled her to death before any more curse words could fall from her lips, and then he walled her up, in the hope of trapping the curse inside with her.’
‘A vile tale to be sure,’ said the stranger. ‘And did it come to pass, her curse?’
‘Well, legend has it that she still walks the halls of Sgathach Dun at night, clutching her true love’s heart in her hands. Neither are buried in consecrated ground see, so their souls can’t reach heaven. But she, vengeful spirit that she is, stalks the castle in the dead of night looking for souls to burn in the fires of hell.’
‘And the murderous husband, what became of him?’
