Magnus stared at her, his brain still trying to catch up. He felt ridiculous standing there with his mouth hanging open, but for the life of him, he could not close it.
The stories say ye are Fae, his thoughts whispered.Ye are spoken of with both awe and fear in tales the Order of the Osprey has passed down through the centuries. They say yer appearance heralds great change for those who meet ye and that their lives are about to get blown wide open.
His sword-brothers Kai, Conall, Oskar and Emeric could swear to the truth of that. They had all, at some time or another, met this woman. And true enough, upheaval had followed her appearance. In his experience, it was wise to avoid the gazes of those who wielded power, especially those as capricious as the Fae.
Instead of answering her question, he responded with one of his own. “What do ye want with me?”
She nodded at his mug. “Yer broth is getting cold, lad.” When he didn’t move, she sighed. “What do I want with ye? Only want I always want, lad. Balance.” She paused to take another sip from the mug. “Choices weave our fate, Magnus Kerr. And ye are at a crossroads.”
Her eyes glinted strangely in the light of the fire. Magnus felt an involuntary shiver run down his spine. “What do ye mean?”
She cocked her head. “Why are ye here, lad?”
“To track outlaws.”
“If that is the truth, then why are ye alone? Why are yer sword-brothers not with ye?”
Magnus’s nostrils flared. “That’s none of yer concern.”
“Isnae it? Choices are never isolated events. They ripple across lives, and sometimes we choose a path that brings imbalance, not only to ourselves, but to the world as well.”
She rose from her seat and approached him. He forced himself to stand his ground, even though he wanted to back away. She craned her head back to look up at him, so short that the top of her head barely reached his chest.
“The choice ye make in the coming days,” she said, patting his arm, “could change everything.”
“What choice?”
“Of which path yer life will take. The path of a man at odds with himself, or the path of one who forgives himself. The first path is easy, the second one long, and hard, and dark. But one leads to darkness and one leads to light. Sometimes we need help to make these choices. Sometimes weneed someone who sees through the masks we wear and sees us as we truly are. Whether ye have the strength to see it too will decide which path ye take.”
He stared at her, mouth dry. Aye, his choices haunted him every day, but he didn’t need some strange old woman reminding him of it.
“Is this...is this why ye sought me out? To tell me this? To speak yer cryptic nonsense?”
He stepped away from her to retrieve his mug of broth from where he had left it on a rock. It had cooled considerably, but he gulped it down anyway. It warmed his belly and provided some semblance of comfort.
“Perhaps it is nonsense,” Irene agreed with a nod. “Only ye can decide what ye believe. Choose well, lad.” Her gaze suddenly shifted to the cave mouth and a wide smile broke over her face. “Ah! Here he is!”
Dumbfounded, Magnus watched as a large, striped tabby cat sauntered into the cave with tail held high and began weaving around Irene’s feet.
What the—?
Irene leaned down to scratch the cat’s ears. “There ye are, Baxter! Ye’ve led me a merry chase this time, my lad!”
The cat closed his eyes and purred loudly, his body vibrating with the sound.
“I should be on my way,” Irene said, dusting herself off. “Remember what I’ve told ye, my lad,” she said, fixing Magnus with a stare that seemed to skewer him on the spot. “Choices and balance are everything.”
With a friendly nod and a soft murmur to Baxter, Irene MacAskill turned and walked out of the cave. Baxter watched Magnus for a moment and then trotted after Irene.
Magnus followed. Outside, the wind had picked up, swirling his hair around his face and making it difficult to see. It was only midafternoon, but the lowering clouds made it look more like twilight. He turned in every direction, searching for the form of the old woman amongst the rocks, but could see no sign of her. He ran this way and that amongst the boulders, but could find no evidence of which way she had gone. Both Irene and the cat seemed to have disappeared like a puff of smoke.
“God’s blood!”
And then he spotted something. Footprints, many of them, in the mud by his feet. He knelt. The footprints were large, suggesting they were not Irene MacAskill’s, but were made by men. The prints had sunk deeply into the mud, as though whoever had made them had been carrying heavy goods. A scan of the area suggested there had been at least ten men here, and they’d recently headed off to the south.
The outlaws he was tracking. It had to be. Who else would hide in this desolate place?
Pushing his unsettling encounter with Irene MacAskill to the back of his mind, he focused once more on his mission.
