Free Dreaming the Hound by Manda Scott Page B

he said, ‘I have said before that you should not hunt alone. The spear went deep.’
    ‘But not too deep, and the one who cast it is dead. He—’
    ‘Mother?’
    Sometime in their conversation they had stopped whispering and, hearing them, Cunomar had abandoned his stalking. He stood in the centre of the clearing, staring at where he thought they might be. Like Ardacos, he had hunted naked and the newly risen moon brightened his hair and the white skin beneath. In so many ways he was the image of his father, and yet so clearly flawed.
    Breaca made herself see the small fragment of Caradoc, outweighing the burning fact of the red-striped slingstone held in her hand. Standing, she smiled a welcome. ‘I’m here. If you could lift my cloak from the fire pit before it burns, I might wear it yet through other nights.’
    He stared at her, blankly. Unlike Ardacos, he wore both the lime and bear-grease of the she-bear warriors. As if to make the point, he had painted as much of the bear-skull on his face as was permitted a boy not yet past his long-nights. White circles ringed his eyes and narrow lines ran the lengths of his cheekbones, ending in a spike that rose up to his brow. He was a stranger, as he had been since he stepped off the boat that had brought him from Gaul. The ancestor had said so and Breaca had denied it. Here, now, she understood the many layers of the truth, and the price she had
    pledged to pay.
    Better lost now, to Mona …
    She said, quietly, ‘Cunomar? It was a good stalking. If you’ll lift my cloak … ?’
    He stared at her a moment longer, then did so, stiffly. White smoke billowed up and was followed by a wash of air-starved flame.
    ‘Thank you. There’s wood by the upright stone behind your left foot. If you feed the flames, we can sit warm at least, while you tell me how you tracked me this far. Rome’s Coritani scouts would pay in gold to know that.’
    She was speaking as she would to a child and her son heard it. He crouched by the fire pit and the flames lit the unworldly skull marks on his face. Resentment and mistrust patterned the features beneath. His gaze flickered to the sling that hung from her hand and rested there.
    ‘Did Ardacos stop you from killing me?’ So much pain in the currents beneath the words.
    Your son craves your love. Why do you not give it? For love, there must first be truth, and it was a long time since Breaca had given that to Cunomar.
    She was about to lose him. Knowing that, she sat on a stone and spoke for the first time as she would have done to his father. ‘No, Ardacos did not stop me from killing you, although he might have tried. I thought you might be a sacrifice, sent forward to draw me out. I waited to see who was behind you.’
    ‘And, because I was not a Coritani tracker in the pay of Rome, the one waiting behind was Ardacos, protector of the Boudica’s children. When father fought in the Battle of the Lame Hind, Dubornos was set to look over me. Now he cares for Graine and Ardacos must keep watch over me instead. It must be very tedious for them both.’
    Breaca stared into the fire, seeking answers, and found none. ‘You could ask him,’ she said. ‘You will have time enough to thrash it out on the journey back to Mona.’
    A shadow joined them. Even in firelight Ardacos contrived to be half seen. He carried with him a bearskin wrapped in a bundle. Laying it at her feet, he said, ‘I brought you this. You should not return to take the torc of your people without it.’
    ‘How do you know I’m going back to take the torc?’
    Ardacos said, ‘One of Efnis’ three messengers reached Mona alive. He died on the straits without crossing over but Airmid heard his message and understood then what Graine’s dream had shown. You are returning to take the rule of the Eceni from ‘Tagos, if he will let you have it. To even think of such a thing, you should have your father’s blade, and your own.’
    He unwrapped his bundle by the fire pit