Free Firebrand by Gillian Philip

all of them. Maybe never better than Eili, though I’d at least be her match, but my most shameful ambition was the one I kept blocked from everyone. I wanted to be better than Conal. I loved him, but I still wanted to prove I was Griogair’s son too, and not always the pointless one.
    When I wasn’t training, and I didn’t manage to slip away and simply run wild on my own, we were set to hunting food, Sionnach and Eili, Orach and Feorag and me, and that was no chore. I was always good at fishing and catching rabbits and hares, and I’d got the hang of a bow quickly, so if we wandered far enough I shot the occasional buck. Sionnach had taught me how to trap gulls and guillemots; they didn’t taste wonderful but their feathers were useful for arrows. Collecting shellfish had always been a game: mussels were easy and crabs were fun and we loved whacking limpets off rocks with an old sword, or digging manically after razor shells, racing to beat them as they tunnelled, and not always catching them. It was hard work but it was competitive, and we spent most of the time laughing and squabbling and shoving, and mostly we ended up stripping off and tumbling into the clear water of the bay. If we’d gathered enough food we’d build a small fire of driftwood, scraping dry fungus off scrawny birks and rocks for tinder, kindling it with dry bracken. Then we’d eat some of our catch ourselves, shivering over the flames and huddling together, telling our own fantasies and gently mocking one another’s. Sometimes I could only stay silent and watch the rest of them, afraid of my happiness, terrified that friendship might suddenly vanish in the dusk. I think Orach knew what went through my head: she often did. If I was silent too long, my heart and my tears in my throat, she would sit close against me, insinuating herself under my arm and letting her warmth sink into my bones.
    Conal was mostly absent for those weeks, keeping vigil over our father on his bleak hilltop. I went up to join him occasionally, but I did not like the business. It was too easy to imagine the birds and the foxes tearing at my own flesh, and my new acquaintance with mortality still smarted too much for me to bear the smell for long. When it was finally decent for Conal to leave, when the bulk of Griogair’s rites were completed and the stripped bones were gathered, Conal left him with two guards and came back to the dun.
    And the day after that, we found out.
    * * *
    ‘What do you mean, hostages?’
    Eili and I stared at Conal in disbelief, but he carried on fletching arrows and didn’t look at us. He seemed different now that his hair was shorn close to his scalp: not older, exactly, since a grown Sithe never looks older till he’s practically on his deathbed; but somehow he looked harder and wiser. I hoped it had done the same for me, since I’d decided on balance that my hair too had to be shaved, though mostly out of respect for Conal rather than Griogair. My skull felt strange, bristly and cold. The arrow-feathers had been dyed sky blue and Conal’s fingers moved deftly and fast; his work was so hypnotic we’d been watching in silence for a while, and the whole time he must have been trying to choose his moment. I’d wondered why his block was up.
    ‘What do you mean?’ I said again, more aggressively.
    ‘What I say. It’s just like last time, Seth. It’s not a request.’
    ‘But…’ I was completely bewildered. Politics were beyond me, and I couldn’t begin to fathom Kate’s reasoning.
    Conal’s two lieutenants exchanged glances behind him, raising their eyebrows. I knew what they were thinking; it was more than audible. Why did Kate have to choose the two stroppiest pains-in-the-arse in Conal’s dun? Righil and Carraig knew they were in for a long afternoon. Carraig sighed, sat down and pulled out his blade to sharpen it, while Righil simply slumped against the steps, folded his arms and shut his eyes, sunbathing in the winter