Daughters of Fire Read online

  Tasha frowned. She looked scared. ‘Who is that woman behind you?’

  Viv froze.

  Cathy and Pete were staring in the direction of the child’s pointing finger.

  ‘What do you mean? What woman?’ Cathy said, puzzled.

  Tasha scowled. ‘There! Behind her.’

  Viv put down her knife and fork. She felt a trickle of icy fear between her shoulder blades.

  ‘There’s no one behind her, Tash, don’t be silly,’ Cathy said sternly.

  ‘There is.’ The child looked confused. ‘I saw!’

  ‘Get on with your food, Tasha,’ Pete put in. ‘Stop making things up. It’s boring.’

  ‘No!’ Viv leaned forward. ‘Tell me. What did you see?’ She put her hand on Tasha’s wrist.

  Tasha pulled her hand away. ‘Nothing!’ She had gone scarlet.

  ‘Please, Tasha.’ Viv said anxiously. ‘Tell me!’

  ‘I didn’t see anything! It was a joke!’ Tasha stood up and ran out of the room.

  ‘Take no notice, Viv,’ Pete said. ‘Don’t let her upset you.’

  ‘No.’ Viv gave an uncomfortable smile.

  ‘She was winding you up. You know she was.’

  ‘Was she?’ Viv glanced at Cathy. Suddenly she was pushing back her chair and, leaping to her feet she headed for the bathroom. Slamming the door behind her, her heart pounding with fear, she stared hard at the mirror.

  VI

  ‘That dog will never be good for anything again. Why not have it knocked on the head. It would save a deal of trouble!’

  The arrogant young voice behind her made Carta spin round. She had been encouraging Catia to walk slowly round the compound in the gentle sunshine.

  ‘Mind your own business, Venutios!’ Her cheeks flared with anger at the sight of her brother’s friend lounging against the wheel of a wagon drawn up at the side of the kitchens. He was chewing the end of a piece of straw.

  He laughed. ‘Sorry. I forgot your new game. Still playing at healers, are we - instead of warrior queens? Your mother must be pleased to see her little girl doing that!’

  The taunt was expertly aimed. Carta’s anger was instantaneous and violent. Forgetting the dog, who sat down wearily where she was, Carta flew at the boy, more than a head taller as he was, her fingers clawed ready to scratch his eyes out. With a shout of laughter he dodged easily out of reach, dancing backwards away from her, jeering until he collided with the two carters emerging from the fragrant darkness of the baking rooms to collect two more sacks from the wagon.

  One of them grabbed Venutios by the back of his tunic. ‘Prince or no prince, you watch where you’re going young man or I’ll tan your backside for you!’

  Venutios’s strangled expletives were drowned by Carta’s crow of laughter as her tormentor was held helpless within her reach.

  Before her small fists connected, however, the angry voice of her mother from the doorway of the house behind her froze her in her tracks.

  ‘Cartimandua! Come here now!’

  The two waggoners dropped their captive and stood back as Venutios regained his feet and scrambled out of sight.

  Carta scowled. For a second she contemplated running after him, but one look at the queen’s face changed her mind. Meekly she followed her mother indoors.

  Sighing, Fidelma surveyed her daughter. Of the queen’s twelve children only four had lived beyond babyhood. Triganos, Fintan and Bran, the three boys and this the only surviving girl. The child had torn her gown yet again. Her face was grimy, her hair a bird’s nest and the vivid grey-green eyes were blazing with anger.

  ‘I want you to send Venutios back to his father. I hate him!’

  Fidelma sat down on a stool beside the fire and drew her cloak around her shoulders. She sighed. ‘The king of the Carvetii has sent his son here to learn how to be a warrior and a prince. We can’t send him away,’ she said patiently. ‘His presence here, as you should know, seals the friendship and brotherhood between our two tribes.’ It was hard to believe that at this moment her husband and their Druid guest were continuing to discuss this girl’s destiny as a matter of the highest importance for the tribe, or that it was more than likely that she and not Venutios would be the one to be sent away. Fidelma, usually at her husband’s side at all the important meetings with his advisers, had left them to it not long since, curious to find out what the young woman in question was actually doing with her time. Carta was too often, she had ruefully realised, out of sight and out of mind. ‘Have you completed your tasks for the day, child?’ She noted without comment that the dog had followed her daughter in and was now leaning trustingly against Carta’s legs.

  Carta shrugged. ‘Mellia said she would do them for me.’ Fidelma bit back an angry retort. The child wasn’t even remotely repentant that her convenient arrangement should be discovered. Somehow she managed to smile. ‘Mellia is far too kind for her own good, Carta. It is you who needs to practise your skills with the needle and spindle.’ She glanced across the room where Carta’s companion, the daughter of one of Bellacos’s senior warriors and almost the same age as Carta, had appeared. Neat, tidy, nimble-fingered and biddable the child was everything that Carta was not. Nor was she strictly speaking Carta’s friend. Fidelma knew perfectly well that her daughter preferred the company of her brothers and their companions - barring Venutios - to that of this gentle child. She suffered her, no more, and, it appeared, exploited her as well. Fidelma shook her head wearily. Secretly she admired her daughter’s spirit and her ambition if not her endless rebellion. As Bellacos’s daughter she could look for a rich and powerful husband - almost certainly the heir to one of the neighbouring tribal kings - but she would need a modicum of education and restraint.

  Eyeing her daughter’s mutinous face, Fidelma gave a wry smile. The husband would need the blessing of the gods and the strength and determination of a bear to manage Cartimandua - but then the gods, their decisions interpreted by the Druids of the tribe, were going to choose her husband and so would presumably send her somewhere she would meet her master!

  3

  I

  ‘Viv! Let me in. Are you OK?’ Cathy was banging on the bathroom door.

  Viv clenched her hands on the edge of the basin, her face sheened with icy sweat. Narrowing her eyes, she leaned forward trying to see past her own profile, past the wild hair, the pale, strained face. What had Tasha seen? She had described her as a lady. Not a child; not the young girl of those first deleted chapters Viv had seen just now in the depths of the cloudy mirror. No, Tasha had seen the shadow of the queen herself. ‘She’s real!’ Viv whispered to herself shakily, her eyes wild. ‘Somehow she’s escaped from my dreams. She’s appeared to someone else. I’ve created her!’

  Her sense of dislocation was absolute. She was shaking, feeling intensely cold. Dear God in heaven, what had happened to her? She was standing surrounded by large unforgiving mirrors shrouded with Cathy’s amazing tropical plants, but she had been there, at Carta’s side. Seen the jeering waggoners, smelled the strange musky scent worn by the woman who was the child’s mother, noted Carta’s muddy shoes, seen how neat and docile Mellia seemed beside her.

  The smell of brewing coffee drifted slowly through the flat as she stood paralysed with fear, staring at her own reflection. Only when Cathy rattled the handle and shouted again did she turn slowly and, unlocking the door pull it open.

  ‘What happened?’ Cathy passed her a mug of black coffee. Tasha had been sent to watch TV in the next room.

  Viv shrugged. ‘Sorry. Tired and emotional, I believe is how it’s described.’ She looked down at her hands, refusing to meet their eyes.

  ‘Tasha didn’t really see anything,’ Cathy said gently. She reached forward and put her hand over Viv’s.

  ‘Didn’t she?’ Viv looked up. She shrugged. ‘Perhaps not.’ How could she tell them what had happened? She didn’t know herself. There was nothing she could say.

  It was a relief when at last Pete offered to drive her ho
me.

  The flat was very still. Standing in the doorway she looked round the living room uncomfortably. The desk drawers were open. She frowned. Surely she hadn’t left them like that? Pulling open the top drawer with trembling hands she rifled through its contents. The pin. What had she done with the pin? It wasn’t there. With a small cry of distress she turned her bag upside down and emptied it onto the floor, scattering the contents across the rug. Notebooks, pens, comb, diary, purse, wallet, shopping lists, receipts, car keys - but no Perspex box. Where was it? She picked up the bag and shook it hard. It was empty.

  Wildly she glanced round the room. She couldn’t have lost it. The thing was irreplaceable. Running next door, she searched her bedroom. Going down on her hands and knees she lifted the valance and peered under the bed. Nothing. Nothing under the pillows, on the bedside table, the bookshelves.

  She had put it in the desk drawer. She knew she had. ‘Perhaps it was another drawer.’ She was talking to herself - another sign of madness! ‘Dear God, what have I done?’ Going back into the living room she pulled all the drawers out one by one and emptied them onto the floor, scattering papers and pens and pencils over the carpet. There was no sign.

  In the street below Pete climbed thoughtfully back into the car and put the key into the ignition. With a glance up at her window at the top of the house he pulled away from the kerb.

  Viv sat down on the sofa, her head in her hands. The flat was totally silent. The script of the play with its forest of red stickers courtesy of Maddie Corston lay on her desk in mute reproach. On top of it sat a small box. She stared at it for several seconds, her mouth dry, then leaping to her feet she pounced on it.

  The enamelled pin shone in the lamplight as she opened the lid. It was exquisitely crafted. Shaped like the head of a crane, with an elegant elongated beak and curved neck, the gold was engraved and moulded into intricate designs, and set with scarlet and green enamels. For a long time she stared at it, then almost reluctantly she stroked it with her fingertip. A slight haze appeared on the surface of the gold from the contact with her skin and she pulled her finger away, with a shiver, biting her lip. The brooch was so cold. She glanced over her shoulder almost guiltily, sensing accusing eyes watching her from the corners of the room. She should not have touched it.

  She should not have taken it at all. Why had she? Had someone else prompted her; guided her hand?

  Outside the window the luminous night had settled over the city and slowly it was growing more silent. In the distance she heard a shout, then another and a short burst of music as somewhere down the Lawnmarket a door opened and then closed again.

  The shadowy woman standing in the lamplight near the desk was staring at the brooch with intensity, her eyes the only part of her that seemed alive. As Viv picked up the lid of the box and carefully fitted it back into place, the figure reached out a hand as if in protest, then slowly faded into the darkness.

  II

  The ponies were kept at the far side of the compound. They were stamping impatiently, waiting for Carta and Triganos to appear from their mother’s house.

  Silently, careful not to be seen, a figure was creeping along in the shadow of the great wall, climbing over the rubble where it had fallen, coming closer to the horses every second. First one, then another cocked their ears watching and Carta’s pony shifted restlessly, backing away as far as its halter would allow.

  The boy glanced left and right, then ran sure-footed in between the animals. There was something in his hand, half-concealed behind his back. Ducking under the rope he approached Carta’s pony and thrust something under the saddle cloth. The horses all moved restlessly now as he turned and ran out of sight, chuckling.

  When the king’s children appeared a few moments later the horses had settled again. Triganos was laughing. ‘Come on. I’ll race you! To the forest and back before sundown.’ He vaulted onto his own pony, leaning forward to pull the rein free, and turned it already galloping as he headed for the gates. Carta was not far behind him. As she leaped for her pony, bareback as his was, but for the backcloth, the animal let out a scream of pain and reared up. Carta flew over the horse’s back and landed on the ground on the far side, winded. For a moment she didn’t move.

  From the shadows Venutios appeared. He stooped to help her climb to her feet. ‘Are you all right? What happened.’ His face was bland. Then concerned. Kindly. Behind him two men working at the bellows outside the smith’s house dropped the great wooden handles and ran to her aid, as did another of Carta’s companions, Mairghread, a tall dark-haired girl with buck teeth, who was just emerging from the house. Shaken and with her dignity wounded Carta scrambled to her feet and shook off Venutios’s arm. ‘I’m all right! I’m fine. How is Olwen?’

  Venutios was beside the pony already, soothing it and gentling its trembling skin. The bunch of holly leaves had gone, tossed into the sunshadows out of sight beyond the other horses.

  To his delight Carta was taken away, back to her mother to be cleaned and soothed and reprimanded for not checking the pony’s saddle cloth was firmly fixed, for not approaching quietly, for not mounting carefully, and long before she was allowed once more to emerge into the sunshine Venutios had climbed onto his own pony and ridden in pursuit of Triganos, followed by some of the other boys and leaving Carta at home to sulk. It was a long time before she managed to slip away at last from her mother’s eagle eye, but when she did she hurried straightaway over to the horse lines and whispering to the pony, fed it handfuls of titbits. Then carefully she ducked under the rope and began to search the ground.

  From the top of the wall she could see far into the distance, beyond the forest, the scarlet gleam as the sun began to set into the sea. Pushing her hair out of her eyes she stood for a long time, listening for the voice. It wasn’t there. All she could hear was the gentle moaning of the wind. Silently she watched as the colours changed to deeper richer red, then to orange, then slowly they dulled into night. Behind her the coming darkness was already thick on the fells. There was no trace of Triganos and his friends.

  There was a rattle of stones behind her and she turned. Mellia had scrambled up beside her. For a moment she too stared at the sunset, then she shrugged. ‘It’ll be dark soon. Is there any sign of them?’

  Carta shook her head.

  ‘You think they’ll spend the night in the forest?’

  ‘I’m sure of it.’

  ‘And you wanted to go with them.’

  ‘You know I did.’ Carta pursed her lips. ‘Someone had put some holly under my saddle cloth.’

  Mellia’s eyes rounded. ‘Are you sure?’

  ‘I found it. And then the scratches on poor Olwen’s back.’

  ‘But who would do such a thing?’

  ‘Venutios. He didn’t want me to go with them. If I’m there Triganos looks after me and does what I say. If I’m not, then the boys can do what they like.’ She gave an elaborate shrug.

  Mellia studied the other girl’s profile with misgiving. She recognised the set of the jaw. ‘What are you going to do?’

  ‘I haven’t decided yet. I’ll think of something.’

  When the boys finally returned they brought with them a fine haul of game and had clearly enjoyed themselves enormously. Carta was not there to greet them. She had decided unaccountably to sit in the sunshine and watch Mellia’s attempts at mending some of the tears in her friends’ gowns; a thankless task, but one she seemed happy enough to try. Triganos brought his sister the gift of a pair of soft leather slippers which he had wheedled from the shoemaker near the entrance gates in an attempt to console her for leaving her behind. She smiled and accepted the gift with a gracious smile which filled him with foreboding.

  Two days later Venutios was taken violently ill after the evening meal. Crouching behind the feasting hall as he vomited again and again into a latrine pit he glanced up at last, wiping his sweating face, to see Carta watching him. She was wearing her best gown and new slippers. And she was smiling. �
�Poor Venutios … Aren’t you well?’

  ‘Obviously not.’ He groaned and leaned down towards the stinking mess again.

  ‘No one else has been ill.’ She did not come any closer, wrinkling her nose fastidiously. ‘The gods must be punishing you for something. I wonder why.’

  ‘I can’t imagine.’ He looked up at her. ‘I hope you haven’t poisoned me, you little bitch!’

  Carta frowned. ‘Why would I want to do that?’

  He was incapable of answering. With another groan he bent double again. By the time he had recovered enough to straighten and look round she had gone.

  III

  ‘Pete didn’t tell you I’d rung him, did he!’

  Pat took one look at Cathy’s astonished face and read the situation correctly. ‘Admittedly, I didn’t give him much notice before I jumped on the Shuttle, but I didn’t think he could forget that easily. Shit, I’m sorry. He said I could scrounge a bed after I’d been down to see Maddie. No worry.’ She had dropped a large scarlet canvas bag and her computer case on the floor at her feet. ‘I can stay with some mates of mine down in Leith. I’m sure they won’t mind, if there is no room here.’

  Cathy shrugged helplessly. Bugger Pete. ‘It’s not that I’m not glad to see you, Pat.’ She kissed her visitor. ‘It’s just that we’ve got Tasha for a couple of nights.’

  ‘Say no more. I remember the child from hell!’ Pat chortled.

  ‘Tasha adores you, Pat, you know she does.’ Cathy didn’t sound too convinced. ‘And we’ve got room.’

  ‘Somewhere I can lie late abed without screaming children or for that matter cats jumping on my diaphragm?’ Pat peered over Cathy’s shoulder. ‘Is it safe to come in now?’