The Unicorn Hunter Page 18

  ‘Will you be OK?’ Maddy asked Roisin.

  ‘I really hope so,’ she said, white in the face, holding a whimpering George by his collar as he strained to chase after Bran and the wolves. ‘Although I’m not crazy about the idea of being out here on my own when the sun goes down.’

  ‘Stay on your horse while you are waiting,’ said Fachtna. ‘Any trouble, kick him into a gallop. He will follow his stable mates into the forest and bring you to us.’

  ‘What if I get lost?’ said Roisin.

  ‘I’ll find you,’ said Fachtna. ‘I can always find you.’ She turned away and followed the Fianna into the forest.

  ‘I hate the way she says stuff like that,’ said Roisin. ‘She always makes it sound like a threat.’ She smiled weakly at Danny and Maddy. ‘Good luck.’

  ‘You too,’ said Maddy.

  ‘We’ll be back soon,’ said Danny, ‘so don’t worry.’

  ‘Not much chance of that,’ said Roisin.

  Maddy leaned down and squeezed Roisin’s shoulder and then ran her hand quickly over George’s head. The old terrier licked her hand and looked up at her eagerly, waiting to be taken along.

  ‘Be a good boy and stay,’ she said, watching his little face fall with disappointment, before turning her horse toward the brooding forest and urging him on.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

  The forest was still and quiet as they rode through it. It was a little too quiet for Maddy’s liking. Surely forests should be noisy at night, when the predators come out to feed? She couldn’t hear the scurry of small animals through the undergrowth or the bark of a fox. It felt like every living thing around them was holding its breath.

  It was warmer beneath the canopy of the trees, out of the autumn wind, and the horses’ hoofs were muffled not only by the cloth around their metal shoes but by the thick carpet of pine needles on the forest floor. As evergreen trees stretched above them and blocked the moon, the darkness was almost complete. Maddy had no idea how the Fianna were gliding through the trees so confidently. The whole place was making her feel suffocated.

  A deep, woody groan reverberated through the forest, as if an old tree was being torn up slowly by its roots. Everyone froze and the horses threw their heads up and flared their nostrils as they dragged in every scent, searching for a predator. Maddy’s hands began to shake on the reins as she watched Fachtna whirl around and scan the trees with her red eyes. The groan came again, closer this time, and the trees around them began to bend and thrash as if their branches were being tossed by gale-force winds.

  ‘They’re remembering!’ shouted Danny, just as a massive tree leaned down and swiped at him with its branches.

  Maddy screamed as his horse was swept off its feet and Danny was thrown from the saddle by the impact. Fachtna shot into the air, while Fianna horses reared and screamed with terror as the trees began to pull their roots free of the ground and close in on them, huge heavy branches swinging like clubs. Maddy sawed on the reins to keep her own horse’s head facing forward and desperately kicked at his sides. ‘Come on, MOVE!’ she yelled, her cheeks wet with tears of pure terror. She saw a white blur at the corner of her eye and then Fachtna was hovering by her side, her sword drawn. She whacked the flat of the blade against the horse’s rump and it was as if someone had hit his on switch. The animal jumped forward and began to gallop flat out in a blind panic and it was infectious. As Maddy tore through the Fianna ranks, every horse fled after hers, whether its rider was still on board or not. The wind in her eyes made it impossible to see where she was going and she cringed against her horse’s neck, waiting for a branch to fall on them. A loud rumble of thunder sounded overhead even though the evening sky was still bright and clear, and lightning flashed down. Maddy screamed and closed her eyes tight as her lids flared red and there was a stink of burning and a vegetable scream rose up from the trees around her that she felt rather than heard. Again and again the lightning forked and the trees shrieked in agony until Maddy was dumb with fear, her face buried in her horse’s mane as she blocked out the chaos around her and the murderous trees, her legs numb with exhaustion as she gripped the flanks of her terrified mount who thundered on. Each crack of lightning seared her lids and her ears began to ring from the noise.

  And then it just … stopped and all she could hear was her own ragged breathing, the pounding of her horse’s hoofs and the wind roaring in her ears. The Fianna had caught up with her and flowed around her, faces of horses and riders alike drawn with fear. Eventually Maddy was able to grab the reins and pull her horse to a halt. He stood, head hanging and chest heaving. His hide was coated in the foam of his sweat. The Fianna’s horses were no better.

  ‘What in the name of the gods was that about?’ barked Finn, his face purple with rage. ‘Don’t bother lying to me, Hound – that had something to do with you. Out with it!’

  Maddy stared at Finn with her mouth open and tried desperately to think of a short, quick lie that would keep him on her side. But before she could say anything they all heard the steady beat of cantering hoofs and Danny rode into the clearing on a cut and bloody Tuatha horse. The animal was trembling but clearly it took a lot more than an enraged tree to stop one of the giant horses. Danny’s face was bruised and swollen, but Maddy was relieved to see he could still sit upright in the saddle. Fachtna flew by his side.

  ‘How fortunate Queen Meabh is watching us all the time,’ she said, while looking at Finn.

  ‘It was Meabh with the lightning?’ When Fachtna simply gazed back at him Finn spat on the ground. ‘I should have known. What have these children done that enraged the dryads so?’

  ‘You don’t need to know,’ said Fachtna. ‘You need to find the unicorns, and quickly – we are running out of time.’

  Finn opened his mouth to say something but Bran gave an odd whimper. Her tail was wagging madly and she seemed to be barking through clenched teeth as she tried to obey Finn’s command to keep quiet. When everyone was looking at her, she bounded away, with Nero and Fenris in hot pursuit.

  ‘Well, it seems Bran has picked up the scent,’ said Fachtna. ‘Although we may have lost the element of surprise.’ She flew after the wolfhound without another word. Finn turned to glare at Maddy. She avoided his eyes and kicked her heels against her horse’s sides as she followed the faerie.

  The exhausted horses could not go faster than trot. Bran frequently had to stop and wait for them all to catch up and her frustration was obvious in the way she paced up and down while they struggled to reach her, the wolves watching her with eager expressions. Every muscle in Maddy’s body was on fire from being in the saddle for so long, and the trotting jarred her aching bones. She clenched her teeth and tried to fight off exhaustion as the evening deepened into night and still Bran raced on, nose to the ground.

  ‘Are you OK?’ Maddy whispered to Danny. His face was white and his eyes were shadowed with pain.

  ‘I’ll live,’ he groaned. ‘But I might have broken a rib.’

  ‘Do you want to turn around and head back to Roisin?’

  ‘I think it’s a bit late for that,’ said Danny. He smiled weakly. ‘Besides, I can’t let you have all the fun, can I?’

  Suddenly Bran stopped and lay down, her body tense as she stared eagerly into a clearing. Finn held his hand up in the air and then swept it down. In total silence the Fianna dismounted and walked their horses forward. Maddy and Danny quickly scrambled down from the Tuatha horses and followed them.

  There, in the clearing, the two unicorns burned in the moonlight with their intense white skin. The mare was positioned exactly as Maddy had seen her in Blarney but with one crucial difference. Maddy widened her eyes at Fachtna and tapped her own shoulder. Fachtna looked at the mare for a moment and then nodded at Maddy.

  In Blarney the mare had been struck by a poisoned dart in her shoulder and it had been easy to see the wound and the veins around it turning black as the poison spread. In Tír na nÓg, the mare’s shoulder was pure, unblemished white. H
er body was showing them what world she was hurt in.

  Finn tried to step past Fachtna with a length of rope in his hand, but she grabbed his arm and stopped him. She raised an eyebrow at him and he tried to shrug her off, but she held on as they glared at each other until Finn stepped back, pulling her with him.

  ‘What are you doing?’ she hissed at him once they were deeper into the trees.

  ‘I’m going to catch the stallion and lure the hunter to us,’ said Finn. ‘We need to move him to a location that will make it easier for us to lay an ambush, make him look like an easy target. I can leave guards with the mare.’

  ‘No one touches them!’ said Fachtna.

  ‘Besides, there’s no need,’ said Maddy as Finn’s face began to turn black with rage again. ‘The mare was attacked in Blarney, and in the mortal world she’s surrounded by Tuatha guards. As the boundary between the worlds is breaking down, they’re able to stay with her. If the hunter is both faerie and mortal and able to move between the worlds, then it makes sense to attack her here, before anyone else finds her, and then finish the stallion. He won’t leave her side, the hunter knows that. But the hunter doesn’t know we got here first.’

  Fachtna snorted. ‘We hope! We made enough noise getting here.’

  Maddy ignored her.

  ‘All we have to do is wait, quietly, and the hunter will come to us,’ she said.

  Finn looked at her for a moment and then nodded. ‘Fine, we’ll go with your plan. I want men on foot to skirt around them and take up a defensive position behind the mare, while mounted soldiers will wait deeper in the forest, ready to chase.’

  ‘You’ll need this,’ said Maddy, taking the walnut from her jacket pocket and cracking it open on the pommel of her saddle. A poisonous green net drifted from the shell, hanging on the night air like a cobweb. Sparks of spells glinted in its knots and the whole thing seemed to whisper as it floated in Maddy’s hands.

  ‘What in the name of all that is sacred is that?’ asked Finn.

  ‘Meabh wove this net to catch the split soul,’ said Maddy. ‘It will hold it in the form it chooses to take and trap it in its folds.’

  ‘Meabh again,’ said Finn, his face twisting with hatred. He spat on the ground. ‘I’ll not take anything from the Witch Queen.’

  Maddy took a deep breath. ‘I know you have reason to hate her,’ she said. ‘I don’t blame you. But I need all the help I can get. If you stop arguing with me, this will be over more quickly and you can go back to brooding in your castle.’

  Finn glared at her and fingered his sword hilt. Maddy tensed and waited to see if she had made him angry enough to hit her. It was Fachtna who broke the tension, by ignoring it.

  ‘Go with your foot soldiers in case the hunter is desperate enough to try to fight their way through,’ said Fachtna. ‘I’ll wait with the horsemen and the Hound.’ She looked down at Maddy. ‘In a few more hours it will all be over and then you can have the justice you so crave.’ She smiled a cold, reptilian smile.

  Justice. Maddy felt her stomach sour with fear.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

  Danny was so exhausted he nodded off sitting upright in the saddle, but Maddy brooded while they waited for the hunter to make a move. She had been so convinced that it was a faerie who had attacked the mare. She was not sure any more. She thought of Cernunnos and his warning that she did not know what she was asking for when she had demanded justice. Now, with a cooler head, she wished she had listened to him.

  She thought about what Meabh had said, that sometimes people taken by the faeries did find their way back to the mortal world, leaving a small part of their tortured souls behind. Any of the people that she knew in Blarney could be responsible for this; it could even be a member of her own family, and she had promised to hand them over to the Tuatha. She had demanded justice. She had no idea what a Tuatha’s idea of justice was. What would the faeries do to someone who had dared raise a hand against a creature they considered sacred? She had not thought about this when she made her demands on Cernunnos. As the faces of aunts, uncles, cousins and neighbours flashed in front of her eyes, she tried not to think about what fate she might have condemned one of them to with her rash words. She thought of that little girl who had stared up at her in the Hansel and Gretel cottage. Who was she in Blarney? Was she old now or a child Maddy didn’t recognize? It had all seemed so simple before.

  Maddy sighed and bent forward in the saddle to lean against her horse’s neck. She could not think about this now. If she had to save someone else, she would come up with a plan when she knew who they were and, more importantly, what was going to be done to them. The animal shifted its weight underneath her but did not breathe a sound. She looked through the trees at the clearing where the unicorns slept, blanketed in moonlight, and sighed.

  She yawned and rubbed at her eyes. She was longing for a soft bed and a nice thick duvet to snuggle under. Her eyes were dry and itchy from lack of sleep and she really wanted something hot to eat – Danny and Roisin had polished off all the food in her rucksack in one sitting.

  Suddenly the unicorn stallion lifted his head and rumbled deep in his throat. His whole body tensed while his sapphire-blue eyes searched the trees to his left. Carefully Maddy eased herself off her horse’s neck with one hand until she was sitting upright and stretched her legs so they wrapped around the horse’s side, ready to grip if she had to kick him into a gallop. The horse was as tense as the unicorn, but he still stayed deathly quiet. She leaned over and shook Danny’s arm. He woke with a start, but luckily he did not cry out and spook the stallion. His horse was as tense and eager as Maddy’s and she heard stirrup leathers creak in the dark as Danny adjusted his position and sat deep, ready for the animal to spring forward into a gallop.

  There! Maddy’s eyes strained against the darkness. Did she see a darker flicker of black in the tossing branches of the trees? A more solid shape among the shivering leaves?

  The stallion began to prance before his stricken mate, tossing his head and pawing at the ground in distress. An owl hooted and Maddy cocked her head in the direction of the sound. It was the signal the Fianna had agreed to get ready for an attack.

  An arrow thudded into the ground next to the stallion’s feet and the grass turned black where it touched. The stallion screamed and reared, his front hoofs lashing out at empty air. Maddy kicked her horse into a gallop as the Fianna charged into the clearing, swords drawn. Another poisoned arrow sang out heading straight for the stallion’s chest, before it was blocked by a Fianna shield. Finn mac Cumhaill’s men surrounded the unicorns and locked shields in a protective ring, while Finn strode out to stand in front of the shield wall, sword drawn and his own shield held high. Fachtna landed in front of him, wings spread, searching the trees for something to kill.

  Maddy wheeled her horse around in the clearing to look for the attacker just as the tree next to the one the arrows had been fired from started to shudder. It began to bend and shake and then stilled as the one next to it began to convulse.

  ‘It’s moving,’ Maddy whispered to herself. ‘It’s moving and the trees are trying to shake it off.’ One of the Fianna brought Bran to the base of the first tree the creature had hidden in and let her sniff at it, Fenris and Nero by her side. The wolfhound began to bay as she caught the scent and the Fianna warrior slipped her leash and let her tear off into the woods, the wolves bounding in her wake, Fachtna running behind them. Maddy’s faerie horse raced after them and she bent close into his neck to avoid low-hanging tree branches that swept just above her skull. Bran was still giving tongue and her cries let Maddy hear where she was as she followed the chase through the woods, the sheltering trees blocking nearly all the moonlight from the forest floor. Hoofs pounded the ground on either side of her and she knew Danny and the rest of the Fianna were riding with her. The occasional moonbeam helped her pick out a flash of horse hide, the white of a rolling eye or the foam that dripped from a mouth to coat a chest. Maddy twined her fingers in the
thick mane and gripped hard enough to turn her knuckles white as she fought to keep her seat. She looked down and saw how far away the ground was and how fast it was rolling past and, as she felt her body begin to slip over the horse’s shoulder, forced herself to look ahead and sit up straight as the faerie horse charged headlong through the night. She squeezed her eyes shut and prayed the animal knew where he was going, as she had no idea how to steer him at this speed.

  They sped on through the woods with Bran baying up ahead and Maddy’s balance in her saddle becoming more and more insecure. Then they burst from the trees into the free air and bright moonlight of a clearing. The faerie horse skidded to a stop so fast that Maddy fell forward on to his neck. When she straightened up, she saw Bran, Fenris and Nero had surrounded the split soul.

  It cowered flat against the ground, its wizened arms thrown over its bald head to protect it from the bared teeth of the dog and the wolves, and it whimpered like a child into the grass. It was naked, a ropy twist of grey mottled skin and bone, long flat feet and slender fingers tapering into sharp nails. Its head was a grotesque parody of a baby’s, round and hairless and bobbing about on a weak neck. It rolled pale, bulbous eyes and squeaked piteously through a tiny rosebud mouth. Maddy jumped from her horse’s back as Danny and the Fianna galloped up. She gasped from the pain in her chest as her heels hit the ground. One of the Fianna walked toward her as Fachtna bared her teeth at the creature.

  ‘Don’t hurt it,’ she warned the Fianna. The man nodded grimly as they all moved slowly toward the split soul.

  It didn’t look up as they approached and gave no sign it was even aware they were there. It didn’t flinch as Maddy threw the spell net over it, but it squealed in pain as its skin steamed where the net touched it. Fachtna stepped around Bran and grabbed the creature through the net by the shoulders. It offered no resistance as she pulled it to its feet and the Fianna began to drag it toward their horses. Its pale bulging eyes registered nothing and streamed with tears.