She was lying on the rearranged bed when she heard orders being shouted from the courtyard. She rose hurriedly and moved to the window. The Scotti party was leaving.
" That was quick," she muttered. MacHaddish had been here less than six hours. Either the talks with Keren had been successful or the reverse. From the way the two men shook hands, with Keren clapping his free left hand on the Scotti's shoulder, she assumed it was the former. She glanced at the sky. The light was fading fast, and she hoped Will could see what was going on. She'd have to send him a signal later tonight. She knew that even when he wasn't watching the castle, he left someone in the trees who would note down the light patterns she sent so Will could decipher them later.
The drawbridge rumbled and the portcullis creaked again as the way opened for the Scotti to leave. She watched them for a few minutes as they jogged through the knee-high gorse, angling back to the north and to the path that led to the Pictan border. Then the bulk of the northeast tower hid them from view.
Half an hour later, she heard the key in the lock and Keren entered. She expected him to be triumphant and boastful but instead he was strangely subdued. When she tried to pump him for information about MacHaddish, he waved her questions aside, preferring to reminisce about his childhood, talking about the years he spent growing up in the countryside around Castle Macindaw. She was puzzled by this unexpected attitude, and the renegade's strange air of sadness. Then, slowly, realization dawned on her.
Instead of feeling triumph that his plan was working, Keren was feeling regret – regret at the fact that he was now committed irrevocably to a path that would take him away from all that he knew and had held dear for years. A path from which there was no return.
Abruptly, as if suddenly fearing that he might have said too much, he stood up, excused himself and departed. Alyss continued to sit at the table after he'd gone. Things were coming to a head faster than she had expected. Later tonight, she'd start work on the bars again.
16
The plan for the ambush was simple. Will had selected a spot close to their temporary campsite, where the track ran in a relatively long, straight stretch. Gundar and nine of his Skandians would be concealed in the trees to either side. They would be at the beginning of the straight section so that, once the Scotti had passed by them, the sea wolves would be able to surprise them from behind.
Will and Horace would take a position at the far end, where they could draw the enemy's attention. The idea was that Will and Horace would step into sight and call upon the Scotti to halt. Then, while their attention was diverted, the Skandians would quickly emerge from the trees behind the invaders – who would realize they were outnumbered and surrounded and that resistance was futile. The two young men had yet to figure what they would do with the nine captives when they were secured. Somehow, they would have to keep them prisoner, but Will decided to face that problem later.
He knew, from his own experience and from watching and listening to Halt, that the mere appearance of a Ranger was often enough to stop enemies in their tracks. In extreme cases, parties larger than this one had surrendered without a fight. Will didn't expect that to happen but he thought that the sight of a Ranger would at the very least cause the Scotti party to hesitate, and that moment of uncertainty would give the Skandians the opportunity to move in and disarm them.
Will made it to the tree line well in advance of the Scotti. One of the Skandians was posted there, as he had instructed. The man leapt to his feet in alarm as the Ranger suddenly seemed to materialize out of the twilight, right in front of him. He grabbed for the ax leaning against a tree beside him, but fortunately, Will stopped him in time.
"Relax!" he said, throwing back the cowl on his cloak so that the sentry could see his face. "It's only me."
"Gorlog's beard, Ranger," the Skandian said, shaking his head. "You startled the hell out of me."
Gorlog was a lesser Skandian deity who had a long beard, curved horns and fanglike teeth. On different occasions, Will had heard all of those features invoked by startled Skandians, but he didn't waste time discussing the issue now.
" They're on their way," he said briefly. "Let's go."
The Skandian looked back across the open ground to the castle. Dimly, he could make out a small group of men moving toward them. He turned back to the Ranger, but Will was already running down the track to the ambush site.
Hastily, the Skandian followed in his tracks. Like Horace, he was intrigued by the way the cloaked figure seemed to shimmer in and out of sight as he moved. He blundered along the narrow track in pursuit of the elusive shape ahead of him.
Horace was waiting at the turn in the track that marked the beginning of the straight stretch. He also started in alarm as Will suddenly seemed to rise out of the ground beside him.
"Don't do that!" he said angrily. Then, as he saw Will's puzzled expression, he explained, "You know we don't hear you coming and we can hardly see you. Make some sort of noise so we know you're there!"
"Sorry," Will said. "The Scotti are on their way."
Horace nodded, his momentary annoyance forgotten. He turned toward the trees.
"Gundar! Did you hear that? They're coming!"
There was a rustle of movement in the trees, and Will saw the shadowy figures of the Skandians moving into position. They had been relaxing in the cleared campsite. Now they moved closer to the track itself. Will nodded approvingly as he saw that, on Horace's instructions, they had taken off their distinctive horned helmets. Nothing would give the ambush away faster than the sight of massive ox horns nodding among the bushes. Gundar stepped out of the trees with four of his men. The other five found positions a few meters back from the track and settled down to wait.
"All right, Horace," Gundar said, "we hear you. How long before they're here?"
Horace glanced enquiringly at Will, who answered for him.
"Maybe ten minutes. Get into position. And once you're there, don't keep moving around." He searched for a way to emphasize the order, then said, "By Gorlog's fangs and beard, all right?"
Gundar grinned at him."Nice to see you're learning the language," he said. "Don't worry. We've ambushed people before." He gestured for the four men with him to move to the opposite side of the track, thus putting five men on either side. Before he plunged into the bushes, he called softly to the others,"Anyone makes a noise, I'll crack his skull. All right?"
There was a muttered chorus of understanding, then the burly Skandians sank slowly out of sight behind bushes and trees.
"Remember," Will said, "we want this man alive. He'll be the one in the lead. He has half his face painted in blue stripes."
"How attractive," Horace murmured. Will glared at him.
"And a large broadsword slung over his shoulder," he added. Horace made a small moue of mock concern.
"Not so attractive," he said.
Will ignored him. Gundar rose out of the bushes beside the track, rather like a whale surfacing.
"So we take this blue-face alive," he said. "But you won't be brokenhearted if some of his men don't survive?"
"I'd prefer to avoid bloodshed," Will said. But he knew in a situation like this, things rarely went exactly to plan. "Do what you can," he said."Wait till you hear me call on them to stop. Give it a moment or so until I've got their attention, then move in behind them. If we time it right, they should surrender without a fight."