Chapter 10

“Catreena? Where are ye?” Ilyssa whispered into the chilly air. Her breath clouded in front of her as she hastened between the yew bushes. She’d heard a maid say that Catreena was out in these gardens, though Ilyssa’s long search was proving fruitless.

She heard a bellow erupt across the garden, then men’s cheers. Swords clattered together and Ilyssa halted.

It cannae be…

She shot off in a different direction between the yew bushes, heading out of the garden and toward the open training lawn. She saw the soldiers first, gathered together with some of the maids. They were watching a battle, cheering on their master, Cillian, in his battle, whooping every time that he made an advance and wincing whenever he was in danger of being hurt.

Ilyssa quickly realized this had to be the sparring match that Tad mentioned. She looked toward the battle, seeing Cillian dripping with sweat despite the cold. He must have been battling for some time, judging by how tired he looked. He mopped his forehead on his bare arm and turned to face his opponent again.

“Come on, Bran,” Tad bellowed from his place a few steps away from them. He was watching with his arms folded, a familiar crease in his brow. That crease was only ever there when he was truly worried.

Ilyssa’s eyes shot to Bran, just as Cillian advanced toward him and swung upward with his blade. It cut cleanly through Bran’s shirt, making Ilyssa flinch in horror.

Nay!

She stumbled forward to the edge of the lawn, coming to a halt when she saw that Bran hadn’t been hurt by the blade. It had simply cut the shirt open, revealing a chest that was intensely muscular and carved. Ilyssa’s mouth was now as dry as sand, though she didn’t know if it was from the sight of Bran’s chest or her fear for him.

He advanced toward Cillian with his sword, lunging and making Cillian back up repeatedly. The soldiers groaned loudly, disappointed to see their master suddenly losing. Bran looked quite wild, red in the face as Tad applauded his sudden advancement.

Ilyssa’s insides quaked. She didn’t feel she could tear her eyes from the sight. She had to see that Bran was well, that he would remain unharmed. Bran struck out with the blade across Cillian’s shoulder.

Cillian stumbled back, hissing in pain.

“Ah, just a scratch,” Tad said, shrugging off the pain.

Nevertheless, Bran stepped back, giving his opponent time to recover. From Bran’s position, he couldn’t see Cillian’s face, but Ilyssa could. She saw the way his expression darkened as he pressed a palm to his upper arm and checked the thin line of blood. He gritted his teeth like a bull about to charge.

Then a scream pierced the air. High pitched, childlike, Ilyssa sprung around.

On instinct her feet acted of their own accord. She followed the sound and raced toward the edge of the lawn, down to the garden and where the garden wall overlooked the loch. On the shingle loch shore nearby, a group of children had gathered.

Three boys were egging each other on, teasing and waving their hands at him.

“Cannae ye get it, Malc?” one laughed, tauntingly. “Yer arms too small?” The boy who had spoken had to be the tallest and oldest of the lot.

With horror, Ilyssa looked at the boy he was taunting. Easily the smallest and youngest, with a mop of fair blond hair, he was walking on the frozen edge of the loch, reaching out toward a small wooden ball they had evidently been playing with.

“Come on, get it,” the eldest boy cried again. “Or are ye going tae keep screaming like a girl?”

The boy, Malc, was now trembling as his fingers reached out toward the ball. He couldn’t quite reach it. He stepped forward, and an ominous crack made him fall to his knees.

Ilyssa’s hands flung themselves over her mouth as the boys watching on starkly changed their tunes. Where the boys had been teasing and laughing before, they were now all terrified.

“Malc, come back,” they called.

“Forget the ball.”

“This way, ye fool. It will crack beneath ye.”

“Malc, I was only joking. Come back this way,” the eldest pleaded desperately.

Yet young Malc was now frozen to the spot, unable to move at all.

Ilyssa darted toward a set of stone steps in the garden that led down to the loch shore. She raced toward the spot where the boys stood on the shore, just as Malc’s eyes shot toward her.

“Malc?” she called to him. He had paled, his skin practically the color of the ice around him. “Ye need tae come this way. Aye? Come this way.”

“Nay. Nay.” He shook his head, wildly. “It will crack, and I’ll fall in.”

“I will nae let that happen.” She kept her voice somber.

The boys slunk back, all scared now. One was on the verge of tears, another covered his face with his hands, unable to look anymore.

“Here, I will stand here.” Ilyssa stepped onto the very edge of the shore, her hand outstretched toward Malc. “Reach forward and take me hand. I’ll pull ye off the ice. Aye?”

Malc clearly wanted to say yes. He tried to stand, but as he placed once foot on the ice, it cracked again all around him.

“Nay!” the boys chorused together, all waving their hands in Malc’s direction.

Malc was now shaking so much that his whole body trembled like a leaf caught in wind.

“I’m nae going anywhere,” Malc shouted, wrapping his arms around his body. “I’m staying here.”

“Ye have tae come this way. Please, take me hand, and I willnae let ye fall.”

“I cannae. I cannae move!” Malc screamed, his voice piercing the air.

Ilyssa looked about her, searching for another way to get him off the ice. She could see where the boy stood the ice was thin, for it was toward the middle of the lake, but the stretch directly in front of her still looked frozen and thick. Inhaling deeply, she held her breath and took one step out onto the ice.

The boys behind her all jumped back in fear. They whispered manically between them, but Ilyssa didn’t pay enough attention to listen to what they were saying. She was purely focused on the boy and how to get him to safety.

“Malc, I’m going tae come and get ye, aye?” she said, moving both feet out onto the ice.

She didn’t hear a crack, but she could have sworn the ice shifted beneath her.

“We will have tae be quick. As soon as ye can reach me hand, ye take it, aye?” she pleaded.

The boy nodded, though he could not speak. He loosened his arms from around his body and reached back toward her.

Ilyssa took another step out. This time, the crack was soft. Knowing she didn’t have much time, she took another step, quicker this time. The next crack was ominously loud.

“Nay, nay, come back,” one of the boys shouted.

“They’ll both die.”

“Nay one is dying,” Ilyssa insisted over her shoulder, then stopped where she was. Beneath her, the ice looked at least white, but where the boy was, it was increasingly translucent. His boots were even wet with the growing water. “Take me hand now, Malc. Take it, and let’s get ye out of here.”

Malc reached toward her. He still didn’t move his feet, too terrified to shift an inch. He just stretched as far as he could, the muscles in his neck straining with the movement.

Ilyssa reached to him, her fingertips brushing his. She couldn’t quite get hold of him.

I cannae let this boy go now.

As she looked at him, and saw that mop of blond hair, another boy entered her mind. She saw Bran when he was just a young boy, saving her, protecting her constantly.

Ilyssa took another step toward the boy and grasped a firm hold of his hand.

“I’ve got ye.” Yet as she spoke the ice cracked loudly beneath her.

A chorus of boys screamed and bellowed behind her as she took a firm hold of the boy’s wrist and dragged him forward. The ice was cracking fast beneath her. She pushed her feet outward, trying to stay stable, but the heel of her boot pierced the ice. She just had time to take a step forward, thrusting the boy in the back so that he ran across the ice toward firm ground. Any attempt she made to run after him was lost – one step, and her boot fell straight through the ice into water.

She couldn’t hear the boys’ screamed words though she heard the piercing noise as she plunged into the water, her body sheathed in its icy depths.

“Help! Help!” boys were screaming.

Bran narrowly dodged the next thrust of Cillian’s blade as he and Tad looked around at one another, listening to the screams.

“Help!” This next shout was so loud, there could be no doubt that the bearer of that voice was truly terrified.

Bran kicked out at Cillian, managing to trip him up – Cillian fell back onto his rear, dropping the sword, giving Bran the time he needed to run and investigate. Tad ran alongside him but was slower. Bran streaked ahead of him, reaching the garden wall and looked out to the cracked ice where he saw Ilyssa’s head. She was trying her best to swim toward the edge, but each time she attempted to pull her body back over the icy edges of the loch, she slipped back down again. A gaggle of boys on the loch shore were screaming for her, reaching out toward her, though their arms were too short to touch her.

“Ilyssa!” Tad bellowed her name as he reached Bran’s side, but Bran was already running again. He tossed his sword to the side and jumped down the garden wall to the loch shore. He ran to the boys’ sides who all leapt away, avoiding him.

Bran jumped across the ice, his greater weight cracking it in many places. He jumped in, not even hesitating in his decision.

The iciness of the water cut him like a blade. It was as if someone had rammed a blade made of ice into his lungs and stopped him from breathing.

“B-Bran?” He heard Ilyssa’s shivering whisper come from nearby. She was spluttering against the edge of the ice, her arms too cold and weak to pull her body over the slippery edge.

“I’ve got ye,” he whispered, forcing his body to swim through the cold. He wrapped an arm around her waist and levered her up onto the ice. It was hard work – the heaviness of the water had caught in her gown and was dragging her down like reeds. She strained to help, her hands clawing at the thickened ice.

Tad was suddenly there. He leaned out from across the lakeshore, trying to take hold of Ilyssa’s hand. His fingers managed to catch her very fingertips, then he grabbed and pulled hard, just as Bran made one last shove to dislodge her from the water.

Splashing back, Bran bobbed in the water.

His arms were now numb, his body practically incontrollable. He could see exactly why Ilyssa had been unable to pull herself from this water. Anything more than a few seconds in these depths, and their bodies were shutting down because of the cold. He took a shaky breath above the water, but his lungs wouldn’t fully inflate now. It was a small, trembling, almost non-existent breath. He saw flashing stars in front of his eyes and raised a hand, rubbing his eyelids to try and dislodge those stars.

“B-Bran?” Ilyssa called to him from solid ground, her voice still stammering in the cold.

“Bran?” Tad reached out to help Bran now. “Come on, take me hand. Any longer in there and ye’ll die of the cold.”

Aye, ye are right.

Bran pumped his arms as best as he could, fighting that numb sensation. He managed to pull himself to the thick icy edge and plant his palms onto the ice. Gritting his teeth, he pushed his body up and over the edge. Tad reached out and grabbed his shoulder, dragging him the last distance across the ice.

They fumbled together before Bran dropped down on the shingle, breathing heavily.

The air didn’t warm him. He was freezing, his whole body dithering as his eyes shot around him.

The boys were all crowded around one of their friends, the smallest boy, who was now crying madly. Tad was dragging his jerkin off his own shoulders and threading it across Ilyssa’s body, trying to keep her warm as she trembled and knelt down beside Bran, her legs plainly giving out beneath her.

“What were ye doing?” Tad asked wildly in anger. “Ilyssa, ye could have died.”

“The boy.” She gestured toward him over her shoulder. “He would have died, had I nae…” She trailed off, the cold taking over again as she buried her face in the edge of her brother’s jerkin.

Bran blinked, trying his best to keep Ilyssa in view, but those starbursts had erupted again. He couldn’t feel his hands, or his feet. He looked down at his open shirt. With so little clothes on, it was hardly a surprise that his body was succumbing to the cold so fast.

“Bran?” Ilyssa reached down toward him. When he couldn’t reply and just stared back up at her, those beautiful eyes of hers widened. “Tad – I think he’s going tae pass out. Quick get something tae warm him up.”

Tad looked at Bran, his expression not dissimilar to his sister’s before he turned and ran from the shingle shore.

“Bran, Bran,” Ilyssa whispered, bending down toward him. She bent over his body. He longed to reach up a hand and brush back her sodden hair from here face, to be able to gaze in those eyes clearly and see that she was safe.

Nay harm will come tae her. I’ll never allow that tae happen.

“Bran, ye stay with me, aye? Dinnae succumb tae the cold,” she begged, her voice still shaky, though not as bad as before.

He managed to make his numb arm work. He raised his hand and trailed his fingers through her hair, cupping her cheek. Her lips parted as she leaned into his hand. He could feel the very edge of her lips against his skin. It was both sensual and tender, but that warm feeling was slipping away fast, like sand beneath his fingers.

Those starbursts vanished and the darkness engulfed him.