Page 64 of Ashes of Betrayal

She wrenched herself out of his grip then and hurried on, pushing her way through the panicked throng that gathered nearby.

“Get inside,” Cailean bellowed, elbowing his way into the crowd. “Lock your doors and shutter your windows. Rouse your hearths, scatter salt, and gather what iron you can!”

They heeded him, scurrying away as he strode through their midst. The cottage his sister resided in was tucked into a wynd behind the fighting enclosure, not far from the entrance to the fort. When the Shee surged their way inside, Enya and her sons would be trapped.

Bree followed her husband. Above her, the smoke from the blazing dwellings the burning pitch had set alight cleared for a moment, and she saw that the sky had turned from black to a deep indigo. Night would soon give way to dawn.

The wynds grew thick with warriors now, all surging toward the gates and the ladders leading up onto the walls. A dull boom reverberated through the night then, followed by another.

Bree’s heart lurched.Shit. They were using a battering ram on the gates.

Reaching the cottage, Cailean hammered at the door with his fist. “Enya!” he shouted. “It’s me, Cailean!” He paused then, waiting for her to answer, yet she didn’t. “Gods-damn it, sister.” He slammed his fist against the door thrice more. “Let me in!”

No one answered. And eventually, with a snarled curse, he kicked the door in. Darkness yawned before him, indicating that no hearth burned within. Grabbing a burning torch off the wall outside, and drawing his dagger, he stepped indoors.

Bree entered at his heel. Halting in the living area, where they’d met Enya earlier in the day, she glanced around. The interior of the cottage was tidy, the dirt-packed floor swept clean. The curtain that divided the living and sleeping spaces had been tied back.

The cottage was empty.

“The Reaper’s turds,” Cailean ground out. “Where are they?”

“It looks as if your sister and nephews are no longer living here,” Bree replied, noting that the hearth had been neatly laid, yet not lit.

“Come to scavenge, have you?” A rough voice intruded. “At the first sign of trouble, the crows circle!”

Bree swiveled on her heel and came face-to-face with a stocky man with heavy features and thinning white hair. He bore a heavy iron poker, and she clenched her jaw as he waved it in her face.

“We aren’t looters,” she replied brusquely. “We’re looking for someone.”

“Enya and her sons,” Cailean cut in, bearing down on the man. “Where are they?”

The man’s heavy brow furrowed, even as the hands gripping the poker trembled slightly. Nevertheless, he held his ground. “The fight master’s wife and her lads left yesterday,” he growled.

Bree’s breath gusted out of her. “They’re no longer in Cannich?”

“No. They loaded mac Frang’s body onto a cart and departed around noon.”

Bree cast a look in Cailean’s direction, to see his gaze had shadowed. Aye, he’d be relieved Enya was safe. But unless he hunted his sister down, he’d never make things right with her.

And to do that, they needed to get out of this fort.

“Come on,” she said, edging around the poker-wielding man. “Time to go.”

Bree left the cottage first, and had just stepped out onto the wynd beyond, when a stone hurtled through the air, slamming into her side.

Cursing, she lurched sideways, drawing her knives as she righted herself. She twisted then to find three powries stalking her. Their red eyes glowed in the dim light, their blood-stainedcaps bobbing as they moved. Meaty fingers, tipped in blade-like nails, wrapped around the hilt of gleaming daggers.

More Sheehallion steel.

“Thieves,” Bree snarled. “Where did you get those knives?”

Something was very wrong. Powries never left the ruins they inhabited, and just like trows, didn’t carry Shee weapons but pikes fashioned from ash.

The powries didn’t reply. Instead, they rushed, howling, at her.

An instant later, Cailean was at Bree’s side, his broadsword glinting dully in the torchlight as he swung it toward the first of her attackers. Together they cut the three imps down. Flames bloomed brightly in the lane as each powrie fell, their fine weapons clattering to the ground.

A roar went up then, the sounds of rending iron and splintering wood filling the air.

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