The Thirsty Sword

"Ah, if only Kenric were here!"

It was on the evening of a bright day in June, in the year 1262, and a girl, clasping her hands in distress, walked restlessly to and fro on the bank of a stream that tinkled merrily along its gravelly bed towards the sea. She, in her loose gown of gray woollen homespun and girdle of crimson silk, was then the only figure to be seen for miles around. Far to the south were the blue mountains of Arran, and westward across the Sound were the brown hills of Kintyre, with the rosy light of the setting sun behind them. The girl, shading her eyes from the strong light, looked over the moorland towards the castle of Kilinory.

"If Kenric were but here!" she said again.

And as she turned to run to the stream, all suddenly she was startled by the sound of a heavy thud upon the heather at her feet. She looked round and saw that a large capercailzie had fallen there. The bird was dead, and there was an arrow in its breast.

At the same moment there was a lusty shout of joy from among the trees and a stalwart youth came bounding towards her. In his right hand he bore a longbow, and at his belt were hung a dead hare and a brace of wild moor fowl, whose dripping blood trickled down his sturdy legs.

"Ailsa!" he cried in surprise, seeing the girl as he came to secure the bird he had just killed. "You here so late, and alone?"

Ailsa's fair cheeks grew rosy as the evening sky, for the youth was he whom she had wished for, Kenric, the son of the brave Earl Hamish of Bute, and now that he was so near her she felt suddenly timid.

He was a lad of sixteen years, not tall, but very thickset and stout built, broad shouldered, deep chested, and strong limbed. His long silky locks were a rich nut-brown, and his sparkling eyes were dark and gentle as those of a fallow deer. The sun and the bracing sea air had made ruddy his fair skin, even to his firm, round throat and his thick arms, that were left bare by his rough coat of untanned buckskin.

"You have been weeping, Ailsa," said he, looking into her tearful eyes.

"Sir," said she, speaking, as he did, in the guttural Gaelic tongue, "come, I beseech you, to the help of two poor ouzels, whose nest is far in under the roots of yonder birch tree. If you help not quickly, their little fledglings will be eaten up by a thieving stoat that has but a few moments ago entered their nest."

"Youmake needless dole, Ailsa, over a pair of worthless birds and their chicks," said he scornfully. "Why, I have this day slain a full half-score of birds! Ay, and right willingly would I have doubled their number."

"The birds you have slain are for men's food," said she, "but the birds I speak of sing as sweetly as the mavis, and I have watched them tenderly for many sunny days past. Rescue them for me, good Kenric, for I love them right well, and I would not for the world that any ill should befall them."

Then Kenric went with her to the stream's bank, and as he stood there his keen eyes saw something move across the short grass at the water's edge. Promptly he put an arrow to his bowstring and took deft aim. The shaft sped quickly to its mark, plunged into the body of a stoat, and pinned the animal to the soft turf.

"There, Ailsa," said he, "the murderous thief is justly punished!" and springing down the bank he put his heel upon the writhing animal and lightly drew out his arrow from its body, while Ailsa picked up the bleeding fledgling that the stoat had been carrying away in its teeth. She took the maimed little bird to the birch tree that Kenric might restore it to its nest. But at the mouth of the nest lay the dead body of one of the parent birds, and hovering near it was the mother ouzel, uttering sharp cries of distress at the murder of her mate and little one.

"And now," said Kenric, "I must hie me back to St. Blane's, for our good Abbot Godfrey bade me be with him ere nightfall. Where is your brother Allan? Say, was he of those who went with my father and Alpin to the punting in Glen More this forenoon?"

But Ailsa was again weeping over the fate of her water ouzels and did not answer him.

Ailsa was some two years younger than himself. They had been companions from the time of their infancy. Her father, Sir Oscar Redmain, of Kilmory Castle, was the steward of Earl Hamish of Bute, and Ailsa was even as a sister to the two lads of Rothesay Castle. With Kenric, the younger of the earl's sons, she had been taught what little there was to be learned in those rude times, under Godfrey Thurstan, the Abbot of St. Blane's, a wise and holy man who, next to Earl Hamish himself, was held in the highest honour of all men in Bute.

Now, just as Kenric, unable to soothe Ailsa, was turning to leave her, a shadow passed between him and the evening sunlight, and at the head of the bank there walked an aged woman, bearing upon her bent back a bundle of faggots. Ailsa raised her blue eyes, and at sight of the old woman shrank back and felt in her dark hair for the sprig of feathery rowan leaves that she wore there as a charm against witchcraft.

"Give you good e'en, my lord of Bute," said the old woman, seeing Kenric and dropping her bundle on the ground.

At these strange words Kenric's cheeks grew crimson.

"I am no lord, Elspeth Blackfell," said he, going nearer and trying to fathom her meaning in her wrinkled and grimy face, "and I know no reason for your calling me by that high name."

"Not yet," said the old crone, "not yet. But by my sooth, the time will surely come, and that full speedily, when all shall hail you lord of Bute."

"I seek no sooth from such as you," said Kenric frowning; "and you shall win naught from me by your false flatteries."

Just then he felt the hand of Ailsa drawing him back as though to keep him from the blighting touch of the old woman's bony fingers.

"Go not so near to her!" whispered the girl, making the sign of the cross. "Let her not touch you with her evil hands, lest she put her enchantments upon you."

Old Elspeth smiled grimly, and showed the one lonely tooth that was in the front of her shrunken gums.

"Heed not the child's silly fears," said she to Kenric, "and tell me, for what cause has she been weeping?"

"It was a stoat that harried an ouzel's nest and slew the birds," replied Kenric.

"Bairns weep at trifles," said Elspeth; "what matters the death of a little bird? The stoat must live by the food that the great God gives it, and the birds must die when their time comes. 'Tis alike with all God's creatures upon earth. Even the castle of Rothesay is no more free at this moment from its secret enemy than is the smallest wildfowl's nest."

"The castle of Rothesay?" repeated Kenric. "Set me none of your riddles, Elspeth, for they are harder to read even than the abbot's missals. What is your meaning? My father has not an enemy in all the isles. Who, then, would do him an injury?"

"Speed you home to Rothesay and see with your own eyes," said Elspeth, taking up her bundle of faggots again; "Earl Hamish of Bute is in great danger, I say. Go to him now, I charge you, and give him my warning against the enemy who is within his gates."

And at that she hobbled away down the hillside towards the little wooden hut that was her home. As she went the red sun sank behind the dark hills of Kintyre. Kenric stood in doubt.

"I marvel that you will dare to hold speech with that evil hag," said Ailsa. "'Tis our own good fortune if she have not already cast her eldritch spells upon us both."

"Nay, Ailsa; fear her not. She is but a poor harmless body," said Kenric. "Only the witless carls and cottar folk are so simple as to believe that she has aught of evil in her words."

"Ah, but I well know that Elspeth is a witch," declared Ailsa. "Never do I see her but I must shrink away and cross myself in dread of her. Why do all the brave men of Bute fear her more than they would fear a band of armed Norsemen? She casts her spells upon our kine so that they give no milk, and upon the fountains so that the clear drinking water is turned rank and brown. Allan told me but yesternight that she rides over to Inch Marnock in a boat that has neither sails nor oars, and that the ribs of the boat are of dead men's bones."

Kenric smiled no more at Ailsa's fears; for, indeed, so great was the superstition of that time, that deep in his heart he believed no less strongly than did Ailsa that Elspeth was assuredly a witch.

"And what meant she by her warnings of an enemy in your father's castle?" added Ailsa.

"Little reck I that," returned Kenric, "for never lived man in all the Western Isles who had so few enemies as my good father."

"Right so," said Ailsa. "But none the less, Elspeth is a most wise soothsayer, and you are unwise if you heed not her warning. And now I mind me that on this very day, as I was returning from matins, a great ship of twelve banks of oars came in from the west through Kilbrannan Sound, and it let anchor in Scalpsie Bay. As I looked upon that ship three tall warriors were brought ashore in a small boat, and, landing, they walked along the shore towards Rothesay."

"Three tall warriors, say you?"

"Even so. Lulach the shepherd boy also saw them, and said that they were surely three of King Hakon's men of the Northland. And Lulach was much afraid of them, and he fled from their sight lest by chance they should learn that he was a Dane, and seek to carry him off. But now, Kenric, I must away, for the night is coming on and you have far to go. Yonder is Lulach driving home my father's kine. Go to him and he will tell you of these strange men."

So Ailsa and Kenric bade each other goodnight, and Kenric sped lightly over the heather to where the young shepherd was driving home the long-horned cattle.