Page 33 of Blood & Claw

She’d been sure she’d seen him before, and she still couldn’t shake it. He’d told her he was from Braewall. Maybe, he’d been one of Kayla’s customers.

It annoyed her that she couldn’t remember where or when she’d seen him.

With a sigh, she stretched out on the fur.

She needed to get some rest. Dale would be knocking on the door at first light.

Stretching out before the hearth, she wrapped her cloak tightly around herself.

The warmth should have comforted her, yet it didn’t.

Closing her eyes only brought back fragments of the evening, including the instant of sharp disappointment when Dale’s hand had fastened around her wrist, stopping her from clawing that man’s face.

Ailsa’s eyes snapped open again, bile biting the back of her throat.

What’s happening to me?

She had no answer to that.

Rolling onto her side, she stared into the embers until her eyes burned.

Eventually, exhaustion dragged her under.

“There’s a group of rough-looking bastards staying out back.” The man speaking was gap-toothed and sour-breathed, his eyes bloodshot and glazed with drink. “Next door to my room. Keep much to themselves.”

Darach nodded. “What else can you tell me?” Ever since leaving Ailsa, he’d gone from ale-hall to ale-hall, asking careful questions. Nothing.

But now, finally, his luck had changed.

“They turned up on foot … but brought horses in later. Not garrons mind … bigger, expensive-looking beasts.”

Darach stilled. So, they were planning to move on. Soon.

Fishing out two iron pennies, he pressed them into the man’s sweaty palm. “Show me.”

His new friend led him through the smoky interior, past tables of drunken patrons playing Liar, and out into a narrow yard. Two long stacked-stone annexes flanked the space, with stables and a midden heap between them. The stench of horse dung and rotting scraps caught in the back of Darach’s throat.

“That one.” The man pointed to a door on the left before scurrying back inside.

Darach approached slowly, boots whispering on hard-packed earth. His hand moved to the hilt of the long-bladed knife he carried at his hip as he studied the building. No light leaked around the shutters. No voices filtered through the wattle door.

His gut hardened.

It was too quiet. Something was wrong.

Reaching out, he tested the door. It swung open beneath his touch. They’d left it unlocked.

Grabbing a torch from a bracket near the stables, he stepped inside. The flickering light revealed a cramped room with three wooden pallets shoved against the walls. Furs lay in tangled heaps. Empty ale skins littered the floor alongside gnawed bones and crusts of bread.

They’d left in a hurry.

That wasn’t all bad. Rushing often meant mistakes.

Sweeping the torch higher, he scanned the space. There, in the corner, he spied a coil of rope, frayed in places. And on the packed earth floor beside the rope, scuff marks. Deep gouges where someone had struggled. There had been a fight; their captive was giving them trouble.

Moving closer, he dropped to a crouch.

In the dirt beside the rope was a symbol drawn in blood: a triple spiral.