Stone Guardian

Chapter One

Callanish Stones

Isle of Lewis—940 BC

Torin traced a calloused thumb along the edge of the blade. Cold. Sharp. Final. A shuddering breath shook through him as metal sliced skin. He would do this. It was only right. The familiar haft spun easily in his palm. The old friend who had served him so well in countless battles would serve him one last time. He turned the knife and settled the glinting point against the scarred indentation just below his breastbone. It was time. With a sharp upward thrust, he shoved the steel into his flesh. The excruciating burn chased the air from his lungs. Torin closed his eyes. He deserved this. Sucking in a shallow, agonizing breath, he forced the knife deeper until the twisted knot of the worn hilt jammed to an abrupt stop.

Justice served. He deserved to suffer, deserved the agony of a slow, bitter end for all he had cost his wife. The palpating sear ripped through him, shoving him forward into a stumbling shuffle. With a tensed jerk of shaking hands, Torin clutched at the leather-bound handle of the dagger wedged beneath his rib cage. A guttural roar ripped from his throat as he guided the blade across his torso forcing it through his gut.

A steady flow of warm crimson wetness streamed across his knuckles. So much blood. The end should come soon. Torin shook his head, blinked hard against the darkening fog of dizziness, and lunged forward until he landed hard on his knees.

A different pain stung across his shins. Scattered remnants of gray shale bit into his bare legs. The razor sharp slivers of Lewisian gneiss littered the ground all around him waiting to chew into his flesh. As he wavered from side to side, the recriminating stones slashed open his legs, clawed into the sides of his calves. Good. He deserved the judgment. The rubble from the ancient spires knew the truth.

Memories of Eilean’s panic-stricken face shoved aside the excruciating pain gnawing through his gut. The pallor of her dying body flashed before his eyes. Gooseflesh rippled across his tattooed forearms at the memory of her touch. The iciness of her weak grasp still chilled him to the bone.

Torin’s heart pounded harder against the raw painful memories. The frantic drumming drowned all other sound, roared a hollow keening in his ears. A raven’s gurgling caw broke through, echoed from atop the nearest monolith. Torin blinked slowly against the dim surroundings and lifted his face to the sky. The bird sounded so far away. Did the feathered demon call from the next reality?

A slow-spreading stain soaked through his plaid, dripping with a sickly plop from the fold clinging wet against his thigh. Torin stared at the widening darkness of the flowing blood. Eilean had clutched that very crease when she’d pulled him down to her pallet. Her hand had trembled as she gasped out the words and writhed in pain upon the soiled mat. She’d begged him to save her. Her last moments sliced through him, causing more pain than the dagger buried in his body. Torin growled against the tormenting visions, shaking his head with a violent jerk. Why did the end tarry so? How much longer must he endure the cruel reminders of how miserably he had failed the most important person in this life?

How many times had Eilean told him she feared the prospect of motherhood? The mere mention of bearing a child had struck terror in her soft gray eyes. ’Twas so unfair. How could one unforgettable moment of passion cost him his very reason for living? Damn the gods and damn their ways of finding amusement. They had most certainly turned their faces from him just to plague him with endless pain.

The stark hillside spun around him. The gray of the sky faded in and out of the blackened outline of the nearest spire. The uneven horizon of the rolling landscape taunted Torin’s senses. He lurched sideways, his knees pushed deeper into the shale. He staggered across the cold unforgiving earth.

The coppery tang of blood flooded his mouth. A warm wet trickle of the choking liquid spilled from the corner of his lips and coursed down his jaw. A breath-stealing spasm ripped through his chest, sparking brilliant bursts of light through his darkening vision. Collapsing forward, he sank his hand wrist deep into the ravenous shards before he rolled to his side. The stones. He must see the sacred stones one last time before the blessed darkness came. At least he’d be found beside his sentinels, the precious gateway he’d guarded all his life.

“Ye will not die, Torin. I will no’ allow it. I will no’ waste ye on a vain, selfish woman unfit to perpetuate your bloodline.” Jagged streaks of glowing-white lightning shattered the midnight sky. An irritated voice laced through the resounding thunder, rumbling across the vacant hillside like boulders spilling from a wagon.

Torin groaned and sucked in a hissing breath between gritted teeth. “Leave me die in peace, Cailleach na Mointeach. My wife’s blood stains my hands and calls out for justice.” Torin attempted to swallow. Instead, the flow of blood choked him. He coughed and spat against the bitter taste of the briny flow streaming into his mouth. “She begged me to bring old Graena to her. The wise woman wouldha helped her save the bairn. The witch wouldha saved my poor wife from death’s cruel clutches.”

Torin coughed again, fighting to wheeze in a gasping breath as he twisted blindly across the ground. A fresh burst of pain inflamed his lungs, cutting off his words as it pumped precious air from his body. Suffocating fluid filled his chest. Surely his soul was about to free itself of this torturous shell. A buzzing pressure hummed louder in his ears. He flinched into a tighter curl in the warm pool of sticky blood inching its way across the ground.

Mayhap the Cailleach would grant him passage to the other side if he could just make her understand Eilean’s fears. A violent shudder racked Torin’s body. Sight left him, plunging him into a roaring darkness. Icy stiffness tightened bands around his arms and legs, twisting them into jerking numbness. Hell’s fire. Hopefully, ’twould be warmer on the other side. Well—mayhap not too much warmer.

“The woman died because she took an herbal to rid her body of the babe and poisoned herself instead. The only reason the wench feared having a child was because she feared losing your warriors’ attentions.” A blinding streak of lightning spilled from the clouds and exploded into the ground. Angry thunder shook the earth. “Damnation, Torin. The child in her belly didna even hold a trace of your blood. Did ye no’ believe the rumors? How many times did she leave ye alone in your bed? How many times did ye witness her whorish glances toward every man in your keep? Yer a fool, Torin. Ye always were when it came to your fickle Eilean.” Blue-white lightning repeated across the sky in an assortment of frenzied bursts. Bone-shaking booms of rolling thunder rattled the stone obelisks dotted along the barren hillside until the blocks swayed in the wind.