Irish Moon by Amber Scott

negotiate it and help without moving him. Hot tears
dripped down her face, the gusts off of the ocean hitting them
cold.
    Please be alive.
    But the longer Finn sniffed and peered, the
larger her certainty became. He was not. She knew it and it numbed
her, panic and fear leadening her mind.
    Finn leapt back up and hung his head. “He’s
gone.” The misery in his voice surprised her. She’d never seen the
beast show any emotion outside of annoyed, amused or bored. Later,
thinking back she would feel a small shame for her surprise and for
her sudden complete lack of her own utter sadness.
    Somewhere someone had moaned. Matter of
factly, her mind told her this. She stood and walked in the
direction she’d glanced moments ago. The wind brought the sound.
The wind also had pushed it down to bring their focus to Heremon,
but the low sound of pain they’d heard was not his. The numbness
seemed to aid her in these conclusions, helping her walk without
fear and listen.
    Behind her, Finn yowled, as close to a human
wail as she’d ever heard from a hurt animal. But, she stepped on,
unmoved in any emotional direction. Three immediate needs showed
clear and foremost in her mind. She first must locate the source of
the second sound. Next, after assessing its source, she must take
appropriate action. Third, she must get Heremon off of that sloping
ledge before he fell from it and washed out to sea.
    The second meant considerations and decisions
unlike the other two. Once she found the person making the sound,
should she dispatch that person? Was he or she lying wounded from
battling Heremon? Or could they have witnessed her teacher’s tragic
demise and need even more priority and help than Heremon?
    Breanne lifted her skirt for her boline. But
it wasn’t there. It lay in the grass somewhere south of this place,
tossed and forgotten when she’d stormed back to the dun.
    Another step brought answers. There in the
brush, Breanne saw the gleam of skin, a man’s leg. She rushed to
the form and found him, eyes closed and body askew. No more than
breeches covered him from the elements and her startled eyes.
     
     

Chapter Four
     
    He moaned again. She observed no marks on him
save a few scrapes, no wounds to speak of. She knelt at his side
and felt his head. A fever.
    Breanne looked back to Finn. He lay on the
ground, curled over himself and yowling into the wind. She could
see he would be no help and hunted the area for fallen branches.
She retrieved four, tore her cape from the shoulder fastenings and
worked the branches and material together. She didn’t have time for
perfection. Heremon needed her and this man would die if his fever
couldn’t be reduced fast.
    Somewhere in her mind, a
voice ordered her to leave for help, insisting he was too big for
one woman to haul anywhere , let alone to Heremon’s home that might not be
safe. Breanne ignored it. If she left him, he would die.
    She rolled him from the bed of heather onto
the tied branches and dragged him, headfirst to the small stone
cottage. The man lay limp, unperturbed by her clumsy hauling of his
person. Her muscles screamed in pain from his dead weight’s pull on
them.
    She managed to get him in and the door
closed. She laid him flat, near the fireplace and piled two small
wood pieces on top of a peat moss clump. The fire lit, she scurried
through the house, ransacking cupboards and drawers for Heremon’s
herbs. He was a Druid priest for Christ’s sake, where were his
herbs, potions? Her mind tangled with hurry and panic and she
forced herself to stop and think.
    He moaned again and she
returned to his side. Only after
she paused next to him did she notice how
out of breath she’d become rushing as she had been.
    She placed her hand to his brow. Damned but
he was dangerously hot. Breanne wiped beads of sweat from his brow.
Then she remembered: the door. Grabbing two candles, Breanne rushed
to the forgotten room and flooded with relief when the light
revealed shelves