Ian Read Online Free PDF

startin’.”
    “Let’s go,” she said, putting her arm around the girl and heading away. She looked back over her shoulder once more, feeling as if she were being watched.
     
    * * *
     
    Ian st epped out of the Horn and Hoof Pub, and stopped when he saw the raven sitting atop the roof and staring at him with its beady eyes. That feeling was back again. The feeling of dread and doom, and he didn’t like it. Not one bit.
    Someone grabbed his arm, and he turned to see a woman peeking up at him from under the hood of her black cloak. She had light brown eyes and very pale skin, and her shift beneath the cloak was tattered, dirty and torn. A chill swept through his body, and a feeling encompassed him as if he should know her, but he didn’t.
    She looked to be mayhap twenty years his senior, but there were weathered creases on her face and also bruises on her hands and arms that made her seem much older. The woman was tall, but stood bent over as if she were hiding something or perhaps writhing in pain. She looked so gaunt and boney, and sickly, and Ian swore she should be dead. Then she raised her chin and looked at him with both eyes, and he gasped as he saw the scar in the form of an x on her cheek. He knew this mark well – it was the MacTavish mark of the dead. 
    “Hev ye got a soul cake fer me?” asked the woman, and Ian just shook her hold from his leine.
    “Nay, I dinna have any,” he said, not knowing if the woman was a ghost or naught more than a beggar and looking for soul cakes that were handed out on this day. Soul cakes were small cakes made with sweet spices and ginger and filled with raisins and currants. Sometimes they were marked with a cross on top to show they were given as alms, and other times they had two large currants on top that looked like the eyes of a ghost. They were handed out to the children and beggars going door to door on this eve, and every one of them that was eaten was a symbol of a soul being released from purgatory.
    “Ye hev no soul or ye have no soul cake?” the woman asked him, and Ian thought it an odd question. And even odder, he seemed drawn to her though he feared her at the same time. He didn’t need any more demons in his head right now. Nor did he want someone with the x of the dead clinging to his leine.
    “Go away,” he told her, almost feeling sorry for her . Still, he didn’t want to have anything to do with beggars or soul cakes on a night like this. “Go beggin’ somewhere else. I have nothin’ fer ye.”
    “Ye’d better look inte yer heart soon, Ian. If no’ ye may be beggin’ fer soul cakes afore much longer yerself.”
    Ian had no idea what that meant and was considering asking her, but was distracted as the door to the pub opened behind him and he heard lots of noise. He turned to see some of the women and children coming out in a group. Effie and Lovelle were among them, as well as Onyx’s children.
    “Tell Aidan and Onyx thet we’re takin’ the bairns door to door to sing fer soul cakes afore we come te the bonfire,” said Effie.
    “Aye,” added Lovelle. “And I only wish Wren and her children were here as well to join us, as they love this time of year.”
    “ Anyone who loves All Hallow’s Eve is got te be mad,” growled Ian. “But dinna fash yerself, as our chieftain Storm and his family will be back from England soon. They are spending some time with Wren’s family,” he informed her.
    “Well, I do wish at least Clarista and her husband could have joined us,” said Effie, speaking of Storm’s parents. “But I ken thet someone has te stay back and watch the camp in the Highlands.”
    “Au ld Ian MacKeefe disna like celebratin’ deid souls,” said Ian, talking about their other chieftain who shared the same name as him. Storm was the man’s son, and they both shared the duty of being chieftain, which worked out nicely since the clan was so split up most the time.
    The women and children left, and Ian had n o idea what