Hide him, Sorcha. Now, quickly.
No time to question. I grabbed Simon by the arm.
“Someone’s coming,” I said, “get over to the cottage, quickly. Go in and bar the door.”
“But—”
“Don’t argue. Do as I say. And keep out of sight! Do it, Simon!”
He stared at me for a moment; my face must have been white, for Finbar’s message had the ring of extreme urgency. Linn barked once, twice, then she was out the door and down the track, tail streaming like a banner behind her.
“Hurry!” I half dragged the unwilling Simon across the clearing to the cottage and shoved him inside. And now we could both hear it—the drum of hoofbeats, more than one horseman approaching fast up the track. “Stay out of sight! You’ll be safe here until they’ve gone.”
“But what about—”
“Shut the door! Quickly!” Hoping he would have the sense to obey me, I left him and ran back to the cave, my feet squelching across the two sets of prints in the mud.
I threw myself inside, heart pounding, and only just in time, for there were voices, and the hoofbeats and barking mingled, and three men rode into the clearing: Finbar first, his face tight with anxiety, and two soldiers in field armor, with swords at their sides—my brother Liam, tall and grim; and Cormack, looking impressively grown up.
The dog was beside herself, and as Cormack slid down from his horse her barking reached a pitch of ecstasy. She jumped up, planting her forefeet on his chest, and licked his face with little sounds of delight. Cormack grinned, scratching her behind the ears. But the faces of the others bore no trace of good humor.
Finbar’s eyes were questioning as he approached the cave entrance where I stood. Where is he? But there was no time to respond.
“Come in,” I said hospitably. “Father Brien is away to the village; the cottage is locked up. I’m surprised to see you all—is Father then returned so soon?” I was quite pleased with this speech—unfortunately my hands were shaking with nerves, and I thrust them into the pockets of my apron.
“We have news, Sorcha,” said Liam, stooping to come in, and removing his wet cloak at the same time. Over the field armor he still wore his battle tunic, with the symbol of Sevenwaters on the breast. Two torques interlocked; the outer world, and the inner. This world and the Otherworld. For in the life of the lake and the forest the two were inextricably entwined. “You must come home with us straightaway,” he went on. “There are changes afoot, and Father requires your presence. He was displeased to learn that you had stayed here so long, whatever the need of your skills in herbalism.”
“Father?” I asked skeptically. “I’m surprised he showed the least interest in my whereabouts. Hasn’t he better things to occupy his attention?”
Cormack was talking to the dog, getting her to calm down, bringing her inside. Her whole body wriggled and she gave small whines of excitement, as if she could barely contain herself.
“He made no objection to your spending some time learning from Father Brien,” said Finbar pointedly, “or sharing your skills with him. He has your marriage prospects in mind, maybe—it is a useful craft for a woman. But now—” he broke off, and I detected a note of deep unease in his voice.
“Now what?” There was something none of them was telling me.
Liam picked up a beeswax candle from the table, rolling it between his fingers. Cormack sat down on the edge of the bed, and the dog jumped up beside him, sniffing at the bedding. I watched her; she had her eyes on the doorway, expectant. Was there anything here that might give us away—a pair of boots, a bloodstained bandage? There had been so little time. I looked up at Finbar; something more than the risk that Simon would be found was troubling him.
“Father has returned,” said Liam heavily, “and with an intended bride. She comes from northern parts, and he will wed her a few days hence. It was sudden, and unexpected. He wants all his children there for the wedding feast.”
“A bride?” After what Father Brien had told us, this seemed almost impossible.
“It’s true,” said Cormack. “Who’d have thought he had it in him? What’s more, she’s young, beautiful, and charming with it. New lease on life for the old man. You should see Diarmid. Follows her around all day making calf’s eyes.”
Liam frowned at him. “It is not so simple,” he said. “We know next to nothing about this woman, the lady Oonagh is her name, save that he met her when we were quartered with Lord Eamonn of the Marshes, and she was a guest in that house. Of her own folk she has said little, I believe—or he has chosen not to share it with us.”
“I can’t believe that he would marry again,” I said, relief that they had not come for Simon mixed with shocked incredulity, “he is so—so—”
“Impervious?” said Finbar. “Not to her. She is—different; as glittering and dangerous as some exotic snake. You will know when you see her, why he has done this.”
“Conor doesn’t like her,” said Cormack.
Liam stood up. “We must return, Sorcha,” he said. “I’m sorry Father Brien was from home, for I had hoped to speak with him in private of these matters. No doubt Father will send for him again, to perform the ceremony. Meanwhile the house is in uproar, and you are needed. Fetch your things now; you can ride down behind me.”
Leave now, straightaway? Leave Simon alone, without even saying good-bye, without telling him what was happening? I sent a desperate message to Finbar. I can’t leave now, not like this, he’s not ready yet, at least let me—
“You go on ahead, Liam,” said Finbar. “I’ll help Sorcha pack up, and she can come with me.”
“Are you sure?” Liam was keen to go, already donning his cloak. “Don’t be too long, then. There is much to be done. Come on, Cormack, that foolish hound of yours will doubtless be glad to be away home.”
But she was not. The two of them swung up into the saddle, and at first she circled Cormack’s horse, all enthusiasm. But when they rode off down the track, the finality of it struck her suddenly and she paused, then padded back up toward us. She looked around her, sniffing, hesitating. The rain began to come down heavily.
“Linn! Come!” Cormack called her, his horse held in check just where the path entered the forest. “Come!”
She turned and walked slowly toward him; stopped and looked back again.
“Go on, Linn,” I said, fighting back tears for her, for me, for Simon. “Go home!”
Cormack whistled, and this time she went to him, but the keenness was gone from her step. They disappeared under the trees.
“Be quick,” said Finbar. “Where are your things? I’ll pack, you talk to him, then we’re going.” I did not ask him when I would be able to come back; there was a dreadful finality about all of it. Silently I indicated my bundle, my cloak, my small pots and jars; then I fled back through the rain to the cottage door; but it was barred from inside. True to his word, he had done as I asked.
“Simon!” I yelled over the roar of the downpour. “It’s me, let me in!”
There must have been enough urgency in my voice to conquer his distrust, for the bolts were drawn and the door opened quickly. He had the knife in his hand, but he made no move to touch me, instead retreating to the far end of the room as I stumbled in and slammed the door behind me.
There was no way to do this kindly.
“I have to go, now, straightaway. I’m sorry, I didn’t mean it to be this way. But my brothers are waiting.”
He stared at me blankly.
“It’s too soon, I know, but I have no choice. Father Brien will be back tonight, he will look after you as well as I could—” I was babbling, my distress obvious. Simon put the knife down on the table. His voice was a mere shadow of a sound.
“You promised,” he said.
I could not look at him.
“There is no choice,” I said again, and this time tears began to spill, and I brushed them angrily away. This was helping neither of us. But I could see the long nights ahead fo
r him, and I dared not look up to see the emptiness returning to his eyes.
There was silence, and he did not move, and after a while Finbar called from outside, “Sorcha! Are you ready?”
Simon’s hand grabbed for the knife, and quick as a flash mine shot out and caught him by the wrist.
“I cannot keep my promise,” I said shakily, “but I hold you to yours. Hold on for today; then let Father Brien help you. Finish the story the way I would have you do it. You owe me this, if no more. I trust you, Simon. Don’t fail me.”
I released his wrist and he took up the knife, raising it close to my face so that I was forced to look up. The cornflower-blue eyes gazed straight into mine, and there was a wildness in them that told me his nightmare was right there in front of him. His face was chalk white.
“Don’t leave me,” he whispered like a small child afraid of the dark.
“I must.” It was the hardest thing I had ever said.
“Sorcha!” Finbar called again.
There was a quick movement of the blade, and Simon held a long, curling strand of my hair in his fingers. With the other hand he offered me the knife, hilt first.
“Here,” he said. Then he turned his back on me, waiting. And I opened the door and went out into the rain.
The lady Oonagh. I felt her presence before ever I saw her. I sensed it in Finbar’s silence as we rode home under a thunderous sky. I knew it from the cold wind that whipped tree branches into prostrate surrender as we passed, from the churning turbulence of the lake waters, from the scream of a gull harried on its flight by needles of frozen sleet. I felt it in the heaviness of my own heart, every step of the way. She was there and her hand was on all of us. I knew there was danger. But this foreknowledge did nothing to prepare me.
Finbar deposited me in the courtyard and took himself off to the stables to tend to the horse, for this was a task the boys always did themselves. It was good to be home at last. I longed to slip away quietly to my own quarters, or to the kitchen—some hot water, a fire, and dry clothes were all I really wanted right then, and time on my own. But the doors were flung open and in an instant there I was in the great hall, my cloak dripping onto the floor and my boots leaving a trail of mud prints, and though my father was there, all I could see was her, the bride, the lady Oonagh.
She was fair. Cormack had been right. Her hair was a curtain of dark fire, and her skin the white of new milk. It was the eyes that gave her away. When she glanced at my father, all merry sweetness, they were innocent and loving. But gaze right into their mulberry depths, as I did, and you would quail at what you saw there. Their message to me was plain: I am here now. There can be no place for you.
Her voice tinkled like bells. “Your daughter, Colum? Oh, how sweet! And what is your name, my dear?” I stared at her mutely as the steam began to rise from my clothing.
“Sorcha, you are not fit to be seen!” said Father curtly, and in fact he was right. “You shame me, appearing before your mother in such a state of dishevelment. Be off, tidy yourself, and then return here. You do me no credit.”
I looked at him. Mother?
The lady Oonagh broke the awkward silence with a peal of laughter. “Oh, nonsense, Colum, you are too hard on the child! See, you have hurt her feelings! Come, my dear, let us take off this wet cloak, and you must warm yourself by the fire. Where on earth have you been? Colum, I cannot believe you let her go off by herself like this—she could catch her death of cold. That’s better, little one—why, you’re shivering. Later we’ll have a talk, just you and me—I have brought some pretty things with me, and it will be such fun picking out something lovely for you to wear at the wedding feast. Green, I think. I fear your wardrobe has been sadly neglected.” She ran an appraising eye over my homespun gown, my well-worn overtunic which bore many old stains: tincture of elderberry, rosemary oil. And blood.
I opened my mouth to speak, but the words refused to form themselves, and instead I felt a great weariness overwhelm me. My mouth stretched into a huge yawn and my legs turned to jelly under me.
“Sorcha!” Father reprimanded. “This is too much! Can you not—” But she overruled him again, all solicitude.
“My poor girl, what have you been up to?” Her arm around me was an icy fetter. “Come now, you must rest—time enough for talk later. Your brother can see you to your room, for you are dead on your feet—Diarmid, my dear?”
And it was only then I realized my second brother had been there all the time, in the shadows behind the lady Oonagh’s chair. He came forward, eager to assist, his dimples showing as he gave her a sidelong look, then took my arm to escort me away. She glanced at him under her lashes.
Diarmid babbled on at me all the way to my bedchamber. How wonderful she was, how vibrant and youthful, how amazing it was that such a beauteous creature had agreed to marry Father who was, after all, getting on in years and not so virile anymore.
“Perhaps wealth and power had something to do with it.” I ventured to interrupt the flow of my brother’s words.
“Now, now, Sorcha,” Diarmid chided me as we made our way up the broad stone steps. “Do I detect a note of jealousy here? You weren’t happy about Liam’s betrothal, I recall. Perhaps you prefer to be the only lady of the house, is that it?”
I turned on him angrily. “Do you know me so little? At least Eilis is—is harmless. This woman is dangerous; I don’t know why she is here, but she will destroy our family if we let her. You are beguiled by her, as Father is. You don’t see her—you see some sort of—of ideal, a phantom.”
Diarmid laughed at me. “What would you know? You’re only a child. And besides, you have barely met her. She’s a wonderful woman, little sister. Perhaps now she is here, you can learn to grow up a lady.”
I stared at him, deeply wounded by his words. Already the pattern of our existence was beginning to break up around me. We had teased one another endlessly, had joked and quarreled as brothers and sisters do. But we had never been cruel to one another. The fact that he couldn’t see it just made it worse. And I could not talk to him, for he no longer heard me. We reached my room, and Diarmid was quickly gone, all eagerness to attend again on his newfound goddess.
I dismissed the serving woman who was hovering, and undressed myself. A fire had been lit, and I sat before it with a blanket around me and stared into the flames. Despite my exhaustion, sleep was slow to come, for my mind was crowded with thoughts and images. Perhaps I was being foolish, maybe she was just a well meaning gentlewoman who had fallen for our father’s so-called charms. But something felt wrong. I thought of what Cormack had said. Conor doesn’t like her. I had seen the message in the lady Oonagh’s eyes, for all her honeyed words to me. There was something deeply unsettling about Diarmid’s fawning admiration, and my father’s readiness to be overruled by his lady. And the way servants were scurrying about nervously, as if afraid of taking a wrong step.
And what of Simon? It was still afternoon; he would be waiting alone for Father Brien’s return. No teller of tales to fill his silent day, to blot out his visions. No friend to banter with, not even the loyal dog, unquestioning companion in the darkest times. I imagined him watching as the sun moved overhead and down below the trees, waiting for the sound of cartwheels up the track. At least he would not be alone after nightfall.
Finally I lay down and slept. The fire burned away to embers, but my candle flickered on, so that when I woke suddenly some time later, the room was alive with shadows. For a few moments I was back in the cave, and I jumped up wide-eyed, ready to confront the nightmare. But this time there was no screaming; the stone walls were heavily silent, the unicorn and owl on my single tapestry moved slightly in the draft. I lay down again, but Simon was in my thoughts, perhaps even then wrestling with his demons, and I told an old story, silently in my head, until I fell asleep once more.
It was to be many nights before I broke this pattern: the abrupt waking, the pounding heart, the slow realization of where I was, and the overwhelming s
ense that I had abandoned him. I never slept more than a brief span without waking, and my tiredness added to my confusion and distress by day. For Liam had been right. Changes were afoot, whether we wished them or not.
I disliked most the change in Diarmid, who had fallen well and truly under the lady Oonagh’s spell. He would hear no ill of her, and danced attendance on her all day long, or at least, as long as she would let him. It was impossible to carry on a sensible conversation with him. He was, I said to Finbar, like one mazed by the little folk. “No,” said Finbar, “not that; but close enough. This is more like the enchantment that comes over a man when he sees the queen under the hill, and yearns for her, though he can never have her without she wills it. She can keep a man dangling this way for a long time, till his face loses its youth and his step its quickness.”
“I have heard such tales,” I said. “She would spit him out like a piece of apple skin, the moment he lost his flavor.”
Cormack and Padriac avoided problems by keeping out of her way. When we asked after, one would be always out riding, or at target practice, and the other busy in the barn or out in the fields somewhere. Finbar gave no excuses for his absence. He simply wasn’t there. Lady Oonagh did have a tendency to summon us whenever it suited her, and though her manner was unfailingly cordial and sweet, it was made quite clear that disobedience was frowned upon. Father enforced this rule for her, as indeed he seemed to follow her every bidding. With him, though, she trod more carefully than with hapless, smiling Diarmid. Whatever he was, Lord Colum was not a weak man, and after all, they were not married yet.
There were but a few days left until the wedding. Seamus Redbeard and his daughter were coming; I overheard Liam changing the sleeping arrangements to place Eilis and her waiting woman as far as possible from the lady Oonagh’s chamber. Instead of looking pleased that he’d be seeing his betrothed again so soon, my eldest brother was grim and silent. He made several attempts to speak to Father in private, but Oonagh with her tinkling laugh dismissed them, and Father declared gruffly that anything Liam had to say could be said before my lady, for there were no secrets between them.