He turned his head slightly then, and his look was dismissive.
“One of your brothers,” he said. “How many of them do you have?”
“Six.”
“Six,” he echoed scornfully. “Six killers. Six demons from hell. But how could you understand? You’re a girl.”
His tone held both venom and fear. I wondered how Father Brien had managed thus far; perhaps the herbs had kept the boy cooperative and docile, so that what he needed could be done without dispute.
“My brother risked a great deal to help you,” I said, “and so did I.” But you were tortured in my house, by my people. “My brother always does what is right. He never betrays a secret. And I may seem a child to you, but I do know what I’m doing—that’s why I was sent for. I don’t know what they plan for you, but you will certainly be helped to reach a place of refuge, and then to return home.”
He gave a harsh bark of laughter, so sudden it startled me.
“Home!” he retorted bitterly. “I think not.” He had relaxed his grip on the blanket, and twisted his fingers together. “There’s no place for me there, or anywhere. Why should you bother with me? Go back to your dolls and your embroidery. Sending you here was foolish. What do you think it would take for me to kill you? A quick grab at the hair, a little twist of the neck…I could do it. What was he thinking of, this brother?”
He flexed his fingers.
“Good,” I said approvingly, trying to keep my voice steady. “At least you’re starting to think, and look around you. Maybe my brother was wrong, and Father Brien, expecting a warrior such as yourself to repay a debt in kind. Maybe they thought there was a code of honor among your people, as with ours.”
“Honor? Huh!” He looked directly at me, and I could see that his face might be handsome in the way of the Britons, were it not for the marks of pain and exhaustion. The nose was long and straight, the planes of the face well chiselled and strong. “You know nothing, girl. Tell your brother to take you through a village after he and his men have finished with it. Let him show you what’s left. Ask him if he’s ever spitted a pregnant woman like a suckling pig. Remind him of your people’s habit of slicing the limbs off their victims while they scream for a quick end.” His voice rose. “Question him on the creative uses of hot iron. Then talk to me about codes of honor.”
He broke off, and began to cough, and I went over to him without thinking and held up the cup of water to his lips. Between the paroxysm of coughing, and trying to breathe, and the trembling of my hand, most of the water went over the bed, but he did swallow a couple of drops despite himself. He drew breath finally, wheezing painfully, and looked at me over the rim of the cup, seeing me for the first time.
“Damn you,” he said quietly, and he took the cup out of my hand and drank the little that was left. “Damn you all.”
Father Brien chose this moment to appear at the doorway, took one look at my face and ordered me outside. Sitting under the rowans, listening to the small sounds of bird and insect about their daily business, I wept for my father, and for my brothers, and for myself.
Father Brien stayed inside a long while. After a time, my tears subsided to a faint hiccup or two, and I blew my nose and tried to get past the hurt of what the boy had said, and concentrate on why I was there. But it was hard; I had to argue with myself every step of the way.
Finbar is good. I know him as I know myself.
Why didn’t he speak up, then? Why wait until the damage was done, to perform a rescue? And what about the others? They did nothing.
Liam is my big brother. Our guide and protector. Our mother gave him that task. He would not do evil things.
Liam is a killer like his father. So, is the smiling Diarmid. He turns a sunny face to you, but truly he seeks to be just like them both.
What about Conor, then? He does not go to war. He is just. He is a thinker.
He, too, could speak out, and does not.
But he helped us. At least I think he did; he knew about the boy, and he never stopped me.
Conor is a skillful player of games.
Cormack knows nothing of war yet; to him it’s all fun and sport, a challenge. He would not condone torture.
He’ll learn soon enough. He hungers for the taste of blood.
And what about Padriac? Surely he is quite innocent of all this, absorbed in his creatures and his experiments?
True enough. But for how long? And what of yourself, Sorcha? For you are no longer innocent.
So, I warred with myself, and could not ignore that other voice. Still it was agony to believe: Could the brothers that had tended my bruised knees and taken me along, with reasonable patience, on so many childhood adventures really be the cruel and unscrupulous savages the boy had depicted? And if so, where did that leave me, and Finbar? I was not so naïve, even at twelve, as to believe only one side in this conflict was capable of torture and hurt. Had we saved the true enemy? Was nobody to be trusted?
Father Brien took his time. I stayed where I was while the conflict within me slowly abated, and my mind was taken over by a stillness that emanated from the old trees themselves, and from the ground that nourished them. This was a familiar feeling, for there were many places in the great forest where you could drink in its energy, become one with its ancient heart. When you were in trouble, you could find your way in these places. I knew them, and Finbar knew them; of the others I am not so sure, for often when the two of us sat quiet in the fork of a great oak or lay on the rocks looking into the water, they were running, or climbing, or swimming in the lake. Even so, I was learning how little I knew my own brothers.
The rain had stopped completely, and in the shelter of the grove the air was damp and fresh. Birds came out of hiding; their song fluted overhead, passing and passing, very high. At such still moments, voices had spoken to me many times, and I had taken these to be the forest spirits or the souls of the trees themselves. Sometimes I felt it was my mother’s voice that spoke. Today, the trees were quiet, and I was in some distant place of the mind when a slight movement on the other side of the clearing startled me out of my trance.
There was not the least doubt in my mind that the woman who stood there was not of our world; she was exceptionally tall and slender, her face milk-white, her black hair down to her knees, and her cloak the deep blue of the western sky between dusk and dark. I stood up slowly.
“Sorcha,” she said, and her voice was like a terrible music. “You have a long journey before you. There will be no time for weeping.”
It seemed crucially important to ask the right questions, while I had the chance. Awe made me tongue-tied, but I forced the words out.
“Are my brothers evil, as this boy tells me? Are we all cursed?”
She laughed, a soft sound but with a strength in it beyond anything human.
“No man is truly evil,” she said. “You will discover this for yourself. And most of them will lie, at least some of the time, or tell the half-truths that suit them. Bear this in mind, Sorcha the healer.”
“You say a long journey. What must I do first?”
“A longer journey than you can possibly imagine. You are already on the path set out for you, and the boy, Simon, is one of its milestones. Tonight, cut goldenwood. This herb you may use, to quieten his mind.”
“What else?”
“You will find the way, daughter of the forest. Through grief and pain, through many trials, through betrayal and loss, your feet will walk a straight path.”
She began to fade before my eyes, the deep blue of her cloak merging with the darkness of the foliage behind her.
“Wait—” I started forward across the clearing.
“Sorcha?” It was Father Brien’s voice, calling me from within the cave. And she was instantly gone, as if there had been nothing there but afternoon shadows shifting in the breeze. Father Brien emerged from the cave mouth, drying his hands on a cloth.
“I see we have a visitor,” he said mildly. I glanced at h
im sharply, then away into the shadows. Emerging cautiously into the clearing, as if uncertain of her welcome, was the dog, Linn. It seemed she had trailed me all the way up here. I spoke kindly to her and she ran to me in frenzied response, her whole body wagging in belated recognition and the urgent need of affection.
“Come inside,” said Father Brien. “Bring the hound, she can do no harm. We need to talk about this boy, and quickly. The effects of my draft are all but gone, and I hesitate to give him more. But if he cannot be convinced to cooperate, I will be unable to attend to his injuries.” He turned to go inside. “Are you recovered?” he added gently. “He knows where to aim his words for most hurt. This is perhaps the only weapon he has left to him.”
“I’m all right,” I said, my head still full of my vision. I put a hand down to touch the dog’s rough coat, and the rasp of her tongue on my fingers reassured me that the real world was still there, as well as the other. “I’m fine.”
The boy sat hunched on the pallet, his back to us. For all his defiant words and angry looks, the set of his shoulders reminded me of a small creature chastised too hard, who retreats into himself in bewilderment at a world turned wrong.
“His wounds must be cleaned and dressed,” said Father Brien in our own tongue. “I’ve managed quite well while he was half asleep, despite his fear of my touch. But now…”
“He must come off these herbs,” I said, “if you want any chance of returning him home in his right mind. We should clear the air completely, and he should be taken outside in the warmth of the day, if we can manage it. Can he walk?”
A look crossed Father Brien’s placid face briefly; a chilling look that mingled disgust and pity.
“I have not dared to move him, save to tend to his injuries,” he said carefully. “He is still in great pain, and withdrawing the soporifics too quickly will be hard for him to bear. Without them, sleep will be difficult, for he fears his dreams.”
My vision still bright before my eyes, I felt a strong sense of what must be done, though truth to tell, the lady had given me little by way of practical instructions. But something within me knew the path.
“Tomorrow,” I said. “Tomorrow he must be shown the sun, and the open sky. From now on, just the one herb, just goldenwood, and it must be cut at night. I’ll do that later. Now what about dressing these wounds?”
I moved toward the pallet. Linn slipped past me and padded trustingly up to the boy on her large hound paws. She knew that he was not Cormack; but he was close enough. She sidled forward and thrust her cold nose into his hand.
“Easy, Linn,” I said in the language the boy knew. After the first instinctive clenching of his fist, he let his fingers relax and she licked them enthusiastically. He watched her through narrowed eyes, giving nothing away.
Father Brien had prepared a bowl of warm water with chamomile and mallow root; and soft cloths. There had perhaps been an attempt to start the task while I was outdoors, for the bedding was disarranged and more water had been spilled. He moved toward the bed.
“I said, no.” The boy spoke with finality.
“You must know,” replied Father Brien, unperturbed, “as a soldier, what happens if such wounds are left untreated; how they attract evil humors, and turn foul, and how fevers then overtake the man so that he sees apparitions and, burning, dies. Would you invite such an end for yourself?” His tone was mild as he washed his hands with care and dried them on the cloth.
“Let her do it.” The boy threw a glance at me without turning his head. “Let her see what her people have done, and so pay penance for it. I spoke plain truth. My body is witness to that.”
“I think not,” said Father Brien quickly, and for the first time there was an edge to his voice. “Sorcha is a child; such injuries are not fit for a girl’s eyes, and it shames you to suggest this. It is man’s work, and I will do it.”
“Touch me again and I’ll kill you both.” He meant this all right; and might just have enough strength to try. “Let the girl do it, or leave me to rot. I can go no lower, surely.”
“I doubt if you could manage to do what you say, however much you might want to,” I said. “But I’ll tend your wounds, on one condition.”
“Condition?” the Briton snapped. “What condition?”
“I’ll do everything that needs doing,” I told him firmly. “But only if you cooperate. You must listen when I talk to you, and do as I bid, for I have the power to heal you.”
He laughed at me. It was not a pleasant sound.
“Arrogant little witch, aren’t you? I’m not sure I wouldn’t rather be left to the decay and the fever. Still, the end result might be the same, anyway. What do you think, old man?”
“I don’t like it, and neither would your brothers, Sorcha. You should leave this to me.”
“Then why did you bring me here?” I asked simply. And since he had no answer to this, he fell silent.
“Out,” said the boy, knowing a victory when he saw it, and Father Brien went, reluctantly submitting to the inevitable.
“I’ll be just outside, Sorcha,” he said in our tongue, of which it seemed the boy had no understanding, “and this time don’t wait so long to call. What you see will distress you, and I can offer no help for that. Treat him as you would a sick animal, and try not to take the guilt for what was done on yourself, child.”
“I’ll be all right,” I said, for the spirit of the Forest Lady was still on me and my sense of purpose strong.
I will not dwell on what came next. To strip before me and submit to my ministrations was painful for him, both in body and spirit. To witness his injuries, to comprehend the vile nature of man’s imagination, was an experience that burned as deep into my heart as the instruments of torture had into his body. He would never be whole again, or know that heedless joy in his manhood that I had seen in my brothers as they wrestled together for sport, or flirted with a likely lass. That another man could do this to him was unthinkable. As I worked, I told him the rest of the tale of Isha, for that took both our minds beyond the dreadful task; and Linn sat anxiously by the bed, licking delicately at the Briton’s tightly clenched fist. Still he cringed from my touch, but having agreed to the bargain, he was stoical under the pain, and only cried out once.
At last, the tale was almost finished, and my work over. My body drenched with sweat and my face wet with tears, I eased the patient into the most comfortable position that could be managed, and spread a fresh blanket over his cleanly wrapped body. In the few moments it took me to fetch the pitcher of water, the dog was up on the bed and stretched out beside him, tail thumping gently. Her expression told me she hoped I would pretend not to notice.
“Well done; Simon,” I said, holding a cup of water for him to sip, and this time he did; he was too exhausted to protest, beyond fear. “Perhaps you can sleep now—one of us will be here if you need us. Linn!” I snapped my fingers. “Down!”
“No.” His voice was a thread of sound. “Leave her.” His hand curled into her wiry gray coat.
I moved, thinking to fetch Father Brien. I was too tired to feel hungry, but my work for that day was not over yet.
“No.”
I looked down at him.
“Stay.”
“I’m not a dog, to do your bidding,” I said. “I must eat, and so should you.”
“The tale,” he said weakly, surprising me. “Finish the tale. Did Bryn ever drink from the cup, or did he doubt himself forever?”
I sat down again slowly.
“He did,” I said, finding the will to go on from somewhere deep within me, though it was quite an effort. “It was much, much later, and it crept up on him unnoticed, for after all his adventures, and the ill that befell so many others after they tried to use the cup of Isha, what did he do but put it on a shelf at the back of his cottage, and forget about it. There it sat, with its emeralds and rubies, among the old crocks and pewterware, and not a soul noticed it for many a long day. For Bryn stayed in his cottage, beside
the enchanted forest with its tangle of thorns, and grew old there; and still he guarded its one entrance, and let none pass, neither man nor beast. There were plenty of young girls that would have wooed him away, if he’d have liked, but he refused them all politely. I’m just a humble man, he’d say, not good enough for the likes of you, fine ladies. And besides, my heart is given.
“Over the years, there were plenty of chances to ride away—to a war with the soldiers, or to make a fortune with travelers, but he’d have none of it. This is my watch, he told them, and here I stay, though I die at my post. And when the three score years were up, and Bryn was an old, old man with a white beard down to his boot tops, the curse was lifted and the wall of thorns dissolved; and out came an old, old lady in a tattered white gown, with a face wrinkled like a prune. But Bryn knew her instantly for his beloved, and fell on his knees before her, giving thanks for her deliverance.
“‘I’m thirsty,’ said the old woman in a cracked voice (but to Bryn it was the most heavenly sound he’d ever heard). ‘Fetch me a drink, if you please, soldier.’ And since there was only one cup in his humble house fit for a lady of her standing, the old man fetched the cup of Isha from his dusty kitchen shelves and lo, it was full to the brim with fresh, clear water. With trembling hands he offered it to the lady.
“‘You must drink first,’ she said, and he was powerless to go against her will. So he took a sip, and she took a sip, and the precious stones on the cup glowed bright as stars. When Bryn looked up, there was his sweetheart before him, as young and lovely as the day he’d lost her. And when he looked in the cup of Isha, his reflection showed curls of raven black and a dazzling, sunny smile. ‘But—but I thought…’ he could scarce get a word out, for his heart was beating like a great drum. His sweetheart smiled, and took his hand. ‘You could have drunk from it all along,’ she said, ‘for who but a man pure of heart could wait three score years for his beloved?’ She put the cup down on a stone beside the road, and then they went into the little cottage together, and got on with the rest of their lives. And the cup of Isha? There it rests among the bracken and daisies, waiting for the next traveler to find it.”