‘I understand,’ Conor told him. ‘If not for your Rhiannon, our friend would be dead and in his grave already. Whatever you can do will be sufficient.’
In these words, Conor heard the echo of Mádoc’s voice. Whatever you can do …
Turning to Fergal, he said, ‘I’m not going.’
Fergal raised his eyebrows in surprise. ‘One of us must accompany Donal—you yourself said so.’
‘You are going,’ Conor told him. As Fergal drew breath to object, Conor said, ‘No—it should be you.’
‘And what are you going to do?’ Suspicion tinged his voice.
‘Mádoc started all this, and I am going to see it through—finish it.’
Fergal hesitated, shaking his head. ‘I am not liking this. What about taking word to your father?’
‘Ovate Galin can do that. Druids are good at such things.’
‘My friends!’ called Gwydion from the boat. ‘The tide is flowing. We must depart.’
Conor gestured to the waiting boat. ‘Go, now,’ Conor told him. ‘For Donal’s sake, the sooner you go the sooner he can be healed.’
Fergal hesitated only a moment longer and then, overcome by his own curiosity and fascination with the faéry, he turned abruptly and strode eagerly to the water. As he was clambering into the boat, Rhiannon slid over the side and splashed onto the strand once more. Conor hurried to meet her. ‘As I see you are not to come with us, I would leave you with a parting gift,’ she said as she came to stand before him. Taking her left hand, she placed the palm against his forehead. Her touch was cool against his skin. Her right hand she placed over his heart and, lifting her eyes to the sky, she intoned a few words in her own tongue, words that sounded to Conor’s ears like water rippling over stones in a stream, or the liquid notes of a blackbird’s song heard as a murmur on the wind.
When she finished, she said, ‘Now I have only to speak your name to know where you can be found.’ She smiled—a slight upward curve of her lips and a lightness in her ice-blue eyes—as she bent near and added, ‘And you have only to whisper mine and I will be there.’
‘Thank you, lady,’ said Conor. ‘I will remember you, too.’
‘Rhiannon!’ Gwydion called again, his voice insistent, urgent. ‘The sea turns against us unless we leave at once.’
She hurried back to the boat and was taken up. The faéry set to their work, plying two long oars shaped like stalks of wheat. The boat rotated neatly and glided away. Conor joined Gráinne on the beach and the two watched until the graceful vessel had left the shelter of the bay and reached deep water.
‘I thought you were going with them,’ the banfaíth said, still watching the boat as it swiftly receded from view.
‘There is something I must do,’ Conor told her, already striding up the beach. ‘And I am going to need your help to do it.’
‘Whatever you require,’ she replied, hurrying after him, ‘if it is in my power, you shall have it.’
‘I will need a spear and shield,’ Conor called over his shoulder. ‘I am a warrior, and I am going into battle.’
Rónán
I had but newly arrived in my new home at Clethar Ciall when disturbing news reached our Wise Head, a venerable old brehon named Talgobain. He called me to his modest dwelling at the edge of the Sacred Grove—the oak wood maintained by the Learned for more than twenty generations—and there he gave me a drink of watered mead, steeped in anise and heated in a copper bowl. ‘How do you find your place here?’ he asked, offering me the cup.
‘Most agreeable,’ I told him. ‘I believe I will get on well.’
‘Of that, I am certain,’ said our chief. ‘Morien has told me many good things about you. He was emphatic in his praise.’
‘I have the greatest respect for him. He has guided me well and wisely. Whatever I have achieved I owe to him.’
Talgobain smiled and sipped from his steaming cup. We sat for a time in easy silence; as a druid of lower rank, I waited for my superior to speak first. He took another drink and then set aside the cup. ‘Troubling news has reached me,’ he said, smoothing his grey robe over his round stomach and folding his hands there. ‘But I did not like to have you hear it from other lips than my own.’
‘Oh?’ I said. ‘Am I to understand that this news is of special concern to me?’
‘It is.’ He arranged his kindly features in an expression of sympathy. ‘Your brother has been cast out of the tribe and is exiled for three years, not to return to his home on pain of death.’
My heart sank inwardly, yes, but I was not shocked by this revelation. Although I had rarely visited Dúnaird since setting my feet on the druid path, scraps of news from my father and the many stray sources I had cultivated over the years fed my hunger for information about my tribe and kin. What I had heard confirmed the view I had of my father and brothers as I remembered them. Thus, I little doubted that my brother’s gross ambition had caught him up at last.
‘You are not surprised, I see.’
‘Not at all,’ I sighed. ‘In truth, he has ever been mindful only of satisfying his own desires and placing his aims above the good of the tribe. A man who lives like that plaits a noose for his own neck.’
Our Wise Head nodded sagely. ‘I am sorry to hear it.’
‘Do not be sorry for Liam. He will look after himself, never fear.’
At this Talgobain’s glance sharpened. His eyebrows raised. ‘Liam?’
‘Yes, my older brother—Liam is his name. Why?’
‘That is not the name I was given.’
‘No? Then who else—’ I could not fathom what he meant. ‘You cannot mean Conor!’
‘Conor mac Ardan, yes,’ he confirmed. ‘That is the name of the ill-fated exile.’ He regarded me for a moment, then said, ‘This name catches you unawares, I see.’
‘I confess that it does, yes.’
‘Why did you assume it was the other one?’
‘Liam has a desire for power and renown that ever induces him to overreach himself—often to the cost of others,’ I declared. ‘I cannot but think that if it was Conor cast out, then the report must be in error.’
‘Conor was the name given to me. I am sorry for the distress this causes you, but there is no mistake.’
‘But how can this be?’ I wondered. ‘Do you know what happened?’
‘Naturally, my information is limited. But, it seems he was caught in the theft of a gold bracelet belonging to one of the Learned Brotherhood—an ollamh of high rank and repute, long in service to King Cahir of the Coriondi—one called Mádoc.’
‘Conor? Stealing? I cannot make myself believe it.’ I shook my head in dismay. ‘The report must be mistaken.’
Talgobain held his head to one side. ‘You sound very certain.’
‘I would sooner distrust myself than doubt Conor.’ Indignation kindled within me and I could feel its warmth spreading to my hands and face. ‘It makes no sense. Conor places little value on such trinkets—and even if he wanted a torc or bracelet, he would never have to steal to get it. King Ardan would give him anything he asked—and happily. A simple request and the thing, whatever he desired, would be his.’
‘Conor is held in such high esteem, eh?’
‘All that and more.’
The wise brehon nodded his head. ‘If not for selfish gain, then the theft—or at least the accusation—must have served some other purpose.’
I slumped back in my chair. Had I so completely lost touch with my kinsmen that I no longer knew them? Still, I could not believe that Conor, the brother I loved and knew best, had become a despised thief.
Talgobain sat silently watching me. He took up his cup once more, blew on the hot liquor, and took a drink. ‘I learned long ago that when a thing defies rational explanation then it is because I lack a complete understanding of the facts.’
‘I am missing something—is that what you mean?’
‘Either that, or there is some other motive yet to be disclosed, something hidden perh
aps. Discover that hidden thing and what has happened will stand perfectly revealed.’
‘That, at least, I can accept.’ I raised my cup and swallowed down the sweet mead. ‘Until I hear it from his own lips, I will not believe Conor would risk exile for anything so trivial—and certainly not for something he could get with a simple request.’
‘So you say.’
He was right, and I told him so. Putting my cup aside, I rose. ‘I must go to and speak to my father. I have been wanting to go for a very long time, and it may be that I can be of some service to him now.’
Our Wise Head regarded me a long time—no doubt weighing the implications of this action.
‘By your leave, Brehon Talgobain, I will go at once. If I travel through the night, I can be at Dúnaird by morning.’
‘No,’ said Talgobain, his voice taking on a note of command. ‘You asked for my permission, but it is denied. You will stay here.’
‘But, I must—’
‘Think, Rónán,’ he said gently. ‘Nothing good will come of your meddling in this affair. Your brother has been cast out of the tribe—owing, I expect, to some dire purpose devised by Mádoc, who, I remind you, will not be unmindful of the dreadful cost to your brother.’
‘Yes, but—’
‘That being the case, do you really wish to hinder, and perhaps ruin, what has been so carefully conceived and constructed?’
I swallowed down the lump in my throat. ‘Then what am I to do?’
‘Nothing,’ Talgobain replied simply.
‘Nothing at all?’
‘Only let the affair run its course. When it is concluded, Conor, being the man of integrity that you believe him to be, will be exonerated and welcomed back into the tribe … but as hero, not as thief.’
‘Forgive me, but it seems that my father may have acted on false information. Certainly, he would wish to know—’
‘Your father,’ our chief interrupted, ‘would not welcome any intrusion just now. Judging from what I hear, he has enforced this exile to appease one whose support he is most desirous of preserving. Any interference, however well intentioned, would be rejected.’
‘With all respect, how can you know this? I have had but little communication with my father for many years, and—’
‘Have you not?’ wondered Talgobain. ‘Morien has not told you?’
‘No,’ I replied uncertainly. ‘What should he have told me?’
‘Morien said that your father has been in regular contact since the very first day of your arrival at Suídaur. He has ever been mindful of your progress and your care.’ Talgobain gazed at me with an expression of mild puzzlement. ‘Has Morien never told you?’
I shook my head. ‘I never knew.’
‘I am sorry for that,’ said our Wise Head. ‘I expect Morien had his reasons for keeping it to himself. Perhaps he thought it would impede your progress.’
He said some more, but I was no longer listening. All I could think was that my father had never forgotten, never given me up, but that I had ever been in his thoughts—even as he and my brothers had been in mine. The wonder of it astounded me.
I asked to be excused, then, and Talgobain released me. I went into the oak grove and to the largest of the ancient trees. There I sank down upon those great, gnarled roots and let the tears fall. All I could think was, I have never been forgotten.
29
Conor lunged with the sword, crouching low and twisting his shoulders to finish with a vicious upward slash. He sprang back, blade upright, ready to parry the blow of his attacker—if the fellow happened to survive the initial thrust. No retaliation followed.
Conor smiled with satisfaction, then took a few steps backward and repeated the manoeuvre—this time with a double lunge and a sweeping sideways stroke. When his opponent did not renew hostilities, Conor lowered the blade, returned to his starting place, and proceeded to rehearse the motion three more times in quick succession. It was a move he had learned from Eamon, improved upon, and mastered to perfection. In all his battles, it had never let him down.
The leaving of the faéry boat—taking Donal to an uncertain future, and Fergal along with him—had freed Conor in a way he had not expected. From now on, he would pursue his own path to the end of his own devising, answering to no one. That alone put him in a better mood than he had enjoyed for a very long time, and he revelled in it—and when combined with the support of Gráinne and Eádoin, it created in Conor a sense of purpose, allowing him to see possibilities he had not seen before.
Whatever you can do…, he thought. I am a warrior. This is what I can do.
When Dáithi arrived at the clóin the next day with the weapons Conor had requested—along with a knife and a good sharp sword—Conor had lost himself in a long, tiring, and ultimately restoring routine of training—a thing he knew so well he no longer had to even think about it. With a sword or spear in his hand, Conor on the practice field faded to nothing and there was only the blade and its shimmering arcs, bright in the summer light.
And now, in the third day of his training, sweat ran in rivulets down his body. He wiped his face with his bare arm, closed his eyes, and breathed in the fresh meadow-sweet air of the druid glade. Weapons practice was always something Conor exulted in; he made it a point to be first on the practice field and last to leave. He liked the feel of spear shaft and sword hilt in his hand, and the solid heft of a shield on his arm. He enjoyed the burning warmth of tired muscles after a lengthy training session. And, after so many days away from the exacting disciplines of the warrior clan, it felt good to lose himself in the steady, studied precision of his craft; he luxuriated in the feeling of honing his skills to battle sharpness once more.
He did miss his own weapons; Bríg left behind when he had been exiled, and Gasta forgotten on the strand. But the weapons Dáithi had brought seemed serviceable enough; the shield, though somewhat smaller than Conor liked, was well made; the sword was a little lighter in heft than Gasta, but it was well balanced and had a keen edge—good enough until he found something better. Likewise, the spear would serve until he found another.
He finished his routine with a final burst of savage thrusts and parries, and then stretched himself in the grass to let the sun dry off the sweat. He had just closed his eyes for a short nap when he felt a shadow pass over his face. Conor opened one eye to see Tuán standing over him.
‘Greetings, Tuán. Sit down and share the sun.’
‘I have brought the provisions you requested,’ said the short druid as he squatted on his haunches next to Conor.
‘The soap and razor, too?’
‘Yes, that and the dried peas, the oats, and salt. There is also a sparán filled with bósaill, and Eádoin said you can take some of the smoked fish with you, too, if you like it. Anything else?’
Conor thanked him and said, ‘If I think of anything, I will tell you.’
‘I see that you are leaving,’ Tuán surmised. ‘May I ask what you intend to do now?’
‘Well, it seems to me that a good blade is always welcome in a warband. I am a warrior without a home. I intend to find one.’
‘Whom, forgive the question, do you expect to take in an outcast?’
‘The Brigantes.’
‘You would go to Lord Brecan.…’
‘Who better?’ Conor then explained the plan he had conceived: he would go to the Brigantes fortress at Aintrén and he would gain entrance—not as a spy, but as an amais, a hired warrior. Once he had been accepted—if he were to be accepted—and taken into Brecan’s warband, he would be in a prime position to learn both the shape and extent of the deceitful king’s ambitions.
As he spoke, a slow smile spread across Tuán’s broad face. ‘I may have misjudged you, Conor mac Ardan.’ He regarded Conor for a moment, then jumped up. ‘But this mad plan of yours is going to need more than dried peas and a pouch full of cured beef if you hope to succeed.’
Tuán ambled off and Conor closed his eyes to doze in the sun. When he
awoke, he went down to the stream to bathe, and then returned to the bothy to find Tuán and two ovates busily grooming Búrach. They had washed the grey stallion and scrubbed his coat until it gleamed, and were now braiding Búrach’s mane and tail, attaching tiny silver bells to the braids. They had brought a fine blue horsecloth and a supple leather bag in which to carry Conor’s provisions.
‘You will spoil him with this pampering,’ warned Conor, but looked on approvingly. ‘He will expect the same from me.’
‘If you hope to impress a king,’ Tuán said, reaching into the bag at his feet to bring out a green apple, ‘it will not hurt to look like a king yourself.’ He offered the apple and the horse devoured it in two bites. ‘As for the rider, so too for his horse.’
While they were talking, Gráinne appeared bearing a neat bundle wrapped in a fine blue-and-white-checked cloak and bound in a new leather belt adorned with silver sun disks. She greeted Conor with a friendly embrace and said, ‘Tuán told me what you intend,’ she said, offering the bundle. ‘A bold plan and one that will succeed the better if you are arrayed like a man to be ranked among the nobility.’
Conor accepted the bundle from her hands, opened it, and withdrew a new siarc of brilliant scarlet, buff-coloured breecs, and new leather brócs adorned with blue spirals sewn over the instep. ‘Banfaíth Gráinne, your generosity puts me at a loss,’ said Conor, shaking out the siarc—it was stitched with a fine needle and embroidered at the hem and neck with silver knotwork; the lace ends were tipped with tiny silver caps. ‘I have never worn anything half so grand.’
‘Put it on,’ she said, beaming her pleasure at his surprise. ‘Let us see the fruit of our handiwork.’
Conor gathered up the clothes and took the bundle into the bothy. He stripped off his old things and dressed in the new, tied up his laces, and tightened the belt around his waist, emerging from the bothy a few moments later feeling every inch the Lord of the Glade.