My last thought before I slept was of Cathal. I pictured him as he had been on the day I met him, his thin lips twisted in a mocking smile, his dark eyes dancing with mischief. From the first he had been an enigma, an irritating, intriguing puzzle of a man, full of a restless intelligence. It came to me that if anyone knew how to outwit the trickster, it might be the trickster’s son, if only he did not let despair overwhelm him first.
The dawn woke me, seeping under my eyelids in a glorious wash of pale gold. Finbar was still fast asleep, a warm, damp bundle against my side. The blanket was over us and my pack was under my head. But I was no longer in the safe place within the hedge of thorn. The sunlight told me so before I sat up and saw that instead of the massive dark trees of the Otherworld a grove of graceful birches stood around the small expanse of open ground where the two of us were lying. Real sunlight; above me the sky was turning to a delicate duck-egg blue. There was a freshness in the air, an openness that made my heart lift. All around us, birds chorused their greetings to the rising sun. We were out. We were back.
I had dreamed of a long walk through narrow underground ways, secret ways, with the Old Ones padding before and behind with their torches, guiding me as I carried Finbar against my chest in the sling. That path had been nothing like the one Cathal and I had followed to enter the realm of the Tuatha De, and I had sensed it was an entry known only to these smaller folk. I had dreamed that I walked all night. And now, on waking, I realized that perhaps it had been so. I felt refreshed, as if I had slept well, but my legs were aching. I stretched, looking around me again. The area looked familiar. There was a marker stone not far up the hill with ogham signs on it. Beyond it, oaks grew. I was close to the nemetons, the well-concealed habitation of the Sevenwaters druids. It was a fair walk back home, but not so far that I could not manage it.
The earthenware jug had been set not far away, with a neatly folded cloth covering it—the Old Ones had kept their promise of providing milk for Finbar. I thought my dream had perhaps included a pause in a little shadowy cavern where I had changed my baby brother’s wrappings and fed him. I’d have to do both again before I moved on.
Which way? Head straight for home, so I could put Finbar in my mother’s arms myself? How could I do so, then announce that I must leave again immediately? I could imagine how Father would react to the idea of my heading back to the Otherworld to confront a dark prince of the Tuatha De. He would consider it his responsibility to stop me; to make sure I came to my senses and stayed safe. I could not go home. But Finbar must, straightaway.
So, go to the nemetons. Seek help from the druids. How would they react when I appeared? Conor was a wise and open-minded man, but I was sure he would share my father’s opinion on this matter. I did not know Ciarán very well. He was the same kind of half-breed as Cathal. Whether that would influence him to help me or hinder me, I had no idea. Perhaps I could slip into the nemetons, leave Finbar somewhere safe, then disappear into the forest. No, that would be irresponsible. Even if I did not love him as I had Becan, I owed it to my brother to deliver him safely into the arms of his family.
As if reading my mind, Finbar awoke, requesting his breakfast. He was loud. If we were as close to the druids’ home as I thought, his crying would soon arouse curiosity. I fed him, and as he sucked and swallowed I cast my eyes all around the area, looking for the chink or crack or cave through which I must have emerged last night more asleep than awake. I couldn’t see anything. No stream or pond, no large cluster of rocks, nothing that might conceal an opening. Only the gentle birch-clad slope. And now, walking down it toward me, an old woman clad in an oddly shifting garment that might have been cloak, gown or robe. She used her staff for support, but she moved with an energy and purpose that belied her years.
I should not have been surprised. After the events of the last few days, I should have been ready for anything. “I thought you’d gone away,” I said as Willow came over and seated herself on a flat-topped stone beside me.
“Where’s your young man?” the crone asked, without any preliminaries. “You got the little one, I see. You did well. Was the price higher than you expected, Clodagh?”
I gaped at her. “How can you know so much?” I challenged. “Those stories you told, they were all about Cathal and the journey the two of us had to take. I know the traveling people have unusual gifts, but what you did went beyond that. It was uncanny.” Even as I spoke, my mind was filling with questions I needed to ask her, things I must find out in case they might help me rescue Cathal. “My young man, as you call him, is trapped in the Otherworld. His father did it; it was just like that story about Albha and her daughter: Set your foot inside the door, you’ll be mine forever more. There must be some way to get around that charm, but Mac Dara is so powerful, and I have no magic at all . . .” I stumbled to a halt, seeing that she was only waiting for the flood of words to abate. “Please will you help me?” I asked, struggling for calm.
Willow smiled, a map of wrinkles spreading across her face. “I don’t cast spells,” she said. “I don’t fight battles. I’m a storyteller.”
Brighid save me, this was going to be like Dog Mask all over again, a blank wall in terms of getting any useful advice. I bowed my head so she would not see the frustration on my face, and met the tranquil blue gaze of Finbar, lying on my lap, drowsy and content now his belly was full of milk. The annoyance abated as swiftly as it had arisen, and the right question came to me. “Will you tell me a story?” I asked. “I missed the end of that tale you told about Albha and her half-human daughter. I’d like to know what happened.”
“If you weren’t wise enough to listen the first time,” Willow said, laying her staff down beside her, “that’s not my fault. I’ve another tale in mind for this morning, and I’ll keep it brief. You’ll be wanting your breakfast.”
“Very well,” I said, for if I had learned anything about her, it was that there would be a lesson of some relevance in any story she told. I just hoped I could understand it.
“There was once a lovely young woman named Firinne, the daughter of a fisherman she was, and lived at a place called Whiteshore on the coast of Connacht. I see you’re bursting to interrupt already, Clodagh, but if you’re wise you’ll leave an old woman to tell the tale straight through. You don’t need me to remind you that time is short.
“Now, Firinne had the misfortune to lose both her parents before she was fifteen years old, but she was adept at mending the nets, and between one piece of work and the next, and one kind neighbor and another, she managed to make ends meet. There were plenty of suitors in the village where she lived, but none that took her fancy. A few years passed, and a man came a-knocking on the door, a very fine fellow in a big long cloak. So fine he was, in fact, that despite all her better instincts Firinne fell under his spell, for no woman could resist such strong shoulders, such long legs and such mischievous dark eyes. The stranger knew how to woo a woman, and although Firinne held him off for some time, eventually she succumbed to his undeniable charms. And then, to her surprise but not, I expect, to yours, the fellow was off without a parting kiss, and she was on her own with a babe in her belly and not much of a livelihood to support it with.
“Now I should perhaps have mentioned a certain ring, a plain green one much the same as that glass circle I see on your finger, Clodagh. That ring had been given to Firinne by her father, and he had made it clear to her that the simple object, passed down from generation to generation, contained protective powers of extraordinary strength. Her father had bid her wear it always, for it would get her out of all kinds of trouble, especially the kind a foolish woman might fall into should she step inside a mushroom circle or entertain the wrong kind of handsome stranger. Unfortunate, then, that Firinne had been doing her washing the day the fellow knocked on her door and had taken the ring off and set it away in a wee box for safekeeping. And once she’d clapped eyes on the visitor, she forgot about the ring until after the dark stranger had left her his unwelcome gif
t and departed. Now, with his child growing fast inside her, she knew how foolish she had been. For her lineage had an unusual thread in it, a thread that gave her certain instincts beyond those of ordinary humankind. She’d been duped, fooled. She’d thought that long, dark, wicked fellow loved her; she’d believed his tender and passionate words. Now, in the cold light of the time after, she realized what he was and what he really wanted.
“For she knew, as we know, Clodagh, that the Fair Folk are not good breeders. Their best chance of a child is to couple with a likely man or woman of our world. Firinne chose the dark stranger because she could not resist his charms. He chose her because she was an ideal mother for his child—she was exceptionally lovely by human standards; she was healthy; she was a simple woman from a fishing village and would be unlikely to put up a fight when he came back for his son later, should he be fortunate enough to get a boy from this coupling. Or so he thought. He never saw the ring. He never knew that somewhere in her ancestry, long, long ago, there had been one of the Sea People. That was Mac Dara’s great error.
“Firinne knew her stories. She knew she had seven years, no more, no less; seven years to spin a web of protection around her child so that he could not be reclaimed by his father and taken to the Otherworld forever. For at seven years old, a boy is old enough to leave his mother’s skirts and her influence and to begin learning his father’s trade. That trade might be carpentry or fishing or scribing. If the father happens to be a prince of the Otherworld, then from seven years old the boy’s future lies in that shadowy realm. Of one thing Firinne was quite certain. Mac Dara would be back. Not for her; for her son.”
“You’re telling me Cathal’s mother didn’t waste away for love of Mac Dara?” I asked, shocked that this tale had been turned upside down. “She didn’t kill herself out of hopeless longing? How can you know that?”
Willow smiled again. “You seem to find it astonishing that my memory has anything in it at all. I hope that when you are old, Clodagh, your grandchildren do not expect you to spend all day mumbling by the fire. I do recall telling you, when we first met, that I’m Dan Walker’s aunt. But, just like everyone else, I did have two parents. My father wasn’t one of the traveling people. He was a handsome stranger my mother met out in the woods one night, a fellow who, from her description, looked uncommonly like that young man of yours. My mother was a bit of a wild girl. Well, she got more than she bargained for from her midnight tryst, just as Firinne did. Fortunately, nobody came for me on my seventh birthday. Mac Dara’s only interested in sons, not daughters.”
My head was spinning. “But . . .”
“But I’m an old woman?” She chuckled. “How old do you think he is? That man’s been fathering girls since the time of ancient legend. Why do you think he places such value on the one son he’s managed to get? It’s taken him a long, long time. Long enough to break his heart, though it’s commonly believed that he doesn’t possess one. Your Cathal has older sisters in every corner of Erin, Clodagh. Of course, not all of them make use of the unusual talents their parentage has bestowed; most have no idea what they are. Now, do you want the rest of the story or don’t you? We haven’t long. You need to get that baby home.”
I glanced at Finbar again; he seemed to have fallen asleep. “Yes, please,” I said, still reeling from what she had just told me. This wrinkled crone was a daughter of Mac Dara? No wonder her tales revealed uncanny truths.
“Now that little boy was very special to his father, for obvious reasons. But that didn’t make him any less precious to Firinne, and she vowed to herself that she would do everything in her power to stop Mac Dara from taking him. She swore she would not let his father turn the boy into another like himself, a man with no awareness of right and wrong. So she took the green glass ring, the gift of her unusual ancestor, and she strung it on a cord and tied it around her baby’s neck. Then she went up to the stronghold of Lord Murtagh, who ruled in those parts wisely and well, and offered herself as wet nurse to his own newborn son. And when she offered, she told Lord Murtagh something of her story, but not everything, and persuaded him to take little Cathal into his household and keep him safe while he grew to be a man. She made his lordship promise to teach her son that he must never, ever go abroad without the green glass ring around his neck or carried somewhere in his clothing. Lord Murtagh was an exceptional chieftain and an exceptional man; still is. He promised to do as she asked, and offered Firinne a permanent place in his household, but she said no. Better, she thought, if she had as little to do with her son as possible, for it would be through her that his father would try to track him down.”
“That must have hurt her terribly,” I said, remembering how it had felt to give up Becan, who had only been mine for a few days. “Cathal thought his mother didn’t care about him.”
“It was an act of selfless love,” said Willow, nodding. “She knew she should go away, leave Whiteshore forever, to put Mac Dara right off the scent. But she couldn’t bring herself to do that. She lived for the little glimpses of her boy that she got from time to time: fishing in the river with his friend, riding through the village with Lord Murtagh and his family, and sometimes walking all by himself along the shore, staring at the waves. She tried to ensure he didn’t see her watching. She thought it best if he forgot her. His new family was kind to him; she could see they treated him as they did their own sons, almost. Sometimes the best place to hide something is right under the seeker’s nose, Firinne thought. When Mac Dara passed that way again, she would tell him his son was dead.
“The time came. Cathal was seven years old and, right on time, Mac Dara came a-tapping on Firinne’s door again. It wasn’t fun and games he wanted this time, but his own child to carry off to the Otherworld. And when Firinne told him Cathal had fallen sick and died two years earlier, the Lord of the Oak didn’t believe her. He pressed her; she held fast to her lie. He used a charm to try to force the truth out of her. She fled out the back way, down to the riverbank. Exactly what occurred there I cannot tell you, for not a living soul was witness to it. I do not believe Firinne killed herself. Her ancestors were the Sea People. She would not have chosen a death by drowning. Nor do I think Mac Dara murdered her, for with her would die a vital clue to his son’s whereabouts. In any event, she carried the truth to her watery grave. I believe they struggled, and that somehow in that struggle she was killed. It was a few days before the boys found her body in the water; time enough for any telltale marks to be gone.”
It was almost too much to take in. “This changes everything,” I said, wishing with all my heart that I could tell Cathal this news right now, for if this was a true story, it gave him back the most precious gift of all: his mother’s love. “If only I had known this before we crossed over into the Otherworld. If only someone could tell him. He’ll be so lonely and lost, without any love at all. What if he sinks into despair?”
Willow raised her brows. “You think him so weak?” she asked with a half-smile.
“Weak?” I was outraged. “Of course not! I just wish someone could tell him the truth about what happened to his mother. And about the powers he might have inherited from her. If she stood up to Mac Dara, if she kept her secret until death, she must have been a brave woman.”
“She was,” said Willow. “Cathal is her son; he, too, will be brave. But he does need you, Clodagh, so you’d best listen while I tell the rest of the story quickly. It took another five years for Mac Dara to work out where his son was. That was highly unusual. Anyone would have expected a powerful prince of the Tuatha De to discover the truth within one season at the most. Why so long? Well, it wasn’t the green glass ring. That was a charm to ensure the boy’s physical safety, not to keep him hidden. No, the reason Mac Dara found it hard to track him down was the boy’s heritage: Tuatha De on the father’s side, both human and Sea People on the mother’s. Young Cathal was an explosive bundle of eldritch power wrapped up in the body of a sad, confused, clever little boy. Not long after his mother’s
death, he began to sense that someone was making attempts to draw him away from safety. He took his own steps to deal with it, hardly understanding what he did. He made up the sort of luck charms all children invent. Because Cathal was who he was, his wards worked. Sometimes he looked into the water and saw things that couldn’t really be there. He told nobody, though from time to time he made use of what the visions revealed. He hated being different. But you know that part.”
I nodded, though it was not the image of young Cathal scrying that was in my mind, but that of Firinne watching her little son as he walked alone on the beach at Whiteshore. I could feel the ache in my own heart. “So he managed to evade them for quite some years, and then when Aidan went off to Inis Eala, Cathal seized the opportunity to go with him,” I said. “And then he came to Sevenwaters, and ended up sacrificing his freedom because of me.”
“You are somewhat hard on yourself,” Willow said. “Cathal might say that to have won your heart made up for everything else. He did give you the ring. A gift of selfless love.”
There was a pause; she was waiting for me to say something. “The ring kept me safe until I could get out,” I said slowly. “If I made a talisman for Cathal, something that represented selfless love, would that provide him with protection against his father?”
“Perhaps. It would not get him out of the Otherworld. But it might help. He’ll need help.”
I was still framing my next question when Willow took up her staff, rose to her feet and made to leave.
“Oh, please wait!” I begged her. “Tell me if there is some way that charm can be broken, the one about setting a foot inside the door—how can I possibly counteract something so powerful?”
“I told you, I’m a storyteller,” said the old woman, not unkindly. “You have what you need already. And now I must be on my way. I wish you well on your journey, Clodagh.” She cupped a hand to her ear. “Who’s that I hear? Unusually busy in this part of the forest, isn’t it, so early in the morning?” As she walked off down the hillside, I heard voices; someone was coming over the hill from the other side. I peered uphill under the birches and discerned two figures approaching swiftly. A slight, dark-haired girl in a blue gown: Sibeal. A tall, redheaded man in a hooded robe: Ciarán. By the time I turned back, Willow had vanished.
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