“That would be a lie,” I said, and saw his complacent smile. “But he could have. He was capable. He chose not to. That means I don’t have to do this.”
“I don’t believe you,” said Mac Dara calmly. “You’re fresh, delectable, untouched. What man would turn down the opportunity of being first to sample you? If he didn’t do it, it was because he couldn’t do it.” He drew me closer once more, and I put both hands against his chest in a futile attempt to fend him off. “You’re afraid of me,” he said, sounding surprised. “No need for that. I know how to please a woman, even an inexperienced one.” He moved his hands to cover mine and his fingers touched the green glass ring. In that instant, his whole body became still. “What’s this?” he said, and there was something in his tone that made my hair stand on end.
“Nothing,” I whispered. A moment later he was wrenching the ring from my finger. He held the little talisman in his long, pale hand. Then he tossed it far away, somewhere out into the darkness among the trees, and it was gone. If I had thought myself afraid before, it was nothing beside the chill that entered my blood now.
“So,” said Mac Dara. “That was why an insignificant human woman stood up to me for so long. That was what gave you the courage to come back and seek out my son. Foolish girl. I don’t know where you picked that trinket up, but it’s led you into a situation far beyond your capabilities. And now you’ve put exactly the weapon I need right into my hand. We’ll skip the dalliance and send you home, I think. This way. I know how much you like the water.”
Don’t panic, don’t panic, babbled a voice inside my head. The ring was your protection, yes. That doesn’t mean you should turn to a jelly now it’s gone. Cathal needs you. Breathe. Use your wits. But against that last spark of reason was the iron-strong grip on my arm, the purposeful tread of my captor’s feet as he dragged me to the riverbank, the terror his last words had awakened in me. No screams now. I could not summon so much as a terrified squeak.
“We’re here,” said the Lord of the Oak, halting with me held before him, both of us facing the river. “See, I’m giving you a chance to get back home safe and sound. Let nobody say the Fair Folk are ungenerous. Just walk across the bridge and you’ll be there.”
The bridge was a single tree trunk, the remains of a forest giant. It spanned the breadth of the flow and lay a handspan under the swift-moving water. In the deceptive light, I would be lucky to advance three steps onto it before I slipped and went under. To cross would be a challenge even to a man with superb physical skills, Johnny for instance.
“Off you go, then,” Mac Dara said, releasing my arms and giving me a little push. “And don’t try to run away; I might be forced to do something you wouldn’t like.”
“I can’t—” I began, and staggered as the little push became a stronger one, and I was forced down the bank and out onto the submerged bridge. “Please,” I begged, stretching out both arms to keep my balance. The water tugged at my skirt; there had been no time to tuck it up before I was forced onto the log. The wood was slippery from long immersion. My boots could not get safe purchase on it. My heart was knocking about in my chest. “Please . . .” I stood there, wobbling, an arm’s length out from the bank.
Mac Dara raised his hand and pointed it in my direction. I did not hear him speak the words of a charm, but fire flared suddenly between me and the safety of the riverbank, scorching, deadly, and I shrank away from it, moving further out along the bridge. My knees buckled; I forced them to hold. Now I couldn’t even see the log bridge under the dark water. One more step and I’d be gone, swept away to oblivion. All for want of a handhold, or a shorter skirt, or a little more courage. Cathal, said a tiny voice inside me. I love you. I’m sorry.
Something hurtled toward me, arrow swift and dark as midnight. I ducked, screwing up my eyes in anticipation of attack. A sudden weight on my shoulder; claws digging in. As I straightened, a dangerous beak came around at eye level, holding a little item that glinted green in the moonlight. The ring. Fiacha had brought me the ring. And as I took it and slipped it on my finger, a familiar, beloved voice from further along the bank said, “Clodagh. Catch.”
He was here. Cathal was here. For one blissful moment I felt relief, then I saw Mac Dara’s hand outstretched toward me, and the flame bursting forth anew from his fingers. Cathal’s cloak passed through the fire on its way to me. My boots slid wildly on the log as I snatched at it. The crow winged up out of harm’s way, and somehow I got the garment around my shoulders, the hood over my head. You’ve got the ring. Cathal’s got his necklace. We’re at the portal. Don’t you dare lose your balance.
“Oh, take off the hood.” Mac Dara’s voice, a lazy drawl now. “Let’s see that flaming hair go up.” Fire on either side of me, swirling, scorching. I shrank back inside the cloak, heart thudding, and the eldritch flames sizzled into the river. “Fool!” spat Mac Dara, the mocking tone quite gone. He was not addressing me. “You would throw away the riches I lay before you for her? She’s nothing. No great beauty even by human standards, and a meddler besides. Persist in this and I’ll be obliged to show you just how disposable your little friend is.”
“Clodagh,” Cathal said. He was standing not far along the bank, looking perfectly calm. He had his eyes fixed on his father and did not spare me a glance. “Trust me.”
“Oh, that’s right,” said Mac Dara. “Just as she trusted you to hold onto her the last time she fell into deep water. The little tricks you’ve picked up since you came here are insignificant, Cathal. Against my magic they are as candle flames to a great conflagration. I had hoped my son might be made in my mold; lover, warrior, leader without peer. How long must I wait to see that promise fulfilled?”
“You will wait forever.” Cathal stood relaxed and still, his hands loose by his sides, his gaze locked with his father’s. “My future lies in the human world. It lies with Clodagh. I want nothing of what you offer. I want neither riches nor power, and I have no interest at all in the craft of magic.”
“No?” Mac Dara’s brows went up. “I find that hard to believe. Perhaps you are frustrated that your progress is so slow, but you can learn, Cathal. You just deflected those flames, didn’t you?” Was I wrong, or had a slight tinge of uncertainty entered his voice? “As for riches and power, there is no man in the world who does not desire those.”
The current pulled like a wild horse. Surely the water was deeper, almost up to my knees now, though I had advanced no further along the submerged bridge. My back hurt. My legs hurt. My head felt dizzy. You’ve got the ring, you’ve got the ring, I chanted silently to myself. Be brave. Be strong. My body was seized by convulsive shivers—cold or fear, perhaps both. Despite this, I became aware of activity above me. In the trees on either bank and in the air over the bridge there was a continuous, rustling movement, like birds’ wings or the passing of a breeze through leaves. It seemed imperative not to look up. I recognized purpose in Cathal’s stance, intent in the way he was holding his father’s gaze. I held as still as I could, willing my legs to support me just a little longer.
A surge smacked into me. Not only was the river rising, it was changing. Its smooth flow had become turbulent, its surface bouncing and splashing and spraying as if stirred by a mischievous hand. Not content with burning me alive, Mac Dara was going to drown me at the same time. The water rose to my hips, to my waist, and I could stand against it no longer. As I toppled, gasping in terror, lines dropped down on either side of me, strong, green ropes spanning the river at waist height. I grabbed first one, then the other, scrabbling to get my feet secure on the log bridge. No time to question. I clung, sucking in a shuddering breath, and felt solid wood beneath my boots. He can’t kill me if I’ve got the ring, I reminded myself as trees and water and riverbank swam around me in a haze. Waves were breaking on either shore with sounds like blows; the river was as choppy as if it were coursing over jagged rocks. Spray danced around me as it grew deeper still, its embrace chilly and urgent. I shut my eyes, clutched th
e ropes and prayed.
Cathal’s voice rang out, clear and cool. “This is over, Father.” As I opened my eyes, I saw him raise his hand and gesture toward the water. It was a graceful, fluid movement, something akin to the dance of fronds in the current.
The river calmed. The eerie turbulence subsided; the surface became as still and glassy as a forest pond. I stood swaying on the log bridge, my chest heaving, my gown sodden, as the water level went down until it was no deeper than my ankles. The place grew quiet save for that odd rustling overhead. On the bank Mac Dara stood like a statue in pale marble, staring with disbelief at his son, who now looked up toward the trees on the far side of the river.
I followed Cathal’s gaze. There were figures swarming in the ancient willow, running out along the branches, as nimble as squirrels. They passed and passed again, working with fingers like twigs, pale and slender. And on the near side, others performed the same work, weaving, making, throwing out ropes of vine and creeper to span the waterway from side to side. So quickly they wove! Their craft was a thing of deep magic, conjured from earth and air, and my breath caught in my throat as I watched them. In the twinkling of an eye they had a third rope across the river, and a fourth. With those supports, and with the water low and calm, a confident man or woman might reasonably attempt a crossing even by night.
I saw Mac Dara raise his arm, then lower it again as Cathal said, “No, Father. Till waves are calmed by human hand, remember? Thanks to my mother, that brave woman whom you so wronged, I can claim human blood. And thanks to her I have a certain knack with water. You are too late. The charm is undone.”
Cathal stepped down to the riverbank. As he moved, a small figure cloaked in gray emerged from the forest higher up. One hand supported the silver dog mask that covered its face; in the other it was carrying Cathal’s pack. Mac Dara did not stir as he watched the creature scramble down to stand beside his son at the water’s edge. On the opposite bank, I could see the hedgehog-dwarf anchoring a rope, and the being that looked a little like a rock passing something up to the folk in the trees, and the owl-faced creature perched on a low branch, apparently giving instructions. My breath caught in my throat. Till ancient foes in friendship stand. Cathal had done it. He had won their trust, and he had broken the spell.
“Thank you,” he said to Dog Mask, taking the pack. “Please convey my deepest gratitude to all your kind. Without your aid, and without theirs,” glancing up at the folk of the trees, who were finished their work of making and now clung half-concealed in the foliage, bright eyes observant, “I could not have made my way out from this place. I owe you a debt.”
Mac Dara was no longer trying to hurl bolts of fire. He stood preternaturally still, and his face was as white as chalk. His eyes were desolate. He looked as my mother had looked when we told her Finbar had been stolen. I understood, in that moment, that love is not always simple; that choices can be right and wrong at the same time. Even now, with hope springing high in my breast and home so close I could almost smell it, I knew that look of desolation would remain forever in my mind. He opened his mouth to speak, and I cringed, expecting a curse, a charm, some final malign attempt at sorcery. But all he said was, “I was wrong.” Not an apology; he was incapable of that. An acknowledgment that his son was indeed everything the father had hoped he might be, and that the moment of realization had come too late. The spell was undone. There was no remaking it.
“Goodbye, Father,” Cathal said. “I’ll be going home now. You underestimated me. In all the long time you have held me here, I have spent every single moment preparing to leave. I have learned new skills; I have put into practice those I acquired in the human world, such as the ability to make alliances and to judge who can be trusted. And I have begun to learn the lore and craft of my mother’s line. There was one thing you failed to understand. For me, hope never died.” He looked up into the trees. “I won’t forget how you helped me,” he said, and the strange folk there bowed their heads to him as if he were a king.
He stepped onto the bridge, turning his back on the Otherworld. Our hands on the guide ropes, we walked across, and the water was so tranquil around our feet that I could see little glinting fish beneath the surface, illuminated by the moonlight.
“Farewell,” came the voice of Dog Mask, but when I glanced back I could not see the little creature on the bank, only Mac Dara, black cloak, white face, lips set grim as death, and above him in the willows, the forms of the tree folk with their curious draping garments of leaves and cobweb and moss, their strange faces and drifting hair. Just for a moment I saw her, high in the branches—a creature very like myself in build, a small, graceful woman whose eyes were big and bright in the dim glow of the invisible moon, and whose body seemed made from all the loveliest fragments the forest could offer. In a sling on her back she bore a child wrapped in a woolen shawl, and as she passed she lifted a hand to me in greeting and farewell. Then she swung up into the canopy and was lost to sight.
In other circumstances I would have found the crossing terrifying, for the submerged bridge was still slippery and the vine ropes provided only flimsy support. Now I walked over with my head high and my back straight, like a warrior after a long and well-fought battle. Just before we reached the other side, I remembered something.
“Right foot first, Cathal,” I said.
“Of course,” came his voice from behind me, shaky now, whether with laughter or exhaustion I could not tell.
The bridge did not quite span the river. It ended at the old willow, and we clambered down, not onto dry land but into knee-deep water floored with round stones that shifted under our feet. When I slipped and almost fell, Cathal caught me. When he teetered, on the verge of losing his balance, I steadied him. As we stepped out onto the shore, right foot first, the forest before us sprang into light, dawn rays slanting sudden and golden through spring foliage, birds caroling overhead, flowers raising tiny, bright faces from the dappled shade beneath the oaks. My cheeks were suddenly wet with tears, and when I looked up at Cathal, he too was weeping.
“We’re home,” I said. “We’re finally home.”
He wrapped his arms around me, holding me close. “You know,” he whispered, “I said once I’d tell you how it felt to cry with you watching. It feels good. It feels better than I could ever have imagined.” A pause. “Clodagh, did you really promise my father your firstborn child?”
“Not exactly,” I said shakily. “I worded it carefully. If I conceived a child last night after lying with you, and if it was a boy, I would give him up when he was seven. Your father agreed, on the proviso that if you proved incapable of the act—that was what he expected—I would lie with him the next night and give up any son resulting from that union. Don’t look like that, Cathal. If I hadn’t had some kind of plan, Mac Dara wouldn’t even have let me see you. He certainly wouldn’t have allowed us time alone together.”
Cathal gave a low whistle. “What possessed you to take such a risk? You’ve become worse than I am. And what’s all this about being incapable? Did you believe my time in that place would have unmanned me?”
“Of course not,” I said. “But I thought you’d be able to show self-restraint. Knowing the story of your mother, I imagined it would be important to you that we waited until we were married before sharing a bed. All along I had faith that if I could reach you you’d be able to get us safely out.”
“By all the gods,” he observed mildly. “In view of our past history, your belief in me is astonishing.”
“I believe in the man you are,” I said, realizing how utterly exhausted I was and how many aches and pains there were in my body, yet knowing I was happier than I had ever been in my whole life. “I love that man, with all his tricks and oddities.”
“It’s actually not true, you know,” he observed.
“What isn’t?”
“That I wouldn’t want to lie with you before we were married. Last night was a close shave, closer perhaps than you realized.”
“But you’re right, all the same,” he said. “It would be correct to wait. That may not be what we want, but it’s what we should do. We still have some challenges ahead of us, Clodagh. Your father . . .”
“He’ll come around to the idea.”
“I am the kind of man who would never be on his list of prospective husbands for his precious daughters.”
“Shh,” I said, halting and standing on tiptoe to kiss his cheek. “You’re the son of a prince, aren’t you? You’re eminently well qualified. We’d best keep walking. I’m not sure how much longer my legs will go on supporting me.”
Just once I looked back, but if the Otherworld had existed on the far side of that river not so long ago, there was no sign of it now. On either side of the waterway the forest was bright with springtime; on either side the morning sun shone, the flowers bloomed and the trees stood proud in their new season’s raiment. Somewhere high above us a bird was singing as if its heart might burst with joy.
“Nobody to meet us this time,” I murmured as we climbed a rise and looked around us for clues as to exactly where we were. “And it looks as if Fiacha’s gone straight home.” We reached a spot where a fallen tree lay across the path, and without saying a word we sat down close together with our backs against it. After all, there did not seem to be such urgency to walk on, to get to Sevenwaters, to explain ourselves. Right now, all we wanted was to be here, the two of us together, away from the rest of the world. The immensity of what had happened was beginning to sink in. It set a silence between us. I felt the tension in Cathal’s body, and when I glanced at his face I saw that there was a struggle going on inside him.
“It was a long time, wasn’t it?” I said eventually. “And it will probably take a long time to come to terms with it. Seven turnings of the moon, that was what your father said. But maybe it was more. I saw Becan. He’d grown a lot.”
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