by Jules Watson
Chapter 41
The band of Finbar’s warriors who had cordoned off the port were hidden in the woods. They recognized Fergal immediately and signalled him to halt. In twos and threes they then crept in among the narrow streets, and seized the small group of traitors before they could defend themselves.
Maeve and Oran, holed up awaiting the dawn, were run down and captured as they tried to escape across the winding channels of silt at the river mouth, dragging the prince Garvan with them. By the time Cahir arrived the port was already his.
Dusk was falling, the sunset gilding the water. The headland that shielded the bay from the sea was already steeped in shadow. Cahir ordered the Dalriadan traders, fishermen and farmers, and all women and children evacuated to Dunadd. Any remnant Roman traders were put under guard, as were Cahir’s wife and son, whom he could not yet face. Nearby he quartered Oran. The so-called priest – in reality an assassin provided by King Eldon – killed three of Cahir’s men with the dagger under his cloak before being brought down by weight of numbers and impaled on a spear.
Cahir tried to put them all out of his mind, his rage at Maeve and his pain over his son held in check by cold thought until this rebellion was dealt with and he could release it.
On the morning of Beltaine, the sun rose over a choppy sea, whipped up by a southerly wind. Cahir stood helmeted and armed, his wolf-fur cloak thrown aside to reveal his polished mailshirt and long sword at his waist. He raised his head and sniffed the wind: this would fill the sails of any craft heading north.
The sheltered bay was cut off from sightlines to the ocean, which was why Cahir kept beacons ready on the cliffs to sound an alarm for raiders. This morning the raiders would come, but there would be no alarm.
When the sun was a handspan over the eastern hills, a man on horseback came galloping down the track from the southern cliffs. It was Donal, puffing from the effort, his cheeks so sun-burned they merged into his ruddy moustache. ‘The ships have been sighted,’ he reported to Cahir.
‘Well?’ The king turned to the man curled on the sand at his feet, his arms bound behind him.
The fisherman squirmed. ‘There will be two ships, with double masts and red-painted sails.’ He bit his lips, shuddering too hard to continue.
Finbar cursed and kicked his rump. ‘Come on, out with it!’
The man scooted away from Finbar’s boot. Cahir did not move. This traitor had capitulated as soon as he lined him up with his companions the day before, screeching that he had been forced – he didn’t want to go against his king – that he would tell them everything in exchange for his life.
Now Cahir glanced at Donal, who nodded. ‘Two masts, there are, my lord. Red sails.’
‘Good,’ Cahir said encouragingly to the traitor. ‘You are pleasing me. Go on.’
The man shot a pleading look at his king. ‘That is how we were to know them. But when they land, four men will come off first, just four. The others will pour ashore only at the signal.’
Cahir squinted at the sunlight now shining on the mudflats at the rivermouth, then turned to his men. Ruarc, Mellan and Ardal were back together again after the latter two brought fifty men apiece in from the outlying duns, giving him a force of three hundred in all. ‘Here is what we do. I want Eldon’s men thinking all is well when they land, so we need to draw them off the ships. Set a score of men without armour or weapons to pose as fishermen and carters on the pier and nearby streets. The rest are to hide anywhere they can.’ He turned to his younger warriors. ‘Pots of coals are also to be set up behind the first line of houses, and good archers alongside. If they don’t come off at once, we will fire the ships.’
As he turned away, the fisherman whined again. ‘And me, my lord? You must spare my life, as you said? I have told you everything, everything!’
Cahir paused and gazed down at him coldly. ‘You offered this information in exchange for your life. I never promised any such thing.’ Without a backwards glance he strode away, ignoring the wail of defeat and terror that rose like a gull’s cry above the waves.
*
Under full sail, two sleek ships with painted eyes on their bows glided into the bay of Dunadd.
Ahead, all seemed normal to the commander of the Carvetii forces, a Roman centurion with many years of service to the Dux under his belt. He squinted at the shore. Cookfires hazed the thatch roofs of the port. Men went about their business, unloading fish from curraghs, heaving sacks into carts. Log-boats trailed nets as they criss-crossed the river mouth. Washing flapped on ropes between the houses.
The furthest house to the right was set on a spur of rock, and flew a long, tattered banner of red wool from its roof. So the signal was in place; all was well. The Dalriadans shuffling about had no inkling that their lives were about to change.
The commander slid down the ladder into the hold, where the Carvetii warriors crouched in rows. ‘Keep your swords hidden. Wait until you hear my whistle, then get ashore as swiftly as you can. It is imperative we take them by surprise.’
A greater number and size of ships would have alerted the Dalriadans that these were no traders, so they could only bring eighty men in total. King Eldon had informed him there was only a small guard in the port itself, however, and the rebels would have dealt with them by now.
Tucked around the corner of a storehouse, his helmet pulled over his brow, Cahir watched the ships tie up on the pier.
‘I assume you won’t charge out at the front,’ Donal muttered in his ear.
‘Why, Donal,’ he murmured, ‘you would deny me my blood-right? This is treason against the person of the king, as well as the tribe.’
Donal snorted. ‘We haven’t come so far for you to be cut down by a lucky stroke from some Carvetii pig.’ He paused. ‘Anger makes one hasty.’
‘Anger makes one swift,’ Cahir countered.
‘I think the lady would prefer it if you didn’t risk your blood on this day.’
Cahir glanced at Donal from the corner of his eye, amused in that heart-pounding, light-headed way that comes with the rush of energy just before a fight.
He turned back to his vigil. For too long his hands had been bound like those of the prisoners. He had been forced to hold his head high, while shamed inside. Now, at last, it could come to this simple thing: his sword against another’s, muscle sparring with muscle. There was no substitute for the pleasure gained when a man’s awareness could narrow to that pinprick of focus – kill or be killed. So simple and pure. ‘I will run as fast as my legs carry me. If you are too old and can’t keep up, that’s your problem.’
Another snort, but then men were disembarking from the first ship. One. Two. Cahir’s palm was slippery around his hilt, so he wiped it down his leg, taking care not to show the blade to the sun. Three. The war-cry rose in his throat, held back like a hound on a leash.
Four.
Four men who, to his practised eye, possessed the lop-sided body strength of fighters, not traders or sailors. Time slowed, as everything happened at once.
As he heard their commander’s whistle, Cahir put back his head and released his voice. ‘The Boar!’ he bellowed, just as Eremon had cried of old. The shout was taken up by men all over the port, rising in a wave that broke over the shore. Donal shot out from the cover of the shed, his sword whirling above his head. Warriors poured out of every side street, cloaks thrown aside to reveal their blades.
As Cahir sprinted for the pier, his legs pumping, arrows of fire began arcing over his head. Some sizzled into the sea, some set alight the barrels and posts on the pier, as black smoke crawled into the sky. But many found their mark, and in moments both ships were alight, the masts spears of fire, the ropes throwing flames across the decks.
The men from the ships were white-faced with fear, shouting over the tumult to their comrades to throw off the ropes and row. But there was no chance, as those onboard were driven out by the smoke and flames, men flinging themselves into the shallow water and stumbling to shore.
Cahir struck and twisted, his blade passing through flesh and into ribs, buried in the space between vertebrae. He caught a slash across the forearm but savoured the burn, for the man was dead in the next stroke and he was spinning to face another.
There was only the chance for two more kills, for the Carvetii were outnumbered, having expected to face a village of farmers and women, not warriors. To Cahir’s right, Donal, Finbar and Fergal were mopping up a knot of men who had run down the beach, moving as one after long years of fighting side by side. To his left, Ruarc was a golden god, taking on two men and laughing, while Mellan and Ardal danced around him with their own opponents.
The fire was still crackling on the ships when it was all over.
The messengers rode back to Dunadd after sunrise. Minna went to Orla and Finola and woke them, her heart heavy.
Carefully, she explained what had happened to their mother; that she would be leaving to go back to Luguvalium now. Then she left a pause. She knew the girls had not been close to Maeve, that they felt desperately unloved. But she was their mother.
They stared up at Minna with round eyes. ‘I don’t want to leave the hills and our ponies,’ Orla announced at last, brushing hair angrily from her brow. ‘Or Lia, because the Romans don’t like dogs much.’
Minna regarded her gravely, holding Finola’s hand. ‘I know you don’t want to leave, and you do not have to. You are princesses of Dalriada, and your place is with your father.’ They had to make their way through this in their own way.
Orla’s lip quavered, and she babbled on as if she did not hear Minna, her eyes glazed. ‘And I could not leave Davin, or his harp, could I? Or the songs, or the river, or the woods.’
Minna shook her head, as Finola crawled silently into her lap and curled up there like the puppy, trembling.
The sun was high, and the Dalriadan traitors were lined up on the beach on their knees, Cahir pacing before them. These were the ones who had been taken at Dunadd’s gates.
To one side stood Maeve, her hair tumbled from its curls, her plump face streaked with tears and saliva. A bruise shadowed her jaw; Cahir did not much care who had inflicted it. Oran’s neat clothes were rumpled and stained with blood where he had caught a sword-nick on his wrist during capture. His carefully bland face was now twisted with contempt.
Cahir’s mind was buzzing, but he needed to keep a grip on his emotions. If he executed Maeve and Oran, Eldon would attack with a greater force and begin a blood-feud. Cahir could not afford to have the Carvetii king anywhere near his lands while he mustered his army for the Roman attack.
He stopped. Maeve’s eyes bored into him with fanatic hatred, and he itched to strike her down. But that was the impulse of an angry young man, not a king. A king kept a cool head. And Garvan was still under guard. Cahir would have no chance to heal that rift if the boy’s mother died by his father’s hand. He knew he had no choice but to banish Maeve to Luguvalium.
Eldon had broken oath with him, and he felt very certain the Carvetii king would lick his wounds for some time, at least long enough to give Cahir a breathing space. And before Eldon could decide his next move, the combined forces of Alban and Erin Dalriada and the Attacotti chiefs – thousands of men – would arrive at his gates and that problem would be solved.
Cahir stood before his wife. In an icy tone he said, ‘Lady, you are a traitor to your king and to your people. But you will be pleased to know that, despite your life being forfeit, I have decided to spare it.’
Maeve’s face clenched, and she tried to spit at him. ‘Traitor?’ she screeched. ‘They are not my people and you are not my king! And despite this I still tried to do the best for them, to bring you into the real world but you would not heed me—’
‘Lady!’ Oran interrupted. Cahir saw the relief in his eyes when he heard they would live. He really thought Cahir would kill them – because that is what he would have done, in a heartbeat. ‘There is nothing to say now.’
‘No, there is not,’ Cahir agreed, slowly exhaling. ‘These are your charges: threatening a rightful king with death; bringing an enemy force onto Dalriadan lands; and supporting the Romans, would-be conquerors of our people. As you so succinctly put it, Maeve, you are not of us, of Dalriada. With your contempt you made that plain from the day you arrived. So now, Dalriada expels you.’
The word had a satisfying ring to it, Cahir thought, as his men smothered smiles and Maeve spluttered. Before she could speak again, Oran nudged her into silence. She shifted her glare to him.
Cahir wasn’t finished. ‘You came to me with a payment, a dowry, but you have forfeited this now by your treachery, so your own return to your father is the mark of our divorce.’ That tasted well in his mouth. He nodded at Ruarc, Mellan and Ardal. ‘Keep them under guard and ready a boat.’ He smiled broadly at Maeve. ‘A small one, open to the sky. One that has carried many fish, I think. And four guards and two sailors. They can leave tomorrow.’
If Maeve had not already lost all decorum, she did now. Yowling, she writhed in Ruarc’s arms. In the end, he and his sword-mates dragged her bodily away, Oran prodded along behind at the tip of a sword.
Cahir turned from the shore and briefly closed his eyes. So it was done. The tension that had kept his blood pumping for two days now was leaching away, leaving exhaustion in its wake. But he had much more to do.
Tonight was Beltaine, a most auspicious time to announce the change in himself, his kingship and the fate of Dalriada. The time, at last, to be with Minna in the brief flicker of light before war closed in.
He braced his shoulders and met Donal’s eyes. The men lined up on their knees all had their heads down, the white skin on their necks exposed. At each end of the pitiful row, Cahir’s men rested their weight casually on their unsheathed swords, murmuring to each other.
He steeled himself from pity. There could be no weakness, no quarter given. ‘Kill them,’ he ordered, accepting into his heart the wails of fear from the captured men. This was a price he would pay for his kingdom.
When the bodies were tossed on a pyre, and the bloody sand kicked into the sea and washed away, Cahir gathered his trusted warriors together. ‘Go now,’ he said, ‘into every house and every byre in Dunadd, every dun within an hour’s ride, and tell the people there exactly what has happened and what we have won. And call them to attend the Beltaine rite this night to hear from their king’s mouth what the gods want of us now.’
Chapter 42
Cahir rode back to Dunadd alone in the still afternoon, smoke smearing the horizon behind him. It was well his horse knew the path, for though the king stared straight ahead, he was not seeing the marsh with its spangled pools, or the glimpse of his hall on its crag ahead.
All he could see was Garvan’s tear-stained face.
Father and son had conducted an audience alone. Cahir knew Garvan had been left with his mother too often, and now he had cause to rue that mistake, for he’d been shocked by how Maeve had poisoned the boy’s mind against him and Dalriada. It took some time to understand his own folly: he simply had not foreseen that he, of all people, could sire an heir so lacking in Alban pride and connection to his blood.
As they spoke, the boy’s coldness turned from sneers to shouting, Maeve’s words spilling from him like a gush of dirty water. Cahir listened and said nothing as his own shock bled into anger, and then pity. For his son was repeating his mother’s feelings when his quivering mouth and stilted voice betrayed something else.
Gently Cahir had to probe for it, stripping away the assertions, cornering the child with unwavering firmness. At last the exhausted Garvan broke, and the truth came out, and what was underneath was not hatred at all. Grinding his fists into his eyes, he looked at Cahir with the hurt of a wounded animal. ‘I cannot be you, Father! I cannot! So I won’t be!’
Cahir didn’t understand. ‘You are my son and heir—’
‘I am not!’ Garvan’s face was swollen with tears. ‘I can’t fight like you, I don’t look like you or s
ound like you – I’m not you and I never will be enough.’
This was why he wanted to be Roman? Cahir tried to reach him, but the boy hunched into the wall and turned his face away. And that was how Cahir had to leave him in the end, with instructions for Fergal to bring him back in two days when his anger had cooled.
Now Cahir nudged his stallion into a trot across the marsh, the wind cold on his set face. Garvan was the heir – he must be brought back into the fold. With Maeve gone it could be accomplished, given time. It was as he approached the gates of Dunadd that he forcibly put that pain aside.
For it was Beltaine night, and already the wood for the bonfire was being carted down the valley to the river meadow. Cooksmoke curled from every house with the scent of honey cakes. Beltaine … this was the time for Minna, at last, and tonight that would be all that mattered.
Urged on by the lean in his body, the horse broke into a gallop.
While Clíona bathed the girls in the queen’s hall, Minna sat on their bed in a linen shift. She had climbed up to the shadowed gallery because she didn’t know where else to go. Everyone was treating her with hesitation, their eyes darting sideways to her when they thought she wasn’t looking.
That morning, Orla had picked some of the may-blossom that was festooning the woods all around the dun with clouds of fragrant white blooms. Minna sat now twirling a sprig in her fingers, her mind racing. She felt a stirring in the air and earth around her, an expectant, breathless weight, heralding … what?
She was so absorbed in the flower, her brow creased, that one moment she was alone and the next Cahir was there. He was muddy, his clothes smeared with charcoal, his eyes red-rimmed from smoke. But they glowed, despite his grimy face.
‘What are you doing here?’ he croaked.
Minna gazed at him uncertainly, until suddenly he smiled. ‘A stór, this is not your bed any more.’ And taking her hand and the lamp, he led her to the bedplace she had rushed past with Brónach on that first day at Dunadd. There were no dressing tables or mirrors here, only a single chest at the foot of a bed which took up the entire space under the eaves, covered in furs. Cahir unbuckled his sword-belt and tossed it to the bed, and then sank backwards on it with a groan.
