Cricket's Song

by Michael A. Hooten

  Airmeda started to take the sleeves off of Cricket’s arms, but stopped and looked at Essa. “Have you seen these?”

  “Yes, in an illusion.”

  “If you feel ill, just tell me,” she said, as she put tourniquets around Cricket’s wrists.

  “What if I feel sick?” Cricket asked.

  “I thought that was why you were here,” she said with a wink.

  “Stop jabbering, daughter. I am almost ready.”

  Airmeda stopped smiling and lowered her eyes. “Yes, father.”

  Fergus said, “Do you mind if I play? Perhaps it would soothe the patient.”

  “Just don’t make it too loud,” Dianecht said. “Now, Cricket, if you would just relax, and look at your wife... no, not at me, I don’t want you to get anxious about anything I might do... that’s it. Master Caitil, are you ready?”

  “I am,” the wizard replied in a sonorous voice.

  “Then I will now begin.”

  Caitil began a low chant that filled the room without ever being distinct, and Fergus played a song that lay on top of the wizard’s voice lightly. Cricket looked into Essa’s eyes for as long as he could, but she was watching the operation, and the reflections in her eyes and the frown that tugged at her lips only made it harder to follow the doctor’s directions. So he looked.

  Dianecht was just finishing the first hand, smoothing the skin over the silver like a sculptor working clay. Airmeda mopped his brow occasionally, and gave Cricket an encouraging smile when she noticed him watching.

  A tingling sensation began at the end of his arm, and his eyes widened with wonder as the feeling grew to fill the new hand. Dianecht took a thick needle and touched it to Cricket’s finger with a tiny ping. “Did you feel that?”

  “A little,” Cricket said. “It’s like my hand is numb.”

  Caitil stopped his chant and said, “That should pass. The fact that you have any sensation at all is very encouraging indeed.”

  Dianecht grunted. “He’s right. The magic needs time to settle and become a part of you. But can you wiggle your fingers at all?”

  Cricket concentrated all of his energy, and was rewarded with a slight movement. “I’m afraid that’s all,” he said.

  ““That’s good, though,” Dianecht said. “That’s very promising. Airmeda, gather our things.”

  “Wait! I thought you were going to do the other one, too.”

  Dianecht gave him a grim smile. “It turned out to be a little more taxing than I expected. We’ll be back tomorrow, though, to finish up.”

  A week later, Cricket sat with an unfamiliar harp on his knee, flexing and relaxing his silver hands. Etain sat across from him, and Essa stood behind him with her hands resting lightly on his shoulders. He glanced up at her nervously and said, “I’m afraid.”

  “It’s okay,” she answered. “You can be a little imperfect, now and then.”

  He smiled at her, and turned back to the harp with a deep breath. Fearing that the silver hands would be too strong for ordinary gut strings, Govniu had fashioned some from metal. Cricket touched them hesitantly, raising notes that sounded like a harp but were different, too. He made a sweeping strum, and closed his eyes to listen. Smiling, he said, “Her name is Brenlyn. She’s a good instrument.”

  “So play us something, my love,” Essa said.

  The strings still hummed faintly, so he stilled them and began to play her favorite song, “The Lily and the Oak”. It took him a few minutes to find the sub-harmonies in the new tone of the metal strings, but soon he had both women laughing at the illusions he created: acrobats juggled misty anvils with their hands and small dogs with their feet; unicorns and griffins twirled in a courtly dance; frogs and fishes in fantastic colors swam through the air. CuChulainn barked and leapt at the misty figures, increasing their laughter.

  Then Cricket erased it all and formed an image of the hall at Caer Arberth, from the common tables between the cook fires to the high table on its dais. Looking at it, he sighed and said, “It’s time for me to go home.”

  “You are certainly free to leave,” Etain replied.

  “Will you send us?”

  The faerie lady looked at him sideways. “I could. But perhaps you would like to learn how to for yourself.”

  “You’re jesting with me, my lady.”

  “No she’s not,” Essa said. “I don’t think she knows how to.”

  “You might be right about that,” Etain said with a smile. “But the matter at hand is magic.”

  “Faerie magic,” Cricket said.

  “Not necessarily,” she replied. “You of all people should know that faerie was originally inhabited by the Cymry, who were simply a magically puissant group of humans. Living in this world has changed us some, but I believe that humans are still capable of anything that we are.”

  “I’m guessing that is not a popular view among your people,” Cricket said.

  “I’m not talking to them; I’m talking to you.”

  “I bow to your wisdom,” Cricket said with a smile. “Now, how do we start?”

  “The magic can be tiring, but it’s not difficult,” Etain began. “You simply hold the image of where you want to go in your mind, and use the magic to build a bridge. The further away your destination is, the more power it will take.”

  “So how do you go someplace you’ve never been?” Cricket asked.

  “Can’t you learn that later?” Essa said. “I want to get back to the children.”

  “Of course, my love.” Cricket stood up and began to play with power, seeing the glowing bridge form in his mind between the room in faerie and the hall in Dyfed. “Are you ready?” he asked.

  “I suppose,” Essa said, gripping him tightly about the waist. “Don’t forget CuChulainn.”

  “I’m not.” Working instinctively, he gathered the dog into the magic. “Thank you, Etain,” he said just before leaving. “For everything.” At her nod, he took a deep breath and stepped from one reality to another.

  Cricket and Essa stepped through a hole in the air and into the hall at Caer Arberth. The three strange men who had been talking to Mannath jumped up, swords in hand, but Mannath just looked up and said, “It’s about time.”

  Smiling, Cricket said, “I beg my lord’s pardon for my tardiness.”

  “Granted,” Mannath said, and the others put away their weapons. Glancing at his bard’s hands, Mannath said, “I’ve heard that you’ve been busy.”

  “And I have heard the same of you. How may I help?”

  “By advising me, of course.”

  Essa kissed her husband on the cheek. “I need to go check on the children. Don’t stay up too late.”

  “Don’t worry, I won’t,” he replied, kissing her back. The three strange men looked at each other a bit sheepishly, as though they had been planning on working till dawn.

  After Essa had left, Mannath said, “Before we begin, I’d like you to meet our latest volunteers. This is Dershal, Prince of Duvnecht, and his champion, Felmid. And this is Lord Innish.”

  The three men bowed, and Cricket bowed back. “How can we help three such great warriors?” he asked.

  Prince Dershal, a man who looked deceptively effeminate, said, “We heard the bards spreading a song about a certain harpist. We came down to see if it is true.”

  Cricket said, “It probably is.”

  Felmid, rubbing his chin, said, “With hands like that, I don’t know why you deny it.”

  Cricket smiled tightly. “You’ll forgive my suspicions, lord, but I have been through quite a bit recently, and I am not currently inclined to trust strangers.”

  Lord Innish glanced at his companions. “I thought he wasn’t from Dyfed originally.” The other two laughed obligingly.

  “We have come to lend our support,” Dershal said. “If such an injustice has been committed, we want to correct it.”

  “With war?”

  “That is what you were planning, was it not?”

  “We had n
ot made any decisions,” Mannath said after looking at his bard.

  “But what she did to you—how can you not attack her?”

  “There are other methods besides pitched battle, my lord,” Cricket said.

  “We want only what’s best for Glencairck,” Mannath added. “We have no desire to steep this land in blood.”

  The three men rose, their faces inscrutable. “If you change your mind,” Dershal said, “I would be happy to lead your army. And Lord Innish is an expert when it comes to logistics. We only want to help.”

  “We are in no hurry for battle,” Mannath said. “But if the queen decides for us, we will be sure and call on you.”

  After the warriors had left, Mannath turned to Cricket and said, “By the gods! We could have used them. Why didn’t you want them?”

  “They’re not what they seem,” Cricket said, sitting down with a sigh.

  “Oh? And just what are they then?”

  “Well, the prince and Lord Innish were real, but that was not Felmid. That was Lord Daigan without his infamous beard.”

  “Daigan? The great tactician?”

  “The same. Perhaps he was examining our defenses. Whatever they are doing, it isn’t entirely honest, my lord, and until we know what it is, let them spread the information we just gave them. It might help.”

  “I’ve missed having you around,” Mannath said with a grin. Then he turned serious, drumming his fingers on his desk. “But we are going to have to fight.”

  “I don’t see where we have a choice.” Cricket jumped up and began pacing the room. “How long have I been in faerie? A week?”

  “It’s been almost a fortnight since Essa came back with the news that the queen had you.”

  “That long? I’m surprised that there’s not a company of kerns and charioteers outside your door already.”

  “She seems to be waiting for something.”

  “Oh? And how do you know that?”

  “Because more than warriors have been volunteering.”

  Cricket met with twenty bards the next morning, most of them young, but most of them familiar, too. And a few he knew rather well: Serca, Arcath, and Scathna did not surprise him as much as Ollave Emerain. It disturbed him somewhat how she deferred to him.

  “I guess what I want to know,” he said, standing in front of them, “is why? Why have you all come here for this?”

  “Why not?” asked a girl in the back.

  “Spoken like a true bard,” Cricket said. “But you have to know that we will go to war eventually, and that some of you may die.”

  “If I may...?” Emerain asked.

  “Of course, Ollave.”

  “We all know the risks, Cricket. But we also know the rewards. I think that all of us have yearned to do what you have done, but were scared. We have become creatures of privilege, parasites on the people we claim to serve, and we forgot the simple joys: playing all day, seeing shoulders relax and smiles appear, watching anger dissolve. We want to be real bards.”

  A murmur of agreement rose behind her. Cricket shook his head though. “It’s not that easy.”

  “‘A bard is busier than the bees’,” Scathna quoted. “Amergin said that.”

  “True,” Cricket said. “But I have to warn you that we may not live long enough to taste the honey.”

  “That’s for us to decide,” Serca said, ignoring the curl that fell into her eye. “Just tell us what to do, and we’ll do it.”

  “Well, for the moment we need to combine our knowledge to try and figure out what the queen’s going to do next.”

  “Can’t we play a few songs first?” Arcath asked.

  Chapter 28: Preparations

  Several more days passed, and each one brought more volunteers. Farmers, warriors, priests, and merchants all wanted to be with the bard who the queen had betrayed. The story of his silver hands spread as well, bringing wonder and awe, which Cricket did his best to downplay.

  Meanwhile, the forges of Dyfed belched black smoke as the smiths hammered out weapons.

  “They are one of our best resources,” Mannath said patiently. “You must send them out.”

  “No,” Cricket answered with growing frustration. “I will not use them that way.” He did not have Brenlyn in his hands, or CuChulainn at his feet, and it made him uncomfortable. But Mannath had called for a council of war, and the hardened men around the table thought of him as a leader, not a musician.

  “But they’re bards!” said Rhys, the commander of a company of fians from Tlachtga. “They can go anywhere, see anything. They’re the perfect spies!”

  “And you think that Ewan MacDougall doesn’t know that?” Cricket asked. “You think that he’s not looking at his own bards closely, as well as sending out a few spies of his own?”

  The men muttered a little, but subsided. “So what do we do?” asked Wymeth, a warrior from Glamorgan. “We’ve been sitting here for three days since you returned, and nothing has happened.”

  “I don’t think the queen sees us as a threat,” said Dairmid, one of the few Leinathmen in the room. “If she did, she would have attacked us by now.”

  “That’s another problem with not getting the bards involved in this,” Mannath said. “Without them, we have no idea what’s happening in the rest of the country.”

  “And so you assume nothing is happening?” Cricket said. “There’s been no word, so you think that the queen is just sitting back, thinking that we are not assembling an army?”

  “Well, we don’t know that she’s assembling her own,” Dairmid answered.

  “I can tell you that she is,” said Brigit, stepping out of the wall.

  Twenty warriors were on their feet swords drawn, but Cricket just looked at her. “I wondered when you might get involved.”

  “You were hoping for the Dagda, and you know it,” the faerie woman answered easily. “And the rest of you can sit down already.” She drew her own sword. “Or if you want to fight...”

  Cricket quickly made introductions, and Mannath asked, “What news do you bring, great lady?”

  “Information, and assistance,” she replied as she sheathed her blade. “I don’t think you’ll like either.”

  “What’s not to like about getting help from beyond the pale?” Wymeth said.

  She looked at him. “Ask me that again when your arm is ready to drop off from swinging a practice sword, when your back aches and you’re soaked in sweat, and I tell you to start over because it’s not good enough yet.”

  He sat up, offended. “I am the son of a prince.”

  “And if you want my help, you will do as I say, no matter how much you hate it or me.” She looked around. “You will do it, or you will die.”

  The warriors looked at each other silently, uncomfortable with the sudden reality. After a moment, Mannath cleared his throat. “You said something about information?”

  “Yes, I certainly did.” Brigit hooked a seat and sprawled in it, cleaning her nails with a stiletto. “The queen is assembling an army, and the longer you wait, the larger it will grow.”

  “So why doesn’t she attack?” Dairmid asked again.

  “Because she can’t enter Dyfed. And that’s because of this man,” Brigit said, indicating Cricket with the point of her dagger.

  “Me?” Cricket asked, surprised. “What did I do?”

  “Your magic sealed the land,” Brigit explained. “All that work you did, cleansing a curse, well it also made it impossible for someone to come in and use magic that would harm the land. So the queen could attack, but she would be lacking her best weapon.”

  “So she’s just out there, probably on the border, preparing for when we march out to meet her?” asked Mari, a woman from Gwynedd.

  “That’s what I would do,” Mannath said, and Brigit nodded.

  “But we still need a way to find out the details,” Wymeth said. “The bards are the best way of doing that.”

  Cricket stared at his shining hands. “I can’t ask them
to do that.”

  “Why not?”

  “Gentlemen, have you forgotten the songs that brought you here?” Cricket asked. “The songs that I’m sure are still being played throughout the land?”

  “The Pen Bardd has crushed them by now,” Rhys said. “As you pointed out, he does control the rest of the bards.”

  “Just as he controlled the ones who defected to us,” Cricket replied. “No, he cannot stop what we started, no matter how much he tries. And he has tried.” Cricket looked around at each man. “But it’s more than that; many people have decided that this whole business is the bards fault. Bards have been turned out of halls and refused hospitality. And although the people of Glencairck stop short of actual violence, the Pen Bardd does not. Some bards have disappeared; several more have received warnings that left scars. And you’re asking me to send the thirty or so who have risked their lives to join us to go back to that?”

  “They would if you asked them to,” Wymeth said.

  “I can’t.”

  “You might have to,” Brigit said.

  Mannath said, “Cricket, we are all here because of what the queen did to you. We think that it was wrong, we think that she has betrayed her country, and we can no longer support her as high queen, because of what she did to you. We are preparing for war, and we will risk our lives in battle, and it’s because of you. Are you saying that we shouldn’t?”

  Cricket looked at his friend. “I should be able to face the queen myself, fairly, and decide this without getting everyone else involved. Yes, that’s what I’m saying.”

  “The queen, and the Pen Bardd, have turned on the bards,” Mari said. “Everyone in this room believes that she has overstepped her authority, and has betrayed her vows. And although not everyone believes the bards as a whole are worth saving, we believe in you, and there is someone here from every part of Glencairck. The whole country is involved whether you want it to be or not.”

  A knock interrupted Cricket before he could reply, and Asaph stuck his head in the door. “I apologize, my lords, truly I do,” the steward said.

  “What is it?” Mannath asked.