Dark of the Moon

by Karen Robards

"Heathen Papists," the guard muttered with an expression of distaste, settling the candle into the iron sconce near the barred door. Then, with a nervous look along the corridor behind him, he added more loudly, ' 'Not too long now, Father."

  "No longer than it needs, you may be sure," Father Patrick answered calmly, his eyes never leaving Connor, who, with six weeks' worth of black beard covering his jaw and his hair grown overlong and untidy, looked every inch a brigand. The guard sniffed and went out, locking the door behind him with a great grating of iron against iron. Connor, recovering his composure, dropped the priest's hand.

  "If you would, cover the peephole," Father Patrick said to the second priest. Connor barely noticed as the man obeyed; his attention was all on Father Patrick.

  " 'Twas good of you to come, Father. But perhaps a trifle unwise."

  "I would have come sooner if I could. Be assured, no difficulties will befall me for this. But come, we have much to do and not much time to do it. I have a surprise for you. I hope 'tis to your liking."

  "Did you not come to give me Supreme Unction, then? I confess I hesitate to meet my maker without it." Connor smiled a little, his expression wry. Father Patrick laid his hand on his shoulder.

  " 'Tis my fervent hope that you'll long outlive me, my son. But just in case, I will give you absolution before I leave you. Are you not curious as to my surprise?"

  "You are surprise enough for me, Father. But aye, I would see what you've brought. I warn you, I'm hoping for a nice bit of mutton and maybe some turnips…"

  "I did not think of food," Father Patrick muttered, sounding put out with himself. "But then, I wager you'll not think of it in a moment either." He turned and beckoned to the second priest, who stepped forward. Connor watched with casual interest until something about this unknown priest's movements held his eyes. Even before she lifted a hand to pull back the cowled hood, he knew.

  "Caitlyn," he groaned as she ran into his arms. They closed around her, holding her tight. "Oh, Caitlyn." His voice broke, and he buried his face in the mass of her shining hair. She clung to him, murmuring love words that he could not make out, so soft and warm and alive in his arms that she banished the specter of the grave that yawned before him. He held her for what seemed like an eternity. Then, finally remembering his interested audience, he lifted his head from her hair and smiled rather unsteadily at the priest.

  "A fine surprise, indeed, Father."

  "I thought you would like it." Father Patrick's voice was dry, but the candlelight caught just the faintest suspicion of moisture in his eyes.

  "Connor, you do love me?" Caitlyn lifted her head from his chest at last, a touch of uncertainty in her eyes. He looked down at her, remembered that he had never told her, and smiled tenderly.

  "More than my life, my own."

  "Enough to wed me?"

  "Aye, willingly. But…"

  "The lass tells me she thinks she is with child. I would not like her to be left in such a state, unwed, should you die on the morrow." Father Patrick looked at Connor with as much sternness as he could muster under the circumstances.

  "With child!" Connor looked stunned. His face whitened, tightened as he gazed into the kerry blue eyes that stared at him so apprehensively. For a moment the reason for her nervousness eluded him. Surely she knew that he would never deny her- The thought that it might not be of his seed popped full-blown into his brain. The brat might be the spawn of his deadliest enemy, and Caitlyn's rapist… He looked down at the beautiful face he loved more than anything else in this world or out of it, and knew it did not matter. If Caitlyn was with child, he would wed her. Of whatever issue, he would give her and the bairn the protection of his name. That was all he had left to give them.

  "Are you pleased?" she asked, low-voiced. His mind boggled. He could not by the greatest stretch of good will on earth term himself pleased.

  "Pleased?" he equivocated, and felt her stiffen before she pulled out of his arms. Both she and Father Patrick fixed him with chilling glares.

  "Aye, pleased!" Though her voice was low, her anger was unmistakable. "As a man should be when told he's to be a father!"

  " 'Tis disappointed in you 1 am, Connor." Father Patrick was no less disapproving than Caitlyn.

  Connor stared at the two of them, then gave it up. "All right. Aye, I'm pleased. I'll certainly wed you, my own, with the greatest happiness on earth. And I'll give a name to your child, whether it be mine or no. 1-"

  "Whether it be yours or no!" Caitlyn's horrified interjection was echoed in Father Patrick's expression. Connor, realizing that the shame of what she had no doubt suffered at Sir Edward's hands had made her wish to block all the reasons that the bairn might well not be his from her mind, could have kicked himself for a clumsy-tongued fool.

  "I didn't mean that. 'Twas a slip of the tongue, a-a misstatement, if you will." He desperately tried to retrieve the situation. Caitlyn and Father Patrick glared at him.

  "It is yours! Whose else would it be?"

  "Sir Edward…" As soon as he said the name, he could have bitten off his tongue. Caitlyn's eyes got huge. Father Patrick looked scandalized, and Connor guessed that there were large parts of her life over the past year and a half that Caitlyn had not confided to the priest.

  "Could you excuse us a moment, Father? We-I think we have the need for some private speech here." Connor looked over Caitlyn's blushing head at the priest. He nodded and took himself to the door of the cell, where with an imperious kick he demanded that he be let out.

  "Forgot my rosary," they heard him grumble to the guard when the door was opened and he stepped outside. "Have to have a rosary, you know. Father Simeon can hear his confession, but have to have a rosary. Do you suppose…?"

  The door clanged shut again, locked. Connor turned his attention back to Caitlyn, who had recovered the presence of mind to pull her cowl back over her head before the guard looked into the room. He would have put his arms around her, but he could not reach her, chained to the wall as he was. She looked up at him, wet her lip.

  "I never did-that-with Sir Edward," Caitlyn said quietly, the wrath dying from her eyes. "I forgot you did not know. Sir Edward was not-lie did not-he was not a normal man. He took his pleasure from-from hurting me…" Her voice was veiy low, and at the end trailed away entirely. Her lower lip quivered, and she looked down at the rough stones beneath her feet. At the sight of her face, pale and shamed, Connor felt his heart twist with love. He reached for her again, but the damned chain tethered him to the wall so that he could not quite get his hands on her.

  "No," she said, shaking her head and stepping back. Then to his astonishment she was loosening the rope that tied the priest's robe about her waist, sliding it from her shoulders. Beneath it she wore a shirt and breeches. As Connor stared, she began to unbutton her shirt.

  "What-?" he started to ask, amazed. She shook her head again, turning her back as she pulled off her shirt. His mouth went dry at the sight of her standing there clad in nothing but a man's breeches and boots, her shining mass of hair the only thing covering the nakedness of her back. He cast a quick glance at the door. The peephole was covered by a cloth, and Father Patrick was sure to give a loud warning of his return. He turned his attention back to Caitlyn. She had dropped her breeches. The gray wool lay in a puddle around her feet. Her back was to him still. His heartbeat speeded up at his knowing that she was naked, though her hair effectively concealed most of her flesh from his eyes.

  "I want you to see for yourself so you'll know that what I'm telling you is the truth. I'll not have any doubts lingering in your head about whether or not this babe is yours." Even as she spoke she swept the fall of her hair aside. Connor felt as though a fist had slammed into his stomach as he stared at the mass of scars crisscrossing her lower back and buttocks and thighs. They were nearly healed, but the faint purple marks of a whip were still clearly visible against the translucent ivory satin of her skin.

  "Oh, my God," he said, the words both prayer and curse. Then
curse got the better of him. He swore loud and long, rage a red mist before his eyes, condemning Sir Edward to fiery torment in a hundred different ways before it occurred to him that she was facing him now, breeches in place, already pulling on her shirt and buttoning it. The look on her face shocked him back to sanity. He could not get his hands on Sir Edward at the moment. He could, however, get his hands on Caitlyn.

  "Come here, cuilin," he said low, opening his arms to her. She looked up, saw the expression in his eyes, and with a little sob ran into his arms. They closed around her, held her tight against his heart. He bent his head over hers, enfolding her in his embrace as she gasped out disjointed pieces of what she had suffered at Sir Edward's hands. By the time she had told of how she waited for the chance to kill him, she was sobbing. Connor's face was white, his eyes glinting murder as he listened. With far more passion than before, he regretted he had not killed the swine himself, when he had had the chance.

  "Cry it out. 'Tis all right, I have you safe now," he whispered into her hair, and she did, weeping against the tattered front of the shirt he had worn for more than a month, clutching him as if she would never let him go. At last, little by litde, her sobs lessened. Finally she gasped, and gulped, and sniffed, and lifted her head to look up at him.

  "Oh, Connor, I do love you so," she whispered, a pathetic little catch in her voice.

  "And I love you, my own," he answered, his own voice hoarse. Teary-eyed and pale, she was the most beautiful thing he had ever beheld in his life. His arms tightened around her. "I'll love you always, forever. If I die on the morrow, then be sure that I'll love you long after my body is cold in its grave. I'll love you through the joys of Heaven, or the torments of Hell."

  "You must not talk of dying! 'Tis bad luck," she moaned, and when fresh tears came to her eyes he bent his head and kissed her. It was a long, long time before he let her go, and then only because they heard Father Patrick loudly condemning the guard because he had not found a rosary anywhere on the premises. By the time the key had turned in the lock again, Caitlyn was dressed once more as a priest, her back to the door and Connor on his knees before her as she pretended to hear his confession.

  "Ahem-children. We've not much time," Father Patrick said as the door shut behind him, leaving the three of them alone. "I assume you have the matter, er, resolved to your satisfaction?"

  Connor nodded. " 'Twas my mistake, Father. The babe is mine. It could not be otherwise."

  He caught Caitlyn's hand, pulled her close. She rested her head against his chest like a tired child. He kissed the cowl, then pulled it back and kissed the top of her head.

  "I take it you are prepared to wed us? Here and now?"

  Father Patrick nodded. "I am, my son."

  "Then please do so, but first-" Connor looked at Caitlyn, his eyes tender, his voice gentle. "Will you do me die honor of becoming my wife?" he asked.

  "Aye, I will," she answered with love shining in her eyes.

  In moments Father Patrick was reciting the words that would unite them, while she leaned against Connor and clutched his hand. They were wed like that, in the middle of the night in a freezing cell in Kilmainham Gaol, with the soft murmurings of a priest washing over them and their hearts filled with love and the fear of imminent loss. When Connor lifted his head from the traditional kiss with which he claimed her as his wife, Caitlyn clung to him and burst into tears again. It seemed she had cried more in the past hour than she ever had before in her life.

  "Caitlyn, lassie, 'tis sorry I am to remind you, but I must have a word or two with Connor before… We've not much time remaining."

  Caitlyn trembled, clutching Connor closer. Father Patrick's words struck terror clear to her heart. Soon she would have to leave him, possibly never to see him again…

  "Don't weep, my own; it might harm the babe," Connor said in her ear. When she looked up, startled at the proprietary tone in which he spoke of what was no more than a tiny bud of life buried deep inside her, he kissed her, brief and hard. Then he put her away from him. Swaying slightly, she nevertheless stood on her own two feet as she drew her hands over her cheeks, wiping away the wetness left by her tears.

  "You'll see her safe away, Father? I'd not have her watch…"He could not put the thought of his grisly end into words, not with Caitlyn standing right there beside him, heart in her eyes as she listened to his every word.

  "Should it come to that, you may be sure I'll get her away. But it may not come to that. 'Tis what else I have to tell you. There's a chance…" And Father Patrick went on to detail what he hoped would come to pass on the morrow. When he had finished, Connor's eyes were bright with hope, and his hand was wrapped tightly around Caitlyn's.

  "Father, if this works, I will personally travel to Rome and petition the Holy See for your canonization." A crooked smile at Father Patrick was so familiar that it near stopped Caitlyn's heart. The scheme had to work. She could not live in this world without Connor.

  "Remember the signal; 'twill be the cannon."

  "Aye, I have it. I'll be ready."

  "In that case, my son, we'd best be on to other things. Caitlyn, forgive me for the suggestion, but should things not fall as they should tomorrow, you will want Connor to be prepared. 'Tis a precaution, you understand, no more."

  Though Caitlyn looked blank, Connor nodded, his hand tightening on hers before he released her. "I must admit 'twould comfort me to mount the scaffold knowing myself at peace with God."

  "Then let us begin, my son."

  Caitlyn, understanding at last, moved to a corner of the cell to give them privacy. Connor knelt and made his confession. Then Father Patrick recited the service for the dying over him. The familiar sound of the last rites struck deep into Caitlyn's soul. Closing her eyes tightly, she prayed with all her might that Connor would be spared. She knew just how chancy were the plans for his rescue, but surely God could work a miracle one more time.

  It was done quickly, the words a soft patter against the muted background of prison noises. When it was over, Connor got to his feet.

  "Thank you, Father."

  "I've something for you, my son. 'Tis yours, I think, and your father's and grandfather's before you."

  Caitlyn crossed to Connor's side and was enfolded against him by a hard arm as Father Patrick reached beneath his robe and pulled out an intricately wrought Irish Cross that dangled from a silver chain. Connor stared at it, then held out his hand. Father Patrick laid the medallion in his palm. Connor's fist closed slowly around it. For a moment he held the cross tightly, looking down at his clenched fist. Then he opened his hand, brought the cross to his lips, kissed it, and slipped the chain around his neck. The medallion gleamed brightly in the candlelight, its magnificence at odds with his tattered finery and unshaven jaw.

  "You shall live or die as the Dark Horseman, beloved by all true Irishmen, and in your true faith," Father Patrick said, as if in benediction. "Whatever comes to you tomorrow, take comfort from that."

  "Whatever happens, I am grateful for all you've done. Now, what of my brothers? And Mickeen?''

  "All fine." Father Patrick shook his head. "Though they are wild with worry for you, of course. Still, I have them convinced of the need for caution, I think."

  "Give them my love. Tell them-if aught goes wrong tomorrow and I in truth pass from this life-tell them that my last request of diem was that they care for Caitlyn and the babe."

  "Connor…" Caitlyn pressed closer against him, shuddering as her arms slipped around his waist. He bent his head to touch his lips to her hair even as the sound of a key sliding into the lock galvanized them all.

  "Take care of yourself, wife, and our babe," Connor whispered in her ear as he put her from him.

  She just had time to mouth "I love you" before the guard was opening the door. It was Connor who had the presence of mind to pull the cowl back over her head. When the guard got the door open, he saw nothing but two priests comforting a condemned man.

  "Time," he said sourl
y, reaching for the candle. Caitlyn looked at Connor, tears brimming in her eyes. He smiled at her. Father Patrick made the sign of the cross again, said, "Be of stout heart, my son," and, putting his hand on Caitlyn's shoulder, half pushed and half led her from the cell.

  XXXXVII

  Outside the prison, Caitlyn was half blinded by tears. She clutched Father Patrick's arm as the priest hurried her along toward where their horses had been stabled at a nearby inn. The night was dark and moonless, and Caitlyn reckoned it lacked two hours yet of dawn. Drunken revels were taking place in the street around the prison even at this wee hour of the morn.

  With so much activity going on, she paid no attention as a closed carriage rumbled down the street toward them. Only when it stopped did she look up. Two men leaped from the inside, brandishing clubs. Father Patrick stopped short, thrusting Caitlyn behind him.

  "In the name of God, begone!" he thundered. "We've naught for you, naught worth robbing!"

  " 'Tis not your valuables we're after, ye bloody idolater! We've come for the wench. Hand her over, or we'll split your skull for ye, priest or no!"

  "Ye may try!" Father Patrick roared, and lunged at one of the men as he bellowed at Caitlyn to run. But there was no time. The second of the men brought his club down on Father Patrick's head with a sound like a melon splitting. Father Patrick dropped to the street like a fallen tree. Caitlyn, on the verge of flying to his defense, looked up at the men advancing on her and turned to run. She got about two feet before one of them caught her by the flapping tail of the too-big priest's robe and jerked her off her feet.

  "Hold her, now! Ouch, watch out, she bites! Get her in the bloody carriage, mate, and quick!"

  Caitlyn screamed and fought, but they were big, burly men and she had to have a care for the babe inside her. The drunken revelers camped in front of the prison barely paused in their merrymaking to watch. Such scenes were all too common in Dublin. Until one of them noticed that the man lying unconscious on the ground was a priest…