Oath of the Brotherhood

by Carla Laureano

  Aine just laughed. “Do you want me to come? I’ve had some training, but I’m really terrible. It could be fun.”

  The idea of gentle Aine with a sword in hand made him smile. “You’d do that?”

  “Of course I would!” She grinned. “Come on. We can laugh about our ineptitude at supper, and if you’re still feeling bad, I’ll serenade you with the cruit.”

  “Careful. I might take you up on that.”

  Conor’s mood brightened, even though the tiny girl’s lack of fighting ability hardly mitigated his own failures. Even if she someday inherited her clan’s leadership, her personal guard would protect her. When would she ever be called to take up a sword?

  Conor didn’t actually expect her to come, but when he arrived at the large room Gainor had designated for lessons, she waited with a wooden practice sword in hand.

  “It suits you,” Conor said, grinning. “The warrior-healer.”

  Gainor, on the other hand, burst into laughter when he arrived. “What on earth are you doing?”

  “I’m here to train,” Aine said. “You don’t think I can manage?”

  “Oh, I think you could manage quite well. I also think Calhoun would have my head. Go have a seat out of the way if you want to watch.”

  Aine rolled her eyes at Conor, but she took a seat on a nearby stool. Conor shot her a smile. Surprisingly, he felt no desire to have her leave.

  Gainor began by teaching stance, grip, and guard positions. They progressed to simple strikes and parries, and although Conor’s movements felt stiff and awkward, he managed to complete them without falling on his face. Then they moved on to a simple, choreographed bout meant to demonstrate the flow of movements. Conor kept up admirably until he forgot to block one of Gainor’s crossway slashes, and the wooden blade smacked into his neck.

  “Ouch!” Conor’s sword clattered to the ground.

  “What did you do wrong?”

  “I forgot how to parry.” Conor glanced at Aine, expecting to see a grin at his poor showing. Instead, she stared at him, pale and trembling. “Aine? Are you all right?”

  Aine blinked. “What? Oh, I just . . . I don’t feel so well. I’m going to get some air.” She slid from the stool and rushed out the door.

  What was that about? For a moment, Aine had looked as if she were seeing right through him.

  “Back to work,” Gainor said. “Let’s take it more slowly.”

  Conor fared no better the second time, his mind returning to Aine’s odd behavior.

  Gainor finally pronounced him hopelessly distracted and dismissed him for the day, though he actually seemed pleased. “We may make a fighter out of you yet.”

  The world doesn’t need any more fighters, Conor thought, but he merely bowed and headed off in search of Aine.

  Aine stumbled from the keep, her heart pounding. Her excuse hadn’t fooled Conor, but the truth was even more unbelievable. Only once she reached the privacy of the clochan’s enclosed garden did she manage a steady breath.

  Lord, what did I see?

  The instant Gainor’s sword had connected with Conor’s neck, the practice room had disappeared, a forest scene in its place. Conor, looking much as he did now, knelt on the mossy ground, a gleaming blade at his throat. Recalling his expression sent another spasm of horror through her. It had been the terrified and resigned look of someone about to die.

  Just because she saw it didn’t mean it was going to happen. Maybe it was symbolic, a warning. She should tell Conor what she had seen. If he didn’t go into the forest, he would never be in danger. But what if knowing of her vision actually brought it about?

  Aine covered her face with her hands and drew a deep, shuddering breath. This was why she concealed her gifts. Mistress Bearrach knew about her insight into her patients, but that knowledge could bring no harm to others. If Calhoun knew she sometimes saw the future, he might be tempted to make decisions based on her imperfect visions. Kings had been led astray by far less. She could not risk anyone learning the truth.

  Even if it meant Conor might die.

  “Don’t be ridiculous. Nothing’s going to happen to him.”

  “Nothing’s going to happen to whom?”

  Aine jerked her head up. Conor stood at the garden entrance, his forehead creased in concern.

  “I was just muttering nonsense,” she said. “Why are you here?”

  “I was worried about you.” He picked his way through the rows of plants. “Don’t tell me you have a headache. I know you too well for that.”

  Aine bit her lip, tempted to spill out the whole story. She may have only known him for a handful of weeks, but her heart told her he would never betray her.

  No. She couldn’t risk it. He was a Mac Nir, after all. Who knew what could happen if his father found out? She closed her eyes. “Please, Conor, don’t make me lie to you.”

  When she opened them again, curiosity and hurt played across his expression, but he only said, “As long as it wasn’t sheer horror over my ineptitude.”

  “No, it wasn’t that at all. You made a respectable showing for your first lesson.”

  “Maybe.” Conor smiled at her. “Come on. Let’s go snatch some pastries from the kitchen.”

  She returned the smile and moved toward the gate. Before they could step through, he grasped her arm and tugged her back gently.

  His touch seared her skin through her sleeve and sent a shiver through her entire body. He stared into her eyes, his intensity making her breath catch. “You can trust me, Aine. You know that, don’t you?”

  “I know.” Her heart flopped over painfully in her chest.

  His hand slid down her arm and squeezed her fingers so quickly she might have imagined it. “Good. Let’s go back.”

  Aine followed him back to the keep, struggling to make sense of the sudden surge of feelings. Her world had shifted in a single instant, and she had absolutely no idea what to do about it.

  The cook surrendered the meat pies willingly, and they stood in a back corridor to eat them, laughing at the bits of pastry that clung to their clothing and hands. When it was time to part ways—Aine to her lessons with Mistress Bearrach and Conor to the music room—he could barely pull himself away.

  As Conor climbed the stairs, though, the memory of her words in the garden resurfaced, leaving him more confused than ever. Something was wrong. He should be pleased Aine hadn’t tried to deny it, but the irrational part of him only saw she didn’t trust him enough to tell him the truth.

  And why should she? He was Timhaigh. She’d known him for only a few months.

  The music room lay empty. Once more, the harp called to him, but he ignored it and took up the cruit instead. He still couldn’t bring himself to play the harp at Lisdara. To create real music in a place was like deciding to call it home. Succumbing to that desire would only make it that much harder to leave when the time came.

  Conor picked out a tune of his own making, halting and imperfect and hampered by the cruit’s six strings when the music in his head demanded the harp’s twenty-eight. He layered the melody with counterpoints and variations until he could play something that approximated his feelings. He was so absorbed in his tune he didn’t notice the man standing inside the doorway.

  “That sounds like a love song,” Meallachán said.

  Conor broke off the song. “Almost. It’s not quite what I heard in my head.”

  Meallachán nodded solemnly and made his way to the other chair a few feet away. “It’s a gift, you know. Music. And I don’t mean a gift like being able to craft a verse of poetry or construct a stained-glass window. It’s a gift, one of the few things left of Comdiu’s perfect world. One Balus gave to His believers when He restored our connection to Comdiu through His death.”

  “I don’t understand.”

  Meallachán took the other cruit from the stand and began to pluck out an idle melody. Even that thoughtless, simple tune was beautiful. “Before man was created, Comdiu made the beings known as the Comp
anions, perfect creations that lived to glorify Him. They praised Him with music and singing so magnificent mortal ears could not bear it.

  “But some of the Companions were not satisfied with this existence. They coveted Comdiu’s power. A Companion named Arkiel led an uprising against Comdiu, which of course failed. Rather than destroy them, Comdiu banished them from His presence.

  “When Comdiu created man in His image, Arkiel desired to rule over these creatures that were so like the Master he despised. He and his followers worked subtly to turn man against his Creator.

  “Arkiel’s power over this world grew stronger until Comdiu sent His son, Balus, a sacrifice that broke the Adversary’s hold. His death reconciled fallen man to Comdiu, and with it opened access to a small piece of His power. Music—true music, a reflection of the divine praise of heaven—is part of that power.”

  Conor listened raptly. He had never heard the Balian story of creation told this way. Music was a piece of a perfect world? No wonder it held so much resonance with him.

  “Only a few have been chosen,” Meallachán said, “to possess the gift of music in its purest form—goodness that drives away the darkness. Daimhin himself was the greatest of them. But not all who have the gift recognize it.”

  Conor looked down at the cruit in his hands. “You’re saying I have this gift?”

  “You tell me, son.”

  He remembered Labhrás’s reaction to his playing at Glenmallaig. “Why would He choose me? The Timhaigh adhere to the Old Ways.”

  “Do you not follow Balus?”

  Conor had skirted the issue since coming to Lisdara, but he could avoid it no longer. He gave a single nod.

  “I’ll let you think on that then. And perfect your song.”

  Conor remained on the stool, the cruit still in his hands. He knew it was true. Perhaps he had always known it. Was that why Riordan had insisted he foster with Labhrás, so his gift could be nurtured? Had he somehow guessed Conor possessed this ability?

  And how did he explain all this talk of magic and the Fíréin and gifts of the Great Kingdom? He’d been raised not to believe in coincidence, only providence. So what did Comdiu expect from him?

  Meallachán and the priests joined them in the hall for supper that night. Normally, Conor relished their lively conversation, but far too much had happened that day to join in. Aine’s gaze lit on him repeatedly, but whenever he glanced over, her eyes darted away.

  While servants cleared the supper plates, Meallachán retrieved his harp and settled into a chair. Once again, Conor marveled at the craftsmanship of the magnificent instrument, his fingers tingling at the thought of touching those strings.

  Meallachán smiled at him as if he knew his thoughts. “What shall we hear tonight? A ballad of unrequited love? A tale of heroism? Or do you fancy some dancing?”

  “Play something from the Great Kingdom,” Conor said.

  Eyebrows rose around the table, but Meallachán nodded graciously and set his hands to the strings.

  Conor had thought Meallachán’s first composition was moving, but it paled in comparison to the melody that now spilled from the harp. Music from the heavens, Conor thought, older than time itself. He let the song wash over him until his heart swelled to bursting, and it took him a long moment after it ended to join the applause.

  He had barely regained his composure when Meallachán asked, “What about you, Conor? Would you like to have a try?”

  The blood drained from his face, and the pounding in his ears nearly drummed out his answer. “I couldn’t,” he heard himself say faintly. “Not after that.”

  Aine touched his arm gently. “Please?”

  One minute, he was taking in Aine’s hopeful expression, and the next he was seated in Meallachán’s chair. Reverently, he accepted the harp from the bard, then sucked in his breath. The instrument throbbed with unseen energy that crackled along his skin like the warning of an impending lightning strike. Conor brushed his fingers over the twenty-eight strings that made up the full, rich sound he had so desperately missed in the cruit, and his frantic pulse calmed.

  Forgetting the expectant eyes upon him, he began to play.

  Aine felt the yearning in Conor beside her, his eyes fixed on the bard. Apparently, Meallachán sensed it as well. When Conor wavered, she knew it would take only a quiet request to push him from his indecision.

  As he prepared, he looked nothing like the perpetually uncertain boy she had come to know. His face relaxed, his eyes going distant, and he handled the instrument with both a respect and a surety she had seen only in the bard himself.

  At first, he coaxed a soft, tentative melody from a few strings. A chill rippled over her skin, similar to the bolt of energy she had felt when she first saw him. The song gradually built and broadened, as he added layer upon layer of complexity. Aine closed her eyes, and images came unbidden.

  Conor, a young child at his mother’s knee, watching her play the harp and yearning to touch the instrument. A harsh, discordant run of notes—violence distantly remembered. Longing, loss, and at last acceptance and understanding in the strict tutelage of a man Aine guessed was Lord Labhrás. Fear and loneliness . . .

  . . . and a beckoning of something darker, sinister and yet seductive, battling for his soul. She recognized the dark magic of the isle. Brilliant light battered back the shadowy tendrils, but they always remained, a counterpoint to the brighter notes.

  Then came a mixture of love, fear, and longing. He was playing his present here at Lisdara, imbuing the music with a constant battle of hope and uncertainty. A repeated motif anchored the wild scattering of runs that spiraled off the melody, then drew them inexorably back. From the way it gripped her heart, Aine knew it had to symbolize her. Just when she thought she could bear no more, the music faded, the last chord reverberating with longing and inevitability.

  Conor remained still, his hands on the strings and his eyes closed. Sweat beaded on his brow. Aine blinked to clear the fog from her vision and realized it was tears. A quick glance around the table showed the others fixed awestruck to their seats, all but Meallachán and Treasach, who exchanged a satisfied glance.

  Conor opened his eyes. He stood, placed the harp gently on the floor, then walked unsteadily from the room without a single word.

  Calhoun shook off the spell first and looked around the table. “Good night, then.”

  Aine rose and followed Niamh and Gainor from the room; Meallachán and the priests remained seated. She hung back just outside the hall, still too bewildered to feel guilty about eavesdropping.

  Calhoun spoke so quietly she had to strain to hear. “It seems you were right. What now?”

  Silence stretched. Then Meallachán spoke. “I’m afraid even I did not expect this, my lord. This boy has had next to no formal training. I daresay we haven’t seen a gift this strong since Daimhin’s time.”

  “Since Daimhin himself, you’re saying,” Calhoun said.

  “It’s a mistake to let him stay here,” Meallachán continued. “The longer he plays, the more notice he is bound to draw. That could be disastrous.”

  “Diarmuid would never have allowed Galbraith to send him here if he knew. Someone went to great lengths to conceal him from notice,” Treasach said.

  Calhoun’s voice held a touch of bitterness. “Well, your kind love secrets, don’t they?”

  “It’s a dangerous time for him,” Meallachán said, as if the king hadn’t spoken. “The decisions he makes here will determine the future. All of our futures.”

  “Send him away then,” Treasach said. “He’d be safe in—”

  “No,” the bard said firmly. “It must be his decision. You cannot tear him away from her against his will. There’s a bond there that goes beyond friendship. I heard it in the music.”

  Aine’s cheeks burned. She had been right. She expected Calhoun to sound surprised, but he only said, “I recognized it from the beginning. But there’s only so much he can learn here, and the stronger he grows,
the more of a target he becomes.”

  Aine jerked in shock. Her elbow knocked the wrought-iron candle stand across the stone floor with an ear-shattering screech. The hall went silent. A chair scraped away from the table, but she didn’t stay to see who it was. Instead, she turned and fled, her heart beating so hard she thought she might faint.

  Conor’s musical gift marked him not just as a Balian, but something more. That put him in danger not just from his own clan, but from the darker forces at work in Seare. If they moved against him, even the protections around Lisdara might not be enough to shield him. The only place beyond the reach of the isle’s dark magic was Ard Dhaimhin.

  Conor must leave Lisdara. And soon.

  CHAPTER TEN

  After Conor played the bard’s harp in the great hall, the others treated him with a mixture of hesitance and respect. Treasach and Meallachán stared at him appraisingly when they thought he wasn’t looking, and even Niamh seemed less aloof. That alone would have been unsettling.

  But it was Aine’s manner that weighed on him most. She still smiled and bantered with him, but he glimpsed sadness behind her eyes. He yearned to tell her the night in the hall was an aberration, fueled by the emotion of Meallachán’s music. He wanted to promise her he would never touch a harp again if she would just stop looking at him with those searching eyes.

  He wouldn’t be able to do it, though. The harp in the music room, a poor approximation of Meallachán’s fine instrument, drew him each night after the others went to sleep. He tried to play quietly, but the music overtook him, and he could scarcely remember the notes when he finished.

  One night, he had just taken up the harp when the door clicked open beyond the circle of candlelight. A small, shadowed figure crept into view. Aine.

  She wore a dressing gown, and with her hair falling loosely around her shoulders, she looked simultaneously childlike and ageless. She pulled up a stool beside him. “I couldn’t sleep. Will you play for me?”

  He could no more resist her request now than he could in the hall. He put his hands to the strings and began to play the song he had first composed on the cruit.