Shapeshifter

by Holly Bennett

  Oisin scowled. “And what am I supposed to do in the meantime? Stand around counting the days?”

  Finn smiled. “I have been thinking on that. And I am thinking that warfare is not your only talent.”

  Oisin felt his interest quicken in spite of himself. Finn could only be talking about his music. His father seemed proud of how Oisin had picked up some skill on the harp from the bards who stayed sometimes at Almhuin, and clearly enjoyed hearing him sing. But the Fianna were warriors. Oisin had not thought his training could be anything different. Then his father surprised him again.

  “I had my own raising with a poet, for some years.” Finn laughed at Oisin’s look. “I know, you would not think it from looking at me. But I have made some passable poems in my day. And it’s how I came to be eating the Salmon of Knowledge, because of my time with him. He thought the fish was destined for himself, but when I was fetching it out of the pan to serve to him, my thumb slipped onto the flesh and got burned, so I popped it into my mouth!” Finn laughed heartily, and Oisin could not help but join in.

  “Wasn’t he mad, but?”

  “I should think. But he was a gracious man, and hid it nicely. ‘Ah,’ he said. ‘Here I misunderstood the prophecy. These seven years I was after thinking the salmon was for me, because of my name, Finnegas, the white. But really, it was for you, Finn, named for your white-blond hair.’ ”

  Finn grew serious. “You have more poetry and song in your smallest toe than I have in my whole body, Oisin. You have come as far as you can in battle skill for now, but it is time you learned your mother’s gifts. I am sending you to Cruachan, to study with old Tanai. He took service with me for a time, when he was younger, and he is a man to trust. He will teach you the sweetest music there is to be found in Eire or in Alba. And then you will not only be a Warrior of the Fianna but our Bard as well.”

  Oisin did not need persuading. He had been entirely focused on becoming one of the Fianna, but now he realized that there was a yearning inside him that could not be satisfied with picking out a few tunes on a harp or singing a marching song.

  “When will I go?”

  “So eager to leave me, then?”

  Oisin shook his head, confused by his own mixed feelings. He was eager for something—the learning, the adventure, to test his own wings. But now he saw it would be hard to leave his father, even though Finn himself had been coming and going through his whole childhood.

  “It’s all right, boy. I am surprised myself at how hard it is to let you go.” Finn’s big arm wrapped around Oisin and drew him into a hard, quick hug. “We’ll make the journey together, once I’m back from this skirmish. And you will keep up your battle practice every day that you are away from us, or I will give each man of the Fianna leave to wallop you into the mud!”

  OISIN WAS FORGETTING his mother. At first it upset him, the way she receded from his memory year by year, and he made songs to cement her in his mind and told himself her story in bed at night. But still their time in the cave began to seem like some fantastic dream rather than a memory, and her face faded and dimmed until he could no longer see her at all.

  Only her voice remained vivid to him. He could hear it in his own singing even after his voice changed and became deep and resonant.

  That was just one of many changes that happened during his five years with Tanai. He had left Almhuin a boy and returned a man, and not just in his broad chest and strong arms. He was steadier in his heart, slower to anger and more sure of his place in the world. The night of his return, after the welcomes and cheering and feasting were done, Finn had walked with him to a lookout point, where they had watched the moon pour silvery light over the bog of Almhuin and talked for long hours. And as the sun was rising, he had held him once more in a father’s embrace and said, “Now, if it is still your desire, you are ready to join with the Fianna. You will be my strong right arm, our champion and our voice. Will you take the challenges and become one of us, my son?”

  “I will, Father.” And Oisin’s heart had swelled with the pride of his accomplishment but even more with the knowledge and warmth of belonging.

  And as the years went by, the more joy and purpose Oisin found in his father’s world, the more distant his mother’s became.

  Oisin Remembers

  So many of my comrades had adventures in the Land of Youth, but I never went there. There were encounters with its people, to be sure. I will never forget that uncanny night four of us spent in a house full of enchantments. It is all a jumble in my head— the giant prodded down the road by that lovely young girl, the ram that stole our portion of meat, the toothless old man who wrestled the ram and threw it out the door, the sweet water that gave Finn such a colic we thought he was like to die from it. A bunch of Sidhe trickery and malice it was, to my mind, but Finn seemed to take some deep lesson from it all—something about truth and lies and strength—and parted from our host the next day with great declarations of friendship from both sides.

  The truth is, I was not looking for a way into Tir na nOg, or to ally with its people. Rather the opposite. I believe now I tried to avoid any path likely to lead there. What had happened to the eager plans I had made as a child? They had faded with my mother’s memory.

  I knew if I found myself in Tir na nOg, I was bound to find her, to save her or die in the attempt. But so much time had passed. How could she even still be living? And what was the Land of Youth to me? A land of phantasms and cruelty, evil druids and appalling loss. A land of ashes. I had no wish to go there.

  Whereas here, in Eire, the ties that held me were strong and clean: my father relied on me, my comrades loved me and I them. I had honor, a growing renown and, one day, the leadership of the Fianna to look forward to. There was no challenge or battle I shied away from in this world. But my mother’s world—that world I turned my face from and pretended not to see.

  TWENTY-THREE

  The once-white strand was blackened and crusted with more hacked and headless bodies than a man could count. How long had they been fighting? It felt like a lifetime ago that the Fianna had made the long march to the strand of Ventry, where the man who dared call himself King of the World had gathered all the enemies of Eire together in one great invasion force. And now it was over. But Oisin could not seem to make his body understand. Every clash of metal and unseen footfall still made him whirl and clutch at his sword.

  Oisin looked out over the heaps of silent dead and clouds of shrieking carrion birds, and understood that all of his battles up to now—against the marauding yellow-haired raiders in their long boats, against the chieftains in Alba or Mona who refused to pay their tribute to the High King—these had all been mere skirmishes and training games.

  Not this. This long, exhausting, heartbreaking war at Ventry was the reason the Fianna were given hunting rights and provisioning by the people in every corner of Eire, the reason they were due their rents and honors from the King. For had ever such a massive fighting force landed on these shores, or been beaten back by so few?

  But the cost was lamentable. Oisin began to number off the comrades who had fallen: Cael, Fidach, Dubhan, the sons of Baiscne and the son of Cuban of Munster…So many heroes gone, and with them hundreds of their men. In the end the Fianna had triumphed over the best warriors of the world—but there was hardly a man of them left to enjoy the spoils of victory.

  The thunder that had rumbled at the edges of the sky all morning at last released a spattering of rain. Oisin squinted through the drizzle, beyond the filth on the beach to the cruel, endless beauty of the ocean beyond. Then he turned his back on all of it and limped off to find his father. The bodies could wait; they’d be none the worse for the rain.

  SEVEN MEN AND A handful of dogs made their way silently through the shredding mist of a chill dawn. Loch Lein hid under a silvery blanket, its reedy shores ghostly, but already the first fingers of the sun were probing at the mist, making it rise in thin streamers from its bed and then waft away. All around them, the m
arshy border of the lake was loud with the voices of water birds waking up and calling to the day.

  It had been a long winter, thought Oisin, and they were all glad to be out on the land hunting together. Though his father’s new wife had done her best to keep his spirits up, Finn had often been downhearted and brooding in the dark months after the battle of Ventry. But it was hard to be downhearted in the sunrise of a new spring; at least it was for Oisin. He had never lost his childhood love for the wild woodlands, and he remembered now, listening to the invisible chorus in the air, the time Finn had asked them all what music they found best. Conan Maol, a man whose intelligence began and ended with his muscles, had answered, “The sound of playing at games,” and Diarmid, predictably, had said he liked best the sound of talk with a woman. But Oisin’s reply came to him like a poem, “The music of the woods is best to me: the sound of the wind and of the cuckoo and blackbird, and the sweet silence of the crane.”

  Which was true enough for this world. But of course there was another music that haunted his dreams: the sound of Sive singing.

  Conan, leading the way, came to such an abrupt halt that Caoilte bumped into him. The look on his face soon stilled their protests: slack-jawed and rigid, he was oblivious to dogs and men alike. And then, as if suddenly slapped awake, he pointed dramatically into the silvery mist and breathed, “Is it asleep and dreaming I am, or is the most beautiful woman that ever graced any world coming to us from over the lake?”

  Oisin saw her white horse first, its gold trappings catching the rising sun in gleams and glints of light. And then she herself emerged from the swirling mist, and for a long, held breath his heart forgot to beat.

  Oisin Remembers

  I had thought I knew what beauty was, until Niamh came floating into my sight. She was radiance itself, beyond the words to tell. I remember her cloak was indigo silk with golden stars, as if cut from a clear evening sky, and it drifted down so long it covered her horse as well as herself.

  I was pierced with a hopeless longing just to be near her. Surely we all were. It filled me with despair, for how could a perfect creation like her wish to spend any time at all with the likes of us? Yet her eyes—a blue to drown in, those eyes—were not remote or contemptuous. They were filled with invitation— lively, mischievous and gentle all at the one time. And they were looking straight at me.

  THE MOMENT HE SAW Niamh’s gaze fall on Oisin, Finn knew how it would be. He had always known his son would go back to the Undying Lands, but he had thought it would be in search of Sive. And then the years unrolled, and Finn saw how Oisin’s memory of his mother grew dim, and how he did not seek to return but grew ever more rooted in his mortal life, and he began to wonder if his son might stay with him after all.

  Not now. He would lose Oisin to this stunning woman, and fair play to him. Finn remembered all too well how it was when he first looked upon Sive. He would have cut off his own foot to stop her tears. And perhaps, after all, this road might lead Oisin to his mother as well. Hope and loss made such a complicated pain in Finn’s breast that it took him a while to realize that Niamh had pulled her lovely eyes away from his son’s face and was addressing him.

  “It is long my journey was, King of the Fianna.” Her voice was low and sweet, full of sympathy as if she understood his struggle. “I am Niamh of the Golden Head, daughter of Manannan, the King of the land Underwave.”

  “What was it brought you to us, Queen?” asked Finn politely, though he already knew.

  “It is I have given my love and affection to your own son, Oisin of the strong hands.” Niamh cut her eyes to Oisin, who had not once torn away his own, and then resolutely turned back to Finn. There was a right way to go about this sort of thing, thought Finn wryly, and she meant to follow it.

  “Though there is many a king’s son and high prince gave me his love, I never consented to any of them until I set my love on Oisin.”

  And just like that, it was done. Oisin shouldered forward and professed his readiness to walk through fire and ocean for her sake, and she gave him a long and pretty speech about the wonders of her land and the joys and honors that awaited him in Tir na nOg, if only he would come and be her husband, but he had no need of her persuasions. He would, Finn thought, have gone with her to live at the bottom of a well.

  OISIN WALKED UP TO his father like a man in a dream. He knew well they were not likely to meet again for many years. What words could a man find for such a farewell?

  For the first time, he noticed that Finn was aging. Strong and vital still, yes. But age knocked at his door, in the lines around the eyes, the thickness in the waist. The white-blond hair was gray at the temples. Could it be true, he wondered, that he himself would not fade? He had thought only about the joys of living with his love. Now he tried to think about living forever.

  Too much. Think now about Finn, and the Fianna, and the love that bound them together.

  His father held him in a tight embrace. “Be happy, my son.” His voice was husky with emotion. “Remember, you are born to that place. It is your home, as much as this world.”

  Finn released him, but bade him wait. He fumbled in his kit and then pressed something into Oisin’s hands. His craneskin bag. Oisin looked at Finn in surprise. That bag was one of Finn’s great treasures. Full of many magical and useful items at high tide, at low tide it would be empty.

  “This belonged to Niamh’s father, Manannan, long ago,” said Finn. “It may please him to have it back. He is a powerful king, a man to have as your ally.”

  Oisin swallowed, overcome with the enormity of what he was doing, and at the same time in an agony to join Niamh, as if she might vanish away in an instant of inattention.

  Finn pulled him to his breast one last time. “Don’t worry, lad. Maighneis is a good woman; she’ll look after me.” He held Oisin then at arm’s length, his eyes bright and commanding, and said at last the words that had been in both their minds: “You will seek word of your mother and help her if you are able?”

  Oisin stood straight and proud, for one last time a champion of the Fianna. “Upon my oath, I will.”

  “Your word is the best surety any man could have.” Finn nodded, his eyes lingering over his son. “Go now, lad, before your Lady grows tired of waiting.”

  The horse was slender, but it seemed hardly to feel the weight as Oisin sprang into the saddle behind Niamh. They turned west and flew swift as an arrow toward the sea.

  Oisin Remembers

  None who know me ever doubted my courage, but if I had been alone on that horse I would have flung myself off before we ever approached Tir na nOg. For when we reached the headland bordering the western sea, the horse waded into the surging foam, gave a loud, ringing neigh, and plunged into the ocean! Yet it seemed he was galloping, not swimming, and we skimmed over the tops of the waves while the strangest sights appeared and passed behind us. I saw sunny palaces and strong fortresses rise out of the foam, hunters and hounds, and once a girl with a golden apple in one hand riding alongside us. And we rode on until the sky darkened and the sea was as if in flames from the sun falling into it, and then we passed through a black storm.

  But daybreak brought a calm sea and a bright sky, and then we came to a delightful country, just as Niamh had promised, the trees in full blossom and smooth green plains, and a king’s dun that was so much grander than anything I had seen in our world that I had no fitting word to describe it. I saw houses of every color, and palaces of shining stones and crystal, and an army of handsome men and an equal number of lovely young girls coming out to meet us with glad cries.

  And Niamh laughed at my amazement, and teased me. “Did I not describe it to you, just so?” she asked. “It was not lies I was spinning but the plain truth. And you will have long life without sickness here with me, and you yourself will be young forever.”

  THE KING WHO CAME out to greet them was as youthful as Niamh herself, yet she introduced him as her father, Manannan mac Lir.

  “A warm welcome
to you, Oisin mac Finn,” he said. “It is glad I am to receive you here, for your renown and that of your father is well known to our people. And come with me now, that you can be refreshed from your long journey, and we can speak together.”

  Manannan led them through many beautiful rooms and halls, until they entered a large, bright room with a jewelled throne and many richly carved and cushioned chairs. He motioned Oisin and Niamh to sit, and warm scented water was brought to bathe their hands and faces, and bowls of honey-sweet fruit and tall goblets of cool ale. And while they were drinking away the thirst of their long travels, Niamh told her father that she had set her heart upon Oisin, and that he had come to Tir na nOg to marry her.

  The purple plum Manannan was putting to his lips stopped in the air, and he regarded his daughter with, Oisin thought, barely disguised surprise. She held his gaze, and it seemed to Oisin that unspoken words passed between them, for at last the plum continued on its journey, and Manannan nodded at them both as he chewed and swallowed. Finally he favored them both with a broad smile.

  “Well, well, it’s a wedding feast then that we are planning! You are an honored man, my son, for my daughter has not been one to choose men lightly.”

  “I am honored, indeed, my lord.” If there was ever a time to make a good impression, that time was now, thought Oisin, and he summoned all his eloquence. “For she is my star and my shining one. Were all the women of all worlds gathered before me, it is she alone would hold my heart. And,” he added, “as you know of my good name, you will know that I have never broken my word, and that though I am a man angry in warfare, I am gentle in peace. With me she will have kindness, along with my love.”

  Oisin rose to his feet and pulled the craneskin bag from under his cloak. As he drew it forth, it grew heavy and bulging, filling with its treasures. He walked forward to Manannan’s throne, knelt and presented the bag.

  “My father charged me to return this to you. It has been in his keeping these many years, and he sends it now with his high esteem.”