Callan looked at his friend crossly. “Breandán is a commoner by birth and now a noble by luck. If he returns with that wine-bag infidel Northman, he will have proved my point ten fold—that he is still common, and knows naught about mature noble issues such as plotting waylays and warfare.”
“You are right, Sire,” Fergus stated sarcastically. “War is a very mature undertaking.”
Callan glanced sideways at his advisor, but before he could say a word in defense, Fergus leaned forward and pointed. “Do you see that?”
Callan peered out between the merlons of the battlements, seeing a distant flicker of light at the top of the next rolling hill. It was just a single torch at first, and then there were two. Then three. Four, five, six… Many torches were lit in succession, surrounding the area of Dún na hAbhann.
“What is he doing?” Callan sneered.
Fergus almost smiled at the mental strategy Dægan was creating. “‘Tis a head count. He is letting you know how many men he boasts. From the looks of it, his army must be colossal in numbers, or I doubt he would go to this much trouble for only a few hundred.”
Callan was mesmerized by the growing chain of torches illuminating his countryside, and once the entire horizon from southeast to west was lit, another long row behind that one was also lit, doubling the intent to intimidate him. If that were not enough, a third row appeared soon after.
Callan began to sweat nervously. “He is toying with me. He is just lighting torches staked in the ground to make it look like an enormous army, so that I will grow weary and surrender! Ignorant fool! He can light them all night, for all I care!”
Fergus remained silent, unwilling to dismiss Dægan’s tactic as just a simple game of intimidation. He estimated three hundred so far and still, the torches were formulating, one by one. “Correct me if I am wrong, but those torches are moving closer to us.”
“Nay, ‘tis simply your eyes playing with you now.”
Fergus shook his head adamantly. “Watch them. Every so often they take a step forward, and not one at a time, but as a group. This is no game, Sire. He has at least five hundred in his command…maybe more. I have lost count.”
“Are you certain?”
Fergus turned toward his king, a sound much like a scoff erupting first from his mouth. “If you believed this man wanted not a single scrap of payment for annihilating your enemies, think again. He is coming for his due right now…which I would guess is your daughter.”
Callan fumed. “Then let him try! I will not bargain with this sea rat!”
“Perhaps you should hear his terms,” Fergus evoked wisely. “They may not be as painful as losing Dún na hAbhann over a few silver coins.”
Callan clenched his jaw. “I will not give this man the hair off my freckled arse! Rally the men and prepare the archers!”
“As you wish,” Fergus mumbled habitually. “But ‘twould be better for all of Dún na hAbhann, myself included, if your presence within the stronghold was undeterminable.”
Callan stared, dismayed with what Fergus wanted. “I will not hide away in my chambers like a coward, if that is what you had in mind.”
“Call it an elusive strategy, if you will, but I suggest you should do to him what he is doing to you,” Fergus explained. “Keep him guessing, or at the least force him to use careful consideration in his assault. He wants his wife—pardon…your daughter. And I doubt he is willing to risk her well-being for the sake of bringing you down, especially if he has consummated the marriage and rooted a child within her. As much as you loathe that thought, you should at least use it to your advantage. With the size of his army and the number of torches he flaunts in your face, he can burn this whole timbered fort to the ground in a matter of minutes. But if he knows not the exact whereabouts of you or your daughter within, he will be more apt to scale the walls with precision instead of devastation and chaos. I beg you, Sire. Make not this easy for him! Stay with your daughter in the keep!”
****
Callan was none too pleased with the advice Fergus had given him, for he was not normally inclined to hiding himself away while his fort weathered an attack, nor was he ready to put himself near his daughter so soon. In truth, he loved Mara very much and wanted to keep her safe, but he couldn’t dismiss what she had done.
Marrying a Northman!
To ease his mind about her safe keeping without having to dwell in close proximity to her, he locked Mara in her own chambers, ordering two guards at her door. For his own security, he ordered another two at his solar, and entered alone.
The room was quiet and dimly lit by a few torches on corresponding walls, leaving the four corners of the solar shadowed and the center quite forlorn. In knowing the room by heart, he strolled to the table near the unlit hearth to settle his shambled nerves with a good long drink of mead.
He poured the honeyed brew as if his chalice were larger, spilling most out of carelessness, and lifted the cup to his lips in the same reckless manner. He slammed the silver cup down when it was empty and wiped his bearded chin of the residual droplets, before pouring another.
Suddenly, from beside him in the shadows, a figure of a man calmly stepped forward. Callan’s reaction was not as polished as the intruder’s, for he stumbled against the leg of the table to get away.
Callan unsheathed his sword in a fumbled haste, but not soon enough, for the stranger’s sword point was already inches from his throat, held in decisive restraint. The king gawked at the man—a statuesque sort of fellow—for his face was stern and confident, and his sword arm was assuredly steady. The point never faltered from beneath his chin.
Callan’s face turned from a reflective stun to a souring grimace. “Ah, I finally get to meet the sea rover himself. I have heard so much about you. How you journeyed for days on end just to save my crown from treachery—from your own twin, I have been told. Dægan, is it?”
“Forgive me if I fail to share in your enthusiasm,” Dægan said rather softly, cocking his head. “As you can imagine, I am a bit tired from all my labors.”
“Thieving does that to a man.”
A grin befell Dægan’s lips. “You should know.”
A rush of confusion swept over the king as he examined the sizeable man more closely, still unable to decipher his comment. “How did you get in here?”
“How I got in here is not as important as how I leave. I can leave just as quietly as I came—or we can clash in fierce battle. But before you make a desperate attempt to shout to the two guards outside your door, I encourage you to put these thoughts into your head. Your mighty Dún na hAbhann has been breached without your knowing and I assure you, I make not a habit of traveling into hostile territory alone. With that in mind, you should know that every loyal son of Dún na hAbhann is looking death in the eye as we speak, yet they are totally unaware of the tragedy they face. With one word, they could be massacred before their next breath. However, I would just as soon not give that word, as I am gravely wounded myself. Keeping this as gentlemanly as possible is in everyone’s best interest.” Dægan’s face was straight and cold as he continued. “Twice, I have been courteous enough to warn you—now—as well as outside your palisade. Surely, your own men deserve the same respect.”
“You call hundreds of torches a respectful warning?”
“Who would have thought advancing sticks of fire could be so bloody distractive? Now, I am assuming your response is that of favoring your men’s lives, so if you would be so kind, Sire, sheath your sword and give it to me, belt and all.”
If the king had any thought of calling the Northman’s bluff, the invading tip of his sword was enough to discourage the idea rather quickly, so much so, that a subsequent verbal reminder from Dægan was unnecessary. Callan reluctantly shoved his weapon back into its casing and began removing his belt from his waist.
“You will never leave here alive!” Callan growled, before slapping his belongings into Dægan’s outstretched hand.
****
&nb
sp; Dægan disregarded the king’s threat, and kept his eyes tame as he backed up to the double solar doors, pulling each lever to the center and shoving the iron bolts into the ceiling and floor boreholes. As a double precaution, he also took a remnant slack of chain from his waist that he had found on his way in, and wrapped it quietly around the door latches.
“Your blacksmith is quite a drunkard, as he leaves his goods lying about,” Dægan said impassively, strolling back toward the king. “But I must say, an expert craftsman.”
“Spare me the flattery! You came here not for ironwares! What do you want?”
Dægan thinly smiled and took an encroaching step forward, forcing the king to back away from his sword point and into the chair behind him. The chair slid slightly as Callan fell into the seat.
“You know what I want,” Dægan said flatly.
“You cannot have her!”
“I think you are not in a position to make that claim.”
“I can as long as there is breath in me!” Callan snarled hatefully.
“And I came here not with the intention of ridding the breath from your noble lungs.” Dægan sheathed his sword forcefully, hearing the small clatter of beads from the dangling crucifix at his waist, reminding him of Nevan’s careful reflection and patience, and the importance of emulating the same. “So perhaps, we can talk as men. You and I, king and chieftain, Celt and Fionnghall.”
“For what purpose?”
Dægan took a seat directly across from the king and laid the man’s weapon on the wooden floor at his left. “For amends, of course. I promised Mara I would.”
Callan almost burst into laughter. “Amends! How can you possibly think I will come to terms with you stealing my daughter and marrying her without my consent?”
“I have done no such thing,” Dægan said coolly.
“You deny your crimes, you pompous bastard?” Callan erupted heatedly. “Did you not take her from this land and shepherd her to yours?”
“Aye, I did.”
“Did you not marry her under Irish witnesses?”
“As well,” Dægan said. “I have done all you say, but none of it was done to your daughter.”
Callan narrowed his eyes to hateful slits. “What?”
“If I wished to gain consent for Mara’s hand by her father, ‘twould not be gotten from you. I would need to go elsewhere for that, would I not?”
Callan swallowed hard, words barely coming to mind. “Who are you?”
“No one of relevance, I assure you. But let me remind you, who you are.”
Dægan put his booted foot under the table and shoved the wooden chest forward into the king’s view.
Callan’s face dropped as his eyes poured over the familiar carved box. He tried desperately to evade any emotions affiliated with it, concealing his knowledge of the peculiar coffer. “And what would this be, Fionnghall? A bribe for my daughter’s hand, perhaps?”
“I know you would like to see me upon my knees pouring riches over your ankles, but my intentions this night will lack the openhanded endowment you are accustomed to. I know who you are, and I know the man you wronged ten years ago. He was the owner of this chest, the man who wished to end the feud between the two of you—the feud that started over one woman—yet you stabbed him and left him for dead. Nonetheless, I am curious as to why you raised his daughter as your own? I cannot possibly fathom why a greedy sovereign, like yourself, would find fulfillment in another king’s bastard child, especially a female whose inheritance will stay amongst her own kinsman. What is there to gain?”
Callan sat frozen, foraging on the Northman’s purpose for bringing the past to light after more than twenty years. No one, not even his own betrothed’s father knew of her pregnancy at the time of their marriage. With rising upheaval of the neighboring clans, Callan thought it in the best interest of his name and his powerful reign to keep her scandalous affair a secret and declare that her growing womb was from his consummated seed. But how could this foreigner know differently, much less know the intricate details of the ill-fated death of his wife’s lover?
“Where did you get this chest?” Callan asked skeptically.
Dægan grabbed the ewer from the table and refilled Callan’s chalice with mead for his own nagging thirst. “Your nemesis gave it to me. Your wife’s first and only love.”
“You lie!”
Dægan boldly lifted the chalice to his own lips, taking a long drink before replying, “What you thought to be a fatal injury to his heart, turned out to be only a deep flesh wound of his shoulder, giving him enough time to make it back to the ports of Gaillimh with quite an interesting tale to tell on his death bed.”
“He aimed to kill me!” Callan spurted defensively. “I was merely defending myself!”
Dægan lifted his brow and poured another full cup for himself. “Really? From what? Fine silk thread and glass beads?”
“Mock me not, Fionnghall! At the time, there was no way for me to know the contents of that chest. Threatening words were spoken between us and swords were drawn, his being first!”
“Now you lie,” Dægan reprimanded. “When he came to me, his fridrbond was tightly secured around his sword. He never drew his weapon, nor did you give him the chance.”
Callan smiled callously as if a flattering compliment had kindly passed his way. “And what summoning of my peerage is going to believe you? Need I remind you that the majority of my kin are all fighting, as we speak, to rid men such as you from our shores. Our Baile Átha Cliath! You have put our Erin lands under your rape for more than a century, and we shall stand for it no longer, nor will I let you threaten me with wasted stories of the past!”
“Care to eat those words?”
“With what?” Callan provoked staunchly. “A spoon made of that fool’s bones?”
Dægan snuffed the grisly image from his mind and spoke restrictively behind a locked jaw. “I hardly find humor in that and I would not think Mara would either, once she is told who her real father is.”
“Yet without those bones, she will never know, will she?”
Dægan leaned across the table and gripped Callan by the throat, scowling into the king’s smug face above his clenched hand. “You truly disgust me,” Dægan said, holding back a fiery temper. “And to think, I thought higher of you for raising a child on your own, albeit ‘twas a stolen child.”
“He had every opportunity to claim Mara and he never did!”
“He never knew!” Dægan shouted, lifting the king from his chair and shoving him back against the wall, his own weight pressing firmly against him. “He believed as everyone else did that Mara was yours! I assure you, had he known, he would have stormed this fort like a mad man!”
“Oh, he knew! But he only came back when it benefited him to take away the child he had rooted in my wife! He only brought the chest as a means to trade quietly, before he could set to ruining me, thereafter, with gossip.”
Dægan shook his head. “He knew naught of a child!”
Callan’s mind whirled into the dark depths of his tumultuous past. “Just a moment!” Callan exclaimed huskily beneath the Northman’s iron grip. “If he truly never knew he had a child when he died, how would you come to know of it?”
Dægan slowly released the king and stepped back, letting him brood a bit longer on the underlying question. There was no doubt Callan was on to him and thus, coming apart in the small silence that followed. Dægan was all too satisfied with the king’s torment to end it so quickly. He only smiled.
Callan pounced back into Dægan’s space, his fists tightly woven. “Tell me, you worthless thug! How could you know?”
Dægan looked down the length of his nose at the tortured Irishman and raised a single derisive brow. “I said he was dying, but I never said he died.”
Callan’s eyes erratically changed from a hard-sunken realization to a bolstering fire of rage. “You conniving bastard!”
Callan dove for his sword on the floor, but Dægan, not in
any hurry, drew his sword and casually turned it on the kneeling king who was still fumbling with the leather strap Dægan had purposely made sure to secure around the hilt before he laid it to the floor.
“The taste of irony is closely to that of bile, is it not, Callan? How does it feel to know you are hopelessly close to death with your fridrbond intact, Sire?”
Callan saw the shiny broadsword inches from his neck, and in raving frustration he tossed his entangled sword and scabbard across the room. “You will hang for this! You will not walk out of here with anyone believing you!”
Dægan swiftly grabbed the king’s lavishly embroidered tunic and slammed him back against the wall. He strung his fingers into Callan’s dark hair, forcing to expose his tender royal throat beneath a well-whetted iron. “I needn’t anyone to believe me, save you! And now that you know Mara’s father lives and breathes, these are my terms!” Dægan proclaimed in a huskily laden voice. “You will release the dear sweet Lady Mara to me. And her father—blood father—promises never to set foot on your lands ever again! He also vows to keep your despicable secret, a secret. Mara shall never know you are the shrewd weasel you are, and in turn, you get to keep your good name. She shall leave with me a happy, grateful, loving daughter, since you— the generous parent—will have granted me full consent as her loyal and notably merciful husband. Whereby you also get to keep the respect and admiration she unconditionally and ever so blindly, bestows upon you. Should you not agree to these terms,” Dægan added with a gentle gruffness, “you will have surely declared war on me as well as Mara’s father, and I should lay emphasis on the term war, for if you look out upon your countryside, you will not find compassion there.”
“Your terms are rather slanted, Fionnghall!”
Dægan jerked Callan’s head further back and pushed the tip dangerously under his jaw. “My terms are what they are! So what say you?”
Callan breathed heavier and faster now, feeling no surrender by the sword at his neck. “I have not much choice, now, do I?”
“In every decision, there is a choice. Make yours well.”
The Emerald Isle Trilogy Boxed Set Page 32
