The Faithful Heart

by MacMurrough, Sorcha

  But Ruairc had been keeping a close eye on Morgana, and already had his mount saddled and waiting. He crept behind her as she went into the stables, and then waited for a few moments after she left before climbing up onto the back of his steed.

  Then Ruairc followed Morgana down the road, but the fog made her nearly invisible, though he could hear the footfalls of her horse clearly.

  They rode thus for several miles, until Morgana grew certain she was being followed, and stopped her horse in a clump of trees. Using all her strength she lashed her reins around and managed to drag a fallen log onto the road, and as Ruairc dismounted to remove the barrier, she crept out from behind a tree and put her sword to his back.

  “Turn around, slowly,” Morgana demanded, and then reprimanded Ruairc. “Why on earth did you follow me? You could have been killed just now!”

  “Surely you could have guessed I would follow you, to make sure you were safe, if not to talk to you, to try to get you to change your mind,” Ruairc laughed bitterly.

  “You were meant to be escorting Aofa and Mary! Now who will take them?” Morgana chided.

  “Matthew and some of the other villages are going to get supplies with the money you left them, so they agreed to go all the way to Dublin with the ladies, and see them safely to the Fitzhughs' house,” Ruairc informed her.

  Slightly mollified, Morgana put up her sword, and they both removed the tree from the road.

  “I was right, you are a sword-wielding nun,” Ruairc teased, hoping to cheer her slightly.

  “I don’t like this fog,” Morgana muttered. "An ill wind is blowing, you mark my words."

  “It’s all coming off the lough shore, so perhaps once we get a bit further east, it will clear,” Ruairc said hopefully.

  They rode on in silence until Ruairc could restrain himself no longer, and said, “Please, Morgana, I can’t help the feeling that you are hiding something from me. That you're in some sort of serious trouble. I wish you would confide in me. Can’t you tell me why, when things seemed to be going so well, you suddenly decided to go back to the convent? It just doesn’t make sense.”

  “Ruairc, you promised me you would accept my decision. Finn and Patrick are home now, and they will do what has to be done. My duties at Lisleavan are finished,” Morgana said firmly.

  “You seem so anxious to be rid of me as well. Do you really mistrust me so much, Morgana?” he asked resentfully.

  “Please, Ruairc, stop this, now. This is exactly why I tried to creep away from Lisleavan. I haven’t got all the answers yet, don’t you see? But in the convent I shall have time to think and reflect on all that has happened, and then I can make some decisions about the future. I’m not certain about my vows, or the investiture as heir, or our love for each other. Only in the fullness of time will some of these problems be resolved.

  “You promised you wouldn’t rush me. I want you to go to Dublin, and as soon as I am sure, I will send word to you, I promise.”

  “If you are certain you aren’t going to take your vows, then I must be content with your suggestion,” Ruairc grumbled.

  “I swear to you, Ruairc, I am not going to become a nun while you are away,” Morgana said reassuringly.

  Suddenly Ruairc glanced around. “Riders coming, a lot of them!”

  “And just when we need it most the fog is lifting,” Morgana complained, as she looked back and saw several men in green and brown jerkins riding towards them full tilt.

  “Ride on ahead. I’ll hold them off at this pass in the woods,” Ruairc urged, as he pulled his weapon out of its scabbard.

  “Don’t be silly,” Morgana scolded, drawing her own sword. “There must be at least eight, maybe ten!I’m not going to leave you."

  “Damn it, Morgana for once in your life do as you are told!” Ruairc barked, as he swatted her horse’s rump viciously with the flat of his sword.

  Morgana had to cling on desperately as Darkie leapt underneath her and began to tear down the road at a breakneck pace.

  She tried to rein the frightened animal in, but even as she halted and struggled to turn the steed, she could hear the clash of swords. Morgana headed for the trees and rode around the melee, until she came up behind two of the horsemen waiting in reserve. Spurring her mount into a gallop, she stabbed the man on her right in the back, before switching the sword to her left hand to deliver a swishing back hand cut which split the other soldier’s belly open.

  Morgana kicked another man waiting on the ground out of her way as she rode straight towards Ruairc, who was valiantly fighting off two men with his dagger and sword. A sweeping cut with her sword beheaded another man standing on the grassy bank, and then she battled with another attacker on horseback, rising up in her stirrups to raise the sword high for a deadly blow to the man’s neck.

  Morgana moved towards the next assailant, but suddenly felt herself being dragged out of her saddle from behind. She clung to her sword and crossed the weapon over her body, stabbing her would-be captor in the side.

  Morgana could feel herself falling from her horse's back. Pushing off with one hand, she tumbled safely to the ground, on her feet, ready to do battle again. She reached up to grab the man nearest her by his chain shirt and yanked him out of the saddle, before neatly cutting his throat with her sword.

  At last she made her way to Ruairc, who was wounded in the arm and shoulder, but still on his horse. She pulled one of his attackers onto the ground, and smashed her elbow into his mouth as she stabbed down with her sword and dispatched him quickly.

  Ruairc fell from his horse just then, and Morgana moved quickly to defend him. The other mercenary dismounted, and circled the pair angrily.

  “No harm is going to come to you, my employer just wants to talk,” he said in English.

  “If your employer is Dermot MacMahon, then we have nothing to say to each other, and he shouldn’t have decided to send eight armed men after me for this little chat,” Morgana panted, as she raised her sword up to defend herself from the man’s thrust.

  Ruairc, though winded, was able to rise. Morgana was just about to finish off her opponent when she felt a stinging blow to her leg, and saw the man whom she had charged with her horse preparing for another strike.

  Morgana swung her blade wildly, but was able to make contact with her assailant’s belly before her leg collapsed under her.

  Though winded and desperately gasping for breath as the pain rocketed through her, Morgana managed to roll out of the way of the first assailant’s weapon. Stabbing upwards, she skewered him with her sword, and grimaced as the dead body fell on top of her.

  “Morgana, good lord! You’re hurt!” Ruairc said, sounding as if he was far away, as he pulled the corpse off her to examine her wounds.

  “Your leg, it’s very bad,” he panted, as he took in the gaping wound which ran almost the full length of her leg from hip to knee.

  Just then Ruairc heard a cart on the road, and taking his sword, he waited behind a tree.

  A young woman was driving the cart, and looking around her at the corpses in dismay.

  Ruairc ran to the fork in the road, and she screamed.

  "Nay, my lady, I would ask for your help, beg for help please. I’ve got a wounded woman here. Do you live anywhere nearby?” he asked desperately.

  “I live at the inn up in the pass through the hills. We can be there in a few minutes if we hurry,” the girl replied calmly, though she was looking around her in dismay.

  Ruairc picked up Morgana and ran to the waiting cart, where he laid her down gently in the back, and climbed up beside her.

  “Ruairc, am I going to die?” Morgana murmured dazedly, as the loss of blood made her lightheaded and drowsy.

  “No, Morgana, I’m not going to let you. Just hold on to my hand. Don’t let go.We’ll be in an inn soon. I’ll look after you. I won’t let anything happen to you, a stor, do you understand?”

  “I’m sorry, it’s because of me that this all happened,” Morgana sighed.

>   “You saved my life, you silly girl!If you hadn’t come back to help me, I’d have been killed,” Ruairc whispered as he hugged her limp body to him.

  “I love you, Ruairc, I always have,” Morgana confessed as she felt herself slip slowly into darkness.

  “Morgana! Morgana!” Ruairc pleaded, but she was slipping into unconsciousness.

  “I love you too. I won’t let you die,” he vowed solemnly.

  The journey to the inn seemed to take forever, but at last the girl jumped down and flung open the front door, then gathered up sheets from a linen cupboard before showing Ruairc a room he could use for Morgana.

  “I’ll get hot water and a knife, and a needle and thread,” she said knowingly, after a glance at the wound. Ruairc peeled off the trunk hose and noted with relief that though the blood was flowing, it wasn’t gushing in huge spurts.

  His companion, who introduced herself as Anna, leaned on Morgana’s hip as Ruairc instructed, while he swabbed away the blood with a cloth gently to expose the mouth of the wound.

  “I’m going to have to seal it,” he muttered.

  The girl nodded.

  “I’ll get some brandy, and we can pour some into her before you start,” Anna said hurriedly as she ran below to the bar where the liquors were kept.

  When Anna returned with the flagon of spirits, Ruairc shook his head. “She’s out cold. I think I need that drink more than she does,” Ruairc said shakily as he took a hefty swig from the bottle to steady his nerves.

  Morgana was blissfully unconscious, but with the blood still flowing this was also a bad sign, so Ruairc knew he had to act quickly.

  “I’m going to tie her legs to the bed posts, and if you could sit on her chest, that should work,” Ruairc instructed, as he stoked the fire with the bellows and put the knife, cleansed with brandy, into the glowing embers.

  When he was sure the knife was hot enough, Ruairc wiped the wound site once more, and then said, “Ready.”

  The stench of burning flesh, and the howl of Morgana’s agonised groans seemed to fill the tiny room as Ruairc laboured to stop the bleeding.

  At last it was over. Heheaved a shaky sigh as she fell back on the pillows, unconscious but still alive.

  “Do you have some old bread and mustard?” Ruairc asked the young woman.

  Anna went down to the kitchen to make a poultice for the wound to draw the poisons out. Ruairc dreaded the possibility of infection, and knew in his heart that by rights most physicians would have taken off the entire leg rather than risk the wound festering.

  But Ruairc knew he could never have brought himself to allow that to happen to his beloved Morgana.

  So he stripped off her bloodstained tunic and pulled her shirt down over her thighs, before tucking her into the bed with as many blankets as he could find. Then he banked up the fire, and ordered a posset of milk and wine and herbs to be made.

  “Is there anyone else here besides yourself?” Ruairc asked.

  “They’ve all gone off to the market, and probably won’t be back until tomorrow. There’s just my father and two brothers anyway.”

  “Well, Anna, when one of them does come back, we will have to get a message to the convent at Kilgarven, to explain what has happened and ask for some remedies.”

  “Sir, you’re doing the best you can, really. Father was in the wars in France and he’s told me all about the wounds he was cured of. The poultices and posset and the hot knife are the best you can do, though if the wound does fester, we might also try maggots.”

  Ruairc wrinkled his nose in disgust, but Anna said quickly, “Father swore he saw it work. I’ll try to find you some.”

  The girl went about her chores in the inn, and Ruairc was left alone to nurse Morgana.

  The hours ticked passed, but as Morgana’s cheeks became fiery red, and she started to mumble deliriously, Ruairc knew his worst fears had been realised.

  “She’s burning up,” Anna observed, when she came in to bring him some supper.

  “I know. Have you managed to find those maggots?”

  “I have them right here,” she said as she held out a small bowl, and then moved to clean the old poultice off the leg.

  “We have to put them all along the wound, like this, and then bind the leg loosely with some cloth,” Anna explained as she worked. “We can check it in the morning, and see what it looks like then. I’ll also bring you some brandy to bathe her in.”

  “Bathe her in it?” Ruairc repeated in astonishment.

  “It will reduce your wife’s fever, cool the skin. I'll fetch some now.” The girl smiled, and left the room before Ruairc had a chance to correct her assumption about their relationship to one another.

  She brought him some fresh cloths and a flask of spirits a short time later, and then shut the door behind her. Ruairc cleared his throat a few times, but finally with shaking fingers he stripped the shirt from Morgana’s sweat-soaked body, and bathed her from head to toe, avoiding only her injured right leg. He tried to concentrate on his nursing duties, but the sight of her naked was more lovely than he had ever dared imagine, and he knew the vision of her laying on the bed was one which would haunt him forever.

  Morgana murmured incoherently as he rubbed her body with long strokes form head to toe.

  Ruairc watched her in an agony of suspense for any sign of improvement.

  Finally at about midnight, Morgana seemed to grow calmer, and her breathing was less laboured. She opened her eyes for a few moments, and saw Ruairc was by her side.

  “I thought I was dead. I felt you, but I couldn’t make you hear me,” Morgana whispered, so that Ruairc had to strain to catch the words.

  “What did you want to tell me, Morgana, a stor ?” he asked as he stroked her face lovingly

  “I’m sorry, I wasn’t running away from you, Ruairc. I wanted you to get away to safety. You could have been killed because of me. Once it was safe I would have sent for you, and asked if you could forgive me, and if you still wished to be married,” Morgana confessed.

  “When you love someone, a thaisce, the question of forgiveness doesn’t even arise. We both have a lot to be sorry for so far as the other is concerned, but I've never stopped loving you.

  “Of course I still want to marry you. It's been my only wish ever since you were old enough to be a bride. I could have married you at twelve, but I wanted to wait. After all, ten years can be a big difference in age. I have loved you all these years, ever since Aunt Agatha was widowed and went to join the convent, and your father was kind enough to take me in and foster me along with Finn and Patrick.

  “I can’t say I wasn’t angry and disappointed that you lied to me about wanting to go back to Kilgarven, but I thank you for your concern for my safety, even if you did put me through inexpressible torments making me think I had lost you again.” Ruairc smiled lovingly, as he kissed her feverish brow.

  “I’m sorry, Ruairc, I won’t ever lie to you again,” Morgana murmured, before sleep finally claimed her.

  Ruairc, exhausted after his many nights tending the sick at Lisleavan, and now having to look after Morgana, began to doze in the chair.

  Anna slipped into the room quietly, and said, “Really, sir, you must get some sleep. She seems to be out of danger. I did send that message for you, by the way, but there’s been no reply.”

  “It doesn’t matter now. She’s going to get well, I’m sure,” Ruairc said with a tired smile.

  “Lie down for just a few minutes, then,” Anna coaxed.

  against Ruairc’s better judgment, he stripped down to his shirt, and lay beside Morgana in the bed. He reasoned fuzzily that he was too weary to take advantage of her nearness, and in any case, if he slept with one arm around her waist, he would waken if she did need something in the middle of the night. So he slipped between the covers, and curled up against Morgana’s naked form for warmth.

  It seemed to Ruairc that he had only been asleep for a minute when the door was opened and Aunt Agatha swept into th
e room.

  “Ruairc MacMahon!” she exclaimed when she saw him in bed with Morgana. With a freezing glance, she turned on her heel and stalked out again.

  Morgana also opened her eyes, and groaned when she looked down and saw her own nakedness, and realised what Aunt Agatha had been so outraged about.

  “Ruairc, how could you!Now my virtue has been completely compromised. Or was that what you intended all along? To ruin my reputation so the convent won't have me back, and no one would want to marry me but yourself?” Morgana accused, before falling back on the pillows wearily as her head began to spin.