“Eh, that will do fine, I am thinking. Thank you, the both of you. Why, Mariota, it’s exhausted you look. Come now, and I will just be getting your bed prepared. And you were not eating, what with those great amadans and all their trouble. Muirteach, you will be excusing us then. And you—”
“I’ll sleep in the hall, Auntie,” I said quickly. “I’ll be comfortable enough here, indeed.”
“Well, that will be fine then.” And with that she ushered Mariota away to her quarters.
I wandered to the kitchens and found some meat and bannocks, and took them back to the hall, and ate. Then I wrapped myself in my brat and lay down on two benches pushed together. I watched the smoke from the fire curl upwards towards the thatch and wondered, about Mariota, vanishing boys, and old bones.
* * * * *
The next morning Mariota and I rode back to the church at Kilchattan, and I thanked Father Gillecolm for saving the sad little bundle of bones.
“It is an infant,” Mariota said, after we had unwrapped the bones and laid them out on the rough wooden table in the back room. “Very young.” She touched the tiny skull gently. “Perhaps just born. See how the bones here have not fused yet. And perhaps it is a bit misshapen, from the birth.”
“Have you any idea how long it has been there?”
“A year or so, I would guess. Long enough for the flesh to decay from the bones. Perhaps two years? It is hard to be saying exactly.”
“Dia, Mariota, where were you learning all of that?” I asked her after we had given the priest permission to bury the sad remains.
“My father is a great one for studying whatever comes his way. As you should know, for it was His Lordship himself who sent him to you last summer. He shows me, and I remember. I find it interesting, for all that it may be a bit ungodly.”
“Well, ungodly or no, it is probably not having anything to do with Niall, then.”
“No, I would think not. Just some local girl in trouble.”
“But no one remembers any girls with child, nor any mysteriously disappearing bairns. Not recently, at any rate.”
“What of the nunnery?” Mariota asked. “There are women there, and ones who would not be wanting to be found with child.”
I should have thought of that myself, what with all the happenings of the last summer. Just because someone is a religious does not always mean they are chaste. I cursed myself for a fool.
The priest went to get someone to dig the grave, and we waited awkwardly in the main church. Then we followed him outside and watched while Father Gillecolm performed a brief burial service over the tiny pile of bones. Some curious islanders looked on. We said, truthfully enough, that it was some old bones that had been found that we were just giving a Christian burial to. But I was sure there would be talk, especially as the bones were buried outside the wall of the churchyard.
On the road back to Dun Evin, I fancied Mariota looked anxious.
“What is it?” I asked her. “Was it those bones that upset you?”
“Muirteach, I am not sure. It’s nothing, a fancy, just.”
We rode a little farther, and were making our way round the large outcrop of rocks called Beinn nan Caorach when Mariota broke the silence again.
“Perhaps I could be staying there a few days, Muirteach.”
“Where?”
“The nunnery up at Cill Chaitrìona. I could ask permission of the abbess to retreat there for a time, say a week or two. And perhaps I will be learning something that will be of help to you. You can put it out that I was overwrought,” Mariota added wryly. “For I seem to be, somewhat, these days. I hardly know myself.”
“Is that what you’re wanting?” I asked curiously. The thought of Mariota in a nunnery bothered me sorely, even if it was but for a short time.
“You know, Muirteach, I am thinking that it is. It had not occurred to me before, but I think it might be restful there. Perhaps I could discover who might have left the bones in the cave. And some rest and quiet would be nice before I return to Islay.”
“Well, that is fine then. If that is what you’re wanting.”
I did not mean to sound curt with her, but I am afraid I did so, and we spoke but little more as we rode the short distance back to the dun. Mariota explained what she was thinking of doing and, although Euluasaid clucked over it all, my uncle replied that it would be no trouble, as the abbess was in his debt for a number of things and would not dare gainsay him. And so that was that.
The next morning I rode with Mariota up to the north end of the island, with Somerled loping along beside the horses, until we reached the nunnery. I introduced Mariota to the abbess.
“I am wanting a retreat for a few days.” Mariota explained.
I also handed her the letter my uncle had had me prepare, requesting that the abbess honor Mariota’s request. Abbess Brìde agreed. As my uncle had predicted, she was in his debt and could not refuse.
“I will fetch you in two weeks’ time,” I said, somewhat forlornly I am afraid. Mariota thanked me and, almost before I knew what was happening, Somerled and I rode away alone leading the second horse, with the gate of the nunnery enclosure closed tight against us.
Chapter 6
It began spitting rain on my ride back to Dun Evin. I took a different path back, one that led up a little valley near the Lochan Gammhich and passed by an old man working in a field there, near a small cottage. I thought this might be the man old Àine had spoken of, the faerie doctor Gillean, and so I smiled and greeted him. He was short and wizened, but still strong, bent over under a creel of peats he was carrying. He set his burden down with some eagerness when he saw me.
“Dia dhuit,” he greeted me pleasantly enough. “And what is bringing you to these parts of the island on a day like today, and trailing an extra horse as well? And a great dog like that one?”
I explained I had been up to Balnahard, and he invited me inside and offered me uisgebeatha. Somerled wormed his way in as well and plopped down beside the hearth. The warmth of the drink and the old man’s peat fire took the bite out of the cold dampness of the day and I began to feel less dreary. It was not as if Mariota was taking vows.
From the doorway to his cottage I noticed Gillean could see Beinn Beag, Carnan Eoin, and even down a ways to the beach. I asked him if he had ever seen the mysterious stranger old Eachann had mentioned.
“No now,” he said. “But I’ve seen faerie lights there in that valley often enough.”
“And have you ever seen the sithichean?”
He crossed himself and spat. “No, I’ve never seen them at all. But I have heard them, right enough. It will be late that they are making noise. One night the moon was down, but I had been up with a sick cow and was just going to sleep when I heard a thumping sound from over there. I am thinking they were dancing and it was the sound of their feet I heard.”
“Old Àine was saying she saw their lights on the beach.”
“I was never seeing any lights.” He took a swig of uisgebeatha. “Although I have heard them many times since I was a child. My mother was saying they stole me when I was but a young one, but she was getting me back again from them. I had wandered off from the house and was missing for a night, but she knew the charms against the sithichean. She said them and found me safe enough the next morning up the valley. But ever since then I can hear them dancing in the night.”
The rains drummed on the cottage thatch and I settled my back against the wall, for I could see the rain would not be letting up for a while.
“That is a good tale,” I said. “You are not remembering what happened to you that night?”
He shook his head. “I was just a wee boy, barely walking I was, and I do not remember. But my mother was saying when she got me back that I had grown shorter in the night. I am thinking they took some inches away from me before they gave me back.”
“You were hearing of the child from the dun who has gone missing?”
“I heard something,” the old
man replied. “Some of the MacPhee’s men came by, looking for the lad, over a week ago it will be now. That was the last I heard of it, for there are not so many people that come by this way. Tell me more of it.”
I recounted the story, while Gillean sat by the glowing peats and listened.
“The sithichean will have him, then,” he said. “That will be the way of it.”
“People are saying,” I continued, “that you are a faerie doctor.”
“I can not help everything that people say,” responded Gillean. “But it is true enough that I have helped some people when the faeries had them. It comes from being stolen by them as a bairn. And I was getting the charms from my mother before she died. May all the saints be good to her soul now. Here, let us raise a glass to her memory.”
We drank, silent for a moment, listening to the rain pouring down outside. Somerled whimpered in his sleep.
“There is another thing,” he continued after another drink. “Perhaps I should not be speaking of it though, for it may make them angry, and I am not wanting to do that. But I was not keeping it. I threw it back to them.”
“And what was that?” I asked him, and reached for the flask myself.
“It was something of theirs, something I was finding, just. Are you having any iron on you?”
I had my dirk, and the old man took it and held it. “That is the best protection against them, and I am not wanting them to be angry with me about it all, so I am trying not to speak of it at all, at all.”
“But surely they will not be coming out today in the rain?”
“Perhaps not.” He spat and held the dirk by the blade. “Well, I’ll be telling you then, and may all the saints be protecting me if the sithichean are abroad on this wet day. I was over by Beinn Beag and I found something of theirs. I picked it up and took it with me here to the house. It was a bonny, bonny thing it was—all glowing and golden it was.”
“It was gold?”
“Aye, gold. A golden bracelet. Although I am thinking it would be too large for a faerie woman to be wearing. Perhaps they are using it for something else altogether.”
“And where were you finding this thing?”
“It was over by Beinn Beag, as I just told you. It was early one morning, not too long ago. It was just lying there amid the grass. I can show you the very spot that I found it when the rain is letting up. But I do not be thinking they will have been foolish enough to drop all their treasure when they left.”
“And what were you doing with it?”
“Och, I got to worrying for the bad luck of it, and so I threw it in the lochan just over there. I gave it back to them, I did.”
* * * * *
“Eh, and so Mariota is off to the nuns at Balnahard,” said my aunt when I returned later that afternoon.
“And what were you doing, Muirteach, to drive her away like that?”
“I was doing nothing,” I insisted, which made my uncle laugh.
“Indeed, and had you been doing something with her, she would not be wanting to go to the nunnery.”
“Hush you, Gillespic, to be speaking of her in such a way. I am ashamed of you. And it’s not that you don’t have troubles enough to concern you, what with those MacRuaris still moping around here and that MacDonald and his wife as well.”
“It’s fine I can handle the MacRuaris and that MacDonald. I’m thinking if we can just find the lad, that problem will be solved,” retorted Gillespic.
Aunt Euluasaid looked sad at the mention of Niall and crossed herself, while I myself felt guilt that the boy had not yet been found. Between the headache I had from Gillean’s uisgebeatha, and a strange irritation at the day’s events, I felt like a snappish hound and suddenly wished only to be away by myself someplace, where I would be free to sulk.
“Aye. Well, Muirteach, and what are you thinking now?”
I scowled, and drank some more ale. I had arranged to fetch Mariota home two weeks hence. It seemed an eternity away. No doubt the MacDonald would be wanting to comb the island again, going over places we had already scoured fruitlessly.
“Keep searching, I suppose,” I answered. “And that Gillean was speaking of the sithichean near Beinn Beag. Perhaps I should be looking there again.” I told my aunt and uncle more of what the old man had told me.
“It’s as I feared. The faerie have taken him,” said my aunt, looking distressed when she heard the story. “For it was their gold he was after.”
“Euluasaid, if there was gold to be found by the Beinn Beag, it would have been found long ago. I don’t think the sithichean are so careless with their treasure as to be leaving it out for little boys and old fools to be finding,” said my uncle reassuringly.
“Perhaps you’ve the right of it,” agreed my aunt. “But I wish we’d find him.”
For myself I was starting to wish, the more time passed, that we would not be finding Niall. For a cold fear gripped my heart that we would not find him alive.
* * * * *
In the days that followed I searched again the area around the Beinn Beag and the Carnan Eoin. I questioned Gillean once more. He remembered seeing the red cow wandering in the area before, but he hadn’t seen Niall or Dòmhnall that day, now over two weeks ago, that Dòmhnall had left his foster brother on the Tràigh Bàn. As it turned out, it had been a day or two after that when he had thrown the gold into the lochan. But he had not seen the stranger.
The Benbecula MacDonald was eager to join in the search for his son, and so in the next days we clambered in and out of the same caves I had searched before, scaled the hills to every abandoned dun, and looked down cliffs and into every ravine on the island. We found nothing of Niall. Indeed, it did seem as if he’d been spirited off the earth. Things grew less tense at my uncle’s dun, and the MacDonald was given back his sword. At the MacDonald’s insistence, a message was sent to Finlaggan asking for some of His Lordship’s men to come help with the search. I do not think my uncle was pleased at this, but there was little he could do.
* * * * *
That night at dinner the MacDonald’s wife started in on her husband and my uncle, saying that no one had been looking for poor Niall, and now we would never be finding him, for the sithichean had him. I felt ill at ease listening to her, the more so because I as yet had found nothing of the boy. I tried not to listen as she repeated her rant, thinking instead of Mariota and what she was most likely doing at the nunnery. That did little to improve my mood.
It seemed others found Sìne’s speech tiresome, including her husband, who had been at the drink after they had come in from searching for Niall. Of a sudden I heard him cut through her sad monotone with his own loud voice.
“If you are so sure we could be finding him if we just looked hard enough, why don’t you go and ask the old witch in Jura? Perhaps she can scry for him and tell us where to be looking next. For we have not found him on this island, and it is not for want of searching.”
“What witch is that?” I asked.
My aunt did not know of her, nor did my uncle, but the Uist men had heard of her, and one of them enlightened me.
“There is an old witch woman there,” he said as he gnawed the last bits of meat off the tiny bones of a quail. “Sure it will be her they are speaking of. I am surprised you are not knowing of her, being as Colonsay is so close to Jura.”
“One can not be knowing everything,” I observed.
“Och, that is true enough. She is an odd one and keeps the old ways, I have heard. She lives on the west side of Jura, in a cave. There was a woman from Barra who was visiting her, just, when her man went missing over in Ireland. It was the MacNeill’s daughter. That it was. She was asking her father to take her over there in a galley, and asking the witch about it all. And for that, perhaps, we people on Uist are knowing of her.”
“How did the MacNeill’s daughter learn of her?”
“I am not knowing that. But sure enough the woman lives there, if she has not died. And I do not think she has, f
or it was not that long ago that all this was happening.”
“And what of her man—the daughter’s man?”
“The scrying was telling the witch that he was lost at sea. And it was a little later that we did get word from Dublin that one of the boats had been lost with Barra men aboard.”
We turned our attention back to the others at the table, and it seemed that the idea of visiting the witch woman had appealed to the MacDonald’s wife. It must have been the need to be finding her son that impelled her. She again started badgering her husband and my uncle as well, saying that as close to Jura as we were, it would be a sin indeed not to visit the witch, and perhaps she herself could be finding Niall while all these men had failed to. Euluasaid listened intently and spoke to Gillespic, perhaps just to placate the woman, but soon enough it was arranged that the two women would go to Jura the next day, with some of the MacDonald’s men from Benbecula to accompany them.
I spoke with my aunt after the hall had cleared, and she suggested I join them.
“That would be a fine thing, Muirteach, to have you come along,” my aunt said. “For I am not knowing much of this woman. I have heard rumors there was a witch on Jura, but I am not knowing anyone who has ever seen her. It seems aye ungodly to me, and it makes me nervous. I would not be going, except the poor woman is so distressed. And perhaps we could be discovering something. But you are not afraid of things, Muirteach, and you are knowing something of the island. For myself, I would be happy to have you along with us.”
At which point my uncle told me I should go with the women, and that was that. I was not unhappy to be going. I felt I had failed already to find Niall, and what with Mariota up with the nuns, I believed I had failed at other things at well. The frustration gnawing in me craved activity. It would be good to leave Colonsay for a day or so. And so I agreed to go.
* * * * *
We set off the next morning. I left Somerled at Aorig’s, and my half brother Sean was delighted to be in charge of the dog for a time. The rain had stopped, and a brisk wind blew in the blue sky to take us across the sound. The Paps of Jura showed across the strait, and it did not take long for the crossing. One of the Benbecula men claimed to know where the witch’s home was located, but for all that it was the afternoon before we reached the spot. The October days were short.
THE FAERIE HILLS (A Muirteach MacPhee Mystery Book 2) Page 5
