THE FAERIE HILLS (A Muirteach MacPhee Mystery Book 2)

by Susan McDuffie

  “I am thinking it will be just up this way,” said the Benbecula man as we beached the boat in a small cove. “There is just this wee bitty path up towards those rocks, and the cave will be up there. Yes,” he considered, pointing upwards as we climbed, “there it will be, just there. I am recognizing it well now. That will be her house.”

  The entrance to the witch’s house hid among the rocks, and it was just the faint blue smoke of her fire and the scent of the peats burning that gave away the location of the cave. As we approached, we could see that the smoke came from a cleft in the rock face above and that the entrance to the cave had been fitted with a rough door, which stood ajar.

  The door creaked open, and we faced the witch.

  She looked to be a bit older than my aunt, but not yet ancient. Her hair, a reddish color going to gray, hung down loosely around her weather-beaten face. She glared suspiciously at us as we stood at her doorstep.

  “Who will you be? And what is it that you are wanting, to seek out Gormal so?”

  The MacDonald’s wife started explaining about her son, how he was lost on Colonsay and how it was feared the sithichean had stolen him away.

  The woman nodded, cutting off Sìne. “And what are you having to pay me with should I scry for you?”

  The MacDonald’s wife reached into her bag, and pulled out a gold coin. She dropped it in the witch’s outstretched hand. Gormal bit on it, then, apparently satisfied, nodded to us.

  “Come away in then, and we shall see.”

  The interior of the cave was surprisingly large, with herbs hung drying from the wall. I found it pleasant enough, for the herbs gave the room a sweet smell. The light was dim, as only daylight from the doorway filtered in and the peat fire cast little light. A rushlight stood in a clay stand on a rough table where two crockery bowls sat on the wooden surface.

  “Sit you down.” Gormal gestured to two rough wood benches. “I will just be making it ready.”

  We sat awkwardly, not speaking. Gormal went over to a chest, opened it, and pulled out a piece of cloth embroidered with diverse symbols—animals and birds, all interlaced into a connected design of great beauty. This she placed upon the table. She then returned to the chest and pulled out a silver bowl, battered and beaten, with strange figures embossed upon the outer surface. She began to polish the interior with a piece of woolen cloth, chanting softly to herself as she did so. The polished inner surface of the bowl caught the firelight, gleaming silver in the darkness of the cave. At length she seemed to be satisfied, holding the bowl to catch the glow of the firelight, and put the cloth away.

  She reached into a pottery vessel for some herbs, which she threw on the fire. Mariota would have known what they were, I am sure, but Mariota was not with us. A sweetish smell and whiter smoke rose from the embers and mingled with the stronger smell and black smoke of the peats. Gormal picked up the bowl again, reciting another rune as she did so.

  The witch walked to the back of the cave, to a small spring that bubbled there filling a small pool with water. She had chosen her home well. Speaking a different chant, she filled the bowl with the spring water and, holding it high up before her, walked solemnly to the table, set the bowl upon the cloth and then sat down before the bowl to scry.

  She chanted quietly to herself, head bent down, eyes focused on the water in the bowl. Almost a hum her chant was, like the bees. We said nothing, barely breathing, and watched. I was aware at first of the hardness of the bench, the aching in my bad leg, the closeness of the others who also watched. But after a time that all fell away, and I heard only the noise of the witch’s chanting. The chant filled my mind and I could not say how long we sat there.

  Of a sudden the woman gave a great cry, and jerked as if a fit was on her. Her arm moved violently, knocking the silver bowl and it fell to the floor, the water running away in little rivulets on the earthen floor. Then the witch lay still, her head slumped on the table.

  “What is it?” demanded Sìne, crossing to the table and shaking the witch violently by the shoulders. “What is it that you are seeing?”

  Gormal opened her eyes, staring at the MacDonald’s wife. “Nothing. I was seeing nothing. I am sorry, but the scrying did not work today. Here.” She reached into her bag and pulled out the gold coin. “Here,” she repeated, holding it out to the MacDonald’s wife. “Take this back, as I was not successful. The Sight was failing me today. Take it back. I am not wanting your gold.”

  “But what of my Niall?” wailed Sìne. “Were you seeing nothing of him?”

  “The Sight failed me. I have told you. I know nothing of your son. Now go.”

  And there was nothing for it then but to leave the witch’s house and make our way down to the cove in the late afternoon while the sun sank, a red ball, in the west.

  Chapter 7

  We passed an unpleasant night, sleeping in the shelter of the boat on that small beach. One of the men managed to bring down a rabbit and the women roasted it on a fire we built on the beach. Along with the food we had brought, it made a supper of sorts. Sìne showed little appetite, and her distress made it hard for me to eat my own food with any enjoyment. My aunt insisted there was nothing to the strange witch’s outburst, but the MacDonald’s wife refused to believe her.

  “She was seeing something, I know she was. She was seeing that my son is dead, and she was not wanting to tell me,” she repeated over and over as we sailed back to Colonsay the next morning.

  “Whist, my lady, she was seeing nothing. Not even a witch can control the Sight,” said one of her husband’s men. “After all, she was returning your coin to you.”

  “Aye,” said my aunt, trying to comfort the woman, “she was seeing nothing, and so she gave the gold piece back to you.”

  I could not stand to listen to the woman’s lamenting as it made me excruciatingly aware of my own failure to find her son, and it was glad I was when the boat finally reached Scalasaig.

  * * * * *

  The next morning as I ate my porridge and drank some light ale with my uncle, Aunt Euluasaid burst into the hall, flushed and agitated.

  “Muirteach, you must come with me. And you too, Gillespic. Come at once.”

  We followed her out to the courtyard where a young girl whom I did not know stood barefoot, flushed and out of breath, as if she had been running. She must have been about eleven. Her plaited red hair had come undone somewhat and her brat was wrapped tightly around her against the chill of the morning. Shy, she kept her eyes fixed on the ground in front of her but breathed quickly, like a frightened animal.

  “This will be Seonag,” my aunt said. “She is coming from the village over near the coast, Riasg Buidhe. Tell them, girl,” commanded my aunt, fixing her with a look. “This is not a time for shyness. Tell the chief what you know.”

  “It is another child taken by the sithichean. In Riasg Buidhe.”

  “Another child missing?” I asked.

  The girl shook her head violently, then raised astonishingly green eyes to meet mine. When she did speak the words came out all in a rush, as if she could not wait to release the burden they were causing her.

  “No, no. The boy is not missing. But the faeries have taken him all the same. It is my sister’s bairn, just a wee boy, barely eighteen months he has, and so healthy and fine he has always been, not a sickness has he had. But in the night they came. They took him and left a changeling. And the changeling is so weak, not like my nephew at all, he is. He has the fits, and they will not stop. We heard of the other poor boy who was stolen, so we thought to come here. And my sister was sending for the faerie doctor, the one that lives over by Loch Fada, as well. And the priest,” she added, almost as an afterthought.

  “What did you see?”

  “I myself was asleep. The entire house was sleeping, and we heard nothing. But then he was so hot that morning, four days ago it was now, and he would not eat, and then he started with the fits. Horrible they are, and he will not stop. It is not Aidan. It is a change
ling. We prayed to all the saints, but he will not stop.”

  “He could not just be sick? With the fever?”

  The girl shook her head obstinately. “No, no. He has been taken by the sithichean.”

  “Well, we must go and see,” said my uncle, and I agreed.

  We made good time to the village on the east side of the island, where a few blackhouses hugged the hills and faced the Sound of Jura. Some fishing boats were pulled up on the narrow beach between the black rocks. We found the cottage easily enough; a crowd of villagers outside clearly indicated which house it was, even if the girl had not been there to lead us to it. Inside there were more people, closer relatives, crowded around the pile of bracken where a young child lay, white and weak, on his seated mother’s lap. It was easy enough to see that this must be Seonag’s older sister; she had the same red hair and green eyes, although her eyes were red and bloodshot with worry and tears. As we watched the convulsions started again, and the woman held the bairn helplessly while he jerked.

  Old Gillean appeared from the crowd of people and moved closer to the child. In his hands he held a wooden bowl, filled with a steaming liquid, and I could see some bits of green herbs floating on the surface.

  “Here,” he said to the woman. “You must try him with these herbs. If he does not swallow, it is a sign he has been taken by the sithichean. Get him to take them, and they will help to drive the changeling away and out from him.”

  The mother nodded tensely and dribbled some of the liquid into the child’s mouth while old Gillean stood nearby, watching intently. The child did not swallow. The fit was on him, and a murmur rustled through the women standing watching, like the wind that rattled the bare branches of the black-barked trees outside the cottage.

  Gillean shook his gray head. “They have taken him,” he pronounced grimly, and the murmurs of the women rose again. “Now we must be getting him back to you.”

  He took the bowl back from the woman and fished some of the herbs out of the liquid and placed them in the child’s mouth. “He must swallow them. He must swallow them three times,” he said. The child’s convulsions ceased for minute, and the woman was able to get him to take a bit of the herbs while the old man chanted. “In the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost, begone from here. Begone from here, back to the sithean where you dwell, and leave Aidan as you found him.”

  The woman tried again to get her boy to swallow, and a faint movement in his throat indicated success.

  Gillean nodded. “One more time. That is all that is needed.” But as he spoke, the boy started jerking again in shuddering fits, and the herbs fell out of his mouth, leaving a trail of green on the white of his chin while his mother started moaning.

  “Now, woman, stop your crying,” said Gillean. “It is a sign they are not wanting to let your son go, but we will be getting him back. For if that cure does not work, I have others I can try.”

  He took a leather pouch from his satchel and sprinkled salt in three circles around the child, chanting all the while. Then Gillean procured a rough pottery flask from his satchel, uncorked it, and threw some of the liquid on the child. I smelled the sharp odor of rank urine.

  “Begone from this child,” Gillean repeated. “In the name of the Triune God, begone.”

  The child continued his convulsions unabated, and the mother raised desperate eyes toward Gillean. Some of the liquid had splashed on her as well and it dripped, untended, down her cheek, mixed with her tears.

  “What am I to do? How am I to get my son back, my own healthy boy? This can not be him. He has never been sick a day.”

  “This is the fifth day since he was taken. If the fairies keep him for nine days, there will be no getting him back. He will be gone, like the poor boy from the dun.” The women in the cottage murmured again, and the boy’s mother started to wail.

  “No now, do not be crying. It will do you no good,” continued Gillean. “You must keep giving him the herbs, and if he will not take them try giving them to him in the new milk, for that is pure and will be making them flee out and away from him. But if that has not helped him by the eighth day, then we must be trying something else to drive them away.”

  With these words Gillean prepared to leave, but first he gave the woman a small piece of iron. “You must keep this on you at all times,” he told her. “And I myself will be coming back to see how the bairn is doing. But try to get him to take the herbs.”

  He left the house, and after my uncle spoke to the woman, we did also.

  “She is a good woman,” he said outside. “And her husband is a fine man. It is a shame this trouble has come to them. But I am thinking that the boy is sick and not gone with the good people.”

  “Perhaps Mariota could help him when she returns from Cill Chaitrìona.”

  “Aye,” agreed my uncle grimly. “I’ve no wish for a plague of faerie changelings here.” He spat and crossed himself. “I am not liking this at all, Muirteach, not at all.”

  * * * * *

  Another driving rain came and kept us all inside, on each other’s nerves. I watched the MacDonald and my uncle playing chess, and listened to the sound of the rain drumming on the thatch, trying not to hear the stifled sobs of the MacDonald’s wife where she sat sewing in the corner. The Finlaggan men were gambling near the hearth with my uncle’s men and keeping my aunt’s maidservants busy bringing them ale.

  The Benbecula MacDonald, as well as my uncle and myself, had also been at the drink a bit, what with the lack of diversion and all the bad weather.

  “That was my knight you took,” observed the MacDonald after my uncle moved his piece. “And it was not a fair move.”

  “Indeed, it was a fair move. But what of the bishop you took a while back?” countered Gillespic.

  “You’re a cheat, MacPhee. And a murdering cheat, as well.”

  My uncle, the temper on him, dashed the chessboard to the floor. The sound of the chessmen clattering fell away, and the monotonous thrumming of the rain on the thatch was all that broke the silence.

  The two men faced each other like two dogs with their hair bristling. My uncle’s men stood, but did nothing else as yet. Euluasaid and Sìne watched tensely from the sidelines, but both knew better, I thought, than to try and intervene when their men had the black humors on them.

  But then the MacDonald’s wife spoke, and not to ease the situation. “And will you be letting him get away with it all? They have murdered our poor Niall. The light of my eyes he was.”

  “And what cause would we have to be murdering the lad?” roared my uncle, no longer quiet. “A fine boy he was, not like his father. Or perhaps you are not his true father indeed, for I can not imagine a weasel such as you getting such a son.”

  “And what are you suggesting?”

  “Just what I said.”

  “Ranald, did you hear?” said Sìne to her husband.

  “Aye, I did,” said the MacDonald grimly, going for his knife.

  Euluasaid had alerted the luchd-tighe, and they grabbed the MacDonald before he could complete his lunge at my uncle, who escaped with nothing more that a prick on the arm, and the MacDonald a wee cut on the hand.

  My aunt finally spoke.

  “Och, and will ye be starting a war, fools that you are. And how will that be finding Niall? No now,” she continued as both men started to talk, “you must put up your knives and put aside your quarrels and act like Christian souls.” And with that she called for food to be brought in.

  My uncle and the MacDonald looked at each other a little sheepishly.

  “It’s overwrought you both are,” continued Euluasaid.

  “Hush you,” the MacDonald said to his wife, who had opened her mouth to speak from her spot by the fire.

  “Fine you know we’ve been looking for the lad night and day. Look, you have both blooded the other. Let you mingle blood and swear as brothers to friendship.”

  My uncle did not wish to sound henpecked and said, “Aye, my wife has the
right of it. A fine Christian woman she is indeed. Come. Let us swear as brothers. For myself, I have loved and treated Niall as one of my own. Come and swear the blood oath with me.”

  Grudgingly, the MacDonald assented, despite the wailing of his wife. And so the blood of Gillespic and the Benbecula MacDonald was mingled before the uisgebeatha was brought out and the meal begun, while the rain drummed ceaselessly on the thatch.

  * * * * *

  By the second day after this, the rain finally stopped lashing the island. We had heard nothing more of the child at Riasg Buidhe, and I decided to go and check on him. Perhaps he had recovered, I hoped, as I walked across hills still soggy with the rain towards the little village, with Somerled loping along by my side. The sun was shining in a cold blue sky and the last of the leaves had been blasted from the trees by the storm. I hugged my brat closer to me and walked faster, for the morning was chill. As I neared the village, I saw a little line of figures walking from the cottages to the chapel and burial grounds, slightly south of the village. The women were wailing and moaning, and as I drew closer I saw them kneel at the edge of the chapel yard, still crying, as a few men carried a small shrouded corpse into the chapel.

  We had not heard of any deaths at Dun Evin, but as I neared the group I had a sick foreboding of what might have happened. I approached the group of women and recognized Seonag’s sister as the chief mourner of the party, and Seonag herself. Their woolen mantles covered their heads, and they watched the men enter the chapel. The women did not go into the churchyard but knelt there in the cold mud, continuing their lamenting.

  “And what is this?” I asked one of the women at the back of the group. “Who is it that has died?”

  The woman glanced at me and appeared to recognize me. She had a sharp-featured face and dark hair, beginning to streak with gray. “You will be that nephew of the MacPhee up at Dun Evin?” she asked.