“I did not run from a beast,” she admitted reluctantly. “There were herdsmen in the forest. I—”
“Herdsmen?” Una repeated in horror. “Ye wicked, wicked lass! Ye know better than to go near the settlements. A thousand times I’ve warned ye. After one glimpse of yer face, should a babe sicken or a cow abort her calf, they’ll descend upon us like wolves upon a wounded stag!”
Fear washed through Meghan as she raised a protective hand to her left cheek. Una’s anger was no easier to bear than the unfounded wrath of the herdsmen. “’Twas a dream that made me go there,” she confided. “It came to me in sleep last night. I sought to learn if ’twas true.”
“The dreams.” Una sighed in defeat, her strong square shoulders sagging. It had been many months since the visions had visited Meghan. She had hoped, had dared to believe, that they were gone once and for all. Now that hope was dashed. Leaving Ulster had not broken the link with the otherworld. “’Tis always the same. What’s a body to do against such temptation?”
“It foretold a man’s death,” Meghan whispered.
Una gasped and crossed herself. “Mercy’s Grace be upon ye, child, for the burden of such evil knowledge.”
Meghan blinked back the tears that roughened her voice. “Why do the dreams come to me? What am I that men must fear me so?”
The older woman shook her head. “’Tis not for ye or me to say what brings the sight. Ye must learn to keep the visions in yer heart, tell no one. I do what I can for ye. There’s been no cause for any to wonder what more a mother could have done for ye.”
It had been many years since Meghan had voiced the question, but now it held a new urgency in her mind. “Why will ye never tell me who my mother was and what happened to her?”
“Ye had no mother, to tell a plain truth!” Una snapped, turning a blind eye to the expression of hurt on the girl’s face. “But enough of that.” A new horror electrified her face. “Meghan, lass, ye didn’t lead the herdsmen here?”
“They didn’t see me,” Meghan lied, fearing what Una would do if she knew the truth. “I did climb a tree. When they passed by, I went to the pond to swim, but a noise frightened me and I ran away. That’s where I left my leine.”
She lowered her gaze before speaking, but Una seemed not to notice. Her own expression had softened a trifle. “Well, there’ll be no more of that. Ye’re to keep away from the settlements after this. ’Tis only a mercy they didn’t set eyes on ye, or I’d not offer a stone’s worth for another safe night.”
Chastened by the reminder of the danger in which she had placed them, Meghan said nothing more.
Turning, Una lifted an oak piggin that was half-full with milk. “There’s been enough mischief afoot this morning to spoil the butter.” She glanced doubtfully at the churn and then back at Meghan. “Ye know what’s to be done.”
Meghan nodded. It was churning day. Churning was a ticklish process subject to the whims of witches and fairies. Everyone knew that. Una had never said so, but they both understood that Meghan’s dreams were a gift of dubious origin. If the butter failed to break, there was no doubt where the blame would be laid. That was the reason why Una had banished her from the house every churning day since she could remember. The “whiteflesh” was their staple for the summer. A failed churn meant a starving week.
“Ye’d best take this. ’Twill be nothing else till evening.” Una plucked two oatcakes from the basket on the hearth.
Without a word, Meghan reached for the cakes, which were generously spread with the last of their butter, then stepped out of the hut into the morning air. A nameless but very real guilt gnawed at her, bringing back her desperate need to be assured that she was not some malignant evil, capable of rousing hatred at a stranger’s single glance.
If only she were brave enough to explain to Una about the man at the pond whose life she had saved. Then perhaps Una would not be so angry with her. Yet, telling the truth would not change the fact that the herdsmen had seen and pursued her and believed she had changed herself into a wild boar and killed one of them. She had seen fear chalk Una’s face at the mention of a vision of death. If she learned that the vision had come true, Una might turn away from her forever. No, she must not speak.
She chose a tree not far from her doorway and sat down among the rosy spikes of foxglove and lacework ferns that grew at its base, resting her back against the trunk.
Meghan closed her eyes, squeezing them until dizzying colors cartwheeled behind her lids and then merged into a single image of beauty that was the golden stranger’s face. This was not one of her visions, which came in a guise altogether different from this mingling of fascination and fear and…and something more. She had dared to touch him, to hold him tightly to her as if he were an unexpected gift of great value. So little time, so brief a moment had he been hers. Now there was only the remembered satiny coolness of his lips under hers. The memory touched her, astonished her senses with delight. Though she had wished it with all her heart, he had not been hers to keep. And she knew instinctively that sharing the bursting sweetness of her experience with Una would only dim its beauty.
“Be silent,” Meghan admonished herself softly, as though the trees would hear and respond, “be silent and pray that the herdsmen will give up their search.”
Reluctantly, she licked the last of the butter from her fingers and gathered the large folds of Una’s cloak tightly about her. But when she started off toward the nearby oak grove where their sow and piglets hunted moldy acorns as fodder, there was a secret smile upon her lips.
Watching from the shadow of the doorway, Una had waited patiently for the girl to finish her meal and disappear into the woods. Sighing with relief, she returned to her stool and began churning with furious determination.
For sixteen years she had lived apart from people, caring for a child who was not her own. In the beginning it had been simple to raise a babe away from the world. But Meghan was no longer a babe. Each day she ventured farther, expanding the limits of her world until she knew the country better than did her aunt. Fear for their lives had made Una abandon Ulster for the wilds of the south. Now a new threat was upon them, one that loomed larger than the troubles that had made them flee their homeland. Meghan had become a nimble, fresh-budded woman.
“And more’s the pity for the pair of us,” Una muttered. “Any man with breath in him would yearn to lie upon her thighs…till he got a good look at her face. Then there’d be the devil to pay!”
The priest who had baptized Meghan had said it was no sin to be born with the mark of fairies. Only time would tell whether the mark was for good or ill. Except for the mark, she had been a wee fair babe with the creamiest of skin, velvety black hair, and eyes that seemed to see into a body’s soul.
Una paused for a moment, resting her forehead against the dash handle. Though she had raised Meghan from birth, she could not say she had spent a comfortable hour in the girl’s company. Meghan was a constant reminder of the guilt Una bore. But even that would have been endurable had the girl’s “dreams” not begun. They had come first in the summer of Meghan’s sixth year. After that, the fear of impending danger seemed ever with them, for Meghan possessed a gift of the “sight.”
Guiltily Una crossed herself. Perhaps the priest’s advice was the best solution. Perhaps Meghan’s true calling did lie with the Church. Once safely behind convent walls, Meghan’s dreams might stop, and her blemish would no longer pose a threat. Yet, how could Una give up the girl whose every look reminded her of her beloved sister Maura?
Una’s gaze softened at the memory of Maura Fitzgerald—a lass no man in Munster could pass without commenting on her beauty. Her skin held the richness of fresh cream and her lips were as red as ripe wild strawberries. In the end, her beauty had entrapped her. It won for her, against her desire, the passion and jealousy of a man who later became known as the greatest chieftain in all of Ireland, Shane the Proud, “the O’Neill” of Ulster.
It had been expected that
Maura would bear Shane a male heir. But after two days of labor, Maura lay dead, and the babe…
Una clasped her hands together. “Lord in Heaven, I’ve lived not a day without the memory. And so Ye well know. But I’m a simple woman. May I not be held in account for what was done out of pity for a poor wee babe’s life. ’Twas her birthright!”
Tears gathered and ran down Una’s full cheeks, though she told her herself the deed was history and Shane O’Neill was dead. A year earlier his handsome head had been lifted from his shoulders through the cunning of the O’Donnells, his clan’s ancient enemies. The head had been tarred and sent to English Dublin, thrust on a pike, and hung from the northwest gate for all to see. All of Ulster was aflame with the treachery perpetrated by the O’Donnells. Shane had been a hard man, more feared than liked, but he had won the admiration of Irish nobility by standing firm against English aggression in his homeland.
Yet, Shane’s death had awakened new fears in Una. He had made many enemies, not all of them O’Donnells. His death would bring either an invasion of Ulster by the English or the massacre of Shane’s heirs by other O’Neills as they fought for the title of “the O’Neill.” Either way, there would no longer be protection for herself and Meghan. This was the beginning of their exile in fear.
After a quick glance at the entry, Una dropped to her knees by the corner of the turf fire and began gently to scrape away the dirt from behind the blaze. The dirt lifted easily, having been dug up frequently. Finally a corner of rough cloth appeared and Una grasped it and tugged, freeing a weighted bundle from its hiding place. When the thong tied around it was loosened, she carefully unwrapped the cloth to reveal the jeweled hilt of a sheathed blade.
Stones of amethyst, translucent rock crystal, and amber gleamed dully from the gold work. It was a weapon of great workmanship and value, a piece of artistry worthy of a nobleman. With trembling fingers she withdrew the dagger from its sheath. Light flashed off the blade, whose only blemish was a single rusty-brown streak along its fine edge.
Una bit her lip until it bled, but her eyes remained fixed upon the dagger. No, she would not give Meghan up to the Church just yet. Lives had been lost to preserve the secret of Meghan’s birth. Now that Shane was dead, Una alone knew the truth. Even in her fear she believed that the visions that came to Meghan were proof of her special nature and that the gift should not be given even into God’s service unless Meghan herself wished it.
“But ’twill be poor comfort for the like o’ ye, Una Fitzgerald,” she whispered as she furtively retied the bundle. “If a vision of the truth should come over Meghan one fine day, ye may still answer for yer part in the deed!”
*
Not until dawn, when rain hissed upon the heath sod that roofed the hut, did Meghan close her eyes and allow herself the pleasure of sleep. For the past four nights she had lain wide-eyed in the dark, listening. A snap of a twig or a rustle of leaves might mean there was a lurker in the woods.
But night after night the only sounds she heard were the faint scratching of her rush mattress when she moved and Una’s low sonorous breathing as she slept. When a lightening of the sky signaled the approach of dawn, relief flooded her body, weariness dragged her lids shut, and Meghan tumbled down the rabbit hole of sleep.
Then, as it had each morning, came the dream of the stranger at the pond.
*
Water, cool and sweet, spangled her lashes and smoothed her hair into an inky flood upon the surface of the willow-green pool. Where sunlight touched the water it melted into liquid amber or merged into the trembling lavender shadows cast upon the surface by oak boughs. Between the amber and green Meghan swam in lazy strokes that sped her across the top of the water toward…toward…
He stood on the moss-covered bank. Only a golden mantle of daylight clothed his strong shoulders, which sloped into the beautiful arch of his firm young back. His angular hips balanced perfectly the tight curves of his buttocks and the long muscles of his legs.
A dark wing of cloud swept before the sun, its shadow a phantom rider on the land obliterating the amber from the lake, and then the man, too, was gone, eclipsed in the blink of an eye.
The first flutter of unease moved in Meghan’s stomach like a swallowed sliver of ice. The strange fluttering intensified, filling her with a foreshadowing of fear. This was not right. This was not the scene as she remembered it.
She raised her hands before her eyes to blot out what might follow, but the dream that was not a dream would not be denied. The water leaped suddenly, drenching her in a frigid shower that tore an uncontrollable gasp from her. She opened her eyes. Mud-streaked currents swam before her eyes, and then she spied the horror.
Una floated below her, her sturdy, compact body undulating with the currents. Reeds held her, viciously wound in Gordian knots about her ankles and wrists. Una’s mouth was distorted in fear, her eyes wide with despair. She was drowning, dying!
Desperately Meghan clawed at the water, trying to reach her aunt. She could not lose Una. She was only a hand’s breadth away. And then their fingers brushed.
The water exploded with light. With no more substance than that of a falling star, the light dwindled. It wavered an instant, flared, and died, taking Una with it.
A scream rolled up from deep within Meghan and poured from her in an impotent wail of misery.
* * *
Suddenly a callused hand stopped Meghan’s mouth. Surprised by the sting of tears on her cheek, she wondered if she was still caught in the grip of the nightmare.
“Meghan, lass,” Una whispered near her ear as she eased the pressure of her hand over the girl’s mouth. “We have visitors. Not a sound!”
Meghan sat up. She heard first the hissing of the dew-drenched grasses as many feet traversed the open field between the forest and the hut. Then came the voices of men who made no attempt to be quiet. Cold sweat replaced the tears on her face. Without seeing them she knew that what she most feared had happened: the herders had found them.
“Don’t go out!” she whispered, grabbing her aunt’s sleeve. “Maybe they’ll go away.”
Una gently freed her arm. “Keep hidden and there’s naught to fear. We’ve braved strangers’ comings and goings before.” She touched Meghan’s face, lightly tracing the mark on her cheek. “’Tis said the fairies protect their own. We could make use of a bit of luck.”
“Please! Don’t.”
The raw edge of Meghan’s voice puzzled Una. “Meghan, lass, have ye seen something? Was it a vision that frightened ye?”
“No! No!” Meghan whispered quickly.
“Well then,” Una said with a smile. “There’s naught to fear.”
Naught to fear. The words were false, but Meghan clamped her lips shut. The dream had not been right. Always before when she had relived the encounter by the pond she had succeeded in saving the stranger’s life. This time the ending had changed.
A shout from the yard startled Meghan, but Una did not pause a second time. She threw back the wool drape hung before the doorway and stepped out into the day. “Ach! If it isn’t a grand welcome I see before me this fine soft morn,” she greeted.
Pausing, she used the excuse of lowering the woolen flap over the entry to observe the dozen men who had come armed with sickles and staffs. There’s trouble, Una, lass, she thought as she turned to face them.
“And what brings ye to my hut? Ye’ll be lost, I’m thinking. Or is it food ye seek? Well? Have ye not a word to spare?”
One man moved forward out of the crowd, his grizzled beard framing his hard mouth as he answered her. “We be chasing the divil’s own.”
“The devil, ye say, on so fine a morning?” she replied mockingly. “Did he steal yer herd?” She gestured to where her two cows stood tethered. “Ah well, he didn’t reive mine.” In challenge she added, “Ye’ll not be saying I took me two from the brawny likes of ye?”
“Tell her, Coilean!” voiced a younger man who stepped forward holding a garment in one hand.
“This is what brings us. The dogs had the scent till the rain came.” With that he threw the garment on the ground before Una.
Bending over, her eyes on the challenger, she picked up the garment and her heart skipped a beat. It was Meghan’s cloak. Her tongue passed quickly over her lips. Meghan had lied to her, but there was no time now to seek out the truth.
“Ye great hairy beast!” she spat, hurling the cloak back at the young man. “’Tis a sad day for wooing when ye must come slavering after the flesh of one wee lass with clubs and dogs.”
“’Tis no bride we seek,” the young man replied. He stepped closer to the old woman. “’Tis a she-divil must answer our wrath. She killed one of our own, not a week past!”
Una stood her ground in the face of grumbled epithets. The men were tense but not overly eager for a fight. The stench of their fear was in the air. Like a warm decay it permeated the cool breath of the spring morning. She had lived many dangers in the forty years of her life, and, as always, danger cleared her senses. She could use that fear to her advantage.
“Killed a man? One wee lass against yer number and ye were bested?” Her sneering laughter echoed across the clearing. “If ye were me, I’d not be telling that tale.”
“She were a divil, I’m tellin’ ye,” the young man maintained, shaking his staff in her face. “Ye saw!” he cried, turning to his companions. “We all saw the bloody mark on her face. She were spyin’ on us. When we gave chase she turned herself into a wild boar and gored our Shaun.”
“She killed him!” cried another man.
“Aye, she killed Shaun!” added another.
The hairs on Una’s neck stirred. Despite their obvious distortion of the truth, she realized that they must have seen Meghan the day she went to spy on their settlement, but it did not follow that they knew Meghan lived with her.
“This talk of devils and such, what has it to do with me? I’m no lass, and ye can see for yerselves there’s no mark on me. Be off with ye before I think up curses enough of me own to shrivel yer short hairs!”
Rose of the Mists Page 5
