Dancing With Demons

by Peter Tremayne

  ‘May I help, lady?’ she asked, eyes downcast.

  ‘I am looking for Brother Rogallach. Would you know where he is?’

  The girl indicated towards the back of the Tech Cormaic.

  ‘At this hour you will find him in the kitchen, lady. The door at the back is open, so you may go through the house to the kitchen.’

  Fidelma was about to thank the girl when the figure of Brónach appeared on the steps of the royal residence and glowered angrily at them.

  ‘Cnucha! What are you loitering there for? I sent you to help Báine in the guesthouse. Be off with you!’ The woman turned on her heel and went inside.

  Cnucha, in an uncharacteristic show of temper, suddenly stuck out a tongue in her direction and then, realising that the others had seen her, she blushed and lowered her head.

  ‘I am sorry, lady. Sometimes it is difficult to put up with all the insults that have to be endured when people think you have no feelings and no ability to fight back. I am sure Brónach is usually a good person. Recently, however, she has become increasingly irritable. I think it is because her lover may have left her.’

  Fidelma was disapproving. ‘It is not seemly to speak of such things, Cnucha.’

  The girl tried to appear contrite. ‘It just slipped out, lady. Brónach is a nice woman, very attractive, and it was sad when her husband was killed. I am surprised that she did not take another husband. Someone like her could have many suitors. I am sure she had a lover until a few weeks ago – not that she ever told us or that we knew – but she has been so miserable and snappy of late, and—’

  The girl caught sight of Fidelma’s frown and stopped dead. ‘Sorry, it’s just … sorry.’ She moved off quickly on her errand.

  Eadulf was smiling at Fidelma’s expression. ‘Well, if there was gossip or rumour to be had, which might help us, we know where to come to,’ he joked.

  Fidelma pulled a face at him, indicating mock offence. ‘It is not gossip we look for, Eadulf, but evidence.’

  Eadulf raised his eyes towards the sky for a moment and said piously: ‘Much truth in gossip, as your old saying goes.’

  ‘Vir sapit qui pauca loquitor,’ she quoted back. ‘That person is wise who talks little.’ Then she thought of something. ‘Or maybe it should be the reverse … ’She began to walk towards the kitchen of the royal house with Eadulf, puzzled, trailing in her wake.

  It was the custom of the large wooden houses in the five kingdoms to have the ircha, or kitchen, constructed as a separate building at the back. This was because of the heat of the cooking fires and the dangers of sparks of heated oil causing a conflagration. There were still instances of such domestic fires destroying buildings and even entire families.

  As they entered the big room, with its stifling heat emanating from two ovens, its pungent odours of herbs and heating foods, they found two people busy preparing the dishes. Fidelma could not see Brother Rogallach although one of the men, who was cutting joints of pork on a thick wooden table, looked up and, laying aside his large-bladed knife, took a step towards them.

  ‘Can I help you?’ he asked deferentially. ‘I am Torpach the cook.’

  Fidelma explained who she was looking for.

  ‘Ah, Brother Rogallach is in the seallad. He is doing an inventory of the goods there. You’ll find him beyond that door.’

  Eadulf recognised seallad as the word for a pantry where provisions were stored and was about to move off but Torpach halted them. ‘Excuse me, lady, but you are the dálaigh come to investigate Sechnussach’s death, aren’t you?’

  ‘I am,’ she affirmed.

  ‘He was a good man,’ sighed Torpach. ‘A good cook, too. He was often down in this kitchen, trying out recipes. He was down here even at dawn on the day before his death. I got here early that day to prepare some dishes and surprised him. He told me he couldn’t sleep, poor man, and so came to get his own breakfast ready. Another lord would have roused his servants to do such a task. That was the last time I saw him. Why Dubh Duin wanted to kill him, I do not know.’

  Fidelma smiled reassuringly at the cook’s expression of woe.

  ‘That is what I must discover, Torpach. Thank you for your concern. I hope to have the answers before long.’

  The seallad was a separate building from the kitchen, a place without fire so that the heat of cooking would not ruin the foodstuffs that were stored there. Fidelma led the way out into what was a large yard. In one corner of the yard was a medium-sized kiln, an aith, which was used for the drying of corn or other grains to make bread. The large wooden storehouse opposite to it had no windows, although its one door was slightly ajar. This was clearly the seallad or the pantry.

  ‘Brother Rogallach?’ called Fidelma as they approached. There was no answer.

  With a shrug, she moved to the door and pushed it open. The interior of the pantry was in darkness. Eadulf stood at her shoulder.

  ‘Brother Rogallach?’ She raised her voice a little. ‘Are you in there?’

  They both heard it. As if in answer there came a soft moaning sound.

  Fidelma stepped inside, trying to adjust her eyes to the gloom and clicked her tongue in frustration that she could not make out anything. It was Eadulf who noticed the extinguished candle on the ground almost at their feet. He had nearly trodden on it as he moved forward. He now bent down and picked it up.

  ‘Can you light it?’ asked Fidelma.

  ‘Stay there, don’t go inside,’ Eadulf instructed firmly and hurried back to the kitchen where, without a word to the surprised cook and his assistant, he ignited the candle from one of the cooking fires. It was easier than spending time with flint and tinder trying to produce a flame. One hand cupped over the flickering flame of the tallow candle, he went as fast as he could back to the seallad where Fidelma was waiting impatiently on the threshold.

  ‘Let me go first,’ Eadulf insisted, and so she stood aside to let him pass within.

  The single room of the pantry building was stacked with barrels and sacks in the centre, while all around the walls was wooden shelving on which were placed various items of foodstuffs. Eadulf stood looking round, seeing no sign of anyone.

  There came another moan.

  Raising his candle high he stepped in the direction of the sound and saw a sandalled foot sticking out from behind one of the barrels.

  ‘Here!’ he called to Fidelma. Behind the barrels was stretched the figure of a stocky religieux, face downwards, one arm under his body, the other stretched out. A little distance from the open hand was an empty candle-holder. Eadulf bent down and touched the pulse in the man’s neck. It beat regularly and steadily, but the back of his head was covered in blood. Carefully, he turned the man on his side, away from the injury.

  ‘Rogallach!’ exclaimed Fidelma, standing above him and peering down at the semi-conscious moonfaced man. ‘I thought I knew his name. I met him once before when I was here in Tara. Is he badly hurt?’

  ‘He has taken a blow on the back of the head. I’ll shift him out into the light where I can have a better look.’

  Giving the candle to Fidelma, Eadulf put his forearms under the man’s shoulders, then dragged him backward out of the pantry and into the light beyond. By this time, the moonfaced man was blinking and coming around.

  ‘Lie still,’ instructed Eadulf gently, as he began to examine him. Finally he sat back. ‘You have a nasty gash on the back of the head, Brother. How did you come by it?’

  The man stared up at him. ‘Who are you?’ he demanded, even though his voice was still weak.

  ‘I am Eadulf.’

  Fidelma bent across his shoulder. ‘You remember me, Brother Rogallach? I am Fidelma of Cashel.’

  The man’s eyes flickered past Eadulf to her. ‘Fidelma the dálaigh?’ he asked hesitantly.

  ‘The same.’

  Brother Rogallach closed his eyes as if tired for the moment and then he tried to sit up but Eadulf pressed him back.

  ‘Stay still for the moment, my fri
end. I do not know what damage might have been caused. Did you hit your head on something?’

  ‘I was struck from behind.’

  Eadulf glanced back to Fidelma and then to the man once more. ‘Deliberately struck, do you mean?’

  ‘I do. I had just opened the trap door which leads down to the uaimha where we store the meats and butter and other foodstuffs that require the cold to keep them … ’

  ‘Yes, I know what it is,’ replied Eadulf, having but recently learned the word for the souterrain.

  ‘I opened the trap door and turned to fasten it before descending to get some butter for the kitchen. I had my back to the entrance and was still holding my candle ready to descend when someone hit me.’

  Fidelma looked concerned. ‘You are certain it was a blow deliberately struck?’

  The moonfaced Brother Rogallach looked at her indignantly. ‘I have not abandoned my senses that I do not know when someone has attacked me,’ he replied.

  ‘We should take you to an apothecary to get that wound dressed,’ Eadulf suggested.

  Fidelma ignored him and addressed the rotund bollscari again.

  ‘Do you have any idea of the passing of time? How long ago was this?’

  Brother Rogallach said shakily, ‘I have been in blackness. I do not know.’

  At that moment Torpach, the cook, came out of the kitchen door and paused, seeing Rogallach stretched on the ground and the others bending over him.

  ‘What is happening?’ he demanded.

  ‘Brother Rogallach has met with a mishap,’ Fidelma replied. ‘Do you know when he left the kitchen to go to the pantry?’

  The man looked slightly bewildered. ‘Only moments before you came into the kitchen asking for him, lady. Why, did he slip?’

  ‘Moments?’ Fidelma did not answer the question. ‘Then if the blow was deliberately struck, the culprit might still be hiding in the souterrain. Stay with Brother Rogallach,’ she instructed the cook.

  Rising, she motioned Eadulf to follow her. She had left the candle alight on a shelf inside the door of the pantry. She picked it up but again Eadulf held out his hand and stayed her impetuous movement forward. He moved in front of her, leading the way forward towards the gaping black hole down which some stone steps led into the souterrain. The trap door had indeed been opened and secured so that it would not fall back, as Brother Rogallach said. Eadulf hesitated a moment and then, holding the candle up and slightly in front of him, he moved carefully down the steps.

  A figure was sitting at the far end of the stone-lined vault, resting with its back against one of the wooden pillars that reinforced the roof, legs stretched out in front of it. The eyes were wide open, staring at him as he crouched in the low underground room. The lips were drawn back in a merciless smile.

  ‘Deus misereatur!’ exclaimed Eadulf, starting back.

  He had no trouble recognising the malignant features of the crone who had identified herself as Badb, the spirit of death and battles. What he did not realise for several moments, as he felt that his blood had turned to ice, was the fact that she was dead. A long-bladed dagger had entered the centre of the old woman’s frail chest, pinning her to the wooden post against which she was leaning.

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  Brother Rogallach had been taken to have his wound dressed by the old physician, Iceadh, and Abbot Colmán had been summoned. The abbot had confirmed their identification of the old woman.

  ‘Poor Mer,’ he sighed. ‘I told you, Mer the Demented One was well-known as a scavenger around the kitchens of the houses of Tara, yet I have never heard of her deliberately breaking into pantries to steal food. She was mad, but she was harmless. Whoever did this terrible thing?’

  ‘We do not know,’ replied Fidelma. ‘I have yet to question Brother Rogallach in depth. However, it would appear that he must have entered the pantry a moment after it happened. The murderer was still in the souterrain and when Rogallach was about to enter, he was knocked unconscious.’

  Abbot Colmán looked sad. ‘And it was the murderer who knocked him unconscious? Did he see him? Can he identify him?’

  ‘Unfortunately, he did not. Whoever did it came up behind him.’

  ‘Well, at least there is no need for you to question him further.’

  Fidelma frowned, her query obvious on her features.

  ‘Of one thing we may be sure,’ Abbot Colmán said gravely. ‘The old woman’s death is unconnected with the assassination of the High King. So one of the other Brehons can undertake the investigation into her death and leave you clear to continue to pursue the matter of Sechnussach’s assassination.’

  ‘Can we be sure that there is no connection?’ mused Eadulf. ‘After all, the woman first appeared warning us that our presence here investigating the murder was unwelcome. It seems a coincidence that she should now be killed as well.’

  ‘She was crazy,’ the abbot assured him. ‘Maybe she was stealing from the storehouse here and someone else, with the same intent, encountered her and panicked. There is obviously no other connection.’

  ‘I suppose so,’ Fidelma agreed. Eadulf thought she acquiesced perhaps a little too readily — but her expression discouraged him from saying anything. ‘Anyway, we still have to question Brother Rogallach on the matters related to Sechnussach’s assassination. That was why we had come to the kitchen in search of him.’

  Abbot Colmán nodded. ‘I had forgotten. Well, let me know when you want to speak to him. Meantime, I will take care of …’ he waved his hand towards the pantry‘ … of this matter.’

  They had been aware during this time that Torpach, the cook, was hovering nearby with an anxious expression, as if trying to judge the right time to interrupt their conversation. Abbot Colmán finally noticed him and turned with a frown.

  ‘What is it, Torpach? Do you wish to say something?’

  The cook nodded unhappily. ‘Forgive me, Abbot … forgive me, lady …’

  ‘Well, speak, man!’ snapped Abbot Colmán, otherwise it would seem that Torpach would ask forgiveness of everyone.

  ‘I could not help overhearing that Mer was killed with a knife. I wonder if I could see it?’

  ‘See it?’ The abbot was astonished. ‘What for?’

  Sister Fidelma smiled encouragement at the cook, who was obviously nervous about asking permission.

  ‘Why do you want to see it, Torpach?’

  ‘Well, lady, one of our kitchen knives is missing. To be truthful, it’s a favourite knife of mine for cutting meat. I reported it to Brother Rogallach but it has not been found.’

  ‘When did it go missing?’

  ‘Some time ago. I discovered it was missing the day after the death of the High King.’

  ‘At least we know which knife killed him. You saw it yourself,’ the abbot said grimly. ‘But you are welcome to look at the knife which killed Mer.’

  He unwrapped it, for he had taken it as evidence.

  ‘You’ll see that it is a warrior’s knife,’ he went on. ‘I doubt if you would use it in your kitchen.’

  Torpach glanced at it and then nodded sadly.

  ‘I am sorry to have bothered you,’ he said. ‘It was merely a thought as we have not found it. I was particularly fond of it.’

  Fidelma looked sympathetic. ‘I understand. A favourite tool is a favourite tool in any art or craft. Did you also see the knife that killed Sechnussach?’

  ‘I did and it was not that one.’

  ‘Then I hope you find your own one again.’

  Abbot Colmán re-wrapped the knife and, with a nod to Fidelma, went back to the yard outside where Mer’s body was being taken away.

  After they left the kitchen, walking back towards the guesthouse, Fidelma was silent. Eadulf, conscious of her moods, said nothing. Then she halted abruptly and looked round, as if wondering where she was. One of the Fianna was passing by.

  ‘Where will I find the physician?’ she asked.

  ‘Iceadh, is it?’ asked the man.

  ‘
It is. Where is his apothecary?’

  ‘You see the building with the blue-painted posts ahead of you?’ The man pointed. ‘Turn to your right and you will see a small building with a yellow sign, and there you will find the physician.’

  Fidelma thanked him and began to hurry forward with Eadulf falling in step with her.

  ‘Have you thought of something?’ he asked.

  ‘Not really. I want to question Brother Rogallach now.’

  ‘I thought Abbot Colmán wanted to be informed?’

  ‘It wastes too much time to go back and inform him. But I think that I need to put my questions while things are clear in my mind.’

  The apothecary of Iceadh was easy to find.

  The old physician himself opened to Fidelma’s knock and let them into a room packed with shelves of jars and bottles and with drying herbs hanging from all the beams. Although it was daylight outside, it was as if they were entering a darkened cave. Several lamps were burning and their heated tallow smell, combined with the powerful odours of a myriad of plants, caused them to catch their breath. It reminded Fidelma of old Brother Conchobhar’s apothecary at Cashel. In answer to her question, the old physician replied in his curious staccato manner.

  ‘Brother Rogallach is resting a moment. Given him a restorative. Superficial wound. Cut will heal in a day or two. Cleaned it. Bandaged it.’ He indicated a door into another chamber in the wooden building.

  It was a small, simply furnished room with two wooden beds, a table and chairs. It was clearly where Iceadh treated his seriously ill patients. Brother Rogallach was sitting on the edge of one of the beds, holding his bandaged head in one hand while the other held an empty glass from which he had apparently been taking Iceadh’s medication.

  The physician went to him, took the glass and nodded in satisfaction.

  ‘Good, good. You may return to your own chambers, Brother. Lie down a while. No work. Not until tomorrow. Might have a headache. No matter. Bad blow. You’ll be all right.’

  Fidelma glanced at the pale face of Rogallach.