A Game of Sorrows

by Shona MacLean

  ‘Aye, Kinsale. A place out of season then, and of no consequence now.’

  Stephen took great care in the drying of his hands. ‘But perhaps it is,’ he said at length. ‘Perhaps it is of consequence, or should be, if we are not to repeat past failings.’

  ‘And past mistakes,’ countered Murchadh.

  ‘Indeed. For such mistakes would cost us all dear, would cost Ireland dear, as they did before.’

  Murchadh threw down his goblet and turned on the Franciscan. ‘What do you want, priest? State your business now or leave this place. I have business to attend to and no hours to spare on you and your old grievances.’

  Stephen looked up, as if he were measuring Murchadh, inch by inch. ‘My masters have long memories, but this is no old grievance; it is something of three days’ standing I would know of.’

  The whole chamber held its breath. My mouth formed the words as Stephen spoke them: ‘Who murdered Sean FitzGarrett?’

  Two or three of the men around Murchadh stepped forward, ready to draw their swords. Murchadh put up a hand to stop them. ‘I am sure you are not here to accuse me, but my men are nervous and see slights where perhaps none was intended. The temper of the times.’

  ‘And always has been,’ responded Stephen. ‘But no, we are not here to accuse you. I know it was not you who cut the throat of Sean FitzGarrett, but I believe you know who did. Do not seek to protect him; powers greater than you have an interest in this and will find it out.’

  ‘Then they need no help from me.’

  I wondered why, given that both of them knew of my grandmother’s accusations against me, neither of them made any mention of me.

  Stephen persisted. ‘It will be in the interests of no one to protect Sean’s murderer. The news will reach Louvain, and further afield before much more time has passed. You had better show yourselves loyal to our cause or you and all of yours will be swept aside in the onslaught that is to come.’

  Murchadh closed in on him. ‘I know that your Spanish masters and His Holiness have other plans for the sovereignty of Ireland, but a leader, a figurehead, is needed for Ulster, for the people of Tyrone, of Tyrconnell, of Antrim and all the rest will not be ruled from Louvain, nor Madrid, nor yet Rome. You and your Pope may do as you please with the faith of the people, and the King of Spain may rest assured that Ulster will always give sound bases for his armies – a thorn in England’s flank that cannot be removed. That is all they want us for. For the rest, you know as well as I, they will leave us in peace.’

  Stephen was struggling to master his ire. ‘Dismiss the Church if you must, but you will find that no rebellion will succeed without it. And I would counsel you not to speak of His Majesty of Spain with such contempt: the English will never be driven from Ireland without him.’

  ‘It will take more than another foreign monarch who cares little for Ireland to drive the English out. The people will only rally to one of their own.’

  ‘And that one was to be Sean O’Neill FitzGarrett.’

  ‘My daughter’s betrothed.’

  ‘Who is now dead.’

  ‘Who is now dead.’

  ‘And who would you see in his place? Who would the old families and their followers accept?’

  ‘They all knew Sean was to marry Roisin; they all knew my lands were to be joined with FitzGarrett’s, that FitzGarrett’s wealth was to be used to buy in to more of the old O’Neill patrimony. It is in their minds already.’

  Stephen shook his head slowly. ‘They will never accept you, Murchadh. Memories are long; distrust has burnt slow: you would be engulfed in their desire for revenge.’

  I watched Murchadh, as did everyone else, waiting for an explosion of rage that did not come. ‘Truly, you think so, Mac Cuarta? They will not forgive?’ His eyes gave out some shadow of sadness, a dawning understanding, at last, that the dreams harboured since his youth would not be fulfilled.

  The priest went towards the rebel leader. ‘Nor forget, Murchadh.’ He laid his hand on the other’s forehead and uttered a Gaelic blessing.

  All through this, Cormac had watched without moving, without speaking, but the sinews in his arms were stretched to their limit, and a muscle twitching in his jaw gave him away – to me, at least, for no one else had the view that I had.

  ‘There is another,’ said Murchadh, at last.

  ‘There is indeed,’ said Stephen.

  Cormac chose this moment to declare himself. ‘And I am ready, Father. Give the word, and our kindred will rally to me; the others will care not that I am your son so much as I am an O’Neill, and a union with Maeve’s family …’

  ‘You?’ said Stephen, as if the idea had not occurred to him.

  ‘If not me, then who else is there?’

  A light had come again into Murchadh’s eyes, but he said nothing. Stephen exchanged an uneasy glance with Michael.

  ‘No one,’ he answered in some bewilderment. ‘There is no one.’

  ‘Then give me your hand, Mac Cuarta, as I give you mine, and let us acclaim my son, Cormac O’Neill, as leader of our rising and, God grant it, the liberator of Ulster.’

  Stephen’s eyes were travelling the hall, where over fifty armed men waited to butcher or to cheer him. He gripped the forearm that was offered to him and Murchadh clasped him around the shoulders as if he were a returning brother. The roar that went up all around them threatened to bring the earthen roof down on all our heads. Cormac was hoisted on to the shoulders of two of his strongest companions and carried in triumph around the hall, shouts of acclamation and the beating of spears on the ground almost deafening me. And through this great moment, through the length of the room from father to son, was a smile as wide as the river Bann and eyes as cold as the water in it.

  Eventually, when the cheering had begun to die down, Cormac was set on the ground again and raised a hand for silence. The clamour faded.

  ‘You do me great honour, and place in me a great and sacred trust. Ireland weeps, she has been raped and plundered. She is abandoned by those whose duty it was to protect her. Let the men of Ulster rise to her defence, and where we lead may Leinster, Munster and Connaught follow in our wake!’

  More cheering, more stamping, more shouts of acclamation. Again, Cormac let it engulf the room, then again he put up his hand. ‘But Ireland has not suffered alone. The Church, our Holy Mother Church, has been brutalised, trampled, stripped by the heretic Saxon horde, and now her bones are gnawed by the avaricious Scot, insatiable in his misery.’ This brought much murmured and mumbled assent, wise nodding and deferential inclination of heads towards the Franciscans. It was them that Cormac now addressed. ‘And so I ask you to give me your blessing, and to beg the Holy Virgin’s intercession on behalf of our enterprise.’

  I could almost have admired him. He knew it was not a thing the friars could refuse, and by encompassing their cause in his own, binding it so closely to himself, they, and those in Louvain, in Spain and in Rome in whose name they acted, could not oppose him. Stephen nodded, the slightest movement of the head but it was enough. With Michael at his side, he beckoned Cormac forward. Cormac knelt down before him, his head bowed, and in that action I saw a glimpse of something better than his father, better than the raiding and the brutality of his brothers, something I might have called noble. Michael made the sign of the cross over him, followed by Stephen, who then laid his hand on Cormac’s head and began to speak.

  ‘In the name of Mary, Holy Mother of God, I ask God’s blessing on you, Cormac O’Neill, in this great enterprise of the liberation of Ireland and of her Church, the Bride of Christ. Grant us the wisdom, oh Lord, to rise, and the strength, to go willingly to an agonising death in defence of our Church and our nation, rather than to bend our necks in the tainted service of a heretic king.’

  Fervent amens resounded around the room. From a pouch hanging from his belt Michael drew a small silver casket and held it out towards Stephen. The older Franciscan affected not to notice.

  ‘The ointment, fat
her,’ persisted Michael, murmuring under his breath. Stephen looked at him, giving the slightest but unmistakable shake of his head, but Cormac had now looked up, as had one or two of the others, and Stephen was forced, with great reluctance, to take the casket. He opened it slowly, and dipped a finger inside which he then laid on Cormac’s forehead in some approximation of the form of the cross. Then he mumbled some words in Latin, the right words, almost, some of them, for a blessing, for an anointing, but in no relation to one another that made any sense to me, and Latin came as easy to me as did my own Scots tongue. Michael glanced uneasily towards him before Stephen again made a cross in the air and called out, clear and with some finality, ‘Amen.’ All present in the room followed and Cormac stood and thanked the friars, with only the mildest of questioning in his eyes, before accepting once more the acclamation of his followers.

  I turned my face from the grille and felt my way to the far corner of my cell, taking care where I put my feet, not knowing what I might find there. The place was cold and damp and told of death. My bones ached with fatigue, and putting up my hood to make some barrier between the dirt and my head, I lay down. I had heard enough tonight of these people and their doings and wanted to hear no more. I had known my cousin briefly, had come to love him and to believe I knew him well, but it appeared now that I had not known him at all, and that this was how he had intended it should be. I felt desolate, more so even than I had done when I had learned that he was dead. And so this was what Andrew had meant when he had alluded to ‘what we are constrained to call Sean’s “business”’. That Murchadh was at the heart of a planned uprising against King and Church did not surprise me in the least, nor, deluded as she was, did my grandmother’s involvement come as a shock. Father Stephen and Michael were also in on it. I began to wonder now whether Andrew had been right when he had questioned the coincidence of Stephen’s presence at Armstrong’s Bawn, and at Coleraine on the night we were unveiled as impostors and chased from the town, into the waiting embrace of his young, armed, acolyte. What did they want with us? Stephen, who had led me to the Cursing Circle of Kilcrue and abandoned me there to be found by the sons of Murchadh O’Neill, and his cowled and crucifixed brethren to whose supposed mercy, on this All Hallows Eve, I had left the helpless Andrew Boyd?

  I could stay awake no longer. If I had the strength in the morning I would get to Deirdre somehow. If I had the strength. I must very soon have been asleep, too exhausted for dreams and too despondent for nightmares. If the spirits of the dead walked Dun-a-Mallaght that night, they left me in peace.

  NINETEEN

  The Dawning

  I did not hear the bolt of my cell drawn back, nor the door open. It was only when I felt the breath on my torn cheek and the voice in my ear that I woke with a start.

  ‘Lie still and keep your mouth shut until I tell you to speak.’

  The visitor had brought no light with him, and his back blocked much of the meagre grey light coming through the grille, but I knew by his voice that it was Cormac O’Neill. And coming to from a deep sleep though I was, I understood enough not to disobey his order. I waited, and when he saw that I understood, he continued.

  ‘Where is Boyd?’

  I had had no notion that the new-anointed rebel leader had an awareness even of Andrew’s existence, and I sought to win some time by this. ‘Who?’

  He slapped me across the cheek and set the wound his father had made to bleeding again.

  ‘Do not play games with me. Andrew Boyd. I know you left Carrickfergus with him, and that you were travelling with him to Coleraine. Where is he?’

  ‘What is it to you?’

  He raised his hand again, but this time I got my arm up in front of my face in time to stop his fist coming down on the broken flesh.

  Slowly, he removed my arm from the front of my face. ‘You will answer me, Seaton, or by God you will wish your mother had never met your father. Where is Boyd?’

  ‘I do not know.’ It was the truth, almost. I knew where the priest had told me they were taking him, but I did not know if he was there now, and I could not think Cormac O’Neill sought him out of concern for his welfare.

  He sat back on his haunches, and told me to sit up. I did so, and in the fine gauze of light that told me it must be daytime, he scrutinised my face. ‘There is something in your eyes that was not in his, and in his heart that is not in yours. But you have the same arrogance, by God. The old woman’s blood runs strong.’ He looked at me a little longer, as if to be absolutely certain that I was not Sean. Then he stood up. ‘Enough of him. You are now the matter in question. I know why you say you are in Ireland, and Maeve confirms it, so my father says; it sounds enough like her to be true. But why did you ride to Coleraine, and what is Andrew Boyd in your scheme?’

  ‘I have no scheme. I went to Coleraine because Sean had some suspicion that Deirdre’s husband’s family might be behind the curse on ours.’

  He smiled slightly. ‘“Ours,” you say. I see you claim them as your own now.’

  ‘I have no other,’ I replied.

  ‘And what did you find amongst the Blackstones?’

  ‘That they are people of few graces who want their hands on my grandfather’s business, but I do not think they would know how to go about treating with Finn O’Rahilly, or have any faith in his powers.’

  ‘Not the slightest. As Sean well knew, and your grandmother too. You went to Coleraine for something else. What was it?’

  ‘I swear to you, before God who knows all, I know of no other reason for me being sent there.’

  He began to pace the small cell, thinking. Then an idea evidently came to him. ‘Who did you meet with?’

  ‘I told you, the Blackstones, Deirdre’s …’

  ‘No, not the Blackstones,’ he said impatiently. ‘Who else? Did you meet with no one on your journey?’

  I cast my mind back to the journey of only three days ago. ‘We stopped at a poor Scots inn on the road to Broughshane, a widow and her children, friends of …’ And then I regretted that I had not thought more carefully. Friends of Andrew Boyd, in whom Cormac was so interested, and victims of the brutal roving of Cormac’s brothers.

  Cormac nodded his head slowly. ‘I know the place. Why did Boyd take you there?’

  ‘Because we needed food and our horses rest. And to give the woman some trade.’ I looked him straight in the eye. ‘They are not far from destitute: armed bands roam the country there and passing travellers keep on their way for fear of their lives; her oldest son and best support was slain by lawless thugs when he would not pay their blackmail.’

  ‘I know all of this,’ said Cormac, ‘and do not think I take any pride in it. Those responsible were punished. I am sorry for the woman’s troubles.’

  ‘Your sorrow does not make her sleep any the easier at night,’ I said.

  ‘It should. It has been seen to. The woman has been reassured and recompense made.’

  ‘Such recompense as can be, for the loss of a son.’

  ‘Many women in this land have lost husbands, sons, brothers, seen their children die at their breast for want of nourishment. They have been forced from their homes and the lands of their people to poor and wild places with little hope of sustenance. What recompense can be made has been made, and more if they need it. I have said it, and my word is not doubted.’

  I believed him, and, in spite of all the circumstances of our meeting, I began to warm a little to Cormac O’Neill.

  ‘What happened when you were at this woman’s place?’

  I shrugged. ‘She and her daughter served us some broth, the young boy saw to the horses, she and Andrew talked a little of family, we paid her and left. Our stop was brief, for Andrew was anxious to get on.’

  Interest flickered in his eyes. ‘Get on for where? Did you aim at Coleraine in the one day?’

  I shook my head. ‘We stopped the night at a bawn beyond Ballymena.’

  ‘Armstrong’s Bawn,’ he said, quietly, almost to himself.
‘And who did you meet with at Armstrong’s Bawn?’

  ‘No one.’ I hoped the meagre light might cover the lie on my face. I was to be disappointed.

  ‘You simply rested and took meat and drink. All you sought was bed and bread. Is this what I am to believe?’

  ‘Yes,’ I said, with some defiance.

  ‘And your bread, tell me, was it well baked? Good bread blessed by the baker?’

  I said nothing.

  ‘You met with Stephen Mac Cuarta of the Franciscan order at Bonamargy, did you not?’

  ‘What of it? It was by chance.’ I was not sure now that I believed that myself.

  ‘I think not.’

  So I told Cormac about the priest’s drugging of Andrew and Andrew’s distrust of him in return, about how the priest had come to me in the night because he had known nothing of me before he had set eyes on me that day, and this seemed to make him more inclined to believe my pleas of ignorance on our part.

  ‘And what did the priest tell you?’

  I kept my recollections to Stephen’s reminiscences about Phelim, and my mother, and left out anything he had had to say about Sean or his secret marriage with Macha. I could not tell how far Cormac believed me. ‘While Boyd was drugged, and before he knew you were awake, did the priest search your belongings, take anything?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘And you had been given nothing, no note, to pass on to him?’

  Again I said no.

  ‘Perhaps, then, you were the message yourself.’

  ‘What do you mean?’ I asked.

  ‘I suspect we will find out before another night has passed. But tell me, where have you left Boyd?’

  He read the cause of my hesitation.

  ‘I mean him no harm,’ he said. ‘I have no cause to love him, and some to fear him, but I give you my solemn word that I mean him no harm. I must – I must have some talk with him though. And I must have him brought here. I ask you again, where is he?’