The Fire in the Oaks: A Novel of St Patrick's Confession

by James Corkern

  The Fire in the Oaks

  a novel of St Patrick’s Confession

  by James Corkern

  for Rachel,

  mo eala

  One

  Twelve silent stone and bronze figures stand as sentinels for the gold and silver inlaid rock in their midst. It is a ring, a drain- an abominable and ancient blood nexus. The man, long haired and bearded, is familiar with the most ancient of these dark gods, grown bloated and immortal through the generations with proffered sacrifices. Tigernmas, that ancient king, died here along with four thousand souls at the new year, destroyed by his own dark rituals. He was not the first and not nearly the last, going back to the days of King Solomon. Battle. Murder. Battle. Murder. That is the cycle. The place takes and takes, and like a flattened, wizened, earthen heart it beats its greedy rhythm.

  The man is on the Plains of Prostration. It is named after their style of prayer, these people who take him as their own. Their prayers are not at all like his own prayers. Theirs, in this place of deceptive green, are like that of the desert nomads still two centuries distant. His prayer is from the same desert, but already antique. Not the last of their gods, this, but the least comprehensible. The most implacable. The other gods were like all those who came before. Knowable. Human. Heroes deified. Not like this thirsty, relentless thing without redemptive trait or scrutable value. There are no stories of it. It is not a conqueror. It is not, was not, a great warrior. It does not trick. It does not lead a great host. It is Crooked. It is Black. It lives in the mounds. It consumes. In a sense it is familiar to him, like his own Lord. One is old enough to escape the amelioration of man. The other still older.

  It was, he says to himself.

  A crowd has gathered. Some have come to watch him. Some have come only because there is a crowd. Many have come to hate him, but now all are quiet. He is safe, for the present. There are enough of his followers amongst them that he will not be killed. Yet. But this must be done. All give him distance. He walks around the stones, examining them. Purposefully he avoids the center. Let them wait.

  ​There is a cold breeze. The wind whips his hair around like torn cloth. It has grown long like the natives’. His beard, likewise grown, waves more stiffly. Tigernmas, he thinks, remembering the stories. It has been centuries, but anniversaries ignore years. Only days are important. He wonders if this was the weather when the four thousand died. Would he die? Undoubtedly. But here? Now? His crozier in hand, he kneels to expect one of the sentinels. Idols. The weather reminds him of a day long before, when he was young. Some days matter--the kind with irrevocable force. Fate-changing force.

  ​The father. The son. He watches his father assist the priest. At the time this is a hollow ritual. His father stares at him and notes the lack of conviction. Mea culpa. For sixteen years, mea culpa. His mind wanders during the reading. The day outside interests him more. Sunshining drizzle, the weather alternates at its most pleasant and he longs to run outside and be away from the stones and the dark and gravity. Pater noster. He receives unworthily, he knows, but it is almost over and how he wants to be free. Soon they are blessed and it is ended.

  ​Patricius, his father calls to him.

  ​Father? he asks.

  ​Where are you going?

  ​To the forest, he says. Others would be at work, it is no sabbath, but his family can read, though he himself never has.

  ​Be careful, his father says, turning his back.

  ​At last he is free--the dance of propriety is ended. Not satisfactorily, he knows, but it is finished all the same and he can do as he wishes for now. Punishment will come later. Once he is there he doesn’t know what he wanted from the wilderness. Perhaps to exist. He hears birds. The solitude frightens him, but he is proud, too, and continues onward. On the slope of a green hill he hears voices, but cannot discern what is said. He listens for a moment and his curiosity overwhelms his caution. It doesn’t take long to scale the rest of the hill. He sees below there is a cluster of men, though they look foreign to him. They don’t seem to have noticed him, though they repeatedly scan the hills around them and move as though they want to remain as close to the ground as possible.

  ​Unseen, he shadows the men. They continue on in much the same way, and he suspects they are hunting something. If the soldiers find them hunting here there will be trouble, he thinks. Watching their movements, he stumbles, catching himself with a quiet grunt. He looks at the men and they look at him. He moves quickly but the hill is steep and he falls. At last he comes to a stop, but there is no breath in him. After a moment he can stand again.

  ​He sees the men coming. They are bearded and their hair is wild and tangled, not like him with his close-cropped hair and no need to shave. He is alarmed and wants to flee, but they are faster than him and there is no one to run to. So he stands and waits for them. They shout at him in a language half forgotten. He responds in Latin, the language of his father and of his grandfather. If they understand, they don’t acknowledge. The men’s clothes are garishly dyed, and he knows in his heart if he runs they will kill him. He stands still. His stillness seems to anger them but they are content to push him, to bind him. After they have him there is no more shouting. The raiders talk amongst themselves with the familiarity of laborers.

  Just off the beach there is a galley where more of them make ready for a journey. Those with him force him to wade out into the cold, dark water, and he is lifted into the galley as the crew take their places. There are others captives, but they are strange to him and he will never know if they speak his language. His first attempt at speech is ended with a kick to his face which leaves him reeling. He is silent the rest of the journey, like the others.

  From the sight of a decrepit sun behind domineering clouds he knows they sail west. The waves are higher than he thought when they first departed, and now he is sick to his stomach. The ship is almost thrown through the chaotic sea, and from his position tied on the deck he doesn’t know how the raiders keep from being thrown overboard. They call to each other and their language is guttural. One scans the horizon and the galloping clouds raise a cry of alarm. Soon the rain is on them. It is on this sea that he fears death for the first time. Its grip is on him, and there is the promise of a plunge into nothingness. The great dark churning ocean sprawls below him and he lunges for it like a falling stone without recourse. Covered in sick and saltwater and away from home, this fear inside him finds itself in good company as another emerges. He fears Hell and his back burns with anticipated retribution. He cowers on the deck, the slick wood pressed against his face. All the cold in the world won’t take way the sudden fires of damnation. It is there he prays for the first time in earnest. It is there he learns the first prayers, the lowest order, the prayers of self-preservation. And though his prayer’s refrain is Ego, it is heartfelt.

  The sailors hear his barbarous tongue in rhythm with the crests and they laugh. They are like infernal denizens themselves. Wind and water mean nothing to them--it is from the wind and the water they come. Their people inherited the land through the sorceries of the sea, taken from the clayhauling half-Greeks and slithering mound things that came before them. They leave a vacant Iberia to claim their birthright, and their ancestral stories tell them nothing of fear nor mercy.

  The storm subsides, the never-at-peace sea no longer boiling, and he feels shame. One of the other captives-a little boy-is dead, drowned facedown on the deck, unable to maneuver his bindings. His body is resentfully tossed into the sea. The sailors look like drying golems of seaweed.

  ​Soon the coast is spotted. Patricius notes the journey is
not long. Perhaps he will be able to return home. His hopes are crushed as the ship begins to follow the coastline. Stupid, he thinks. There is no settlement here, why would they stop? If anything, the tracing of the coast takes longer than the initial voyage. He is hungry and can no longer feel his limbs. His eyes burn. The sailors eat without regard for him, their mouths closing enough only to tear their food and their beards become filthier still.

  At long last he sees structures and human shapes on the coast. They have reached a village. The men bring their galley close to the shore, maneuvering into the shallows. He and the others are forced from the deck, numbed legs struggling to wade at knifepoint. He is frightened once he reaches the beach. The raiders shout at him with instructions he can’t hope to follow. All the captives are lined up in front of a crowd of people, and all save one of the raiders have moved on to other interests. One remains, their leader he supposes, and addresses the crowd. A woman is exchanged and he now knows their fate is slavery. He despairs. He will never see his home again.

  Soon he is the one for sale, and he is sold to a stocky man with brown hair. The man says something to him; it sounds like he is trying to say Lord. The boy replies to the man in Latin, but the man shakes his head and repeats himself. The man points directly at him and says the word again, louder. Finally the boy understands.

  ​Patricius, he says. My name’s Patricius.

  ​The man considers this. He tries the name in his rough tongue.

  ​No, Patricius.

  ​Padraig, the man replies. He turns away and seems to have satisfied himself with the name. Mounting his hobby, the slaver starts the animal out of the village. The boy is no longer fettered--where is there to go? Padraig follows his master.

  Two

  ​The first night they make camp, Padraig falls asleep immediately, exhausted from the trials of the day coupled with brisk travel. He feels as though he has just gone to sleep when he is kicked awake, the sun narrowing his eyes to slivers. As they travel, Padraig learns the language of his new home. At first he doesn’t know what his master is trying to tell him, but eventually he realizes he is being taught simple words. By the time they stop that day he is able to say his new name and some other simple phrases. On that second night he decides to pray again, still the halting, stilted prayer of the ship, but this time there is no imminent threat of death. He remembers his father and his grandfather telling him stories of the Hebrews and their struggles in the Holy Land, and looking around him he equates their struggle with his own wilderness. The moist greenery surrounding him is his own prison, and it is as empty as any wasteland. He and his owner have encountered no other souls on their journey, and for one who has lived his entire life under the shadow of Rome, there is something dangerously lawless about this place. Padraig’s master watches him at his prayers, his face blank. The boy wonders whether the man approves or disapproves. He merely looks at Padraig for a long moment then turns his attention to the fire.

  ​Padraig dreams. He stands facing the rising sun, coming out of the east. Before him is a vast plain, empty but verdant, completely silent apart from his breathing. Suddenly, he hears water behind him and turns, finding himself on the edge of a great cliff, angry waves crashing beneath him. The light of the sun stops at this precipice, eternal night extending forth over the sea and beyond. He can barely discern the writhing of some colossal horror just below him in the darkness, a spectral beast transfixing him with an unseen stare and soon he feels no warmth--not even the sun on his back--and he is falling. There is nothing below but pain and torment and oblivion.

  ​Cold dirt and twilight find him awake, the terror he felt still accelerating his heart. Looking around, he sees that his master is already awake, staring out across the hills into the receding darkness. Having arisen from his sleep, Padraig’s master is unclothed, and Padraig sees is body is covered in serpentine markings.

  ​On the third day they arrive at their destination, across a field and at the top of a small hill some ways from the crude road. Padraig sees there is a primitive fort, not like the great castra of the Romans, but more of a ringed wall of mud with an entrance.

  ​Dún, says his master, pointing to the structure.

  ​Dún? Padraig asks.

  ​Tá. Padraig sees the affirmation in the man’s face. Tá d'ainm Padraig. Is Milchu mo ainm.

  ​Milchu points at himself emphatically, and Padraig only needs him to repeat twice more before he understands. Milchu. Now he has a name to go with the strange, marked, bearded man who stares at him without comment or expression. He looks around, but there is the same monotony of landscape which has formed their entire journey. Rolling green, uniform in every direction except for groves of trees and ancient, worn mountains and clusters of rock. Milchu is moving toward his dún and even after only three days Padraig instinctively follows him, for there is no defiance left in him.

  ​Once they are near the homestead, there are two girls and a woman who watch them from the entrance. They stare unquestioningly at Padraig with round hazel eyes, dirty brown hair hanging limply about their shoulders. Their eyes brighten and smiles transform their plain faces at the sight of Milchu. Padraig’s pride at how much of the language he has already absorbed is shattered by the rapid outbursts from the group as both sounds and syntax escape what he had thought were his keen ears. It is as though he is not present during their reunion, and at first he marvels until he notices the dismounted hobby is also reduced to the background. Though he has accepted his bondage, it is only then he realizes that he is now an object, with the same utility and status as the horse. Standing awkwardly and unneeded, he notices from his vantage point atop the hill that there are more structures on the property previously hidden from view. These are on the opposite side of the dún and are shabby enough that Milchu’s home suddenly appears palatial. Milchu points at the huts and nods his head as though he wants Padraig to go, then walks inside with his family without another syllable wasted on the new slave.

  ​Padraig makes his way down the hill, his legs finally beginning to rebel after so much exertion. In the first hut there is an old man. He looks at Padraig with sullen eyes through a curtain of unkempt, greasy grey hair. He says something to Padraig, revealing rotten teeth in the nest of dog mange. Though his language seems to be the same as Milchu’s and the slavers’, he speaks with an accent that renders the words even more incomprehensible. Padraig stares at the man with morbid attention as he laughs and babbles out more gibberish among his collection of wood and stinking rags.

  ​That’s Coinneach, says a voice behind him. Padraig turns and there is a girl. A woman with dark hair and dark eyes, speaking Latin to him.

  ​What did you say? he asks.

  ​Coinneach. It’s his name. He’s mad.

  ​Mad?

  ​He’s been here ages, since Milchu’s father was alive. Long before any of the others came here.

  ​How many?

  ​How many years?

  ​No, how many others are there?

  ​Oh, she says. Him, me, you, and two more.

  ​Where are they?

  ​She shrugs.

  ​How long have you been here? he asks.

  ​Ten years. Twelve years. I can’t remember. Since I was young.

  ​And you’ve never tried to leave?

  ​She laughs.

  ​Where would I go? My home is far away and I don’t have a ship. Even if I did leave, there’s nothing waiting for me.

  ​Padraig says nothing.

  ​Are you hungry? she asks.

  ​Yes.

  ​They eat barley bread and milk that has soured, along with some mutton. There are chickens, but the chickens are for the family, as are the cattle. He learns the other two of Milchu’s slaves watch Milchu’s cattle, for they are strong and the cattle are as important as the chickens.

  ​The woman’s name is Clara, and she explains to him that in the custom of their captors she has no specific task, that she is currency which could
be exchanged in a time of need, though she does perform tasks for the family as requested. She expects he will primarily watch over the flocks of Milchu’s sheep, which Coinneach had watched before Padraig. The sheep are important but don’t require strong men. They are valuable, but there is no glory in their theft.

  ​No one sings about stolen sheep, she tells him.

  ​Night falls and he hears rejoicing up the hill. Clara’s face is distant as she looks into the fire they warm themselves by. Out of the darkness come Murchadh and Suibhne, Milchu’s others. They are loud and hungry and until they have eaten they ignore Padraig, but even then they seem only to notice him as he converses in Latin with Clara who seems to oscillate between introspection and openness.

  ​They don’t speak Latin, he says to her as he watches them watch him out of the corners of their eyes.

  ​No, she says. They’re captives just like we are, but they’re native to this place and so they’re better in the eyes of the law, but the same at the fire. They’re criminals.

  ​What did they do?

  ​I’ve never asked.

  ​The camp grows silent. The fire crackles. Padraig begins to pray to himself, trying to remember the prayers he learned from his father which had once come so easily from rote, but now were like trying to recall the face of a forgotten childhood friend. He’s interrupted by some sentence spat at him from across the fire.

  ​What did he say? Padraig asks Clara after Murchadh speaks.

  ​He asked to whom you are praying, she says.

  ​Christ Jesus.

  ​The god of the Romans, Murchadh replies through Clara.

  ​Yes.

  ​There are some of your kind here, too. They gather at Teach-na-Roman, not too far.

  ​I didn’t realize there were Christians here, Padraig says.

  ​There are a few, Clara translates. They are womanly. They don’t know the ways of the north or the people of the mound, and they have no fear of the Bloody One who watches the harvest.