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

by James Corkern

  ​I see, Padraig says.

  ​You don’t, comes the reply.

  ​Suibhne wordlessly smiles as Murchadh ceases the conversation. The former pokes the fire.

  ​Months pass. Clara is right about his purpose, how he is to serve Milchu. He spends his days following the sheep, watching over them as they graze. Sometimes this means he stays out in the pastures with the sheep when they are far afield and there is no returning home. On those nights he sits awake. When he is at the dún he learns more of the local language from Clara and soon he can converse unassisted with Milchu or Murchadh or Suibhne, though with difficulty.

  ​Soon, before a year has passed, they gather at Milchu’s hill. It is night and the torches cast light on strangely marked bodies and ritual clothing Padraig has never seen before. Adorned, they look like a great silent mass of foxes, deer, otters, badgers, horses, and carnivorous birds, a jumble of hooves and fur and horns and feathers and bright dyes hinted at in the torchlight. There are painted, hanging breasts, both male and female, and faded tattoos writhing like orgiastic oarfish. They are coming down the hill toward the slaves’ quarters. Clara grabs Padraig’s hand and leads him some distance away where they watch from outside the light of the fires.

  ​What are they doing? he asks.

  ​Watch, she says. He watches. Milchu, barely recognizable in costume, like some great wolf, steps away from the rest and gets Coinneach from his hovel. He doesn’t lead Coinneach, but simply leans in and then Coinneach follows. The crowd forms into something like a procession and follows Milchu and his slave as Padraig and Clara watch. The procession is cacophonous as the different masks emit their cries and their appeals to whatever was pleased by their changed faces.

  ​Padraig has spent nights outside with the sheep but has never traveled the land at night before. The inexhaustible landscape becomes something altogether different in the darkness. Worn trails are graves. Stone fences, familiar and warm and restive during the day become cold and hard and places of secret shadows. The flickering lights cast the party in grim synecdoche. After some time the mob leaves the main paths and enter the wilderness. It is here that their chants and calls and half-screamed prayers stop. The sound coming from them implodes without warning and it is as though thunder has sounded through a clear sky. The absence fills Padraig’s ears first with the noise of his footsteps and the raging beat of his heart. Padraig hears the sounds of animals and he thinks a distant wailing. He begins to turn, but Clara takes his arm and they continue after the crowd.

  ​They walk for hours and besides the sounds of night and the footsteps and breathing of the procession, there is no noise. At last they reach a large clearing and stop. Padraig and Clara find a grove of trees out of sight. Those with torches arrange them in a wide circle around Milchu and Coinneach.

  ​Here we gather, Milchu says. The time of the harvest is at hand, and now we give to Cernunnos.

  ​Cernunnos, the crowd echoes.

  ​From his depths he watches, from his depths he provides, from his depths he protects, and to him we make our sacrifice, Milchu says.

  ​We honor the horns of the lord of animals, the crowd says.

  ​Bear-friend, stag-rider, wolf-runner, Snake-with-antlers, He-with-the-sheep, accept our sacrifice.

  ​Padraig looks at Clara but she shakes her head and they watch in silence. Coinneach mutters at Milchu’s side, shivering and filthy, staring blankly ahead. A shape appears at the edge of the clearing, growing larger and larger. Great wooden wheels guide it forward as it is pushed by more of Milchu’s acolytes. Once it is in the firelight he sees it for what it is. A colossus of interwoven wood, it stands as tall as several men. It is only crudely in the image of a man, as though scratched into sand, despite standing out against the sky.

  ​What is it? Padraig dares to whisper.

  ​One of their gods, she says.

  ​They worship it? he asks.

  ​Yes, but it’s not the worst of their gods, she says.

  ​Coinneach is led up a makeshift ladder into the thing’s belly and he sits there whimpering. Milchu continues to speak and periodically the crowd responds, their combined speech either too arcane or distant to be understood. As the captive sits babbling softly, Milchu draws a circle around the effigy with a stick. The circle soon becomes a wheel as Milchu fills in the spokes. He stops. He grabs one of the torches from the ring around the effigy and lights the figure. At first there is no discernible fire, just vague puffs of cotton white. Soon the white becomes storm clouds and greasy hanging choking fumes bellow from the abominable legs. The fire spreads. The crowd watches the wooden statue become a pillar of flame, emitting a gargantuan elemental crackling and hissing and spitting. There is no sign of Coinneach. Padraig and Clara watch the inferno from their place of safety. They watch and the crowd watches and many more hours go by.

  ​Dawn hints. The remains of the giant smolder. Birds awaken. The crowd shows signs of restlessness, the unmistakable murmurings of a body of people at the end of their purpose. Clara takes him by the hand.

  ​Let’s go, she says.

  ​Where?

  ​Home, she says.

  ​They retrace their steps. The sun still threatens to rise but the slightly illuminated dark of early morning persists. Soon they are home and it’s like they never left. Except Coinneach is not there. They do not see Murchadh or Suibhne.

  ​What was that? Padraig asks.

  ​It’s something they do once or twice a year, she says.

  ​But what is it?

  ​I told you. It’s a gift for one of their gods.

  ​Once or twice a year?

  ​I don’t know for sure how often it happens. I’ve lost count of it.

  ​But you’ve seen it before?

  ​Oh, yes.

  ​They nap together for what is left of the night, curled among their shared furs and ragged cloth. They sleep except when Murchadh and Suibhne come into the camp after dawn. They sleep as late as they dare, then go about their tasks.

  ​Milchu is in high spirits, as though he hasn’t been up all night. He has added to his many animals a hound. It is like a bear or the offspring of man and wolf. The hound is longer than a man is tall and easily weighs more, as well. His head sits at the bottom of Milchu’s chest and his shaggy coat is like dirty snow, except for the tip of the tail which is black. It plays with Milchu like a puppy and a lesser man would have been crushed by its play.

  ​Padraig goes to attend to the sheep. It is with the sheep that he feels most at home now. With the sheep he can let the pasture become a pasture from his own island, with his father just beyond the hill. He has a crook with him for the wayward sheep or predators, depending on how he must use it. Here too he can think. He doesn’t need to look busy, he doesn’t need to avoid the scowls of his fellow slaves or the eyes of others. Here is not free, but it is close.

  ​The sheep are grazing nearby and he finds a tree to sit beneath. The oak is ancient. The branches creak in the wind. He closes his eyes and hums to himself, a tune from home. Then he hums one from his new home, one he’s heard Clara sing into the fire at night. He tries to write a poem but he cannot make the words fit and soon he falls asleep.

  ​He wakes around noon. At first he is panicked that the sheep have gotten away from him but they are only a little distance off. He finds a closer tree and beneath it eats the food he brought. The sun is warm and soon he is asleep again and the poem still unfinished.

  ​When he opens his eyes, she is there and it is late afternoon.

  ​Hello, he says.

  ​Hello.

  ​Won’t Milchu be missing you?

  ​I made myself seen. You’re forgetting that I’m cattle, nothing more.

  ​She sits beside him in the shade. They watch the sheep together, and the grass and the trees and the sun shining down through the clouds in the blue sky. She takes his hand. The first time is exciting and there is a kind of violence in its excitement, but it is brief. They
sit in the grass with the sun on their skin and they kiss and do not talk. It begins to rain. The second time is slow and relentless and it is not brief. Their hair is wet and fallen leaves stick to their legs.

  ​Lying there in the grass, she turns to him and kisses him.

  ​They have a story here that you might like to hear, she says.

  ​What story is that? he asks.

  ​The story of Etain, she says.

  ​Tell me.

  ​There is a woman, Etain, more beautiful than any other in the whole world.

  ​Not true, he says and she smiles.

  ​Let me tell the story. She was so beautiful that she caught the eye of Midir. Now Midir was one of the Other People, the ones who were here before. One of the Old Ones. Well, those-beneath-the-mounds, when they want to, can appear to be beautiful and they can be persuasive, and this was how Midir appeared to Etain. He loved her and through his beauty she came to love him and they were married. What Midir never told Etain was that he already had a wife. Midir’s first wife, Fuamnach, was also one of the Other People, and while Midir liked to use his power to be clever and get what he wanted, Fuamnach used hers for witchcraft and was a hateful, spiteful thing.

  ​Eventually Fuamnach finds out about the marriage, and she curses Etain. What was a beautiful woman is turned into a pool of water, but her troubles are not over. The water eventually dries and becomes a worm, but not long passes before that worm becomes a gorgeous scarlet fly, like the kind that land on the flowers in the meadow. It’s as large as man’s head and the sound of its wings is like music. Then Fuamnach, not content with the transformation, causes a great wind to plague the scarlet fly, and she is so constantly assaulted by the wind that she cannot land anywhere but the rocks on the coast by the sea. For seven years she lives like this.

  ​After those years she’s discovered by Oengus, a rival of Midir, and he builds her a house that he carries with him so that she may come and go as she pleases. Even this small happiness, such as it is, is not to last, though, as Fuamnach finds out what has happened to Etain and causes another wind to come, and once again Etain knows no peace.

  ​Finally, the scarlet fly lands into a cup of wine, which is drunk by Etar, a woman, who becomes pregnant and gives birth to Etain again, over a thousand years after she was first born. As she grows into her second life, she marries another man, and though Midir finds her and visits her in disguise as her husband, she always knows it is a trick. He tells her that they were once married but she doesn’t remember and doesn’t believe him.

  ​Frustrated, Midir takes on his true form and visits her husband. Etain’s husband gives Midir task after task to gauge his power, always reneging on the offered reward whenever Midir completes his assignment. At last, Midir challenges Etain’s husband to a game of skill. Now, Midir is clever, and each time he purposefully loses his bet, starting with fifty horses. Each time he increases the stakes of the bet, and Etain’s husband thinks Midir is a fool for continuing to bet larger and continuing to lose. At last, Midir wages for Etain herself against all of his livestock, and her husband is surprised when he is ruthlessly beaten by Midir. Etain is brought out to him, and he puts his arm around her and the pair of them turn into swans and fly to his palace under the mound.

  ​That’s a sad story, Padraig says. They were apart for so long, and she didn’t remember him.

  ​But at the end they fly away, she says.

  ​They lay silently in the grass together, looking at the sky.

  ​He stays with the sheep and she stays with him and for days this is the way it is. Then one day there is a figure on the horizon. Soon they can see Murchadh’s shape and when he arrives he tells them that Clara must return to the dún. If they are in trouble they do not know, because nothing is ever said to either of them and they are not punished, but still she is told to return.

  ​Padraig stays with the flock until it’s near his new home again and then he too returns. He is the happiest that he has been in months, except that now the clouds look like smoke. When he arrives at their camp, Clara is cooking and slips him a sly smile. Murchadh is trying to get the fire to light and Suibhne is sitting with a game board and some crude pieces, half of which are blue and half of which are red. Padraig sits opposite of him and watches as Suibhne arranges the pieces, some in the center in a configuration and some in a circle on the outside of the board.

  ​What is that? Padraig asks.

  ​Fidchell, Suibhne says.

  ​It looks like latrunculi.

  ​How do you know latrunculi? Suibhne asks as though surprised.

  ​The soldiers played it. How do you know it?

  ​We are about to play a game, Murchadh and I, Suibhne says, ignoring the question.

  ​Do you mind if I watch? Padraig asks.

  ​We don’t, Murchadh says, and the fire is finally lit.

  ​As far as Padraig can tell the goal is to move the king from the center to the outside edges of the board with the help of the king’s men. The invading force stands on the outside and its only objective is to stop the king. Pieces can be captured by being outnumbered on their flanks. The two men play several games. Suibhne plays as the defenders and Murchadh is the attacker, and they wager and drink. Murchadh wins again and again. In frustration, Suibhne changes his configuration each game after his first two losses. First a sort of star, then different squares and rows and patterns. With the last game he uses two intersecting lines standing against the circling invaders with his king in the center. This game he wins. Murchadh announces he is tired and is able to keep most of what he has won. Suibhne drinks more and then he too sleeps.

  ​Clara and Padraig stay up and watch the fire die and listen to the sounds of Milchu’s hound as it runs under the moon. She holds him around the waist and he smells her hair and scratches her with his beard, which is short and grows in patches. They lay together and the sun takes its time in rising.

  ​Things remain unchanged and their routine becomes one of open love and no one says a word. Three months after the field, Clara tells Padraig she is pregnant. At first he is surprised then delighted, but then he sees that his son will be in the same situation he’s in and he doesn’t want his child to be a slave. He approaches Milchu one afternoon soon after that. His master sits outside of the ringfort with the dog at his side and his eyes closed.

  ​What do you need, Padraig? Milchu asks without looking.

  ​I want to talk to you, Padraig says.

  ​About Clara? Milchu asks.

  ​She’s pregnant.

  ​Clara is pregnant and you are the father.

  ​I am. Did you know?

  ​I knew.

  ​I wanted to talk to you because I want your mercy. I was brought here and sold and that is done, and I’ve done as you asked. But I don’t want my child to live the life I will have to live.

  ​You don’t want your child to be my slave.

  ​I don’t.

  ​He won’t be, Milchu says.

  ​He won’t?

  ​I haven’t bought your child. I own you and I own Clara, but I don’t own your child. That isn’t our way. Both of you were taken and the weak are subject to the will of the strong. But your child will just be born and that is a battle we all lose.

  ​Then let me be free with my child, for the child’s sake.

  ​Milchu opens his eyes and looks a Padraig for a moment. At first he seems angry but then laughs.

  ​I will tell you what I will do. You will be mine for seven more years. At the end of the seventh year, you’ll be free. If you’re able to give me six milch cows to compensate me for her loss, then you may also take Clara. Your child will be yours to do with what you wish, and to show you my good will I’ll let the child live with you and Clara here with me so long as it doesn’t keep you from your work.

  ​You will? Padraig asks.

  ​I will. Now work.

  ​Padraig goes back down the hill to Clara. That night she watches him pray a
s she has so many nights before.

  ​What are you praying for? she asks.

  ​For our child and for you, he says.

  ​It is quieter than Milchu’s worship, she says.

  ​It is. Who do you pray to?

  ​I remember when I was home the people would talk about Ataegina and Bandua, and I think Bandua is who the Romans called Mars before they turned to their new god.

  ​But you don’t pray to them?

  ​From what I’ve seen of their deeds, they’re as good as stone. Since there is much stone where I’m from, I might as well pray to the rocks.

  ​Tell me more about your home, he says.

  ​It’s hot and it’s dry and in the mountains it is even drier, not like this soggy place at all. The air is clear and you can see for days in front of you, and if you go to the coast it’s calm and warm and blue. It’s not gray and cold and always angry.

  ​My home isn’t different from here. I don’t want you to be unhappy if--

  ​If what? If we live there? We are Milchu’s.

  ​What if we weren’t?

  ​What if I had wings? What if we were dead?

  ​I talked to Milchu. He said that our child will be free.

  ​He will be.

  ​He said that we could be free, too, if I remained his for seven years and then bought you from him.

  ​He said that?

  ​He did, Padraig says.

  ​And you believe him?

  ​Why wouldn’t I?

  ​Why would you?

  ​He said so.

  ​And if it is the truth how will you pay for me? What will we do with the child?

  ​He said we could raise the child here. And I’ll find a way to pay for you.

  ​You shouldn’t have spoken with him.

  ​Why?

  ​You shouldn’t have. How many years do you think Coinneach was here?

  ​I don’t know.

  ​Many, many years. If slaves were released just for their effort, shouldn’t Coinneach be free?

  ​Padraig considers. Will we be sacrificed? he asks.