by Erin O'Quinn
And even as I thought about the enigmatic woman that was the Widow Moc, she entered the room.
Chapter 4:
A Sounding Roar
Mockingbird stood for a moment on the edge of the room, her eyes taking in her guests, not yet lingering on her lover. Her hair, deeper than black, caught the myriad lights, and the sparkling dust made it seem iridescent, rippling from black to deepest purple and then to black again. It was swept up from her face, away from her prominent cheekbones, and held in place by a large bodkin, a kind of hair clasp favored by Éireannach women. The clasp was bone, or perhaps ivory, carved with mysterious, runic figures.
She was dressed simply, in a stiff, dark taffeta that, when she moved, ruffled and crackled like a rousing bird. The top of her gown was high, shielding any sign of her breasts. But I could see a swelling under the cloth, rising and falling like a secret tide.
She moved toward Owen and stopped a foot or so from his bench, still not looking at him.
“Lou”—that was her name for Torin—“will you introduce your brother? For he is unmistakably your brother.”
Torin’s given name was Lough Mac Lóeghaire—the warrior Lough, son of Leary, destined to be high king after his father. His name to every Éireannach was synonymous with the legendary Lugh of the Bright Sword, and that is what Swallow called him and how he was first introduced to Moc.
“Of course, dear madam,” Torin said. “Liam, husband of Caylith and nephew of Owen, this is Mockingbird, she of song and legend.”
Liam took her tiny hand and bowed very deeply, his forelocks falling across his eyes exactly like his oldest brother. Indeed, except for his facial hair, Liam was the very image of Torin. Well, Liam was taller by an eyelash and his brown eyes deeper by a shaft of shadow. Liam wore a close beard, and Torin was clean shaven. Otherwise, they may as well have been twin chicks in the egg.
“Madam Mockingbird. Me heart is joyed…I meet ye at last.”
I could see that Liam’s unaffected speech was pleasing to Moc, for she allowed Liam to hold her hand a few seconds too long before drawing it back, and her dark-on-dark eyes snapped and sizzled in the candlelight.
“Peas in the pod,” she said shortly, and I smiled in spite of the tense moment. She liked Liam right away, that was plain to see, the same way she liked Torin.
She turned then to Owen, and her expression changed altogether. As only a woman could see, Moc’s eyes held a depth of passion and an excitement of sexual skirmish that transformed her face entirely. Her high cheekbones became so suffused with rose tint that the angles softened and glowed. Her mouth, straight and unyielding as Sweeney’s own, settled into the same rosebud shape as her daughter’s. A haunting beauty welled up from somewhere inside her small frame and took over her entire body, so that she became, in that moment, more beautiful than her ravishing daughter.
None of that was lost on Owen Sweeney. I saw his own face, normally hollow and pale, soften into a ruddy fullness as he gazed on Mockingbird. The eyes that I had once thought malevolent and devoid of humanity were suddenly blazing with fierce affection and sensual vitality. His eyes went from her bodkin to her shimmering hair to her bodice, then to her down-covered arms. His thin lips now seemed soft and pliant, almost ready to caress her smooth skin, even in public.
All, all transformed by love. There was so much raw emotion in the room at that moment that I took Liam’s hand with no thought of embarrassment and drew it to my mouth, loving him and loving his touch.
He let my tongue linger on his skin, and I stole a look at his eyes. He, too, was smoldering, catching fire from the sparks flying from Owen and Moc. At that moment I heard Swallow’s voice, full of humor. “Supper is waiting.”
Still holding Liam’s hand, I walked to the dining area and waited for Moc to gesture where she wanted us to sit. I found myself next to Michael on one side and Liam on the other, with Owen directly across from me. On the one hand, I was glad to have a chance to talk with Michael about the construction of our brugh; on the other, I still felt a bit subdued in the presence of Sweeney.
Supper was perfect—bowls and bowls of tender summer squash, buttered parsnips, and fat dwarf beans and trenchers piled with savory salmon rubbed with garlic and wild onion. All of us ate for at least ten minutes before pausing to talk, a sure tribute to the flavor and a sign of our keen appetites.
And the sun-petal wine flowed. I had never tasted better. It was redolent of the fragrant grasses that grew along the Foyle, with a hint of pine from the forest floor.
At last I slowed down enough to address Michael. I started a bit obliquely, not wanting to press him about our new holdings. “Ah, Michael. What do you think of the idea of a new church—all made of oak and cedar, dedicated to Father Patrick?”
He nodded, still chewing. Then he swallowed and put down his eating knife. “Aye, colleen, we need another church. An’ sure a house of the Lord built of wood would last a few generations. At least it would last beyond the rude clay an’ mud we now have.”
“I heard that Father Patrick now has a psalm singer, Michael. His voice would sound like an angel, echoing off walls of oak, do you not think?” I took another sip. My stomach felt warm with a blurry edge, like the clansmen’s speech.
“I agree. But what if we went a step further, lass, an’ built a church of stone? Methinks Liam might leave a few stones in the river when the trench is completed.” I knew that Michael was teasing me now, leading me from mud to stone. Next he would propose a church of diamonds and rubies.
“But, Michael, what I really hear you say is that my own brugh will not last long—only sticks and mud, after all.”
“Aye, Cate. There is no turning back. Ye wanted certain—refinements, and those I cannot give ye in wood or stone. And I think ye would not want to wait the years it may take to build it.”
“You mean the construction is too far along to stop now?”
He looked at me narrowly. “D’ye want me to stop and begin all over, Caylith?”
“Certainly not, Michael. I badly want to live there…soon.”
He laughed with his whole face, his eyes crinkling and his mouth wide. “Ye’re a joy to me, lass. Why d’ye not just ask me? I could finish part of the brugh, an’ you can live in that part while me workmen finish the rest. Is that what ye want?”
“I…I did not want to press you, Michael. That would invite ill fortune.”
“Come and see me tomorrow at the work site. An’ Liam, too. We can talk about what part to finish first an’ when ye can move in.”
I knew my eyes showed my excitement, but I said only, “Tá go maith, a Micheál.” Then I bent my head to my trencher while Michael laughed, a rousing sound that warmed me completely.
Owen’s deep voice rose then. “Michael, I know you built the longship I sailed in a month ago. I have sailed in many a vessel through my life, but never one so graceful. Sleek, and yet powerful. I congratulate you.”
Michael, about to stab another portion of fish, paused, his cheeks blazing in a way I had rarely seen on him. “Ye’re too kind.”
“No, lad. Flattery is not an art I have learned. I would have you build my own holdings, yet I think you and your pretty wife have other plans. Am I right?”
“We…have talked about staying in this fair garden. I am directing the building of a brugh for Liam and Caylith. An’ we have a home on the Lough Neagh, where Brid’s father also has a home.”
“Then perhaps I can call on you to help me design a new home for…my family.” He put his hand on Moc’s downy arm as he spoke. “Others can build it if you could conceive it.”
“An’ where would this be, Uncle?”
“On the bay they call Trawbreaga.”
“Let me talk with me wife, an’ sure I will speak with ye again on the subject.”
“Owen,” I said, a bit tentatively, reaching for my wine cup. “What are your plans when you leave here?”
He regarded me from under his shaggy, dark brows for a while, as if c
ounting in advance how many words he would speak. But he answered me directly enough. “Limavady first. Moc and I will travel to the old holdings in Ballysweeney and stay with my two youngest sons. Then we will take the measure of my daughters’ new husbands, the clan O’Cahan in Coleraine. From there, we will board the lovely ship Brigid”—he glanced at a reddening Michael—“and we will sail from the Lough Foyle to where she can take us no farther. And from there we will find a vessel to Trawbreaga Bay.”
Moc said softly, “The less land we have to travel over, the better.”
All of us knew how difficult it was for Owen to make it over land in his little cart designed for wooden floors and not for pitted roads and cow paths.
“I think,” said Michael, “I can arrange for the Brigid to take ye straight to the bay. That would not add more than a few hours to her schedule.”
“That would be a kindness—” started Owen.
“Kindness is not an art I have learned,” Michael said with a grin. “An’ if ye take it not wrong, I would like to design a better cart for ye to travel in—one that is road worthy. For ye cannot take boats the rest of your days.”
Then I saw Owen’s eyes fill with an emotion I could hardly believe—gratitude, and deep fondness, too. “Thank you,” he said. Then he lowered his gaunt face to his plate while Mockingbird smiled at Michael.
After a while, when we were scraping empty trenchers, Swallow stood, not much taller with her sandals on the floor than when she sat on the bench. “Let us retire to the great room. Bring your wine cups, if you will.”
We followed her back to the comfort room, whose myriad lights seemed even more festive than before. I wondered vaguely if the wine had given the dwarf dust a few more whirling facets. Liam sat close to me on a large, comfortable bench while the rest of the company settled back, each in his own realm of serenity.
We talked for more than an hour, pleasant, lilting conversation that buzzed and hummed through the welcoming room. It was Michael who finally asked the question on everyone’s mind, the one we did not want to ask. “Uncle, when d’ye an’ Moc plan to leave us?”
“Soon,” rumbled Owen.
It was Moc’s turn to lay a soft hand on his brawny arm, as if to subtly admonish him for his curtness. “Before the owl crosses the next full moon, I think. We need to make…certain arrangements first.”
A silence followed her words, as if inviting her to expand her thoughts. “We need to make sure of Nuala’s security, foremost.” Nuala, the mysterious figure I once called “Mother Sweeney,” was the elderly mother who had fiercely clung to the secret of Owen’s birth for more than forty years. Only the fear of her own imminent death made her confess at last to Brother Jericho. And she had agreed that her son should find out only when she learned that her lover Niáll, he who once held the nine hostages, had been dead these past ten years.
Her clinging to the past, to secrets strange and frightening, had been the cause of Owen Sweeney’s approaching madness and near destruction. No one blamed sweet Nuala, whose closely guarded knowledge of his birth was due to her fear for Owen’s life. When her secrets had at last been bared and she had been released from the guilt of causing his pain, Nuala began to bloom and glow until she seemed ten years younger, and all her warm spirit began to radiate from her slight body.
We had brought her back to Derry from Owen’s former holdings near Limavady, and now that her son was leaving, she wanted to go back and live where she had made her home for twenty years—the sprawling brugh near Limavady where her grandsons lived. She was living for now under the care of Quince and Persimmon, former entertainers who had turned from a life of acrobatic dancing to one of caring for the elderly and infirm.
“We have kept her, ah, special conveyance,” said Brigid, referring to Michael’s invention for carrying her between two horses. “Now if we had Cara and Orla and their well-behaved horses…”
At that, Owen smiled, a wry quirk of his lips that was shared among all his kinsmen. “My girls shall be here with their horses, and Mother shall return like a queen.”
“Moc,” I said. “Who will carry on your leatherworking enterprise?”
“Why, Swallow, of course,” she responded quickly, tearing her eyes from Owen and looking at her daughter.
“We…need to discuss that, Mother. But not tonight.”
Mockingbird had arrived in Derry sometime in early January, finally giving up any notion of clinging to the “old country” with memories of her long-dead husband, and grimly holding onto the sides of the Brigid as the longship carried its emigrants to the Lough Foyle. Soon after arriving, she had enlisted a group of ladies—mostly her own nieces—to make and sell leather clothing to the locals. I, in fact, was one of her most eager buyers of goods.
At last a note of edginess had entered the comfortable atmosphere, and I hastened to change the subject. I had been accused more than once of needing to be a savior figure, and I felt compelled to assume that role again.
“Tell me how the enclave building is proceeding,” I said to Torin.
He grinned, and I could read his face as I could read his brother’s. He saw that I was pulling the subject from his darling Swallow—and perhaps from their imminent marriage plans—to a safe area of discussion.
“We are expanding more an’ more,” he said. “We work from the tree roots outward. I have never seen such an eager or more talented corps of workers. They are short but nimble. I am tall an’ clumsy, so I spend me days doubled over. But somehow they put up with me.”
Moc could not help but smile. “They put up with you, Lou, because you are the biggest jewel they ever found in the tunnels. Before we leave Derry, I need to talk with you about your future with our clan. Until then, I think it is time for Owen and me to retire from this excellent company. Would two of you mind assisting us with the cart?”
She stood, and her quiet remarks were a clear signal to all of us to leave them to their private lives. Torin brought the invalid’s cart, and Liam and Michael lifted him and set him inside so swiftly that it seemed a natural movement.
With his nephews gathered around his cart, Owen raised his pale face and swept his hand through his straight black hair. “Mo theaglach,” he said, and I was startled at his using the Gaelige word for family. Perhaps it meant something much deeper to these sons of Éire.
His strange, dark eyes glittered with the vestige of a tear—or was it the play of dwarf dust dancing through the room? “Boys, I am loath to leave you, in a way. And yet my future—Moc’s future, and my children’s, too—our future lies to the north for now. We have much to build. Ten and twenty years from now, the promontory, ah, Inis-Eóghan, will be a different place. In no small way, that future is possible because of you. And the irritating redhead Caylith. Come here, young lady.”
Astonished, I walked to his cart and stood looking up at Owen Sweeney, once my sworn enemy, holder in slavery of my dear mother, captor of my darling Liam. As I had earlier, I held my hand out to him, not sure of what else to do. And again he took it.
“You know I am not given to hyperbole. In fact, rhetoric is not my strength. Let me say”—and he brought my hand to his mouth—“your exasperating stubbornness has brought me here. I thank you.” He dropped my hand, and I backed away, my face hot.
“Yes. I shall miss you, Owen Sweeney. Without you, my life holds no adventure. I wish you a safe trip.”
“Perhaps Moc and Murdoch and I will see you and Liam on the great bay. Fare thee well.” With a practiced move of his brawny arm, Owen spun his cart toward an inner chamber, and Mockingbird walked at his side.
She opened the door for Owen, then turned and spoke to her guests. “I treasure your acquaintance—all of you. I, at least, will see most of you before we depart for Limavady. Good evening.” She turned back to her chamber door and disappeared inside. We did not even hear the door close.
Once again Swallow escorted us. We trailed behind her from the comfort room, through the dining area, and into the hu
ge, lighted cavern that marked the entrance to all the inner dwellings. Swallow lifted her head to Torin, who was standing at the bottom of the staircase leading to the outside portal. He put one finger to his lips then placed it on her rosebud mouth. “Soon,” he said, and she smiled. He was the first to climb the stairs, two and three at a time, like a rowdy young boy. The rest of us, a bit wobbly from the wine, climbed more slowly to greet the summer night.
Chapter 5:
A Dream Captured
I awoke to a strange tickling sensation on my mouth like an errant insect, and I brushed it away with some irritation. Then it came back. I opened my eyes and saw by guttering candlelight that Liam was propped on one elbow facing me, his finger tracing the outline of my lips. Shutting my eyes again, I captured his finger with my tongue and mouth and began to suck on it. “Mmmn,” I told him. “Get up later.” I still tasted last night’s wine, and my mind felt indistinct around the edges.
“Up now,” he said, his voice husky. He captured my waist and pulled me against his long body. Ah, God, it felt like at third leg. I felt a milky fluid begin to run between my legs, and my stomach clenched in a tight spasm of desire. I did not always feel so aroused when I first awakened, but last night’s subtle love play between Owen and Moc had settled into my memory and torched my body as soon as Liam’s erection touched my thighs.
I began to rock against him, back and forth, still sucking on his finger as he moved it around in my mouth. “Turn me over,” I said. “Póg mé, póg mé.” Those provocative words differed just slightly from asking for a kiss—póg dom—for they meant that Liam should use his mouth on my willing behind. I loved saying certain things in the Gaelige tongue that I would never tell him otherwise, like a naughty child using adult words.
He put his hands on my hips and turned me facedown, and he began to lick and suck and stroke my back, moving closer and closer to my buttocks. I began to writhe and arch up, anticipating his touch. “Talk to me, Cat,” he said, leaning close to my ear, then licking it and biting my earlobe. “What do ye want?”