“It happened just a bare year after you left,” she said. “Master Aillel went to Cechre around Beltain, like always, and when he came back, that harridan was with him. And until this last winter, he’s kept her fairly well in hand, but with him sick and all, she’s been taking over more and more.”
Lechan spat. “She don’t know nothin’ about us, and nothin’ about farming. We don’t know why he married her, and we sure as hell don’t know what will happen when he’s gone.”
“Where’s Eochaid?”
“He went mad,” Golias whispered. “He started raving soon after Fairlin appeared, and we locked him up so that he wouldn’t hurt anyone.”
“We took care of him as best we could,” Lechan added.
Fear had made the people reticent, and Cricket asked softly, “What happened to him?”
“He disappeared,” Orlan said. “He broke the clasp off the door in the middle of the night, and we don’t know where he went.” He looked at Cricket pleadingly. “We tried to find him. We really did.”
Cricket swallowed his tears, and offered the man a tremulous smile. “I know you did. I know you all did.” Serca squeezed his hand tightly, grounding his pain with her presence. “Has anybody seen Aillel since Samhain?”
“He comes out occasionally,” Golias said. “But it’s clear to see that he’s not doing well.”
“And she won’t let any of us near him,” Agnes added.
“Isn’t there something you can do?” Lechan asked. “You being a bard and all.”
Cricket looked around at the familiar faces. “Well, I’ll certainly try.” He started playing again, and soon the mood lifted. But the ache remained in Cricket’s heart, growing stronger as he thought about what might happen to the dun.
After everyone had left, Cricket shivered. “There’s something wrong going on here,” he said. “But I can’t quite figure it. It’s like a shadow over the whole dun.”
“It’s just a poor reception and that story about the priest’s madness,” Serca said. “At least, that’s what I hope.”
“You feel it too, don’t you?”
“Yes, but I keep telling myself that it’s just Fairlin’s attitude. The way she looked at us, I almost don’t feel safe.”
“I’m not too worried about us,” Cricket said, lying down on his blanket. “It’s these people, and what they’re about to face.”
“Fairlin is obviously after the wealth of the dun, such as it is,” Serca said. “And you know she will abuse the farmers until she’s wrung them dry.”
“I know.” Cricket watched her blow out the lantern and felt her settle beside him. “I just can’t help but think that that’s what she wants the world to see.”
“You’re just jumpy,” Serca said, ending with a yawn. “Let’s just get some sleep, and work on this tomorrow.”
He snuggled close to her, listening as her breathing slowed and evened, but he felt more alert than he had all day. A glow kept appearing at the edge of his vision, but every time he looked at it directly, it faded into the dark. He rolled over and pulled Linnaia from her pack, putting his fingers to the strings despite a sudden urge to sleep. He battled the unexpected weariness with a song, weaving in a subtle magic that became a shield around both bards.
The glow returned, growing brighter as it probed Cricket’s defenses. He watched it warily as it flitted about, angry and frustrated at being cheated. It stopped and hovered in front of the young bard a moment before disappearing without a sound, disintegrating back into the darkness.
Cricket continued to play; he didn’t trust that the manifestation was truly gone, and he certainly didn’t want to take a chance that there were no other apparitions waiting for him.
“Very good, bardling,” said Fairlin, stepping out of the wall. The darkness coalesced and sparkled around her, hiding her features but not her sensuality. “I thought it was going to be too easy to be enjoyable, but now I see that I might have some fun after all.”
“Who are you?” Cricket asked.
“Now, that’s hardly fair, is it?” she asked. “You haven’t given me your true name, but you want mine. Perhaps, though, we could trade.”
Cricket forced a laugh out of his dry throat. “Perhaps not, milady.”
“Then what game shall we play, little one?”
Cricket tried to see beyond the illusion that she presented him, but instead revealing her true form, he felt as though he was standing on a precipice.
She laughed at his efforts. “You’ll have to do better than that. After all, I hold this dun in my hand, along with the woman at your side.”
Cricket looked at Serca. “She’s just sleeping,” he said.
“Is it just sleep?” Fairlin asked.
He called Serca’s name and nudged her with his foot, but she didn’t budge. Worried, he kicked her a little harder, but all she did was roll over. “Alright,” he conceded. “You have enchanted the dun, and you almost got me too. But I still don’t know why.”
Fairlin said, “Don’t you? I married Aillel and came to this miserable place because I knew that you would return sooner or later.”
“Do I know you?” Cricket asked. “Did I offend you somehow? Why do you hate me?”
“So many questions,” she said, lifting her hands. Lightning crackled between her palms, filling the air with the smell of ozone. “I think your ignorance is touching, and I think that I would rather you die that way.”
Cricket closed his eyes, concentrating on the music, and the magic it made. He saw a bright flash, then felt the darkness ooze forward, covering his shield. He risked a glance, and wished he hadn’t; midnight faces leered back at him, melted and disfigured, reminding him of Gorsedd Ogham. He swallowed bile and fear and probed Fairlin’s magic with his song.
The faces dissolved back into the night, and Fairlin regarded him with narrowed eyes. “You’re not the child you appear to be.”
He nodded at the compliment. “Milady is also quite puissant.”
“More than you could ever imagine. Try this.”
The light blinded Cricket, and he could feel his shield start to fray around the edges. He tried to see into the magic she threw at him, but it escaped him. A trickle slipped past, searing his leg with a line of white hot pain. He fueled his shield with his growing anger, letting it act as an immobile wall between him and the woman before him, and her attack finally faded.
Cricket tried to breathe through his nose to calm his racing heart, and he felt better when he saw Fairlin breathing hard as well. “Will you desist, milady?” he asked. “I have no wish to continue this battle.”
She smiled cruelly. “If you want to forfeit, by all means, do so. Otherwise, continue you shall.”
She lifted her arms and cried out in a loud voice. Cricket felt the roar of magic, but it did not come against him; she had turned her hate on the dun, and Cricket could feel lives being snuffed out one at a time. He played the Chord of Laughter, but she had her own shields, it seemed; he heard a child call out for his mother just before he died.
The rage built up into a crescendo in his blood, and he threw all the magic he could think of at her, trying to distract her, or kill her. She shrugged off his efforts like a cow brushing away a fly with the sweep of its tail.
The rushing of wings and the pressure on his shoulders came, and Fairlin’s eyes widened in surprise. But Cricket saw what he had to do, and he knew what it might cost him. Relaxing into the inevitable, he tuned his music to the song of the dun and opened himself up to Fairlin’s magic.
He felt like he had stretched himself over the dun. Every blade of grass and every pebble pressed into his soul, but Fairlin could not slide past him. He felt her energy disappear inside him like raindrops in a pond, causing ripples without disturbing his serenity. Fairlin screamed and tried harder, pouring her hatred into him like a thunderstorm. He simply absorbed it all, offering nothing in return, no defense, no attack. He finally saw her true form, a tall woman with slanted eyes and ears
: a lady of faerie.
“Who are you?” he asked again from a mouth that covered the dun.
She struggled more, but finally slumped in defeat, a tiny figure against the dark barn. But when she lifted her eyes to his, he could see his own reflection, and the ice cold hatred in the woman behind it. “May you never know,” she said. He tried to bind her with magic, but she slipped into another world, and Cricket returned to his body in a rush.
He stared into the empty barn for a long time, playing automatically. The ghost birds had flown; he could still hear the song of the dun faintly, but he had no energy to do more than cancel the spell that the Faerie woman had laid. The voices of those who had died still echoed in his memory, making him cry for them, and for his own failure. He did not notice Serca until she had wrapped him in a hug.
“What happened?” she asked. “It stinks of magic in here.”
“You can’t tell?” he said.
She closed her eyes and hummed a little tune, then opened them suddenly, looking around. “Fairlin?” she said. “That was Fairlin?”
“She was trying to kill me. She hates me for some reason.”
“But what—what was all of that? I can’t figure out what you did.”
Cricket looked at his fingers, still playing, and consciously willed them to stop. “I don’t understand most of it either,” he said. “All I know is I defeated her, or at least got her to go away.”
“But she was from Faerie—”
“I know.” He felt his eyelids growing heavy. Gripping Serca’s hand, he said, “Can you stay awake? I mean, for the rest of the night? I don’t think that I’m going to make it much longer.”
“I guess,” she said. “But what do I do if she comes back?”
“Wake me up.” He laid back, leaving Linnaia on his chest, his fingers in her strings. He could feel the sleep invading his sight, turning the edges black. “What ever happens, wake me at sunrise,” he said. “There’s a lot to do.”
Cricket thought that he would feel terrible when he woke, but after stretching, he felt remarkably alert and energetic. Someone had bound the wound on his leg, but the barn was empty, and the sun slanted down through the cracks in the rough planks of the wall. He stood and stretched again, feeling his back pop and crack, then picked up Linnaia and made his way into the yard, limping slightly.
Brother Eochaid presided over a large wake, singing a hymn of hope while Serca played her harp. He was dressed in rags, his hair matted and his body emaciated, although his eyes had regained their sanity. The people of the dun danced around the biers, where three children and five adults rested with coins on their eyes. Cricket could see tears flowing despite the happy music, and he leaned against the barn door, overwhelmed with his own sorrow.
Agnes saw him first, and without a word, she took him and led him in a solemn dance. She hugged him hard at the end and passed him to the next woman, who repeated the process. No words were spoken, but he could feel their pride as well as their pain; they loved him for his victory, and forgave him for not being perfect.
He ended up with Serca, who had given the music to two women that sang with high, piercing voices. She led him across the yard to Aillel’s door, and went in without knocking.
Cricket barely recognized the shrunken man on the bed. Aillel had lost most of his hair and his sunken cheeks shone with an unhealthy pallor. He lifted a shaking hand to the bard, and Cricket knelt beside the bed, taking the cold fingers in his own.
“You have saved the dun,” Aillel whispered.
“I didn’t save it all,” Cricket said. “I’m sorry.”
“People die in war,” Aillel said. “I will be one of them.”
Cricket started to protest, but he could see a ghostly crow hovering above the bed. He bowed his head to the vision.
“I was the one who failed,” Aillel said, tears streaming down his cheeks. He swallowed several times. “Fairlin... by the time I knew what she was, it was too late.”
Brother Eochaid came in and stood on the other side of the chieftain.
“But who was she?” Cricket asked. “Do you know?”
Aillel closed his eyes, and the bard wondered if he had fallen asleep. Opening his eyes, Aillel said, “I think she may be part of what killed your parents. But I’m not sure.”
“She is evil,” Brother Eochaid said. “She caused my madness, and Aillel’s illness, and has killed eight innocent people besides... oh, the children...”
Serca wrapped her arms around the shaken priest, holding him tight while his gaunt frame was racked with sobs.
“My people have suffered so much,” Aillel said. He coughed, a deep, tearing sound; when it passed, he gripped Cricket’s hand tightly. “Promise!” he hissed.
“Promise what?” Cricket asked.
“Promise me that you will choose the next chieftain of this dun. That you and no other will place the torc around his neck. Swear it!”
“I swear it.”
“By your true name!”
Feeling the authority of a bard of Glencairck, Cricket said, “By my true name, I so swear.”
Aillel relaxed. “Then all is well.” He sighed once, deeply, his spirit escaping into the air.
Cricket wept, feeling the hand turn cold in his grasp. After a timeless interval, Serca touched him on the shoulder. “We have the living to attend to,” she said softly.
Wiping his nose on his sleeve, he stood up. “Rest well, my friend,” he said, closing Aillel’s eyes. Together, he and Serca led Eochaid out of the room to tell the dun of one more death.
Rumor traveled faster than horses, and Sean met them at the gate when they returned to Caer Mwalloch. He took them to a secluded area and listened to their story with growing unease. “Are you sure she was from Faerie?” he demanded. “And you defeated her?”
“It wasn’t really defeat,” Cricket explained. “More like a stalemate.”
Sean grunted and leaned back, although his eyes remained sharp. “Quite an accomplishment, nonetheless. So, what of your promise?”
Cricket spread his hands. “I have no idea how to pick a new chieftain. Do I have any time?”
“Not much,” Sean admitted. “Lord Olammy is already looking for you. And there is a crowd in the hall waiting to be considered.”
“It figures.” Heaving a great sigh, Cricket said, “I guess I’ll know when I know.”
Serca laid a hand on his arm. “Disappear for a while.” With a glance at Sean she added, “With the ollave’s permission, of course.”
“Granted,” Sean said with a wave of his hand.
“Go out and spend some time sorting it all out,” Serca continued. “We’ll run interference until you get back.”
“Take all the time you want,” said Sean. “After all, she’ll be doing all the work.”
Cricket wandered through the fields, trying to make sense of everything that had happened. He had gone to Dun Aillel hoping to visit some old friends, and had ended up battling faerie.
Most stories only spoke of faerie second hand; few that visited that strange realm ever returned. Even Gwydion, who had enlisted the aid of the entire faerie kingdom, spoke of it very little.
The ghost birds didn’t help. They had come in Uislign when he had turned winter into summer, and again the night on Gorsedd Ogham. He pulled out his flute as he walked, playing an ancient tune known as “Morrigu’s Lay”. No one remembered the words, but in the few remaining stories of the Morrigu, she was a war goddess who had two black birds on her shoulder. Cricket turned the tune into a magical call.
An old woman, bent under the weight of her wrinkles, stepped out from behind a tree. “Such a pretty tune,” she said with a cackle.
The magic that swirled around Cricket like a fog felt nothing like faerie. “Morrigu?” he asked.
“‘Tis myself,” the hag said with a grotesque parody of a curtsy. “What would you have of me, my handsome young bard?”
Swallowing the dread in his throat, Cricket said, “I h
ave a question about your birds...”
“Not just birds, pretty lad. Ravens. And a nastier pair of harpies you won’t likely find.”
Cricket bowed. “About your ravens then.”
“And what will you give me?” the old woman asked with an evil grin. “Perhaps a kiss, yes?” She smiled, revealing blackened gums.
Cricket smiled. “Your offer is well known, I’m afraid,” he said. “I kiss you, you reveal your beautiful aspect, I make love to you, and then I am married to you forever.” He shook his head sadly. “I have no wish to be married to war, my lady. I’m sorry.”
She nodded. “Wise bard. Unusual, in such a pretty face.” She grinned suddenly. “Would you like to see the beautiful me anyway?”
Cricket balked; none of the stories had prepared him for such an offer. “I’d better not,” he said.
“Come on,” she urged. “Just a leg, maybe a flash of cleavage? Something to make your loins ache, eh?”
“No, thank you.”
“Suit yourself then.” Morrigu plopped onto ground. “Make yourself at home, boy. We’ll chat.”
“I thought you wanted something in return,” Cricket said.
“If the ravens still belonged to me, perhaps. But they’re no longer mine, and knowledge should be free, am I right?”
“That is one of the tenets of the bards, yes,” Cricket answered.
“So ask, you pretty little thing.”
“What are the ravens?”
“In simple terms?” She rubbed at an open sore on her hand. “They call themselves Memory and Thought, but don’t try to keep them straight. I can’t, and I created them.”
“For what purpose?”
“The names or the creation?”
Cricket swallowed his impatience, fully aware that Morrigu could turn on him faster than she talked. “Why did you create them?”
“To stir up trouble, of course.” She winked. “That’s what I do; I love to cause the children of men to kill each other. There’s no greater glory or foolishness in the world, you know.”
“I know.”
She grunted. “Look at you, now. Burning with desire, with questions that must be driving you crazy, and yet you put up with all my silliness.”
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