The Shadow of the High King

by Frank Dorrian

  Women. Their naked forms wove and ground together as they pleasured one another, hands, fingers, mouths and tongues wandering and exploring each other with a heated, patient lust. The scene focussed on one lithe young thing with a length of copper hair, reclining as she lay back from sharing a kiss with a raven-haired stripe of a girl. Her back arched and mouth opened in a gasp as the other’s tongue and nails trailed down her stomach to spread her legs and find what lay between. Her face turned towards Harlin, mouth shaping wordless noises at the other girl’s attentions, and emerald eyes stared straight at him beyond that thin veil of rippling water.

  Ceatha. Younger than she was now, no older than eighteen, even younger, maybe, and achingly desirable – age had not diminished her beauty at all, only matured it.

  The High Kings took Weavers as their concubines, as clan chiefs did before and after them, her voice echoed nearby. Her pale phantom still stared at him through the pool’s surface, smiling wickedly between pleasured gasps and groans that made her tense and shudder, biting her bottom lip, holding his gaze as she knew he watched distantly, unable to reach out or touch them.

  I would make you High King, the Ardas Rú of Luah Fáil. You would lead our people, make them strong and whole again. A thousand warriors would wait at your every command, even more in time. A great hall of oak and gold would be yours for you to feast them in and sing of your victories and those yet to come. And I would be at your side, guiding your hand, your every step, warming your bed of a night and giving you strong sons worthy of your name and clan… you would even come to love me in time, I think, once you see what I can give you, and I know I could love you, too, sweetly and dearly.

  ‘If I had an ounce of love left in me, Ceatha, I would not squander it on one such as you.’

  She gave no answer to that, but the water’s surface roiled violent, until it swept upwards and engulfed all in its path. Harlin threw his hands before his face, yet felt nothing as it washed over him. The pleasured groaning met his ears once more, and he found himself in that other, grander nemeton, his eyes greeted by the sight of many young women wound round one another like lithe cord.

  Ceatha’s pale, captivating phantom lay before him, her emerald eyes intense upon him, the raven-haired girl’s head still firmly between her legs. She beckoned to him with a harlot’s smile and slender hand, the other knotted in the long, dark hair that cascaded over her flat stomach.

  Harlin approached against himself, unable to stop his feet from moving, or hands from removing his clothes as he neared. The other girls among the oak’s roots, once busy with each other, looked up with interest and immodest smirks, eyes fixed upon him as they made a more blatant performance of their play. The girl between Ceatha’s thighs looked up at him with lascivious, dark eyes and tousled hair. She wiped her mouth with the back of her hand and gave him a lewd smile before she returned her attention back down to where Ceatha’s hand drew it.

  Her eyes followed Harlin as he knelt beside the two of them, his own entranced gaze wandering up and down their forms, body screaming for him to touch them. Her cool fingertips traced up his stomach, following the pattern of criss-crossing scars there. She took his hand, guided it to her small, pert breast, made him squeeze, made his fingers trace the fine lines of her body. He found himself unable to resist, that he was filled with an endless want of her that tore through him deeper than the knives of any simple lust or passion, which seemed to eat away at everything, all inhibition, all self-control. Except for one thing… one cold, dark thing, that stirred like a kicked hornet’s nest.

  ‘I have been a slave before, Ceatha,’ he said, ‘to eastern blood-merchants, to lying, landless Marcher lords. I find that chains all weigh the same, whether they are wrought of iron, or of words.’

  He pulled his hand free. The dream broke apart like rippling water. He found himself awake atop his furs, shivering in the dawn light flooding in from an open shutter, frustrated and aroused despite the rage that animated him.

  ‘Weave your web for me, you spidery bitch,’ he said loudly to the dawn, his voice echoing from the house’s rough timbers. ‘You are a prick-teaser and schemer both.’ Feeling then foolish amidst his anger, he was grateful Anselm was nowhere to be seen. He must have spent the night with Ula. Wherever he was, at least he wasn’t there to question Harlin’s outburst, and possibly his sanity.

  I will show you strength, Ceatha, and we will see if it is to your liking in the end.

  Harlin kept to himself over the next week or so. After Ceatha’s interference in his dreams, he found himself no longer content to sit and mope and swig ale whilst Anselm trained and sharpened himself back to what he once was. Instead, he ran free through the steep, forested hills overlooking Tásúil, leaping rocks and fallen boughs, put himself through Arnulf’s old exercise regimes till he was breathless and exhausted. It felt good to be active again, and as the days passed he felt his body recoup a modicum of its strength lost since idling so long in Tásúil. A week would not be enough, far, far from it, but he would need every ounce of strength and speed he could muster, soon, no matter how little. He would have to make do with what he had, whatever end it brought.

  Ceatha let him be while he slept. He would have hoped that she had given up trying to sway and coerce him, had he not felt he knew the woman better than that, if he knew anything of her at all. He doubted she would ever relent until she was taught. His dreams did seem to fixate upon crowns from that night on, though thankfully were nowhere near as lucid or… lurid as they had been.

  There was a fanfare of sorts when Bradan eventually came strutting into Tásúil one morning after his party was relieved from duty some nine days later. His men came trailing proudly behind him in their green cloaks, their bows slung over their shoulders and bundles of worn spears tucked beneath their arms.

  They had killed a score and more of Marchers, folk said, who had come into the boundaries of the forest seeking to hide themselves from something. Fighting men, they said, and they had brought their spears back to the town as trophy. Whatever they had been hiding from, it seemed the clansmen had neglected to ask before killing them.

  Bradan was full of swagger, Harlin saw, following him toward the town centre. His gold rings glinted in the morning sun as he was made a fuss of by women and children in equal measure, his hands soon so full of shieldflowers that they tumbled between his fingers and left a trail of white petals to where he stood in the town square, surrounded by admirers and fawning young girls.

  Harlin watched him from the shadows of a wooden stall, where a plump clanswoman was trading turnips with an elderly fellow, who glanced at Harlin unpleasantly, as if his loose, unbraided hair meant he might be eyeing his vegetables inappropriately. A clansman came from the north of the town rolling a barrel of ale that he opened besides Bradan, the red-haired man boasting of the victory in the forest.

  ‘We climbed the trees once we spotted them,’ he was bellowing in the clan tongue, hands slashing out dramatic gestures that drew the crowd to him. ‘And we took them from above! One! Two! Three fell to our arrows, before we leapt down from the boughs and took to beautiful sword work!’ He threw back his head and roared, ‘Na stachanna seabhac!’ The falcon strikes. ‘I gave my clan’s battle cry as I leapt and cut down the scum left then right, my men behind me giving theirs as we let loose bloody hell amongst them! The gods themselves must surely have watched such a grand spectacle as we made, laying the Marcher vermin low, like wheat in the field.’

  Harlin stepped from the shadows and edged towards the crowd. Near to where Bradan stood, he saw Ceatha and Radha appear, bustling bodies parting to let them pass with braided heads bowed. Ceatha padded over to her brother and threw her arms around him, planting a kiss on his cheek, her mother imitating her but more reserved. Bradan passed ale around his men gathered about him, reciting each individual’s great deeds of the ranging, as the crowd cheered them all and more girls threw shieldflowers to the men who caught their eye the most.

  Drun
k on Marcher blood, Harlin thought. It reminded him vaguely of the fighting pits, and he shuddered briefly before his anger crept back. He shoved his way through the crowd to stand in the clearing, treading shieldflowers into the earth beneath his boots.

  ‘Bradan!’

  The clansman slowly turned to face him as the crowd went silent, a curious eyebrow raised and a small, annoying laugh escaping him.

  ‘And what do you want, dog,’ he said in the clan tongue as Harlin approached, a ripple of disdainful chuckling passing through his rangers. ‘Come to mourn your Marcher friends, have you?’ That earned him a good few laughs. Harlin saw Ceatha frowning at him, lips tightly pursed, he snarled at her and looked back to her brother.

  ‘I want my rings back, Bradan,’ Harlin answered, ‘give them to me, now. I will not ask you twice.’ Bradan roared with laughter, bending double with it, his face turning as red as his hair. The crowd imitated him, Harlin was even sure he heard the occasional knee being slapped.

  ‘You make me laugh,’ Bradan wheezed, wiping a tear from his eye and recovering himself, ‘crease me like fresh laundry, so you do, Harlin.’ His face hardened and all humour fled from it. He patted his pocket with a thick fist. ‘Never,’ he said, ‘your kind don’t deserve to wear them, you’re an insult to everything they represent, and you dirty them with your touch. Now run along, pup, and let us men enjoy our victory over your weakling kinfolk, before we hang your corpse from the trees along with theirs.’ Bradan made a shooing motion with his hands and turned away, shaking his head and muttering to one of his rangers, who smirked slyly at Harlin, no doubt at some whispered insult.

  The crowd snickered, jeered and clamoured at Harlin, following Bradan’s example, hurling insults, slurs against his clan and lineage and his mother’s chastity. He clenched his teeth and stared, wide-eyed and furious, around him at their milling, meaningless faces, chest swelling. His eyes fell upon one, though, that did. Anselm. Ula was with him. He stared back at Harlin, lips drawn tight amidst the berating masses. He nodded encouragingly, Ula looking to him, confused, like he should be joining in with the ridicule against his friend instead.

  Harlin’s chest heaved as he looked back to Bradan, stood facing away from him, happily sipping ale with his men, white flowers landing in his hair as they were thrown.

  ‘Féu fola!’ Harlin roared, his voice echoing over the square, silencing the crowd like a thunderclap.

  Again, Bradan turned slowly and met Harlin’s gaze, surprise shaping his features. ‘You call blood feud upon me, dog?’ he said, voice low and dangerous. Harlin spat at his feet, seeing his lip curl as he stared down at the globule in the dirt.

  ‘I call it upon your whole clan, Bradan,’ he snarled.

  ‘How dare you, boy.’ Radha stepped forward, face drawn in a snarl, her carved staff thudding against the ground. Ceatha laid a hand upon her arm to stop her. ‘I should kill you where you stand.’

  ‘You will do no such thing, Weaver,’ Harlin snapped. ‘It is my right. You have insulted me and dishonoured my clan, my name and made a wretch of me. As have you all!’ He directed that last one at the crowd, multitude faces twisting in sneers around him. He could hear them mocking him still, muttering of how Bradan would surely kill him, how it would be a mercy, like smothering a poor, deformed creature.

  ‘I have suffered you all,’ Harlin roared, ‘suffered your slander, your spite and your insolence for far too long. It ends now. I am Harlin, of Clan Faolán, son of Cunall, and I demand blood for the insults you have heaped upon me, Clan Seabhac Eirga.’

  Bradan watched him with narrowed eyes and pursed lips. ‘So be it then, dog,’ he grunted, ‘you have your feud.’

  The crowd went ballistic then, roaring, screaming and whooping. A feud meant a fight, and a fight meant blood. Harlin’s blood, most importantly. They chanted Bradan’s name and his clan’s name and called for him to strike down Harlin and offer his body up to Cu Náith. Harlin smiled at it all.

  ‘So what are your terms then, Harlin,’ Radha said, looking down her nose at him. ‘If you would dare to fight my son, there must be something you want out of this affair.’ Harlin glanced at Ceatha who waited behind her, silent and glowering. Her eyes glittered green in the sun, and for the briefest of moments the image of her stripped naked cavorting with another girl passed before his mind’s eye.

  ‘We fight barehanded,’ Harlin said, shoving the image away, ‘you have denied me my weapons, and I need none, so we will be on even footing. If I win you will give me back my armour, my helm, my sword and shield and you will grant me passage to Luah Fáil upon one of your ships, with food and supplies to last the journey and beyond. Then, and only then, will our feud be at an end.’

  Radha narrowed her eyes at him until they were slits. ‘You ask a steep toll, boy,’ she seethed.

  ‘One that will just about compensate me for the ills I have suffered from you all.’

  ‘Do not think to make demands here, Harlin,’ Radha snapped, ‘you have no standing amongst us, you are less than the dogs in the street. None here would cry injustice should I put you in the ground this very second.’

  ‘Let him have what he wants, mother,’ Bradan said, unfastening the brooch that held his cloak in place. ‘It will not matter either way. I gave him a beating when I first set eyes on him, now I will kill him and his body will be hanging in the woods.’ He removed his sweat-stained tunic, bare down to the waist now, one of his men taking his bundled clothing. Harlin stripped off himself, tying back his loose hair with a leather lace.

  The crowd still cheered, and Bradan’s rangers fanned out, forming a ring twenty paces across each way, thrusting their claimed spears into the ground between them to mark it.

  Harlin stretched, limbering up and loosening his limbs. It had been a while since he had fought like this. There was an excitement to fist-fighting, he found, unequalled by anything else. It is a brutal, primal thing, to fight and win with no weapon save your own body. The thrill of winning is like nothing else, the surge makes you giddy, makes you lightheaded and euphoric, almost, to realise the destruction your own flesh is capable of unleashing. It is a beautiful thing.

  Ceatha went to Bradan, glancing over at Harlin viciously, whispering something to her brother, who nodded, then planted a kiss on his cheek and hurried away. Anselm came to Harlin and laid a hand on his shoulder. ‘Are you sure of this?’ he said, glancing uncertainly at Bradan, ‘the bastard can fight like a cornered treefox.’

  ‘As can many,’ Harlin said with a shrug. ‘Why the uncertainty? It was you who put this idea in my head, I fear we’ve crossed the hazel branch at this point.’

  He smirked, seeing Bradan’s eyes dance over the vicious mass of scars on his body, noticing the man had few of his own. The tiniest of frowns creased that ginger brow. Bradan flexed broad shoulders, stretched out the lean muscle of his body, as if to reassure himself and the crowd of his strength.

  Anselm shook his head. ‘He means to kill you, Harlin, I couldn’t live with myself if my braggart’s mouth was the end of you.’

  ‘Death is nothing to fear,’ Harlin answered, ‘but a cage is, Anselm. If I fight, I can win, and be on my way to Luah Fáil. If not, then I will die well, and dying well is better than dying in chains like an animal.’ Anselm sighed, closing his eyes, expression troubled.

  ‘I will be watching, Harlin,’ he said at last, almost sorrowfully, ‘may your gods watch over you, too.’

  ‘My thanks, Anselm, but I would not trouble them over a matter this petty. I’ll try to make it quick. Enjoy the spectacle, it’s not every day a Marcher gets to watch a Luah Fáil fistfight.’ Anselm frowned and backed off.

  Across the space marked for their fight, Bradan’s eyes burned into him steadily. ‘Are you ready, dog?’ he said.

  Harlin nodded, taking up his stance, guard tight at his chin, Bradan mimicking him as they both moved forward. They circled one another slowly in the clearing, the crowd calling for Harlin’s blood. He watched the way Bradan moved. Sp
ringy, light on his feet and nimble in his movements. Elusive probably, likely awkward and keen to close the distance with his lack of height and reach.

  Bradan came at him suddenly, flicking out his jab, the blow landing with a thud on Harlin’s nose. He answered with a left hook, catching Bradan across the jaw as he exposed himself throwing his right hand, the impact stumbling him. The crowd hissed.

  Bradan backed off and spat blood, shaking away surprise. Grinning with red teeth, he came at Harlin again. Right hand, left uppercut, a sly right knee to the stomach. Harlin closed his guard, the punches landing on his forearms, the knee slipping through before he could step out of range, connecting enough to knock the wind from him slightly. He bit down, refusing to show pain.

  The crowd whooped and clapped for Bradan with every shot. Besides a good swordfight, there was little else the clans loved more than a hard, gritty brawl, and the atmosphere they exuded was ferocious, wild and blood drunk.

  Bradan was a fast and aggressive fighter, his stance made it obvious even before the first punch had been thrown. He was like a wasp, in and out like lightning, difficult to hit. He needed to keep Bradan at range, use his height and reach against him to keep him at bay till he found an opening. But Bradan was not punch-shy, more than content to suffer a blow or two as he waded through Harlin’s defence to try and open him up on the inside. Their first few exchanges were even, punch for punch, both suffering their share, voices crying out around them in excitement when Bradan pressed forward, jeering as Harlin fought back.

  Bradan came crashing into him with a swift one-two and a flurry of rapid hooks, aiming to make Harlin cover up and expose his body for finishing a liver shot that landed on his elbow. Bradan’s sudden intensity was startling, forcing him onto the back foot, his guard tightening. Harlin sidestepped away from the crowd and the hands that tried to push him back towards Bradan off-balance, firing back with a right hand as he pivoted around his opponent, knuckles crunching against thick skull.