by Sarah Rayne
A pause. Flynn thought: well, I knew it would be said. And of course I must promise. But he took a moment to reply, and as he paused, he felt a great calm and a great strength descend on him. A stillness fell on the Sun Chamber, and to the watching Court, it was as if a great calming hand had been laid on him. Portan, never taking her eyes from his face, thought that for an instant the light of the great Finn of the Fiana shone in his eyes, but she could never afterwards be sure. Conaire, who was nearest, saw the expression in Flynn’s eyes change and thought: he is accepting this strange unknown leadership. With all of his being he is accepting it. And perhaps because his perception of the Samhailt was a little sharper and a little more finely honed than that of the others, he saw the light about Flynn’s head become momentarily tinged with a pure clear blue, and he thought: authority. And knew the light for the sorcerers’ ancient mystical symbol of leadership.
Flynn was aware only of a great peace like a thick dark cloak. He felt as if a warm sweet breath had ruffled across his mind, and then he thought that it was more as if he had come from a darkened forest into a warm bright room and been welcomed by people he loved and by people who loved him. When he finally answered Amairgen, he did so with a confidence he had not until now felt.
“I accept!”
Amairgen slid the heavy gold ring on to Flynn’s finger, and Flynn felt his mind and his heart accept. And then, as a movement from the corner of the Sun Chamber caught his eye, he glanced up to see both the twins watching him unblinkingly. Something that was mischievous and reckless stirred in Flynn, so that he shook off the solemnity of the ceremony, and found, as he was always to find, amusement in the situation, in any situation.
He regarded Joanna’s twins thoughtfully, and he thought: well, I have promised not to return to Tara, and I will keep my promise. But I would not count on what those two might do!
*
Cormac sat alone in the Sun Chamber, watching purple shadows steal across the floor. Twilight. A time for lovers. And yet I am alone.
He need not have been. There were more than sufficient young women in the Court, any one of whom would gladly have come to him. His lips curved in a smile. Quite soon, perhaps, my dears, but for the moment, for tonight, and for a few tomorrows as well, I shall be alone.
He would not feel this way forever, of course. He would soon be scanning the Court, selecting the ones that pleased him, wooing them with courtesy and mockery and mischief, taking them off to his bedchamber. And everyone would smile and say that the Wolfking had not changed so very much.
But for a little while, I prefer to be alone with my memories of Joanna …
The shadows had deepened when the door was pushed open, and he looked up, startled, for he had been thinking of her, and imagining her, and for a moment he thought the light was playing tricks. The Purple Hour, when strong magic was abroad …
But it was Joanna in truth, smiling rather hesitantly, a little unsure of her welcome, standing in the doorway, not moving.
As Cormac stood up, he saw what Joanna held in her arms and a sudden hope flared up inside him.
And then Joanna walked across the room and held out her burden to him.
It was their daughter.
Cormac could not speak. An intense and painful happiness was unfolding inside him, and he thought: of course! Not Mab’s daughter, Joanna’s. Joanna’s daughter to be here with me, to be reared in the ancient wonderful tradition of
High Queen. Joanna’s daughter to inherit the legacy of Tara. Joanna’s daughter — and mine.
Together we will make Ireland great.
It would happen. Delight was exploding inside him now, and at last he felt slide from him the despairs and the frustrations and the feeling of: is this all? He had felt his victory a hollow one, because he had known that Joanna would not be there to share it with him. Now he saw that it was not hollow, it was filled to brimming point with promise and happiness and love.
Joanna’s daughter and mine.
Joanna shed no tears, but he knew that she was crying inside. But she handed the child to him and stood back, as if, thought Cormac, she is deliberately severing the link between them. And she will have the boy … An ache rose in him for the boy also, for the son he would never know, but he quenched it at once. If she will leave me this, if she will leave me our daughter, I shall bear it. I shall bear losing her because I shall not be losing her at all. I shall see Joanna every day in the child, and she will be doubly precious to me because of it.
He was alight and alive with happiness now, and laying the child down — and yes, her eyes were watching the light, fascinated and aware — he took Joanna’s hands in his.
Joanna said, “I am hardly bearing this, Cormac, but there is no help for it. There is nothing else to do.” She looked down, and Cormac felt her whole body wracked with longing. “I shall know nothing of her!” cried Joanna in sudden anguish. “I shall share in nothing of her life!”
“Then take her with you,” said Cormac. “Go now, through the Time Curtain. With Flynn and the boy.”
Joanna said in a low voice, “No. Tara is hers as much as it is yours.” And lifted her head and looked at him.
Cormac stood, unable to speak, Joanna’s hands still in his. And then, without warning, an idea slid into his mind.
“Listen,” he said. “There may be a way.”
*
They stood together, Joanna and Flynn, hands tightly clasped, the child — Cormac’s son — held firmly between them. Ahead of them were the sorcerers, and behind the sorcerers lay the darkling forests. And somewhere within the forests …
“We will do our utmost,” the sorcerers had said. “But we cannot promise.”
Behind the sorcerers was the entire Court, all of them lined up, waiting to bid a farewell. And it is the last farewell, thought Joanna. It is scarcely to be borne. If only I can keep a tight hold on control. If only I do not cry. She thought she would not cry, and she thought she would manage if she could keep thinking about the things that were ahead; Flynn and the boy, and the life she would have with Flynn in the square white farmhouse. Oh yes, those were things to hold on to, because those things were real and solid and good and enduring.
And yet, and yet …
“But I shall do it,” said Joanna to Flynn. “I shall bid them all farewell.”
“You cannot omit a single ceremony.”
“I know.”
Certainly the people of the Court and the Cruithin were gathered before them with a look of eager expectation, and despite her resolve, Joanna very nearly panicked. I cannot do it! Can I? And then, with a sudden squaring of her shoulders: of course I can!
The Bloodline came first; Conaire and Oscar and Midir and Etain, with Cait Fian at Etain’s side. “I shall never forget any of you,” said Joanna, and now she felt the tears begin to gather, and thought that after all it was going to be as difficult as she had thought.
The Councillors were next, with Bolg nodding solemnly, because he liked a bit of ceremony, telling the others that you should always be prepared to learn about new things. The Councillors would all be very interested in the enchantment that had been specially woven for this occasion. Bolg said, and the others agreed, that new enchantments were a good thing. You could not have too many. Progress, that was the thing, declared Bolg, and the Councillors nodded and said wasn’t that the truth?
Muldooney stood with the others, waiting to say a last goodbye to Joanna. He had thought that there might be just a touch of awkwardness between them, and he had prepared a bit of a speech, nothing very much really, only a few words, wishing Joanna well and Flynn of course. He had spent quite a long time over this, and he had shown it to Sean, because Sean had the way with words, Sean had been enthusiastic about it. “Don’t change a word of it,” he had said, and Muldooney had beamed, and then had said anxiously couldn’t it be improved on at all? and Sean had said, very vehemently, that it could not be improved on in the very least bit, and Muldooney had thought that a
fine thing for a person like Sean to say.
And then, in the end, there was no need for the speech, because Joanna had hugged Muldooney, genuinely and warmly, and thanked him for being such a true friend, and Flynn had shaken his hand, and Muldooney had had to mop his brow and blow his nose, and wonder after all if he shouldn’t be returning to Tugaim? But the sorcerers had been explicit about this also.
“Only Joanna and Flynn and the boy,” they had said firmly. “We can only weave the enchantment for three.”
And of course if it was a question of enchantments, Muldooney was the one to be agreeable. You could not tamper with enchantments. Anyone knew that. And when you came to think it over, this was not such a bad place to be living. Muldooney had surveyed the terrain with an experienced eye, because the Muldooneys knew about these things, and had seen that you could, if you were careful, start up a very nice little farm of your own here. Pigs and wild boar and some geese. He’d had a word with the King’s cooks, and it seemed that there would be a grand living to be made from supplying the Royal Kitchens. Ah, Muldooney was the man to be making the most of any opportunity that offered itself! They’d all of them see how prosperous he’d become, and they’d be astonished at what he would make of the bit of land that Cormac had made over to him and the nice snug house that went with it. He’d visit Amairgen and Portan from time to time, and Gormgall and Dubhgall had said they would be sure to come to stay. And so, although he would be very sorry indeed to bid farewell to Joanna and Flynn and the little one, Muldooney felt that he was not going to be acquitting himself so ill in this rather odd, but not at all unfriendly land.
Sean was there, of course, well to the fore, his eyes bright, drinking in everything. He had already composed a lengthy ballad, and they had all promised that later on that night, they would all attend a banquet in the Sun Chamber, and Sean would sing the ballad, and they would tell again the marvellous stirring tale of Cormac’s escape and the final battle, and the slaying of the Morrigna and the Erl-King and the defeat of the Dark Ireland.
“In case,” said Oscar caustically, “there is anyone left in Ireland who has not yet heard it.”
But they would all be thinking of Joanna and Flynn, said Sean earnestly, pressing a copy of the ballad into Flynn’s hands. They must be sure that they would all be thinking of them.
Joanna and Flynn had reached Amairgen and Portan now, both of them quietly waiting their turn.
Joanna thought: I believe this is the worst yet. I barely know them, and yet I feel as if I am going to lose something very precious and infinitely dear. She bent to embrace Portan. “And I wish there had been more time for us,” she said.
Portan smiled, although she, too, was crying. “Love Flynn very much for me,” she said, and Joanna, understanding, said at once, “Yes. Yes, I will.”
When Flynn moved forward, they saw that he was beyond words.
And then, he also, embraced them both, and everyone watching knew that there were no words possible, and that anything Flynn said would have been inadequate.
Portan was crying, but she was smiling too. She took Flynn’s hands and said softly, “Flynn, I am going to be so very happy here,” and Flynn managed to smile.
Then Amairgen reached for Flynn’s hands also, and said very gently, “Flynn, you will be in my thoughts for a part of every day for all of my life,” and Flynn remembered that this was what Portan had said to him at Scáthach before the battle, and he thought: after all, what could be a better parting sentiment?
You will be in my thoughts for a part of each day …
What better memory to take with them.
And now they turned at last to where Cormac stood, a little apart. Joanna thought: the Wolfking alone. Is that how I shall remember him? And then she looked across at him and saw that he carried their baby girl in his arms, and she saw that he was smiling at her. A mist clouded her vision, but she blinked it away. When she looked again, he was still there, the wind lifting his dark hair a little, his eyes glowing, and quite suddenly, Joanna knew that it would be all right. And I shall remember all of the good things about him. The way he could make love and the way he was strong and gentle and generous. And quite suddenly, the dying words of Dierdriu slid into her mind.
“I shall be with you in the good things of life. In the things you love. In the woodsmoke of a twilight fire, and in the moonlight over the Morne Mountains, and in the golden sunrise. You will hear me laughing in the Purple Hour, for that is the most magical time of all. I shall be in the wine you drink, and when you hold feasts, I shall be among you still. You will never quite lose me.”
“You will never quite lose me,” said Cormac very softly.
Joanna tightened her hold on the child in her arms, and said, as if completing some kind of ritual: “And you will be in my thoughts for a part of each day.” And to herself, thought: after all he will be with me, I shall see him in the boy. I think it will be all right.
The sorcerers were coming to meet them, drawing them into the forest now, hurrying them forward, and Joanna felt excitement and apprehension flare up, and felt Flynn’s hand tighten on hers.
Here we go …
And then the great glittering Time Curtain was stretching out ahead of them, filling the horizon, and they were being drawn towards it, and Joanna had just time to think: Cormac’s magic was always strong, and then they were in the light and they were in the scents and the sounds, and Time was closing all about them, and it was going to be all right, it was going to be all right …
EPILOGUE
The hillsides of Tugaim were calm and untroubled and in a curious way welcoming. Flynn and Joanna walked slowly up to the summit of Tara’s Hill and stood looking down.
Below them, they could trace the paths they had taken; the Dark Forest of the Sleeping Trees; the Plain of the Fál; the narrow path that had led to Gallan and the cool fires of Cait Fian’s Mountain Palace. Fragments and snippets of history; the thin sheet of the Time Curtain that separated all the worlds just out of sight now.
The Glowing Lands …
“They are still there,” said Flynn softly. “We could go back.”
“Yes.” But Joanna knew they would not. And they both knew as well that the Glowing Lands would cool and dim, and the Gateway would eventually re-seal. “We shall not return,” she had said to the sorcerers as they stood on the edge of the light. “We shall never come here again.”
“Never is a very big word, Human Child,” the oldest of the sorcerers had said. “One day you may look across a valley and hear the echoes of our world. We are still here, Human Child, in our world as you are in yours, for Time is simultaneous.”
Time is simultaneous …
Joanna stood on Tara’s Hill, Flynn by her side, and thought: I could almost believe it.
And then Flynn said, “Down here …” and moved forward.
“Are you sure?”
“Yes. Look. The hillside is virtually unchanged.” He smiled at her. “Not by flood or fire or Devastation. Not by the passing of the centuries.
“And Oscar’s eye for terrain was very good.”
Joanna said uncertainly, “They would not fail us —”
“No.” But Flynn’s voice held a note of uncertainty, for how could they be sure. So many centuries …
Yes, but Time is simultaneous …
But the small cave in the hillside was still as Flynn had remembered, and they burrowed their way inside.
Joanna’s throat closed with the dust and her heart was thudding erratically. She thought: of course they would not have failed us; they promised.
But that was centuries ago …
The little cave was thick with the accreted dust and dirt of decades and the light was poor. They moved cautiously forward, both of them experiencing a strong feeling of recognition, neither of them daring to hope.
Flynn said, “We may have to dig.”
“Yes. We knew that.”
But the digging did not take very long, for the spo
t had been chosen carefully and well. Sheltered by a jutting overhang of rock, protected by a solid wall of the hillside, time had barely touched the narrow recess. There, a few feet beneath the cave floor, was the cache chosen by them with so much care and so much searching before they came back through the Time Curtain.
“A month ago?” said Joanna.
“Or a thousand years.”
“Would they have had the box specially made?”
“Yes. It’s solid gold,” said Flynn, and grinned. “That must have cost Cormac a pretty penny.”
But gold would have been the only substance that could have withstood the centuries. Even though Time is simultaneous? Even then.
Open it! cried Joanna silently, for I cannot bear it. But Flynn was already prising open the beautifully crafted box.
He glanced at Joanna. “Airtight,” he said. “I think we can be hopeful, acushla.”
The box opened with very little persuasion, and the thin linen sheets they remembered so clearly lay carefully packed beneath, exactly as Amairgen and Portan must have placed them. A month ago? A thousand years? Joanna sat in the dim narrow cave that they had spent weeks searching for until Flynn and Oscar were both sure that they had found a cave that Flynn remembered from Tugaim and the future they were about to return to.
A cave that had survived from that world to this …
For a moment, that other world closed about them again, and Joanna felt tears sting her eyes.
And then Flynn lifted the contents of the box out, and said very gently, “Joanna. Look.” And fell silent as they stared at what lay in the casket.
A tress of hair. Pure black and even in the dark cave gleaming like a raven’s wing. A small engraving — a pure profile etched on silver. Tip-tilted cheekbones and mischievous eyes.
At the bottom of the casket were more linen sheets, thin and rather brittle, but preserved by the gold of the box. The writing — Portan’s clear firm hand — was easily readable, worlds after it had been written.