by Sarah Rayne
“Now!” cried Fergus, and Conn brought the razor edge sweeping downwards.
Pain exploded in Fergus’s body, irradiating outwards; so fierce, so intimate, so utterly and comprehensively agonizing, that the wave he had so carefully constructed in his mind closed over his head in a suffocating blackness. He was drowning in the pain, he was unable to breathe, because the pain was choking him, his lower body was a raw open wound, and his life blood was leeching from him, and there had never been such pain anywhere in the world. The waters closed about him and he sank into the merciful pain-free depths …
… to wake again to pain, dulled, but still terrible, and to Conn and Niall bending over him, their eyes wide and fearful, their hands gentle.
Conn was saying, “It’s all right. Fergus, it is over.”
And Fergus heard himself murmur, “Yes, over once and for all … and she is gone from me now for all time … she is safe and I am safe …”
There was an interlude, a between-time, which he was later to look on as a time when he was neither quite in the world nor yet quite out of it. He thought that the children came and went, solemn, dark-eyed faces watching him, their eyes filled with sympathy and trust. “For,” thought Fergus, restless against the vice of the pain between his legs, “for they are waiting for me to lead them out of this place and back into the world to defeat Crom Croich’s grisly cult.”
Conn and Niall were with him almost continuously. “I do not think you ever left me,” Fergus said afterwards to Conn.
“I did not,” said Conn.
He had thought that this would be the worst part of all; the memory of what had been done, the realisation that never again would he make love to a woman; never again would he feel the slow, sweet stirrings of desire, the excitement of pursuing a lady of the Court. But all through it, like a dim silver thread, was the thought of Grainne and the knowledge that at least he had killed that sweet, illicit feeling.
For her as well? Please let it be for her as well, thought Fergus.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
Lugh of the Longhand had explained his new plan very clearly and very simply, and in an altogether friendly fashion. He had not dissimulated in the least bit, but still it had been odd how he had found it difficult to look directly at the wolf-emblem pennants which always flew from the camp’s entrance. He would not trouble about this, because he knew now that the Wolfline was nearly extinct, and it was dying. You threw in your allegiance with those who were in the ascendant. Medoc was in the ascendant. Lugh could be sure about this.
He had been very much shocked to learn that the Queen (he still thought of her by that title) had borne a child in secret, and allowed the child to be taken away and raised in secrecy: Folaim, the place of concealment. Lugh remembered very well indeed the rumours and the gossip, and he was rather pleased to think he had been instrumental in bringing the thing to an end. Just a word or two in the right quarters, that was all he had done at the time. And he had been saddened and hurt when Dierdriu, instead of calling him to thank him, and perhaps bestowing an honour of some kind on him (the Order of Nuadu Airgetlam, which was a silver wolfhead, would have been nice), had actually treated him rather coldly.
Medoc’s story about the child, the Wolfprince, fitted exactly. Lugh remembered how Grainne had gone on a tour of the Western Isles, and how she had been away for several months. Lugh thought it was deceitful and sly of Grainne, and wondered that she had been able to command such allegiance from the people. Cormac and Dierdriu had been no better, of course. What was in the meat came out in the gravy, and Grainne was really no better than her forebears.
He called the armies together and mapped out the new plan. He only spoke for quite a short time, telling how they would all march on to the little township called Folaim, there to raise further men for the battle. He managed to smudge over the reason for choosing this really rather obscure place quite well, so that it was irritating of Dorrainge, who always made things difficult, to ask awkward questions like: But why are we leaving Tara? And: What is so special about Folaim? Or even: But didn’t we come to Tara to spy on Medoc?
Lugh did not answer any of these questions directly, because for one thing he did not know how to. Medoc had not told him how he should deal with such a curt approach, and for another thing he was not going to have Druids telling him what to do. He adopted a rather vague manner and said it was all part of a new strategy and it would be a better tactic.
“Why?” said Dorrainge, and Lugh sighed at such bluntness. He said that it was a very good plan, and they would all of them do what they were told, and that the army in general, and Lugh in particular, did not have to be answer-able to Druids. He raised his voice towards the end, so that several people who had been nodding off woke up with a start, and four soldiers who had been engaging in a little dilettante dice-throwing at the back, scooped up the dice at once, because a quarrel between Longhand the Lily-Livered and Fatchops Dorrainge would be much more interesting than a furtive game of dice.
Lugh was not going to quarrel. He was not even going to quarrel with Dorrainge, even though he was being given provocation. He made a short speech (only a few well-thought-out words it was) about Duty and Loyalty and Obedience. He would certainly have gone on to talk about Fidelity as well, if he had not been distracted by Cathbad, who was tiptoeing stealthily out, one finger to his lips to indicate that he had no intention of making any noise, but unfortunately tripping over the feet of several people who were sitting on the ground, so that there was a good deal of tutting and shushing, and Cathbad was told he ought to be less clumsy, and Lugh lost the thread of his speech, and had to go back to the beginning which, as Dorrainge pointed out, was exactly what they did not want.
The men were interested in the new plan. They nodded and said wouldn’t it be fine to be on the march again. Several of them looked rather unhappily to the dark, saucer-shaped valley where Tara lay, and which was now a blur of shadow. A fine thing to be getting away for the moment, said the men. There was nothing but gloom and black sorcery down there, and if they could break Medoc’s nasty Enchantment by rounding up a few hill farmers and one or two shepherds and woodcutters it would be grand. Didn’t it just about break your heart to be so close to the Bright Palace and see it shrouded in darkness, only that you couldn’t see it at all, and wasn’t that the point. They became quite emotional, and somebody went round with the mulled wine which Cathbad had put out, and there was much drinking of damnation to the Twelve Dark Lords, and death and destruction to Medoc and the Conablaiche, and long life and health to the Wolfqueen.
“There’ll be a few sore heads in the morning I shouldn’t wonder,” observed Cathbad, “I’ll just gather a few pansies for a brew, or should it be elfwort? Let me see now …”
Lugh was glad that it had been so easy to persuade the men to march to Folaim. Of course they would agree to do whatever he told them. That was the sign of a good leader.
It was to be hoped that he would recognise the Wolfprince when he found it. This would make the task a whole lot easier, because no one wanted to go about slaughtering children wholesale. Lugh would look very hard for the signs of the wolfstrain, and since he was a person of some perspicacity, he would probably spot the creature without any trouble. He kept the image of the High Kings firmly in the forefront of his mind; let him once find a child who had the distinctive slant and golden glow to its eyes, the dark glossy hair that resembled an animal’s pelt, the three-cornered features that could look at once austere and sly, and he would know. Here is the Lost Prince!
But he had forgotten the really irritating habit that the reckless womanising Cormac had had of seducing anyone and everyone, and he had reckoned without the fact that Cormac (and one or two others of the Wolfline) had been indiscriminate, not to say incontinent, in the spreading of their seed.
When Lugh said crossly that there were bastards everywhere, he was misunderstood. Dorrainge frowned, and Cathbad sucked in his teeth and said, “Oh, dear me, what an expres
sion, and me with my sheltered upbringing,” and Lugh had to explain.
Dorrainge said, “Oh. Yes, I see. Yes, Cormac was a great one for that sort of thing, they say,” and Cathbad, who loved gossip, was so entranced by this that he forgot to look where he was going, and tripped over his robes, and tumbled headlong into a thicket hedge, and had to be hauled out by several of the soldiers.
“And I was pricked,” said Cathbad breathlessly, dusting himself down, and hunched a shoulder and giggled when the soldiers guffawed and said, Yes, more times than he can count, and Lugh had to call them to order, because you could not have this sort of ribaldry among the men. You did not know where it might lead to.
They travelled a good deal by night — “Inconspicuous,” said Lugh, and they covered a good deal of ground that way. “No distractions,” said Lugh, pleased, although one or two of the soldiers muttered that a bit of a distraction was a good thing sometimes, and got you through a boring march.
Lugh could not have told when he first became aware that they were no longer alone; when they ceased to be the High Queen’s army and a brace of Druids and became something a bit different.
He thought it was when they were about two days’ march from Folaim, just as they stopped for a break and a midday meal.
“It’s called Black Pig’s Dyke, this,” said Cathbad, who liked to know all the names, and who had read the maps earlier, and had, in fact, dropped Lugh’s best map into a large puddle. “We’ll have a plateful of stew each,” said Cathbad, beaming.
Folaim was not a very long way ahead of them now, which was why it was odd of Lugh to keep glancing over his shoulder. He thought that it was as they were crossing a narrow river that he began to feel uneasy. A kind of prickling on the back of his neck. He half turned several times, thinking he would see one of the men, or possibly Dorrainge, standing watching him. But there was no one, although Lugh retained the strong feeling that there had been someone; that just before he had turned, the watcher had disappeared.
This was ridiculous, because you did not see things that were not there. But the feeling persisted, and Lugh began to have the impression that the night was going to be altogether too dark and the air altogether too quiet, and the forest through which they were now marching altogether too lonely.
He began to feel very strongly indeed that there was something with them. Something that was creeping through the dark old forest, and something that could see them without them seeing it.
A shadow. Yes, now that Lugh came to concentrate, there was a shadow. An insubstantial form that rode alongside them and kept pace with them. Something that hovered at Lugh’s side, grinning and waiting. Lugh frowned, because this was something he had not reckoned on, and he did not care for silent nearly invisible things that rode with you and watched you and vanished when you tried to pin them with your eyes. He frowned and tried to think what the thing might be.
And then, as they rounded a curve in the forest path, and saw Folaim ahead of them in a little hollow by itself, the shadow coalesced for a minute, and Lugh saw the shape quite clearly, and cold fear gripped his vitals.
Small. Light. Frail. A creature that would presently cry in the night and beg for a share of the food and a place by the camp fire. Something that would certainly be there when Lugh sought out the Wolfprince. Something that would certainly exult and gloat at the killing of the Royal child.
Medoc had sent the Lad of the Skins after them.
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
When Grainne said to Raynor, “Come with me to Tara. Help me to drive out Medoc,” she knew and Raynor knew that she was really saying: Return to the world with me. Let me give to you those things which have been denied you. She did not say this, because she knew that the knowledge was still too new for them. They had accepted that they were the Enchanted Beastline of Ireland, but they did not yet quite believe it.
“We dare not,” said Bee, but her eyes were shining.
Raynor listened to Grainne and watched her face, as if he wanted to absorb her and know her so well that he would never forget her. When she said again, “Come with me to Tara,” he turned on her a look of such fierce love and such blazing intensity that she felt her heart stop and then resume a painful beating. He cupped her face between his hands in the gesture she was coming to know, the gesture that said, “You are mine and nothing and no one shall take you from me.” And then he said aloud, “Yes. All right.” As simply and as directly as that.
It was important to remember that bringing these creatures out of the Grail Castle was only one part of the plan to defeat Medoc, and it was very important indeed not to lose sight of the fact that the Beastline would form only a small fighting detachment. Grainne thought she had not lost sight of any of this; there was, in her mind, the strong wonderful image of the Beastline and their creatures swooping down on Tara, with the ancient banners of their Houses streaming behind them in the wind — Banners that were so nearly lost to Ireland, she thought — but even as she was seeing this image, she still knew that it was the army, the Fiana, who would lead the charge against Medoc and the Twelve Lords.
And Fergus? Yes, Fergus must certainly be there, for it was not to be borne that they should regain Tara and Fergus not to be there with them. Grainne could still think, you are still here with me, my love; she could still pause in the day’s events and send out a thought, a message, an outpouring of strength to Fergus, who might be anywhere at all now, and who might be dead. Only if you were dead, my dear lost love, I think I should know it. She thought Fergus was safe somewhere, and she thought he would succeed, because failure was not something she would ever associate with him.
But when Raynor cupped her face between his hands and said, “You are mine,” and when he smiled the winged smile that was his strange inheritance and said, “Did you think I would let you go away from me?” Grainne felt delight pour over her in great, brilliant waves.
And the others would come with them; they would leave this dark ancient fortress, which might hold patches of sunlight and happiness, but which also held the miasma of centuries of despair and fear and madness.
When Rinnal said doubtfully, “We do not form a very large army, Your Majesty,” Grainne smiled at him and said, “But you will be the quintessence of it all, Rinnal. You and Bee, and your people. The Badgers and the Hares and the Chariot Horses and the Swans.”
“And we shall see Tara at last,” said Rinnal.
“Oh, yes,” said Grainne softly. “Oh, yes, you will see Tara.” For it is your inheritance as much as it is mine. And Fergus? said her mind, without warning. Isn’t it as much Fergus’s as well? I don’t know, said Grainne silently. I cannot tell any longer. Only that I must do all I can to drive out Medoc. It does not matter after that who rules.
Fintan and Cermait and Tybion the Tusk had been commissioned to marshal everyone into a proper fighting force. They had been charmed to be thus employed, although, as Fintan said, the task was not without its difficulties.
“It isn’t the people of the Beastline themselves,” said Fintan. “They’re the easiest creatures in the world.”
Cermait and Tybion had tried to count up how many they had. “Six Royal Houses,” said Tybion, but Cermait said there were the lesser Houses as well. “People like Bee and Rinnal, and Diarmuid and the Forest Dogs,” he said. “And if you allow ten animals per person, well, say a round dozen, that’s — dear me, it’s rather a lot.” He counted up on the fingers of both hands worriedly.
“It’s too many by far,” said Fintan crossly.
“It’s too many different species by far,” said Cermait, who had lost count and had to start again, and had already reached three different answers.
“It will be all right,” said Tybion, and Cermait at once wanted to know how Tybion could possibly think this, what with the Foxes falling out with the Forest Dogs, and the Badgers snuffling and getting under people’s feet, and the Hares leaping on to the table just as you were about to sit down to your supper.
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p; Tybion said, mildly, that he thought everyone was getting on very amicably, all things considered, and Cermait said he would not call it amity precisely, not when the Foxes had spent that very morning chasing the Hares, and not when the Dogs had spent the afternoon barking at the Badgers who had decided to dig up the Grail Castle’s west lawn.
“It works,” said Tybion firmly.
“The stables are overcrowded with the Chariot Horses.”
“But nobody seems to mind.”
“I’m worried about the White Swans and the Eagles,” said Fintan, who was not going to be left out of such a promisingly gloomy discussion. “Mark my words, there’ll be trouble there once we set out. I told Her Majesty so,” said Fintan, who had not done any such thing, but thought it sounded well. “There’ll be trouble before we’ve done, I said. Of course, Raynor might be able to control the Eagles,” said Fintan doubtfully. “You never know.”
“It’s a grand strong army,” said Tybion contentedly.
Tybion was utterly and completely happy. He was enchanted to be here, to be in the High Queen’s service, to be helping his beautiful shining lady. He liked the Beastline creatures, and he thought they were courteous and noble and interesting, and that there was a fascinating air of great tragedy about them. Tybion, who had lived what he considered to be an ordinary sort of life, was intrigued by the tragedy and the drama of the Beastline creatures who had spent their lives shut away from the world and were now going to emerge into it. He was wide-eyed with delight, and he thought, as he went about the Castle, that to be sure this was the stuff that dreams were made on. He went about in a happy glow.
Grainne had talked to him, quite privately, and Tybion had stored this away to be relived later. She had said that she believed Tybion was going to be of great importance in the battle ahead of them, in the great fight to destroy Medoc and regain Tara, and Tybion, unable to take his eyes from her, had asked was there really going to be a battle, and Grainne had laughed and said, Oh, yes, for sure there was going to be a battle, and they would be sending Medoc and the Twelve Lords to the rightabout, and wasn’t that what all this was about anyway?