"Oh pooh, Kieran," said Oisin. "We've been all through this. If you objected, you had plenty of time to back out before we left. We did promise them we'd be back to see them, after all. They did go to a lot of trouble to get us through the mountain alive and well.”
"Actually, Oisin, you told the Sprites we'd be checking on them. I don't remember you asking any of us..."
"What does that matter, Kieran?" said Olloo. "You knew all this and came anyway. And besides, I'd think you'd have some gratitude for the Sprites' getting us out. You were the biggest whiner in the mountain, as I remember."
"I agreed to come, all right, but remember the whole subject was discussed in mixed company where I'd have looked like a coward for not agreeing to go."
"Mixed company?" said Olloo. "What does that mean?"
"He means Doona and Lilee," said Oisin.
"So what?" said Olloo. "You had all kinds of time to back out."
"Right. And Doona would've known why the minute you all headed off into the grass without me," said Kieran as he sent another stone skipping out across the water. "But maybe that's just what you wanted, aye Oisin?"
"Oh dry up!" said Oisin. "Why would I bother sitting about thinking up ways to make you look bad in front of Doona when you keep doing that all by yourself?"
"Will you two shut up?" said Olloo, "I don't think any of this belongs out here..."
"We're going in, Kieran," said Oisin, "and you can either come with us or go back by yourself and really look good for Doona..."
"You all need to shake hands and not another word like this as long as we're out here..."
"Shake?" said Oisin, thrusting out his hand.
With a sigh and a nod, Kieran took his hand.
"Good," said Olloo. "Shall I tie up the unicorns on that little old cottonwood back yonder?"
Olloo returned directly and the three of them carefully stepped inside the lava tube, feeling their way along the slippery ledge which ran alongside the rushing stream.
"Hey!" cried Kieran above the thundering water. "What are we supposed to do for light?"
"I figured the Fire Sprites would come light our way!" hollered Oisin. "I've been thinking out to Radella as hard as I can, but I sure haven't got any sort of reply yet. Let's go a little further while we wait on her, at least as far as we can still see daylight behind us."
They shuffled along, slipping and stumbling and soon came to a place where the lava tube formed a grotto to one side of the stream over a pool of swirling water. "What on earth died in here," cried Olloo, "some old cow?"
"What are all those things bobbing in that sink?" cried Kieran.
"Looks like a couple dozen of the Sprites' plews, all bloated up! Are you still thinking out to Radella, Oisin?"
Oisin shook his head. "I don't think they're here!"
Without a word, they turned about at once and quickly made their way out into the light. Just as they stepped outside, Kieran slipped and soaked his leg up past his knee. "Damn this stupid trip into the mountain!" he wailed.
"Yea?" said Olloo. "Well damn you! You've done nothing but balk, argue and complain from the time you got astraddle your unicorn. You may be my best friend, but you make me wish you'd stayed behind."
"Friend indeed! How come you take Oisin's side every time anything comes up?"
"How can I side with you when you make it so I can't tell which end of you I'm talking to?"
"Well it's those very times when you're supposed to stand up for me..."
"With breath like you've got, how do I manage to keep standing?" said Olloo as he threw back his head, slapped his knee and stumbled about in a fit of laughter. Soon all three of them were laughing uproariously. After a time they each found rocks to sit on to stare out over the lake.
"So," said Olloo as he scratched an aimless design in the sand with a twig, "what do you think happened to Radella and them, Oisin?”
"I can't imagine anything but trolls. Had to be."
"I'll sure be glad to stay on the east slope of the mountains while we hunt for Vorona's gap..." said Kieran.
"Now what's he saying?" said Oisin.
"Can't tell. This end stinks too bad." And with that, they made giddy tracks to their unicorn.
Chapter 10
It was not yet mid-morning and already quite hot atop Carraig Faire under the cloudless sky, as the Elves busied themselves thatching the sunshades which they had been making from the poles they had split on the ground, down below. Sweat trickled down Doona's back as she went from child to child, applying a salve she had concocted for their sunburnt noses and foreheads. Sudden shouts made her stand up at once. "What's everyone pointing at, Roseen?" she said, peering under the flat of her hand.
"See that commotion down there in the grass? It's a pair of strike falcons after a deer and they're headed right for Lilee and them."
"Now I see... No!"
As one of the shawkyn spooghey flanked the deer, the deer wheeled and shot away in a new direction. "Thank the Fates!" shouted Roseen, "They've headed north... Look! They've got it down!"
"Yea," said Doona, "but now they're awfully close to Brendan and them. It doesn't look like any of them down there cutting sod even see, for all the grass..."
"Donachan's got his bow. He's on his way down to warn everybody."
"Doona..."
Doona looked down at the sudden tugging at her skirt.
"I said, could I please have the jackstones, now?" said Cara, completely ignorant of the commotion below. "Lulach and I've decided to play right here so we won't get stepped on, since everyone's playing foxes and hens over yonder. You're sure hard to get stones out of, sometimes."
"Are you sure that you want me to be 'keeper of the stones?'"
"Oh yea," said Cara, with a huge nod. "But we just want them right now."
"Well here you go, but don't forget to get under one of the new shades before the sun gets much higher. You're awfully burnt and that salve can only do so much."
Cara and Lulach sat down cross legged at her feet at once. At the glassy rattle of stones tumbling from the sock, Onner came racing away from her grasshopper hunt to plop down beside them, pinfeathers and all. She gave each wing a confident snap, shook herself and began looking keenly up and down at each rock being picked up and tossed.
"Do you mind if Onner watches you play, or shall I come get her?" said Doona.
Both girls glanced up at once. "She can stay," said Lulach.
Onner quickly gobbled up a jackstone.
Cara turned back and gave a stone an indifferent toss before squinting up at Doona again.
Onner followed the stone keenly as it traveled up and down.
"Very well," said Doona, "but if she gets to be a handful, bring her over to where Onora and I are or have me come and do it."
Onner slyly gobbled up two more jackstones.
"We'll watch her, Doona," chorused the girls as they went back to their game.
"Well," said Doona when she found Onora near their sleeping spot, cleaning the last of the utensils from breakfast, "the little squirts are all salved up and going hard at either foxes and hens or jackstones. If we're lucky, I suppose we'll have time to talk before any of them decide they are thirsty or hungry."
"Where's your fluffy little shadow?" said Onora.
"Playing jackstones..."
"What?"
"Well, watching Lulach and Cara playing jackstones at least, but you'd think she wants to learn by the way she looks. Actually, I think she wants to swallow one if she can."
"For her gizzard?" said Onora as she set aside the last of her work. "I never noticed Baase doing that, but I suppose they'd do that just like any fowl. Though, I've not watched either bird beyond noticing that they both seem to be taming up right nice and that they aren't making messes that don't get cleaned up."
"So," said Doona, "have you thought about...?"
Onora studied her face for a moment as a dickcissel called from the grass below them. "If you're absolutely s
ure that you care more for Oisin than Kieran, then there's nothing for it. Lilee's right. You must encourage Oisin and discourage Kieran, and you must be clear about it to both of them right away..."
"But how do I keep from hurting Kieran?"
"You don't. But you can be kind about it. There's no way he'll like it. In fact it'll be quite a wound for him, but in time he'll come to recognize that you're still his friend and that you had no choice but to hurt him."
"He'll get over it, then?"
"I didn't say that. He'll be your friend again, but he'll never be the same friend he once was. And you don't want him to be, either."
"Surely there must be a way to let him down without hurting him, Onora. He's been almost like another brother to me."
Onora shook her head and took up her hand and smiled. "It doesn't work that way, dear."
"What if I just wait a while? Maybe Kieran will get discouraged and find someone else. Then I can..."
Onora was still shaking her head. "That isn't the kind of affection Kieran wants from you. And the more you ignore him, the harder he'll try, and the more you'll hurt him before it's all over. You have to be kind enough to tell him no." She paused to brush a lock of hair from Doona's cheek. "Unless you're still uncertain whether you care more for Oisin than for him, you must do what is right and let him know. The sooner, the better."
Doona studied her hands for a long spell. At last she took a deep breath and looked up with a smile. "Thank you Onora. You're right, and when Oisin and Kieran return..."
Onora already had her in her arms, stroking her hair.
By the time Oisin, Olloo and Kieran had ridden back around Lake Na Gealai, they realized that they were utterly exhausted and chose to camp for the night on the shore near the cleft. The next day, they rode their unicorns down the east slope of Mount Sliabh until they were well below the tree line before heading north along the east flank of the Eternal Mountains. They spent the entire afternoon studying the ridge of mountains as they rode, with a growing fear that perhaps they had gotten beyond Vorona's gap, Kieran was convinced that they had.
"No, we have not," said Oisin, studying the peaks as he swayed with the determined rhythm of his unicorn. "Have you noticed that the mountains don't rise as far above the trees as they did? Vorona told me that the peaks start being covered with spruce and blue maidenhair, right before we reach Doras..."
"Doras?" said Olloo, heaving himself into a new position in the saddle.
"Yea. No one would have known it as Vorona's Gap back when we all lived at Baile Gairdin. And you probably never heard of Doras because it was pretty well forgotten except in old stories."
"Think it's far?" said Kieran.
"Not too far. Couldn't be."
"Then let's camp right here by this stream," said Olloo. "I've never been this saddle sore in my entire life."
Olloo was awake at the first light, listening to the cries of jays over the rushing water in the stream as it dashed down the mountain from somewhere far above. At once he was on his knees, rolling up his blankets. He paused to stare at the peaks above, awash with the red light of dawn. Oisin was just getting to his feet.
"Hey Oisin. That looks like trees, 'way up yonder on the rocks, don't you think?"
"Yea. I'm not just pretty sure that they are. I'd lay odds that they're all blue maidenhair."
"Well the gap, Doras if you must, is supposed to be a tight fit, right?"
"Yeap. Onora said that there'll be places where we'll not be able to ride abreast..."
"Well, if that's the case, how are we to see it from 'way down here when it's covered with trees?"
Soon they were under way, continuing north in hopes of reaching the peaks by the time they were forested, so that they would not possibly miss Vorona's Gap. Their unicorns plodded steadily through the leaves, nodding in purposeful rhythm as they climbed, turning their ears this way and that as they listened to the cries of ravens far overhead. The deep shadows of morning slowly turned into a mottle of light on the forest floor, as the sun climbed aloft. By noon they were meandering along a carpeted path of spruce needles and blue maidenhair leaves amongst a great tumble of basalt boulders just below the peaks.
Kieran was following Olloo, and Oisin had just disappeared from sight ahead of them. "Hoy!" cried Oisin. "Come look at this! This has to be it!"
They found him peering into a chasm, a great crack in the rock so narrow that they could have thrown stones to the far side, yet so deep that they were going to have quite a long trek down the mountain in order to enter it from the bottom.
Olloo rode up and dismounted, carefully walking to the edge to see. "It looks like the mountain's just one big rock that split open," he said.
"We're not riding all the way down there, are we?" said Kieran.
"Not you," said Olloo, giving him a sudden look in the eye. "We're going to save ourselves a lot of trouble and throw you over the edge."
Kieran gave a huff of disgust and wheeled aside with a yank of his reins.
It was steep going down the mountain to the entrance of the gap. They spent most of the way struggling to keep their balance on the sliding talus as they lead their unicorns, here and there, kicking loose showers of rocks to go bouncing and rolling down through the trees. At last they found themselves riding single file into the gap as their unicorns stepped carefully through the water running along its bed from springs far up the sides, which made a dribbling cascade down a mantle of liverworts and moss. In spite of the hot early afternoon sun, it was quite cool down where they were, splashing along as they listened to the croaking of ravens from the ledges above.
At last they came out of the gap into the upper reaches of a great cathedral of towering maidenhair trees, just as the bellbirds and peewees were beginning their late afternoon calls. There, they followed the gentle slope of a long leafy ridge down the mountain in the emerald light until at last they reached a prominence overlooking Baile Gairdin and the meadows and orchards which lay 'round about it.
"Look 'ee yonder," said Oisin as he paused and took off his hat to wipe his brow. "From here you'd swear no one ever left."
"Yea," said Olloo, "but I'm not sure I'm ready to go see it up close. You know it'll be all torn up from the trolls."
Oisin gave a solemn nod and leant forward to spit into the leaves. "Nothing's ever as bad as the dreading of it," he said, taking up his reins.
"So I've heard," said Olloo as he turned to peer over his shoulder. "Hey Kieran!"
Kieran snapped to from his trance of staring at the village and followed after at a canter.
The absence of grazing livestock and the unmowed fields could be seen long before they reached the houses, and the weeds and the dark vacant look of the windows were apparent the moment they sauntered amongst the first buildings. Song sparrows and catbirds called from gardens gone wild.
"Chickens," cried Kieran. "You'd think the foxes would have eaten every last one of them by now."
"That is odd as can be," said Olloo. "Someone surely must have had a strain of unusually alert ones."
Presently they tied up their unicorns at the picket fence around the foot of the Sacred Maidenhair tree and looked about, studying the front of the palace.
Kieran was the first one up the steps with his bow, arrow knocked. "So where's this library, Oisin?" he said, pushing open the great door, hewed from a single oak plank. "You were part of the royal family."
"Just be patient. I'm headed straight there. I hope the Marfora Siofra haven't ransacked it."
"So far it looks like the stuff they tore up was just random," said Olloo, stepping inside after them with his bow.
"Yea," said Kieran, "They wouldn't have been interested in anything sensible like books. They just wanted to eat us. If no one tried to hide in the library, it's probably untouched..."
Suddenly they all froze in wide-eyed shock at the sight of a white-haired troll across the foyer, standing still as a statue, keenly studying them with dark pink eyes. They drew t
heir bows at once.
"Isbal! Reina! Strangers!" bellowed the troll as he wheeled and vanished into the adjoining room.
"It talks," cried Kieran, springing after to let fly an arrow which glanced off a long polished table top and stuck in the far wall.
"Stop!" shrieked a woman, suddenly appearing from the hallway.
"Aunt Isbal!" cried Oisin, letting down his bow. "You're alive!"
"Yes I am. Now don't shoot our troll..."
"'Our' troll? Who else made it through the massacre? And how would you ever have a troll?"
"Your aunt Reina is who else. Now you heard me about not shooting him, right?"
"How does one not shoot a troll?" said Kieran.
"By being polite enough not to, Kieran," said Isbal.
"I'm sorry, Isbal. I just saw them kill..."
"Yes. So did I. But this one won't. Come on out Darragh. Come on now."
After a pause, a chair scooted away from the long polished table with a screech on the stone floor as Darragh lumbered out from under it and slowly stood up.
"Now this is Darragh, and I swear he'll not harm a single hair on your head..."
"What's the matter with it?" said Olloo. "I've never seen one with snow white hair before. And what's wrong with the thing's eyes?"
"Shake their hands, Darragh," she said as she gently took him by the wrist and held his hand toward Kieran.
Kieran stepped back as Oisin came forth in his place and took Darragh by the hand.
"How do you?" rumbled Darragh with a beetle-browed nod as he pumped out a couple of giant handshakes.
"Carefully, sport," said Oisin with a wary look as he stepped back.
"Meanie. And he meanie, too," said Darragh, wrinkling his nose with a sneer and pointing at Kieran and Olloo.
"Well shake his hand, Kieran," said Olloo.
"No," said Darragh, shaking his head from shoulder to shoulder. "He big big meanie. He dirty butt stinker man."
"Well," said Olloo, "there've been moments on the way here when we've thought so ourselves, Darragh."
Kieran bit his lip and kicked Olloo in the ankle.
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