The Mammoth Book of Irish Romance

by Trisha Telep

But his face was not hideous or twisted with evil, nor was his body misshapen. He was broad of shoulder and comely like the disgraced King Bres, who carried the blood of both the Fomóiri and the Tuatha Dé Danann in his veins. Like Lugh, born of Ethlinn, Balor’s daughter. His hair was like smoke to Séanat’s flame.

  Still he was of the enemy. Séanat lunged towards him, her sword reaching his throat before he could raise his own.

  “Prepare to die, Fomóir,” she cried.

  His eyes, blue as the sea, met hers. “Kill me, then,” he said, his accent so light that she might never have noticed it had he worn the armour of the People.

  Her hand twitched, and her sword drew a thin line of blood from his neck. “Do you seek death?”

  He smiled with a great sadness that tore at her heart. “I do, for I have no people and no place.” He lifted his chin. “Finish it, warrior.”

  If it had not been for the old oak and the magic of its peace, she might have severed his head then and there. But her fingers trembled and the sword went slack in her hand.

  “Who are you?” she demanded.

  “I am called Aodhan,” he said in his soft, low voice. “I fought with the Fomóiri.”

  “You are no Fomóir!”

  “Am I not?” He gestured at his armour with its sigils of writhing wyrms and ravening wolves. “Will it help if I fight you now, woman of the Tuatha Dé?”

  She backed away. “I will fight you, and win!”

  He shook his head, stirring the black forelock that curled over his brow. “You will win,” he said. He dropped his sword and spread his arms. “Come.”

  Séanat’s heart danced a wild jig in her chest. “Coward,” she hissed.

  “Yes,” he said.

  Moving clumsily as a newborn calf, she stumbled backwards until she came up against the oak’s massive trunk. Light filtered through the branches to lie across Aodhan’s head and shoulders like a crown of fire.

  “I am a traitor,” he said, “a traitor to both my peoples.”

  “Both?” Oh, she had known it, known from the beginning . . .

  “You asked who I am,” he said. “But that I do not know. I was raised by Fomóiri to be Fomóir. But my heart has told me—” He shook his head again. “It matters not. I fought beside those who gave me food and shelter and cared for me in times of illness. I would die with them.”

  Oh, how simple it would be to give him his wish rather than pay heed to the pity that weakened her. Bes had been half-Tuatha Dé, though in the end he had chosen his Fomóir father’s people. Lugh had chosen the opposite. This warrior, like them, was half light and half darkness.

  But he had made his choice.

  Séanat raised her sword again. Aodhan closed his eyes.

  She dropped the sword with a wretched cry. She could not do it. He was unarmed, a pig for the slaughter. She was a warrior, not an executioner.

  And he was comely. So very comely. The light was there, shining in his eyes, almost eclipsed by the shadow of his pain and sorrow.

  When he moved, she had no time to think how easily she had been tricked. In an instant he had her sword in his hand. The blade glittered in the waning light.

  She laughed inwardly. She’d been a fool. And soon she would be a dead fool.

  Séanat stood very straight, raised her head, and lifted her arms. Morrígan, Great Queen, be with me. Let me die with honour.

  The blow never came. She heard a grunt of pain, and the sound of a body falling to the ground. Aodhan lay curled like a newborn babe around the hilt of the sword he had plunged deep into his chest.

  Séanat dropped to her knees beside him. His blood was already soaking into the soil, painting the brown leaves with crimson. She didn’t dare pull the sword free, for that would surely end his life. He must die slowly, his life leaking away, with only an enemy to witness his passing.

  There were songs for the dying – taught, it was said, to the People by the Goddess Danu herself before the coming to Inis Fáil. Never had such a song been sung by one of the Tuatha Dé for a Fomóir. But Séanat laid her hands upon Aodhan’s shoulders and began the lament, her voice rising and curling among the heavy branches above her head. One tear came, and then another – no shame, for the emotions of the Tuatha Dé ran high, in battle and in sorrow.

  “Why do you weep, child?”

  Séanat opened her eyes. The scent of flowers filled her nostrils, and the oak’s leaves murmured as the great tree bowed to the one who had come.

  “My lady,” Séanat whispered. Bluebells and primroses had sprung up where the lady trod, covering her bare feet and clinging to her robes like the finest embroidery. No shadow fell over Séanat as Brighid came to stand beside her.

  “He is dying, lady,” Séanat said. “Though I know not why I should mourn.”

  Brighid sighed, and a dozen tiny birds settled on her shoulders. “I have mourned,” she said. “Mourned because there is no peace, and my son is dead.”

  Sickened by her stupid mistake, Séanat bowed, her braided locks brushing Brighid’s feet. She knew the great loss the lady had suffered in this battle, the sacrifices she had made in the name of peace. She had married Bres when he had become King of the Tuatha Dé, hoping that the union would bring the two warring peoples together at last.

  But Bres had enslaved his subjects, making a mockery of Brighid’s hopes. He was deposed and sent into exile. Their son, Ruadán, had become a spy for the Fomóiri and had met his death in the camp of the Tuatha Dé. Brighid’s keening had been heard the length and breadth of Inis Fáil.

  “Forgive me, lady,” Séanat said.

  Brighid’s tears fell on a scattering of acorns, and new trees sprang from their hearts. “My son was misled,” she said. “He was destroyed by his father’s lust for power. But he was not evil.” She knelt, laying her hand on Aodhan’s arm. “This one, too, was misled.”

  Séanat’s breast swelled with hope. “Is he Tuatha Dé, lady?”

  The lady gave no answer. She bent her head over Aodhan as the last breaths shuddered out of his mouth. “Do you wish him healed, a nighean ruadh?”

  Yes. Oh, yes. “He is the enemy . . .”

  “Is he?” Brighid stroked Aodhan’s damp hair. “I see only a boy driven to his death.” She touched Séanat’s hand. “It is your choice, warrior. But know that if you choose yes, you are bound to him forever.”

  Forever. The Tuatha Dé lived long. Séanat had always known she might die in battle, but such battles must be fewer now. She might live many years yet to come.

  “I accept,” she breathed. “Let him be healed, lady.”

  One touch was all it took. One touch of the lady’s fingertips upon the torn flesh under the armour and cloth beneath. One moment, and the sword slipped from Aodhan’s chest. A spurt of blood followed, stanched with another touch of Brighid’s white finger. Aodhan groaned, and his muscles went slack.

  But he was not dead. He was sleeping, the rest of one who has fought every battle and staggers back to the ráth to lick his wounds. In his face was an innocence Séanat had almost forgotten.

  “You must stay with him,” Brighid said, rising. “He will have no defence until he wakes.” She brushed Séanat’s forehead with the back of her slender hand. “Remember, he is yours now. All that he is will be within your keeping.”

  She turned and walked away, her white form dissolving into the gloom of dusk. Séanat stared after her until there was no more light to see. She removed her cloak and gently spread it over Aodhan. The night would be cold; Samhain was done, and the season was turning. Wolves crept in these woods, silent and yellow-eyed, creatures of Badb and her grim sisters.

  I have betrayed my queen, Séanat thought, shivering as she drew her knees tight to her chest. The Morrígan would never forgive her for such mercy shown an enemy. Had not the Morrígan summoned all the Druids and magicians to defeat the Fomóiri? Had she not foreseen victory? Had she not predicted the very end of the world?

  The other Daughters would not understand.
But Séanat had made her choice. She must return to the royal camp and tell Lugh what she had done. If he sent her into exile . . .

  It was a warrior’s place to accept her fate.

  Her skin puckered as the warmth left the earth. Brighid’s flowers withered, and the birds scattered for shelter. Séanat lay down beside Aodhan and pulled the cloak over her shoulder so that it covered them both. His breath stirred the hair at the nape of her neck.

  “All that he is will be within your keeping.”

  The Dagda grant he was worth it.

  Aodhan woke with a start. The air was crisp on his face, but his body was as hot as the fire that shaped the sword.

  She lay beside him, the warrior with her mane of red hair and dimpled chin and wide, wild eyes. She had curled into him, her hands tucked under her breasts, her legs drawn up as if she meant to keep one last barrier between them. A barrier besides the sword that rested in the narrow space between his body and hers.

  Releasing his breath, Aodhan touched her hair. He had seen such hair many times before among the Tuatha Dé. But hers was brighter, shot with gold, spitting sparks when he touched it.

  He didn’t even know her name.

  Not even when he felt his chest to find unscarred flesh did she wake. Only when he began to rise did she come to wakefulness and spring to her feet.

  Aodhan raised his hands to show them empty. “Lady,” he said softly, “how is it that I am still alive?”

  The tension left her body. She bent to pick up her sword and flung it into the brambles. “No thanks to yourself.” She brushed the leaves from her breeches and ran her fingers through her hair to untangle the strands that had come loose from their braids. “You won’t be trying that again.”

  Struck by sudden weakness, Aodhan sat on the hump of the mighty oak’s root. “I remember nothing,” he said, “after the blade touched my heart.”

  “’Tis no surprise,” she said. Her brow furrowed. “Are you well?”

  He didn’t laugh, though the temptation was great. “You have taken my honour from me.”

  Hands on hips, the warrior looked him over with disgust. “Your honour? You said yourself you had none to lose.”

  And he did not. Unless he could win it back again. Perhaps now that was possible. “How did you heal me?” he asked.

  “’Twas not myself who did it.” She walked towards the oak, keeping her distance from him, and sat on another root. “’Twas the Lady Brighid herself.”

  Aodhan started. It was not that Brighid, royal daughter of the Dagda, wise woman and healer, could not work such magic. It was that she chose to do so. She was of the Tuatha Dé.

  Yet she had lost a son at the hand of one of her own people, a half-Fomóir son whose loyalty had lain with his father. In his despair, Aodhan had confessed to the girl that he had questioned his own blood and heritage. And so he had, more than ever during the battle, even to questioning his own loyalty.

  That had shamed him beyond bearing. He had wished for the warrior to end his shame. But she had spared him, and Brighid had brought him back to life.

  “Did you ask for the lady’s help?” he asked the girl.

  She jerked up her chin. “Why should I?”

  Aodhan got up, testing his strength, and crossed the space between them in three steps.

  This time she did not rise to face him but remained where she was, her back against the rough trunk, and looked up at him with all the pride and defiance of a captive warrior.

  To whom was she captive? Not to him, who owed her and her lady his life.

  To something else, then. Something that lay within her heart. Something he might use if he chose.

  Aodhan knelt before her. “I cannot thank you,” he said, “but it is a debt I must repay. What would you have of me?”

  Her eyes, as green as the forest in spring, met his. Fear was what he saw in them . . . not the fear of battle or death, but of something far more deadly.

  “You must do as I say,” she said. “You must make no further attempt to take your own life.” She swallowed. “And you must give yourself into my keeping.”

  Even though he had begun to guess at what lay behind her fear, her words struck him like the magical spear that had slain Ruadán in the camp of the Tuatha Dé. He knew now that the girl had paid a price for his healing, and she loathed that price even as she accepted it.

  “Why?” he asked.

  She looked away. She knew the answer but would never speak it. He was still her enemy. She could not trust him, though she was bound to hold his welfare even above her own. Bound to keep and protect him, even from himself.

  “What is the name of the one I must obey?” he asked.

  Her voice was so low that he could barely hear. “I am Séanat,” she said.

  “‘Eagle’,” he said. “And so you are, lady.”

  Séanat laughed and shook her head. “Eaglet, more like,” she said, “fallen to earth before it learns to fly.”

  Slowly Aodhan reached out to touch her hair. She flinched. He gentled her as he would gentle a fine steed, stroking the heavy tresses as a butterfly strokes the blossom.

  “You are brave,” he said, “and fair. Too good for the likes of myself. But I will follow you, lady, and do your will.”

  Séanat trembled. Her breath came fast. Aodhan felt the first flush of desire, for she was no warrior now, but a woman, yearning for that she did not want to accept.

  Had it not been for the whisper of the trees and the lingering scent of flowers, they might have stood apart again. But the memory of death was too near, and life would have its due. Aodhan cupped her face in his hands, wiping away a crust of dirt from her cheek with his thumb. He drew her towards him, and when his lips touched hers they opened and drew him in.

  Séanat was as fierce in love as she was in battle. She would not give way even when he pulled her to her knees and embraced her with all his body, chest and hip and thigh. It was she who bore him down to the earth, she who straddled him and unlaced the hardened leather of his cuirass, casting it aside. Only when she sought to remove his tunic was she forced to let him join in, and then it was an easy thing to strip her of her armour and shirt and breeches until he and Séanat lay naked together.

  Her body was a glorious thing, lean and muscular yet blessed with the delight of sweetly curved breasts and thighs made to rock a man to blissful release. Her skin was scarred and yet as soft as lambskin where no blade had touched it, fair and freckled and exquisitely responsive to his caresses.

  When he would have rolled her on to her back, she resisted with the growl of a she-wolf and mounted him. She hesitated, looked again into his eyes, and impaled herself on him, gasping in astonishment and pleasure.

  Aodhan understood the gift she had given him. She had never taken a man into herself before, yet she kept nothing back, holding him and then releasing him again with a fervour that matched his own. He raised himself up to take her brown, peaked nipple into his mouth, and she flung back her head, her loosened hair cascading over her shoulders and sweeping the earth.

  Glorious it was when she cried out, bucking as the pleasure took her and carried her into realms of light and joy. Aodhan followed before his heart could beat again, and for the first time since his earliest youth he knew how it felt to be whole.

  He tried to keep Séanat with him after it was finished, but she was having none of it. She lifted herself and swung away without a lover’s endearment. She walked across the clearing, snatching up her forgotten cloak as she passed by.

  Aodhan meant to stay where he was, as stubborn as she, unwilling to admit to more than a fleeting pleasure. He should be shamed by his need, as she was.

  But he rose, shook the leaves from his body, and went after her. She stood facing the forest where it grew dark with secrets, where any man might hide forever.

  “A chuisle,” he said.

  She stiffened. “Don’t be calling me such things.”

  “Would you have me curse you, a chroi ?”
He moved so near that he could feel the warmth of her skin. “What would you have me call you?”

  “Nothing but my name.”

  She shifted, and the cloak slid from her shoulders. He caught it and laid it over her, drawing it close around her neck. “Look at me, Séanat.”

  “Leave me in peace!”

  “How can I do such a thing when you have said I must give myself into your keeping?”

  She turned about, despair in her eyes. “Dress yourself,” she said, “but leave your armour behind. We go to the High King.”

  It was exactly what Aodhan had hoped. He nodded and returned to his discarded clothing, careful not to let Séanat see that he was pleased . . . not only to be alive, not only to have enjoyed her, but to know he would soon have his honour back again.

  All the camp was rejoicing. Warriors sang of their exploits and drank sweet mead and ale until they staggered and fell into fits of laughter; women grinned as they filled bowls with great ladlefuls of stew; horses stomped and whinnied, pigs squealed and banners snapped in the sharp, bitter air.

  Séanat would have given everything she had to join her sisters where they sat around a fire with the other warriors, singing songs of victory in high, sweet voices. The spears she carried over her shoulders, Goibhniu’s finest; the sword she had won with her own skill when she was barely more than a child; her armour and her finely wrought golden helm – all these, and more, she would have surrendered to change what had happened the night before.

  But there was no going back. No undoing what had been done, no leaving Aodhan to his death.

  The terrible thing was that she knew she could never have done aught but save him, not even had the Morrígan herself appeared to forbid it.

  Forgive me.

  “Where are we going?” Aodhan asked softly at her shoulder.

  “Hold your tongue,” she whispered. “It is not for you to speak, but to be humble and silent.”

  She thought she heard him laugh, but the sound was quickly gone. Here he was surrounded by those who would cheerfully have killed him had they met him on the battlefield or found him alone afterwards. There were doubtless many who would still be glad to spit him on the end of a sword. Ruadán’s betrayal had not been forgotten.