by Erin O'Quinn
I knew I had won him over when I saw the smile begin at the corner of his mouth, and I saw his eyes crinkle into a laugh. “Agreed, Cate. Let us ride and talk. I want to tell ye about Mockingbird and me before you hear it from others.” I knew he meant “from Swallow,” for I was sure to question her closely tomorrow at our Triús meeting.
We rode a few minutes in quiet, breathing in the crisp air. January was on the cusp of being February, and I knew we needed to enjoy the clear days as they came. I saw small patches of icy snow here and there in sheltered, shady places, a reminder that even riding was an indulgence. Tomorrow this same landscape may be hidden by drifts of snow or running with torrents of angry, slashing rain.
Torin guided his horse close to NimbleFoot and began to speak quietly. “After I met Mockingbird, ye probably know I felt like a knave. I was telling her all about truth and right action—and all the time hiding the real truth from her. As soon as I reached the enclaves yesterday, I asked Jay to bring Mockingbird to talk with me.
“As soon as she entered the room, I could see that she had made a decision about me. She looked at me—not with a smile, mind ye, but with clear, strong purpose—she looked me in the eyes and greeted me like a friend. I tell ye, Cate, I could hardly speak for the remorse in me throat.”
I watched his face as he talked, marveling at how this rough soldier could betray such tender emotions. “This is how our conversation went, Cate.”
“Madam Mockingbird, I have not been completely honest with ye. I must speak the truth, else ye may never speak to me again.”
“Young man, I know the truth. It came to me suddenly, after ye left. Why could ye not speak openly to me? I have been on this earth a long time, and I am capable of seeing a picture whole. Ye gave me but a part.”
“I have come to tell ye now, O honored one. Ye deserve the truth.”
“The truth is not so bad, Lou. Why can ye not face up to it? Why do ye think it need be hidden from me?”
Me very heart was bursting with joy to hear her. She accepted me as suitor to her darling daughter! “Then ye have no regrets?”
“Why would I regret the accident of your birth, young man? Can ye help the fact that your father is the king over all this country? Are ye ashamed of your birth?”
I felt as though she had dealt me a mortal blow. Her truth and mine were not the same at all!
“But I am not ashamed of me father. I love him dearly. I spoke not of my birth for fear ye may think I was bragging.”
Then she seemed to draw herself up in a great fluttering of feathers, and her face shut like a steel beak.“Then what truth do ye speak of?”
“I seek the betrothal of your beautiful daughter.”
“What? My Swallow? Ye have betrayed me completely. How dare ye continue to stand here? Please leave.”
She puffed up, Cate, an’ I swear she looked taller than I, like a great bird of prey, wanting to sink her talons into me flesh.
“How have I betrayed ye? Every word I spoke was the truth. I did not tell ye about Swallow, hoping ye would come to know me and accept me. An’ sure I came to ye this morning to tell ye even that hidden truth, at the risk of losing your respect completely.”
I admit it, lass, me voice began to crack and break. I felt ashamed, an’ sorrowful. I yearned for her approval somehow, as much as I ever yearned for that of me own father. Me head was bowed low, and me eyes were filled with bitter tears. I could not stay, an’ sure I could not leave.
It seemed like a long time, but finally she spoke, an’ her voice had lost all its edge of ice. “Raise your head, Lou. Look at me.”
I did—I looked at her. I was full of feelings that battled inside me—of love, of remorse, even defiance. How did she know what lay in me heart? But I think she did know. She seemed to be standing over me, an’ her eyes were snapping with the belief of the righteous.
“Ye may work here with us, alongside us. That is not an offer made lightly, for we largely shun the society of others. Ye may speak with my daughter. But if ye respect me, as ye claim, ye will lay no hand on her except in the company of me or my family. She will love ye no less, and the rest of us may love ye more, if ye can accept me terms.”
I did not hesitate. “It is done, honored one. I accept with me whole heart.”
We had reached the church grounds and were sitting on our restive horses. Torin’s eyes had lost their look of torment, and he gazed at me with a kind of relief. “I did stay, an’ I worked all day yesterday. Then, when it was time to leave, Mockingbird came to the tunnel where I was toiling. Swallow was at her side. ‘Ye may stay for supper, Lou,’ she told me. I reached out an’ took the hand of her fair daughter. ‘It would be a high honor,’ I told both of them. An’ I meant it.”
“Dear Torin,” I said, and now tears were sitting behind my own eyes. “You should blame not yourself but me. It was my idea to deceive Mockingbird. I have gotten by on half truths and high drama most of my life. I hope you will serve as a reminder to me always to seek the path of honor.”
“Ah, Cate, there ye are again, saying words I deserve not. Please, let us keep such thoughts inside. We will both know how ye feel, but ye will spare me the shame of hearing them.”
“And you must pledge the same to me.”
“I promise not to tell ye again how—how dear ye be to me. Now I must ride like the wind, a chara mo chroí, for I cannot be late.” He grinned and turned his horse’s reins with a flick of his shoulder, and then he was off, galloping quickly, his body bent into the wind.
The wind had picked up during our ride, and now I drew my mantle around my shoulders and walked into a swirl of cold. NimbleFoot snorted and tossed his head as I walked from the tether as though protesting his imprisonment.
I decided to check the church first, and I forced the door open against the pushing wind. A glance told me that Séamas was not there. In fact, the central fire pit near the altar had not yet been lit, and the building was still and cold.
From the church I turned to our newest round-house, the large school that stood some sixty feet from the church. A high fire was blazing in the fire pit. I saw a group of students sitting, as they had yesterday, waiting for a mentor. I hesitated, wondering whether to check behind each partition, when I heard Brigid’s voice behind me.
“Dear Cay, I am surprised to see you.”
I turned and welcomed her with a robust hug. “Bree! I see you are teaching today. I am here seeking Séamas.”
“He has no council meeting until later. I suppose he is still at his teach.”
“And where is that, Bree?”
“Right now he is staying at Father Patrick’s, along with his, um, his ward Sweeney.”
I was astonished. “Séamas lives with Sweeney?”
“Why are you surprised, Cay? Father Patrick left Sweeney under Galen’s care. It seems only natural to me.”
“Bree, do you ever…see Sweeney?”
“See him? Every time I am here. In fact, he often sits with my students while I teach.”
I was still reeling from her revelation that Galen lived with the murderous slaveholder. “He—he comes to your class? And you allow it?”
“Caylith, what is wrong with you today? I do not choose my students. They choose to listen to me, or to stay at home. Sweeney is no different. Well, he is different, really, for he is much smarter than most.”
I stood breathing deeply, trying to gather my thoughts. “Brigid, you know the charges against Sweeney.”
“I do.”
“And yet you allow him to get close to innocent children and others? To you yourself?”
“The lord said, ‘Judge not others, or ye shall be judged.’ I try to keep my mind open and free.”
“I am completely shocked, Brigid. The man is a devil. He is reputed to have killed his own wife. I know he enslaved my mother.”
“And what has your mother said against him? What charges does she bring?”
“Well, she has not—has never said—”<
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“And what of his wife? How do we know he killed her?”
“I think his own mother has accused him.”
“In a moot? Before a judge?”
“I, um, I know not.”
Bree looked at me with great affection. “Darling Cay. You are my best friend, since the moment we met. But I need to tell you that your mind has closed like a hunter’s trap. I cannot talk just now, for my students are waiting. But I need to tell you again what I said not long ago. Take your time. Use your intelligence and your large capacity for love and compassion. Téigh go mall.” Proceed slowly.
She hugged me warmly and stepped back. “I will see you at the Triús meeting tomorrow. Fare well.” She walked briskly to the waiting group of students, and I turned and left the school.
I knocked at the door of the clay-and-wattle house that had been built for Father Patrick whenever he visited Derry. The wind was even stronger now, and I was glad I had pulled my hair back from my face, for my brat seemed to rise as though it had become wings, billowing and lifting from my shoulders.
Brother Galen opened the door right away, his eyebrows raised almost to his tonsure. “Dia dhuit, a Chaitlín. Teacht isteach. Please come in.”
He stood aside, and I walked in. I had been here only once before, at a time of great emotional distress, and I remembered only the low bench near the door. I looked around then and saw several benches scattered throughout the rather large space and at least three tables. One table held a chess board, the players scattered in defense of their kings. Another table, stained with dark rings, held two cups.
A tall fire pit was roaring, and the room was comfortably warm. The builders had thoughtfully constructed four large windows facing the four cardinal points. The polished wooden floors shone as though carefully burnished each day by a dedicated acolyte.
“Give me your mantle, lass. Please sit down. I will make another cup of tea.”
Wordlessly, I removed my brat and handed it to the monk. His eyes were as vibrant as I had ever seen them, and his dark eyebrows danced above. “I believe you, ah, know me house guest.”
I had not seen him at first, for he was on the opposite side of the fire pit. But I heard the unmistakable sound of wooden wheels grating against wood, and I took a few steps backward in spite of my resolve. And then I was looking into the dark, hooded eyes of Owen Sweeney.
PART II:
Limavady to Tara
Chapter 16:
The Tale of Sweeney
Sweeney had once been a tall man, at least as tall as Glaedwine, and he was still as broad through the shoulders and as brawny of arm as my Saxon vassal. When last I had confronted him, his hair was long and matted with months of neglect. Now cut almost to his ears, I saw it was the deep color and glow of my steel war hammer, a black so deep as to be imbued with blue lights.
He was as clean-shaven as ever, his face betraying no dark afterthought of whiskers under the skin. His jaw was clenched, his mouth a thin, jagged line. His short-sleeved tunic revealed muscles bulging and moving as his arms guided his personal chariot across the floor. Inside the cart, his legs were splayed out, useless as sticks, covered with a blanket.
The invalid’s chair was large, at least two feet tall and four feet long, and it sat on four wooden wheels like a small oxcart. Sweeney himself would have been the size of an ox, I thought, if his legs had not been somehow ruined, for his immense forearms propelled the cart as easily as if it were a toy. With a slight pull here or a tug there, he had learned through long use to move the contraption as though it were part of his own body. In a way, it was an extension of him, I thought, as he moved and whirled in rhythm with his own taunting words.
“Well, who have we here? Caylith the Duchess, out to seduce me with her bodice of jewels?” He wheeled the cart to within six inches of my feet and grimaced up at my chest.
Then he spun the cart to my left. “Caylith the ravening supplicant, devouring my property at the behest of the high king?”
And then, in mock fury, Sweeney raced his cart around the fire pit and came to a rest near my right side. “Perhaps Caylith the vengeful goddess with her corvine minions eager to peck out my very eyes? Or are you an entirely new and different Caylith today?”
I flushed deeply. Sweeney was right. Each time he had seen me, I had showed a different side of myself. I decided to be straightforward with him. Settling onto a bench near the door, I looked at him with what I hoped were passive eyes.
“Today I am Caylith the curious. I would know more about you. I would set aside my prejudice and listen.”
“And what prejudgment do you speak of, you immature brat? You admit that you have already judged me and found me guilty, but you allow me to speak on my own behalf before the noose is tightened around my neck? Pahgh!”
A great glob of spittle hit the polished floor, a foot from where I sat. I did not move. If he had spat on me, as he had done to Liam, would I still have sat immobile? I tightened my mouth, glad I did not have to decide, unwilling to answer his anguished question.
“Very well. You wish to know how it happens that a wife-killing, slave-holding criminal speaks like a member of royalty? Why he knows how to read and write Latin and Greek and several other languages besides? Why he had access to untold wealth yet chose to live like a sod puller? Why his own mother would condemn him to death? Is that what you want to know?”
I blanched from the blistering heat of his attack. “Please—I—””
His steel-dark hair fell onto his forehead, partially obscuring his stony glare. He gave a sudden swing with his head, sending the lank hair flying backward again. “I will not be subjected to the gaze of the pitying priests, nor made into a spectacle before the idly curious.”
I glanced sideways and saw that Brother Galen sat, highly engaged, his bright eyes watching both of us.
“What if I told you I am ready to believe you are innocent of all charges?”
“What if I told you I spit on your obvious lies?”
“Then spit, Mister Sweeney. But I shall not retract my statement.”
I forced myself to remain immobile, unblinking, waiting for the phlegm to spurt from his mouth and cover me with its filth.
Sweeney turned his chair in a full circle, slowly, as though deep in thought. His voice seemed to choke from his throat. as though his memories were edged with death. “It would do no harm to tell you that I grew up not in Éire but in Gallia, realm of the Franks. I had no father, or so my mother told me. He had died, she said, on a great battlefield, defending his land against strangers. He had left us a large fortune, wanting my own education to be better than his own. He wanted me, she said, to be an ollamh. A wise man. A scholar. And finally he wanted me—me!—to be a king.
For a moment I thought he would spit again, so full of self-loathing did he seem.
“And so I was nurtured by Christian priests at a large monastery. Where? That is not important. I was given access to parchments and scrolls of the greatest antiquity, and I was able to read, write, and even speak the languages written thereon. My mother was soon browbeaten into accepting the Christian gods. But I held strong to my own beliefs—that there is no god, else he would not have taken my father.
“She told me my name was ‘Eóghan Suinhe’—a name, I think, partly from the highlands of Alba, that great barbarian expanse of gorse bush. And so I grew up ‘Owen Sweeney,’ a scholar and a stranger, even unto myself.”
“And what of your mother?” I asked softly.
“She idolized me. She shunned the society of men, except for the babbling priests. I was precious to her as any jewel. Whatever I craved, she made sure I got. And so I began to crave more and more—to know about my father. At last, plagued by my incessant questions, she was forced to move with me here to Éire. She said that the huge promontory was home of my late, lamented father. Except that as I asked, I found that none knew his name. ‘Rory Sweeney? Sorry, lad, that name is not in me head, nor under the bones of the mammoth stones.
’”
He whirled again in his chair, gritting his teeth, reviling the very words he spoke.
“I pressed my mother, of course. But she was adamant. She still is. Rory Sweeney was a great lord, she insisted. But she admitted at last that the land was Alba, scant miles away over the dark sea, the land of the Picts and the gorse bush, not the land of the soft-spoken clans and the emerald forests. I was furious with her for lying to me. And there lies another tale, young, snooping Caylith. I raged at her for days, even months. I was filled with anger and remorse so that I knew not half the time what I was doing.
“Still, to this day, I think my mother does not understand the depth of my passion to know of my father. Why I raged, and drank, and spent all we had in pursuit of a dream. And I myself do not understand why she would cling to a long-dead secret, lo these forty years. And so I raged, and so she clung. And the outcome was—you see it in front of you.”
I looked at him with new eyes. His hair was hanging limply on his forehead again, and he did not attempt to draw it back. His somber eyes were dull, and he sat with his great chest compressed, as if not breathing at all. He seemed as lifeless at that moment as his stick-like legs.
“Does your mother still dwell in Limavady?” I asked in a low voice.
“That is where we fled after my…my storm of abuse. That is the only home she and my family have known for more than a score of years.”
“I would ask you, Mister Sweeney, why you kept slaves.”
He looked up then, his brows drawn together as if he were puzzled. “Have you not asked your own mother?”
“At the risk of seeing her break apart before my eyes? No.”
“Then I shall remain silent on that subject.”
“And I would know about your wife.”
Suddenly his eyes filled with an emotion—love and pain somehow combined—so palpable I flinched. “That is a subject for no one else to know.”
“Then will you tell me of your, ah, accident?”