by Erin O'Quinn
Liam took my hand, the one with the scar still outlined in red, and he pressed my palm to his mouth, remembering. I had used a stem of hawthorn the day we had captured Sweeney at his holdings on Trawbreaga Bay, and Liam had correctly seen it not as a weapon, but as the plant that had encircled Christ’s head, the crown of thorns. He alone, of all of us, had seen Sweeney’s capture as an opportunity for forgiveness.
“I used my knife to remove a thorny branch. What I do not use, I will keep as a reminder of Christ’s forgiveness.”
He kissed my lips then, so lightly that I could scarcely feel anything more than his own heartbeat, a slight tremor from his lips onto mine.
“Dear Cat, heal m’uncail Eóghan. I know ye can.”
“I can help remove the pain from his mind, a ghrá. But no one can ever make him walk again.”
“I know.” He traced my mouth with his forefinger, so lightly I could hardly feel it. “Do ye mind, we…lie quiet tonight?”
I remembered back to our time on the longship, when he had held me close without the pull of passion, and I remembered and repeated his own words. “Sometimes ye want just the love. Am I right Liam? Without the hunger?”
His answer was barely a whisper. “Ah, Cat, how I love ye.”
Chapter 23:
Where the Rainbow Ends
A gay caravan left Ballysweeney very early Monday morning. Liam and Michael were in the lead, followed by Brigid and me. Brother Jericho seemed to waver between staying near us ladies and guiding NimbleFoot to the rear to watch over Nuala, riding like a very queen in her special couch devised by Michael. In fact, I had begun to call it a Queen Chair, as though it were a kind of throne.
She lay on a kind of blanket attached to two horses ridden by her granddaughters Cara and Orla. The blanket was really a large piece of tarred canvas, very stout, used by the drovers during extremely wet weather. It was fastened on opposite corners to the women’s horses. The horses were yoked like oxen, connected by pliant beams front and rear of the women’s saddles. The beams kept the horses walking in the same line at the same pace.
Over the canvas, someone had placed a thick woolen blanket, and Nuala rode—sometimes sitting, sometimes lying—clear eyed and happy, smiling often, wrapped in another woolen coverlet.
Our pace was slow. The horses that held Nuala’s canvas could not be allowed even to canter, for fear of the entire contraption being sheared by any uneven movement. At first I had been dubious about the horses’ ability to walk together, even yoked by the beams. Cara had reassured me. “Cate, my sister and I have ridden these mares together since we were little more than babes. We may as well name them ‘hand’ and ‘glove,’ so well do they respond to each other.”
She was right. The two of them seemed to watch each other and to move in the same steady way like shadows of each other.
The days had continued cold but clear. We met no one on the way, for few people ever traveled far from home in the cold months. Stands of yellow gorse seemed to stretch for miles, lightening our way with their bright winter flowers. The skies overhead seldom held any but the flimsiest of clouds, and often we would remove our warm mantles to let the sun soak into our skin.
Still somewhat troubled about it, I thought back to yesterday morning, before we left. I was saddling Macha in the light of the pale predawn sky, and Murdoch quietly walked up to me, calling out so as not to startle me or my mare. “Dia duit, a chara.”
“A fine morning to you,” I smiled as I cinched Macha’s saddle. I needed to tie my container of herbs and plants securely, and I was somewhat distracted by my task as he stood near my elbow.
“I, um, I came to say thank you—” he started to say.
“For what, dear cousin?” I asked as I folded and tied my gruit ingredients carefully into a square of cloth.
“Cate, listen,” he said.
I stopped fussing with my gear and looked up at him, standing straight, his shoulders squared back. He looked at me with his distinctive, somber eyes. “We owe you more than mere thanks. You have brought back our grandmother and soon our father, too. You have brought back even our mother, in a way. I am shamed to say how I begrudged my poor father even the love of his wife, thinking him somehow depraved. I—”
I reached out and touched his sallow, grave face. “Murdoch. There is no need to be shamed. There is no need to proffer thanks. It is I who need to do that, and I will do so publicly, in front of your uncle the high king himself, and all his audience.”
“What do you mean?”
“I plan to be in Tara for the festival of Beltane. That will be a time when thousands of people will be able to hear Leary declare his former judgments null and void. He will then publicly announce new land holdings, at my urging. I want you, or someone from your close family to be there, to accept his endowments. Will you?”
“Caylith, I do not understand.” He looked genuinely confused, and somewhat flustered. “How can you know what the high king will declare?”
“Never mind for now,” I said with a little smile. “Will you be there?”
“I—I cannot promise, cousin. That is a sacred time for us, when we purify our cattle. We need to be here, we have to—”
“Hush, Murdoch. I know that out of six children, at least one of them can come to the king’s festival. Especially since I will move the very ocean to make sure your father is there also.”
“Give me your hand, Cate.”
Then it was my turn to be flustered. I held out my hand, and he took it into his own large rough one. Turning it over, he brought it to his lips, palm up, and kept it there much longer than custom allowed.
Still holding my hand, he did not lower his gaze. “I am but a rough cattleman. My manners are not suitable for the royal bally, as you can see by the way I know not how to kiss a lady’s hand. Perhaps one of my brothers may find time to be there.”
He let my hand go. I realized I was flushing deeply, and I turned back to my saddle. “Very well. Then I bid you farewell, and hope that Liam and I may ride to Ballysweeney soon to visit you. Or wherever you decide to establish your new holdings.”
I reached out to my pommel and leapt astride Macha. I looked down on the overly large Murdoch, the very image of a whole Sweeney, and I saw that his normally serious mouth was broken by a small, crooked grin. “If I am here, it will be called Ballycaitlín, be sure of that.”
I proffered a half salute, and he waved and turned back to the sprawling brugh as I urged Macha ahead to join my companions in the dusty yard.
That was yesterday. Now, as I rode along deep in thought, I realized that I needed to make sure Liam knew about my forming plans to give back some of Sweeney’s old holdings. I knew he would not object, but he would want to be part of the decision. I chastised myself again for speaking first before seeking Liam’s advice. Being married took much getting used to.
Our journey from Derry had taken about a day and a half. I reckoned that the return trip would take twice as long, and I reconciled myself to the much slower pace. At this rate, I thought, Liam and I could ride off into the trees for a while and then easily catch up with the others. I guided Macha up to where Liam and his cousin were engaged in a rousing conversation.
“…An’ I wager a sét that ye will find no good barley beer in Derry. Ryan had his secret sources, but he kept them a secret.”
“An’ where…where find ye half a cow, ye boat builder? Pah! Ye currach carpenter?”
“An’ how did your precious arse make it to Éire, unless it were in me longship?”
I cleared my throat discreetly, and Liam caught my eye. “Cat. Tell this—this deviser of brughs, he cannot wager a cow when a cow he has none.”
“Um, Liam, could I speak with you a moment?”
He reined Angus back a bit and rode next to me. “What is it, a ghrá?” The next moment we were galloping back to where we had ridden a few minutes ago, after telling Michael we would catch up with them later.
We lay on our thickest blank
et, close to the only trees we could find—a few scrawny hollies, started perhaps by a wayward bird, their red berries clamoring for our attention.
“Too many people,” I confessed to my husband. “I need to speak a special language to you, louder than I can at our campsite.”
“What language?” He teased me with his tongue, pulling me close and tickling my chin and cheeks. “Talk to me, Cat. Speak…special language.”
“Mmm, mo chuisle, póg dom, tarraing dom le do bheál.” Then, boldly, “Kiss me and suck me.” My own language was much more direct than his.
If my Gaelige was wrong, he did not correct it. He started by enclosing my entire mouth in his, then coming off with a wet, sucking sound that put a tingle in my very toes. “Again. Again,” I said into his mouth.
“Give me your tongue, Cat.” I inserted my tongue as far into his mouth as I could, forcing him to capture it and suck it. This was a special sensation for both of us, for usually he was sucking my tongue in the same sensuous rhythm as his moving loins. Now I was sucking his, and I could feel the milky wetness between my legs as I imagined taking his distended groin into my mouth.
Soon he found my breasts under my tunic, themselves clamoring for attention, and his mouth played me like a mouth organ. “Suck, suck my nipples,” I told him, not caring if the birds and squirrels could hear me. Ah, the sensation was so erotic that I moaned louder and louder.
I could see that my husband was fully aroused, straining against his tight breeches. Together we pulled them to his ankles, then all the way off. He seized the waist of my trousers and pulled, and I immediately wrapped my legs around him, demanding his bata, wanting his hard groin inside me.
“What do ye want, Cat? Tell me,” he said, his voice husky.
And I answered, shouting my desire. His engorged shaft pierced me, and I could not hold back a scream, somewhere between pain and desire. My response was what he seemed to crave. Again and again he pushed into me, then out, until we were both crying out like inarticulate animals, needing and then finding release.
Then we lay stroking each other’s skin, shivering with cold yet satisfied, waiting for the tremors to cease. “Tonight we must be quiet,” I told him.
“Tá go maith. Hard to be quiet. But tomorrow we ride away again. Yes?”
“Oh yes, Liam.” I laughed softly. “Before we go, apply a bit of healing powder. Today I felt you all the way to the bone.”
As we rode back to the caravan, I spoke to Liam about the possible trip to Tara for the Beltane festival. “…And we could put Sweeney on the longship Brigid and sail it to Dunleary, and travel on foot from there to Tara. That way the trip will be easy for all of us.”
He began to laugh. “Cat, ye have already brought me uncle to Tara, an’ we have not even talked to him about his unknown family.”
“We can plan it out later, my love. I just want to know—if we can make it happen, would you object?”
“I would not object. It be fair, an’ it be right. I love ye for being so giving, dear Cat.”
“I do not call it ‘giving,’ Liam. It is the right thing to do.”
By the time we rejoined our companions, the day was growing late. Brigid greeted me with an appraising look and a knowing smile. “You have a gift for finding private chambers,” she said tartly.
I thought about my spacious bed near the bonfire at Ballysweeney, and my just-vacated nest of hollies. “I have grown used to seizing opportunities,” I told her.
“You know what the Romans said.”
“No, Bree. If I ever knew, I have forgotten.”
“Carpe diem. Seize the day.”
“Yes. That is close to being the story of my life.”
“Someday I would hear it all, dear friend. From start to finish.”
“From Vilton to Faerie to Éire. I wonder where I will go from here?”
“Perhaps you have found your special place. B’fhéidir…this is where the rainbow ends.”
“Bree,” I said seriously, “I want you and Michael to share my rainbow. Would you consider staying in Derry, near us?”
“Michael and I have talked about it, sometimes for hours. He misses his lake, and I miss my father. But we both love you and Liam too much to go back and relive our past. If we stay here, we build a whole new life, one with only happy memories. Let us wait and see, dear Cay.”
I changed the subject abruptly. “Bree. What think you of our new kindred?”
“They all share the same spirit, the joy for life I have found in Michael, and Liam, in Ryan, and even Fergus. They are truly of a common blood.”
“Even Murdoch?” I wanted to know.
“Well, he shares his father’s brooding nature. But I think his dark moods are a reaction to sorrowful times, not a fault that was born in the blood.”
“Do you think he could learn to smile?”
“Yes—when Owen does.”
“Your words are very wise, Bree. I will expand my own heart on the subject.”
We smiled at each other, and I reached out my hand to her, into the space between our horses. In my mind I was touching her smooth cheek, cherishing our friendship. She touched her own cheek and nodded, understanding.
That night was especially festive. We would reach our destination by midday the next day, and I thought all of us felt the same suppressed excitement. Liam and Michael took one long knife and one sling into a copse of trees, and they returned with a feast of mountain hares.
Liam silently handed me the bloody skins. I set about cleaning them while Carla and Orla squatted near me, transfixed. “Cousin, you are a wonder,” said Orla.
“What mean you?”
“On the one hand you can quietly control an entire cenél, as you did at Ballysweeney. And on the other, you prepare a pelt as though you were born in the woods.”
I had to laugh at her misconception. “Both those tasks require diligent learning, and I am still an unschooled pupil. You should meet my friend Brindl if you want to behold a miracle of contradictions.”
“Cousin,” said Cara in a small, tentative voice.
“Yes, Cara?”
“If my rude brothers have not said it, we all feel it. We feel deep gratitude to you for—”
“Hush, hush, a Chara. The truth had to come out someday. The truth is too profound to stay hidden, even after forty years. If you must thank someone, let it be the Lord. And by the way, Murdoch has already expressed to me your common feeling.”
“What?” asked Orla, rolling her eyes. “If the great mournful wolfhound has bayed, it is already well said. Come, Cara, let us help Grandmother prepare for supper.”
After supper, I sat leaning against Liam’s robust chest as he, Michael, and Brother Jericho talked about cattle raids and the nature of warriors in general. The rest of my traveling companions were ranged about the fire, listening or talking among themselves.
“Michael,” Brigid said, “you promised us a fine story.”
“Too fine for the gentle ears of our present company, my love.” He looked pointedly at the young ladies and at Nuala. “I will tell ye that story in private. B’fhéidir…even tonight.”
“Then I am well satisfied. Or I hope I will be.” She playfully stroked his leather-clad thigh just above the knee.
I could not help calling out. “Then I propose a song—abair amhrán, as my friend Brigid has taught me to say. Who will start a song?”
Liam’s large hands stroked and played in my hair. “I…start.” He reached into a pouch at his waist and brought out his mouth organ. He played an air so free and happy that soon everyone was singing along.
The ladies began.
O roam the land, sail the sea
But always turn your boots to me.
Sure ye sail, and sure ye roam
But always end your trip at home.
Come a merry doun, lad,
Come a merry doun.
And the men followed.
I traveled here, I traveled there
But
never found a lass so fair.
And so I roam and so I sail
But always to your bonny tail.
Come a merry doun, lass,
Come a merry doun.
A bit worried about the suggestive lyrics, I looked at Nuala. She was nodding and laughing. At that moment I caught a glimpse of the lovely young girl who fell in love with Niall the Cloud, and at that moment I felt a deep contentment.
As Liam sang, I sank deeper and deeper into his chest, feeling the vibrations of his honeyed voice. And then he sang one of my favorites.
Fair colleen from Cenél Doire
lay your hair around me breast.
Tie your braids into me heart
and never, never let us part.
A mo cailín, an- dheas cailín
Red-haired lass from Cenél-Doire.
The next moment, he was carrying me, along with our blankets, into a secluded spot he had already chosen. I could still hear the singing, a bit ragged without his pure tenor, as he undressed himself, and then me. He turned me on my stomach. Straddling me, he leaned down and licked my ear and whispered, “No need to talk loud, Cat. I…love ye without words tonight.”
And then his gruff hands became somehow satin soft as he stroked my back and my buttocks. Thrilling to his touch, I arched up, and he caught me between the legs. He stroked my wetness with one hand, all the while biting and sucking my bum. I began to writhe and move, and he knew what I was asking for, no words spoken.
I could feel his lips moving on my softest parts, and then his pliant tongue. I buried my head in the blanket trying to stifle my moans of pleasure. I wanted him to suck me until I exploded, and I spread my legs to him. Then it started—a slick, wet sucking that brought me almost to the brink and then withdrew. It happened again, then again, until I was frantic with the need to release.
Just when I thought I could bear it no more, he entered me, almost lying on top of me, so that the penetration did not hurt. A few wild moments of sheer ecstasy, and then all my inner muscles began to clench and move on his groin as I climaxed.