The Phantom Queen Awakes

by Mark S. Deniz

  To make battle at the river’s edge.

  Blood spattered, crimson in the dawn’s light. A thin line opened on Mairaed’s cheek, but no pain rose with it. The sword came again, metal dull with viscera that mocked the rising sun. She countered this time, elegant: she had never learned the steps to this dance, but she knew them from within, as she had once known the cairn dances as though they’d been imprinted on her soul. Her hands were easy with her bladed staff’s weight, swinging it, twisting it, smashing men aside with it, and each blow felling her enemy with more certainty than she might have hoped.

  Each time one of the Fir Bolg fell, she crowed triumph, and her ravens spun in the sky around her, black-winged harbingers of death.

  All around her — behind her, following her lead — came the people of her village; came Sion O’Connail, came Aine’s daughter, came faces she knew and had once loved; faces for whom she had called the goddess Morrigan, so that they might live and fight another day. She saw in their eyes how they needed what she was, and so she plunged deeper into battle, turning the Fir Bolg’s red cloaks to ribbons; breaking their small dark forms in half on her staff, cutting them to pieces with her blade. Her heart screamed with joy, every beat a thing of pain: no mortal form was meant to hold such battle lust, and the goddess of war hungered for more.

  She was bloodless, unmarked amongst the soldiers, a slim creature of white and silver at the heart of the enemy, and even when their blades scored they drew no cry, drew no streak of red anger across her skin. Only their blood marred her armor, streaks and spatters that steamed in the cold morning light, and blackened as the day wore on.

  Her people were weary: she could feel that in them as a remote and meaningless detail. They followed her still, but their strength waned, and she could not hold the field alone. Not alone, not even with the ravens, whom her people had feared until they saw the birds fed only on the eyes of the Fir Bolg.

  “Hold!” Her voice was not her own: it was the serrated thing the Morrigan spoke with, but tempered by a mortal throat. “Hold until night, Sion! Hold until night, and then the land is mine!” She looked back as she called the rally, and saw new things in her peoples’ eyes. Belief, yes, but worse than that, oh so much worse was the fear, for that was the price of calling a goddess to battle.

  “Hold,” she whispered again, and turned back to make war on her enemy.

  ****

  At dawn the ravens feasted, gorging themselves on the slaughtered Fir Bolg and splashing red melted river water over their sleek black feathers. They clucked and gurgled over the dead villagers, but left them untasted, and one by one those bodies were gathered, and brought to the cairns.

  Sion O’Connail was the first to see the broken body fallen amongst the tall stone piles. The first, and perhaps the least surprised: it was he who knelt by Mairaed’s figure, who tested her skin for suppleness and found it frozen through and through. Dead a day, at least, and the spattered blood foamed at her mouth said perhaps her heart had burst. Her eyes were open, staring sightlessly toward the sky; her body was arched as though caught in a moment of rapture, and her skull and frame were cracked, as if she had fallen a terrible distance, when there was no high place at all that she might have tumbled from.

  It was not easy, closing those staring eyes, and no one said him nay as he lifted her frozen body and took it some little way away from the other cairns and there began to shift the stones that would cover their dancer, and mark her place of rest as a spot of especial honor.

  “No more cairn dancers,” he said when her body was hidden, and because he was their voice of wisdom, the villagers listened. “No more,” he said again. “Mortals are not meant to call on the gods. We have won the day, but we’ve asked too terrible a thing. This will not happen again.”

  Murmurs of agreement rose, the memory of Mairaed’s twisted form too fresh to deny, and one by one the people of her village turned away to do mortal honor to the fallen dead, and to bury them properly. No more dancers, they said to one another, and when the last of the cairns were built, they slipped away, never to bury the dead in this place again.

  And so no one saw a boy slip forth amongst the tall stone graves, and begin to dance.

  ****

  Afterword

  ‘Cairn Dancer’ was inspired by a watercolor painting I own of the same title. It's a wonderful, vivid painting of a beautiful woman swaying in front of stone cairns, and beyond that there's no resemblance whatsoever between story and painting. The painting's woman is quite modern; Mairaed's story was never imagined as such. But the woman in the painting did beg the question of why she danced at the cairns. Mark and Amanda's invitation to write a story for The Phantom Queen Awakes gave me an opportunity to explore the answer to that question, and I have to say I rather like it. Now, I can suppose my painting is Mairaed's spiritual, if not physical, descendant, still dancing for the souls of the dead after all these years.

  ****

  Biography

  C.E. Murphy is a fantasy novelist who makes occasional forays into short stories, comics and photography. Born and raised in Alaska, she now lives in her ancestral homeland of Ireland. More information about CE Murphy and her career can be found at http://www.cemurphy.net.

  ****

  Jennifer Lawrence

  Washerwoman

  Perhaps because the wind was uncommonly bitter that morn, or because she could still hear the angry words Aoibheann had whispered to her husband, Treasa’s son, in the darkness last night, Treasa spent ten minutes scrubbing at the laundry down by the stream before she realized that she did not know the other old woman washing her clothes on the opposite bank.

  Treasa had long known her son’s wife did not like her, wanted her gone so she could run the household in the manner she preferred, but it had still been a shock to lay there on her bed in the darkness and listen to Aoibheann whisper to Dallán about the tales she had heard from the last bard who passed through. About how the man had spoken of far lands where customs were different, and where, when a man or woman became too old to help the family any longer, they were led out into the wilderness in winter and abandoned to die.

  Dallán had hushed his wife, but the damage was done. Treasa was thrifty with the house’s resources, strict when it came to directing the work that had to be done ― and there was always so much of it, cleaning and cooking and spinning and watching the children ― but she had not thought that Aoibheann wanted to see her dead.

  Little wonder, then, that her thoughts were elsewhere this morning as the cold curled round her shoulders, sharp enough to cut tough meat. Spring it might be, and the ewes in the fields with their lambs a full two months ago, but even the flowers in the meadow nodded their heads low and shivered as if they were chill.

  “Rare frosty day,” she said at last to the crone bent down over the clear water on the other side of the brook. The woman nodded and Treasa continued politely, hoping the conversation would take her mind off last night’s shock. “Here’s a prayer that the cold will keep the Northmen up in their own lands, where they belong.”

  “‘Twill warm before an hour has passed,” the woman croaked, her sticklike fingers scrubbing ceaselessly at a rusty stain on the length of an old, ill-mended green skirt.

  “Good to hear,” Treasa murmured, squeezing the water out of one of Dallán’s tunics. She peered at the woman, belatedly realizing that the voice was not familiar. The hair under the woman’s shawl was black as raven’s feathers, with threads of white at the temples. “I don’t know you. Are you Fearchair’s kin, from his house over the hill?”

  The woman was silent for a moment, wringing the water from the skirt, and then shaking the garment out to peer at it. It hung in wet folds, embroidered in black at the hem, and Treasa dropped the tunic in her hands. The skirt the woman held was identical to the one she wore, save for the vicious rent through the fabric over the hips, and the red stain around the tear.

  That...cannot be what I think it is...But I’d know my ow
n skirt anywhere. And that means she is...oh, Danu protect me.

  “I am kin to all,” the woman finally said. She tilted her head to listen and turned to look toward the east. “They are coming.”

  “Coming...who?” The basket at her side tipped over into the brook, and the clothes slowly floated downstream. The woman reached into her own basket and lifted out another garment, the swaddling clothes of a babe. There was a fresh stain of milk and oats on one corner, a stain matching the one on the identical wrapping that Treasa had gathered up this morning. Laoghaire spat up his gruel this morning, his belly would not settle...is he going to die? Am I? Seeing the washer at the ford is an omen...

  A roar reached her ears from the beach to the east, and Treasa paled. She had heard the harsh, guttural sounds of the language of the Viking raiders only once before as a child. She had run and hidden then, burying herself in a hole in the ground in the forest, while the men of her father’s village fought the Northmen and lost. She had been the only one to survive that raid, and still heard their voices in her nightmares.

  She recognized it now.

  “You could run, away from the coast, away from your home ― west, into the woods,” the woman across the stream said to her flatly. “You could hide, as you did once, and they would not find you. Your daughter-in-law would die. You would survive.”

  Treasa closed her eyes as the warming wind from the east swirled around her. “Aoibheann would die, yes. And so would my son, and his children, and the others in the village.”

  There was no answer, so she opened her eyes. The woman and her basket were gone. Only the bloodied, rent green skirt lay there, draped across the rocks, next to the babe’s swaddling. Laoghaire...Maolán...Órlaith...Easnadh. She could see it in her mind’s eye, those tiny bodies hacked and pierced by the Northmen’s axes and swords.

  And her own.

  No! Let other old women prattle about omens. Yes, I have seen her and I will die, but it does not have to be today. She would not have spoken if there was no chance. I saw my clothes in her hands, Laoghaire’s clothes...not those of the others. She spoke of a choice. There might still be time to run home, to fetch the babe ― to save him from the axes and swords of the Northmen. I cannot save them all. The raiders are too close to flee. But if I can save just one―

  She leapt to her feet and raced up the hill, running towards home as fast as her legs could carry her, tears streaming down her weathered, wrinkled features.

  She crested the top of the hill, feet pounding along the beaten dirt path that led from the village down to the stream. She could see the boats nearing the shore, less than a mile away, where the ocean’s waves beat against the rocks. Her heart slammed against the inside of her ribs like a blacksmith’s hammer against an anvil, and her mouth had gone as dry as hanging herbs on the last day of August. The bell in the church built by the priests of Christ had not yet begun to ring; the men were out in the fields, leaving the women and children undefended.

  Her lungs wheezed like a bellows in her thin chest as she ran, the pounding of her heart like the beat of a bodhran at a céilidh, and even as she neared the village, she had time for a prayer of thanks, glad she had not taken the Christian baptism, glad she had stuck to the ways of her gods, no matter how Aoibheann glared or how her son pleaded. If I had...would the Great Queen have come to bring me warning?

  She thought not, snatching a quick glance at the shore as she moved around the rear of the family’s hut. The first of the boats was being dragged onto the sand, but the shaggy, filthy warriors had not yet charged toward the village. She could see her people running, panicking, the women trying to gather their children and lead them to safety, the few men not in the fields racing toward their cabins to fetch their swords.

  Treasa ducked into the cabin and forced her withered limbs to carry her back to where Laoghaire slept fitfully, bundled into his cradle. She grabbed up a blanket, spare changing rags, and then the babe himself before hurrying for the door. We may die of starvation in the woods; my dugs have been dry of milk for many a year now, and I dare not stop to try to leash and drag one of the goats along. But a chance at life was better than none at all. She paused only long enough to grab up a waterskin and a half-full basket of oats before ducking out of the cabin and dashing for the woods.

  Treasa tried not to cringe as she ran. Her thin, papery skin was stretched taut across her shoulders, expecting to feel the impact of an axe with every step. The air burned in her lungs, the cold bit at her face, and as the branches of the trees gathered her in to the safety of the forest’s shelter, she stifled a sob of relief.

  Behind her, in the village, she could hear the first screams begin.

  ****

  Afterword

  A lot is made of the martial aspects of the Morrigan; her status as a goddess of war and death can hardly be overlooked. I’ve read stories in the past about her appearing to warriors and kings, and swooping over the field of battle as a raven. But she is also a goddess of prophecy, and aside from the passage in the Táin Bó Cúailnge where she appears before Cuchulainn as an old woman, washing his garments in a stream on the night before he dies in battle, I’ve never read any fiction portraying that aspect of her. What better protagonist for such a story than an old woman, already near death and seeking to find a way to escape it? This was the side of the Morrigan I wanted to share with readers, and I hope you all enjoy it.

  ****

  Biography

  Ye olde author likes the weird and the strange, which explains most of her friends. Married, with two daughters, she has earned a B.A. in Literature and a B.S. in Criminal Justice. Her interests include gardening, herbalism, mythology and fairy tales, theology, everything Celtic, role-playing games, horror movies, and the martial arts. She lives with her husband, her younger daughter, five cats, a dog, and a houseful of gargoyles somewhere near Chicago.

  ****

  Sharon Kae Reamer

  The Raven's Curse

  Lys ab Gysell felt she had sat on a bumpy horse her entire life. After three weeks of riding along dry paths, she felt cloaked with the dust of high summer. It invaded every orifice and her hair and clothes were layered in grit. As some of her entourage and all the slaves traveled by foot, they had been forced to ride at a slow pace. They followed the trail north along the coast before turning inland to the estuary near the walled settlement that belonged to her husband-to-be and his people. The briny sea air assaulted her nostrils as they approached a small bay. She spied standing stones in the distance.

  “What is that place?” she asked her escort. The individual dialects varied widely, but their respective tongues had enough in common that they could communicate.

  “The ar-men-hir of Karnag,” he answered. “The spirits of ancient heroes buried under the stones guard the mor-bihan ― the bay ― against invaders.”

  As they made the turn inland, she heard them before seeing them. On the hilltop in front of her, naked, painted men danced and brandished their iron-tipped spears. They welcomed her with loud blasts from long horns in the shape of pig snouts. Various sized dogs ran to and fro, barking wildly. She laughed with joy to see the men with their limed hair sticking up like frost-rimed sedges. She imagined that to an enemy, their demeanor would be altogether different and a frightening sight. In this case, it was a regal greeting. Fit for a queen.

  Even before they entered the village, people lined the way on either side of her, eager to have a glimpse of her. She let her entourage lead her horse to where a tall man in a richly patterned tunic waited, surrounded by other noblemen. She knew instinctively it was her future husband. Unable to keep her eyes from him as one of his men helped her from her horse, she felt a smile form.

  The rumors traded by the older women in her tribe were now confirmed. Iaun Reith was a handsome man, indeed. His loosely belted tunic did not hide a trim and muscular body that contrasted nicely with his thick mane of dark hair and a well cared for bushy mustache. He wore an astonishingly beautiful gold
torc around his neck. Her folk had received hints of Veneti wealth ― acquired through battle gains and shrewd trading ― but Lys was in awe at the abundance of gold on the noblemen who surrounded their leader.

  She could have done much worse, she thought, and hoped she would please him as well. She approached and knelt before him. His golden brown eyes sparkled like topaz as he held out his hands to her, and she rose to stand next to him. His answering smile as the throng of people cheered in front of them told her all she needed to know.

  ****

  The joining of hands had been timed to coincide with the summer solstice. Two days before the fête, Iaun led her to the hut near the forest where the holy women of his tribe dwelled. Holy women were known to Lys, but her own people had none, so she was anxious about meeting them. Iaun explained that their approval of the match was a formality, but a necessary one.

  “Why do I have to spend the night here?” she asked as they approached the two young women waiting patiently near the entrance to the woods.

  “It’s a necessary ritual. To make sure that we are fruitful,” he said. “The holy women’s blessing will fortify my seed.”

  His gaze as he said that had been rather easy to decipher. She knew he would not have waited to bed her under ordinary circumstances, but their handfasting symbolized a union between her tribe and his. Iaun knew the tradition required of a leader and was bound to honor it. Lys understood the hope this union meant to her own people. The Condrusi stood to gain more from it than the Veneti: protection, something her people desperately needed. They had already faced the Roman wolf at the door.