Sevenwaters [06] Flame of Sevenwaters

by Juliet Marillier

  “Of course, being beautiful does not make a person good.” Finbar had evidently thought about this, or had been taught it.

  “And being ugly does not make a person bad,” I said, feeling my mouth twist. “I know that lesson very well, Finbar.”

  He turned his gaze on me, and in his clear eyes I saw myself as he saw me, a beloved sister, perfect in every way. I saw that he had no idea what I meant.

  “You’re the best brother in all Erin, Finbar,” I said.

  “How do you know that? You only have one brother.”

  “I know it the way dogs know things. Inside. In my heart.”

  “That’s good,” Finbar said. “I can’t say you’re the best sister, even if it is true, because I have lots of sisters and it would not be right to say any of them was the best.”

  “Very tactful of you,” I commented. “I think Rhian may have that nut cake ready by now. I can smell it from here. Shall we go and see?”

  Luachan was busy with his fellow druids—he had not explained what he was doing, but I imagined he needed time for prayer and study—so Finbar was with Rhian and me for the whole afternoon. We sat in the cottage awhile enjoying Rhian’s baking. Bear and Badger got a generous share, since their cooperation in the biting experiment had earned them a treat. When we were finished, I gave Rhian leave to walk up to the keep with some cake for Emrys and Donal, bidding her be sure to get home before dark. I’d have been happier if she had not been alone, but I knew she wanted to see Emrys, and the path was considered safe. Rhian, in her turn, was more willing to leave me if I had Finbar to act as my hands.

  We lingered awhile before the fire, my brother and I, on the floor with the dogs. I sat with my back against the bench; Bear was asleep, his big head resting on my knee. Finbar sat cross-legged, staring into the flames. Badger stretched out on the mat with one eye half-open.

  “Can I tell you a story?” Finbar asked.

  “I’d like that.”

  “Are you sure? It has a fire in it.”

  After a moment I said, “All right.”

  “Once there was a great forest, and in the heart of the forest there lived a white dragon. You know how dragons live in caves and breathe flame? This dragon could breathe fire all right, but she didn’t like dark caves, so she lived on a high hill in a grove of oak trees. This was a dragon who loved the light.”

  My brother paused as if thinking out the next part of his saga. I could hear that he already had a druid’s gift for storytelling, and I sat quiet, waiting for him to go on. Bear’s head was heavy on my knees; he was sunk deep in his dreams.

  “The white dragon watched over all the smaller creatures of the forest and kept them from harm. So it went for a hundred years, two hundred years and more. Then the dragon grew old and tired. One day when the birds and mice and squirrels went up the hill at daybreak, they found that she had flown away. All that was left was the warm hollow under the oaks that had been her resting place.

  “That made the animals sad. Now there was nobody to protect them from hunters, or keep them warm in winter, or listen when they squeaked and chirped out their little tales. But life went on. They learned to manage without their white dragon. Until one day, when the small creatures came out from their roosts and their burrows and their hollows, they found that a new dragon had come to watch over the forest: a dragon black as night.”

  Finbar paused for dramatic effect.

  “What happened next?” I asked.

  “The black dragon didn’t make his home on the hill, but down in the shadowy depths of the forest, out of reach of both sunlight and moonlight. He hunted by night and slept by day, curled around the roots of a great oak. All the other creatures were afraid of him. He didn’t look after them the way the white dragon had. When they dared to come close, he burned them with his fiery breath or crushed them to splinters.

  “The black dragon ate up all the larger creatures of the forest: badger, wolf, wildcat. Hunters didn’t come there anymore, because there was nothing left to hunt.”

  Morrigan’s curse! My brother had a dark imagination.

  “Under the black dragon’s rule, the peaceful forest became a place of fear and flight. Nobody came in; nobody went out. The little creatures lived in terror for their lives. They were too scared to look for food; too scared to leave their young ones in the nest. Surely they would all die. The age of the black dragon was dark indeed.”

  Finbar looked at me as if concerned that his story might be upsetting me. “Shall I go on?” he asked.

  I nodded, wondering if this was indeed a story of his own invention, or something he had discovered during his studies with Luachan. Part of becoming a druid, I seemed to remember, was memorizing a vast body of lore, including ancient tales. This might be one of those, retold in Finbar’s own words. I suspected it was not.

  “You might think, Maeve, that the story ends with all the creatures dying and only the black dragon left. But that wasn’t what happened. One night the black dragon thought, I am master of this whole forest and all that lives in it, except for that one hill where the white dragon used to hold court. That hill should be mine. I will go there and claim it.

  “Of course, there was nothing much on the hill. Only a few oak trees. But the white dragon had left something behind: her spies, a flock of doves that nested in the shelter of the trees.”

  “Wouldn’t they have died long ago?” I asked. “The white dragon had been gone years and years, hadn’t she?”

  “They were the great-grandchildren of the first doves,” Finbar said gravely. “You must know about wisdom being passed down from father to son and from mother to daughter, Maeve.”

  “Oh,” I said. “Yes, of course.” I wondered what my mother had passed down to me. As I would never have children, it probably didn’t matter if I remained as ignorant as my little brother clearly thought me. “What did the spies do?”

  “The bravest dove flew all the way to the island where the white dragon had gone to rest, and told her what had happened. That island was far, far away, beyond the setting sun.”

  Lulled by Bear’s warm presence against me, I had been enjoying the tale for what it was, a good story told well. Now a curious feeling was creeping over me, a sense that the tale my brother was telling had nothing much to do with dragons.

  “The dove begged the white dragon to return to the forest and challenge the black dragon. Only she, the dove said, could drive him out and bring back peace. But the white dragon did not want to do it. She was old and tired, and all she wanted was to rest. Besides, she told the dove, it wasn’t easy for one dragon to defeat another. If it came to a straight-out fight they’d probably burn each other up. When the dove heard this, she said, ‘I have flown to the end of my strength to bring you this message. I have given my last breath to find you. Please help us.’ Then she fell to the ground, stone dead.”

  Was this in fact a tale about Sevenwaters and Mac Dara? A grand, symbolic version of the way Finbar wished our story might unfold? He had fallen silent now, his gaze on the flames. While he was telling a story, I forgot that he was a child of seven, for he spoke with an assurance beyond his years. But he was a child. He had a child’s frailty and a child’s limits to understanding.

  “Did the white dragon come back then?” I asked, no longer confident this tale would have a happy ending.

  “She did,” Finbar said, “and it made the black dragon so angry he set many trees alight with his fiery breath. Then he realized that would only make it easier for the white dragon to find his lair. So, for a while, he did nothing at all, and the white dragon settled into her hollow atop the hill as if she had never been away. She slept by night; he slept by day. Dragons sleep deeply. In their sleep they get their strength back, so they can fly and hunt and feed when they wake up.

  “Because of the black dragon’s greed there wasn’t much left to eat in the forest, and he was not prepared to share even a vole or marten with his rival. He plotted and planned how best to be rid of
her, and decided he would make a fire by night, all around the white dragon’s hill. It would be so bright she would wake up, thinking it was day, and take wing immediately. But she would be weak after so short a sleep. Then he would attack her and tear her to pieces.

  “So, by night, he felled many of the great trees within his forest. He carried the massive logs in his talons to a place close to the hill but hidden from his rival. This would be a fire of fires, a great con—” He struggled for the word.

  “A great conflagration,” I suggested quietly.

  Finbar’s eyes were distant; he was caught up in the story. Watching him, I was reminded strongly of Ciarán, and I was convinced this tale had some meaning that went far beyond the rival dragons. The black dragon was surely Mac Dara. But who was the white dragon? My brother couldn’t really believe the Lady of the Forest would come back to help the human folk of Sevenwaters, could he? In the old tales, when the Fair Folk sailed into the west, it meant they were gone forever.

  “Now, though the brave dove had given her life to bring her message to the white dragon, her flock still lived in the oaks on the hill. The morning after the black dragon had knocked down the trees, one of these birds was wandering across the white dragon’s back, pecking out the troublesome insects from between the creature’s scales, and as it did its work, it told the dragon how her rival had spent his night. Logs, logs, a hundred logs, two hundred he piled up, and a thousand birds lost their homes. All night he worked. These forest giants lie waiting not far from your hill. But for what, I cannot say. When the white dragon heard the dove say this, she knew what the black dragon was planning.

  “The white dragon was furious. How dare the black dragon ruin the beautiful forest and harm the creatures she had protected? How dare he try to trick her? She wanted to spread her great wings and fly over the forest so she could blast the black dragon with her fiery breath as he slept. But she did not, for that would make her no better than he was. And a battle might end with both of them dead. Who would protect the other creatures then? The white dragon needed some advice.

  “Not far from her hill there lived a wise woman, old as the oldest oak, her face all wrinkled, her hair long as a horse’s tail and white as moonbeams. She was a friend of the white dragon from long ago and knew the answers to many questions.”

  I looked at Finbar, and he looked at me. “But—” I began.

  “The crone had fey blood,” my brother said. “Such people live far longer than you or me, Maeve.”

  “Quite right,” I said. “Go on. I want to know what happened.”

  “The white dragon told her friend the evil things the black dragon had done and asked what was the best way to be rid of him, and the wise woman said, ‘Aha! So you don’t know?’

  “‘Know what?’ asked the dragon.

  “‘About the geis,’ said the wise woman. ‘The geis is the key to everything.’ It turned out someone had spoken a curse over the black dragon when it was just out of the egg, though not many folk knew about it. That kind of thing is too complicated for mice and hedgehogs and birds to remember. The crone knew, just as her great-grandmother had known, but nobody had thought to ask her because, after all, she was only an old woman.” My brother fell abruptly silent. He did not look at me, but stared off into a corner of the cottage as if he hardly knew where he was.

  It seemed to me Finbar had reached some kind of sticking point, and although I was keen to hear the rest of the tale, I could read on his face that going on would be difficult. “What was the old woman’s name?” I asked.

  My brother mumbled something I could not quite catch. Willow?

  “It’s all right, Finbar,” I said. “It is a long story, and you tell it very, very well. If you want to save the rest for another day I can wait, though I do want to know what happens.”

  “I’m not sure what happens,” my brother said. His voice was no longer that of the seasoned storyteller, but had become that of the little boy, and an uncertain little boy at that.

  But he had told it with such confidence. I remembered what he’d said that other time—that Luachan had told him he should not share his visions, but that when he was older he might learn how to retell them in the form of stories. “Did you dream of those two dragons, Finbar? Did you see them in the water or the fire?” He had said it would be a story of fire, but there had been only the threat of fire in it. What had he left out?

  Finbar seemed to shrink into himself, making me regret that I had spoken. “I’m not supposed to tell,” he said. The house seemed momentarily darker, as if a shadow had passed over us. Bear raised his head, then with a sigh laid it back on my knee.

  “Then I won’t ask any more questions,” I said briskly, “though I will think about the story, and when I’ve worked out how I believe it should end, I’ll tell you. I always prefer happy endings to sad ones, and I like stories where people show courage and think out clever answers to their problems. Finbar, I need to go out to the privy. You could feed Pearl if you like. Rhian’s left a bowl of scraps on the table there. I won’t be long.” Pearl would do him good; goats were uncomplicated creatures, pleased by simple things, and she was a particularly kindly sort of goat.

  “All right.” My brother took the bowl and went out, leaving the door ajar for me.

  Bear came with me; Badger went with Finbar, which pleased me. My shy second dog was starting to emerge from his shell. Sitting on the wooden privy seat, with Bear waiting beyond the door, I pondered the story Finbar had told. The most troubling thing about it had been the sudden ending before the tale was done. I’m not supposed to tell. What did that mean? Was it only that Luachan and Ciarán had warned him visions were perilous to share because they could be so misleading? Or was it something more sinister? Was my brother keeping a secret, and if so, whose?

  I was midway through the laborious task of tidying my clothing when Bear started barking. The warning note in it made me thrust open the privy door and stumble down the step with my stockings halfway up and my skirt awry, expecting to find Cruinn’s searchers streaming along the track or some wild creature attempting a raid on the chicken coop. Bear was agitated, hurling his challenge with hackles up, and now I could hear Badger barking, too, farther away. Much farther away. Cold sweat broke out on my skin.

  From here, the cottage blocked my view of the field where Swift and Pearl were housed. It blocked the spot where Finbar would be standing to feed the goat. I could hear Pearl now, bleating loudly. I ran, and Bear ran with me, soon outpacing me in a headlong hurtle down to the fields.

  No sign of Finbar, but he might be back in the house already. No sign of Badger, though his voice, fading fast, could still be heard somewhere in the forest beyond the fields. Pearl was running to and fro in her enclosure, uttering cries of distress. And Swift was gone.

  “Finbar!” I shouted. “Finbar, where are you?” I leaped up the step, shoved open the door, saw immediately that he was not in the cottage. As I turned to go out, wondering how fast I could run to the druids’ quarters for help, I saw a flash of white under the trees across the clearing, and over the sound of Badger’s barking I thought I heard my brother calling.

  “Here! Maeve, here!”

  Oh gods. By the time I ran to the druids to raise the alarm, and someone went up to the keep to fetch people with horses and bring them back here to start a search, Finbar might have gone far into the forest and become completely lost. What if Mac Dara was out there waiting for him? But if Bear and I ran after him now, he’d still be within shouting distance and we could quickly bring him back. No time to waste. Didn’t you promise not to go off into the forest? asked Sensible Maeve. But Wild Maeve said, I like stories where people show courage.

  “Bear, come!” I said. We ran.

  CHAPTER 9

  I collapsed between the roots of a great oak, my breath coming hard.

  “Wait…” I gasped. “Bear…wait…”

  Badger’s voice had long since died away, and it was some time since we’d sp
otted the glimmer of white that was Swift. Perhaps I’d imagined Finbar’s call. Maybe he’d run up to the druids or been collected by Luachan in that short time when he was out of my sight. He couldn’t have come so far so fast, surely. I prayed that I’d been mistaken and that he was still home and safe.

  Bear had stopped running now and was pawing at something on the ground. He made a little sound, a courteous reminder that we were in a hurry and that I was wasting time. I dragged myself to my feet and went over to him.

  And there they were: my brother’s footprints in the soft earth, deep enough to tell us Finbar had been running at full tilt. I blinked back sudden tears. This was no time for weakness.

  “Well done, Bear,” I said. “On we go.”

  We followed Finbar’s tracks for some time, until we came to an area where deep leaf litter blanketed the way and there was no longer any visible sign of his passing, or indeed of Swift’s or Badger’s. But Bear had the scent, and he led me onward. Uphill, downhill, through thickets swarming with little biting insects, across muddy streambeds inhabited by strange-voiced frogs, under prickle bushes, over the great dark forms of fallen trees, their crevices inhabited by night-pale fungi and scuttling, many-legged creatures. Bear found the way; I followed him. Where I needed help, he was there. He pushed aside hanging foliage to let me through. When we had to wade across a stream on slippery stones, he stayed close so I could steady myself with one hand on his neck. When we had no choice but to scramble up a steep bank, he provided his back as a support for my foot. Without him I could not have made the journey. It no longer seemed adequate to say Good boy. He was so much more than that.

  There came a point where Bear knew I must rest or be unable to go on. He paused beneath an oak, eyeing me, then flopped down, tongue lolling. I lowered myself to a sitting position. Stopping was perhaps not such a good idea. Every part of me was hurting. Worse, the moment I ceased the effort of walking, my mind was full of voices. Sensible Maeve said, It’s late in the day. You have no water, you have no food, you told nobody where you were going, and Finbar is out there on his own. How are you going to look after yourself, or him, if one of you gets hurt? What if you’re stuck out here overnight? But Wild Maeve said, Finbar. Badger. Swift. Run.