I had not noticed until she'd pointed it out, but she was right. A slender aura of luminous fog encircled the moon, the promise of tumultuous weather.
"If you go," she said, "something bad will happen."
"I'm not going anywhere, Ishleen."
But even after I tucked her into bed and kissed her on the temple, she looked uneasily at me.
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CHAPTER 14
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Deep in the night, when I went outside, the sky was lit up with the moon and portending storm, flashes of trembling light breaking between massive clouds. I got into the boat and sailed away from the land. A violent wind blew me miles to the south until I beached on a rocky isle, where I came upon a dozen bodies of dead Spaniards lying facedown in the sand. All were wearing the purple jackets, the mysterious white steam rising from the silver cording and disappearing on the air. The tide had soaked them all through, and ran in again now, flooding them and retreating in jetties of foam.
With great effort, I turned each man onto his back and bent over him, searching for signs of life. I wiped sand from their faces, pushed and cajoled until I knew with certainty that each was dead. I was sweating, in spite of
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the blistering wind and icy salt sparks from the tides. My heart pumped hard, my eyes raking the shore for any others.
It was then that I saw the torn side of a hull, bobbing and stuck between rocks. Words were painted there but partially obscured with kelp. I waded in up to my thighs to where the rocks were high, jagged and numerous. Their black surfaces were slippery; it was with effort that I managed to climb them and come close enough to move the kelp and read the words: La Hermana de la Luna.
Turning, I saw the figurehead from the ship, the one that Francisco had insisted looked like me. It was presiding over something in a pool between three or four large peaked stones, something I thought at first was a sea plant, dark fringes waving in unison with the sloshing water. As I pulled myself along toward it, the figurehead's eyes flashed to mine, peering at me for a few moments before looking down again at whatever she was watching over. As I got closer, my perspective grew clearer and I saw that it was the hair of someone in the water.
When I reached the edge of the rock, I could see the poor soul quite clearly. It was the sailor who had come out in the little boat to bring Francisco back to the ship, the one who had told me that Francisco promised to come back for me. Only his head was above the water-line, leaning back against the rock. His eyes were open, staring but unseeing. His arms were rising slightly from his sides in the water, and softly bobbing on the cold
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current. I leaned far over the stone, desperate to bring him up somehow, when I saw that one of his legs was caught under a piece of fallen wreckage. It held him there, suspended underwater.
I pushed on the various stones that surrounded him, to see which might be movable, and found that one of them rocked and might be shifted. With my entire body, I pushed until I got it out of the way and, swimming down, pulled the wreckage away from his feet. Despite my exhaustion, I began to drag him ashore; at one point, still half in the water, I stopped to rest, pressing his body near a rock wall. I felt how intensely cold he was. Though it made little sense to do so, I wriggled out of the deluged jacket I wore and wrapped the sailor in it.
Then, as I continued to try to drag him to shore, a strong tide came in. I lost hold of his body, and it went seaward, then under a wave. I swam down after it. The moon shone in a long beam of light into the water, illuminating him, his arms raised all the way up now, as he stared ahead unseeing. I caught him, struggling hard to bring him up by swimming with one arm and holding him with the other, but the effort was too great and he slipped from me, continuing to plummet.
Panicked, I pulled myself deeper, swimming after him, when my need to breathe grew desperate. I had to rush upward and break the surface, gasping for air.
When I went down again, my hopes of helping the Spaniard faded. He was nowhere to be seen. I resurfaced to breathe, but decided to try once more. My heart jumped with hope as I saw a shadow coming up from a
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great depth. But as it ascended, I realized that it was the jacket floating there, open-armed and filled with water. Remembering what Francisco had said about keeping him alive, I swam down after it, but the waves had become choppy. The forceful push and pull of the water played havoc with me. I thought I was finally getting close, when the water pulled me suddenly away from the jacket.
A figure that seemed to be wearing a dark gray cape appeared in the depths and came swimming quickly toward me, revealing itself to be a kind of stingray, a wide flat kite-shaped creature with human hands and an angry human face. It bared its jagged teeth and planted a bite on my shoulder, sharp and painful. I screamed, the sound muted by the water.
Four women similar in visage to the Swan Woman approached us in a frenzied swim, driving the creature off. As I swam to the surface, aching to breathe, the women also rose upward, turning into swans as they reached the air. Each ascended to the sky with a tremendous shriek as the light of dawn began to break. Three of them flew westward, while the other hovered close above a few yards away, as if to show me Da's little boat, which was bobbing on a wave below it.
My shoulder ached badly and bled, and my arms were intensely tired as I trod water and made my way toward the boat. When I got in, the swan flew over me as if magically propelling the boat back north. The dawn light had now driven off the shadows of night. I had not intended to be so long away, and found myself anxious to be home,
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praying that Ishleen had not awakened and found me gone.
I was almost back at Ard Macha when, to my shock, I saw a small boat riding seaward from the shore, rocking unsteadily. Recognizing Tom Cavan in the bow, rowing the craft, I felt an intimation of dread. A woman in gray-green sat in the boat, too, hunched forward and holding something contained in glass. Neither seemed to see me in the periphery. With tremendous effort, I rowed forward, struggling to see what the woman was holding. It was small, too insubstantial to be called a figure, yet it had a shimmer and a form, and moved within the glass that contained it. For flashes of moments, it took on a solidity. Straining to see, I recognized it suddenly as the transparent figure of a child. Just as my heart sped with suspicion, the swan flew toward them and began screeching.
The little transparent figure grew opaque as it looked up at the swan, and in that instant I recognized a ghostly Ishleen. I cried out, but my voice was drowned by the violent rush and crash of the sea. Soon the boat was swallowed by a sudden mist that opened like a curtain, revealing something massive floating there, a flash of ice and light, before it was again obscured.
I tried to row after them, but a powerful surge lifted my craft from below. The clouds rent apart, and rain fell in a deluge. The sea carried the boat to the shore against my will, lodging it between stones on the high beach. I ran up to the cottage and found Old Peig inside, sitting forward on a chair as if stunned.
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"Peig!" I cried.
She turned her head slowly and looked at me, her eyes wet with tears. She hesitated, then lifted a trembling arm and pointed to the yellow curtain, which was pulled closed. I went and drew it open.
Ishleen lay limply beside Mam, wearing the same vacant expression Mam wore. I sat on the edge of the bed and touched her arm.
"Ishleen! Ishleen!" I whispered, shaking her gently.
"She won't wake," Old Peig said. "She came to me before dawn when she found you gone. I came back here with her to wait for you. She was playing outside just as dawn was breaking. The door was open and I could hear her singing to herself the way she does. But then she was quiet, and when I said her name, she didn't answer. I went out and found her sitting on the ground. I said her name and she didn't turn. As I went toward her, I saw Tom Cavan and a strange woman rushing into a boat. I think they've carried off her spirit the way they did with your m
am."
"Do you think they have Mam, too?" I asked.
"It's the same awful devilry at work here," she said, and pointed to Ishleen. "I think they must."
"What do I do, Peig?" I pleaded.
She shook her head.
I ran outside, but the water was still too unsteady and the wind too high for me to attempt going after them. Clouds bulged with seemingly endless rain. I heard on the air itself the voice of the swan, which I could no
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longer see. It had now flown into the distance, leaving a vague, melancholy echo.
That night I lay with Mam and Ishleen on the box bed, leaning my face close to my sister's, making sure of her steady, transparent breathing. Exhaustion set in and I closed my eyes.
The light was very blue, like late dusk or early dawn. A quiet wind was blowing and the sea was still. I was staring at the ruins when I saw an opening through the tower, a dark doorway with faint illumination like candlelight within. I went in and descended a staircase. The place was rough, dilapidated walls and crumbling passageways. I heard Ishleen's soft breathing and followed the sound into a once-elegant room with a great canopied bed, now collapsed; the walls and furniture were dusty and decrepit.
Everywhere I looked, I saw the triple spiral carved into furniture in decorative repeated patterns, embroidered on the faded bed curtains. On the wall was a framed portrait of a little girl. I approached and recognized it as Ishleen, but she was feathered along the hairline like the mysterious woman who had given me the bottles for protection, and was wearing a cloak of white feathers, and a crown. Below the portrait was a mirror, shattered and etched with cracks, flecked black in places, so my own reflection was unclear. A piece of the mirror, big enough to fit into the palm of my hand, broke off and fell to my feet.
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"Take it," I heard a disembodied female voice urge. "You will need this when you go."
"When I go where?" I asked, looking around me for the source of the voice.
But there was no answer.
I looked again at the portrait of Ishleen, but it had transformed into a portrait of a swan.
I awakened, and sat up panting and disoriented. Mam and Ishleen lay in the same vacant postures they had been in when I had fallen asleep. In my hand was the jagged piece of mirror. Shocked, I tried to understand how this could have occurred. My heart beat swiftly, and I listened for the weather. The wind had gone silent. I dressed and put the compass and the piece of mirror into my pocket.
Outside, streamers of sunlight threshed through the clouds. The sea was calm and could be, I decided, easily navigated. I went down and dislodged Da's boat from the rocks. When I turned around, I gasped, wondering if I was still dreaming.
The Swan Woman was there, looking expectantly at me, her garment so white that it glowed in the sunlight. Her shoulders, I noticed, were taut, as if they might transform at a moment's notice into wings.
"Maeve," she said to me urgently, leaning slightly forward from the waist. "You cannot approach that ice barge alone and unprotected."
"Are they there through that mist? My sister and mother?" I asked.
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"Yes."
"Has my mother been there all this time?"
She nodded. "Though the ice barge has not always been at anchor this close to Ard Macha."
I was flooded with anxiety. "All this time, she's been on that barge waiting for someone to help her. I've got to go there and get them both back!"
I showed her the compass and the mirror, and told her how I had come upon each.
"The creature who lives on that barge was a battle goddess. Her name is Uria," she explained. "The women in gray-green are some of her henchwomen. They taunted you with the compass, believing it was powerless because it was shattered. Instead, they provided you with an invaluable tool. For you, the needle is still sensitive and alive. You will need these items, but neither is enough to protect you. You will be killed if you try to approach."
"What can I do? How can I save my sister and my mother?"
"I will tell you how you should go there, but first I have to tell you what you must do."
Clouds were now gathering above us, their shadows moving across the landscape. Her eyes darted around uneasily.
"Somewhere on Uria's barge, there is a jewel the size of a small apple, very cold to the touch but with a look of bright fire about it. It is called the Fire Opal. You must do everything you can to find it."
"Why?" I asked. "What is its power?"
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"I can't tell you this, but you must find it, and when you do, guard it with your life. Danu needs it."
"But what about my mother and sister?" I asked.
"I can only tell you that we are at the very precipice of a new cycle in nature. In order to save your mother and sister, you must first do this."
As the moments passed, the feathers she wore looked more and more like they were growing directly from her skin rather than sewn to the fabric of her cloak.
Each time I had seen this woman, she had been in a different stage of transformation from swan into woman, or woman into swan.
"Tom Cavan's unearthing of the armor five years ago, the day the first Ishleen fell ill and died, brought Uria back into the waters just beyond this shore. Uria, too, is after something she lost, without which she is incapacitated. She has made Tom Cavan her assistant, and he has been helping her search all these years for it. Tom has become indispensable to her. She liked that he killed birds for sport and encouraged him to continue doing it, fearing that Danu's children might return to Ireland in bird form."
"Why don't the two goddesses meet and resolve what's between them?"
"Uria can never penetrate Danu's exile. Only the very subtle can survive the journey through the Realm of the Shee, which leads to Danu's Holy Isles. Besides, Uria knows that what she is missing is somewhere in Ireland, and most likely in Ard Macha, where it was lost to her
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seven centuries ago. But she cannot walk land without it, and thus Tom Cavan has become her agent."
"What is it that Una's lost?"
"I don't know all the answers, and besides, I can't take the time," she said, her eyes darting toward the bog or up to the hill. She seemed to mistrust the very atmosphere of Ard Macha.
"During his long absences, Tom Cavan lives splendidly on Uria's barge," she went on. "He has been watching everything here for her, and it was he who orchestrated the abduction of Ishleen. He recognized that the bottle she wore around her neck kept her safe, and he tricked her somehow into removing it."
"That devil!" I muttered.
"What you must do, you will see, will go against every emotion you feel for Tom Cavan." "What?" I asked.
"Go to his mother's house and tell her that you want to accept his proposal of marriage."
I stared at her as if she had slapped me.
"She will take you to him on Uria's barge. It is too carefully guarded by abysmal creatures for you to go there alone to try to save your mother and sister. You must go to Mrs. Cavan as if in despair.
"There is a kind of ventilation system to the ice barge, air shafts that connect every room and corridor, preventing the ice from fully closing off. When you find the Fire Opal, which is what you must do, eat this leaf, then light this pastille and put it into the main air current. The
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smoke is narcotic and very swiftly moving. It will inundate the air of the barge. Everyone will fall asleep, but the leaf will keep it from affecting you. Take the Fire Opal downstairs to the lowest level and get into one of the small boats. Let your compass lead you to Danu's isle.
"You have only three days to return before they all awaken. You must be expedient, or the ghost souls of your mother and sister will be in danger."
Some sound or shift in the light startled her. In a flurry she transformed into a swan and rose into the sky with a melancholy shriek.
Overwhelmed by thoughts of what might be ahead of me, I re
mained where I was, watching her and listening to the brush of her wings as she flew seaward.
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Part Three The Ice Barge
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CHAPTER 15
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It seemed a long time before Mrs. Cavan came to the door once I'd knocked. When she did, she opened it only a crack and peered out at me with one wide-open eye.
"May I speak with you, Mrs. Cavan?" I asked.
She hesitated, a wrinkle deepening over her brow, before she allowed me in.
I was astonished. This was not the cottage I remembered at all: big upholstered pieces of furniture; sweeps of fine curtains over the windowless walls; velvet and silk brocades; exquisite things, as if she had bought out the entire Muldoon's shop. Even the kettle was solid gold, and lined up on the mantel were crystal goblets and fine china cups with their saucers leaning upright behind them.
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There was no sign of the old furnishings: the rush-and-cane chairs, the rough wood table, the mattress stuffed with hay. And unless they were in the shadow behind one of the brocade curtains, the sow and her sucklings were nowhere to be seen.
Mrs. Cavan herself was festooned, almost outrageously so, in feathers and lace.
Yet there was something eerie about the light in the house, an atmosphere of shadows and pale iridescent glitter. The light seemed to be missing some important quality that light needed. The entire effect was unsettling and caused a slight pounding in my temples. I tried to figure out what was wrong with this illumination, and what its source might be.
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