“And he kissed you.”
“If he hadn’t, Aidan, be sure I wouldn’t have said he did. It wasn’t the way Eithne told it. It was quick and not in the least passionate. A farewell kiss, that was all.” Not quite true: a chaste farewell kiss would not have caused me to respond in the way I had. It had been a lovely kiss, a kiss that I could never have imagined a man like Cathal had it in him to give. “He took me by surprise. It was an odd thing for him to do, since we weren’t even friends. Then he left without another word.”
Aidan looked at the floor. “He didn’t say anything to me,” he said. “He left without even telling me.”
“Maybe Johnny’s right. Didn’t he say Cathal has done something like this before? He’ll probably be back by nightfall with some good explanation.” I could see that Aidan believed this no more than I did. “I’m sorry,” I said. “He’s upset you. The two of you seem to have a knack for doing that.”
He grimaced. “We know each other too well. We’ve had all our lives to learn each other’s weak spots. And Cathal’s never stopped trying to prove he’s as good as me, or better, whether it’s in feats of daring or skill in arms or just making a spectacle of himself. Thanks to his prickly nature, I had few other friends as a child. My father has a genuine affection for him. The rest of my family tolerates him. For all the opportunities my father provided, Cathal has never learned to behave in a way folk think quite fitting. The rivalry’s been irksome sometimes. Worse than that recently. His behavior here at Sevenwaters has tried me hard.”
I remembered the conversation I’d overheard at the stables, and the unexpected kindness in Cathal’s voice as he comforted his friend. I recalled that it was Aidan who had lied to me. I thought of the stricken look on Cathal’s face the night he heard the Wolf-child story. “Do you know who Cathal’s father was?” I asked. “I know your father took him in because his mother couldn’t cope, but . . .”
“She was a woman from the village. Poor, unmarried, expecting a child. She never said who the father was. Cathal won’t speak of it. I don’t know if she ever told him, or even if she knew herself.”
I did not much like the implication of that last remark. “Is she still living?”
Aidan shook his head. “She died when he was seven or eight. Cathal and I may have our disagreements, but we’re like brothers, Clodagh. I’m closer to him than I am to my real brothers. That’s what makes his behavior so galling. A brother doesn’t kiss his brother’s sweetheart.” He suddenly blushed scarlet.
“And a brother doesn’t go away without telling his brother where and why,” I said, deciding I would pretend I hadn’t heard the last part of his speech. “He sounded upset. Sad. I wish he had explained a little more.”
“So you do care about him.” An edge in his voice now; if I’d thought the jealous anger of that earlier time was absent, I’d been wrong.
“Only as I would care about any person who was a guest in my house and was unhappy,” I said. “Aidan, I have to go. And you’re supposed to be resting.”
“Clodagh?”
“Yes?”
“I spoke out of turn then; said more than I should have. I didn’t mean to offend you. I have the highest regard for you.” He took my hand and lifted it to his lips. “I know it is the wrong time to speak of such matters. Your baby brother . . . you must be so worried.”
“I wasn’t offended,” I said, withdrawing my hand from his and turning away before he could see how close I was to bursting into tears. Those few gently spoken words had almost undone my best efforts to keep control of myself. I ached for him to put his arms around me and tell me everything was going to be all right. That was foolish. Nobody could make this better, not so easily. “Now you should go to rest, and I’m needed upstairs. Goodbye, Aidan.” I made myself walk away and not look back.
As I passed the door to Mother’s chamber it opened and Muirrin came out, looking wretched.
“Are you all right?” I asked her. Silly question; one look at her had told me the answer must be no.
“I’ll cope,” my eldest sister said in a brittle tone that sounded so like Mother’s it jolted me. “Clodagh, you know Father didn’t want her to go into the nursery. I’m wondering if he was wrong.”
“Why?” I croaked, my nerves jangling in alarm.
There was a strained silence. “I’ve tried everything,” Muirrin said eventually. There were dark circles under her eyes. “I don’t seem to be able to help her. We must do something to snap her out of this trance. She won’t listen to reason, Clodagh. With Finbar gone, milk fever is almost inevitable. She won’t let me touch her; insists that if we try to relieve the pressure in her breasts there won’t be anything for the baby to drink when he comes home. She won’t even listen to Father, not properly.”
“This is all wrong,” I said, my pent-up feelings getting the better of me. To see capable Muirrin shaking and defeated was deeply disturbing. “I wish she’d let us go in and visit her. She needs people to hug her, cry with her, share her grief . . .” And so do I, I thought, remembering how close I had come to throwing myself into Aidan’s arms not long ago just because he’d spoken kindly to me.
After a moment Muirrin said, “I’ve been doing my best.”
Now I’d hurt her. “Of course. But there’s only one of you, and you’re a healer, you’re busy with other things.”
“Clodagh, I do think we should let Mother go into the nursery chamber as she asked to. That might help her accept that Finbar is actually gone.”
“Isn’t it rather soon for that?” I asked quickly. “It might be too much of a shock. Maybe you should wait a bit. You could consult Conor when he arrives.”
Muirrin looked a little surprised, but she said, “I don’t suppose another day will make much difference. It may be better not to trouble Father with this right now. I expect Conor will be here in the morning.”
CHAPTER 7
One day.One day was all I had to save Becan and find a solution to the nightmare that had fallen over everyone I loved. As a druid, Conor would be open to the otherworldly. But he and my father had a long-established trust. They tended to agree about things. He’d probably see Becan the way Father and Muirrin and Johnny did, as a crude simulacrum of a child. I was sure Father would take Conor into the nursery. They would ask me where the manikin was. That meant I had to get Becan safely out of the house before Conor arrived. And that was only the immediate problem. My family was doing the wrong thing; I was becoming more and more certain of it. I wasn’t losing my mind. I refused to accept that. I was exactly the same person I’d been before this happened, whatever anyone else might think. My instincts told me Johnny’s party might search the forest forever and not find my baby brother. He had been taken beyond the world of men.
I sat in my bedchamber with my mind darting from one impossible plan to the next, while Becan slept soundly in his improvised cradle. At some point in the morning he woke and I fed him again and changed his wrappings, which were damp. I made replacements by tearing up an old shift. I had just settled him once more when I heard a commotion from downstairs. My father did not often raise his voice, but he was doing so now: “What? I cannot believe this!” I heard Johnny, who was supposed to be out searching for Finbar, replying in more measured tones.
They’d found Finbar. Something terrible had happened to him. What else would make Father shout like that? My stomach churning, I left my chamber, shutting the door firmly behind me, and hurried down to the hall.
A man stood before my father, his chest heaving, his clothing in disarray. His hair looked as if it had been singed and there was a red mark across his cheek. Johnny stood close by, in his riding clothes. There were two of Father’s men-at-arms by the door. I went quietly over to the hearth, waiting to hear the worst.
“Glencarnagh,” the man gasped. “An attack—a terrible fire—” He bent double, fighting for breath.
“Take your time, Cronan,” Father said, though alarm was written all over his face. “
Johnny, where did you come upon him?”
“On the main track westward,” Johnny said. “We rode straight back here. The assault on Glencarnagh happened yesterday, at dusk. It seems many men have been killed.”
“My lord,” Cronan said, his breath still rasping, “it was utter carnage. The fire took hold so quickly . . . As we fled the house, they attacked.”
“What of Lughan and his family?” Father asked. Lughan was the steward who looked after Glencarnagh for us; I knew his wife and daughter well.
“We got them out safely, my lord. We kept watch over them in the forest until the raiders were gone. At first light Lughan sent me to give you the news.” The man took a gasping breath. “So many lost, my lord. To use fire in that way, heedless of the women and children . . . Of Lughan’s household guard, I am one of only three survivors. And the house is gone. Gone up in flames . . .” Cronan swayed where he stood.
“This man has suffered burns,” Johnny said. “He should be attended to before he tells us more.”
Father looked grim as death. “Cronan, who were these attackers?” he asked in a voice whose very quietness was frightening. If he had seemed on the verge of losing control not long ago, now he was a different man. “Can you hazard a guess? Who would dare make such a mockery of my authority?”
“I don’t know who they were, my lord. They had masks on and plain clothing. No insignia; nothing. And it was growing dark. It was a party of perhaps thirty men. We had no warning at all. They must have disabled the forward sentry posts.”
A deep chill was creeping through me. This tale was in my head already. Glencarnagh: a gracious house surrounded by oaks and elms. A hedge of beech, a pond, a garden. Thirty men. The sentry posts. I had known about this. Cathal had told me about it and I’d hardly listened to him because the whole thing sounded so impossible. I hadn’t even realized what place he was speaking of. And now the details were all coming back to me, and they were the same, just the same . . . As the men-at-arms ushered the injured Cronan out I stood frozen before the hearth, my head swimming. The mysterious figure in the night; the peculiar disappearance on the day of the picnic. The odd statements: My instincts tell me you may be personally at risk, and, I don’t think it’s wise for me to be here.
“Father,” I made myself say, “I have something to tell you. Aidan should be here when I say it. And I think we need to be somewhere more private.”
We went into the small council chamber, where the table was spread with the various maps, charts and notes by which Father was maintaining meticulous control of the search for Finbar. A lamp burned and a small fire glowed on the hearth. Johnny fetched a yawning Aidan, then shut the door. Standing before the men, I stammered out an account of the hints and clues and warnings I had been given since the day Aidan and Cathal had first come to Sevenwaters; signs I had dismissed as either my own imaginings or Cathal’s mischief. Despite the fire it felt cold in the chamber. Father’s expression was wintry; Johnny’s was fierce. Aidan tried to interrupt several times and was silenced by Johnny.
I explained how Cathal’s description of a possible raid on Father’s holdings matched exactly what that poor man, Cronan, had just told us. “I never thought of Glencarnagh, Father. I’m sorry. I didn’t entertain for a moment that this might be something that would really happen. I mean, Cathal is—was—always saying outrageous things. I thought he was just playing games. He does that a lot. But in Cronan’s account, all the details were the same: men going ahead to disable the forward sentries, the estimate of numbers, the fire, the family fleeing into the woods . . . And his description of the house was like Glencarnagh, only I never thought . . .”
“How could Cathal know?” asked Aidan. “He’s never been to Glencarnagh. Couldn’t this be sheer coincidence?”
“Why would Cathal describe this to you, Clodagh?” That was Johnny, his tone very grim indeed.
Now for the hardest part. “He thought Illann might be behind it,” I said miserably. “And because he knew I could communicate with Deirdre, he wanted to warn me not to let slip anything important. I told him that was ridiculous, that Illann is family and an ally, and that Deirdre wouldn’t be involved in anything underhand anyway. Cathal suggested I might get myself in trouble by giving her information that Illann could use to strategic advantage. I did tell him he should bring it to you, Johnny, or to Father. He said you wouldn’t believe him if there was no evidence.”
“In the name of the gods, Clodagh, why didn’t you tell me about this at the time?” Father was holding back his fury, but it trembled in his voice.
“There was Mother, and the baby, and the trouble in the north,” I whispered. “This sounded like nonsense. I didn’t want to bother you with it, Father.”
“Tell us again about the night of the wedding feast.” Johnny spoke sharply. “What exactly was it you saw?”
“A figure down by the far end of the barn. Someone in a gray cloak.”
“And Cathal was out there as well.”
“He was, yes. But the figure—I couldn’t even be completely sure I’d seen it. I thought I did, but when I looked again it was gone. None of this was enough to justify troubling you with my fears and imaginings.”
“And in the woods, when you were riding?” Father’s eyes were on me, judging. My stomach was churning with tension.
“Eilis and Coll rode ahead; Cathal went after them. They came back, he did not. You know that’s a simple path. He turned up later at the lake and said he’d gone a short way down a couple of side tracks, but nothing more. It was a plausible explanation, Father.”
“But Cathal was gone long enough to have met up with someone in the forest. He could have exchanged information. Both times.”
“Lord Sean!” Aidan protested. “Cathal is no spy! He’s a loyal—”
“Enough,” Father said. “Men died at Glencarnagh last night. My son has been cruelly snatched. We will get to the bottom of this, and if Cathal is in any way responsible he will pay the ultimate price for his treachery.”
“Sean.” Johnny’s face was white under his raven tattoo. “There is no proof that Cathal was involved either in the attack on Glencarnagh or the abduction of Finbar. Clodagh’s first assessment could be correct; the odd accuracy of Cathal’s account may be coincidental. I find it almost impossible to believe he would be involved in this. My men are faultlessly loyal. The tests of skill and character they must pass to be admitted to my band are thorough and taxing.”
“Cathal never says much about his feelings,” Aidan said quietly. “But Johnny knows, and I know, what it meant to him to be accepted into the community of Inis Eala. Becoming one of Johnny’s trusted men wasn’t only being received into a brotherhood of peerless warriors, it was . . . it was like coming home for him. Finding a home he’d never had before. He could not have done this, Lord Sean.”
“He has been adept, perhaps,” Father said, “in deceiving even those who most trusted him.” He looked at Johnny. “You are quick enough to plead his innocence. If what Aidan says is true, Cathal owes you a particular debt for accepting him into the small number of your personal protectors—an elite within an elite. We know Cathal admires you. Like all your men, he strives to please you. We know also that his behavior is unconventional. Might not such a man decide to act unilaterally to remove someone he saw as a future threat to you?”
There was a pause. I clutched my hands together behind my back and tried not to see the way Johnny’s jaw tightened, or the anguish on Aidan’s features, or my father’s cold look of judgment. I knew what he meant and it made my heart shrink.
Johnny was the one who put it into words. “Sean, are you suggesting a plot to remove your son because he will in time be my rival for the chieftaincy of Sevenwaters? You believe Finbar has not been taken for ransom, but . . .” He did not finish the sentence; the alternative was too terrible.
“It’s not true!” Aidan burst out, speaking the words I was forcing back. “That’s wild speculation! I will not hear this
—”
“Sit down.” Johnny sounded terrible; weary to the point of tears, though men like him do not weep. “Sean’s right. We must consider all the possibilities. In fact, Cathal cannot have been responsible for Finbar’s abduction, since Clodagh would have seen him carry it out.”
“The two events are not necessarily linked,” I ventured. “This attack on Glencarnagh and the baby’s removal, I mean.”
“Coincidence again? I think not,” said Father. “Someone seeks to undermine me on two fronts. To weaken my authority in any way he can. As for Cathal’s inability to seize the baby, there’s an accomplice, or so it seems—the shadowy figure Clodagh saw on at least one occasion. More than one accomplice, perhaps. Cathal may not have removed Finbar himself, but he provided the distraction that made it possible.” His eyes turned to me. “I would not like to think, Clodagh, that you were in any way trying to shield this young man. It seems the two of you were closer than anyone ever imagined. If there is anything that you have not told us, now is the time to disclose it. Your motives for holding back this information for so long must be suspect.”
This felt like being whipped. “Why would I protect someone who meant harm to my brother?” I choked. “How can you think that of me, Father?”
“It occurs to me,” he said, “that your wild story of changelings might have been concocted to allow your friend to make good his escape.”
“That’s crazy—” Aidan began, but Johnny silenced him with a sharp gesture.
“It was not a wild story, Father,” I managed. My heart was hammering and my skin felt clammy. “I did believe it. I still believe it was not worldly forces that snatched Finbar, but uncanny ones. I’m convinced that unless you search in a different way you will not find him. As for Cathal, there’s no reason why I would lie to protect him.”
[Sevenwaters 04] Heir to Sevenwaters Page 17