One of the burial detail – a female camp follower – high up on the pile had her boot firmly planted on a corpse’s cheek. She bent down to retrieve something that had been hidden under one of the bodies and called to her mates further down. ‘Oh look,’ she said, ‘In’t it sad?’ She lifted the corpse of a baby from its mother’s dead grasp. The other women of the detail went ‘Ah.’ Some crooned, ‘Poor little thing.’ Others, ‘What a shame.’ The baby was laid carefully in the cart and a sentimental moment spent on arranging its shawl until the horseman in charge of the St Mary’s nuns sharply told the detail to hurry up.
Eventually a path was cleared and the monks and nuns were ushered between walls of dead whose rigored arms stuck out to brush their skirts as if in supplication. One of the nuns stopped as she saw a pallid face she recognised, a father, a brother, but another sister clasped her round her shoulders and hurried her on. Nuns or not, they were Irish and must not display pain before the enemy.
The cramped, carved wooden frontages of the streets Finn had come to know well had disappeared so that there was an uninterrupted view over the entire eastern side of the city up to the castle and down to the river wall. In their place were wide rows of ashes and fallen timbers patterned into charcoal by the fire, sending up steam in the rain. The shrivelled, featureless shape of a Norseman stood against the stone portal of a doorway with his sword still stuck to the bones of his hand where the melting flesh had glued it.
The cathedral, when they reached it, was untouched except for its great doors which had been rammed and hung splintered on their hinges. More carts were being filled from another pile of corpses; this one consisting of the women, children and old men who had sought sanctuary in the great church. Whether or not the Norman leaders had tried to prevent the massacre when their men had broken in, they hadn’t been able to. On the hideous roundabout of the ages it had come to the descendants of Vikings to be hewed to bits at an altar by berserkers.
A mass for the dead was being conducted on one side of the cathedral steps where a large congregation from the religious houses of the city was kneeling in the rain. Perhaps it was the rain which was damping down hysteria, or perhaps the release of brutality which had ejaculated over Dublin the night before had brought its own peace, but there was a sense of calm, almost purposefulness, over everyone – even the nuns and monks, even the few survivors who ambled the streets like sleepwalkers – which seemed as nightmarish to Finn as anything she had ever known. The ordinary priest who was taking the mass – there was no sign of Dublin’s archbishop or bishop – wandered from psalm to psalm, sometimes penitent, sometimes pleading for help, but never angry. ‘My soul is among lions,’ he said, quietly, ‘and I lie even among them that are set on fire. Deliver me from the workers of iniquity and save me from bloody men. O God thou hast cast us off, thou hast scattered us, thou hast been displeased; O turn thyself to us again.’ He paused. ‘Be still, and know that I am God.’
Behind him, brawny camp women were washing down the flags of the cathedral interior and jovially chatting together in Welsh as they brushed out water which was pink with diluted blood.
There was a squeak from Brother Pinginn kneeling beside Finn and she felt him nudge her. She looked up and followed his eyes, which were trained on a helmeted Norman soldier who had his arm round a raddled camp follower and appeared to be looking intently in her direction. She found she had been crying, wiped her tears off with the back of her hand, and looked again. The Norman was very tall and the camp follower seemed familiar. ‘Deliver my soul from the sword,’ said the priest, ‘my darling from the power of the dog.’ Finn sobbed. The floozie was her friend Tailltin and the soldier was Lief.
She and Pinginn got up and walked with their heads bowed round the steps and into what had been Fishanger Lane beside the cathedral, where a row of once-respectable stone houses still stood, windowless, doorless, ransacked but otherwise intact. An arm drew her into a doorway and for a long time Lief held her close, then he passed her on to the embrace of Tailltin and hugged Pinginn, who was still squeaking with joy.
Finn wanted to say that she had never seen anything so beautiful in the whole world as the two of them, but none of them could speak. Ridiculously, they stood in the filthy doorway and patted each other’s faces.
A file of soldiers marched down the lane outside and the four of them backed into an inside room. Suddenly Finn was cross with relief. ‘You buggers,’ she said, ‘Where have you been?’
‘We yoined Strongbow’s army,’ said Lief.
When he and Tailltin had arrived at Lough Mask and found that Slaney, Aoife and Dervorgilla had already left for a destination unknown, they had decided not to inform Finn until they had news of the girls’ whereabouts.
‘You had worries enough,’ said Tailltin. They’d rested for a day, packed themselves food for another long journey, and set out on fresh horses to pick up the trail. It had been easy going until they reached Leinster where, although by that time they’d guessed Dermot’s daughters were heading for Ferns, the country had been so criss-crossed by Dermot’s patrols and pickets that they had to keep hiding or wasting time in wide diversions. ‘The trouble with him is,’ said Tailltin, jerking her thumb towards the Norwegian, ‘he looks like a Norseman, and after Waterford stray Norsemen were being killed on sight.’
Eventually Lief had decided to make for Wexford, a town he knew from his trading days, where there were still sufficient Norse-Irish left alive for him to pass unremarked, and which was close enough to both Ferns and Waterford to find out what was happening. ‘He’s not the fool he looks,’ said Tailltin fondly – Finn had already seen that the two of them had become close. For their purposes Wexford had turned out to be perfect. Mercenaries were still arriving from across the Irish Sea and, a few days after their arrival, Strongbow and his army had passed nearby on their way to join up with Dermot, his army, and his daughters, at Ferns. ‘So we joined too,’ said Tailltin. ‘It’s a real dog’s breakfast; old hands, new hands, recent arrivals, all nationalities, as well as individual mercenary bands. Nobody knows who anybody else is and nobody questions much. There’s even some Irish-Norse turncoats and levies, so Lief didn’t look out of place. I made out I was his wife and mucked in with the rest of the camp followers, but I could have joined on my own and nobody’d have thought anything of it. There’s a terrible woman; Alice of Abergavenny; her man was killed at Waterford and in revenge she’s supposed to have chopped off seventy Waterford heads – she’s still with the army, drawing a soldier’s pay. Another hag didn’t make any difference.’
Along with the rest they had made the terrible march through the Wicklow mountains to Dublin. Tailltin closed her eyes remembering it. ‘I wouldn’t like to do that again,’ she said. ‘We tried to get near to the girls but Dermot had them under guard. You know the bastard’s marrying Aoife to Strongbow? Well, we were with Miles De Cogan’s lot by then and we had to take up a position to the west of the city. We’d hoped to sneak away and get to you, but De Cogan was making sure nobody gave away the surprise attack and kept the camp surrounded by his men. And, well, that’s it.’
It wasn’t it. She hadn’t mentioned the attack on Dublin, which indicated that Lief had been forced to keep his cover by taking part in it. Finn decided she didn’t want to know. The loyalty and courage these two had displayed was something she could never repay.
‘And Slaney?’
‘Lief’s done a reconnaissance,’ said Tailltin.
‘Not good, but maybe,’ said Lief. He squatted down and drew a shape in the dust of the floor with his finger. ‘If Dermot won’t bring her and the other girl to the cathedral for the wedding, then we go to his house and steal them, maybe. Yust now it’s surrounded by guards in case somebody try to assassinate him.’ He spat. ‘But if he bring them, he put them there,’ he jabbed at the transept in a rough drawing of the cathedral, ‘in the Lady Chapel with the other women.’
‘Yes?’ For the first time in her life Finn blessed the sep
aration of male and female congregation in church.
‘Ja. Little door in the back of the chapel. Here.’ He jabbed a point which meant the door was in the north wall and opened out into St John’s Lane.
‘It’s full of inns, that lane.’
Lief shook his head. ‘Not now. Mostly rubble. We get horses maybe, many as we can. Arms too. We wait for you there. You get the girls out some time in the ceremony.’
‘And Aoife?’
Lief shook his head. Nobody could help Aoife.
‘We’d better get back to the steps,’ said Tailltin, ‘in case it begins. Better not go out all together.’ Lief went first. Then Pinginn. Tailltin put her hand on Finn’s arm. ‘I didn’t just pretend to be his wife, Finn. I was.’
‘I know.’
‘You don’t mind?’
‘How could I? I’m glad.’ In all this annihilation it was beautiful, even if it made her own loneliness even more dreary by the loss of them both. ‘Tailltin, you listen to me. If we get the girls out and we make it, try and get them to Lough Mask. But if there’s choices at any point, yours is Lief. The two of you have got to get away and have babies. Promise me you won’t ever come back.’
Tailltin’s mouth was moving. ‘But you’re coming?’
‘If I can. But I swore to Elfwida I’d go back for her. I’m not risking heroics from the rest of you, you’ve got to promise now.’
‘I don’t want to leave you, Finn.’
‘Well, you’re bloody going to.’
Tailltin sighed. ‘Then I might as well tell you. I wasn’t going to for fear you’d stay, but if you’re staying anyway… the Pilgrim’s here.’
‘Here?’
‘He’s a prisoner. I saw him on the march and he had fetters on. One of Strongbow’s followers said he was a spy for Fitzempress, and that if they didn’t keep him locked up he’d get word to England that Strongbow was setting up a rival kingdom here in Ireland.’
‘They’ll kill him.’
‘Well, they haven’t yet.’
I can’t worry about him, Finn thought. Slaney comes first. I’ll give him spies. And, God, I love him. ‘Is Strongbow setting up a rival kingdom?’ she said.
‘He means to be High King. Marrying Aoife is symbolic, his claim to Ireland.’
‘Jesus help her.’
* * *
The crowd of nuns and monks were allowed into the cathedral at midday. Its floors were still damp but splashes of blood on its pillars had been overlooked. As they waited, anger began to replace shock and one or two of the abbots started out again with the intention of protesting to Strongbow, but guards on the doors turned them back. While they weren’t looking, Finn went into the Lady Chapel and tried the tiny door in the north wall. It was unlocked.
Some of the camp followers showed charity by bringing soup in pails and passing cups around, but most of the sisters and brothers refused to touch it. Finn and Pinginn accepted gratefully, not knowing when they’d have nourishment again.
They heard later that while they waited Asgall was on trial in his own hall.
Strongbow sat in the great, carved chair that had once belonged to the man who, with his arms and legs in chains, had been kicked to the ground before him. Close by stood the executioner with a raised axe.
‘Do you ransom your life, Norseman,’ asked Strongbow, ‘or do I take your head?’
A true Viking at the last, Asgall, son of Thorkil and King of Dublin, looked up. ‘We were few this time, Norman. You had better take my head, for if you do not I shall come after you with greater numbers.’
Strongbow nodded to the executioner and there was a swish as the axe came down. ‘Asgall MacThorkil died,’ wrote the chroniclers afterwards, ‘not for his armed defiance but for his impudent words.’
Through the high slit windows of the cathedral the dull light of the rainy day outside turned duller as the afternoon progressed, making a muted tapestry out of the brightly-dressed Norman leaders who had begun to come in; they had already learned to appreciate the beauty of dyed Irish wool and linen, as well as the huge gold Celtic brooches, enough to filch them off the shoulders of dead Irish nobility. They milled around, talking, planning, calling each other ‘my lord’ of this or that Leinster cantred, discussing the advisability of their own marriages to Irish heiresses.
More and more of them arrived, to be joined by flustered Irish bishops whom Strongbow had summoned to his wedding. He was packing the cathedral with as many dignitaries as possible so that nobody could say he had been married to this heiress improperly.
The monastic community looked at the Normans and the bishops with contempt. Even if the bride was willing, and it was known that she was not, didn’t the fool Strongbow know that a woman could bring him nothing?
Brother Pinginn, who had been praying next to Finn, sudddenly said, ‘Now there’s a thing.’
‘What?’ Finn was irritable with nerves. She and the nuns were still herded with the monks. If, against custom, they were kept together during the ceremony, and out of the Lady Chapel, there would be no escape for anybody.
‘I’ve had a revelation.’ The little man tugged at her sleeve in excitement. ‘A real one. God has just showed me that women will win after all.’
She buried her head in her hands.
‘They will, Finn. It’s just a matter of taking the long view, God’s view. All these men, they’ll marry and Irishwomen will bring up their children and Ireland, female Ireland, will absorb them. Gradually they’ll speak Irish, or their children will, and think Irish and copy Irish customs and it’ll be lovely because after a time, quite a long time, you won’t be able to tell the difference. That’s how women win. That’s how God wins.’
‘For Christ’s sake, shut up,’ snapped Finn. They were among the last words she spoke to him and she regretted them for the rest of her life. She sat up. ‘Hell, if they separate the men and the women, you’ll be trapped in here. Get into the Lady Chapel quick, and get out.’
There was such a crowd by now that, small as he was, Pinginn was able to scurry into the chapel unnoticed. He disappeared into the shadows.
From somewhere Strongbow had found trumpeters. Not very good trumpeters, more used to sounding a battle charge than a fanfare, but they produced a discord which turned all heads towards the great, shattered doors. Strongbow entered, flanked by Le Gros and De Cogan, both of them taller than he was which may have been why he still had his helmet on. It gave him a warrior status which was lost when he took it off and revealed his bald head. His eyes went round the congregation, counting.
Murchadh came in behind him, disliking the whole business but, as ever, making sure it was properly conducted. He clucked when he saw that men and women were mingled together and hissed instructions to some Hy Kinsella. To her relief, Finn and the nuns were directed to the Lady Chapel. They were joined by some of Dermot’s female relatives. Finn placed herself near the rail at the front, next to the Mother Superior of St Mary’s. ‘God help me. If I ever disbelieved, forgive me and help me now.’
The chatter in the cathedral rose to fever pitch. Choir monks, adjusting their surplices, dithered at the altar steps. Were they supposed to sing and, if so, what? There was a shriek from the chancel and a dead body flopped forward onto a choir stall from under the curtain which had hidden it. The sacristan who had dislodged it by opening a cupboard flapped his hands in horror and indecision. Murchadh clucked again and, striding the chancel steps, picked the corpse up, put it in the sacristan’s cupboard and shut the door.
Again the trumpets set everybody’s teeth on edge, but now quiet damped down the echoing tumult of the cathedral as outside the rain was putting out the Dublin fire. Dermot stood in the entrance.
A church, candles, armed men, the circumstances in which she had last seen his face were around her now. Bracing herself to look at it, Finn had gripped the chapel rail. Slowly she let it go. She had been expecting to remember terror but there was nothing in the figure whose legs were jerking it towards the
nave to bounce it back at her; the metamorphosis, her own and his, was too great. The Abbess of Kildare had died long ago and so had the man who’d had her raped. This wasn’t him. This was a corpse as dead as the poor thing in the chancel cupboard even if this one was walking; its eyes as lifeless and its face more advanced in putrefaction. Automatically people drew back as it passed them.
Finn felt no pity; if she had contributed anything at all to the destruction of that creature there she was glad, but there was no point left in hating a man who was being so obliging as to be consumed by his own evil. It was just a disaster for the girl who walked beside him that it wasn’t happening quicker.
Somebody had dressed Aoife in white and gold. Somebody had piled her fair hair into a convoluted shape on her head and somebody had stuck flowers into her hand, but they had done so without any co-operation from Aoife. Unresisting, she was permitting this thing to happen to her because she couldn’t do anything else, but she had withdrawn so far into herself that in her way she, too, looked dead, as if the rest of her life were a waiting period until, in the same dress and with the same flowers, they put her in her coffin.
For that moment Finn forgot why she was there, not even seeing her daughter and Dervorgilla as they walked behind the girl being buried alive. She looked around, amazed, at the people who were going along with this travesty by adding their own pretence to it. ‘Help her,’ she said, ‘Help her.’ But just as she had once asked for help in a church and received none, there was none for this girl now. Beside her, the Mother Superior of St Mary’s might have turned into rock.
At least Strongbow wasn’t pretending. He waited in the centre of the nave for Aoife’s approach with less emotion than a housewife calculating the contents of her larder. Up in the choir the monks began a hymn. Aoife suddenly turned round and looked at her sisters, but a guard of the Hy Kinsella moved round them. Imprisoning them in a lobster-pot of their own bodies they walked the two girls towards the Lady Chapel and, pushing them into the crowd of women, took up position in front of them.
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