Mage of Clouds (The Cloudmages #2), page 6
Vaughn Mac Ard, Doyle’s uncle and commander of the Rí Gabair’s army, had immediately sent troops from Lár Bhaile in pursuit of the attackers, largely suspected to be raiding Inishlanders—no one believed they were mere bandits, then or now. The highwaymen fled west along the High Road pursued by a squad of gardai, retreating into the haunted and feared depths of the ancient oak forest of Doire Coill, dark and trackless. None of them, attackers or gardai, ever came back out. Three days later, where the northern edge of Doire Coill touched the High Road, the heads of both the bandits and the squad of gardai were found in a field amid a black flock of feasting crows. Doyle, as squire to his uncle, had ridden with the Rí Gabair and the Rí Ard to see the sight. He still could recall how the crows took flight, reluctantly, as Nevan O Liathain rode toward the gory sight, shouting. The heads had been stripped of much of their flesh by then, the eye sockets just raw bleeding holes and the gaping mouths tongueless . . . Some would say later that they’d noticed Bunús Muintir watching from under the shadow of the oaks, but Doyle hadn’t seen them, the Old People who supposedly lived there.
No one ever knew for certain who had sent the murderers. Many, including the Rí Ard, would continue to believe it was the Inish, but Doyle never believed that—it wasn’t Jenna’s style to be covert. But there were factions enough among the Tuathian Riocha, families who wanted to advance their own fortunes and who wouldn’t be troubled over stooping to hired murder.
Doyle would say afterward that this was the day he gave up his childhood and took up his da’s legacy, at once and early, driven by the awful vision in front of him. Doyle knew who the Rí Ard blamed and they were the same people who had taken Doyle’s da away from him. He would take allies where he found them, justified or not.
“What Enean did was incredibly noble and brave,” Doyle said to the Rí Ard. “The Mother-Creator saved him for a reason. He still has a destiny to fulfill.”
“Then I wish She would whisper Her secret to me, for I don’t see it,” O Liathain answered. He groaned as he shifted in the bed. “And I fear that I never will.”
“Don’t say that, my Rí.”
“Why not? For the last many months, I’ve been thinking this is the last summer I will see, the last Festival of Gheimhri I’ll ever celebrate, the last harvest. One thing I’ll never see is the face of the person who will take this torc from my cold body and put it on their own, but I know that will be soon.” For a moment, O Liathain closed his eyes and Doyle wondered whether he’d fallen asleep. Then the gray, rheumy eyes opened again and he licked dry lips. “What of Inish Thuaidh and your sister?”
“News came from Tuath Infochla this morning—that’s why I asked to see you. The rumors we’ve heard are true: the northern Stepping Stones have gone over to Inish Thuaidh, and the Ards of those clans are now sitting in the Comhairle in Dún Kiil. We bleed in the north, Rí Ard. The Banrion refused to see the delegation Rí Infochla sent in protest. She wouldn’t even accept Rí Mas Sithig’s letter. She defies us all.”
“Damn that woman!” The effort cost O Liathain another spasm of coughing, his face going red then gray; he spat again, and again the servant hurried forward. When he’d recovered his breath, he shook his head. His voice was much fainter. “We should have moved against her before now. We shouldn’t have let her recover after Dun Kiil—I should have renounced the oath I made to her, should have gathered together all the Tuatha and clochs na thintrí and come against her with an army even Lámh Shábhála and the Inishfeirm cloudmages couldn’t resist. But my father and the Riocha were all afraid after our first defeat and I couldn’t get them to agree, and I had given the Mad Holder my word. My word . . .”
O Liathain went into another fit of coughing and Doyle waited patiently, leaning over to press the cloth against the Rí Ard’s lips when he’d finished. “So we waited and waited and now we pay for our cowardice,” the man continued, “and it will be that much harder to pry her out and remove her.” He stopped, his eyes closing again. Doyle waited, and he stirred a few breaths later. “I need you, Doyle,” O Liathain whispered. “As I needed your da long ago: a strong and loyal hand, a strong and loyal mind, someone fit to hold a Cloch Mór. That’s why I’ve given you my daughter, that’s why I gifted you with the stone you hold.”
These were words he’d heard many times before. O Liathain’s mind sometimes wandered along old paths now, and it was best just to nod and pretend you’d never heard the words before. “You have my hand and my mind and my loyalty, Rí Ard,” Doyle said. “You know that. You treated me as a favored son when the others . . .” He stopped, remembering the mingled shame and anger he’d felt since his childhood every time he heard the taunts: “There’s that bastard child of Padraic’s . . .” “Useless offspring of a tiarna’s whore . . .” He bloodied himself frequently in those first years, and as he’d grown, the taunts had come less frequently. But he still saw them in people’s eyes sometimes, unspoken.
“Jenna could have been my Banrion, long ago,” the Rí continued, his mind still drifting back. “I offered her that, when I first met her, but she refused me. It was not long after Enean’s mam had died, when I was still Tanaise Ríg. She could have been my second wife. All this trouble would have been avoided had she accepted. But she went mad with Lámh Shábhála.”
“I know. My mam told me that tale. Jenna is a murderous fool, Rí, and too proud for her own good.”
A faint nod. “Your sister is an abomination and must be destroyed before she destroys us. I’m sorry, Doyle, but that’s true. Still, I hate to ask you to plot against your own sister.”
“Oh, I have no problem with that, Rí,” Doyle answered easily. He fingered the Cloch Mór around his neck. “Someone else needs to hold Lámh Shábhála. Someone whose loyalty to the Tuatha is unquestioned. Perhaps the Rí Ard himself. It would look good around your neck.” Doyle’s hand went to his own neck, and in his imagination it was not Nevan O Liathain wearing the cloch.
There was no answer. The Rí’s chest rose slowly; his breath labored and loud. Doyle rose from his stool. “Rest, my Rí. Don’t worry, Jenna will be weakened, and very soon. Edana and I will see to that.” He touched the man’s cheek and went to the window where Enean had been sitting. Far below, he could see the Rí’s son and his entourage just emerging from the keep’s main gates and riding toward the harbor. He glanced at the ship coming toward the docks. Enean was right; on the mast flew the banner of Tuath Airgialla, and below was another: a stylized dire wolf on a field of blue—the banner of the Concordance of Céile Mhór.
Doyle’s eyes narrowed at that, wondering why Céile Mhór would be sending unannounced someone whose rank demanded the banner. He thought that perhaps Enean had the right idea, after all.
“Make certain the Rí sleeps comfortably,” he said to the chamber attendant. “If he wakes and wants me, I’ll be with Enean at the docks.”
5
Excerpts from Letters
3rd SILVERBARK 1148
My Dearest Lucan:
I’m alone now.
Well, in truth I’m never “alone” here—that’s impossible. My mam left three days ago with Nainsi and I’m now in my rooms with Faoil, who I told you about in the last letter. Doors are not locked here in the White Keep—no, that’s not quite true. Many doors are locked here, some with metal and some with magical wards. But not the doors for the acolytes’ rooms; anyone can walk in on us at any time and the Siúrs seem to often do so. Faoil’s usually here when we’re not together in classes or doing the duties assigned to us. She’s here right now as I write this, and has already asked me who I’m writing to. I told her “a friend.” She didn’t like the answer but she’s too uncertain of me to ask any more questions. Maybe she’s afraid of what I’ll say to my mam, and how that might affect her family.
There are always other people around; the Bráthairs and Siúrs; visitors and supplicants from Inish Thuaidh; people from Inishfeirm; even Riocha from Talamh an Ghlas come to inquire about putting their sons and daughters here—though not too many of those. I’ve heard from the other acolytes that the Rí Ard has created his own “Order of Gabair” based in Lár Bhaile and he wants none of the Riocha taught the arts of the cloudmage by “vile Inishlanders.” I’ve been told that several acolytes from the Tuatha left here in the last two years to go to Lár Bhaile and the new Order, and there are empty rooms in the keep’s dormitories. Still, I can feel people watching me, all the time, even though they think I don’t notice. Máister Kirwan seems to be around every other corner I turn, especially. There’s one Bráthair—Owaine Geraghty—who also seems to go out of his way to be around wherever I am. My mam knows him somehow; knows him well enough that she gave him a clochmion even though he is of totally common blood, if you can believe that.
And my mam seems to think that some of them may be watching me for other reasons. She warned me before she left: “Be careful. Not everyone is your friend, and because of who you are, you are always going to be in some danger.” I wanted to ask her why in the Mother-Creator’s name she is leaving me here if she felt that way, but that would have just made her angry.
I’m treated like a servant. I’m expected to wash dishes, to wait on the cloudmages and visitors at meals, to tend to the gardens. The acolytes are little better than slaves. You should see my hands, my love—they look worse than Nainsi’s, all red and splotched and scratched, the nails hopelessly broken. Not the soft hands you used to hold at all. Tomorrow morning, before my first class in slow magic, I have to go out and help bring in the breadroot crop from their easy beds in the High Field, a good half-mile trek, and we’ll be getting up before dawn to start.
And the classes themselves: dry, boring material droned at us by dry, boring teachers, mostly. Histories, lists of names and dates and events; catalogs of clochs na thintrí, both Clochs Mór and clochmions and their names and reputed powers and current mage-holders; all the past Holders of the Clochs Mór and Lámh Shábhála; the skill of letters—which many of us already know but that doesn’t matter, we still have to attend the class; the clan names of the Riocha and their genealogies. Máister Kirwan’s class, once a week, is the worst waste of time, since we do nothing but sit silently with our eyes closed and “think of nothing.” An impossible task, of course, since the moment you try to think of nothing your mind is filled with everything. We can’t even sleep while we’re sitting there—anyone caught actually sleeping gets extra chores. And I can’t neglect telling you about the slow magics of water and earth, the most boring and insufferable classes of all—nothing but memorizing long chants and lists of ingredients to make little or nothing happen.
I miss you so much, Lucan. Sometimes I try to imagine your face and your touch and the sound of your voice, try to fix it all in my mind so I can’t forget it. Usually I can, but the last time I saw you seems so impossibly long ago, and I want so much for my inner vision to be real and for the words I hear in my head to really be your voice, calling to me. . . .
5th Silverbark 1148
My Love:
I had such a strange, strange dream last night. At least I think it was a dream. I awoke because I heard the sound of seals—not the normal browns that one hears all the time around Inishfeirm, which by the way is positively infested with the creatures—but the mournful moans of the blues. I got out of my bed in the darkness, trying not to wake Faoil, and went to the window, pushing it a little farther open so I could hear better. The Saimhóir were making an enormous, sad racket. The sky was bright with the nearly full moon, though the ground was misty from the rain earlier in the day. I saw movement below, close by the wall of the White Keep. When I looked, I thought I saw a young man, perhaps twenty and one—staring up at me as I gazed down at him. He was entirely naked even though the night was cold. I gasped in surprise and blinked hard to rid myself of the last bit of sleep, and he was gone when I looked again. Yet . . . the bushes near the base of the keep were swaying, as if someone had just moved through them.
I thought of mentioning this to Siúr O’hAllmhurain, who is in charge of our floor, but decided not to do so since it was probably only a dream. Perhaps my thoughts of you were too much on my mind. . . .
I have made something of a friend, though I’m half afraid to tell you about it for fear you’ll misunderstand. His name (aye, his) is Thady MacCoughlin. He’s a third-year. His da and mam are MacCoughlins from An Cnocan; you may have seen his parents in Dún Kiil last year for the Festival of Méitha. Thady says they were there and were introduced to me at one of the dances, though I don’t remember them specifically—I end up meeting too many people to possibly remember them all. Thady’s already told me several things about Inishfeirm and the White Keep I didn’t know. He’s promised to show me a particular outside door that’s warded. He says half the acolytes know the ward-word to the door and use it to sneak out when they want to do so. I wonder if that doesn’t explain the person I saw outside last night (though not his nakedness—though perhaps one of the first-years was tossed out that way as a prank by some of the fifth-years, who are insufferably superior). Anyway, he’s very kind and helpful and I’ve told him about you, just to make sure that he understands. He’s just a friend, Lucan, and from such a minor name at that. That’s probably why he’s been so helpful to me, hoping I’ll say something complimentary about him to Mam or Da and gain favor for his family. . . .
8th Silverbark 1148
Dear One:
Thady told me the ward-word yesterday and tonight I used it. I heard the seals again, the blues, so loud they woke me. You know how I love the Saimhóir, and there was, well, something . . . I don’t know . . . compelling about the sound. Maybe some of what’s been said about my mam is true. I do know that listening to them made me want to get near them, the same way I felt every time I heard them in Dún Kiil.
I slipped on my clóca and overcoat and put on my sandals, leaving Faoil sleeping in her bed. I tiptoed down the corridor, half expecting Máister Kirwan or that squinting Bráthair Geraghty to be waiting for me around the corner, or Siúr O’hAllmhurain to be standing in the door to her room at the end of the Women’s Corridor. But I could hear Siúr O’hAllmhurain snoring almost as loudly as the seals were calling, and so I went out of the wing and down the central hall to the Low Stairs in the back that we’re not supposed to use. At the bottom of Low Tower was the door: a tiny opening half-hidden in an alcove. I spoke the word and it clicked open, just as Thady said it would. I went out.
The seals were still grunting and moaning. I hurried away from the keep (expecting that someone would call out an alarm as I did so) toward the trail head that leads down to the beach at the foot of the mountain. I started down.
It was stupid, I know—the moon hidden behind clouds, the ground slick from the rain, a mist all around. But I managed to get down, maybe half a stripe later, without killing myself in the process. I could hear the water slapping against rocks and the sound of the blues was almost deafening.
They were there, the gorgeous creatures, out on the rocks near the shore: a dozen of the Saimhóir, as big and beautiful as I remembered from Little Head. There was a bull and four cows, the rest juveniles and pups. They saw me, too; they lifted their snouts in my direction and called out to me, wailing and crying like keening sochraideach at a funeral. I took a step toward them. And another. It was like they had cast an enchantment on me, and I think I might have walked right out to them . . . but the water was so cold that when it touched my foot I cried out.
I was shivering, and a wave came and soaked me to the knees. I looked back up the mountain, realizing that it was going to take me a stripe or more to walk all the way back up there, and that I was going to be exhausted from lack of sleep for my morning chores. The seals called me, but I turned my back on them and started climbing back up the trail. . . .
11th Silverbark 1148
Sweetest:
I had hoped to receive a letter or letters from you by now. Whenever I hear that a ship has come into Inishfeirm Harbor, I wait for the Order’s carriage to bring back the mail and supplies that have come, but so far there’s been nothing from you. I hope my letters have been reaching you, and that the next ship will bring me your words.
I saw the naked young man again last night. Again it was the racket of seals that woke me, and I went to the window and saw him. I was awake this time: person or wight or ghost, he was real and not my imagination. He seemed to be coming from the Low Tower and the door there—the ward-locked one. He moved quickly across the grass toward the head of the trail, glancing back over his shoulder once or twice at the keep, though I don’t think he saw me watching as I leaned back into the shadows. I could see his face clearly—black-haired, black-bearded, and thin—and it was none of the acolytes or Bráthairs here. That much I know. He ran strangely, as if he were drunk or slightly dizzy, but quickly disappeared into the heather near the beach trail.
I thought that I might follow him (I know; I can hear you saying it now: that was foolish and dangerous, but somehow he didn’t seem frightening at all) and went to the door of my room. When I opened it, I stopped. In the moonlight that came through the corridor windows, I could see wet footprints on the stone flags: not boot prints, but the prints of a bare foot. They were drying quickly, even as I stared at them.
