Only the Stones Survive: A Novel (3 page)

Earthkillers? Sword of Light? What were those? I had never heard of them before, but the very names made my heart race.

My father lifted his hand from my head and stood up. “You all know me,” he announced in a ringing voice unlike any he used at home. “I am Mongan na Manannan Mac Lir, heir to the wisdom of my forebears. Their experience as leaders—and yes, as warriors too—is part of me. Therefore I warn you: the treasures we possess were not acquired through war, but war could destroy them.”

“Impossible!” shouted a voice from the crowd.

Others hotly contradicted him. The argument grew more passionate. Every person present seemed to have an opinion about the Earthkillers—whatever they were—and was determined to express it without listening to anyone else. Tempers flared. Men and women who had been laughing and singing together only moments before shouted furiously at each other.

I sat small between my parents, hardly daring to breathe. An event that had begun as a celebration had turned into … what?

Something dangerous had been set loose in the Gathering Place.

THREE

A
T LAST THE GREAT QUEEN,
whose eyes were old when the world was young, stood up. Everyone’s attention went to her; she had that power. When Eriu spoke the crowd fell silent. No bird could rival the music of her voice. “How can you accuse the Fír Bolga of being savage in one breath,” she asked in a reasonable tone, “then want to turn the Earthkillers against them in the next? Is that not the ultimate savagery? As you well know, we have ample means at our disposal to discourage violence without committing it ourselves. We can repeat the techniques we have used before to call upon the resources of the sacred island.”

In support of her sister, the queen called Fodla the Wise counseled, “Beware how you cry for war, my people. When there is keening on the night wind in the halls of the Iverni and the Velabri, there will be wailing likewise in our own halls.”

Dos na Trialen na Barinth, Prince of the Lakes, was next to speak. “What Eriu suggests may be the obvious solution,” he told the Dananns, “yet I warn you there are drawbacks. Such a response might require little effort, yet we cannot be sure of the results. Our powers are broad but not precise, and one mistake could erupt into war very quickly.

“Let us consider some alternatives. I propose we visit the disaffected tribes in person and seek to resolve their problems through negotiation. For example, they should be amenable to an offer of additional grain. The elders have predicted the weather will be unusually harsh during the next darkseason.”

Greine, titled MacGreine, the Son of the Sun—and also husband of Eriu—stood up next. There could be no doubt of his right to kingship; his face and form exemplified Danann nobility. He spoke slowly, leaving space between his phrases so his listeners had time to think about them. “Discouragement is practical. Negotiation is wise. But if there is a revolt anyway … and I’m only saying if … we must be able to defend ourselves. It might be prudent to consider our weaponry in case anything untoward does happen.”

Greine’s two half-brothers, MacCuill, the Son of the Wood, and MacCet, the Son of the Ancient One, were nodding in agreement. But Banba the Brave, youngest of the three queens of the Túatha Dé Danann, drew the sunlight into herself until it burnished her coppery hair. “Let us forget this talk of Earthkillers and put our trust in the bronze swords and spears forged by our ancestors!” she cried in a clarion voice. “Every one of you must have some stored away in honor of the past. Those strong old weapons will serve us well with no risk to the land.”

A man halfway between youth and age leaped to his feet. “I agree with Banba! I propose that we can form companies and begin weapons practice at once. Sippar, Rodarch, Agnonis and Ladra, you can join me.”

His enthusiasm took hold like fire in dry grass, scattering sparks. The men who were eager to fight became more eager; the ones who wanted negotiation grew more determined. Those who supported Eriu’s way were mostly the elders, whose voices were not strong enough to outshout anyone else.

Greine waited. From time to time he exchanged a look with Eriu. I had seen my parents exchange that look; it said more than words ever could.

I turned to see what the Dagda thought of all this. The old man was sitting as he had been from the beginning, with an impassive face and his arms folded across his chest. He had passed the rule of Ierne to a newer generation and would not interfere.

Was he right or wrong? I still do not know, though I have asked myself that question many times.

Even the Dagda could not see the future.

Finally, Greine raised his arm. In his fist he held a staff carved of white ash, the symbol of regal authority. When he spoke he did not shout, yet his voice went everywhere. “The responsibilities of a king are heavy,” he intoned. “None is heavier than that of making a decision when his people cannot agree among themselves. My wife has laid out a straight path, but when alternatives were suggested that path seems to have lost support. We now come to a fork in the road. We are in danger of losing our direction. Therefore, this is my pronouncement.”

The listening Dananns held their collective breath.

“I decree that the Earthkillers remain in the ground as Eriu wishes,” Greine soberly intoned. “I shall not order their use. Our ancestors brought the gifts from the stars when they came here, but the time for using them has long passed. We have become a wiser people. The Túatha Dé Danann will enforce peace on this island with simple swords and axes. The other tribes are primitive but not stupid; the sight of so much weaponry in our hands should discourage them from further violence.”

I expected someone to argue with him, which would have been exciting, but nobody spoke up. The air was filled with his words and his words alone.

When the last echo died, Greine announced, “Now we must invoke the Stone of Destiny to seal the agreement.” He reached out to take the hand of Eriu, and they began climbing the ridge. The entire crowd followed them, a moving blaze of color. It was steeper than I thought. From where we were sitting, the ridge had appeared to be a low hill, but when we reached the top I saw to my amazement that the land was spread out below us from mountaintop to mountaintop.

A king’s view.

At the crown of the ridge was a grass-covered mound like a burial cairn, together with a single pillar of gray stone sunk into the earth. The exposed part of the monolith was taller than a man and rounded on top. I thought I saw tiny flashes of color peeping from its rough surface.

The stone was watching me.

A shiver danced across my shoulders.

Greine went to one side of the pillar, Eriu to the other, while the Dananns formed a circle around them, spilling back along the ridge and blocking my view. The sun was warm, but a cool breeze was blowing across the hill. The sweet, damp air smelled of life, of green and growing things. A corncrake uttered its grating cry from its nest among the grasses. Far overhead, an eagle circled.

The Stone of Destiny stood at the center of the Túatha Dé Danann.

Throwing back his head, Greine lifted both his arms and brandished the ash wood staff. “Lord of wind and flame!” he exhorted. “Lord of the boundless curve! You alone know my people’s destiny. If we have chosen wisely, support us. If we have chosen wrongly, protect us. This I ask for the Tribe of Danu, the Children of Light.”

Then he waited.

When nothing happened, I tugged at my father’s arm. “Is the stone supposed to do something?”

Mongan looked down at me. “Not now. We do the doing. The Stone does the knowing.”

This made no sense to me. Was this not an ordinary piece of rock? “Where did it come from?”

“We brought it with us, Joss. Before the Before.”

Greine backed six paces from the Stone, then turned and walked away down the ridge. Every person he passed saluted him by saying, “Elgolai.”

“Is that the old language?” I asked my father.

“It is,” he confirmed. “Elgolai means, ‘He goes out,’ which is a term of the highest respect. Life is extended by the going, not by the staying. Greine is a direct descendant of those who had enough courage to go out Before the Before.”

I had thought myself capable of thinking adult thoughts. Apparently I still had a long way to go.

Later in the sunseason, an unfamiliar fleet appeared off our southern coast. The clans that lived along the shore assumed they were traders. The Sea People were known to sail great distances in order to buy and sell copper and tin and olive oil, silk and amber and rare perfumes. As restless as fleas, they were always going somewhere else. One of their trade routes passed between our island and the rising sun.

We too had come from somewhere else. Before the Before.

The lures of the Sea People did not attract the Túatha Dé Danann. We had what we needed. What we did not have we did not want. Preferring the steady glow of serenity to the destructive tarnish of commerce, whereby everything was bought and sold and nothing was ever enough, we had long since developed ways of avoiding traders.

Unfortunately, the fleet from the south penetrated our usual defenses. This had happened before; my people were not alarmed. They habitually greeted any unwelcome visitors with courtesy and sent them on their way with confused impressions designed to discourage further contact.

This time would be different.

FOUR

S
HORTLY AFTER SUNRISE,
Éremón thought he saw land. An irregular shape floated on the horizon, startlingly green against the blue of the sea. The husky Gaelic warrior had been keeping watch in the prow of his galley for most of the night with two of his hunting hounds at his feet while he alternately strained to see something that was not there and struggled to stay awake in case it ever appeared.

Then there it was.

Éremón blinked. The vision vanished. He blinked again. The miracle he sought glowed like a green jewel in the light of the rising sun.

Kicking one of his hounds aside, Éremón turned toward a thin, swarthy man awkwardly draped across a pile of rope. “Get up quick, Sakkar! Look where I’m pointing. Is that Ierne out there?”

With a groan the Phoenician dragged himself to his feet. He had hoped to eke out a few more moments of rest before the work of the day began. Every part of his body ached. He was no longer young, and coils of rope were no substitute for a comfortable bed. It could be a long time before he enjoyed a bed again. “I may see something,” he conceded. “Perhaps…” He shrugged his left shoulder. “At this distance it could be anything or nothing. You’ll have to go closer.”

Éremón glowered at the smaller man. “I have to go closer, Sakkar? And risk running aground? Need I remind you that I am responsible for the future of the Míl’s entire tribe? All these lives depend on
me
!”

Éremón was the youngest son of Mílesios—respectfully titled the Míl—the recently deceased overlord of a large Celtic tribe in the northwestern corner of the Iberian Peninsula. The clans comprising the tribe were known collectively as Gaelicians, or the Gael. The dominant clan preferred to be called the Mílesians after their chieftain. The fleet was laden with iron implements and weaponry and carried all six of the Míl’s princely sons—even though one of them was mad.

As Sakkar was aware, Éremón was claiming a prerogative that was not his alone.

The Phoenician would not dream of contradicting him.

Sakkar had been an orphan, one of the countless ragged little beggars who thronged the crooked streets and malodorous alleyways of the ancient seaport of Tyre, on the Middle Sea. A scrawny child with dark, almond-shaped eyes and nimble fingers that could slip a coin from a purse without being discovered.

Deference to authority had been beaten into Sakkar from an early age, but from some unknown ancestor he also had inherited a stubborn pride. He refused to spend the rest of his life begging—or stealing.

As soon as he was big enough, he had apprenticed himself to a Tyrian shipbuilder. “I’ll do anything,” he insisted. His new employer promptly assigned him to carry timber that weighed almost as much as he did.

Sakkar was short but wiry, with iron muscles and boundless stamina. In the beginning, nothing more was required of him. The work was exhausting, yet he thrived on it. For the first time in his miserable life, he was sure of a meal at the end of the day and a dry place to sleep at night. He took great pride in being able to earn his living.

After a few months he began to look for other jobs around the shipyard. On his own, he taught himself to straighten bent nails, to braid rope, even tried his hand at patching sails. Such skills came easily to him. Before long, his efforts were observed—and approved. The more he could do, the more he was given to do. In time, Sakkar was offered better food and slept on a pallet instead of the floor.

Within a year he understood how a ship was constructed, down to the smallest detail. In another year he could have built one by himself.

A decade had passed, during which Sakkar absorbed knowledge like a sponge, observing everything that happened around him and listening intently to more experienced men. In this way he had mastered several languages and a handful of dialects that were common among those involved in commercial trade. He also acquired the gestures and manners that set an educated person apart from a common laborer. Only a portion of what he learned was of any apparent value; some of it was merely trivia that stuck to his brain the way barnacles stuck to the hull of a ship.

Barnacles have their uses too.

On the day when Sakkar was promoted to shipwright, he had thought a special star shone over him. This was confirmed a few years later when he met a wealthy trader called Age-Nor, who required an outstanding shipwright to accompany his fleet and supervise the inevitable repairs needed on long journeys.

Sakkar had demonstrated a full and impressive range of skills, and the position was his. He abandoned his original employer without a second thought. Age-Nor promised that after their first voyage together, Sakkar would be able to afford a house of his own and an obedient wife instead of waterfront prostitutes with bad teeth and worse diseases.