Shadowmagic - Sons of Macha (44 page)

The sons of Macha, panting, once again faced off.

‘If you had come to me earlier, Cialtie, we could have worked something out.'

‘You don't get it, do you, brother?' Cialtie said. ‘I am not fighting you – I am fighting Ona. I have been Ona's puppet since I was born. There is nothing you or anyone could have done. This now is the only chance I have at a life.'

‘I feel sorry for you, brother, I really do, but I can't let you win.'

Dad called up to the tree. ‘Mother Oak, can I have a banta stick?'

Above I heard the familiar sound of water being drawn from wood. A perfect fighting-stick-sized branch fell just behind Dad. He picked it up and quickly shaved off the dead small twigs that stuck out from the side.

Sword and sword vs. sword and stick – I remembered Dahy putting me through this muscle-aching drill. I also remembered thinking why do I need to learn that – when will this ever happen? As usual Master Dahy was right.

Cialtie didn't seem as confident as he had been before. Dad performed stuff right out of Dahy's drill book. Anything Cialtie tried was countered like Dad knew it was coming. But then Dad let his left hand drop. Cialtie came around with a full swing of his Banshee blade just as Dad brought the stick up to block. The blade stuck into the wood. Dad pulled the blade down and then kicked Cialtie in the wrist. The Banshee blade broke free from the silver cuff and then with another tug Dad snapped the gold wire that rode up my uncle's sleeve. Dad threw the stick, with the Banshee blade still attached, away and it was sword vs. sword again.

‘When I took my Choosing,' Dad said, ‘this is what I saw.'

‘Fascinating,' Cialtie said. ‘How did it end?'

Dad launched himself at his brother, shouting, ‘Not well!'

I was forced to watch the sons of Macha do battle and with every thrust and parry I strained my muscles against my bonds. I watched as the man who made me sword-fight with him every week before he gave me my pocket money fought for his life. In my mind's eye I saw us sword-fighting in the backyard and sometimes in the living room and I watched him use the same techniques and tricks he taught me.

The good thing was that Dad was in great shape. Not just because of the dragon blood youth tonic but he had also been practising his swordsmanship. When he first became young again he would draw on me almost every time he saw me. When I finally impressed on him how annoying that was, he started sparring with the young castle guards who couldn't really complain about their king. Dad and Dahy still squared off periodically. The result was that Dad was a better swordsman than Cialtie and it was beginning to show. Cialtie was back-pedalling with every parry. Dad manoeuvred his opponent onto a downward slope. That was Dahy's rule number three – find the high ground.

Dad was now battling like a man possessed. Cialtie successfully turned and got the fight onto even ground and once again the swordsmen locked pommels.

‘You never studied with Dahy, did you, brother?'

‘I've always hated that pompous blowhard,' Cialtie said.

‘I thought not,' Dad said, disengaging.

That's when Dad started an attack I was very familiar with. He came at his brother with a high downward swipe. Cialtie parried it off to his right – exactly as Dad expected. Then Dad did the move he always called, The Dahy. His sword kept going to the right. Cialtie fell for the fake. His eyes followed the blade when they should have been looking at the arm. Dad clocked him high in the cheek with his elbow and Cialtie went down. He raised his sword while lying on his back but Dad swatted it out of his hand.

If Cialtie was expecting mercy from his brother, he was mistaken. The time for mercy was over. Dad placed both hands on the hilt of the Lawnmower and came down on Cialtie like he was going to split him in half. Cialtie raised his right arm and the blade slammed into his stump and then notched into the silver cuff that encircled his wrist. Blood shot from his stump as Cialtie let out a painful grunt – then he whistled twice. The rope around my chest tightened with such a force that I screamed. Dad turned to look at me and that was all the distraction Cialtie needed. Life slowed down as I tried to warn Dad but the rope made it so I couldn't even catch a breath. When Dad's eyes turned back at his brother he saw him holding a knife. Before he could even react, Cialtie pushed the blade into Dad's chest.

I had been fighting the pressure on my ribs but when I saw that I shouted, ‘NO!' As the air left my lungs the rope took up the slack and blackness crept into my peripheral vision. The last thing I heard, or should I say felt, was Mother Oak in my head saying,
‘Oh no, not Oisin.'

F
or the second time today I came to from unconsciousness without opening my eyes. This time I didn't want to see what was out there.
Make it a dream
, I said to myself,
make it a dream
.
Let me open my eyes and see my father sitting on the edge of my bed brushing the hair out of my eyes
.

But the chest pain that came with every breath proved to me that this was real. I touched the rough bark at my back to see if Mother Oak was still there. She was and she was … she was crying.

I opened my eyes as leaves fell around me and saw Dad face down on the grass. His chest was tilted up at a strange angle because of the knife still sticking out of it. Another pain hit me in the chest and this pain had nothing to do with the Brownie rope.
Daddy
.

‘Conor, be sharp,'
Mother Oak shouted into my head.
‘He comes.'

Cialtie staggered into my vision. His right sleeve was torn off and wrapped around his bleeding stump. He plopped down on the ground cross-legged in front of me like he was drunk. Then he leaned in and said, ‘Tears for your father, good.'

‘You bastard,' I said without looking at him – I couldn't.

‘I've been a bastard since the day I was born, nephew, but I was genuine when I said your tears were good. He was a man worthy of tears.'

I looked up and saw tears in Cialtie's eyes. It's a rare thing to see a grown man cry but my uncle's crocodile tears didn't induce any sympathy in me. ‘Go to hell,' I said to his face.

‘Hell is where I have been,' he replied, standing. ‘I have been in a living hell every day since I read Ona's prophecies. I have been marching to the rhythm of her maddening tin drum all of my life.'

‘Oh shut up,' I shouted. ‘I am so tired of your “this isn't my fault” speech. Save it for someone who doesn't know you.'

‘I thought you at least would understand.'

‘Oh I understand, Cialtie – I understand that you are an idiot as well as a sadistic bastard. You think because something is written it's done. Well, give me a pen and I'll write – Drop Dead. You did what you did. No one made you do anything. You killed your brother, my father – you. Your son ran to you and instead of hugging him – you chose to stab him – you. I was there. There was no one behind you. You killed Fergal – you. So go peddle your sob story somewhere else.'

‘I had hoped to avoid this, nephew. I know you don't believe me but I don't want to kill you. I was saddened when I heard you took your Choosing. I was hoping just to take your runehand but now that you hold a Duir Rune I must kill you. Then I will finally be king, finally be safe.'

I laughed then, or at least I think it was a laugh. I was such a mess of emotions; if you were looking at me I don't know what you would have thought I was doing.

‘I'm surprised you find that funny,' Cialtie said.

‘You really are an idiot,' I said as I reached in to a small pocket on the side of my tunic. Cialtie raised his sword and stepped back but when he saw what was in my hand he stopped dead in his tracks.

You see, almost immediately after I completed my Choosing all hell broke loose and I never had the chance to talk to anybody about what happened. Since everyone assumed I would pick Duir and inherit the Oak Throne, nobody asked to see my new rune. I hadn't even told Dad. I was worried he was going to be disappointed, so I was waiting for a quiet moment alone to tell him but I never had the chance and now I never will.

I held up my new rune for Cialtie to see. On it was engraved the major symbol of – Cull. ‘I'm not the new king – you are,' I said. ‘I'm the new Lord of the Hazellands.' I thought of what Dad would have said to that. After the disappointment, he would have laughed at the thought of me being the new Dean of the Hall of Knowledge. I tried to laugh, too, but couldn't.

‘You chose Cull?' Cialtie said, stepping forward for a closer look.

‘Yes.'

‘Then … then I am king.'

‘Don't expect me to bow.'

‘I'm safe. It is … it is over.'

I held out the rune. He sheathed his sword and came towards me to take it. I don't know what possessed me to do what I did. It might have been some sort of subliminal message from Mother Oak but I think it was just me remembering what she had said earlier about giving Cialtie ‘
a piece of my mind
'. All I know is that at that moment I needed Cialtie to talk with the family tree. As he reached for my rune I dropped it, grabbed my uncle's wrist and pushed it against Mother Oak's trunk. Both he and I stuck to the bark like we were steel touching an electromagnet.

I recognised the sensation instantly. It was identical to the attack of the oak tree at the perimeter of Castle Duir. The difference was that this time the attention was not directed at me. This time the guy in the hot seat was Cialtie.

The first thing I saw was the circular tree amulet. I had seen a template of it made in silver but I had never seen the one made of gold, the one that was used to obliterate a town. I had watched Cialtie place it on the stump of a tree he had just chopped down. In the centre he placed a small glass bottle, and stopped inside the bottle was a moth. Then he hopped on his horse and galloped out of there. Mother Oak's vision showed both of us what no one had ever seen – no one who lived, that is. Cialtie's amulet bomb went off and the destruction rippled out from the stump. The eerie thing about it was the sound – except for the crashing stones and the screaming people it was silent, even though it looked just like a shot from one of those ground-zero cameras at atomic blasts. It was hard to watch, no … not just hard, it was almost impossible. Admittedly these images were horrible but I was feeling them at a gut level that … I don't know how to describe it. It was so intense, I wasn't sure I could stand it. I screamed and then I heard Mother Oak in my head say,
‘Oh I'm so sorry dear, that was not meant for you.'
Swiftly the overpowering intensity lifted. The vision was still forced on me and it was still tough to watch but I was saved the gut-churning emotional power – Cialtie was not.

The destruction of the village of More was followed by Cialtie's seduction of Mná, the Banshee sorceress who became Fergal's mother. I watched with nausea as Cialtie purred while he lied to the poor girl. He promised her he loved her – he promised her she would be his queen. Then I had to watch as her screams of labour were cut short by Cialtie beheading her.

Next came a string of murders: the cowardly attack on my grandfather's horse as he stepped through the portal to the Real World, Ona being smothered by a pillow, the killing of four striking Leprechaun miners as an example to the others.

Then I saw something that really surprised me. A Banshee carrying Dad's severed runehand through the Choosing. Cialtie had been too cowardly to attempt that himself so he promised the Banshee great riches for the attempt. When he succeeded in getting a Duir Rune he was rewarded only with death.

Hundreds of indecencies ranging from rudeness to inflicting debilitating pain flashed by, each one painting a portrait of a poisonous life. In the end Mother Oak did to Cialtie what the oak at Castle Duir had done to me. She showed him what his life could have been like if instead of killing Fergal he had accepted him. She showed a Cialtie walking along a beach with his boy. She showed him hugs and handmade presents and bedtime stories. She made him feel the joy of parenting, the swell of pride, the unconditional love. Then she showed him the truth. I heard Cialtie moan as he relived the stabbing of his son. I moaned with him as I again watched the blade enter Fergal's chest.

‘You could have stopped all of this at any time,'
Mother Oak said.
‘Shame. Shame on you.'

Mother Oak let us go. I almost blacked out from the emotional roller-coaster I had just been through. Then a sharp pain shot through my broken arm as the Brownie rope was ripped away from me and the tree. I was free. I tried to stand but found out, by falling, that my leg was definitely broken. I fell on my broken arm and once again my brain threatened unconsciousness. I looked across the field and saw the Sword of Duir lying about twenty-five feet away. I looked to Cialtie – he was down on his knees with his face buried in his hands. I started to crawl; it was agonisingly slow and painful. I didn't dare look behind me. I knew as soon as he saw what I was doing I was a goner. I finally got my hand on the pommel and turned to defend myself. I didn't need to.