Son of the Shadows (49 page)

.

When my mind was quite still, only then I reached out for my brother.

Sean?

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I hear you, Liadan. I'm coming home. What of our mother?

Are you far away?

Not so far. Will I be too late?

You must be here before dusk tomorrow

. Even the voice of the mind can weep.

Can you be here by then

?

We will be there

. In his mind he put his arms around me and held me close, and I sent him back the same image. That was all.

Liadan?

This was not my brother's voice.

Uncle? My heart thumped. Where was he?

I'm here, child. Turn around.

Slowly I got up from the wall and turned to look back down the path into the forest. He was hard to see;

not so much a man as another part of the pattern of light and shadow, the gray and green and brown of trunk, leaf, moss, and stone. But he stood there, barefoot on the soft earth, still clad in his ragged robes and dark, enveloping cloak. His black curls tangled around a face white as chalk. His eyes were clear, colorless, full of light.

I'm glad, you are here. She asked for you.

I know. And I have come. But I think I will need your help.

I felt his fear, and knew the courage it had taken to come this far.

I will take you in. What do you need?

I fear to be

—

touched. I fear to be

—

confined, shut in. And, there are If you can help with this, I can stay for long enough. Until dusk tomorrow

.

"I am honored by your trust," I said aloud. "This cannot be easy."

My weakness shames me. It was indeed a long curse the Sorceress set on me. It has compensations of a sort. But I would not expose my frailties to my sister or to my brothers. It is not pity I seek, merely assistance, to be strong enough for her.

"You are very strong," I said quietly. "Another man would not have survived so long, would not have endured it."

You, too, are strong. Why do you not ask me what you wish to ask?

Because it seems

—

selfish

.

We are all selfish. It is our nature. But you are a generous giver, Liadan. You hold those you love very safe, by any means you can. Later I will show you how to see what you long to see. Now I think we must go in.

"Uncle," I said aloud, rather diffidently.

What is it?

"Why do you reveal your fears to me when you conceal them even from your brothers?"

No man wishes to be weak. Yet my weakness is also my gift. What is commonplace in one world
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may be a source of terror in the other. A closed door, the baying of a hound. And yet, what is a mystery in this place becomes clear and simple in that other. It is image and reflection, reality and vision, world and Otherworld. I show you my fears because you can understand them. You understand because you have the gift. You are not burdened as I am, but your spirit recognizes the

pain and the strength such knowledge brings. You know the power of the Old Ones, how it works still in us.

"This gift—the Sight, the healing mind—it comes from them, from our first ancestors? It comes from the

Fomhoire woman, Eithne?" I knew this thought for truth the instant it came into my mind.

It is very old. Very deep. As deep as a bottomless well, as deep as the darkest recesses of the ocean. Like them, it bides its time.

I shivered.

"Come," said Finbar, trying out his voice, which was clearly seldom used. "Let us be brave, and make ourselves known." And we set off across the field to the house.

There was an awkward moment when folk from kitchen and stables I

came out to stare, and a hound barked, and my uncle's mind communicated to mine, without a sound, a state of heart-hammering, mind-numbing terror, a paralyzed instinct for flight. I sent out a swift, silent call.

Conor? Uncle, we need you.

Folk were muttering, whispering, as we approached. A man had his hand on the dog's collar, but it was growling and snapping, as if some wild thing had come within reach of its jaws. I did not know how to quiet a hound with my mind. Beside me, Finbar froze where he stood.

"Look! That's the man with a swan's wing!" A child spoke out, clear and innocent. "The man in the story!"

"The very same, and my own brother." A calm, authoritative voice spoke from the kitchen doorway and out stepped my Uncle Conor, looking as if this sort of thing were an everyday occurrence. "Away off to your work now. There will be more visitors here before tomorrow night; Lord Liam would be displeased to see you idle."

The crowd dispersed; the dog was led away, straining against the hold on its collar. The moment was over. In my own breast, I could feel Finbar's breathing as it quietened, his heartbeat as it slowed. The next night and day would indeed be an ordeal for him.

"Come," said Conor quietly. "You'll want to see her straightaway. I'll take you."

"I'll talk to Liam," I said. "There are arrangements to be made. Then I must go to my son. He'll be hungry."

I will see about the dogs. Will you right

/

?

Thank you, Liadan. Later, perhaps, you will show me your son.

Liam was surprisingly understanding, especially since I interrupted a meeting with his captains to speak to him. Orders went out immediately that all dogs were to be confined to kennels or kept in the stable area for the next night and day at least, and that folk were to keep themselves to themselves and leave the family alone. Liam's own wolfhounds were chained even as he spoke and led off to temporary captivity with reproachful looks on their long, whiskered faces.

"You're a good girl, Liadan," said Liam, as he returned to his meeting. From him, this was rare praise. He was not a man much given to expressions of approval. I wondered how good he would think me if I told

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him the truth.

"Thank you, Uncle."

It was getting late, almost dusk. There was only one day left, and I longed to be by my mother's side, sharing this last time with her. But as the wheel turns and life slips away, so also new life makes its clamoring presence known, reaching out, urgent for recognition, eager to move forward on its path. My son could not wait. He was awake and hungry, and I sent the nursemaid away to some supper and sat down to feed him. The copper bowl was ready, half filled with warm water, but the girl had not bathed him yet, knowing I loved to perform this task myself. I opened my dress and offered him the breast, and he latched on and sucked with vigor, one small fist beating gently against my flesh while his solemn, gray eyes watched me intently. I hummed under my breath, feeling that odd sense of quiet that comes with the letting down of the milk, as if some power inside bids you be still while the child drinks its fill. Later, I would take Johnny down to see my mother, if she were still awake. Now, it was her time with Finbar, and they were best left alone. She had many farewells to make, but that might be the hardest, save one.

After a while I moved Johnny across to the other side. He began a protest, then clamped his jaws on the nipple and commenced to drink again. For a small baby, he had a hearty appetite. I thought about

Conor's suggestion that I might go to the nemetons. That both I, and in time my son, might join the wise ones. I considered the instructions of the Fair Folk.

No more going off on your own. The boy must stay in the forest

. In neither vision of the future was there any place for my child's father.

Johnny was asleep. There would be no bath tonight. Janis said I bathed him too much anyway; it was unnatural for a child to be so clean or spend so much time in the water. What was he, she joked, a son of

Manannan mac Lir, the sea god? But I laughed off her comments. For Johnny loved the water so much, loved to float, to give himself into its warm supporting hold, to move his small limbs against its supple, changing surfaces. I could not deny him this small pleasure, and I promised him that, in the summer, we would go swimming in the lake. When he was older, I would teach him how to jump off the rocks and swim to shore, as I had done long ago with Sean and Niamh.

I would show him how you could lie there with the sun warm-ing your back and the ancient stone holding you and trail your fingers in the dear water as the silvery fish swam by.

You'll like that

.

I fastened my gown and got up, thinking to put the babe in his cradle. But as I passed the bowl of cooling water, something flashed across its sur face, evanescent as a rainbow, quickly gone.

Had I really seen it?

I moved closer, Johnny warm and relaxed in my arms, and stared down into the still water. I made myself quiet as a standing stone, quieter than the deepest thought.

The water was moving, shifting, as if about to boil, but there was no heat in it. I sensed the door opening and closing silently behind me, but I did not turn.

Good. So you Aid, not need, me, after all.

I knew Finbar was there, in the shadows, but still I remained motionless.

The water began to swirl deasil, sunwise, as if chasing itself in circles. I felt my head swimming.

Then, as abruptly as it had begun, the movement stopped. I gazed into the bowl.

The image was small, but clear. A child's hands, making patterns in sand. The picture tilted, became wider. The child was in a cave, with light filtering through from above, painting the scene in many shades of gray and blue. A cave by the sea, a place where water washed gently in and out, and you could hear the far-off cries of gulls. This was a place where many margins came together, a secret place. Within the cavern, there was a tiny, soft beach where the child sat
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playing quietly as a woman watched. I could not tell if this child were boy or girl. It was maybe two years old, and had a cap of dark red curls, and milk

pale skin. The woman said something, and when the child looked up, I saw its eyes, which were deep and dark as ripe mulberries. The woman was so thin her bones showed through her skin.

She was slender and frail as a winter birch. Her hair was a faded red-gold, hanging loose down her back. She watched the child closely, that it should not venture too near the water. And after a while, she moved to sit on the sand close by the little one, and began to add her own patterns to those already inscribed with such care. Her blue eyes were shadowed; but as she watched her small charge, her wasted features bore an expression of such joy and pride that I felt tears running down my cheeks. The woman was my sister, Niamh.

Then, suddenly, something else was there: a force, a power such as I had never before encountered.

Woman and child played on, unaware. But something was pressing out against me, as if a very strong hand had been placed against my thoughts, as if a barrier had been thrown up to block my vision.

No

, said a voice.

Keep out

. And with that, the image was gone, and I was simply standing there staring foolishly into my baby's bathwater.

Shivering, I decided I did not want to let go of my son after all, and I backed away from the copper bowl and sat down in my chair, cradling

Johnny warm against my shoulder as he slept on. He made small, snuffling noises, as if to reassure me.

From the edge of the room, Finbar watched me.

"Did you see?" I asked him.

"I did not see as you did. But you keep your mind open to me, and so I witnessed your vision."

He did not use the inner voice but spoke aloud in the soft, hesitant way he had, as if he must practice this little-used skill now he was among men again.

"What was that? It was like an iron fist, pushing me away. Like the barrier put by a—by a Sorcerer, to keep prying eyes away from his secrets. The old tales tell of such invisible walls."

"Indeed. This may be a vision best concealed from Conor, I think. I had thought it would be another, whom you would most wish to see, not your sister."

"The two are linked. What I see of the one tells me of the other, for now. But this vision was not of the present. It could not be. That was her child; I read it in her eyes. It must be a vision of what is to come."

"Or a vision of how you wish it might be."

"That's cruel," I said, choking back my tears.

"The Sight is cruel. This you know already. Will you look again?"

"I—I don't know. I don't know if I want to see."

"You're not a very good liar."

So I put Johnny in his bed and covered him with the many-colored quilt I had made and went back to look once more. Finbar made no attempt to direct me, but his silent presence gave me strength.

For a little I thought there would be nothing. The water seemed to cloud and go dark, but there was no movement. It lay still as if long untouched.

Trust. Truth

. I held these words in my mind, and worked to keep out all others.

Truth. Trust

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.

I closed my eyes, and when I opened them again, there was another Ullage on the smooth surface of the water.

Tiny pictures, changing and changing. They were fighting in a strange 'and under a burning sun.

Bran grimaced, ducking as a whirling axe flew past his head. They were in a boat, traveling swift through merciless seas. Gull held the tiller, grinning into the salt spray, and the sail creaked in the gale. Bran was bending over a man who lay sprawled on the deck, a man whose neck and shoulder were heavily wrapped in bloodstained linen.

"Can't you make more speed?" Bran shouted.

"If you want to end this voyage on the bottom of the ocean, I might manage," Gull retorted.

"Fancy a life among the sea monsters?"

Then they were on shore and digging a hole under trees. They were lowering a limp form into the earth.

Other men stood around, silent. The soil was shoveled in, the ground leveled efficiently.

"You should have let Liadan stay," someone said. "She'd have known what to do. She'd have saved him."

There was the sound of a blow and Bran's voice, the tone savage, "Shut your mouth!"