The Crow of Connemara (25 page)

Colin took off his shoes and socks on the porch, wrapped the towels around himself, and entered the narrow entranceway. The man he'd glimpsed behind Mrs. Egan was there, smiling sympathetically at the sight of the drenched Colin: a priest, he noted—middle-aged, with brown hair liberally touched with white and beginning to thin at the crown. Mrs. Egan was sliding past him toward the kitchen. “Colin, this is Father James Quinlan, from St. Joseph's,” she said. “He stopped by and was caught in the weather, too.”

“Good to meet you, Father,” Colin said, taking the hand the man extended; it was like shaking a bone-infested piece of fresh cod, and Colin released it quickly. “Give me a few minutes and I'll be back down . . .”

“Certainly,” the priest said. “It wouldn't do to get Mrs. Egan's rugs all damp.”

By the time Colin came back down, Father Quinlan and Mrs. Egan were ensconced at the dining room table drinking tea. She'd lit several candles on the table against the gloom of the day. “Sit,” Mrs. Egan said, pouring a steaming cup in front of one of the empty seats. “A rain like this just seeps into yer very bones.” As Colin sat, Mrs. Egan shot a glance at Father Quinlan, then her attention wandered to the window of the room, where sheets of water were being tossed at the rattling panes. She pointed to the picture of her brother on the mantel of the fireplace. “It was storming just like this the night that Darcy died,” she said, and shivered.

“Indeed 'twas,” the priest agreed. Colin decided not to mention that Mrs. Egan said that every time it stormed. He lifted his cup to his lips, sipped, and set it down again. “So, Colin,” Father Quinlan continued. “Mrs. Egan tells me that yer Catholic, but I ca'nah say I've seen yeh at Mass.”

Colin could feel both of them staring at him. He felt like a child ambushed by his parents after receiving a bad report card. “I was raised Catholic,” he told the priest. “St. Ann's parish in Chicago. Went to parochial schools all the way through high school. But I've kind of lost the habit of going to church over the years.”

“But yeh still believe, don't yeh?” the man persisted.

“I suppose so. Honestly, Father, I haven't given church much thought over the last several years.” That wasn't precisely true. As he'd told Maeve, he'd lost his faith in high school and had never found it again. He wasn't certain he could call himself a complete atheist, but he was certainly agnostic. His father had brought up Colin's lack of church attendance regularly since that time, and he'd (somewhat grudgingly) been a “C&E Catholic” while living in Chicago, going to Mass with the family on Christmas and Easter because it was expected and because that's what the family did; once he moved out to Seattle for school, he gave up even that pretense.

He could imagine poor Father Quinlan on Inishcorr, trying to convince Maeve and the Oileánach that they should come to church. It wasn't a pretty image.

The priest was nodding as if deciding what to say next; Mrs. Egan clucked once reproachfully. “That's why the Oileánach are especially dangerous for yeh,” she said. “Why, 'twas only our faith that saved the good Father and me that night at Darcy's, with the very hounds of hell carousing 'round the house.”

With Mrs. Egan's comment, the shutters all slammed hard against the west side windows of the house. Broken glass chimed against hardwood floors as rain and the wind blew freely into the dining room, toppling over the china figurines Mrs. Egan had placed on a buffet table underneath the window and blowing out the candles. The lace curtains flapped and fluttered like white, grasping hands. The hissing of the gale through the broken panes almost sounded like laughter.

Mrs. Egan cried out in distress as Father Quinlan and Colin lurched from their chairs. Colin rushed outside with Father Quinlan to help resecure the agitated, swaying shutters. The rain cut off as if a celestial faucet had been turned, though the wind still screamed through the trees surrounding the house, making them bend and sway. “Look here,” Father Quinlan half-shouted against the din. “The wind's torn loose the clamps. Help me close the shutters over the window for the time being, Colin, and we'll get something to cover the broken windows until Mrs. Egan can get them repaired. Then we can help her clean up the mess.”

But Mrs. Egan wasn't cleaning. When they went back into the house after securing the outside, they found Mrs. Egan standing in the midst of shards of broken glass and china. She was staring at the center of the table with her hands to her face. “Father . . .” she said, pointing with a finger that trembled visibly.

In the middle of the table was the photograph of Darcy in its frame, sitting perfectly centered as if someone had carefully placed it there, facing the window. “I was watching the two of yeh dealin' with the shutters. I started to go get me broom, an' I turned around and there was Darcy a'smiling at me.”

Father Quinlan crossed himself. “'Tis only the wind,” he said. “A gust toppled it from the mantle, and an angel was looking out for your dear departed Darcy and made sure the picture landed there safely, that's all, 'tis all.” Father Quinlan glanced at Colin. “Would yeh not agree, Colin?”

Colin stared at the picture, at Darcy's smiling face. The man seemed almost to be laughing at him. “Yeah,” he said. “That must be it.”

21

“H
EY.”

The call was so soft that Colin thought he might have imagined it. He turned, and saw Maeve leaning against an oak tree at the edge of Mrs. Egan's property, wearing a long skirt and a loose, red sweater, her dark hair down and falling over the shoulders. He grinned, seeing her, then glanced back toward the house. “Hey, yourself,” Colin answered.

“I see yeh haven't left yet.”

He felt his cheeks growing hot, as if she'd somehow overheard his musings of the other day. “Did you think I was going to do that?” he asked her, and she shrugged without answering. She took a step forward out of the shadows. “Y'know, if Mrs. Egan sees you here on her property, she's going to have a fit. She'll be calling the gardai on you.”

Maeve's laugh was quicksilver. It wrapped around him and drew him toward her. She hugged him, giving him a fleeting peck on the cheek, but turned her head when he tried to make it more. She held him nearly at arm's length, then released him entirely. “Yer Mrs. Egan doesn't worry me a'tall,” she said. “Besides, her dining room window's boarded up at the moment, ain't it? She won't be looking out it.”

The comment brought Colin back to yesterday's storm, and the strange occurrence with Darcy's picture. He felt a roiling in his gut as he looked at her. “How'd you know that?”

“Why d'yeh ask?” she answered. She gazed at him coyly. “Yeh think I had something to do with it?”

“Did you?”

Her smile came and vanished, like the sun slipping behind fast-racing clouds. “Someone who believes in the Papist God wouldn't believe that possible—or they'd attribute it to the devil or something equally gacky.”

“You're not answering my question.”

“I'm thinking yeh already know the answer, but yer asking only because yeh need to pretend yeh don't.” She held out her hand to him. “Come on. I promised yeh a talk. Let's take a stroll, the two of us, and we can have that chat.”

He hesitated, then took her hand. She led him away from the house and farther up the slopes into a tangle of trees and brush, moving along winding, narrow trails that he couldn't see himself but that she seemed to find easily. They crossed two quick streams running down the headland, nearly hidden underneath the heather. He was panting as he followed her, though the climb didn't seem to bother Maeve. Finally, she paused in a small open glade sheltered by oaks and hawthorns; there, he saw a small earthen mound, an outcropping of gray rocks speckled with moss thrusting through the loam blanketing it. Around the mound was a ring of slightly-raised earth, as if there'd once been a low wall surrounding the hillock, now pressed down and cushioned with centuries of loam and grass. Maeve sat on one of the boulders, waiting as he straggled after her. “Yer fierce slow,” she said.

“You're fierce fast,” he answered. “And I think I stepped in the stream back there.”

“Ah, yer a fine, fine singer, Colin Doyle, but a poor tramper.” She laughed again and patted the rock next to her. “Come and sit. The sun's nice.”

He sat beside her and she leaned into him. The sun dappled the ground, and the stone was surprisingly warm. He was nearly sweating after the climb, despite the chill of the day. He put his arm around Maeve's shoulder, enjoying the feel of her against his side. It felt right; it felt natural. “Where are we?” he asked. She raised an eyebrow. “I mean, where's this place? It feels old, somehow. I thought I'd explored most of the Head, but I've never seen this before.”

“Yeh don't know how to look for it,” she answered. “I do. But it's interesting what yeh say, that this place feels old. I like that.” She moved away from him so that his arm dropped, leaving his side cold. She shaded her eyes from the sun. “It's been two days. So have yeh been thinking about yer visit to Inishcorr?” she asked.

“I have, and it seems everyone else has as well,” he told her. “The entire damn town has been giving me their opinion.”

One shoulder lifted under the sweater, then fell. “I care nah about the town's opinion. Only yers.”

“Maeve, I still don't
know
where we stand. I've enjoyed being with you, I've loved the time we spent together, and yeah, maybe there could be more between us if things keep going. Being with you was wonderful, and I'd
like
it if things kept going between us. But right now, I don't think I really know you well enough to give you more of an answer than that. I
want
to know you better. I feel like we could share more. I guess . . .” He hesitated, feeling guilty over what he'd actually been thinking the last few days. His hand reached into the pocket for his grandfather's stone, as if the answer might be there; her gaze followed. “I guess I'm willing to stick around to find out what's possible with us. Is that good enough?”

“
Are
yeh willing to stick around?” she asked. “Even if it means yeh have to deal with the crap the locals are going to give yeh?”

She was staring at him, and he had to look away, remembering how he tried to convince himself to do exactly the opposite, with nearly the same words. “I thought about leaving,” he admitted. “But I haven't.”

“Not yet yeh haven't.” She said it flatly, so that he couldn't tell what she meant by the comment.

“What about
your
people?” The rejoinder was reflex. “Some of them seemed less than thrilled about me.”

“Like Niall?” She leaned closer to him again, her arm sliding between his arm and side. She laid her head on his shoulder. “Niall doesn't hate
you
specifically. He would hate anyone I chose to be with. An' he's just one person. The other night—well, yeh saw how m'people responded to yeh in the pub. I remember hearing lots of applause, and seeing everyone watching yeh, all mesmerized. Yer quite the bard, Colin, and Niall . . . he's jealous of yeh more than anything.”

“Of me?”

“It's more complicated than yer thinkin',” she told him, and shook her head. “'T'ain't just the relationship. He's afraid I've made a wrong choice with yeh, but I know I haven't. Yeh see, sometimes two people care about the same thing deeply, and yet differ completely on what needs to be done about it.”

“And what is it the two of you care about?”

“Inishcorr,” she said, “or rather, not the island but the people there: Niall for his people and me for mine. We're the Last.” Her voice capitalized the noun.

“The last of what?”

She didn't answer. Instead, she lifted her head to his and gave him a long and lingering kiss. When it ended, she stood. From a leather pouch tied to the belt she wore over her skirt, she took a small metal flask. She unscrewed the top, then poured a small amount on the mound behind the rocks. “For the fairy folk,” she said. She took a small sip from the flask herself. He watched her face. There might have been a small grimace, but she licked her lips afterward and extended the flask to him. “Here, have a drink.”

He took the flask and sniffed at it, then drew back, his eyes widening. “Wow,” he said. “That's got a kick. Potcheen?” She nodded. He put the lip of the flask to his mouth and tilted it, listening to the gurgle of liquid inside. The swig was larger than intended, and he swallowed fire that burned all the way down to his stomach, making him gasp for air. “That's smooth,” he said in a strangled voice. He drew in another breath. “Just a little stronger than I expected.”

Maeve laughed at that, and the sound seemed to linger in the air, reverberating like the strike of a gong. He thought he could almost
see
her amusement, like a winding line of fireflies emerging from her mouth, except that he'd never seen fireflies in Ireland, and certainly never ones bright enough to be seen in the daylight. The light about them had changed as well; the sunlight was the rich gold of late afternoon, and the grass under his feet was a saturated emerald that throbbed and ached in his vision. “Maeve?” he called out, trying to find her in the dazzling vision. His voice sounded too low, and he saw
his
voice as well, an umber wave that rippled out from him, foaming white at the edges like a great sea wave. “Maeve?”

He couldn't see her, though he swept his gaze around the glade, but heard her call back to him. “Don't worry,” her voice said. “Just let it happen.”

“Let
what
happen?” he asked. The umber swell crashed and broke around her.

Dark laughter answered him, coming from unseen dozens of throats all about him. The light dimmed, as if storm clouds had hidden the sun. He looked up, but everything was confused and fuzzy, and he felt as if he were falling. His arms flailed, and hands grasped at him while low voices murmured words he couldn't understand. He could feel his body being pulled, dragged along the ground by his feet as the world went abruptly dark around him. He tried to kick at those pulling him, but his legs refused to work. Stones and dirt scoured his back, and his head bumped against something hard and solid, like he'd been taken down a series of steps. Yellow lights flickered across his vision and more voices filled the darkness, deep and laughing. They spoke in Gaelic, not English, so fast that he could understand none of the words. A face—the face of an old hag—looked down at him, and he felt her hands sliding across his face, the dry, scaled skin of her hands like fine sandpaper. “He was born with a blue caul,” the old woman said to someone. “An' the voice is the one that's needed. 'Tis good, that.”

Voices answered her, and he squinted, trying to see them. “So what?” a male voice shouted back. “That doesn't mean shite. Not with him. His grandfather was much the same, and that di'nah work.”

“Niall?” Colin called out. He tried to focus on the shapes in front of him and failed. Behind them, he glimpsed a huge room lit fitfully by guttering, smoking torches, the spots of light receding well into the distance. The walls were rough stone, though with gleaming and polished half-pillars carved into them at a separation of several strides. The ceiling was lost in darkness above. The room could have easily held thousands of people, but Colin could only see a few dozen gathered here, moving in the twilight darkness, though perhaps more were lurking in the shadows further out in the hall. “Maeve, where are you?” Colin called, but there was no immediate answer except for a susurrus of laughter from those around him, as if he'd said something amusing.

“You
dare
call for Her in that manner?” the hag said. “That's not her name. That's a
new
name, and t'ain't hers. T'ain't her
true
name.” She stood at his feet as he struggled to sit up. She spat on the tiles between them. But a shadow moved behind the hag, and she glanced over her shoulder. The hag bowed to someone in the shadows and slid away. There was a fluttering of wings, and he thought he saw a huge raven descend from the air into the misty shadows of the hall, but even as Colin pushed at his glasses to see more clearly, from the mist a human figure emerged: tall, spectral, its face hidden by the hood of a cloak that might have been red, but appeared black in the dimness. Behind the figure, a white-horned bull stamped its feet in shadow, snorting and angry.

“So yeh can hear us, mortal?” he was asked. It was a woman's voice, and he thought at first it might be Maeve's except that this voice sounded older and deeper, as if time and a hard life had roughened and scrubbed away any lightness it had once held.

“Of course I can. I'm not deaf.” More of the sinister laughter billowed from the shadows in response.

“Do yeh know who I am?” The figure swept back her hood, and he was looking at Maeve-but-not-Maeve. This face was much older and more careworn, and other visages seemed to cross her face like clouds chased by winds.

“The Morrígan,” he said. The name came to him; he spoke it without thinking, without knowing why.