The Hound of Ulster (5 page)

But Skatha was by no means sure of victory, knowing only that she and her people must fight or be enslaved, and though she seemed to accept all the young warriors of her War School, she determined that Cuchulain, who had no equal among them saving Ferdia Mac Daman and was not yet come to his full strength, and who, moreover, she had come to love better even than she loved her own two sons, should not be hazarded in such a desperate venture. And so on the morning of their setting out, she mixed certain sleepy herbs into the cup of wine that she sent him from her own before-dawn meal. And when, the meal eaten and the camp fires trampled out, the warriors rose to take their chariots, Cuchulain lay asleep with his head in the hollow of his shield.

And when Ferdia came striding through the camp to tell her that he could not rouse the Hound of Cullen, she said, ‘Do not try. He will sleep for a day and a night and wake with no harm come to him.'

So Ferdia went back to the rest, and told them what Skatha had done, and they growled among themselves that it was a woman's trick, and were angry for Cuchulain's sake, but there was nothing to be done save take their places with the rest of the host who were already swinging their chariots out on the war trail.

But the drug that would have held most men sleeping for a day and a night, held Cuchulain for only an hour, and when he woke to find himself beside the black still-warm scar of a camp fire, he knew what Skatha had done, and he would have been angry for his own sake, save that there was no time to waste in anger. He snatched up his shield and his two great war spears, and set out in the wake of the rest, his buckler banging behind his shoulder at every step. For a long while he followed by the ruts of the chariot wheels, travelling at the swift untiring lope of a wolf in a hurry. He crossed the ford of the hill stream where they had made their midday halt, and before the shadows began to lengthen, saw far ahead of him the faint dust cloud rising behind their rearguard, and quickened his pace like a hunter when the quarry comes in sight.

And in a while and a while he was running straight up through the long dark wild-goose skein of men and horses and chariots, who called their greetings to him and cheered him as he ran, until he came at last to the side of Skatha's chariot, where she drove with the vanguard. ‘Chieftainess, you do not mix your wine strong enough, for the man who drinks it will be sober again in an hour!'

And she looked down at him over the chariot rim, and sighed. ‘I might have known that where there was fighting in the wind, Cuchulain could not be held back from it.'

At noon next day, the armies of Skatha and the Princess Aifa came together. And in a broad valley where the black rock ridges cropped through the heather they drew up the battle lines and grappled with each other, and the thunder-roll of meeting shields made the hills shake all around them. And all the rest of that day there was red slaughter on both sides, and Cuchulain and Ferdia fighting shoulder to shoulder with the two sons of Skatha, killed, among others, six of the
best and bravest of the Princess's warriors, part of her inmost bodyguard.

Sunset came, and the two hosts drew apart to lick their wounds. And on both sides of the glen the watch fires were lit, and food and drink doled out to the tired warriors. And then, and not until then, Skatha swayed and sank to her knees beside the fire, and when Cuchulain ran to support her and put back the heavy dark folds of her cloak that made red stains on his hands, he saw that her sword arm was laid open to the bone.

Her sons and the other warriors came thronging round her. One brought wine in his warcap, and Eoghan the Druid, who was skilled in the tending of wounds, came hurrying with strips of linen and pungent-smelling wound salves, and knelt by her side, and taking the wine that she had barely tasted, began to cleanse the wound with it.

‘Bind it tightly,' she said. ‘There will be more fighting tomorrow, and I must lead my warriors even if I lash myself to my chariot bow.'

And the Druid said nothing, and the warriors looked at each other with a dark cloud spreading over their thoughts of the next day.

But there was to be no more fighting for the war host, that time.

For in the darkest hour of the night, those who were wakeful about the dying fires heard a challenge from one of the pickets, and even as they sprang up, snatching at their weapons, two of Skatha's men stepped into the leas of the firelight, and between them a man wearing the white swan's feather tuft in his war cap that marked him for one of Aifa's bodyguard, who carried no weapon but the green branch of a herald in his hand. ‘Here is one who would speak with Skatha the
Chieftainess,' said one of the picket warriors. Skatha had roused with the rest and was sitting upright on a pile of skins beside the fire, where she had been trying to sleep; her cloak drawn about her so that no man should see her wound. And when the herald was brought to her, he touched the green branch to his forehead, and stood waiting for her leave to speak.

‘You bring me some word from the Princess Aifa?' she said.

‘The Princess sends you, through my mouth, these words: “Skatha, chieftainess of many spears and my enemy, both our war hosts are weary and their wounds are deep. If we fight again today as we fought yesterday, and maybe the next day, and the next after that, what shall it avail us which triumphs in the end, when we are so weakened that any hungry chieftain may step into our land, and we lying up to lick our wounds? Therefore, let us fight the thing out in single combat, in the open between our war hosts an hour after sun-up, and the war hosts shall play no part in it save that men of mine and men of yours together shall fix the battle ground.”'

When he had finished speaking, there was a long silence, and then Skatha said, ‘I have listened to the words of the Princess Aifa, but I must have time to look into my heart and make sure whether they are good or bad. Therefore, do you go and drink a cup of mead beside the lower fire, and come back in the half of an hour, and you shall have my answer to carry back to the Princess.'

‘The Princess Aifa likes not to be kept waiting,' the herald said. But Skatha pointed towards the fire with her left hand, and her face was bright with angry scorn. ‘Nor does the Chieftainess Skatha like to be prodded along like a dawdling sow on the way to market!'

But when he was gone, she looked about her at her warriors, and said, ‘What am I to do? What can I do? I cannot use my
sword arm, and if the war host fights again, even though we gain the victory, it is as she says, and we may lose all beside.'

Then before anyone else could speak, Cuchulain said, ‘Skatha, my master-in-arms, let me give proof now, whether you have taught me well.'

Skatha looked at him with pain-darkened eyes. ‘If you mean what I think you mean, I tell you no. I do not need unbearded boys to fight my combats for me.'

‘Will you fight your own, then, with a sword arm that you can scarcely lift from your side?' Cuchulain said.

And there was a blur of voices as the warriors came closer in, and man after man thrust forward, claiming his own right to take her place in combat against the Princess Aifa.

But Cuchulain said, ‘Do not listen to them, Skatha; 'twas I spoke first, and to
me
is the right to take your place against this fighting princess.' And then leaning towards her as he half knelt at her side, he said, ‘Skatha, you owe me that, for the trick with the winecup!'

And Skatha thought, and said at last, ‘Surely, I owe you that. So be it, then, but do not cry to me from beyond the sunset!'

‘Tell me one thing, then, if you can, and I will not,' Cuchulain said. ‘What is it that Aifa loves most in all her heart?'

‘What Aifa loves best in all her heart,' Skatha said, ‘are her horses and her chariot and her charioteer.'

And Cuchulain laughed, and went to see his weapons.

And by and by the herald went back to his own chieftainess with Skatha's word. ‘I, Skatha of the Land of Shadows, greet you the Princess Aifa, and sorrow it is to me that I cannot meet you sword to sword, for I am something hurt in the
sword arm. But in my place I send you Cuchulain of Ulster, to be my champion; therefore, let you choose a champion in your turn, or come yourself against the champion I send, as you would if it were I . . .'

An hour after sunrise Cuchulain dropped from Skatha's own chariot at the place of combat that had been chosen by the captains on both sides, and turned to look up at Ferdia who had come with him as his charioteer and weapon-holder, saying, ‘Keep the horses well back.' Then he swung his shield round from his shoulder, and walked forward with his throw-spears ready in his hand to meet the shining figure that came towards him through the heather and bilberry scrub. The chosen place was a piece of level ground that ran out from the black-bloomed mountainside into clear view of both war hosts; and beyond it, suddenly the whole glen fell away into a deep gorge, and a honey-brown hill burn plunged downward with it, arched and white as a stallion's mane.

The enemy champion had left chariot and driver on the far side of the level place, and the rays of the rising sun made a rim of fire round chariot and charioteer and fidgeting team, with nothing beyond them but the darkness of the mountain slopes across the glen. But Cuchulain was watching the figure as it drew towards him, trying to guess at the mettle of the warrior he must meet. And as the figure drew nearer, he saw that it was Aifa herself had come out against him, just as he had hoped.

She too had her rim of sun-fire round her, and the hair that spilled from under her war cap seemed a yellow cloud, as it would be the pollen-cloud that shakes from a hazel tree in March when the wind blows by; and the plates of bronze that
covered her war-tunic rang together as she moved, and for all its weight and the weight of the great round buckler and the two spears she carried, she walked as lightly as a red hind along the hillside.

Cuchulain heard the roar of the watching war hosts like a storm in his ears as he began to run, and the Princess Aifa also began to run, and they came together in the midst of the level place, and saluted each other with their spear tips. And the salute done, they fell to the fight, circling about each other, each seeking to get the sun at his own back and in the other's eyes, while the war hosts were silent, remembering what hung upon their spear points. First they drew off, and each threw their javelins, but each took the light throw-spears on their shields with no harm done; and then they closed in with the broad in-fighting spears, and when the spears were blunted and bent on their shields, they cast them aside as by common consent, and drew their swords. Long and long they fought, circling and crouching in the heather, trying on each other every thrust and parry and champion's trick that they knew, yet neither able to gain the advantage though both were bleeding from more wounds than one. And then at last Cuchulain caught his foot in a heather snarl, and in the instant that he wavered off the balance, Aifa leapt upon him like a wild beast, their swords rang together, and Cuchulain's sword that had been the battle-sword of Conor Mac Nessa himself flew into a hundred shining fragments.

Cuchulain sprang back, with the useless hilt still in his hand, and in the instant before she could spring after him, he shouted, glaring wildly past her, ‘The horses! Name of Light! The horses! They're over the edge and the chariot with them!'

And as Aifa cried out and snatched one frantic glance
behind her, he flung his shield one way and the sword hilt the other and sprang. His arms were round her waist, crushing the breath out of her against the bronze scales of his own armour. With a scream of rage she flung aside her own sword that she could not use at so short a range, and he was just in time to grasp her wrist as she went for the dagger in her belt, and wrench it behind her. She fought like a mountain cat, not hitting man-wise, now that she was captive, but clawing at his face with her free hand, and struggling to get her head down to bite his neck where it rose from the band of his war tunic. And Cuchulain laughed and crushed her harder and harder against him until the breath was all driven from her and she could fight no more. And then he flung her across his shoulder, and turned back to his own chariot.

Ferdia brought it to meet him, laughing as he leaned back on the reins. ‘What have you there?'

‘A wild cat, and its claws are sharp!' Cuchulain scrambled in and the horses sprang away, wheeling and breaking into full gallop, back towards the camp of Skatha, while Aifa's own charioteer, swinging his team half-circle, came thundering after them, and the roaring of the war hosts rose even above the drumming of hooves and the clangour and screeching of the chariot wheels.

They reached the fringe of their own host, and the warriors closed in behind them to cut the pursuit, and in the clear space before the branch shelter that had been woven for Skatha Ferdia brought the team to a trampling halt, and Cuchulain sprang down with his captive still powerless across his shoulder, flung her on the ground, and next instant was kneeling over her with her own knife at her throat. In all the camp of the war host it seemed that no one moved, not a horse in the picket lines nor the youngest armour-bearer, nor Skatha herself,
standing hollow-eyed in the entrance to her shelter and looking down at her foe.

The Princess Aifa looked up past Cuchulain into Skatha's face, and said, ‘Chieftainess, if ever you loved the swiftness of a horse under you or the balance of a spear in your hand, grant me my life that I may know them again. It is one thing to die in battle, but this is another thing.'

‘Ask that of Cuchulain of Ulster,' said Skatha. ‘Your life is his, not mine.'

And so suddenly Cuchulain found her looking up into his face, and he saw for the first time that she was beautiful, with the beauty of a tempered sword blade or an arrow's flight that is dear to the heart of a fighting man. ‘If my life is yours,' she said, ‘be as open handed as you are strong and give it back to me. It is well that those who are renowned as warriors should be renowned as gift-bestowers also.'