The Mammoth Book of Irish Romance (58 page)

Emptiness. White space.
Please, white space, come on!

Something flashed in her mind, a memory of the emptiness she’d seen briefly in the hole she’d cal ed with her mind. Not quite emptiness, though. Empty, but very, very ful . Tara grabbed Ulick around the waist. His air-shield crumbled, and tons of debris tumbled down into the space where, moments before, they had stood.

“Wonderful.” He kissed her. “Wonderful.” Another kiss. “Clever woman.” Three more kisses accentuated his words, then the playful elation at their narrow escape turned serious. His kisses deepened, her arms wound tighter around him.

Ulick lifted her from the ground and twirled her around, laughing. “Thanks be to mother Eireann, I found ye. She is nothing if not complicated, our wee island’s soul. Why just take me to a wielder of time magic, if she could find my soulmate at the same time?” Had he said soulmate? But Tara was too overwhelmed to savour the term. Right now, she wanted to take in the sea of forest around her, the blue-green giant pine trees that undulated to a rim of mountains in the very far distance. Snow lay heavy on the boughs, twinkled in what looked like early morning sun. They stood on the round top of a hil that alone bore no trees, only grass on its gently sloping flanks. Tara thanked her lucky stars that she stil wore hiking boots with thick socks.

Ulick turned and scanned the world around them. He gasped, then started laughing.

“What?” Tara asked.

“Do ye see those footprints, lass?”

She couldn’t exactly miss them. A lone line in the virgin snow, they snaked up the side of the hil and ended abruptly a few steps from where they stood. Another line of prints seemed less churned, the snow less disturbed.

“Those are my footprints,” Ulick said.

“What?”

“I ran here before I left Tir na nóg. I was very tired by then. And I know it was me, because in that tree yon, I left my lunch. See? The red sack. I was walking in the woods when I overheard the man ye cal Dul aghan meeting with another. A servant in the King’s castle. The man I met in Warrington had discovered their plot, though he knew not who was involved. I turned and ran for the gate to Tir na nóg.”

Tara frowned. “Not for the King?”

He shook his head. “They were between me and the castle, and I felt power rol off this enemy in waves. I would not have stayed alive much longer, had I tried to reach the King. Instead I aimed to reach the one who knew of their doings. Each of us knew half of their plan: he the details but not the mastermind, myself the names but not the plan. I thought if both of us knew al , we stood a better chance of getting word to King Nuada.”

“You mean to tel me that here, it’s no more than hours since you left? Yet you lived through more than 250 years while you were gone?”

Ulick grabbed her hand. “Aye. And in the here and now I must make al speed to the castle.” Tara glanced over her shoulder as she hurried after him, fear clutching her throat. “What about Dul aghan? Won’t he just step through that empty place to Tir na nóg right after us?”

“He wil indeed. And there the Lord of Time wil let him through into Tir na nóg when he feels it is best.”

“When is he likely to feel it is best?” Tara let go of Ulick’s hand to run better. He snatched the lunch bag from the tree as they passed, and settled into an easy trot. He grabbed Tara’s wrist to slow her down. “It’s a long way to go, lass. Pace yerself.” He remembered her question. “The god of time is a good friend of the King. I judge he wil feel it is best for the enemy to step into this land with not enough time for him to catch us, but enough time to tempt him into trying.”

“And then?” A stitch grew in Tara’s side, but at this pace, she felt she could go on for hours.

“And then prepared men wil meet the man ye cal Dul aghan, with his fiendish accomplice trussed and ready for judgment. Not men caught unawares, with a cancer in their midst they do not know of.”

Tara jogged beside him in silence for a while. “And then?” she ventured.

Ulick glanced at her. “And then we explore this land together. Or Eireann. Whatever ye wish. As long as we can do it together.”

“Sounds like a plan.” She grinned at him, and ran a little faster.

The Skrying Glass

Penelope Neri

The Village of Glenkilly, southeast Ireland – 853

“Siobhan! It’s your turn! Come!”

“I don’t want to. I’m frightened!”

“Frightened,
mo muirnin
? There’s nothing to be frightened of! What could go wrong on your lucky day? ’Tis but a mirror, after al ,” her mother soothed, stroking Siobhan’s tangle of black curls.

“Aye, a mirror that shows the future where my face should be, Mother! I’m thinking ’tis better not to know what lies ahead,” she added with a wisdom that belied her years.

“Oh, very wel then. Ask it a question instead. What would you see?” Deirdre thought for a few seconds. “I know! Bade it show us your wedding day!” She smiled. “And your future husband.

Wouldn’t that be fun?”

Knowing her mother would not give up until she took part in her fortune-tel ing games, Siobhan rol ed her eyes and sighed. “Very wel , Mother.”

Taking her seat, Siobhan gazed deeply into the skrying glass. Her lovely face was grave, her expression intent, her brow furrowed.

The large oval looking glass was framed in silver. The precious metal had been exquisitely cast with crescent and ful moons, stars, and al the constel ations of the heavens, including the sign of Scorpio; the lucky star under which Siobhan had been born twelve years ago that very day.

However, the polished silver oval that should have reflected her face was instead as black as a raven’s wing.

At first, Siobhan saw nothing in its inky depths, although she stared, unblinking, for what seemed an eternity.

She was about to give up when her mother motioned her to try again.

“You must ask it your question aloud, daughter. Bid the glass reveal your future husband on your wedding day!”

Siobhan nodded. “Very wel . Show me, mirror!” she commanded. “Show me my husband on our wedding day!”

She stared into the mirror’s ebony depths. Did the future even hold a husband for her? she wondered. Perhaps not. Perhaps she was destined to die a young and tragic death, like one of the martyred Christian saints the monks at the monastery had told her about?

But then, a grey mist began to boil and gather within the mirror’s dark depths, like bil owing smoke.

Little by little, the silvery fog cleared, revealing a tableau of figures and an unfamiliar place.

Her mother’s watching maids gasped.

Siobhan saw three tal men in the looking glass. They stood around a low couch on which sprawled a fourth man. He was bare-chested, deathly pale and very stil . Siobhan could not make out his features, but his terrible battle wounds were plain to see.

The gorge rose up her throat. It was al she could do to keep from retching.

“A Druid healer has been summoned,
min jarl
,” murmured one of the men. “He wil be here before sunset.”

“Too late for this brave warrior,” said a second man. ‘‘He is already dead. By Odin, three of our finest fel like trees before his sword! He wil feast in Valhal a this night!” The little tableau began to blur and dissolve. The three men slowly disappeared. The fourth image – that of the dead man – lingered for a heartbeat more, then he too, vanished.

Blackness returned to the looking glass.

Siobhan jumped to her feet. Horror and sorrow contorted her lovely face. “No!” she cried. “No! It cannot be!”

“Siobhan! What is it?
Mo muirnin,
sweetheart! What did you see?” Deirdre cried. “Was it your bridegroom? Tel me!”

Siobhan did not answer. Rather, she fled her mother’s bower.

The Lady Deirdre and her serving women stared after her, wondering what great tragedy the skrying glass had foretold for their chieftain’s daughter.

It was on that day, the day of her twelfth birthday, that Siobhan vowed she would never wed.

The looking glass had shown her that she was cursed. She’d surely become a widow before she was ever a bride.

One

Never, in al her eighteen summers, had Siobhan seen a man more handsome than this one. The look of him made her heart beat so wildly ’twas a wonder it did not soar from her breast like a frightened bird.

For the first time since her twelfth birthday, Siobhan wondered what it might be like to take a husband.

Her companion gasped. “Oh, mistress, wil ye look at that one!”

“Shush, Aislinn! He’l hear you!” her mistress hissed. “Besides, I’m not blind, girl! I see him wel enough!”

From their perch in the ancient oak, where they had climbed when they heard the hunters coming, Siobhan and Aislinn held their breaths as the man and his party – hounds, horses and al

– halted directly beneath them.

Clad in tunics and tartan mantles, and shod with boots of fur, the hunters blended wel with the forest greenery. The ornate buckles and shoulder pins of Irish red gold that fastened their cloaks said these were the sons of chieftains.

“. . . Nay, that’s where you’re wrong, Finn. I have heard old Diarmaid boasts but the one treasure,” a man with wild red hair, bushy brows and a merry grin was saying.

“Aye? And what is it?” asked the handsome fel ow. He was smiling, his teeth white and even against a wind-browned face and curling black hair. His deep blue eyes twinkled. “A hundred head of cattle? A magnificent red bul ? Or is it fine torcs and gold wristbands the old miser’s hoarding?”

“You’re not even close, Colm. Old Diarmaid’s daughter is his treasure. A lovely maid she is, too, they say. It is said the Lady Siobhan’s beauty could make the stones weep.”

“Weep, is it? Ha! I’ve yet to meet a maid whose beauty made me weep. Mind you, I’ve met many an ugly one that had me sobbing into my beer!” His companions laughed. “Enough of your blarney, Fergus. Hand over a bit o’ that mutton, and leave the maids to me. I’m the one who’s wanting a bride, after al !”

Siobhan’s cheeks burned.

“Did you hear that? They were talking about you, mistress!” Aislinn squeaked. “Why, the cheeky devils!”

“Aye,” Siobhan agreed, annoyed. She disliked being discussed by a band of rogues like this as if she was no more than a joint of beef. She was more than her looks, after al . Why, she was better educated than most men in Eire, thanks to the Christian monks at St Kieran’s monastery.

The holy fathers had not quite persuaded her to become a Christian, but they had taught her Latin, and how to il uminate their Christian manuscripts with coloured inks and pens. She could sew, weave and play her harp. She excel ed at chess, and could dance, hunt, ride horses, and run her father’s household. Even better, she had another skil : a supernatural power that even her father knew nothing about. She had the ability to shape-shift to any form she chose, a magical power she’d inherited from her mother’s bloodline. Such things were best not spoken of, however, for they came not from this world, but the Other.

She scowled, scrunching her face up so that furrows appeared in her brow. She had a mind to show this Lord whatever-his-name-was that she was more than a pretty face! Aye, and so she would!

“Wait here until they leave,” she told her servant crisply, “then take the baskets home. I shal see you anon.” The baskets were fil ed with the medicinal herbs and plants they had gathered for Siobhan’s healing potions.

“Why? What are you going to do, my lady?” Aislinn asked, suspicious. She was familiar with her mistress’ unusual talent. She also knew that Siobhan’s changing spel s rarely worked exactly as her mistress intended.

“Nothing that you need to know about,” Siobhan came back pertly. “Now, hush.” She closed her green eyes and began to chant the spel : “Fleet of foot, / Yet white as snow / Let this hind / Escape the bow. / By the magic / In my blood / Change me!” The leaves ceased their whispering.

The air grew very stil , as if the forest was holding its breath.

Aislinn held her breath, too.

Within a heartbeat, there was a faint tinkling sound, like fairy laughter, or the silvery chiming of tiny bel s.

The fine hairs rose on the back of Aislinn’s neck as light began to stream from Siobhan’s fingertips in a shimmering aura. Siobhan beckoned the light to come to her.

The aura slowly expanded, until it limned Siobhan from her head to her toes.

In another heartbeat, Siobhan dissolved into the sunshine that dappled the leaves, and was gone! The branch beside Aislinn was empty.

Aislinn cursed under her breath, and made the horned sign against evil for protection. Unlike her pagan mistress, she had been properly baptized by a Christian priest.

Almost immediately, Aislinn saw a delicate white doe appear across the forest clearing. She held her breath. It was Siobhan in magical form.

The doe took an elegant step or two, emerging from between two leafy green thickets. Its dainty white head was lifted to the wind. Its velvety nose twitched. Catching the hunters’ scent, the doe turned, and was gone with a parting flirt of her tail.

“Whoa! Did you see that? A fine white doe, it was!” exclaimed Fergus. He took up his bow, swung his quiver of arrows over his shoulder and looped his hunting horn over his belt. “The little beauty’s mine.”

“Not so fast, cousin. You took the stag, remember? This one’s mine,” Colm said firmly. “Eat!

Drink! I’l see you later, at old Diarmaid’s hal .”

“Take your time, Colm,” Fergus said generously. “By the time you get there, I’l be betrothed to his lovely daughter, not you. Fifty head of cattle, cousin! That’s al he’s after askin’. Why, by al accounts, the Lady Siobhan would be cheap at five times such a bride price! Imagine the sons she’l give me!”