Only the Stones Survive: A Novel (19 page)

With an effort, Éremón regained the use of his limbs. He reached out to pull her away. One of his arms inadvertently brushed the stone.

He sprang back as if he had been burned.

Taya did not notice. She snuggled against him and looked up into his face. “I have never asked you for a bride gift,” she said sweetly, “or anything at all for myself. Give me this hill, Éremón. For my own, my own place. Let it be known henceforth as Tara, the Hill of Taya, and when I am dead, build my tomb here.”

Glancing over her head, Éremón saw Amergin watching them. The bard who had wanted Taya for himself. The bard who had thought he could challenge a warrior!

The division of Ierne was sealed beside the Stone of Destiny.

No one realized it at the time.

Éremón lifted Taya above his head and held her there, pinned against the sky like a trophy brandished aloft.

NINETEEN

A
FTERWARD,
WHEN I THOUGHT
about that day with Shinann—and I thought about it often—I was not sure if I actually became a tree, but I was certain she had opened a door for me. Where it might lead I could not guess and did not care. I was still young enough to mistake change for growth.

If my father had been more receptive I could have talked to him about it. I did not think he would scold me, but I found it impossible to begin the conversation.

I had other things to keep me occupied. Being frequently on the move was exhilarating; I could feel myself growing stronger through a succession of challenges. Find new hidden places where we could live for a while, make certain there was fresh water nearby and an adequate food supply, determine if there were any primitive tribes in the area, help transport our ever-decreasing belongings …

The most recent refuge we had discovered was a string of limestone caves that honeycombed the cliffs overlooking a bountiful fishing river. Ierne in her bounty possessed many such caves, but I liked these because they were near the former territory of my own clan. Besides, it was a refreshing change to leave the forests for a while. The living trees were our friends, but it felt good to have a roof over our heads when the rain threw its shining spears.

A few of the limestone caves were big enough to house an entire clan. Since the Day of Catastrophe, the largest surviving family of the Túatha Dé Danann, a group from the south, numbered twenty-seven.

Mongan’s clan had ten. In addition to my father, Drithla, and me, there were Rimba, Sinnadar, Demirci, Trialet, and Piriome, whose parents were dead, and the Dagda and Melitt. The task of caring for the little ones increasingly fell upon myself and the elders. My father was with us and yet not with us. Sometimes I watched his shadow on the wall to be certain he was real.

Because Shinann had told me she was related to Mongan, I hoped she would join us in our cave, but she stayed with Dananns from the west. I understood; there were substantial differences in the clans. Each had been uniquely influenced by the region they occupied, and in any situation they preferred to be with their own.

I wondered if the New People would have the same experience.

That was a very adult thought.

When we found the limestone caves, they already were inhabited by bats, a large population of little creatures with pointed faces, leathery wings, and a pungent dung whose eye-watering odor came out to meet us. We made no effort to displace them; this had been their home first. During the day, they clung to the ceilings of the caves like densely packed leaves, peacefully asleep. At sundown, they awakened to go hunting, sweeping out of the caves in great clouds, emitting a high-pitched music that only a few of us could hear. They did not return until the dawn.

Making accommodation with them should not have been difficult: they were children of the night; we were children of the light. There was room enough for us all above the river. But the bats frightened some of the children. Little Piriome cried whenever they stirred. Rimba called them “monsters” although they were smaller than one of his feet, and several times I had to stop him from throwing stones at them.

Only my sister, Drithla, snugly nestled in Melitt’s arms, loved them. She laughed when the bats swooped overhead and reached her dimpled baby hands toward them. I was so proud of her then.

Our real problem was one of timing and could not be resolved. We needed to stay hidden during daylight and go out at night, like the bats, in order to forage. This meant bats and Dananns were crowded into the caves together during the day. The bats were wonderfully clean; they bathed each other with their tongues and used a communal dung heap. But that smell!

Perhaps they thought we smelled bad too.

Living at such close quarters in the caves could not be a long-term solution, although it did give me an opportunity for frequent conversations with the Dagda. How strange that I had once resented his trying to teach me. Now I soaked up everything he said. I was grateful to my father for giving me the gift of remembering.

But did I ever thank Mongan for it? Sadly, that is one thing I do not remember.

Sadness was in the eyes of the Dagda, too, when I once surprised him gazing at me. “Is something wrong?”

“Everything,” he replied. “You are missing out on so much, Joss.”

“Like what?”

“Your first Being Together should have been the first of a series of rites of passage as you gradually matured. When you were ready, it would have been my privilege to introduce you to the temple on the hill and the two that stand near it. You would have learned their rituals and prepared to take part in them. But we cannot do that now.

“Our ancestors left their original home because it became uninhabitable, and they were determined not to allow that to happen here. The temples were part of their effort. Everything must be kept in balance, Joss; balance is one law that can never be broken.”

“I don’t quite understand.”

“I know you don’t. Children are supposed to learn gradually, as they are able to absorb knowledge. Maturity is coming upon you too quickly, and neither you nor I are ready.”

I tried to persuade the Dagda that I could learn whatever he wanted to teach me, but he would not be hurried. In his mind, there was a natural progression he refused to disrupt. “It has been difficult enough to adapt ourselves,” he kept saying.

But we kept talking together in the gloom of the caves.

When I told the Dagda about my experience with Shinann, he was pleased. “She is a remarkable individual; you are fortunate that she likes you. Her generation was a great leap forward for us. Until they came along, talents were dispersed unevenly among us, and almost at random, but the few children who were born in Shinann’s season were extraordinarily gifted. The elders recognized it first. We speculated among ourselves as to what the future might hold, what wonders would be performed when these young people matured.”

“Tell me!” I urged.

A light faded from the old man’s eyes. “They never had the chance to show us, Joss. Even for members of the Túatha Dé Danann, they aged slowly, ripening like the sweetest fruit on the vines, and we did not rush them. We knew they would be worth waiting for. But”—the Dagda’s lower lip trembled, reminding me how old he really was—“the New People arrived,” he said flatly. “The brightest flames of Shinann’s generation were extinguished on the battlefield. They are gone now, except for her.”

There were so many things I had not been told! My childhood had passed like a pleasant dream while titanic forces were destroying my future, and I should have
known
.

I did not say those words aloud, but the Dagda heard me. He put one withered hand atop my own. “When you have children of your own, Joss, you too will want to protect them.”

“Why would I want to have children to raise in a dark cave filled with bats while savages outside hunt them with spears!” I did not realize I was shouting until I heard Piriome start to cry.

Melitt came bustling forward from the rear of the cave to scoop the little girl into her arms and rock back and forth with her, murmuring shapeless sounds of comfort. Over Piriome’s blond head she chided, “Now see what you’ve done, Joss. Do you want to be the last of the Túatha Dé Danann?”

“No! I mean of course not, but there are plenty of other youngsters who…”

“There were never plenty of youngsters,” said the Dagda, “but we always thought there were enough. Until now.” He shook his head.

In the dark of the cave, I felt the weight of the future we might not have.

It was too heavy; I went outside to walk along the riverbank. The sun had not yet set, but I did not care. Let the New People, the Mílesians or whatever they called themselves, try to attack me! I would tear them limb from limb; I was stronger than they would expect, stronger than even I knew—seething inside with the fury of one who has been robbed of riches he did not appreciate until it was too late.

Something shivered the reeds on the far side of the river.

Busily gathering material for weaving baskets, two Ivernian women, mother and daughter, had been unaware of the passage of time. Usually they would have returned home before the sun sank so low, but on this day they were too engrossed in their conversation to notice.

The daughter had just learned that she was carrying her first child. She was little more than a child herself. She was proud and fearful and needed the sort of reassurance her husband could not possibly give. Birth was a natural act she had seen many times before, but when it was happening to her, everything was different. She was bombarding her mother with questions. How much longer would she have to wait for her baby? What foods should she be eating? Should she still accept her man into her body? And perhaps the most important of all to such a young woman, what changes would take place in her body?

Her mother had borne a number of children; the Iverni were a fertile race. But this was her eldest surviving daughter and had a special place in her heart. She took time to answer every question at length until the girl was satisfied.

The reed gathering took longer than usual.

When they noticed that the light was failing, they hurried to collect one last armful of material, wading into the shallows with their scythes ready.

The mother gave a shout of alarm.

Her daughter looked up to see a strange man staring at them from the opposite bank.

The river was old and winding and deeply cut through the hills, but shallow in this season. The man could easily cross over to them. It was too late to run. The mother stepped in front of her daughter and extended her arms to both sides like a wall of protection.

I had been brimming with courage until I found myself actually facing strangers. My mind hurried to catch up with what my eyes were reporting. They were only two women, not Dananns, and not dressed like Mílesians. Each held a small bronze scythe in her hand.

They looked as horrified to see me as I was to see them.

Hate begins with fear,
said a remembered voice in my head.

“Don’t be frightened. I won’t hurt you,” I called out to them. Even to my ears, my voice sounded tentative. It was not strong enough to carry across the sounds of the water. I drew a deep breath and tried again. Louder.

One of the women gave a shriek and dropped her scythe. Seizing the arm of the other, she pulled her up the riverbank, and they ran for their lives.

When I told the head of my clan about my unfortunate encounter with the two women, Mongan was unconcerned. “We are sure to be seen from time to time, Joss, but those two don’t sound menacing. Did they threaten you?”

“They had scythes for cutting reeds, but they were too busy running away to use them.”

“Two frightened women are no danger. Forget about them.”

“What if they tell others about us?”

“They do not know anything about us, do they? All they saw was you alone on the riverbank. And what others would they tell? You said they were not of the New People.”

“Their clothes were different; they belonged to one of the primitive tribes, I think.”

“There is nothing to fear from them, then,” Mongan said dismissively. “Go and play with the other children and let me be.”

His words shocked me, confirming my worst suspicions. My own father was not aware that I had become a man.

The Dagda was asleep—he was beginning to sleep a lot—and did not hear our conversation. When he awoke, I did not tell him about it. To do so would betray a weakness on Mongan’s part. Circumstances had made him chief of the Túatha Dé Danann, and my loyalty must be to him, even if he did not recognize an important change in his own son.

TWENTY

T
HE MÍLESIANS
had won the battle with the Túatha Dé Danann, but there was no peace. Éremón’s fort was not built, and the outline was not even delineated on the earth with stones. To the surviving sons of the Míl, it represented a war yet to be fought.

“Don’t take sides,” Amergin warned Sakkar unnecessarily. “I know my brothers, neither Éremón nor Éber Finn will give the width of a hair in this matter, and you don’t want to get caught between them. Ever since they were knee-high, those two have fought about everything: who was the strongest, who was the bravest, who was the favorite—and our father encouraged them. He was raising them to be warriors like himself, and he wanted to make sure they would be fiercely competitive.”

“What about your other brothers?” Sakkar wanted to know. “Donn was a warrior too.”

“Yes, but Donn had more than one side to him,” said Amergin. “Fighting was something he did only if he had to—and then he usually won because he used his mind as well as his body. He never went looking for a battle, though. He filled his life with other interests.”

“As you and Colptha did.”

“Druidry isn’t an interest, Sakkar. It is born in a person like the color of their eyes. Druids come in different sizes and shapes, male and female, with a variety of abilities. What sets us apart is that druids are in touch with the unseen world.”

An old superstition fluttered awake in Sakkar’s belly. “What unseen world?” he asked warily.