The Legends (9 page)

Fineen’s first stoke of bad luck was that the spy from Emain Macha had difficulty locating the two men he left behind. The spy rode to within view of the earlier camp’s location but since he did not see the horses or tents, he assumed that he was mistaken about the location. As a result, he spent the next couple of hours wandering around the general vicinity. Eventually he decided that he was correct the first time and it was only then that he encountered the men who had been left behind, sleeping peacefully in and among the rocks and trees.

When the spy was finally escorted into his camp, Fineen was furious at the delay but delighted to finally be able to begin his mission. Morale in the camp was particularly low because none of the men were happy with living outdoors in the rain and the dampness for weeks on end. As Beltaine approached the queen’s champions knew they were missing one of the major celebrations on the Celtic calendar. With the summer coming on, they would far rather be working their fields and living in the comfort of their own homes. Instead they were chasing infants on behalf of their noble queen whose sanity was frequently questioned even at the best of times.

Questioning the spy, Fineen was pleased to discover that although fourteen champions were included for defense, the Ulster men would not only be outnumbered but they were also on foot. Certainly they would be no match for his detachment’s war chariots. Fineen was quick to give the order to mount up and his squadron, relieved to be completing their mission, was quick to obey. In a matter of minutes the forces of Queen Maeve were thundering north and east across Meath and heading for the Boyne.

They travelled only about a mile when the morning sunshine turned into afternoon rain. While chariots moved quickly on dry, hard ground even a light rain caused its share of difficulties. Wet grass or muddy paths did little to slow the horses but chariot wheels had a tendency to slide, especially when it was necessary to make any type of turn. Since the path they were taking followed the terrain, there were plenty of turns and continuing at speed could easily cause a chariot to overturn. Cursing the luck, which found him with chariots instead of riding horses, Fineen had no choice but to order his troops to slow their pace.

As the skies darkened and the rain intensified, the pace of his troop was further slowed by the thickening mud along the pathway to the Boyne. Fineen’s men were soaked to the skin, cursing loudly at every turn, and the horses were breathing heavily at the extra weight they were required to carry. Fineen looked to the west to see if any break in the weather might be on the horizon but was again forced to curse his bad luck.

As any good leader would do, Fineen considered the options that faced him, now that the fates destroyed his original plan. While it didn’t look like he would be able to intercept Cathbad before he reached his destination, he knew that his prey also had to travel in the same conditions. It would, therefore, do no harm to continue even at a snail’s pace. He also remembered what the spy said about Cathbad’s mission. Seemingly neither Maeve nor her druids actually believed that Lugh of the Long Hand was likely to take the infants into the under-world. Absurd, was the word the spy had reported.

Although nearly everyone in Connaught had more faith in Cathbad than they did in any of their own druids, it did seem a bit hard to believe that the child would be in Cathbad’s company one minute and gone completely the next, having been spirited away to the land of eternal youth. Assuming that Cathbad’s disappearing act was not successful, there was apparently no rush because his party would be an easy target as they attempted to return home. As he watched his men slog through the mud, a plan that included waiting for the Ulster men to finish their hopeless task and turn back toward Emain Macha, was beginning to sound quite appealing.

Fineen was just about to call for his men to halt and shelter from the storm when one champion pulled up next to him and pointed into the hills above. Shielding his eyes against the rain, Fineen followed the man’s finger and saw a large number of people on foot, some distance to the east of his detachment. The group was picking its way up the hills that rose from the river valley. Watching carefully for several moments, Fineen was confident that his prey was in sight. He was also confident that they had not completed their mission because if they had, the group would be either coming down toward the river or not moving at all. The discovery caused him to reconsider his decision once again and he urged his men forward.

Fineen’s detachment continued on the flat path along the river, running parallel with Cathbad’s movements well up on the hillside. He had little doubt that Conchubar’s champions now knew he was coming but for a time they continued working their way to the east and further up the hill. Turning his attention to his own men it became obvious that the horses pulling the chariots were nearly spent. The path was a spongy mess and if one chariot got stuck the entire troop was impeded. When the chariots were not moving, they slowly sank into the mud. Eventually Fineen recognized that the vehicles were more a hindrance than a help and he ordered his detachment to halt and dismount. If they were to overtake Cathbad, the rest of the journey would have to be on foot.

While the men gathered their weapons for the assault, Fineen again cursed his misfortune. Not only were the chariots useless in any upcoming battle, but his men now faced a long and steep climb after which they would have to fight the Ulster champions who held the higher ground. That alone would eliminate the advantage of his numbers and there was no reason to be confident of a victory.

Once again, the idea of waiting for the results of Cathbad’s efforts was beginning to sound like the better course. But then he thought of Maeve and her foul temper and he thought of his own wife and children and what might happen to them if he were to be disgraced. Perhaps, with a little luck, which certainly didn’t seem to be with him today, someone could grab the children during the battle that would follow. “Right,” he thought, “with a little luck.” And again he cursed his fate as he urged his men on.

As Cathbad peered into the rain trying to pick out the landmark that would signal the journey’s end, the leader of Conchubar’s champions, a man called Lorcan, who had been guarding the rear of the procession, approached.

“With respect,” Lorcan began, “some time ago I noticed a troop of charioteers in the far distance and I have been tracking their progress. They seemed to be following us but it is clear that because they are mounted, they have now closed on us quite quickly. Although the visibility is not great, one of my lads thought he saw the banner of Connaught. It is possible that Maeve has sent a troop after the child.”

Cathbad was alarmed at the revelation and quickly moved to a vantage point to the rear of the parade so that he could judge the threat. Standing on a rock he peered intently down the hill and raising his arms he closed his eyes as if he could somehow place himself among the trailing force. When he opened his eyes, he calmly announced, “Maeve has sent her men to take the child.”

The Ulster champion looked down the hill in alarm. “They have abandoned their chariots and are coming up the hill on foot. Do you have any orders?”

Cathbad looked down into the thickening rain and then turned and looked at his goal that he could now see was about fifty yards beyond where his entourage was resting. “Form a battle line here,” he ordered. “Keep your men between their forces and that grove of hawthorn bushes at least until I have presented Ferdia to his grandfather. If I am successful and Lugh of the Long Hand takes custody of the child they will have no reason to fight especially since they are far from their home. If I am not successful, you will have to hold them off until we can make our way back to Emain Macha.”

Lorcan looked down again at the oncoming troops. “I make it about twenty champions and an equal number of drivers and spear-carriers. Although they outnumber us, we hold the high ground. We will hold,” he stated flatly.

Cathbad was pleased with Lorcan’s confidence but concerned with the number of enemies who now closed to within a couple hundred yards. It was decidedly possible that a few of them could slip past Lorcan’s battle line and the remainder of his druids and witnesses would be in no position to defend the child. Cathbad then looked to the west and south noting that the clouds were even blacker in that direction. “Perhaps I can buy us a bit more time,” he said with a grim smile.

Returning to the rock from which he first viewed Maeve’s champions, Cathbad removed his heavy cloak revealing the white and gold robe of a great druid and raised his staff to the sky, clutching it with both hands. Turning his head skyward, he began chanting in a language the Lorcan could not understand.

As Fineen and his men struggle up the hill, the Connaught commander looked up and saw Cathbad standing on a rock, his robe and beard bent by the wind and rain, his staff held high, horizontal to the ground. Although he couldn’t hear what the druid was saying he knew, as did every man in his detachment, that Cathbad was calling down some misfortune on the men of Connaught.

Just then a distant flash of lightening lit the northern sky providing a backlight for the druid and the Ulster champions who had taking their positions across the hill behind him. Fineen and his men froze in their steps. They knew that Cathbad brought champions to protect the children but in that brief moment of illumination, it was entirely unclear just how many of Ulster’s finest stood in their path. Without a doubt, it was more than a few token warriors and possibly more than the dozen or so they originally estimated. Of greater concern was the old druid standing before them. All of Fineen’s men had heard of Cathbad’s great power, which dwarfed the skills and abilities of their own druids. Whatever fear they might have felt at the sight of Ulster Champions taking battle positions, was nothing compared with their fear of Cathbad’s power.

Just then the rain strengthened and it seemed as if a curtain of water was drawn across the hill above them. All sight of Cathbad and the Ulster men was gone and all they could see was a solid wall of water. The rain now beat down with an intensity none of Maeve’s men ever recalled. But it was not just the rain falling from the sky, because streams of water from rain which had fallen higher on the hill made it seem as if they were wading uphill and against the current in a small stream. Several Connaught champions slipped backwards, scrambling in vain to regain their footing. Others accepted their fate and turning on their backsides to protect themselves, allowed the water to take them down the hill.

Fineen tried to rally those that remained on their feet but he knew there was nothing he could do to contend with the power of Cathbad. His day was cursed by the gods and there was nothing he could do to alter what was fated. All that he could hope for was that Cathbad’s power was not strong enough to call on Lugh of the Long Hand to take Cúchulainn’s children. Shouting into the wind, he ordered his men to return to the chariots and shelter there until the storm broke.

Because of the intense rain, Lorcan’s Ulster champions also lost sight of their adversaries below. Remarkably, although the rain intensified higher up where they had taken their positions, it seemed like a far heavier wall of rain was holding steady some fifty yards down the hill. That wall was the outer limit of their vision. Lorcan ordered his men to hold fast expecting that the Connaught champions would eventually break through the wall and the battle would commence.

Satisfied that he had done everything possible to slow the advance of Maeve’s warriors, Cathbad hurried back to the remainder of his entourage and urged them to begin the final ascent. Since many of them realized what was transpiring further down the hill, they needed no additional urging and the procession was soon scrambling forward.

A few minutes later, Cathbad led the party toward a grove of hawthorn bushes on a small rise not far from the base of the hill of Knowth. To everyone’s relief, Cathbad announced that the journey was at an end. As the party gathered, Cathbad directed them toward a suterrain or passage nearly adjacent to the hawthorn grove. The suterrain appeared to be a small opening amidst the rocks at the base of the hawthorn bushes. This was undoubtedly the portal through which, if invited, Ferdia would pass on the way to his grandfather.

As the people gathered around Cathbad, he instructed the lesser druids to form a semi-circle about ten yards from the suterrain. The remainder of party was told to form behind the druids in the same concentric formation. The litter bearers came forward and carefully placed the heavy granite crib at the mouth of the suterrain.

Cathbad then asked Mairéad and the oldest man from among the witnesses to come forward. While the litter bearers held a cloak over the crib to protect the child from the heavy rain, the two were instructed to make sure Ferdia was comfortable and had not been dislodged during the trip. The cloth cap was drawn back disclosing a smiling infant who apparently wasn’t the slightest bit disturbed by a long journey or by the discomfort of a cold and wet day.

Mairéad fussed about the child, readjusting the down mattress, straightening his robe and again tucking the blanket in around the baby. When she was satisfied, she bent down and kissed Ferdia’s forehead for the last time and pulled the cover back over the rock crib. Cathbad then instructed that the second set of litter bearers place their burden containing the child’s treasures next to the crib. When everything was positioned to his satisfaction in front of the suterrain Cathbad removed his outer garment and handed it to the elderly couple. He instructed the witnesses to spread the cloak over the stone crib and treasures to protect them from the elements.

When this was accomplished, the witnesses and litter bearers returned to their places behind the lesser druids and Cathbad, by now soaked to the skin followed them to a point a few feet in front of the druids and a few feet from the crib.

As soon as everyone took their positions, Cathbad raised his arms to the heavens, his stout walking stick clenched tightly in his right fist. The rain continued, soaking his uncovered hair and beard and dripping off his face as he turned it up toward the sky. The storm seemed to intensify once again as the skies opened and the rain bucketed down. In the distance, lightening flashed across the sky. Cathbad held the pose for several moments before he roared: