Waves in the Wind (25 page)

A fast pace brought me down from the hill country just before dusk. It was an empty land. Wooded mounds dotted open grasslands where but a few isolated groups of cattle and sheep grazed. I made ready to bed down beside a cairn of stones when I saw a chariot in the distance. Presently, two Corcu Duibne warriors aboard the chariot approached, long ropes towing two men behind them.

Probably slave takers,
I thought, crouching behind the rocks, but there was little I could do against them with only a blackthorn cudgel. They passed within a hundred paces of me and, as they did, I heard one of their captives singing an old ballad and knew that voice. My heart thrilled as joyous tears crowded my eyes, for no man could sing with such a voice but my friend Laoidheach.

I waited until they had gone well past and followed them at a safe distance, knowing they would soon make camp for the night. I was no warrior and lacked skill in the use of weapons. Yet, Laoidheach lived…by the hands of the gods he lived, and I was determined to try to free him despite the risky nature of it.

Sure enough, they halted by the riverbank and lit a fire after pasturing their horses. The men tied their captives to a tree and made ready for the night. These were brutal, battle-hardened warriors, and I prayed silently to the Morrigan to aid me in her battle aspect. I thought my best plan was to sneak upon them in the dark and club them while they slept.

Hidden within the brush, I waited until clouds had stolen the moon from the night sky. It was late when I kissed the serpent ring for luck and began creeping as silently I could though the long grass to where a warrior lay sleeping. The firelight revealed a giant of a man with bright red hair. He wore a leather jacket with studs of iron.

I crept up to him and was lifting my cudgel when he rose up to his elbows and grunted, “You would murder me as I slept? Well, now it’s three to sell to the salt mines in the north,” and grabbed for his sword.

The spirit of Macha, the battle fury aspect of the Morrigan, was in me, and I struck the warrior a mighty blow on his head. He fell back, so I struck him again and heard his skull break.

I dropped my cudgel, seized the sword lying on the ground beside the warrior’s body and ran to where his companion was stirring awake. The man staggered to his feet, a war club in his fist, and I thrust the sword through his belly. I then slashed him, then again, again and yet again.

“And so, Ossian,” Laoidheach called softly. “We thought you dead, and that one certainly is. You cannot kill him twice.”

The grotesque, broken bodies of the warriors lay sprawled on the ground, and I tore my eyes from them as a spiritual sickness overwhelmed the battle rage within me. I threw the sword to the ground. Yes, more than once in the past I had given orders that men be killed, and always they were my enemies, the enemies of my faith and people. There was no joy now in my personal triumph. My hands trembled and I stared at them, wondering at their weakness.

“Ossian! Ossian, come cut us free!” Laoidheach called again.

I went and released Laoidheach, who wrapped his arms around my shoulders in a firm embrace. Firelight revealed his watering eyes. “I thought you dead. I was certain of it, but now, just now you come out of the night to save me from,” he gestured towards the dead warriors, “those bastards there. How is that possible?”

“We will discuss it later.” I pointed to the other prisoner. “Who is this?”

“He is Goban; a smith from the drumlin country to the north.”

The smith was a short, bald, stocky man with arms the size of young oaks. Taking up the sword, I cut him loose and he too embraced me.

“Ye have me life,” he said, “and I, Goban, will not forget it.”

I nodded a somber reply.

He pointed to the bodies of the Corcu’s and then peered up at me intently. “It is no small thing to kill men, eh? But, those two swine needed killin’. I’m thinkin’ they were your first?”

“Yes. Yes, they were…” I hesitated as I struggled to find the proper words.

He nodded. “No man with a sound mind finds killin’ an easy thing. I am honored that ye chose to shoulder such a heavy burden that I might be free. Yet, I know too, that as a man of honor, ye will not permit tonight to weigh on ye, for what ye did was the right thing. Ye saw the need for it, did ye not?”

“Yes,” I nodded, “had I not seen the need, I would not have acted.”

“Ye acted as a true man,” he beamed, “and there ye have it. Again I thank ye!”

“Yes, yes, we thank you again and again, but we need food,” Laoidheach urged. “Those bastards have not fed us for two days.”

We found some barley bread and a bag of rancid beef in the men’s pouches. My nose wrinkled at the odor of the beef, and I poured it onto the ground.

“So, ye know each other, do ye?” Goban asked.

“Yes,” Laoidheach said, “we have been good friends for many years.”

“Well then, I will leave two old friends to talk. If I might have a slice of bread to take with me,” he pointed to the bodies, “I will drag these two pieces of offal into the darkness and check on the horses.”

I gave Goban bread, and he went to work. I was curious about the man. “Tell me about Goban, Laoidheach.”

He shrugged as he sat down beside the fire, cross-legged. “There is little enough I know other that what I said earlier. He is a good, solid man, I think. Have you nothing more to eat with you?”

“Satisfy your hunger for tonight with the bread, old friend. Our breakfast waits there.” I pointed into the darkness toward the river. Even as I said it, I was hoping that my old skills had not deserted me.

Seating myself beside him, I continued, “So, we have much to tell each other. How is it that I find you here a prisoner?”

Laoidheach was chewing the bread, but glanced towards me. “First, quickly. Tell me of Aine. Have you seen her?”

“No, my friend, I have not seen her, but I know she is dead.”

His expression did not change as he urged, “If you have not seen her, how can you be certain?”

“It was told to me by…” I hesitated. How could I explain the Morrigan? “It was told to me by someone who was there and knew her for dead.”

He hung his head quietly for a moment, and sighed. “I knew it for the truth, though I held small hope… She was not among the other captives, you see, so yes, I suspected as much.”

“We both lost much to the Christians that day, my friend. Much more, I fear, than we can ever replace. So, tell me of the other captives.”

The names he cited were people I knew, or had known, though he didn’t know all their names or if they all still lived. I nodded as he spoke of them, and, when his list ended, I asked, “How was it you were taken?”

“I’ve a simple story,” he shrugged, “with little to tell. I was in the long hall with the King when the Corcu Duibne came. Their attack came as a surprise; as you know. We were not prepared to defend the village or ourselves. Mounted warriors streamed into the village as our men ran to their homes for their arms.”

I nodded. “Aye, I was in the fields when they struck and was knocked senseless early in the raid. The big man there, with the red hair,” I nodded toward the corpse, “I remember seeing him. He rode his chariot and was among the leaders.”

“Yes, his name was Ó Scannláin, and he was their most beastly killer. You see, the Corcu Duibne took me and a hundred or so others of our village prisoner. They insisted we march under guard to pay homage to their king. Those who were grievously wounded during the battle, or were too young, ill or feeble to make the march were slaughtered without delay. Ó Scannláin took great glee in the killing of our innocents.”

The image of it filled my mind, and my guilt over killing the man turned to dust as I spat. “His death was well done then, though small penance for our many dead.”

“True. The man was an animal.”

“But Laoidheach, they left you alive. Why?”

“Their king liked my songs and ballads…at least he did for a while. Later, he demanded I learn the songs of the Christians, songs exalting their God and Jesus Christ. That was all very well; it makes little difference to me what I sing, so long as I am alive and fed. So, I sang their songs of piety, the songs of their beliefs.”

“And yet, I find you here, a slave on his way to the salt mines in the north.”

“Yes. Is there more bread?”

I reached into the bag and handed him another piece.

Wiping crumbs from his mouth with his tunic’s filthy sleeve, he continued, “A few weeks ago, I forget the day, the king said I was to make up a new ballad to praise his greatness. He insisted the ballad include verses to honor his raid on our village. I could not do it, Ossian; I would not.”

“You said as much?”

His eyebrows shot up. “Of course I did no such foolish thing! The king would have lopped my head in a moment at such arrogance. I found excuses to delay creating his ballad, citing a lack of inspiration, you see, that sort of thing. Finally, the king grew weary of waiting…in fact, I believe he grew tired of me generally, and decided to be rid of me. So, here I sit.”

* * *

Sunrise had not yet chased away the morning mist when I made the short walk to the river where I cautiously peered into the cold clear water. Two fat salmon not yet spawned rested in a pool beneath an alder tree and I sang to them as I sank my hands into the water and gently stroked their bellies. I quickly jerked them onto the bank and they were soon roasting on a spit.

Laoidheach walked over and eyed the salmon. “Aren’t those fish cooked yet?”

I smiled. “Patience, my hungry balladeer friend, just a bit longer.”

Goban lounged beside the fire and pointed to the bodies of the Corcu Duibne warriors. “We must bury those pieces of shit soon. They will begin to stink and attract the carrion birds that will draw attention to this place.”

He was right. “Yes, the bodies might be found, but we must be far from here when they are.”

“The chariot can be burned here on our fire, and we must search their belongin’s for things we might use. The big bastard there,” he nodded, “wears a kirtle studded with iron. I would take it if it suits ye.”

“Take it,” I shrugged as I eyed the short, almost gnome-like man, “though it be overly large for you.”

“It’s true I haven’t the son of a bitch’s height, but the shoulders and girth will fit me well enough.”

“Tell me Goban, you are a smith? How is it you came to be here, a captive?”

“My home is Tara—”

“The city of the High King?”

“Damn it man, and what other Tara is there? I am a smith, as was me father and his father before him, and came to Tara from the drumlin midlands some twenty years ago. I work silver, gold, copper, bronze…metals of all kinds, ye see, though I prefer the working of iron. I was among Tara’s best smiths.” He straightened up. “No, I was Tara’s best smith. No man can equal the strength of me iron.”

Laoidheach glanced at him with a grin. “Tara’s best smith, you say? What manner of great smith and tradesman are you that that you lie here and starve alongside us? Speaking of starving, Ossian, see to the fish. Aren’t they yet ready?”

“No, my friend. Bide a while longer, for the salmon will taste all the better for it.”

“It is not I that is impatient; it’s this unruly stomach within me.”

Goban was a man who interested to me. He was a difficult man to age, but I thought him only a bit younger than my father. “As a smith at Tara, you must have been a man of respect and wealth. How is it you became a slave?”

“Humph. I worked many years, and, as ye say, accumulated wealth in gold, land and cattle,” Goban growled. “Then, foul priests branded me a sorcerer who practiced black magic, and demanded the High King banish me from his city forever.”

The King had shown his support for priests in the past, so I was not surprised. “Why should they do such a thing? Why would they take offense against a common smith? Are you also a sorcerer as they claimed?”

“I am a man! I am Goban! I am what and who I choose to be! I choose to be a common metalworker who plies his craft in the age-old ways of his father…in the ways known to smiths long before the priest Patrick arrived in Eire and began convertin’ our people to the new religion.”

He waved a dismissive hand. “The foolish priests overheard me citin’ the ancient prayers to Lugh, Go fannan and Ebhlinne during the making of me fire and the meltin’ down of metals. They declared them to be spells, they did, invokin’ profane magic. When the priests speak through their asses, the King smells nothin’ else. Bah! I waste words speakin’ of it.”

Images of a blue flame, molten metal and white-hot sparks spiraling into the sky filled my mind. How could there not be enchantment behind it? “No, Goban, your words are well said, and yet it would seem the King showed poor judgment toward you in relying on the priests’ nonsense.”

“There was more, Ossian, for in his eyes, the King showed great judgment. You see, the King’s Gatekeeper’s cousin’s son-in-law is also a smith there. The son-in-law was envious of me success and the Gatekeeper knew of it. When the priests brought up me name in court, the Gatekeeper whispered in the King’s ear, and that was the end of me.”

“The end of you? I don’t understand.”

“It is all very simple. The King’s power rests upon the shoulders of his most trusted supporters, don’t you see? He strengthens his power by occasionally bestowin’ gifts upon them. By means of the priests’ accusations, my removal became a gift to the Gatekeeper’s family, no more, and now they are even more beholden to the King.”

The truth of it was plain to see although so was the injustice. “But the Gatekeeper’s gift was small compared to the shameful thing the King did to you. How can a King treat his people so unfairly, and still—”

“Unfairly? Unfairly, Ossian? Powerful men offer fairness only when they have nothin’ to gain by withholdin’ it, and that’s a bitter truth. This was not a matter of fairness as you and I judge it. Ye see, I meant nothin’ to the King, and yet, through me, he could appease the meddlesome priests, delight the Gatekeeper’s family and, as an added measure, take all me possessions into his treasury. In his beneficence, he left me alive when he had the power to do otherwise…which I admit was no small thing. Oh yes, Ossian, the King likely considers his actions most fair.”