Daughter Of The Forest (29 page)

She was a big dog, and I was still quite a small girl. Nonetheless, before dusk I carried her back to the cave mouth, and laid her down on the grass. Then, trembling from head to foot, I crept into the smallest space I could find under the rock wall, and wrapped the cloak all about me, and I tried to make my mind as quiet as a feather in the breeze and as still as a stone. But my body shook and shivered, and my spirit was full of fear and hatred and shame. I thought that I would never be clean again.

At dusk they came. I heard their voices and I did not move. They knew what had happened. I thought later, if it had indeed been my brothers I had seen before, drifting out there on the tranquil waters, how it must have been for Conor, seeing it all as it passed, unable to act until the sun set. They exchanged words in low, furious voices.

“Diarmid? Cormack?” Liam queried.

“No, let Cormack stay here and tend to the dog. I will go. This task is mine.” Finbar’s voice was shaking.

Then, peering between my fingers in the half light, I saw the three of them take cloak and knife from the cave, and slip away into the forest with death in their eyes.

Conor knew where I was. I felt his mind reach out to touch mine, but I drew deeper into myself. He did not approach me, not yet. Padriac, blinking back tears of rage and confusion, set about rekindling the fire and lighting the lamps and heating water. Cormack’s face was like a carving in stone as he took the spade and began to dig a resting place for the bloodied remains of his dog.

After a while, Conor came over to sit near my bolt-hole. I remember still the feeling of solid rock at my back, how I pressed myself in tight against the wall, curled in on myself as small as I could, biting my knuckles, one arm up over my head in protection. I remember wishing the earth would absorb me, take me in and soak up the hurt and guilt and the wretchedness. I was full of hate; hate for the men who had done this, hate for the innocent who had led them to me, hate for the lady Oonagh who had driven me to this lonely place. I hated my father for his weakness. I hated my brothers as well, for not being there when I needed them. Besides, they too were men, and so how dared they try to make it better?

But Conor sat there, not too close, and talked to me in his quiet, measured tone, and the fire Padriac had rekindled spread its golden light on tree roots and ferns, and even into this tight rock crevice; and after a while I looked out through the tangle of hair that covered my face, and saw the sorrow and love in their eyes.

“Will you come out, little owl?” Conor said gently. “We have but a short time in which to help you.”

It was hard, very hard. I could scarcely bear to let them touch me. Padriac had a deft hand, having helped many a sick animal in his short years, and, shuddering, eventually I let him tend to my injuries. Finally, wrapped in blankets despite the night’s warmth, I lay by the fire and they spoke in low voices as the fragrant smell of healing herbs rose in the night air.

Cormack’s grim task was finished, and he returned to the fire. “Linn’s been dead awhile,” he said soberly. “Whoever did this would be well away and out of the forest by now. Our brothers cannot track them down and return here before daybreak. They would better have stayed and helped us here. Perhaps we could have taken Sorcha to some place of safety.”

Conor glanced at his twin, and away. Cormack seemed calm; but his eyes were red, and his cheeks were smeared with earth where he had dashed away his tears.

“I don’t think so,” said Conor. “Sorcha cannot be moved, not tonight. For better or worse, she must remain here for now. As for the other matter, strange things happen in the forest at night. Especially this forest. People sometimes get lost in the dark, even on a familiar path. It’s not unusual for a mist to come up suddenly, and mask the true way, or for mysterious voices to lead a wanderer down a deceptive track. Glades can appear where there were none before, and tangles of branches suddenly fill a clearing. Many have died under these trees, and their bodies never been found.”

His two brothers looked at him, and then at each other.

“Mm,” said Cormack. “You’d know, I suppose.”

“I do know,” said Conor.

Padriac was boiling a pannikin of water with more herbs in it; the smell told me he was using self-heal, sometimes called heart-of-the-earth, and the spores of wolf’s claw, that herb of power which must be gathered with such care. They’d already made me drink, but my stomach rejected even what was good for it. Now I sipped again, but not too much. I had no wish to sleep, for no infusion could promise me a sleep without dreams. I watched the stars, and my brothers talked on in quiet voices. I am a healer; I was then, and I am now. Strange, then, how on that night I felt deep in my spirit that I would never be healed, as if I could never rise out of the well of despair. I had been there to help Simon, and others before him. But who was there to help me? Even my dog was gone. I watched the stars until they seemed to wheel and spin above me, until their images blurred with my tears.

It was stranger still that on that night I did not care whom I hurt. Conor’s face was white and drawn; he bore not just the burden of what had happened to his sister, the guilt of not being there to stop it, for they all felt that, but he knew at first hand my every feeling. He was tuned to my wordless curses and silent screams, my anguished sense of betrayal.
You weren’t there. I needed you and you weren’t there
. Such was the flood of emotion that there was no holding it back. My mind overflowed with pain and he took it all and never once spoke of it. But it could be read on his face. The worst of it was that I didn’t care anymore. My brother was a man too. Perhaps it was just that he should share the damage that men had done.

I must have dozed off briefly, for I remember waking with a start as Liam drove a bloodstained dagger into the earth by the fire and wiped his hands on his cloak. The three of them had returned. Diarmid’s face was a mask of fury, Liam’s tightly controlled. Finbar sat apart, and he held his hands to the sides of his head, as if his thoughts threatened to burst it apart. His hands were dark with blood. At home, the Armsmaster Donal had drilled them with iron discipline. Even I knew a weapon must always be scrupulously cleaned straight after use; cleaned and oiled and put away safely. Tonight it was different. Their three daggers stood in the soil around the fire, and its gentle flicker showed the bright metal encrusted with their quarry’s life blood. It had been a hunt, not a battle. A swift, violent meting out of justice. I did not care how many they had killed, two or three. I did not weep for the innocent caught up in something beyond his understanding. It was late, too late. My body ached, and I was scared, and even with my six brothers around me, I was all alone.

“Oonagh will pay for this in blood,” said Diarmid, his voice thick with fury. His thirst for retribution had not been slaked by the killings. “I will draw the knife across her throat myself, if no other will do it.”

“She bears responsibility for this, though maybe not directly,” agreed Liam. “But this is not the time. We have done what we had to. Now we must look to Sorcha. She must go from this place, and straightaway. How soon can she be moved, Conor?”

They discussed me as if I were a piece in their game of strategy; a prized one, but still just an object to be maneuvered to best advantage. I lay there unblinking, silent in the darkness. My body was throbbing with pain, my mind endlessly replaying the thing that had been done to me. I didn’t seem to be able to stop this happening, and I almost wished I had taken enough of the herb to blot it out for a time with a drugged sleep, nightmares or not. My mind would not be still; I could not focus my thoughts on a story, or count the stars, or take in properly what my brothers were saying.

Their voices swam in and out of my consciousness, Conor saying I could not be moved tonight, Diarmid furious, Liam trying to make plans. Flashes of pain, memories of other voices. I put my hand up to cover my eyes, its roughness brushing my skin.
Maybe her mother was a toad
. There were other images there too. My broken garden. Father Brien lying on the ground, an empty shell of himself. Simon screaming in the dark. Oonagh combing, combing my hair, and the creatures twisting on her mirror. Pain and fear. Their voices, again and again.
Prize piece of meat, eh? Just how I like it, young and juicy
. How could my brothers talk on, planning, arguing now, as if I weren’t there?

“This is impossible! It’s out of the question!” Diarmid was yelling. “We can’t just leave her here! There must be some other way!”

“There is no other way,” said Conor quietly. His face was turned away from me.

“Then, by the Lady, let us end this enchantment once and for all,” said Cormack, and there was a reckless note in his voice. He got to his feet and faced his twin across the fire. “We cannot abandon her, not now. I say we use what time we have left to take her to the nearest farm, tell our story, throw ourselves on these people’s mercy. At least then Sorcha has some chance. Left alone here, she will not last the season out.”

“These people showed little mercy when they raped our sister,” said Diarmid savagely.

“Anyway, we cannot do that and return here by daybreak,” said Padriac. There was an unspoken question in his voice.

“Padriac’s right, we cannot do it,” said Liam. “Tell your story to these cottagers, and the lady Oonagh learns of Sorcha’s whereabouts tomorrow or the next day. Be away from the water at dawn, and you may end up on somebody’s dinner table tomorrow. You are not fools, I hope.”

“What are you saying?” Diarmid had pulled his dagger up from the earth and was tossing it restlessly from hand to hand.

“I’m saying this plan is impossible. I see no choice but to make Sorcha as safe and comfortable as we can; and leave her. Perhaps next time we can move her; there must be other caves down shore.” Liam did not sound altogether happy with his own suggestion.

“What do you say, druid?” Diarmid’s tone stung like a whip. “No wise pronouncements, no rhetoric to inspire us? What price your mystical craft now? Perhaps it is time we stopped heeding your advice and took matters into our own hands.” He was like a hunting dog straining at the leash.

“That’s not fair,” said Cormack, springing to his twin’s defense despite his own doubts.

“Nor is it quite accurate.” Liam spoke firmly. “You cannot have forgotten how we were able to track down our quarry tonight with such speed. Seldom have I seen a mist come down so quickly or so selectively. Or dissipate in a flash as it did when we were done. Nor have I ever before witnessed ferns and mosses creep and spread in moments to cover men’s bones and flesh so. There was a magical craft at work there; you can thank your brother for that.”

“Bollocks,” growled Diarmid, but he sat down again, the knife still in his hands. Their words faded out of my consciousness and the evil images returned. I tried again to block them out, but they would not go. I wanted to scream, to shout out, to let go the anger and hurt in my head; but somehow still I clenched my teeth and swallowed the sounds that threatened to break forth, and my tears flowed silently. My brothers meant well. But I almost wished it were dawn, and they were gone again. The voices went on arguing, and after a while Padriac brought me more to drink and I took it, and he went away again. The images passed and passed in my mind. The brand of hot iron on human flesh. Eilis racked with convulsions, her pretty face distorted with retching. The dog with her trusting eyes and the knife wound deep across her face. The wide smile of the simpleton as he gazed up into the trees.
Don’t hurt faery girl! Your turn next, farm boy
. Under the thick cloak, I was shivering.

I’m here, Sorcha
.

I would not believe it at first; it had been so long since he had touched my mind in this way.

I’m here. Try to let go, dear one. I know how it hurts. Lean on me; let me take your burden for a while
.

I could scarcely see him; he was on the far side of the fire, behind the others and half turned away, with his head still in his hands. It seemed as if he had scarcely moved at all.

How can you? How can you know?

I know. Let me help you
.

I felt the strength of his mind flow into mine, and somehow he managed to close off the terrible, the dark and secret things that he had dreaded sharing with me, and fill my head with pictures of all that was good and brave. Myself, a small child dancing joyfully along a forest path, sheltered by the arching branches, lit by dappled sun. This was an old image, stored deep in his consciousness and influencing all that he did. Then, the two of us, lying on the rocks by the spring pools, facedown, chins on hands, still as small basking lizards, watching the tiny jewellike frogs as they hopped and dived and sprang among the fronds of watercress. Finbar, patiently extracting the barbs of starwort from my hands as Conor told the story of Deirdre, Lady of the Forest. The seven of us in our circle around the little birch tree, our hands linked.