Atonement of Blood (21 page)

‘The heat will quickly dry your clothes, but I would suggest that you remove your cloaks to allow them to dry more quickly. You are all soaked through.’

They did so with gratitude.

‘So,’ resumed Fidelma, ‘your name, you say, is Temnén? I take it you are a farmer?’

The man bowed his head in a solemn gesture. ‘That is now my lot, lady. I farm this small piece of land with some cattle, some pigs, two horses and my hound as my companion.’

‘You do not look like a farmer,’ Eadulf commented.

‘What is a farmer supposed to look like?’ laughed their host good-naturedly.

Eadulf shrugged. ‘I suppose I could only give the answer that I will know a farmer when I see him. You do not look like a man who has spent his life tilling the soil or herding cattle.’

Temnén regarded him for a moment and then said: ‘So what are a Princess of Cashel and her husband doing in the land of the Uí Fidgente?’

Gormán frowned and glanced at Fidelma. Temnén noticed and addressed him.

‘Have no fear, warrior – I presume that you are a warrior of Cashel – although it is a strange Cashel warrior who carries an empty sheath and lacks the insignia of the Golden Collar. Anyway, there can only be one Brother Eadulf in these parts and the stories of Sister Fidelma and Brother Eadulf are told and retold around many a hearth at night.’

Fidelma inclined her head. ‘That is flattering to know. I must tell you, however, that I am no longer in the religious.’

‘I have heard that you prefer your role in the Law to your role in the Faith,’ replied the man. ‘So, as I was saying, what brings you here? Apart from want of shelter from the storm, that is.’

‘You seem very well informed for a farmer, Temnén,’ Eadulf observed.

‘I have made it a rule in life to be as well informed as I can be. Is it not an old saying that knowledge is power?’

‘It depends on what power you seek, my friend,’ replied Eadulf.

‘The knowledge to provide for myself and protect my people.’

Fidelma peered quickly round the house and the man caught her doing so. He chuckled again.

‘You look for signs of a wife and children, lady? Alas, you will not find them. My wife was killed several years ago, as was my son. He was but a baby and died from want of his mother’s milk. They were bad days.’

There was no rancour in the man’s voice. It was almost emotionless, as if the stated facts were somehow unconnected with him.

‘Are you referring to the time of the Yellow Plague?’ asked Fidelma.

‘It was the time following our defeat at Cnoc Áine.’ A bitter smile came to his lips. ‘Ah, yes. Bad days, best forgotten by those who can forget.’

‘A lot of people were killed in that useless conflict,’ Fidelma pointed out sharply.

‘Too many,’ agreed Temnén, and now there was a trace of anger in his voice.

‘So you were a warrior?’ interposed Gormán.

‘Not by choice.’

‘But you fought at Cnoc Áine?’

‘I remember wandering over that dark hillside among the dead and the dying,’ the man confirmed. ‘I was lucky. A blow to the head rendered me unconscious for a while, and when I came to, the battle was over. I can remember the human vultures crawling over the battlefield and taking things from the slain, even from those who were not yet dead. Swords, jewels, torcs, shields, anything they could lay their hands on, all taken away as if they were prizes of honour. And I admit, the scavenging was not all done by the victors. Sadly, I saw many of the Uí Fidgente taking what they could before fleeing from the field.’

‘Many were slain on both sides at Cnoc Áine,’ Fidelma said once again, but this time she spoke sadly.

‘And many slain
after
the battle on Cnoc Áine,’ grunted Temnén.

Fidelma was puzzled. ‘After the battle? I am not sure what you mean.’

‘Many, like my wife and child, were killed after we had disarmed and surrendered.’

‘My brother would not countenance that,’ Fidelma protested, shocked at the assertion.

‘Who did your brother send to ensure our people were pacified?’ the farmer asked, his voice sounding tired, as if teaching a well-known fact to someone who would not learn.

‘It was Uisnech, Prince of the Eóganacht Áine,’ supplied Gormán, adding sarcastically, ‘and he was ambushed and killed by your so-called disarmed warriors.’

Temnén turned with a grim smile. ‘And deservedly so. He made this land a desert with his raids and burnings until at last the people could stand it no more and he was caught on a lonely hillside and cut down.’ He sighed deeply. ‘His death did not bring back my wife and child.’

Fidelma was quiet. Somehow she knew that the man was not making up the story. She had met Uisnech only twice and knew instinctively that he was a man not to be trusted. ‘I did not know of this,’ she said after a while, ‘and I am sure that my brother did not know either. He had given command to Uisnech of the Eóghanacht Áine after the battle. Uisnech was to deal with any who objected to the surrender. Later Donennach came to Cashel and agreed a treaty on behalf of the Uí Fidgente. We knew, of course, that Uisnech had been killed in an attack and that was just before the peace was agreed.’

Temnén nodded slowly. ‘Bad days,’ he said, as if agreeing with her. ‘Yet they are hard to forget.’ He drew back his shoulders with a cynical laugh. ‘I will say one good thing of Uisnech, if it is true. That he caught and slew Lorcán the son of Prince Eoganán, who was both a vicious and cruel man, although he was a Prince of the Uí Fidgente.’

‘I thought Torcán was Eoganán’s son?’ Eadulf asked, remembering back to when he had been held captive before the battle and had encountered Torcán.

‘Eoganán had three sons. Torcán was the eldest,’ Temnén explained. ‘The other two were …’ He used a word –
emonach
– that Eadulf had not come across before.

Fidelma quickly translated for him. ‘Twins.’

‘They were as alike in looks as if they were one,’ agreed Temnén. ‘But in character they could have been born of different parents. Lorcán was ruthless and without morals even to his own people. No one shed a tear when he was killed. At Cnoc Áine, Lorcán had a moment of glory when it was thought he had killed King Colgú. He went round waving the King’s shield and claiming that he had killed him. That soon turned out to be a falsehood.’

‘So Lorcán was killed?’

‘But that was after Cnoc Áine. Uisnech caught and slew him but Uisnech slew a good many of our people.’

‘Why did you fight at Cnoc Áine?’ Eadulf asked softly.

‘I was a
bó-aire
, a young noble, and when Eoganán’s rider came with the fiery cross to summon all the clans to his side, I took my arms and my horse, bade my wife and child farewell and rode off. We were young and our love of country sped through our veins like intoxicating liquor. We became drunk on it.’

‘And you did not question the morality of Eoganán’s cause?’ asked Eadulf.

Once more there was a smile on the face of the man, albeit a bitter one.

‘How does a simple warrior assess morality? Morality is for kings and philosophers, not for warriors.’ He turned to Gormán. ‘Do you ever debate with your King or even your captain when you are given an order? When you are told to do something, do you sit down and ask whether the order is right and moral?’

Gormán pressed his lips together nervously and glanced at Fidelma as if seeking guidance. Temnén saw the look and slapped his thigh with a sudden, unexpected hoot of laughter.

‘So, my friend, you prove my point. You are not even sure that my question should be answered without receiving an order from your superior. Of course, you don’t question your order. You fulfil it and, sometimes, if you have a conscience, you struggle with justifying your actions to yourself in the long dark nights that lie ahead.’

There was a silence and then Fidelma asked softly: ‘Is that what you have been doing, Temnén?’

He glanced at her, his face angry for a moment, and then his facial muscles seemed to relax again. ‘You are a wise woman, Fidelma of Cashel,’ he said.

‘Tell me, Temnén, what was the name of your wife?’

‘Órla,’ he replied, his eyes misting for a moment. Then: ‘You have not told me what brings you here,’ he said brusquely.

‘We are on our way to Dún Eochair Mháigh,’ she replied.

‘You will waste your time if you are going to see Prince Donennach. He is in Tara.’

‘We know that,’ Eadulf blurted out and then regretted it, for the man turned to him with an interested look.

‘So you are not here to see our Prince. What is your purpose then?’

‘You will hear soon enough, Temnén, and so it will do no harm to tell you now,’ Fidelma replied. ‘My brother lies near death if he has not already passed to the Otherworld. There was an attempt to assassinate him at Cashel. At the same time Áedo, the Chief Brehon of Muman, was struck down.’

Temnén’s eyes widened. ‘And you are looking for the assassin? How could he have escaped from the middle of your brother’s fortress?’

‘I did not say he had escaped. He was struck down himself.’

‘Then why do you come here?’

‘The name he gave was Brother Lennán of Mungairit.’

Temnén sat back in astonishment. ‘Lennán the physician? But I was told he had died on the slopes of Cnoc Áine!’

‘We found that out when we went to Mungairit and spoke to his father, an elderly man named Ledbán.’

‘Old Ledbán? Does he still live? He used to run the stables of Codlata close by Dún Eochar Mháigh. Codlata was Prince Eoganán’s steward. He disappeared after Cnoc Áine. But Ledbán retired to a monastery some years before that.’ He paused. ‘I still do not understand. If Lennán was killed at Cnoc Áine, how could he have been killed at Cashel? Ah.’ A look of understanding settled on his features. ‘You are here to find out who the man who called himself Lennán really was – and why he used that name.’

‘So you knew Ledbán, you say? What did you know of him?’

Temnén rubbed his chin reflectively. ‘Little enough, except that some years ago he was in service to Codlata, whose rath was at the Ford of Flagstones. Ledbán must be elderly now. Brother Lennán was his son. I simply knew him as a physician from Mungairit who came to tend the wounded during the battle. He was no warrior. He should not have been killed.’

‘You know nothing else about Lennán or Ledbán?’

‘If you spoke with Ledbán at Mungairit you must have learned all he could tell you.’

‘Ledbán died the evening we arrived there,’ replied Fidelma.

There was a moment of silence and then Temnén said reflectively: ‘That was bad fortune.’

‘Indeed it was,’ returned Fidelma. ‘Then there is little you can tell us about Lennán or his family?’

‘Little enough, other than what I have already told you. But there may be some left at An tAth Leacach, the Ford of the Flagstones, who still remember old Ledbán. As I recall, the old man was well known for his work with horses.’

‘When the storm clears, we shall continue on there.’ Her sentence was punctuated by another clash of thunder.

Temnén glanced up to the ceiling, as if able to peer through it to the storm raging above.

‘This will not pass for some time. I suggest that you join me in the
eter-shod
, the middle-meal?’

It was usual to have a light meal between the morning breaking of the fast and the evening meal. Temnén was no poor provider. He produced some cold joints of ham called
saille
, deriving from the word for salt and applied to any salted meat, for the joints were salted for preservation. These had been mixed with berries of rowan to enhance its flavour. There were also
indrechtan
, sausages made of a pig’s intestine, stuffed with minced meat,
creamh
or garlic,
folt-chep
or leeks, and
inecon
, carrot that had been cooked, pickled and placed on the table. There was also a dish of barley cakes, the inevitable basket of apples and a jug of ale.

‘You serve an excellent table, Temnén, especially for one who lives alone,’ Fidelma observed.

The farmer shrugged. ‘I make use of that which I am surrounded by.’

‘You work this farm alone?’

‘During the summer months I sometimes share the work and produce with my neighbours.’

‘I did not see any fences marking the boundaries of your farm,’ observed Eadulf.

‘What need?’ replied Temnén. ‘So far as the land is free from forest and bog, it is clan land, and as I was a
bó-aire
there was little need for fences to mark out my portions of it.’ He hesitated. ‘But after Cnoc Áine some of us are beginning to mark our land even though it was once common property.’

‘It is true that as tillage increases, the Council of the Brehons have introduced new regulations regarding the erection of fences between farmsteads,’ Fidelma agreed. ‘The laws now state how such fences are to be constructed, and if they are not constructed well then the owner is liable if animals are injured by them. For example, if a fence was so constructed that stakes were too sharply pointed and placed in a way to cause injury, that would bring the owner into difficulties.’

‘Doubtless Cashel will send a Brehon to teach our backward lawyers the new laws,’ Temnén said sarcastically.

‘Only if they need instruction,’ replied Fidelma without taking offence. She felt that she should make allowances for the bitterness of the
bó-aire
. ‘But this law does not come from Cashel. You know that every three years the Brehons gather to discuss and update the laws, and these are promulgated in the name of the Chief Brehon of the Five Kingdoms.’

Temnén suddenly relaxed and smiled.

‘There is much resentment in this land, lady. I suppose I am a symptom of it. It is hard not to feel aggrieved when you see your territory being changed by defeat and conquest.’

Fidelma saw that Gormán was having difficulty restraining himself and she gave the young warrior a warning glance.

‘We won’t argue the rights and wrongs. In Cashel we feel it was wrong for Prince Eoganán to lead his people into rebellion against us and thus, being defeated, the Uí Fidgente reaped what they had sown. Unfortunately, as we have already discussed, in warfare the innocent are swept away with the guilty. That is the sad lesson of life that we must all live with.’