Elf Killers (20 page)

"You kept these all these centuries?" she gasped. "Are these the ones he gave you when you were Olloo's age? He thought you were the best young musician."

"I never needed another teacher after your husband."

"Oh," she said as tears came to her eyes. "He made my heart sing. I'll forgive the pair of you, but they got my kitchen roof done while you ones were out scaring all of us, so I'll expect you to play every bloomin' request I make at the dance tonight."

As the excitement waned, people began leaving to get ready for the festivities. Doona turned to go as Oisin caught up to her on his unicorn. "Say," he said with his hat in his lap. "Can I offer the most beautiful girl I have ever seen a ride to the rock?"

"I accept my valiant."

Oisin quickly dismounted and helped her into the saddle before turning away to lead his unicorn. "Remember, you must dance with me more than any other fellow this evening, since I'm not your escort," he said, but added with a chuckle. "I'm teasing. I promise I won't be counting."

"You don't think I'm being silly, not flaunting my happiness in Kieran's face after hurting him, do you?"

"I think you're the most considerate young woman I've ever known and it only makes me yearn for you all the more."

"Here come Brenden and Onora," she said as they neared Carraig Faire.

"Good afternoon," said Brenden as Oisin turned about to walk with them.

"It sure is," said Oisin, "especially since we found Martyn alive."

"Indeed," said Brenden.

"There's something I'd like to ask you since we're all here," said Oisin.

"Ask away..."

"I'd like your leave to court Doona, sir."

"By all means, if Doona's willing," he said, turning to look up at her.

"Oh yes!" she said, suddenly breathless by it all, "I am indeed."

"In that case," said Oisin, "I have more reason than any one else in Baile Tuath to celebrate at the dance this evening." And with a squeeze of her hand, he helped her down and rode to the foot of Carraig Faire.

Chapter 14

A meadowlark and a dickcissle called outside as Onora wove, patted, combed and brushed, fixing a most elaborate garland of bright pink roses, which she had just gathered beyond the well into Doona's long red tresses. "There," she said, standing back to look from side to side. "I hope they last. They're so delicate."

"Is there a name for them?" said Lilee with dancing eyes. "They look perfect. And they smell just right for a bride."

"Not that I've heard tell," she said, finding a spot for a whisper of a brushing and a pat. She stood back for another look.

"Then let's call them 'Doona's roses' so that this day will always be remembered for the very first wedding on the Great Strah."

Doona giggled as she shyly looked down to smooth her gold-white spider silk gown, a long leine woven in one piece, without a single seam in it.

"Olloo and Queen Vorona were quite right, dear," said Onora. "Your green eyes simply set off that gown like jewels."

"Thank you both," said Doona with a blush. "I'd never have managed without you."

"Oh yes you would," said Onora. "A girl always finds a way. Now, here's your nosegay of roses to match your hair, all tied up with a snippet of blue satin ribbon which made its way here, all the way from Baile Gairdin. It's been ironed and ironed and been in all sorts of weddings. And so have these. Chin up for a moment, please..."

Doona caught sight of a pearl choker going 'round her neck. "Onora!"

"These here be the very pearls I wore when I wed, as did my mother before me and her mother before her and her mother before her, as far back as I can tell. And they be the very ones your daughter shall wear when she marries..."

"Onora, they're gorgeous, but..."

"Now hush," said Onora to the sound of a quail and her chicks running under the window as she hooked them under her hair. "You mustn't taint this moment with your doubts. Fosterling you may be, but you're the only daughter I'll ever have. And I hope you'll never have to know how it did my heart when the Marfora Siofra stole you away. Please. I love you, and this is my gift to you."

Doona gave a great watery-eyed sniffle and threw her arms around her.

"Whistles!" cried Lilee. "Martyn, Donachan and Alister have started their flutes and bodhran. It's time to go outside."

"Look," said Kieran as he removed and held out his necklace of asters. "I'm sorry, but I just can't go through with this."

"I can guess at why you might not want to," said Olloo, frowning at the flowers, "but don't you reckon Doona will be disappointed? I'm sure this is the most important thing that's ever happened to her."

"Yea? And it's the worst thing that's ever happened to me. Here take these. It'll be better for everyone this way."

"Aw pshaw! I'm not taking your flowers. The sun's nearly set and the whistlers have commenced their piping already. Nobody will notice if you don't make a scene."

"Well, think what you must then," said Kieran as he turned on his heel.

The pipers paused. A vesper sparrow called from somewhere far off in the sea of grass as Olloo watched him tramp away between Queen Vorona's neat rows of flowers. He ran his tongue along his teeth with a sigh and set out to find Oisin, who might be wondering what had become of his best man. He found him standing before the altar of flowers with Alister fidgeting anxiously as the pipers began whistling The Wedding Reel.

"There you are," said Oisin.

"Don't worry. I'd never miss Doona's wedding," said Olloo with a shake of his head.

"Is something going on?"

"Nothing of any consequence at all."

Suddenly the music was much louder than before as Doona appeared on Brenden's arm at the end of the grassy isle, strewn with every kind of flower imaginable from Queen Vorona's great garden. Behind them came Sorcha, scattering more flowers from a basket, and Rory, with a ring in his fist. As they passed under an archway made by Doona's strike falcon, Onner, and Lilee's strike falcon, Cairys, holding onto a braid of rose vine, Onner let go of her end of the vine and trotted up behind Doona to demand a scratch. The crowd roared with merriment, but no shooing would send her away, so she spent the rest of the ceremony by Doona's side, attentively preening and tugging here and there at her dress and hair.

Doona was led down the aisle, bewildered by the joy of her dream come true, to find herself standing before Queen Vorona with trembling fingers, tying the very first ceremonial knot of Strah flax with Oisin. At last the knot was tied. Vorona raised her arms and the entire village of Baile Tuath erupted into hornpipes, handshakes and hugs... Everyone, that is, but the single Elf sitting up on Carraig Faire, wishing he had been aboard the ships which had sailed away from this cursed land two years ago.

Fnanar, smeared head to toe with black and red ochre mud, stepped quietly through the brush beyond the trees and studied the grass stretching away before him. A vesper sparrow called nearby. Presently his fifty brutes began appearing one by one out of the timber, wincing and shading their eyes from the light even though the westering sun was at their backs. Without taking his eyes off the waving grass, he clambered onto a rock. "Dyrney nyr-vyr-nirr-trad," he bellowed as he furiously drummed his chest with his fists. "Dyrney halt!" He began springing up and down, chanting, "Ay-ooo, ay-ooo, ay-ooo, ay-ooo..." while his brutes gathered at the foot of the rock, taking up the chant as they bobbed up and down in time. Suddenly he sprang into the air with a leap. "Ooot-ooot, ooot-ooot, ooot-ooot!" he cried, planting his feet and pounding his chest once more. "Why are we each no-go-back?" He glared at each of them in turn. "Nirrg-spon?"

"They all-be crawl-animal!" cried Nirrg-spon with a chinless hoot. "They rolly-eye and turn-away when we don't crawly-bow to Dyr."

"Ooot-ooot!" cried Fnanar with a nod and a two-fisted smack of his chest. "Phnyr-phaf?"

"Dyr be the biggest crawl-animal!" cried Phnyr-phaf as he thumped the ground with his stick. "He fraidy-fraid from just the big-eye think-back of big-big-big gut-rip-birds..."

"Ha!" cried another. "Dyr has no think-back. He be too crawl-animal to ever see a gut-rip-bird. He can only bristle-arm woof-woof at us."

"That's why he squinty-eye sneak-says that the grab-up-squeakers be gone-away,

gone-away," cried Fnanar. "Dyr has sow-heart. He won't jump-bite grab-up-squeakers on this side of the mountains because he big-nods to-himself that he'll run-away when he sees gut-rip-birds." He paused to look over the mud smeared faces of his little troop of hot-heads and young toughs before bellowing, "We be Dyrney-brutes! We stand bristle-big! Gut-rip-birds just be cluck-meats! We go get grab-up-squeakers!" And with a grand wave of his club, sprang from his stone and tramped into the grass. 

Foothold by foothold Vorona carefully climbed the face of Carraig Faire, pausing near the top to look out over the countryside. The view reminded her of a very different vista she had once climbed up to see on her own wedding day, overlooking Baile Gairdin. "Doona and Oisin," she said with a shake of her head as she went back to her climb, "bless you. You ones got clean out here with all those little kids.

"Now that was a nice climb," she said, as if she had merely come up the steps of her veranda, when she reached the top of the great rock and found Kieran staring off into the west as though she were not there at all. She quietly meandered over and sat on the ground beside him. "It's always worth it for the view alone, but it's a relief to get away from the wedding. My flowers will certainly be glad when it's over. But since it's the very first union in Baile Tuath, it's rather more than a wedding, wouldn't you say?"

"
Oh here it comes!
"
thought Kieran as he sighed and turned away.
"
And Mother and Father will never let me hear the end of it if they think I was rude to her.
"
He heaved another sigh. "The carraig’s a good place to come to be alone and think," he mumbled as he let her have a glimpse of his face.

"Good place to come and think. It certainly would be, but somehow I'd allowed it was rather more than that."

"Why? Because of Olloo or, maybe Mother and Father?"

"Well now, if they cared enough to be concerned, do you reckon I'd set them up just so that you could be sore at them?"

"Yea? Well phooey on them! I just want to be left alone. Is that too much to ask? If they're so worried, can't they at least grant me that?" He set his jaw and stared out across the Strah. "And I suppose you climbed all the way up here to tell me that I'll get over this and find someone else, but right now that doesn't begin to stop the pain."

"My word. What ever would possess me? Being the Eldest Elf in Baile Tuath, just as I was in Baile Gairdin before everyone sailed away, gives me at least enough sense to know better than to advise a young fellow like you, who already has all the knowledge of the heart that he'll ever need. You'll get through it all just fine without help from an old gammer who probably can't remember her own wedding day."

"My dear Great-Grandma," he said with a deep blush, not quite able to meet her eyes. "Nobody thinks of you that way. I do apologize. I know you mean well. I'm simply too upset to give anyone's feelings the consideration they deserve. I'm rotten company for anyone right now, and I'm sorry for my rudeness."

With a sudden string of twitters, a lark at the far end of the carraig winged its way into the sky to vanish in the deepening blue.

"I'm tough as old shoes and I'm a long way from being stung by your words," she said with a smile as she rose to her knees. "And since I see that you're also tough enough to handle things, I shall go back and let the others know that you will certainly return in good time." She found his eye and gave a wink. "And considering your cross to bear, I'll see that no one else intrudes on your contemplations. Fair enough?"

He nodded with a faint smile.

She rose to her feet and gave him a pat. Suddenly her fingers tightened on his shoulder. "Look out yonder. Do you see them?" 

"I do, but what are they? Shawkyn spooghey wouldn't be out at dusk, and besides, there are 'way too many of them. And they don't look like birds at all. They..."

"That's because they're the Marfora Siofra," she said. "Dear Fates! It begins again." For a moment she stood there with a look of stunned alarm, as if counting them. "Quick!" she cried as she grabbed him and steered him toward the way down. "We have to warn everyone."