Glendalough Fair (22 page)

[T]he Irish suffer evils not only from the Norwegians,

but they also suffer many evils from themselves.

Annals of Ulster

Failend felt like she was floating, like she was moving through a dream world. A dream world like no dream she had ever experienced before; a dream filled with terror and discomfort, with hope and exhilaration, with exhaustion and lust and amazement. A dream that seemed to encompass every kind of feeling she could have imagined, whipping her like a gale of wind and rain.

She had killed a man. At least she was fairly certain she had. By the river, during the fighting at the Meeting of the Waters. He had come stumbling through the line of Irish warriors and she had been there and she had struck him down. But he was still alive so she plunged her sword into his neck.

At least that was how she remembered it. It was all a swirl in her head, and hard to recall exactly what had taken place. She was not even certain how she felt about it. Astonishment, confusion. Not remorse. There was no remorse. She wondered if that should concern her. But of course he was just a heathen.

When the fighting was done they had left the killing field, marched back along the river bank and then through the trees to the road. The men were very excited, very animated. They had fought well. That was Failend’s impression of the battle. It was based on the men’s reaction, since she was in no state of mind to draw any conclusions on her own. They had done well. And now they were excited.

Making love to Louis de Roumois, the attack by the assassin, Aileran killing the man after she, Failend, had knocked him on the head, it was all part of this extended dream. She could still see the spray of blood from the killer’s neck as he went down. She felt like her whole life was a wagon rolling down hill, building speed, and now it was moving as fast as it could move. It was nearly out of control, threatening to come apart.

Back at the dúnad she had returned to her husband’s pavilion, bracing herself to face his fury. And he had been furious, so much so that he sent her away, told her to return later. “I will see to you then,” he had said, and said no more. He did not look at her.

And she had not returned. She knew there was only a beating at her husband’s hands waiting for her, and she did not feel the need to endure it.

She waited for the chance to speak to Louis alone. “Aileran will tell my husband he found us together,” she told him.

“No he won’t,” Louis said. “Aileran and me, we’re soldiers. There is a bond between fighting men.”

Failend shook her head. “Aileran’s my husband’s man. He has been for many years now. He owes more to my husband than he owes to anyone.”

“I think you’re wrong,” Louis said. “But even if you’re right, and Aileran tells him, it will not be some new revelation to your husband. He cannot hate me more.”

Failend let it go. It was pointless. Louis de Roumois was one of the most extraordinary men she had ever known, but he was still a man, and there were things he would not understand. He was not stupid and he was not naïve. But when it came to his fellow soldiers, he viewed loyalty the way a dog views loyalty: simple, complete and unwavering. In some things Louis did not grasp nuance.

After the successful fight at Meeting of the Waters, Failend had thought they would march back to Glendalough. She was certain Colman would wish to do so. He would want to enter the city in triumph. But they did not.

Instead, they remained in the dúnad because Louis was not done with the Northmen. There was a place on the river where he guessed the heathens would have to drag their ships over the shallow water, and he convinced Colman to let him set a trap there. Colman agreed. All this Failend heard from Louis. She did not see her husband, and though she waited for him to order her dragged to his pavilion so that he might punish her for her many sins, he did not.

What he did, to her surprise, was ignore her and she continued to float through her dream world.

Louis de Roumois gave up complaining about her marching with the army. He told her she was not a child, if she wished to do this thing, and Colman said nothing about it, than he would not stop her. She guessed Louis did not want to leave her behind at the dúnad with Colman while he marched off to fight the enemy. She suspected that he actually liked her company in the field.

He found her a mail shirt, one that had been made for a young man. It was tight across the chest but otherwise fit her well. He found her a helmet, though it needed rags stuffed in its sides to keep it in place. He showed her how to hold her sword, taught her the basics of thrust and parry, ordered an embarrassed Lochlánn to work with her.

Two days in the dúnad and then in the predawn dark, Louis and Aileran roused the men and got them under arms and marched them off toward the river. Failend walked at the head of the column at Louis’s side. She felt the weight of the mail on her shoulders and the pull of the sword and dagger on the belt around her waist and the incongruous soft brushing feel of the leine around her legs.

The sun came up and the light revealed a misty grey morning, and with the lifting of the night came a lifting of the dream feeling that had enveloped her like the fog. She was marching off to a fight, but this was not a new thing to her. She had marched with the men to the Meeting of the Waters and back again. The mail, the sword, she had grown used to them over the past few days. She felt like she was waking up, like the wagon, rolling down hill, had reached a flat place and the momentum was coming off it, and it was slowing down.

This was not a dream anymore. She was awake in a new place, a wonderful place. This was the place she had been looking for ever since she had gone from girl to woman. She was not bored.

They came to the edge of the wood line that bordered the river and Louis called for the men to halt and rest, and he and Aileran and Lochlánn headed into the trees. Failend came with them because she wanted to, and it seemed that people had stopped trying to tell her what to do, which she reckoned a good thing. They paused when the river was in sight through the trees, then crept up to where they could see. There were no ships, only the woods and the churning water running over the shallow bottom.

They went back to where the rest of the men, nearly two hundred in all, waited in the tall grass.

“The archers will be first at the river bank,” Louis told the men. “They’ll shoot down as many of the heathens as they can. Then you men with spears, you’ll be right at the water’s edge. When the heathens attack, the archers will drop back. The heathens will have to fight their way up a steep bank and you will be there to kill them when they do.”

Failend could see anxious looks flashing back and forth among the bóaire and the fuidir. At the Meeting of the Waters there had been no archers, because the archers were among the men Father Finnian had brought. In that fight, Louis had sent the men-at-arms in first, the farmers behind them. It was an arrangement that the bóaire and the fuidir had liked, and it worked well. But now they were being ordered to take the first assault.

“Kill two of them, that’s all I ask,” Louis continued. “Use your spears. Kill them as they come. Kill two and then you can drop back and let the heathens run right into the men-at-arms.”

With this the bóaire and the fuidir
nodded. Two men. They could stand fast for the time it took to kill two men. That seemed like a thing they could do.

Later, before the fighting had started, Failend asked Louis if he thought the spear-wielding farmers would really stand long enough to kill two heathens each.

Louis shrugged. “Some will,” he said. “Some will run at the first sight of a heathen. But some will stand and keep killing. It’s the way of men in battle. No man ever knows what he’ll do, and no commander either, until they are in the middle of it. But if I had told them to hold their ground and fight to the end, if they saw no hope of escape, then I can guarantee they would run like rabbits.”

Louis and Aileran led the men down to the water’s edge and positioned them as Louis had described. They stood ready and waited. The rain set in and they waited, the cold drops working their way down through the leaves and soaking them through. And then the heathens came, just as Louis had said they would.

In silence the Irish stood ready, tense and fearful, unable to see from their cover of bracken and trees what was going on down river. Only Louis and Aileran saw, approaching the river bank on their knees like supplicants to the altar, parting the brush, peering out like frightened creatures. But Failend knew they were not frightened because they were not the ones being hunted.

Ten minutes later, in a voice that was little more than a breath, Louis told her that the heathens were unloading their ships to lighten them enough to drag over the shallows. It seemed to Failend there was little need for such quiet. The rain was loud and the great beastly heathens were louder still, calling to one another in their coarse gibberish.

Failend knew that the heathens were not frightened either, because they did not know how close death hovered above them.

It was almost an hour after they first appeared downstream that the Northmen discovered the proximity of death. The fighting, when it started, played out almost exactly as Louis had envisioned. The spearmen did their work, and when the heathens finally managed to get among them, Failend stood with Louis, her sword in hand. She even managed to slash at some of the bastards as they came at her, though Louis or Lochlánn seemed always there to take the brunt of the attack.

This fighting was not like the Meeting of the Waters. Then, her head had been whirling, she had hardly been aware of what was going on. It was different now. She could see. She could think.

And because of that she understood what it meant when more of the heathens appeared out of the trees to their left, when the men-at-arms were forced to swing away from the river bank and meet this new threat. In the end the Northmen had driven the Irish off. But they had not won the day. Far from it.

Louis and Aileran led the men, somber and weary, back to the dúnad. Some of the wounded walked with arms flung over the shoulders of comrades on either side, a few were carried in makeshift litters. Failend stumbled along. She felt exhausted like she had never felt before. And she felt strong in a way she had never felt before.

Once again she did not return to her husband’s pavilion. The great surge of power that the fighting had brought on had not dissipated. What she wanted, and wanted desperately, was to be with Louis, to go to his tent, to run her hands over him and feel his strong arms on her naked flesh. She shivered as she thought about it. But even the reborn Failend retained some sense of discretion, so she avoided Louis, found a tent that had been owned by one of the men killed at the Meeting of the Waters, and made her camp there.

The next day mounted patrols were sent out along the river to keep an eye on the heathens, but the rest of the men remained in the dúnad. Louis and Aileran and some of the lead men among the warriors Finnian had brought met in Colman’s pavilion, where they discussed how next to unleash their fury on the Northmen. Or so Failend imagined. On a few occasions she could hear raised voices from within the oiled cloth walls. She kept her distance.

With Louis occupied in planning the campaign and Lochlánn off leading one of the patrols, there was little for Failend to do and no one with whom she wished to speak, so soon after the sun went down and the gray day melted into black night she crawled into her tent to sleep. Under the dead man’s blankets she slept soundly and dreamed wild dreams. It was still dark when someone shook her awake.

She gasped and sat up quick, and her hand fell on the grip of her sword, but she could see nothing. Then she heard Louis’s voice, soft, just a few feet away.

“Failend?” he said, and now she could see his outline against the darker land beyond. She wondered why he had not just slipped into her tent and lay down beside her.

“Yes?”

“We’re going out to scout the heathens. Do you wish to come?”

She was quiet, trying to make sense of this in her sleep-numbed brain. “Yes,” she said again and picked up her sword and slipped out of the tent.

Somewhere above, the moon was casting its light behind the thick overcast of clouds and blunting the edge of the dark. Failend could see Louis now, or at least the dark shadow of him, and a larger figure behind whom she recognized as Aileran.

“What’s happening?” she asked, realizing she had said “yes” before she really had any notion of what was going on.

“Aileran had word from one of his men,” Louis said in a low voice, “that the heathens have sent a small band along the river. Said they were camped not more than a mile or so from here. We were going to take a look. Fight them if we can.”

Failend looked from Louis to Aileran, who stood just five feet away. She could see other men now, a dozen or so under arms. A small war party.

“And you want me to go?” Failed asked.

“Certainly,” Louis said, and she could hear the pleasure in his voice. “You seem to delight in this sort of thing.”

Failend nodded though she knew no one could see her. The gesture was more for herself. “Captain Aileran,” she said, turning in his direction, “you don’t mind?”