Pride of Lions (39 page)

When she told him, he slid the panel shut.

Cera waited with the taste of anticipation tingling like mint on her tongue. At last she rang the bell again.

A different monk looked out at her and she repeated her request. This time she was told, "The abbot has been informed."

"I am not here to see the abbot, but Prince Donough. I am ... a friend of his, and I want to know if he's all right."

"Please wait." Once more the panel closed.

The third time the panel opened, it was Cathal Mac Maine himself who gazed out at her. She recognized him immediately and braced herself for another unpleasant confrontation, but instead he arranged his features in an expression of polite regret.

"You have come to visit Prince Donough, I believe?"

"I have."

"Then I am sorry to have to tell you he will not see you."

Cera stared at the abbot. "But I've come a long way ..."

"Then I am doubly sorry."

Her small chin lifted stubbornly. "Let him tell me himself that he does not want to see me."

Cathal smiled. "He cannot do that without seeing you, and he refuses. There is nothing I can do.

He is our guest; we cannot ignore his wishes in the matter."

"But he's been hurt!"

The abbot looked surprised, but quickly recovered. "How did you ... indeed, he was injured in a battle, but he is almost well now.

You need not concern yourself about him."

She was sure he was lying. Faced with his unyielding determination, the closed gates, the high stone wall, she was effectively blocked, however. She could not simply push her way in.

But when Cathal said, "I am sorry," a third time, he sounded so sincere her conviction was shaken. She was not born to noble rank, her woman's heart reminded her. Perhaps she was only a pleasant interlude in the life of a prince, and Donough really did not want to see her again.

Perhaps when he sailed away to Alba he had forgotten all about her. She had no proof otherwise.

Reading self-doubt in her eyes, Cathal saw his victory.

He could afford to be generous now, if only for the sake of keeping the enemy off-guard. It was not hypocrisy, merely clever strategy. Anything was permissable for the greater good of the Church.

"Wait there and I will have one of the brothers bring you a small cask of mead to take home with you,"

he said.

As the days passed with no word of Cera, I began to feel anxious. It had been necessary to establish an alliance with Malachi as soon as I returned to Ireland, but I had meant to go to her straight from Ui Caisin territory. There were things I needed to say to her, and explanations to be made in a way she would understand.

Instead I had been injured.

It was Cathal himself who informed me she was not coming to me. "We sent a request as you asked, but she has refused. There is nothing more we can do, Prince Donough."

"Why did she refuse?"

Cathal gave an noncommittal shrug.

"I cannot explain the ways of women. I can only assume, in the light of your mutilation ..." He paused meaningfully.

I stared down at my hand. "She was told of this?"

"Of your injury, of course."

When he had gone, I sat for a long time just looking at my hand--or what was left of my hand.

The pain I felt was much greater than it had been on the day the axe cut through me.

In him was an anger that simmered and seethed.

At times it lay almost quiescent, no more than a dull heat beneath the surface of his soul. Then it would erupt for no reason he could consciously identify, lashing out with a white-hot fury that scorched himself as much as those around him.

When Ferchar told him the hand had healed as much as it ever would, Donough left Kill Dalua.

He summoned Fergal and Cumara to accompany him and crossed the Shannon into Ely territory.

Like the Dal Cais and the Owenachts, the Ely had extensive tribal landholdings in Munster. Their territory ran from the east bank of the Shannon north to Meath and south as far as Cashel. Eight powerful clans comprised the tribe, whose tribal king was tributary to the King of Munster.

Donough and his companions set up camp near the fort of a cattle lord called Lethgen, who promptly came out with a pair of spear carriers to question their intentions.

When Donough identified himself Lethgen was visibly impressed. "A kinsman of mine was historian to your father," he boasted.

"Maelsuthainn O Carroll of the line of King Cearbhaill, the greatest of the chieftains of Ely."

"He is a very good friend of mine," Donough asserted. "As a child at Kincora I sat on his knee while he taught me my letters. We Dalcassians have always referred to him simply as Carroll, however; he prefers it."

Satisfied that Donough did indeed know his kinsman, Lethgen beamed. "I am certain he would expect me to give you the utmost hospitality," said the cattle lord, a bandy-legged, barrel-chested man with ruddy cheeks and the roseate nose of a confirmed ale-lover.

"What may I offer you?"

"Land."

Lethgen was taken aback. His smile slipped. "What?"

"I need a holding, some land."

"As a prince of the Dal Cais, surely you have holdings in Thomond."

"I want to build a stronghold somewhere else," Donough replied, "and gather an army."

Lethgen was thinking fast. Here was another of the line O Brian, obviously extending his grasp. It would be wise to accommodate him.

"This army of yours--it would protect your holding?

And support your allies?"

"Indeed."

"Now that I think of it, Prince Donough, there is a hilltop not far from here with a grand view of the countryside; no one could sneak up on you at all. I have plenty of grassland, I could certainly grant you a holding as a kindness to my kinsman."

Donough smiled. "You are the soul of generosity," he assured the lord of Ely.

Learning his whereabouts, Dalcassians came to him: the loyal, the disaffected, the bored. From them he assembled a personal army and from Ely timber he built a new fort with no old memories to taint the walls.

And no women, not even bondservants. In the beginning Donough's fort was an exclusively male stronghold where he sought to reproduce the masculine atmosphere of the Kincora he remembered.

Countless warriors had postured and swaggered through his father's hall, boasting of everything from their battle skills to the size of their genitals.

As a child, Donough had hung on their every word. He had regarded them as demi-gods in a pantheon whose chief deity was Brian Boru.

Now similar men gathered under his banner in Ely and pledged their allegiance to him.

On the day each new man joined him, Donough held out his right arm in a way that forced them to observe the damage. "This is a battle wound," he said, "gained in honorable combat. I am not ashamed of it. Look your fill now. Then we can talk of things that matter."

Wounds more disfiguring than his were common in a warrior society, but never exhibited so blatantly. By calling attention to the mutilation, in a curious way he diminished its power. His men soon ignored it, which was his purpose.

He demanded to be treated as a whole man.

"I have lost enough," he told Cumara one night as they sat late beside the fire, "and I don't intend to lose any more." As he spoke he withdrew the harp from its bag beside his bench. He did not ask Cumara to help him. "The time has come to teach myself to play this with my left hand," he said.

Cumara looked dubious. "We can find a harper for you if you want music, it would be easier."

"I don't need anything to be made easier."

Donough rested the ruin of his right hand on the forepillar of the harp, holding the beautiful instrument in place with a purple-scarred stump ending in a single thumb like a hook. A webwork of exceptional musculature developed by wielding the sword remained at the base of the thumb. As the wound healed it had tried to contract and stiffen, but he fought back, manipulating the thumb, forcing the joints to flex and stay functional.

With grim determination he had taught himself to do many things using his maimed right hand, things that Cumara would have thought impossible. He would undoubtedly teach himself to play the harp with his left.

Donough's hall was silent except for the crackling of the fire. The first notes he evoked from the harp strings sounded tortured.

But he persevered.

Several warriors passing the hall overheard the attempt at music but did not realize who was responsible. There was a bark of derisive laughter.

Donough carefully laid the harp aside, then rose to his full height and hurled himself through the open doorway. In two strides he reached the surprised warriors. Seizing the nearest man by the shoulder in a punishing grip, he doubled his right arm and slammed it into his hapless victim's windpipe.

The warrior sagged in Donough's grasp. He gasped and made gurgling noises. His companions tried to intercede, but Donough gave them such a ferocious glare they fell back. With an oath he flung the laugher away from him, then ran after him and punched him in the face two or three times with his left fist.

When the man was lying inert and unconscious Donough turned without a word and stalked back into the hall. He picked up the harp and resumed practice as if nothing had happened.

After that no one laughed at his playing.

*

He had grown too old and too stout for traveling by foot, so he made his journey in a wicker cart driven by a pungent bondservant.

The man was disinclined to bathe but loved to talk, and his only topic was himself. He had an endless supply of pointless personal anecdotes.

Occasionally Carroll interjected polite murmurs, but as they jolted along the rutted trackways the historian's thoughts wandered.

During a rare silence on the part of his driver he remarked, "As a scholar I have been singularly blessed. I was thinking about that just now, counting my blessings if you will. I have witnessed momentous events and been the confidante of kings.

Words I have written will be carried to lands I shall never see, and speak, long after I am dead, to people as yet unborn."

"Annh," grunted the driver. "I don't read, myself. Bondservants aren't entitled to an education like you lot. You nobles. But I have other skills. Did I ever tell you about the time I beat my cousin at arm wrestling? Four times running?"

Carroll sighed. "Please do," he murmured patiently.

But before the driver could launch into this new tale, a column of dark smoke on the horizon drew his attention.

"Outlaws burning some homestead," he said, pointing. "It's a disgrace. I am an honest man, and while there are days I feel hard done by, I would never ..."

I have seen Ireland at her zenith, Carroll thought sadly. Now I am witness to her decline.

But at least there is Donough.

Like a traveler at sea, Carroll found himself pinning his hopes on a star.

When he found Donough he was shocked, though he tried to hide his reaction. Instead of the merry, arrogant youth he remembered, Carroll saw a man who wore his tragedies in his eyes.

The hand was the least of it. "Have a look,"

Donough offered casually. "It's healed remarkably well, they tell me."

Carroll glanced, then quickly looked away.

He had seen too many battle injuries; he did not want to see any more. "I had no idea you'd lost an arm."

"I haven't lost my arm. Look again.

Only part of my hand is gone. I can do everything I used to do, I'm not crippled," Donough said as if daring the historian to contradict him.

Carroll turned to see his baggage being carried into the hall by his bondservant. "Be careful!"

he called sharply. "My writing desk is in there, and my quills."

Donough raised an eyebrow. "All that baggage for a portable desk and some quills?"

"I have a few other things. You know. Clothes.

Books. Mementos. One accumulates a certain amount of property over the years."

"From the looks of it you've brought most of your property with you."

Carroll lowered his eyes. "I have, actually."

"You intend a long stay?"

"If you have no objections. I would prefer to spend my remaining days with you than with ..."

"With my brother? But surely Teigue can make you more comfortable than I can." As he spoke, Donough was gesturing to his men to bring a basin of heated water.

Carroll replied, "At Kincora, perhaps.

But he does not live at Kincora these days.

Cashel seems to please him better, being less Brian Boru's place and more his own.

Our Teigue has become quite fond of the perquisites of being King of Munster. Ah, that's nice," the historian added as a steaming basin was offered for bathing his hands and feet.

While these ablutions took place, Donough steeled himself to ask, "Who occupies Kincora now?"

"The king keeps a garrison there so it does not stand empty."

The tall young man with eyes like winter lakes said softly, bitterly, "Teigue could have offered it to me."

Carroll did not reply. He devoted himself to removing the dust of the road.

Donough made the historian welcome and ordered a separate chamber built for him on the east side of the stronghold, where the morning sun would awaken him. "You and I seem destined to take care of old men," he remarked to Cumara.

"At least we don't have Gormlaith."

One of Donough's increasingly rare smiles flickered across his face. "Strangely enough, I almost miss her."

"And your father?"

Donough looked at some point over Cumara's shoulder. "I used to think he was with me ... most of the time. Though not the way my mother seems to."

"It's not uncommon. After Mac Liag died I had a sense of his presence for months. I take it you no longer sense Brian Boru beside you, though?"

The skin around Donough's eyes tightened with pain. "No," he said.