Seer of Sevenwaters (28 page)

“I am sure of very little.” Gods, those others—there were five others with us, Artan and Donn, Fiac and Demman, young Colm on his first sea voyage, all of us set out from Muredach’s court—were they on the ship when it foundered? All gone, all drowned? My knees stop supporting me and I slump back onto the bench, willing the two men to go away and leave me with my tangled thoughts.

Perhaps I have turned white, for Johnny says, “No more for now. Pack the things up, Cathal. I want another word with Muirrin, then I’ll walk back over with you.” He goes into the infirmary.

Cathal packs. It does not take long. Nobody comes. When he is done he moves to lean against the wall beside me. It is a casual pose, almost lounging. His eyes tell me quite a different story. This is a man I do not want as an enemy.

“I have something to say to you.” Cathal is keeping his tone level. “I’ll say it quickly. I have family here on the island. I have a wife I love more than life itself, and a child yet unborn. If someone has sent you here, someone with ill intent toward me, know that I have the capacity to destroy you and that I will do so without hesitation. Sibeal’s fondness for you will make not a scrap of difference. Now tell me the truth, Ardal. On whose orders have you come here? What fell master set you in our midst to wreak your havoc on our dreams?”

I am too surprised to respond. Cathal believes I was sent here to do him harm, to injure his loved ones? Why would he think that? I open my mouth to tell him his suspicions are nonsense, then close it again. While any part of my past remains forgotten, I cannot know why I am on this island or for what purpose. Yes, I traveled north on a mission for the king of Munster. We bore betrothal gifts from his son to the daughter of the Orcadian Jarl, lovely things she never received. It was a peaceable mission, and my role in it merely that of interpreter. But until I can remember what went awry, what left us broken and sinking on the rocks off Inis Eala, I cannot assure Cathal that I am blameless. I cannot tell him anything. And I want to tell, not because he is formidable and I fear him, though that is true, but because I hear the sincerity in his voice, and the pain.

The silence has drawn out. He is waiting, night-black eyes fixed on me. “I do not remember everything, Cathal,” I tell him. “If your enemy seeks you out, I think it unlikely he would use me as his agent.”

“Unlikely.” His tone is flat. “That answer is inadequate, Ardal. I don’t trust a man who holds back information when he need not. You’ve remembered something. I see it in your eyes. It was there the moment I lifted those things out of the box. I can think of only one reason why you won’t talk, and I don’t like that reason.
Why were you on the ship? Who sent you, and for what purpose?
”

I say nothing. I will Johnny to come back. A moment later, I hear his voice from within the infirmary, bidding Muirrin a courteous farewell. I breathe again.

“If anything happens to Clodagh,” Cathal says in a furious undertone, “or to the child, I’ll make you talk, Ardal. I can do it, believe me. Another warning. You’d best step back from your friendship with Sibeal. She’s young, she saved your life under extraordinary circumstances, and she feels a bond of sorts, no doubt. It can’t be good for her to get involved with a man who won’t tell the truth. Whatever it is you’re doing, don’t embroil my wife’s young sister in it.”

I swallow my rage. In a way, his attack is justified. “As soon as I am strong enough I will leave this place,” I said. “I wish you and your family nothing but good, Cathal. But don’t you see, I can’t—” My voice cracks; I am not yet as strong as I need to be. “Until I remember all of it, there is no certainty,” I say more quietly. “Not for you; not for me; not for anyone here. That’s the curse of the ill luck man.”

His eyes have narrowed. “What do you mean?” he asks, his tone quite different.

I do not answer, for across the garden someone else is approaching: Knut, tight-jawed, striding fast. As he comes up to us, Johnny emerges from the infirmary.

Knut’s ice-blue gaze sweeps over us, pausing on the box, which is now closed and strapped. “Look for wife,” he explains. “You see her?”

“No,” says Cathal.

“Svala’s not here,” adds Johnny.

Knut looks at me. “None of us has seen her,” I say in Norse. There is an unspoken question on his face. He’s been shown this box before; he knows what it holds. He’s seen me with Cathal. His eyes ask:
What have you told, ill luck man?
He turns on his heel and leaves.

I see the jetty at Ulfricsfjord, men loading supplies, the crew readying the vessel to sail. One of them has Knut’s face. Paul is keeping guard over the box that holds the gifts and the chest with its cargo of silver pieces. Colm is excited, his gaze going everywhere, his enthusiasm spreading to the rest of them, even the weathered Norse crewmen. The others tease him, saying he’ll be sure to meet a buxom Norse girl and achieve another first along the way. A girl. A woman. But not on the ship, because there are no women on
Freyja
. A crew of Norse sailors, a party of Irish courtiers, and with them a pair of brothers,
Breizhiz
both.

I’m on the verge of saying it to Johnny and Cathal.
This woman, Svala—she was not on the ship when it left Ulfricsfjord.
What the significance of that is, I have no idea, but the need to tell is strong in me. My memory of Knut’s eyes stops my tongue. There is peril in that last, lost memory. In this moment I understand what Cathal is feeling, the turmoil that has led him to threaten me. Misery washes through me. I look up at Johnny, and he looks back at me. A strong, clever, just man; a true leader. A man who would listen, I think, if I told the truth. But what good is an incomplete truth, one in which the missing piece might place them all in peril, the wife and child for whom Cathal so fears, generous Gull, and Sibeal, most precious of all?

“I want to leave the island,” I tell Johnny. “The moment I can fend for myself, you must send me away.”

~Sibeal~

I would tell Ardal about Svala’s vision first. He might interpret it as something cryptic, needing scholarly consideration. After all, the scene had been like something from an ancient story, with its lonely isle, its massive seas, its fearsome monster and desperate men. But perhaps Ardal would tell me it was true. Perhaps he would remember.

I walked briskly back to the settlement. As I passed the dining hall, the door opened and Clodagh stuck her head out. “Sibeal! Come in here!”

Inside, I was somewhat surprised to see Muirrin seated in the kitchen corner with a cup of mead before her on the table and her cheeks flushed a becoming shade of pink. Biddy sat beside her, and Brenna opposite. “What’s this?” I asked, seating myself beside Brenna and accepting the mead I was offered. Muirrin was hardly seen outside the infirmary during the day, and for a moment I had been concerned that some misfortune had occurred, another disaster for which the community could blame the ill luck man. But there were smiles all around.

“Tell her, Muirrin,” said Clodagh.

“Tell me what?”

My eldest sister looked at me across the table. I saw the joy that lit her eyes, and guessed the news before she spoke. “Sibeal, I’m expecting a child. At last! I thought it would never happen, and now . . . ” She had tears in her eyes.

“Oh, Muirrin, that’s wonderful. Congratulations.” I went around the table to embrace her, thinking how far my mind had drifted, these last years, from the concerns of hearth and home. I had never considered it unusual that after more than six years of marriage Muirrin and Evan had no children. It had not occurred to me that they might have wanted them, perhaps badly, and have faced the possibility of never being parents. I had simply thought of them as healers, dedicated to their profession.

“I’ve suspected it for a while,” Muirrin said, “but I didn’t tell anyone except Evan, because . . . well, we’ve been disappointed before, thinking I was with child and then . . . But I’m sure now. I even have a little belly—look.”

Muirrin was a small, slender woman, like all of us sisters. Under the practical homespun of her gown, her stomach was indeed very slightly rounded. Even I knew this meant her pregnancy was a fair way on, three turnings of the moon or four. Looking at Clodagh, whose form currently resembled that of a very ripe fruit, I felt a deep shiver of unease. The dreams, the visions, the murmurings among the islanders . . .
Gods, keep my sisters safe
, I prayed.
Let their children be born whole and healthy.

“We’re all taking the afternoon off work, even Muirrin,” Clodagh said. “We’re going to find a nice corner in the sun and sit there doing absolutely nothing. You, too, Sibeal.”

A protest was on my lips, but I held it back. I had never seen that look on Muirrin’s face before, save perhaps when she told us Evan had asked her to be his wife. Her happiness was a gift of great worth, and I would do nothing at all to spoil it. “Biddy, you’ll be a grandmother again!” I said. Clem and Annie had three children, Sam and Brenna one.

Biddy’s amiable features were pink with pleasure. “And that man of mine will be a grandfather,” she said. “Not that he doesn’t think of my lads as his own, of course. But this is different.”

Evan was the only one of Biddy’s three sons who had been fathered by Gull. Sam and Clem were the offspring of her first husband. It was easy to imagine Gull as grandfather to a tiny child. I saw him singing songs; telling tales; holding a small hand in his big, maimed one and leading his grandson down to the shore to watch the boats come in. Yes, it was a boy I saw: a curly-headed mite with almond skin and mischievous dark eyes. A sturdy, healthy child. I remembered my vision of Clodagh’s infant, tiny and frail, naked in the forest, and suppressed a shiver. “Has Gull heard the news?” I asked.

“Muirrin told him earlier,” Biddy said. “He needs time to come to terms with such tidings, welcome as they are. Brings back the past, you see. He doesn’t talk about it, but a long time ago, years before he and I were wed, he lost his whole family, mother and father, sisters and brothers, wife and children, all slain by raiders. He’d have done away with himself, but for the Chief’s intervention. Gull’s content here. He loves the family he has now. But that sort of thing never goes away. The shadow lingers. He’ll look at his new grandchild and see the babes he lost.” I saw a trace of that shadow on her own face, and wondered how many times she had gentled Gull through his nightmares.

The apple grove would have been a good place to sit and talk, but Clodagh could not manage such a long walk today. The baby had shifted and was pressing down awkwardly, her back was aching, and between her discomfort and Cathal’s dreams, she was short of sleep.

“Not the kitchen garden,” said Brenna firmly. “If Muirrin’s in sight of the infirmary she’ll be wanting to go back up there and start brewing something. Nowhere near the work room, or Clodagh won’t be able to keep her hands off the loom. I don’t know what it is with you Sevenwaters girls, but you seem to like being constantly busy.”

“It’s our mother’s influence,” Clodagh said. “She never was comfortable with idleness. Why don’t we go to that sheltered area out the back of the married quarters?”

“Take some of those oatcakes with you,” said Biddy, who evidently did not plan to come with us. “And a bit of cheese. Sibeal, I’ll give you a basket.”

It was no surprise to me that Clodagh went to her chamber and fetched her embroidery, so she would have something to do while we talked. She was working a border on a tiny tunic, fronds of seaweed and curious goggle-eyed fish. “You won’t have to sew a stitch for your baby,” she told Muirrin with a smile, settling on one of the two wooden benches placed in this sunny corner. The wall of the married quarters screened us from one side, and a lone blackthorn from the other. “Everything I’ve made for mine can be handed on.”

“Just as well,” Muirrin said wryly. “I may be able to stitch a wound, but I doubt if I’d be up to such delicate work as that. My infant will be proud to wear your handiwork, Clodagh.”

“I’ve already passed Fergal’s smallest garments on to Annie’s youngest,” Brenna put in. “He’s grown apace. Takes after his father.”

“Where is Fergal this afternoon?” I asked idly.

“With a clutch of other children, under Alba’s care. By the time she settles down and has a child of her own, she’ll be expert.” Brenna’s tone changed. “It shocks me to think Alba liked that fellow, Rodan, gods rest his spirit. I saw through him the moment he tried to worm his way into Suanach’s favor. According to her, Rodan assumed she’d be ready to open her legs as soon as he asked her.” She glanced at me. “I hope I don’t offend you, Sibeal. We women can be rather frank in our discussion when there are no men around to hear us.”

“Rodan must have thought himself irresistible.” Clodagh stabbed her needle into the linen with more force than was strictly necessary. “No sooner did he get a refusal from Suanach than he was trying again with Flidais. We should not speak ill of the dead, of course. But I’ll be happy when these Connacht men are gone. It hasn’t been a good time. There’s unrest everywhere.”

The seed of an idea had started to grow in my mind, and I did not like it much at all. Svala naked on the shore, playing with sand as if she were a child. Something half-seen in the bushes on the cliff top. I had dismissed my thoughts of a watcher. Svala earlier today, on the cliff’s edge. My heart tightened. I must be wrong. Surely I must be wrong. “Brenna,” I asked, “do you think it was true, what the Connacht men seemed to be saying about Rodan at the time of the burial, that he didn’t care much whether a woman was married or single? That if he was attracted to her he’d approach her anyway?”

Three pairs of startled eyes turned in my direction; nobody had expected such a question from me.

“I heard a few remarks along those lines,” Brenna said. “Flidais was of the opinion that it was her husband’s identity that put Rodan off, rather than the fact of her being wed in the first place. Nobody in his right mind would want to get on the wrong side of Rat. Why would you ask such a thing, Sibeal?”