Seer of Sevenwaters (8 page)

“There were three men he couldn’t name,” I said. “This one and two of the dead.”

“Ah well, the full tale will come out in time, I suppose,” Gull said, stifling a yawn. “Poor fellow. Knut, I mean. As for his wife, she seems half-destroyed by grief. Biddy said nobody in the married quarters got much rest last night, with Svala’s crying. Makes the prospect of sleeping up here for a while almost enticing.”

By day’s end the wind had died down, but the sea washed in with relentless ferocity, carving out the cliffs, scraping away the pebbly beaches, reminding us of the power that had taken so many lives in a heartbeat. The clouds hung above, massy and dark as the sun sank lower. Johnny had decided we would not wait for the late summer dusk, but would conduct the ceremony as soon as all was prepared.

Torches had been set around the chosen area, where a boat-shaped hollow had been dug out, marked with a double line of stones. We formed a solemn procession. First walked two of the tallest men on the island, one bearing a sword and shield, the other a spear. Behind them followed the fallen, each carried on a stretcher by two of Johnny’s warriors. I came next in my hooded robe. I had plaited my hair and pinned it up, and in my hands I carried a shallow bowl containing herbs to be burned on the brazier we had placed by the burial site. The men and women of the island followed me. I had thought Svala might not come, but there she was, walking beside her husband, her golden hair loose, her lovely eyes quite blank.

Gull had stayed in the infirmary and one or two folk were tending to stock or infants, but almost the entire island community stood hushed around the burial site. The dead were laid in two rows, and the warriors who had led the procession placed spear, shield and sword down between the fallen. Knut had explained to us that a Norseman is laid to rest with his weapons by his side, as a recognition of his manhood—a fighting man, in particular, needed to go armed into the afterlife. As the sea had taken all these men had, the Inis Eala community had provided these shared items.

Now I stepped forward to scatter my herbs into the fire and begin my prayers. I did not perform a full druidic ritual, but tried to convey with simple words and gestures a wish that the gods, whichever of them looked kindly on us at this moment, would usher the drowned sailors safely to whatever awaited them next. The Norse, as I understood it, believed that men who died bravely in battle were elevated to the realm of the immortals, where they would feast eternally by the side of their warrior deity. Possibly the same fate was expected for a ship’s crew fallen foul of wind and waves. It was a different belief from our own, but one that should nonetheless be respected.

Muirrin walked between the dead with a bowl of water and sprinkled droplets, and Brenna carried aromatic crushed leaves to strew. Johnny spoke about the bravery that took men far from their home shores in search of new opportunities, and how risks were part of being a man, and part of living a life well and fully.

When he was done, I moved between the dead, kneeling by each in turn to lay my hand on his brow, and although all I said was the name, in my spirit I called upon my own gods, the old, good gods, to ferry the departed gently on their last and most mysterious voyage.

“Thorolf Magnusson, and Ranulf his brother.” Three paces. “Svein Njalsson.” And the next. “Mord Asgrimsson.” Dead; dead and cold. I wondered if he had a wife somewhere, keeping the hearth fire alight for his return. “Starkad Thorkelsson.” So young; he had hardly begun to be a man. “Sam Gundarsson.” I walked on to the gray-bearded man. “And this elder, whose name we do not know.” A few steps more. “And this young man, who died before his time.” Who died with blistered hands. “We honor them. The blessing of the gods be on them, and on every man, woman and child who perished when
Freyja
foundered here. For those who lie here now, and for those at rest in the deep, we speak the same prayer. May their spirits fly with the winds; may their souls be cradled in the waves; may their lives be celebrated in fine tales around the fire. May their love of family and land, of hearthstone and chieftain, of clan and kin, stay strong in their children and their children’s children.”

Knut’s face looked hard as stone. By his side, Svala stood dry-eyed, staring straight ahead. Kalev translated for them in a murmur.

I had spoken to Knut about the next part, but it was still hard to get the words out, with the two of them right there in the circle. I cleared my throat.

“I say a special prayer for the little ones who perished. In particular, for Svein Knutsson, child of our new friends here.” Tears had begun to flow down Knut’s face, a stream over granite. Svala’s expression showed not a flicker of change, though she must have heard me speak her son’s name. “He was taken early by the gods, and is now at peace with his forebears in the place beyond death. Pray for him, and for all those lost here.”

After a few moments I stepped back outside the shape of stones, and so did Muirrin and Brenna. The men who had been digging earlier took up their spades to lay the last blanket of earth over these sleepers. An eerie silence hung in the air, broken only by the whimpering of a child whose mother hushed it against her shoulder.

“Now, Sibeal?” Johnny asked quietly.

I nodded. The spades rose and fell; the earth pattered softly down, a dark rain on the shrouds of the dead. Fitful torchlight played on the circle of somber, watching faces.

It happened in a flash. One moment I was standing there, the next I was sprawled facedown on the ground, knocked off balance as Svala hurled herself forward. As I struggled to sit up she seized my shoulders, shaking me so hard my teeth rattled. A scream burst from her, high, ululating. Then Knut was dragging her off me, pulling her away, while Johnny and Cathal came to help me up.

“Are you hurt, Sibeal?”

“I’m . . . I’m fine. She took me by surprise. We must continue with the ritual, Johnny.” I looked past him. There were Muirrin and Clodagh, looking somewhat paler than usual. And there was Knut, holding Svala by both arms, speaking to her in a low voice. Her chest heaved, but she was silent now. She did not meet his stern gaze; her beautiful eyes were turned on the ground.

“She was overcome by grief, I suppose,” Johnny said in an undertone. “And better to release that grief than keep it locked inside. But that’s no excuse for an act of violence.”

It was not sorrow I had felt in the grip of her strong hands. What I had sensed was a cry for help.

“Are you sure you can continue with this, Sibeal?”

“Of course.” I was still working on my breathing. “We need a final blessing, that’s all. It would be right for you to say that, as leader of the community.” The ritual must not end on a note of violence and discord. The gods would be deeply displeased, and the spirits of the dead would journey under a shadow.

My cousin stepped forward, a somber figure in his dark tunic, the raven markings on his cheek and brow brought to eerie life by the shifting torchlight. The sky was fading to dusk. “The gods speed you on your journey,” he said quietly. “We honor your endeavors. We salute your courage. We offer our prayers for your passage to the next world. Let your memory be held in every stone of this island. Let your songs be whispered on the wind. May the tongues of bards tell your tales until the end of time.”

The spades rose and fell once more. After some time, a time silent save for the thud of metal on earth and the soft descent of the soil, the hollow became a mound. Stones would be placed here to hold it firm; this boat would hold a true course to the northeast, toward these seafarers’ ancestral home. In time, the vessel would bear a shivering shroud of grass.

Dusk blanketed the island. As we headed back toward the settlement and a warm fire, the rain descended in sudden sheets, drenching every man and woman among us, turning the paths to quagmires and filling each hollow with a slate-dark pool. The torches fizzled and died. Behind us the burial mound stood quiet in the fading light. The ritual was complete.

I was too tired to go to supper in the dining hall, but too unsettled to think of sleep. In the infirmary, Muirrin tended to my bruises and Clodagh brought me food and drink. Folk came and went. I heard from Evan that Knut and Svala had been offered the fisherman’s hut down by the main cove, away from the rest of the community, and that Knut had accepted gladly. Svala had not appeared at supper time, Evan said, but Knut had come to the dining hall and had gone around the tables with Kalev, personally thanking every member of the community for the kindness shown to him and his wife.

Later, when Evan and Muirrin had gone to bed and I was sitting by the sick man’s pallet deep in thought while Gull pottered at the workbench, Johnny came in. He nodded to Gull, then came over to me.

“How are you feeling, Sibeal? That was . . . unsettling.”

“I have a bruise or two on top of the ones I got yesterday, but nothing serious.”

“You did a fine job. To stay so calm, to finish the ritual . . . Ciarán would be proud of you.” Johnny sat down opposite me. I felt his scrutiny. He was doing what he did so well, taking in what lay below the surface.

“Mm.” I knew exactly what Ciarán would say if he were here.
What might you have done differently, Sibeal? What learning can be gleaned from this?
A druid was always learning. One sought wisdom in all that occurred, whether planned or unplanned. Right now, I was not feeling very wise. I was feeling exhausted, out of my depth and on the verge of tears. Svala needed help. She was trying to tell me so, or thus it seemed. But she had attacked me with some violence, when I was doing my best to conduct a solemn ritual in which I honored her dead son. Why would she do that? Was I wrong about that plea for help? Perhaps she was completely out of her mind, and unreachable. “I hope the gods looked kindly on us. Svala’s grief has shattered her, I know that. But those men deserved better. I should have anticipated that she might act wildly and taken steps to prevent it.”

“Sibeal, look at me.”

I looked. It seemed an immense effort.

“You were exhausted and upset. Evan told me the man you rescued may not survive, and I can imagine your feelings on that. Yet you undertook this duty for us. After Svala’s outburst you picked yourself up and we finished it. You did a good job.”

I was reluctant to tell him that what had caused my collapse was more than simple weariness. The flaw that had made Ciarán send me away, the open window I seemed to have in me to the fears and sorrows of others, had never been more evident than today. To speak of it was to admit to a weakness that few knew about.

“I hope Svala can recover, given time.”

“Time,” echoed Johnny. “That’s just what we don’t have, unfortunately, with these men from Connacht due soon.”

“Why does that make a difference?”

“Secrets,” put in Gull from where he was chopping something at the bench. “Nobody comes to Inis Eala without prior arrangement. We’re more accustomed to welcoming parties of warriors than hapless seafarers. When we have men here for training, we take precautions to ensure they learn only what we want to teach them.”

“I understand that.” Ever since Bran’s time, they had taught not only methods of fighting, the construction of weapons and battle tactics, but many other skills a leader could put into use to maintain the advantage: mapmaking, for instance, and covert surveillance and codes. What had made Bran’s outlaw band feared and envied throughout the north of Erin now made Inis Eala much sought after as a training ground for elite warriors. “What has that to do with Knut and Svala? And him?” The man on the pallet was asleep, his heavy lids closed, his face a study in white and gray.

“We know very little about them, Sibeal,” Johnny said. “It seems Knut was happy to offer his services as an oarsman, and took no interest in who owned the ship or why certain folk were traveling on her. He can’t even give me a name in Ulfricsfjord so I know where to send my message. My inclination would be to dispatch him and his wife, along with this fellow, over to the mainland before our visitors arrive. My people in the settlement there could arrange passage home for them. But even if this man survives, Muirrin tells me he won’t be fit to travel for a long while. And Svala clearly can’t go anywhere. We’ll have to keep them for some time.”

“I don’t imagine any one of them is a spy,” I said, wondering if that was what he meant, “or they would have arrived by less dramatic means.”

“No, I imagine not. But while they’re here, we’ll have to keep an eye on them. And with this man needing so much care, our healers are going to be very busy. When we’re conducting training, there are always injuries.”

“I’ll help, of course,” I said.

“Good,” Johnny said. “Sibeal, I sense you didn’t give much credence to what I said before. You shouldn’t let what happened at the burial weigh on your mind. I never lie to my men about their performance in the field, and I wouldn’t lie to you. When I tell you that you completed your task well, you should believe me.”

“Thank you, Johnny.” His men reported to him as commander, and it was up to him to determine whether they had done well or not. In the absence of Ciarán, only the gods could determine my success or failure. I could not help feeling they would be watching me with some disappointment.

“You’re very hard on yourself,” Johnny said.

“The path is one of constant learning. Constant striving for improvement.”

“Don’t forget that your family is here. You may be a druid, but you should lean on us if you have need. Now I must go. Good night, Sibeal. Good night, Gull.”

“Good night.”

I moved over to sit on the mat before the fire, watching the patterns in the flames. Gull moved quietly around the infirmary, securing shutters, opening the door for Fang to go out, letting her back in with a muttered, “Your ladyship.” Eventually he settled himself on the shelf bed in the corner. He had assured me that he slept lightly and would wake if the sick man needed him, so I should go to bed whenever I wanted to. The dog was asleep in the crook of the survivor’s knees. One lamp still burned. My head was full of tumbling thoughts, and I knew I would not soon fall asleep. I listened to the sounds in the chamber: the crackling of the fire, the creak of timbers in the wind, Fang’s snuffling snores, the labored wheeze of the man’s breathing . . . He was awake. I knew it without going near him. Awake; alone; afraid.