Spirit of the Mist (12 page)

“You are a prisoner here.”
 

“Prisoner? I am no prisoner! I am the tanist of Dun Bochna, and the guest of your King Murrough!”
 

Brendan’s two companions, Darragh and Killian, came running to his side, but the men only took firmer hold of their captive. “What is wrong here?” cried Darragh. “What has he done?”
 

“He is a hostage with an unpaid ransom,” continued the first warrior. He nodded to the men who held Brendan. “Take him to the hall, place him in one of the rooms, and bolt the door.” With a shove, they started him walking in the direction of the King’s Hall.
 

“What do you mean, an unpaid ransom?” said Muriel, hurrying after them. “These two companions of his brought the gold when they came here for him. I saw it myself, as did you! What are you talking about?”
 

“The gold was only part of the ransom. Cattle were due as well—fifteen milk cows, to complete the honor price under the law for a tanist.”
 

Darragh and Killian looked at each other.
 

“Cattle?” Muriel stepped in front of the first warrior and held up her hands in front of him, forcing him to stop. Brendan’s captors halted too but only tightened their grip on their prisoner. “Surely his men can return to Dun Bochna and fetch a few head of cattle, if that is all that is needed!”
 

“Lady Muriel,” said Brendan, his voice formal and calm, “I thank you for your concern. But these men are right. The remainder of the ransom was never paid. I thought only of returning here to you, and nothing else entered my mind.”
 

“Listen to me,” said Muriel, catching the warrior by the arm. “In the leather case at Brendan’s belt is gold and bronze and copper enough to ransom any prince. Ask the king if he will accept that instead of cows. Ask him!”
 

“Muriel—I will have your king do nothing of the kind,” said Brendan. “That is your bride price, and it will be used to secure your marriage or I will throw it into the sea. I thank you for your offer,” he said, smiling at her, “but I must apologize to your king, and have him tell me what I must do to make the situation right again.”
 

“That is right,” said the warrior. “It is the king who will decide. Now, Lady Muriel, please make way. The king awaits us.”
 

They took him to the King’s Hall and walked him inside. The doors closed tight and Muriel could only wait outside, alone.
 

The day wore on. Muriel shut herself up in her house with the largest basket of clean combed wool that she could find, spinning the wisps of wool into fine, smooth thread wrapped around long wooden spindles.
 

The simple work occupied her hands, but it could not keep her from thinking the same tormenting thoughts over and over again. She tried to push those thoughts away, tried to tell herself that she was calm and unconcerned, but knew that she was fooling no one—certainly not Alvy.
 

“Please, dear one, don’t worry for him,” the old woman said, combing out more wool for Muriel to spin. “They wouldn’t think of harming him. He’s just being held for the ransom he’s worth. They’ll put him in a fine room and feed him enough for three strong men and make sure he’s well and happy. He wouldn’t fetch much of a ransom otherwise! He’ll be back with you before you even have a chance to miss him.”
 

Muriel kept her eyes fixed on her work. “I know he is safe. It’s just that…that…I am so unsure of what he is.”
 

“Isn’t he the tanist of Dun Bochna? Their next king? That’s why King Murrough is being so careful of him. A tanist will bring a very nice price. Murrough would be a bad king to his people if he did not get what this Brendan is worth!”
 

“Brendan says he is the tanist. He says many things, but—”
 

“Ah! You are unsure of his words.” Alvy laughed, pulling her comb through the masses of wool she, too, was spinning. “Then I suppose I am happy, dear one, for you have learned a thing or two! No young woman with a mind to call her own would believe every little thing a handsome man says.”
 

Muriel smiled a little. “I have listened to you for a very long time.” Then her face grew somber again. “No matter how many times Brendan tells me that he is a prince and will one day be a king, no matter what fine clothes he wears or how much gold gleams at his shoulder and on his arms and his fingers…the only way I see him is as a prisoner.”
 

“A prisoner? What do you mean?”
 

Muriel looked away, gazing into the softly burning hearth fire as her thoughts drifted back to when she had first found Brendan. “I discovered him as a half-drowned outcast, an exile thrown to the storm to die…then he was a mysterious visitor dressed in gray, not a guest but not allowed to leave, who might or might not have been what he said he was…and now he is again an outsider, a prisoner dragged into the King’s Hall and locked into a room.”
 

“I see,” Alvy said, nodding her head. “But everyone else seems to confirm the story he tells. Why do you doubt him? I am sure you wouldn’t unless you had good reason.”
 

“The mirror,” Muriel said quietly. “You are right. Everyone does confirm his story. Only the water mirror seems to say otherwise.”
 

Alvy set down her wool and leaned in close. “What does the mirror say?”
 

“Perhaps I am not understanding it…but it seems to show Brendan as the child of slaves.”
 

“Slaves,” Alvy whispered, then leaned back again. “I’ve never known the mirror to be wrong. But how could the tanist of Dun Bochna be the child of slaves?”
 

Muriel shook her head. “I want to believe him. I know that he himself believes what he told me; I know that he does not lie. But though my heart wants to take him at his word, I cannot help but think that there are still many questions left unanswered about who—or what—this Brendan really is.”
 

The afternoon wore on. After what seemed like forever, Muriel heard the sound of galloping horses—horses heading across the grounds of the dun toward the gates. She sat bolt upright for a moment, then dropped her wool and her wooden spindle into the rushes as she dashed outside, flinging the door wide open and not bothering to close it.
 

“Brendan!” she shouted as she saw three riders approaching the gate. “Brendan!’
 

She thought he could not possibly hear her—but then his gray horse slid to a halt, and he turned around on it to face her. His two companions halted as well. Muriel ran over to them.
 

“I’m sorry,” Brendan said, smiling down at her as his horse moved restlessly beneath him. “I did not mean to leave without a word for you, but I did not want you to worry.”
 

She reached out and touched his horse’s neck, and the animal quieted. “You are leaving?” she asked. “I thought the king ordered you to stay until the rest of the ransom was paid!”
 

“He did. But I convinced him that the best one to bring back the cattle was none but myself.”
 

“You? The king has allowed you to ride all the way to Dun Bochna, and then all the way back again, to bring back your own ransom?”
 

He grinned again. “Not so far as Dun Bochna—only to the hills above Dun Camas, where King Odhran’s cattle graze. I have promised to bring back not just the number of cattle owed for my ransom, but twice that number. Not only will I pay the lawful ransom, but I will convince you that I am worthy of being your husband—the husband of a lady who will have none but a king.”
 

“And why would King Murrough agree to such a thing?”
 

Brendan sat back, and his horse began stepping about in impatience once again. “Because he knew that there was no one else who could accomplish such a feat!”
 

Muriel stared up at him. “Or he knows you will be killed!”
 

Brendan only laughed. “No one but a king can defeat another king! That’s why he’s sending me to face King Odhran! Take care, Lady Muriel, and I will be back in three nights. Watch what I will do to win my lady!”
 

He reined his gray horse back toward the gate then, and, with his two companions, galloped away toward King Odhran’s lands.
 

For two nights and three days, Muriel went about her normal life and tried not to think about Brendan and the unbelievably risky attempt he was making. But it was impossible to avoid hearing about it, for it seemed that the people of Dun Farraige talked of nothing else.
 

Working at a loom beside the other women in the King’s Hall, Muriel kept her eyes on the fabric she wove but could think of nothing but the conversations floating through the air all around her.
 

“Dun Bochna’s tanist means to steal thirty head of cattle from a vicious outlaw king?”
 

“How can he even think he will get close to those herds?”
 

“They will be guarded by half of Odhran’s warriors. And the tanist himself rode out with only his own two men!”
 

“King Murrough will have to send out a party to find him.”
 

“Ha! Our king has no reason to send out anyone to search for this Brendan and his men. He is little better than a fugitive, so far as our laws are concerned.”
 

“That’s right. No matter how you look at it, none of them are any part of Dun Farraige.”
 

“But this Brendan might just succeed. He might return with his ransom.”
 

“If he returns empty-handed, he’ll simply be a prisoner again, safely held here in a room in this very hall. Perhaps I will favor him with a visit and take him some honey wine.”
 

All of the weaving women laughed. “Or maybe he won’t come back at all. Maybe he’ll just flee back to his own kingdom, happy to be alive and nothing more!”
 

Muriel closed her eyes as the others’ laughter started up again. Brendan would never turn away from the task he had been given, for that would only make him the butt of jokes for years to come. She knew very well the amount of pride he took in being the tanist of Dun Bochna—to say nothing of his own personal pride in himself.
 

She wished, now, that King Murrough had indeed kept him a prisoner, just as she had seen…for if he were a prisoner, he would be safe, and he would be alive. Muriel knew that Brendan would never flee back to his home without keeping his promise to bring back the ransom he owed. Only death or capture could stop him. He would come back victorious with King Odhran’s cattle or he would never come back at all.
 

The sun set yet again, and the waning moon rose, but still there was no sign of Brendan or his men.
 

Muriel was long past telling herself that she should not concern herself with his life, that he was nothing to her but a handsome young man who had chanced to come into her life one wild and stormy night, a man with romantic intentions he would likely not fulfill, and yet… She filled her water mirror and carried it outside, placing it on the earth in the shadows of the house, and sat down in the grass before it.
 

She placed her fingers on the surface of the mirror’s cold water. The moon was losing its power now, at this part of its never-ending cycle, and fleeting white clouds from over the sea obscured its light from time to time. Seeing anything would be difficult this night—but not half so difficult as sitting back and not trying anything at all.
 

Muriel gazed into the bronze dish, feeling only the cold seawater on her hands and the soft night wind on her face. “Brendan,” she whispered. “Now.”
 

Faint rings appeared on the water. The pale shadow of a cloud passed over it. And then the water cleared and Muriel saw the image of Brendan, riding with his men in the darkness, sweeping past a herd of bawling cattle high on the mountaintop pastures with shouting, torch-bearing men riding after them.
 

Her heart pounded. The battle had begun. But which way was it going? It was impossible to tell. She saw only a wild stampede of men and horses and cattle in the darkness.

She raised her fingers clear of the water and then touched them to its surface once more. “Brendan,” she repeated. Again she saw him, and this time the cattle lumbered across the moonlit hilltop with Brendan and his men clearly driving them on.
 

Hope surged through her. He had the cattle—he and his men had somehow gotten control of them and were herding them away. Now that they had gotten the animals, they would leave Odhran’s territory and return to Dun Farraige, where they would be safe.
 

Where
Brendan
would be safe.
 

The images faded. Once more Muriel raised her fingers and dipped them in the water.
 

At first she saw only the clouds moving past overhead, casting their fleeting shadows over the glimmering surface inside the flat bronze dish. “Brendan,” she whispered a third time, through clenched teeth, fighting to maintain a calm and patient mind. “Brendan!”