The Firedrake (21 page)

Hilde had the baby, very quickly. One moment she was coming to Laeghaire telling him that she was going to have it, and the next she was lying on the bed, asleep, and the new baby wrapped in swaddling in the nurse’s arms. It was a girl. Hilde called her Traude, and Laeghaire called her Dierdre. Hilde was well right away and very happy. Six days after the baby was born, she died, and they buried her in the castle graveyard outside the wall.

“Don’t worry. Well get another,” Laeghaire said.

“But I wanted this one. I wanted my little girl. You have Murrough, and I wanted a girl.”

Murrough sat on the bed, looking from one face to the other. Laeghaire put his arms around Hilde. “We’ll get another. She’ll be happier where she is.”

“She wasn’t christened.” Hilde pulled away from him. “And we will never have another. It’s a punishment on us, for our sin. I’ll keep having them, and they’ll keep dying, they’ll just keep dying. I hate it. I hate it.”

“Murrough, go outside.”

“You go too. Go away.”

He went out after Murrough. Murrough turned and looked up.

“What was my mother mad about?”

“Your little baby sister.”

“Where is she?”

“She’s dead, Murrough.”

Murrough caught Laeghaire’s hand. “She’s dead? I can’t see her any more?”

“No.”

“Did she go to Heaven?”

“Yes.”

“Why did she die?”

“I don’t know.”

“When I die, will I go to Heaven?”

“Stop talking about it.”

Murrough’s fingers tightened around Laeghaire’s. His face turned up toward Laeghaire’s. Suddenly he began to cry. Laeghaire picked him up. Murrough wept.

“Hush. Be quiet. Don’t worry. Hush.”

“Why are you mad at me?”

“I’m not. I’m not.”

Murrough was a heavy weight in his arras. He stood in the hall with the child in his arms. Murrough cried against his shoulder. He should marry her. It would not take away the sin. They had lived together for a long time, slept in the same bed, without a marriage. He did not think it would take away the sin.

He fought the mock fight with Karl, with a wrapped sword and a padded shield. ‘The whole castle came to watch, in the field where the squires trained. The snow was melting and the horses moved in mud to their fetlocks. Murrough sat by the Count. Hilde was with him. The two horses were well matched, although Laeghaire’s stallion was much older and wiser than Karl’s horse. Karl fought well. Laeghaire rapped him several times across the ribs. Once Karl beat down Laeghaire’s shield and almost tapped him on the shoulder. They fought for nearly the whole afternoon. Twice Karl fell off his horse. The people cheered wildly and threw snowballs at them when they made bad moves.

Finally Karl thrust up his hands. “Quarter,” he said. He took off his helmet, laughing. “By the Cross,” he said, “you killed me a dozen times.”

“You’ll be a good knight,” Laeghaire said. “Hold your shield higher. Cover your neck with it.”

“Yes, my lord.”

Murrough ran up. He danced around them, laughing. He caught the brown stallion’s stirrup. Laeghaire bent and swung him up. Karl said. “That’s dangerous.”

“He plays in horses’ stalls. He’s an Irishman. We’re half horse.”

“When I grow up,” Murrough said, “I’ll be like my father.”

“He’ll be a very devil of a knight,” Karl said.

“No, he won’t He’ll be a landed lord, e count, like his godfather.”

The others were all around them now. Murrough jumped up and down, hanging onto Laeghaire.

“Where?”

“It doesn’t matter.”

No word from William. Rumors. William had sent to Rome for a special blessing on his claim against the oath-breaker. Tosti was in Normandy, helping William. The Pope would call a holy war against the usurper Harold. Harold had been crowned by the Archbishop Stigand, who was not invested from Rome, and the Pope hated him. The Emperor was sending aid to William, the rumors said. They said that the Spanish Moors were seeking an alliance with Harold Godwinson, and with Harold’s help would crush Christendom.

There was no word from William. Laeghaire thought of going to Normandy uncalled. He did not want to. He wanted William to send for him.

Hilde was better. She was merry most of the time but sometimes she would be quiet and sit alone and think. He could not reach her any more. He made love to her once but she was dull and empty in his aims. After he was finished he lay in the darkness, trembling, and listened to her fall asleep.

He took his horses for long gallops to condition them. He worked often with Karl and one or two of the squires. All the long spring he fretted. The Count knew it, and called him in one day to tell him that it would be a while before William would send for him. England was a bigger enterprise than Maine. Wait. Be calm. Wait. He rode hard, leaping the horses over the swollen streams and the windfalls of the gone winter. The brown stallion ran at the end of the whipping rope, his great body flecked with lather. Both horses began to trim down. Laeghaire sat in his saddle one day in the late spring and watched the brown stallion stamp and wheel at the end of the rope. The stallion was fresh and wild. He had not been ridden since the fight with Karl. His legs bent and drove down, smashing at the ground, tearing clods of turf out of the ground. He played like a colt, arching his neck. Spring wildness. He wanted a mare. His eyes rolled. The muscles of his haunches arched and flattened and his tail, cocked high, flew back and forth. Laeghaire could not stop watching him. He had had the stallion since he was a colt. Now the stallion was in his prime, sleek and strong and proud in the mean glitter of his eyes. He wished he were the stallion and could leap and dance and strut, fling out his hoofs and claw open the ground.

When Laeghaire went back to the castle that day, Lanfranc the Prior of Bee was there. Lanfranc said that he had only come to visit and bring some minor news, but when he said it he looked at Laeghaire, and Laeghaire thought, It’s a fine honor guard, my lord. He laughed. The Count turned, surprised, and Laeghaire made his face straight.

That evening, Lanfranc sought him out and said, “I must go back to Normandy in four days. The Duke said that if I saw you I was to tell you that he is calling knights to take England.”

“For the fun of it?”

“England is rich. Booty, land, women …”

That night he dreamed that he rode in English fields, and saw a witchwoman there. He dreamed they stood and stared at one another for a long time, and suddenly he jumped for her and caught her, and in the middle of the sunny fields he raped her. In the dream he was happy about it, but when he woke up he saw Hilde and was a little ashamed and put it out of his mind.

“We’re going to Normandy, aren’t we?” Hilde said.

“Yes.”

“When?”

“In three days.”

“I’ll get ready.”

“Good.” Laeghaire called to Murrough.

“Here, leave him here, he’s sleepy. He woke up again last night. Where are you going?”

“I’m going to run my horses.”

“Normandy?” Murrough said. “Normandy? Are we really going to Normandy?”

“Yes.” Laeghaire picked him up. “You sleep. You’re sleepy.” He grinned. He grinned at Hilda also. He put Murrough into the bed and went out. He went up to the armory and got his shield and sword. He took them down to the smith’s forge, at the back of the stable, and pounded the dents out of the sword. The smith came to watch. He asked about the ball on the pommel and how it was set in. They talked about swords for a while. Laeghaire took the horses and rode out, down south to the open flat land.

When he came back in, he was hungry, and he put the horses up and went to the kitchens to get something to eat. He was sitting there with a bowl of stew when Hilde came to him.

“Laeghaire. I can’t find Murrough.”

“When did he wake up?”

“I don’t know. I left right after you did—I had to sew some things.”

“And he’s not in the room?”

“He isn’t anywhere. Nobody has seen him.”

“Did you look in the armory? He goes there sometimes.”

“He isn’t there. I looked there, in the stable, everywhere.”

Laeghaire got up so quickly that the bench fell over. He ran out of the kitchens and down the corridor. The courtyard was empty. He ran across it. His boots rang on the stones. He threw open the stable door.

“Murrough.”

The stableman came from behind a stall partition. “What?”

“Have you seen my son?”

“No. When was he here?”

“How long have you been here?”

“I just came back.”

“Murrough!”

He looked in all the stalls but Murrough wasn’t in any of them. He looked by the haymow and under the saddles. In all the long stable there was no sign of Murrough. Maybe he had gone to the kitchens. Maybe he was in the armory. Laeghaire went slowly to the cleft in the floor. The boards seemed to bend under him. He kicked his heel and the echo came up to him, softly. It was dark down there. There would be spiders. The vault gave horses thrush. He went slowly out to the courtyard and got a dead torch and went back to the stable. The cleft grew wider under his eyes. The stableman stood silent in the middle of the stable. He crossed himself suddenly. Laeghaire knelt and swung himself into the cleft. He rammed the torch through his belt and lowered himself down. He hung at the length of his arms. The darkness swallowed up his legs and hips. He dropped. His boots struck the stone floor and he went to his knees. It was a long drop. The noise echoed softly, slowly. He took the torch and lit it. He saw cobwebs dripping from the ceiling of the vault, and the great shadows racing away from the torchlight and the dark floor, damp and solid stone. He saw Murrough. He went slowly down and laid the torch on the floor and picked him up. He was cold already, damp and cold as the stone.

“Did you find him?”

Laeghaire shut his eyes tight. The darkness slithered in around him. It was a slimy darkness. He tasted it lapping at his mouth. He rocked a little.

“Sir Laeghaire.”

He crushed Murrough against his chest and pressed his face against Murrough’s neck. The skin was unyielding and smelled of the dank vault and the cobwebs. The creeping darkness giggled in his ears. The torch guttered and died.

“I’ve found him.”

His breathing filled the vault and came back to him, almost covering the gibbering of the darkness and the clammy dribbling of its fingers down his spine. He heard many feet on the ceiling over his head and bodies sliding down over the edge of the cleft. They could not reach him. He felt himself walled in by the thick stinking body of the darkness, pressing in on him, damp and horribly smooth. Their torchlight rebounded away from him and never touched him, and their hands only moved the darkness around him. He opened his mouth and swallowed up the darkness, and in the light but with the darkness inside him he let them help him up.

“He’ll be happier where he is,” Hilde said.

He wheeled on her.

“That’s what you said to me. We’ll get another, you said. That’s what you said to me when my baby died.”

“Get out.”

“Laeghaire, oh Laeghaire, I’m sorry, please, let me be sorry too? Don’t shut me out. I was his mother, Laeghaire.”

He stared at her. She floated above the ground. She floated in the light from the window. It was still afternoon, afternoon of a million days.

“Laeghaire,” she said, and caught his arm.

He threw her off. She fell against the wall. He stood watching her. If she got up he would kill her. She looked at him. She shook her head.

“Please, Laeghaire—”

“I’ll kill you if you don’t go.”

“Laeghaire.” She stood up. She put her hands out. “Please, please …”

He stared at her. He took a step toward her. She turned and ran. He heard her sobbing. She tore open the door and ran. He could hear her crying.

He looked at the open door and the shadows. He raised his fist and took a step and hit the door and it slammed shut. His fist split open. The blood spat out and lay on his hand. He clenched his fist again. He turned wildly. He took a step and hit the chair and fell over it. He rolled over on the floor and got to his knees and stood up and sat in the chair.

Church bells. Nothing. The bed and the wall and the way the wall ran up to the other wall. Three of them all gone. Murrough. The eyes looked at him. The face laughed at him. The flesh peeled back in strips and the bony skull lay beneath it and jaws laughed at him and maggots crept from the eyes. His throat was blocked. In Ireland the women keened but the men never keened. If he screamed they would all hear him. Hear him scream. His eyes blurred over. He put his hands to his face and drove his nails against his cheekbones.

The door opened. He whirled up and jumped into a corner. It was Lanfranc. He stood in the door.

“Your woman sent me.”

“No.”

“You cannot deny me that way. Sit down.”

“Spiritual comfort for the bereaved? The aid of Holy Mother Church for the distraught father? Tell me, priest. Comfort me. Aid me. Tell me how he is gone up to Heaven and sitteth at the right hand of God.”