Chapter Thirty-Eight
Quarrie went to visit the harper, Danoch, once he’d taken a meal and something to drink. His body wanted sleep, but he could not make an excuse for it, and anyway, he was much too unsettled to find rest.
He could feel the physical effects of a night’s long lovemaking. Indeed, at random moments he could still feel Hulda’s mouth, her fingers upon him, to devastating effect. But the spiritual effects reached far deeper. The longing deepest of all.
He received a lot of pushback on his decision to feast the Norse, first from Ma, then from the seneschal, who came to him nearly in tears as soon as he heard of it.
“Chief Murtray, ye ask me to spend our stores to celebrate our mortal enemies?”
“Nay, but only to celebrate an alliance wi’ them that will prevent more dyin’.”
“I maun say”—Kalen had to fight for the words—“I do no’ like it.”
A sentiment shared by everyone else Quarrie met. Such word traveled swiftly in an enclosed community. Even before he went to see Danoch, folk approached him to protest.
As calmly and kindly as he could manage, he heard them out and turned them away.
Old Danoch lived with his daughter, a widow whose husband had been slain fighting other Norsemen.
Quarrie had always liked Danoch, whom Da had taken on after years of traveling bards had come and gone.
A slender man who did not look his years, with a charming tongue and a quick smile, Quarrie liked his music even better.
This one, quiet household, so it seemed, had not heard of his perfidy in choosing his guests. Danoch’s daughter, Raisa, invited him in with courtesy and visible surprise.
“Chief Murtray. Father, ’tis himself come calling.” She addressed the old man sitting by the fire.
Danoch greeted Quarrie warmly. Quarrie sat while Raisa fussed around them for a time, providing hospitality. Not until she withdrew did Quarrie speak.
“Master Danoch, I ha’ come to ask your advice.”
“Have ye, then?” Danoch’s hair had once been black and his eyes were still bright blue.
“Aye. Ye ha’ traveled much during your time on the road, ha’ ye not? In yer role o’ shanachie.”
“Och, that I have. In my youth, before I came here to your father, I was all over Scotland and Ireland, and much o’ Wales also. On foot that was, mostly. I carried all I owned on my back, and the main o’ that my clarsach.”
The instrument in question stood not far away, another presence there in the room.
“A fascinating life that must ha’ been.” Quarrie found himself distracted for the moment from his purpose.
“Aye, so it was. And often a difficult one. But I lived for the music, ye see. And och, but I collected some songs and stories.”
“And we ha’ benefited from those.” Quarrie could not help but smile. “Wha’ made ye settle here?”
“I ha’ Murtray blood, way back. And I would come here often on my yearly rounds. Your father always made me most welcome.”
A bard provided wondrous entertainment, and a chief could not always afford to keep one of his own. They tended to move with the seasons.
Danoch smiled. “On one such visit, I fell in love wi’ a Murtray lass. Raisa was born not long after. Eventually, your father was good enough to offer me a place and a home here. He was a fine man, yer da.”
“He was,” Quarrie replied gravely. “Tell me, wha’ d’ye ken o’ the Norse?”
The enthusiasm in Danoch’s eyes cooled a mite. “Ye mean, besides the fact that they love to wet their swords and axes wi’ Scottish blood?”
Quarrie’s lips tightened. “Besides that, aye.”
“Back in the days when I traveled, I saw the damage they did in Ireland as well as here in Scotland. Families broken and folk taken for slaves. I was nearly captured myself, once. The Norse chief decided he wanted a bard o’ his own. I barely escaped wi’ my clarsach.”
“Ye ken a little o’ their ways, then?”
Danoch gave him a long look. “In Dublin, they ha’ established a kingdom and hold sway there. Wexford and Waterford also. They ha’ their own culture, one o’ boasting and drinking, mainly.”
“And music?”
“And music,” Danoch replied.
“I would like for ye to help me. I ha’ decided to feast the band o’ Norsemen that ha’ taken up the wee bay to the north o’ here.
I ha’ made an alliance wi’ their leader”—and had given her his heart—“and wish to celebrate that agreement. I thought wi’ all ye had seen, ye would best know how to honor them. ”
The old man blinked at him. He took so long before answering, Quarrie began to wonder if he would.
At last he spoke. “Honor them, ye say?”
“Aye.”
“Chief Murtray, even if ye invite a wolf in beside yer fire, ’tis still a wolf.”
“I understand that.” He had heard almost the selfsame warning from his mother.
“I am no certain—wi’ all respect—ye do.”
“For generations, as ye say, there has been killing. I seek to change that.”
Danoch sighed. “Since coming here to settle, I ha’ learned much o’ the history of Clan Murtray. ’Twas my duty to do so, and to sing wha’ I know in honor and respect. A chief likes to hear his ancestors praised.”
“Aye.”
“Did ye know yer heritage goes back all the way to Ireland? To the great Ardahl MacCormac himsel’?”
“I did know that, aye.” Quarrie wondered what this had to do with the Norse.
“He was a warrior wi’out compare, back in those ancient days.”
“So they do say.”
“His clan would ne’er ha’ survived wi’out his sword. And later, after your ancestors came here to Scotland—it was called Alba then—they had to fight for this land. Fight for what became dearer to them than their ancestral Irish lands.”
The old man had fallen into a storytelling rhythm now, his rich voice taking up the cadence of the tale.
“So I ha’ heard.”
“They fought each other, clan against clan, and the Caledonians also.”
“And one o’ them wed a Caledonian princess, did he no’?” Quarrie added deliberately, “To end the fighting.” Why could that not happen again? Love and war. Which might prove the stronger?
“Aye so, that is true, and there is Caledonian blood in yer veins. My point is, all these who came before ye were warriors. I would caution ye about laying yer sword aside too quickly or too soon.”
“I do no’ intend to lay my sword aside. Just, mayhap, be sure I do no’ need to use it before times. The Norse leader has promised that in exchange for a berth here, there will be no conflict between us.”
“And ye believe him, do ye?”
“Her. I believe her, I do.”
Danoch’s gaze sharpened. “The Norse leader is a woman? This had no’ come to my ears. I must be getting old.”
“I wish to honor this alliance—to mark it with a feast. I thought ye might best know how.”
“Aye well, as I ha’ said. Food, drink, music.”
“Will ye play for them?”
The old man did not hesitate. “My music is meant for all. I will no’ withhold it. But, Chief Murtray, I maun urge caution. Trust may be misplaced. And ye ha’ yer people to think upon.”
“So I do. So I am.” Was that true? Or did Quarrie think of himself and his longing for Hulda? His need for her.
“If ye give these wolves a den, might they no’ invite others o’ their kind? Enough to rend us limb from limb.”
“Should that happen—should I see any hint o’ other Norse moving in—the alliance will break. Then will I tak’ up my sword.”
And what would such an act cost him, in breaking with Hulda?
He leaned toward the old man. “Tell me this, Master Danoch. Ye say ye ha’ traveled far and heard many a story.”
“So I ha’.”
“Wha’ do ye ken o’ the cauldron o’ rebirth?”
Danoch’s gaze returned to his. It held a spark.
“An old tale, that.” Again his voice assumed a cadence.
“Our ancestors believed that life was but a wheel, one that never stops turning. We are born to our place upon that wheel, and as it turns we meet the successive occurrences of our lives—including death.” Danoch gave a rueful smile.
“When we die, our spirit flies awa’ to feast and celebrate.
But eventually—or so they said—it finds itsel’ in the cauldron o’ blood and pain and hope that is rebirth.
We are once more born into yet another place on the wheel, to struggle and learn, and so become the beings the gods wish us to be. ”
“And,” Quarrie asked carefully, “should such a thing prove true, is it possible we should meet other souls upon that wheel o’ life, those we ha’ known before?”
“It seems, does it no’, that we must do. For do we no’ learn from one another more than any other way?”
Old wisdom. Ancient as a song only half remembered. “And,” Quarrie pressed, “that being so, will we know these people, remember them from before? Would we recognize them?”
Danoch’s gaze prodded his kindly, yet with wondering. “We do no’, lad. No’ in the ordinary way. For surely therein would lie madness.”