Chapter 11 #4
He nodded, turned back to the cairn. No weeds sprouted up around its base, no vines trailed across it.
It was clean-swept, tended as if someone came to it often.
Fiona, Niall thought, his heart twisting.
Such unexpected tenderness from a neglected child.
A girl fighting to survive yet still taking precious time to remember...
berries on a summer's day, games of sea monster and dragon fire.
Fiona trying to remember what it felt like to be loved, to be cared for, to be safe.
A bunch of fading flowers marked the top of the stones. Caitlin bent to touch them, her face soft with sorrow.
But as some of the wilted blossoms fell away, Niall froze, staring at what lay half-hidden beneath them. A small wooden sword.
"Oh, Niall," Caitlin whispered, her eyes over-bright.
Niall swallowed hard. He dropped to one knee, his fingers tracing the exquisitely carved wood of their own volition. "I fell asleep, forgot the sword here the day before my father was taken," he said hoarsely. "He promised we would come back, get it the next day."
"Where did your father get such a wondrous thing?" Caitlin asked in awe.
"He carved it himself. I remember watching him in the firelight, the shavings falling in long gold curls. Fiona kept trying to hang them upon the hound's ears."
"Whatever his mistakes, your father must have loved you very much. He would not have taken such time and care to make a child's toy if he did not."
It was true, what she said. Niall remembered the pride shining in his father's eyes whenever he had looked upon his son. The way that big hand had tousled his hair, the way his father's strong arms would swing Niall high, carrying him everywhere astride broad shoulders.
A wistful softness curved Caitlin's mouth, her fingertips touching the gold of her bracelet.
"It must have been wonderful, being together.
Sharing everything—laughter and tears. Being so certain your parents loved you, wanted you.
All the years at the abbey, I wondered why my parents abandoned me.
I was lucky. The abbess loved me with all her heart.
But it was not the same as having a real family.
A mother and father, sisters or brothers, who were mine and mine alone.
She belonged first to God, then to the abbey, then to me.
Does that sound selfish of me? Ungrateful? "
"You are the most unselfish person I have ever known. And grateful? You welcome everything with joy."
"But I could never welcome my father, Niall, or fling my arms around my mother. I cannot remember feeling her heartbeat beneath my cheek or her hand upon my hair."
Her fingers traced the bracelet as if she could somehow stroke life, breath into the mellow gold curves.
"I would trade this bracelet in an instant if just once I could have felt the touch of my father's hand."
He squeezed her fingers, silent. Nothing he could say could restore what had been stolen from her.
After a moment, she turned shimmering blue eyes up to his.
"Sometimes the hardest lesson of all is to learn to forgive, Niall," she murmured. "Perhaps if you could forgive your father, remember what was good, you might start to forgive yourself."
Niall flinched inwardly. "Nay. You do not understand. After what I have done to Mother, to Fiona, how could I ever—"
"When I was a little girl, I got in so much mischief. I had such a hard time obeying rules, being good. But every time I forgot and ran in the chapel or shouted in the abbey, Reverend Mother would gather me in her arms and tell me this: It is never too late to begin again."
"Caitlin—"
She turned to him, clasping both his hands in the warmth of her own. "Listen, Niall. Truly listen to Fiona. Open your eyes, see the love in your mother's face. Do not turn away."
"I will only fail them again. In the end, I have no choice but to make them do something they will loathe. I will force them to go north, to leave Daire. They cannot stay."
"Then what little time you have left is even more precious. Fiona is not clinging to stone and earth but memories—memories of love, of being safe, of the family she has lost."
"But it is gone. Gone forever."
"Your mother only wants to love you. Let her, Niall.
I swear you will not regret it! I know it seems as though you have lost so much since you left Conn's fortress.
And you have. But maybe, just maybe, you can regain something here that is even more precious.
Do not think about tomorrow and worry what will happen then. Just grasp today in both hands."
"Is that your secret, Lily Fair?"
He wondered if Oisín had been lured from the world of the mortal by a fairy maid such as she. He could not take his eyes off her, the earnest beauty, the soft plea in a face as soft with hope as the first flower of spring.
"But I have made so many mistakes, betrayed everything I believed."
"I believe in you, Niall. Perhaps protecting your family and healing their wounds is your real quest, the one your father gave you so many years ago." She took up the wooden sword, laid it in his hands.