Chapter XXIV #3
Donnán takes the lead, his voice deep and rich and solemn.
His song is not like those of Caten, with their symbols and drums and tibias chanting to steady beats.
Nor is it the music of my childhood, all drama and heat and passion in the stringed notes that demanded dancing of those who listened.
This is a story. Solemn. Melancholy. Aching.
A man called Gofannon, a smith who brews an ale of immortality.
I do not understand all of it. It does not matter.
There is a mesmeric beauty to the way the notes fill the spaces between us.
Lir often steps back, but when he joins the song it is in perfect counterpart, threading a higher but no less yearning series of notes that allows the poignancy of the telling to shine brightest and hit hardest. In those moments, I feel their voices deep in my chest and even in this room of battle-scarred warriors, I am not alone in brushing tears from my eyes.
Other than that, the room never moves. Never breathes. We are enraptured in a way that few performers can ever hope to make their audience be.
The two men sing on, and even their midnight eyes don’t distract me. They soar and whisper, harmonize and break. Five minutes. Ten. No mistakes, no wavering. It is as remarkable, as beautiful a thing as I have ever witnessed.
And then with a sigh and slumping of the shoulders, their eyes clear and they are done.
As the last notes fade there is a lull and then the hall stirs, slowly, as if emerging from a dream. I am with them. Dazed. I remember my plight and yet it feels strangely distant, less important than it was when they began.
Finally, gradually, low conversation returns to the room.
There is no applause, which I think I can understand; clapping would feel garish, diminish the performance somehow.
But it is clear that the song was designed to cap the ceremony.
Those who just pledged begin mingling with everyone else, trails of blood drying on their cheeks as they receive thumps on the back from everyone within reach.
For a few minutes, I just sit and try to listen to the chatter around me. Hard to make out, especially given my uneven grasp of the language, but there is much boasting of a recent successful battle. I hear the word “war” more than once.
And then Lir is signalling, and Aodh is prodding, and I am moving to the centre of the room.
We approach Lir and Donnán, who are speaking cordially, though from a distance Lir’s demeanour comes across as more formal than outright friendly. The thrust of their conversation quickly becomes apparent as we approach.
“So you were right.” Donnán has taken Cian’s staff from Lir, examining it with a sadness that feels strangely stilted in the wake of the emotion he’s just put on display. “Was it with Cian’s body?”
“No.” Lir hesitates, and I can tell he doesn’t want to elaborate as Aodh marches me up. A few people have begun paying attention now, though most have resumed their meals and own conversations. “Deaglán here had it.”
Puzzlement, then wide-eyed anger from Donnán. He looks at me as if I had killed someone. “Why does he live?”
“He says it was given to him. There was a witness. And he is ábálta,” adds Lir, in a lower voice. I don’t know the word, but he makes it sound significant.
“That does not matter,” snarls Donnán. His hand, I notice, has gone to the hilt of the dagger at his belt.
The conversation is too complicated and fast for me to follow after that, but one thing is clear enough: Donnán believes I should be executed, and he doesn’t want to wait around for it to happen.
Lir protests, but I can see his uncertainty, his desperation to make his case.
I get the impression that Donnán is his superior.
Aodh’s spear is still pointed at me but in a vaguely disinterested way, his focus more on the argument between the druids. Chatter nearby has eased, too, as others at the tables listen in curiously.
Heart pounding, I dart forward.
Aodh shouts and the druids both stop in surprise, but I’m not headed for the exit; even if Kegan and several others weren’t in between, I’d never make it more than a few steps outside the door.
Instead I slip past the fire, toward King Rónán.
The massive man next to him, the one adorned in the armbands and silver torc, has his spear in hand so fast I can barely countenance it. It doesn’t matter. I skid to my knees in front of the king’s table. Conversation around the hall has all but stuttered to a surprised stop.
“Great King Rónán. I am Deaglán ap Cristoval.” My father’s name tightens my throat as I say it, but I press on hurriedly as someone shouts behind me.
“My arm is your arm. I tiomnaigh myself to you. If I break my oath, by gods and anam may the earth swallow me. The sea drown me. The sky burn me.” I finish with the same three words as the others before, barely gasping out the last one before there’s a hand tangling in my hair and jerking me violently, angrily backward.
I can’t help but cry out as Aodh slaps me on the side of the head with his free hand.
“What is this?” The behemoth next to the king still grips his spear, eyes angry.
“King Rónán. He is marked for death. He carried the comhlánam,” says Donnán, hurrying forward. I’ve heard the word before—it doesn’t mean staff, but I know that’s what it refers to.
There’s a murmur around the hall. Not a pleased one.
“And it was witnessed that he was given it freely.” Lir steps forward. There’s a gleam in his eye. “As it was witnessed that he sacrificed his arm in defending a family from a raid. This family have sworn a life-debt to him. So if he is to be executed, then they must be executed also.”
“What?” I try to twist, unsuccessfully thanks to Aodh’s grip on my hair. “No. Lir. Please. No.” This is the first I’ve heard of such an arrangement.
“The law is clear.” Donnán’s surprised by the revelation, but grimly determined.
For the first time, King Rónán speaks.
“You would deny his oath?” His deep, authoritative voice cuts easily through the hubbub.
Donnán hesitates. “Druidic law is clear—”
“Druidic law does not supersede an oath. It is my judgement to make, now.” Rónán says it calmly, but the power in his voice silences Donnán. He turns to me. “Did you do this thing?”
I lick my lips. “Cian gave me his comhlánam. Just before he died. I did not know it was … wrong, great king,” I say, reaching for the right words. “I am sorry for my speech. I am not of this land.”
Rónán nods slowly. “Not knowing is not always an excuse for acts. But if you are owed a life-debt by one of my people, then you are owed it by me. A life for a life, Deaglán. The life-debt is paid.” He glances at Lir.
Something passes between them, unnoticed by most, though I think Donnán picks up on it.
“Rise, Deaglán ap Cristoval. Before gods and anam, your oath is received. My hearth is your hearth.”
A murmur accompanies the words. Surprised, but not outraged. Donnán frowns but seems to accept the king’s decision; he walks over to the bowl on the table and takes the hawthorn branch. Dips it again and flicks it at me with ritual, practiced motion.
The blood is warm. Some gets in my mouth, salty and viscous. I feel like I am going to throw up.
I think that will be the end of it, but to my surprise, King Rónán speaks again. Loud. Addressing the entire room.
“To sacrifice in order to protect is the highest duty. Deaglán ap Cristoval, by witness, has done this, and in these times we are in need of good men. He is to be sent to Loch Traenala.”
This time the murmur that goes around the hall is shocked. Donnán looks stunned. The expression of the mountainous man next to the king is one of utter outrage.
Lir, in fact, is the only one whose surprise strikes me as feigned.
Vek.
I’ve been manipulated. Lir and the king planned for this, wanted me to do this. There’s something going on here between all these different parties, and I have no idea what it is.
“He is not worthy of Loch Traenala.” The large man by the king’s side snarls the words, not keeping his voice down as the muttering around the hall grows more indignant, more in agreeance. “He is leathfhear.” A chuckle at that, clearly something at my expense.
“And yet he protected those he should have, Gallchobhar.” King Rónán’s comment cuts through the room.
An intake of breath from many. The big man’s eyes bulge.
“If he is to travel to Loch Traenala, sire, then he should also first be tested here before your warriors,” observes Donnán suddenly, his voice pitched to carry.
“Yes.” Gallchobhar stands as if the opportunity might physically elude him. “Sire, I would show this man the honour he is due.”
From King Rónán’s frown, his refusing would not go well.
“A high honour indeed, Gallchobhar,” he says slowly.
A touch too smoothly, though. Unsurprised.
He pauses, every eye in the room on him, then turns to me.
“Deaglán ap Cristoval. You will need a spear, and as you do not have one of your own, and for your sacrifice in protecting my people, it falls to me to provide.” He motions behind him, to a section of the hall more dimly lit. “The choice is yours.”
My gaze follows his gesture as another susurrus goes around the room and somehow, Gallchobhar’s look turns even more angry.
“Take your time,” Lir murmurs as I take in the jumble of spears, swords, daggers and shields. “This weapon will be yours not just now, but throughout your journey to becoming a warrior.”
“A warrior?” I hiss the words. Waggle my stump at him.
“King Rónán has decided,” says Lir calmly.
“Can I pick a sword instead, at least?”
“No.” The druid keeps his voice so that only I can hear. “And choose carefully.” No doubting the emphasis, this time. He’s conveying something important.