Chapter 17 #2
“I’ll lock Aife upstairs until it’s time for her to leave,” said Uathach.
“Thank you,” Scáthach told her daughter. Her gaze turned to Aife. “I wish things could have been different. I never meant for there to be strife between us.”
“You didn’t mean for there to be anything between us.” Aife’s despair was gone. The hardness had returned to her eyes. “You believed you were always so much better than me that I didn’t even deserve your notice.”
Scáthach sighed out a long breath. “You are wrong. Think rationally, Aife. The last time I saw you, I was a child of five years old. You were just a babe. These assumptions you have about me, about my mother, are based only on your mother’s jealousy.
I wish you hadn’t allowed her to poison your life. Goodbye, sister.”
She started forward, meaning to leave Aife there, but Cuchulainn was climbing the stone stairs to them. Scáthach halted, not sure what he was going to do. Uathach paused and glanced questioningly at her mother. Scáthach nodded once. Cuchulainn deserved the right to confront Aife.
He stood before Aife and studied her silently. “You’re so small. You seemed so much more last night.”
Aife’s smile was knowing. “I seemed like many things last night.”
“No!” Uathach’s hand gripped Aife’s arm so tightly she cringed and let out a little squeak of protest. “You will stand here and shut up and not speak to him unless he asks you a question.”
Scáthach felt immense pride in her daughter, who was as wise and compassionate as she was powerful.
Uathach looked at Cuchulainn. “Go on. Say whatever you’d like to her.”
“I only have this to say.” Cuchulainn slid a gold ring from his pinky.
Scáthach had noticed it before. It was inscribed with a large S and was the only jewelry he wore.
He handed the ring to Aife. She took it, opened her mouth to speak, but thought better of it when Uathach’s grip on her arm increased again.
“Give this to my son. Should he desire to come to me when he is old enough to travel without you, I will welcome him if he shows me this ring. But you, Aife, should I ever see you again I will kill you.” Then Cuchulainn turned, strode down the stairs and out of the fort.
* * *
They left the fort at midday. Scáthach knew that would mean they would travel the last part of their journey after dusk, but they would be on her isle near her castle—she could lead an army to Dunscáith blindfolded.
The ferry crossing was a lot less dramatic now that Cuchulainn was on the long, flat boat with them and not coaxing his horse to leap into the loch.
Scáthach gazed around the ferry and found Cuchulainn standing in the bow watching them draw nearer and nearer to Skye.
Leannan sat beside him. Cuchulainn’s hand rested on her head.
Periodically he’d pet her, scratch her ears, and even speak softly to the big dog.
But mostly he kept to himself with Leannan as his shadow.
“She knows he suffers,” said Tabiti.
Scáthach slanted a glance at her friend but said nothing.
“I was there when Uathach brought Aife to the chamber from which we’d just freed the three Kintail girls.” Tabiti muted her voice so that only Scáthach heard her. “I saw her. I smelled her. And after observing Cu, I can guess the rest.”
“Because it happened to you,” said Scáthach.
Tabiti’s jaw clenched and her hands fisted before she drew a deep breath, released it, rolled her shoulders and forced her body to relax. “Yes, as you know.”
“That was many years ago.”
“Sometimes a thing happens to you that even the passing years cannot diminish.” She glanced from Scáthach to where Amage sat on a pile of blankets with her wounded leg elevated and her face tilted back, raised to catch the sun. “Love is like that, as are great wrongs.”
“But you recovered. You moved on. And you were able to find love,” said Scáthach.
“Remember how long it took me to accept Amage?”
Scáthach arched a tawny brow. “I told you she was right for you from the beginning.”
“And you were correct. But I didn’t believe you—couldn’t allow myself to believe you for almost two years.” She paused and sighed. “Those are two years I missed holding her in my arms. I hope Cu does not have to wait years to allow himself to love and be loved.”
“Would you talk with him?” Scáthach’s voice was barely a whisper.
“Of course, but if I do, he will know I know,” said Tabiti.
Scáthach held out her hand and a butterfly that had been fluttering around them landed on her finger.
It was small, with brilliant blue wings that were spotted black, and gray and tan on the undersides.
She studied it as she replied to Tabiti.
“I believe the wisdom you share with him outweighs the chance that he will not hear you through his pride.”
“Leannan is good for him,” said Tabiti. Both women turned their gazes to Cuchulainn in the bow. He slowly stroked the deerhound’s ears. “She’s safe for him to touch and be touched by.” Her gaze shifted to Scáthach. “It is difficult to be touched afterward, even by someone we love and desire.”
Scáthach watched the butterfly. Its wings opened and closed. It was a living jewel of such beauty that it soothed the sadness in the Queen of Shadow’s heart. She ached to help Sentanta and mourned the invisible wound that haunted him.
“How do I know when he can be touched?” she asked Tabiti.
“Ask him. Let him take the lead. Be patient and compassionate.”
The ferry reached the dock and the butterfly fluttered from Scáthach’s finger. She watched it fly to the rolling hills along the bank and their carpet of heather.
“Is that what Amage did for you?”
“It is.”
“Then I shall do the same for him,” said Scáthach.