Lila turned and looked directly at me. “Who was your mother?”
“I know little of her, only that she was gentle, very beautiful, and that my
father rescued her from some pirates in the western isles, and that she had told
him she was not frightened because she knew he was coming for her.”
“She knew?” Lila looked at the old man, and the girl, who had come back into the
room, had stopped also, listening.
“Aye.” I loved that part of the story. “Father said she was very calm, and she
told one of the men who started to lay hands upon her that he would die before
the hour was gone, and he stopped, and they all stopped, frightened.
“One of the others then asked her, sneering, ‘And I?’ He was a young man, and
very bold in his youth and his strength. ‘You will live long in evil, but my son
shall kill you one day.’
” ‘Your son? Where is he? I shall kill him now and be sure what you say is a
lie.’
” ‘I have no son. Nor have I husband yet, but he is coming now. It is his
sword,’ she looked at the first man, ‘which will draw your blood.’
” ‘What are you?’ that first man asked. ‘A witch?’
” ‘I am of the blood of Nial,’ she said.
” ‘If you be afraid,” the younger man said to the other, ‘I will take her. She’s
a handsome wench, and witch or no witch, I’ll have her.’
“And then my father was there, and my father’s men. He came into the room sword
in hand. The first man died, and the younger escaped with a sword cut, and my
mother called after him, ‘Do not forget your destiny. You will die by the sword
in the flames of a burning town!’ ”
“It is a fine story,” the old man said, “a grand story! And you, the son, have
killed this man?”
“I am the son, but I have killed no man in the flames of a burning town, nor am
I likely to. Soon I shall go where there are no towns, but only forests and
meadows and mountains. I fear the prophecy will not be complete.”
“Be not sure,” Lila said. Then to the old man and the girl. “Did you hear what
he said? That his mother was of the blood of Nial?”
“I heard,” the girl said. “I believe it.”
“It was in his face when he came into the room,” the old man said, “I know the
look of those who have the gift.” He looked at Lila. “You have it.”
“What is this gift of which you speak?”
“It is the gift of second sight, the gift of looking beyond or back. Nial was a
spaeman, one of those who foretell events. The story is ancient, and from
Iceland, and the mother of Nial was the daughter of Ar the Silent, master of a
great land in Norway. But Nial was a gifted man, a great talker, and a pleader
for his people.”
I was tired, and it was late.
“We must to bed,” I said, “for in the morning we cross the Menai.”
The old man tapped out his pipe. “Put them in the loft,” he said. “They’ll sleep
warm there.”
“I shall stay by the fire,” I said, “for to sleep too sound would not please
me.”
The old man turned his head to look. “You are followed, then?”
“It may be. If so, we would not wish to have it known that we were seen. We are
good folk,” I added.
“Sleep,” he said, “and rest. We will let no harm come to the blood of Nial.”
I added sticks to the fire when he had gone to his bed, and rolled in my cloak
upon the floor near the hearth. It would be a cold night, but the cottage was
snug and warm.
I took two pistols under the cloak’s edge near me, and my naked blade. Its
scabbard lay to one side. I hoped the night would be quiet, but I was not a
trusting man, and the hilt of a sword has a good feel.
Oft times a blade across the room beyond the reach of a hand means that death is
nearer. I closed my eyes, and heard the rain fall upon the thatch, and against
the walls. Drops fell down the chimney and the fire sputtered and spat.
The wind curled around the eaves, moaning with its loneliness, and listening to
wind and rain half slept.
Where, O where was Abigail? How far out upon the sea? Did she sleep well this
night? Did the ship roll? Was all well aboard?
Outside a stone rattled, and in the darkness my hand tightened upon the sword’s
hilt.
9
We came over the hills to Bangor in the morning, with shadows in the valley and
sunlight on the sea. The mist was lifting from the trees, clinging wistfully as
if reluctant to leave—like the smoke of ancient Druid fires which once burned in
this place.
We came over the hills, and I knew it well from my mother’s tales of Taliesin,
the great Welsh bard. The village lay upon the hills where once the Druid’s
upper circle had been, overlooking the Menai Strait that separated Wales from
Anglesey, once called Mona, and before that other names as well.
Bangor had been a place of ritual for the Druids, but that was long ago.
Something stirred in me when I saw the view from there. Was it some ancient
racial memory? Something buried deep in my flesh and bones?
Lila rode behind me into the village. My eyes were alert for trouble. From here
our destination was clear: from the north coast a boat to Ireland; then to lose
ourselves in that war-torn island where marched the armies of Lord Mountjoy.
Eyes turned upon us when we dismounted, for we were strangers, and Lila as tall
as any man here, and as broad in the shoulders. She looked the Viking woman
whose ancestors had once raided these shores, then settled here and across the
water as well. They had founded Dublin. What was it the name first meant? Dark
Pool, if I recalled correctly.
Recalled? How could I recall? But so I did … no doubt something heard,
something read, something dimly remembered from another time.
Yet I seemed to have passed this way before. Too many strange memories came to
me now, too many whose origin I could not recall.
There was a roadside inn where fishermen and sailors stopped, or travelers like
ourselves. And we went there now and sat at a table and were brought without
asking—fish, bread, and ale.
The people were Welsh. Yet there might be spies among them, although I hoped my
pursuers were far from us, seeking in Bristol, Falmouth, or Cornwall.
Traveling with a woman may have helped to fool them, for that they had no reason
to suspect—nor that I would go into Wales. Yet I was ever a cautious man.
A distinguished-appearing man sat near us, with a thoughtful but stern face.
That he was a man of the Church was obvious.
“You travel far?”
Smiling, I said, “It is my hope.”
“It is not many who come here,” he continued. “I come for my health. It is the
air of the sea, the smell of the ocean.”
“It is a place for poets,” I said, “or warriors.”
“Are they not often the same?” He looked from Lila to me. “Your accent is
strange,” he said, “yet your companion, I’d say, is of Anglesey.”
“You’d be right,” I said. “She lived here once.” About myself I said nothing. He
was curious, yet I liked the man. He was someone I should have liked to spend a
few hours with, talking over the ale, and watching the ships, feeling the wind
in my hair.
“I am Edmund Price, of Merionethshire,” he said.
“You are a poet,” I said, “spoken of in London and Cambridge.”
“So far off? I had not realized my poor talents were known.”
“The tongue of Wales is music, and you write it well.”
“Thank you. That was well said. You are a poet also?”
I shrugged. “I am nothing. A man of the sword, perhaps. A man yet to shape his
way.” I looked at him with respect. “You, they say, are a man of vast learning,
familiar with many languages.”
He shrugged. “The more one learns the more he understands his ignorance. I am
simply an ignorant man, trying to lessen his ignorance.”
“I spoke of travel,” I said, “and not lightly. I go to Raleigh’s land.”
“Ah, yes … Raleigh. Well, he has acquired a name these last few years, has he
not? Men speak of these new lands. I wonder if they are new.”
“Who knows? Where man is able to go, man has been. The Irish, they say, sailed