‘Come, Druid, what manner would you favour?’
‘’Tis of no matter, Lord, but that it were done quickly.’
‘This evening, perhaps? Or shall you despatch her now? Fergus, your weapon, my friend.’
The King reached behind him and a warrior drew his sword and put it in his outstretched hand.
‘Here, Druid, here is a sword.’
‘This evening would do very well.’
Conor spoke hastily, his words muffled like a man who is parched. The light in his eye dimmed and he seemed to draw back from both the powerful questioning presence of the King and the proffered sword.
‘This evening will do as well as any. Is that so, Druid?’
The King balanced the sword in his hand, narrowing his eyes as if he were testing its trueness. For a moment he looked at the inlay of the handgrip, examining the delicate workmanship in the beasts entwined there. When he spoke again, he spoke softly.
‘And where would you suggest you kill this woman?’
Deara did not hear Conor’s reply. She was watching the King’s face, her body taut with tension. In the silence, she became aware of men moving like shadows along the walls. She waited for Conor to speak, to name the place of her execution. But Conor paused again.
Suddenly, it was the King’s voice that thundered out. Warm and welcoming, free of the dark menace which had chilled her heart as he consulted the Druid about her death, it roared down the Hall.
‘Welcome back, my brave warriors. Come, draw closer. I forgive you for leaving me thus to the business of Council. You would not have left me had I a sword in my hand and an enemy at my back. I know that well. Come, come closer and let you judge this case.’
The King rose to his feet and pointed the sword at Deara, as the men drew closer.
‘Here is this girl, a slave, the handmaiden of the Lady Merdaine. She is accused by Conor, chief of the Druids in the Ullaid, of witchcraft, of causing the death of that Lady. He wishes her death, for all your sakes, to keep you safe from evil.’
The King paused. Deara felt at that moment, that if she took her eyes away from his face, he would toss her aside like a bone to his hound.
‘Do not let him frighten you.’
As if the words had been spoken by someone present, Deara felt the memory touch her. She held her gaze and it was the King’s eyes that moved away.
‘What think you, my warriors?’
There was not a murmur from the warriors. They knew their King too well to answer a question that was purely rhetorical.
He raised the sword and looked at her again. Then he spoke once more, addressing himself to her in a strangely quiet manner.
‘A rare thing is it not, handmaiden, for a Druid, a Druid of such mighty power and knowledge of magic, to require your death so unceremoniously? Think you not it more seemly for him to make sacrifice to the Gods, to ascertain the most auspicious time for your despatch, the most auspicious place, and the most pleasing method? Surely there are proper observances for the purification of the evil caused by one such as you – a witch?’
The warriors murmured. Even the slower-witted amongst them had seen the drift of the King’s words. They had no love for Conor and his self-important ways, but, even if they had, it would be enough that the King’s favour had turned against him.
‘What say you, witch? Shall your King become your Druid? Shall I consult the magic lore and tell you what I see?’
The warriors roared their approval, and Morrough, smiling broadly, held out his hands to them.
‘I see a fat man, and a long road,’ he whispered loudly. ‘And I see hounds baying and footsteps fleeing – and – I do believe – ah, the mists, the mists dim my vision, I cannot see as I should. My powers are dimmed by a slavegirl – oh, what mischief is this . . . I am asleep again by her spells.’
There was laughter now, and the slapping of hands on thighs. Conor’s face, Deara could not see, but within her grew a seed of hope. If only she kept her eyes on the King she might yet live.
The laughter died away as the King made a dramatic gesture with his raised arms. He closed his eyes.
‘Ah, but hold, all is revealed to me. Why, it is Conor. Conor, the fat man, who boasts of the past and listens at doorcurtains, who feasts on the sacrifices the poor bring him out of fear. What say you, men, to my prediction? Shall I not be your Druid?’
‘Surely, surely. Morrough, our Druid and our King.’
The Hall filled with noise, the bang of weapons on wooden benches and walls, the hammer of fist on collar and belt, the stamp of feet, the chanting shout: ‘Morrough, Morrough.’
From the corner of her eye Deara glimpsed Conor’s hasty movement as he ran from the chamber. The men, still laughing, drifted away.
Morrough filled his drinking horn and lowered it, his head thrown back, his eyes closed. He wiped his mouth with his hairy arm and threw himself back in his chair.
‘So, brehon, what pledge did I give the Lady Merdaine? I have forgot.’
‘Sire, I have the deed here and your mark upon it.’
‘Get on then, man, would you have us here till Connaught wished us well?’
‘Item, that the Lady Merdaine doth give all her property to the King for his sole use upon one condition.’
‘Condition? I agreed to no condition. You are mistaken, man. You cannot make out your own marks.’
‘Sire, it is not writ in my marks; the script is in the lady’s hand.’
‘Then how can you read it? Her hand she conned from a trader in my father’s time. A rogue he kept about the place to play fidchell with.’
The brehon, who had throughout the day tolerated the King’s irritability, seemed at last to lose patience.
‘My Lord, the times are changing and we must change with them. It would not do if all of the King’s servants dozed by the fire and lined their pockets. In these three winters, Lord, I too have conned this language that can be written down more easily than our own. By your leave, I read you the words you spoke to the Lady Merdaine:
‘By the brooch of my mother brought in token, I swear that I will free the girl, Deara, give her dowry of twenty milk cows that she may be betrothed, or, if it be her wish, dowry in gold that she may pursue her studies with Alcelcius of Ard Macha into whose household she may enter.’
‘Twenty milk cows!’
The King bellowed as if he had been stung by a wasp, his face dark with anger.
‘Where in the name of all the Gods, man, would I find the price of twenty milk cows to dower a slave-girl? Had I a daughter of my own I might be hard-pressed to do as well.’
‘Sire,
