BENDING THE BOYNE: A novel of ancient Ireland (19 page)

The Dagda indicated that they should stand lined around the walls of this inner chamber, and extinguished his reed torch. They waited in darkness. No one spoke. He had not seen Boann among the assembled Starwatchers outside, but she might have filed into the chamber after him. When he strained to look it was so dark that he became dizzy, and stopped for the effort. Bresal stood awed by the stillness and absolute blackness of the inner chamber.

A sweet low humming began from the chorus, carrying along the passage, and upon hearing it his skin prickled. The hosts and guests stood under the lofty corbeled roof, listening. This inner chamber felt neither cold nor damp, he realized.

Hidden to his eyes, above the capstone lay a cairn of water-rolled stones. Over this cairn lay alternating layers of clay, and sod turves, and pebbles, covering all the passage and chamber. As an extra barrier to dampness, the builders caulked between the drystacked roof stones with sea sand mixed with burned earth. The layers of the great mound and its carefully slanted inner roof slabs, grooved for runoff of water, had already kept the long passage and interior chamber dry through hundreds of solstices.

Starwatcher masons carved the hidden, reverse surface of some of the passage’s upright slabs although this work remained unseen after the outer layers covered the passage. A removable slab over the entrance roofbox had a reverse, hidden side, carved by Coll himself.

Aware the place was some sort of temple, for Bresal this mound held little meaning. Though, he had marveled at the carvings on the outer kerbstones. His fingertips tingled from the carved spiral in the passage. Its artistry eluded him. None of these carved symbols looked to refer to gold. A few reminded of sun and stars. As an Invader shaman, he abhorred writing of any kind, it weakened the memory. Bresal’s skin prickled again as he waited in utter darkness, the chorus growing louder. He could not remember ever feeling such anticipation.

The quiet ones stood waiting for the sunrise, for their stones to speak to them.

They had hidden their knowledge in plain view. Their symbols covered these stones and reached an apogee of complexity and execution. Oghma carved the kerbstones with sensitivity, following the contours and overall shape of each stone. On many he laboriously pick-dressed around each symbol over the entire kerbstone, and the raised symbols swirled over the textured background like living tendrils wrapping the boulder.

Two of the kerbstones held the most symbols and relief picking, an entrance stone and the kerbstone opposite it on an axis running north through the mound. A prominent vertical line on these massive kerbstones emphasized this north-south alignment. On the entrance kerbstone, unseen to Bresal and his warriors inside the mound, the solstice display began.

Slowly the rising light cast a shadow from the standing stone up onto the entrance kerbstone, crossing the eloquent spirals to touch its deep vertical line. The expectant Starwatchers saw the shadow, a finger, with satisfaction. Griane and Coll returned with all their ancestors, Starwatchers who harnessed light and dark into their calendar.

The deepest voices from the chorus reverberated into where the guests stood. The sun peeked above Red Mountain. The moment in time arrived.

Bresal heard the surging chorus. A young woman’s clear voice soared, the others responding. A quiver ran up his spine, he sensed the shaft of light before he saw it creeping along the passage. Dazzling light burst into the inner chamber and gilded the carved stone at the rear north wall. Light bounced into the side recesses. Bresal and his warriors gasped at the rich decoration now clearly illuminated in golden warmth.

The Dagda spoke, and Bresal’s interpreter delayed, intent on the words. Bresal nudged but the interpreter waited until the voice no longer rang in the vaulted chamber. Only then did the interpreter repeat the Dagda’s words:

“Almighty sun, you alone give us warmth from above. You alone remove darkness from the sky. With this rising you return to us. Soon you will bring forth the fruits of the earth to all. We honor you here and consecrate our deeds before the eye of all knowledge. We wait upon your blessings, and we are thankful. Let us all go in peace.”

Bresal deflated with utter disappointment. What was so remarkable in this speech? He would have made a prediction for the masses, exhorted them, lectured them. These are really such simple people, he thought, these
culchies
hiding from the sun inside their mound. And where is their gold?

While the light retreated from the inner chamber, that clear voice soared again above the chorus. In the chamber, all the people craned their necks to watch golden light fade in the side recesses and from the high vaulted ceiling. The singing blended into final notes as the light seeped out, until they all stood in total darkness and silence. They filed back through the passage and out onto the forecourt.

The warriors looked stunned as they came out into the brisk morning air. Early sunlight gleamed on the silver Boyne. Bresal felt unnerved, or overly stimulated; whatever it was, he craved a drink and something to eat. To his amazement, large steaming pots of food and drink arrived and the quiet ones distributed the pots’ contents. He looked over the choir, trying to ascertain which of the young women had done the solo, to see if her face and body matched that voice.
Perhaps I too should take a Starwatcher wife
… He definitely felt on edge.

Bresal stared at the magnificent triple spiral chiseled in relief on the entrance boulder: light and darkness and infinity. He lost hold of it, his one insight, for at that moment his interpreter came to his side and while bestowing on him a small joint of roast fowl, steered his gaze toward the standing stone casting its shadow.

“Tairdelbach tells me that they knew sunlight would reach the inner chamber and strike its back stone. They direct the light so that it penetrates this mound only at winter solstice. He claims tonight there shall be another ceremony these Starwatchers haven’t told us about—to bring the moon into this mound with the Bright One.”

Bresal winced at this ludicrous assertion from his informer. “These people can hardly feed themselves. Bowsies and cute hoors! How would they know to make the moon and the Bright One appear together inside this mound?”

His interpreter smirked and leaned closer. “Tairdelbach tells me the quiet ones also will bring another full moon, before it is time.”

Bresal frowned. This smacked of outrageous heresy: to claim that Starwatchers controlled the heavens. He stayed long enough to appear polite and make full use of the food, then hustled his group off to their horses tethered east of the mound. There a Starwatcher boy, evidently posted to watch their horses, stood up from the winter grasses. His obedient but proud appearance provoked Bresal.

“What’s your name?”

The lad told them,
Dubh
. It sounded like the name for the dark mound.

Bresal heard the bold reply and inspected the young Starwatcher. He had good height with a strong build, and an angular face and jawline under thick brown hair. His growing hands and feet appeared too large, but when he grew into himself he would be quite the specimen. A potential fighter, thought Bresal, like that big fellow, what’s his name. Like Cian.

“Do you want to come with us and learn our war games, so?”

The boy shook his head and said something firmly about the Dagda.

Bresal laughed. “Lord of the Light, is he?”

Still laughing, the shaman and his group rode away, back to the Invader encampment and their pasttimes within its reeking walls.

With nightfall, Bresal and two of his men returned to the mounds. They tied their horses at a different spot, and sauntered back into the level area surrounding the main mound. A small group of Starwatchers stood at a covered fire, their backs to its glowing embers.

The Dagda stepped forward courteously and inquired of their mission, and he did so using the Invader tongue, noted Bresal.

“We wish to see the moon with you tonight. The full moon may be viewed inside this mound. Am I correct in this?” he inquired of the Dagda.

“You are correct. As you wish.”

Ah, thought Bresal,
this Dagda is indeed the man of few words, a quiet one. We may have surprised them. I might gather something of value to us here
.

The Dagda left them standing apart from the Starwatchers for what seemed like a long time, on the bright side of the fire, then motioned Bresal and his group to follow along into the main mound whose tall entrance stood open. None carried a torch in the darkness, but the ground around the great mound was smooth from tending it. They entered the looming, silent mound and lined up midway along the passage, and waited. Outside, a damp frost blanketed the ground as freezing mist floated in the air. The moist chill clung to Bresal’s clothing as he waited inside the mound, flexing his stiff arms and legs.

The Starwatchers stood with eyes fixed on the entrance, ignoring the cold. Bresal began to feel uneasy inside this mound once again.

The brightest star appeared. The shaman trembled. The full moon glided into view, framed in the opening above the entrance, shining there in the deep night sky together with the Bright One. Intense silver moonlight struck them exactly where they stood in the passage.

On seeing the moon framed just so by the stone box over the portal, Bresal quaked. How was this possible?

His men stirred and muttered, and bolted. The Dagda approached as if to speak to him, but the sage of the Invaders retreated to the outside with his men, across freezing rime on the ground and into the moonlit night.

As Bresal ran for his horse, he thought he heard the crying of a newborn child. Luminous mist curled around the riders and they had trouble finding their camp, lost in a milky haze from the river Boyne.

On the next morning Bresal sent formal word to the Dagda that negotiations, the council with quiet ones, would not occur.

This breach came with no explanation from the Invaders. Starwatcher scouts reported normal activity in the intruders’ encampment, considering that it was the cold season, and they all waited for further word from Bresal.

During the solstice moon the Starwatchers attended another evening ceremony. As was their custom, the cremated bones of Sheela would be removed from Dowth as the sun set and reburied at a minor mound a small distance away. Boann had not fully recovered her strength from delivering her son, Aengus, on the solstice, and she was thus accompanied by Tadhg and Airmid to the ceremony.

On that setting of the sun, preceded by noise from their horses, a party of Invaders swept into Dowth’s clearing in a raucous frenzy. They surrounded the Starwatchers who convened for the solemn reburial. Those who could run, dispersed quickly from the scene. Tadhg and Daire sped away, helping Boann, with Airmid protecting them all under the cloak of swan feathers. The Invaders tilted the standing stone at the dark mound’s north entrance, and rode their frenzied horses around and over the mound as if to destroy it.

The Dagda emerged from the north passage, guarding a large pot and waiting to complete the rites so that Sheela’s ashes could be re-interred. He stood without weapon or recourse while jeering, shouting riders displaced stones that contained centuries of observations. Bresal intercepted him and with warriors he took the Dagda into the intruder camp for questioning.

Bresal allowed the old man to be seated and planted his rotund frame close to the Dagda. “Where’s the gold that lies here, the gold in the mounds?” He queried the stoic Dagda several times with little reply made. The Dagda’s arms wrapped a large clay vessel and Bresal got an idea. The sweating shaman put his face up to the old man’s. “What is it you have in this pot?”

“The bones of Sheela, the murdered woman,” said the Dagda.

Bresal set the Dagda free at once.

The waning moon backlit the low clouds. All was white cold surrounding the lone figure put out from the camp. No Invader would walk with him and help carry the burden of Sheela’s ashes. The bent form slowly made its way back to the mounds where the Dagda deposited Sheela’s urn with her ancestors, and on to his village.

The Invaders had disturbed burial rites and riled the Starwatchers. Bresal cowered in his dwelling inside the walled camp, drinking whatever he could find.

Foolhardy warriors threatened to tear apart the mounds looking for gold. The warriors came and went as they pleased. Over the next sunrises, one, then several, warriors went missing from the camp, their bodies found frozen but without signs of injury or struggle. The swaggering Invaders had reason to fear the long dark nights at the Boyne.

Starwatcher scouts armed themselves with long flint knives or stone axeheads lashed to stout ash handles. The carrying of battle weapons alarmed the elders, but they did not speak against it. Frostbitten, the Dagda recovered painfully, healed by Airmid’s good care.

Heavy sleet intervened to quell the troubles. Both sides waited out the icy storms.

To Bresal’s consternation, at the end of the Invaders’ lunate a second full moon arose, dark bloody red in the east on a bitterly cold night. With it, Elcmar returned to the Boyne camp.

P
ART
T
WO

NIGHT

Woe to the reckless who revile them.

Woe To Him Who Slanders Women
, Gerald Fitzgerald, 4th Earl of Desmond
Trans. from the Irish by Thomas Kinsella

Aengus, The Youthful Son

E
LCMAR WATCHED
B
RESAL
hurry into the great hall, no doubt hoping to find a feast laid out by bustling slaves and to claim a share of any spoils. Instead the hall stood dark and the pots lay cold, no serving women in sight and no toasting warriors. A damp dog lay at Elcmar’s feet, one loyal companion but even so it was Dabilla, Boann’s puppy. Halfway into the gloom of the great hall, the shaman’s pace slowed.

Elcmar smoldered with anger. “Perhaps you should have taken greater care to anticipate my return,” he said, his eyes accusing Bresal.

“But you return now, many nights past the solstice.” Bresal stumbled backward but Elcmar pulled him forward again with his piercing look. The shaman groped and took the first bench he found, not the closest seat to the champion. Lacking the feast he had hoped to enjoy, Bresal’s stomach gave a loud rumble and he cursed it.

“Where! Where is she? And where’s the child?” Elcmar’s questions bounced around in the rafters.

Bresal’s voice shook. “There’s a snapper—ehm, a fine new son for you at the Starwatchers’ village, and Boann there with him, awaiting you.”

“And how many warriors have been killed here at the Boyne?”

“A few, only a few. Well, five. None injured, so.” A long silence underscored Bresal’s absurd statement.

“Are Starwatchers getting our weapons? Who is trading in weapons?”

“To be sure, I don’t know that a’tall.”

The air roiled to midnight blue in the hall. Only Elcmar’s eyes glowed in the chill space. “You had my instructions on these matters, Bresal. To be sure to be sure.”

Even Bresal had the sense to not reply. He lingered, eyes roving.

“Why are you sitting here?” Elcmar snapped, tempted to draw his knife.

Twisting a bronze armlet wedged onto his wrist, Bresal babbled about a party that had just arrived from the Continent. “Ten in number, all warriors save for a shaman, Ith. They brought only a few provisions for us and no horses or livestock. Their boat had been swamped several times and some of these lads are half-drowned and half-frozen.”

Elcmar rose. “I’d say Taranis sent this crew for an inspection. We must ready some hospitality. The men have been shown to quarters for now and their injuries tended, no thanks to you, Bresal. Warm some honey mead and have that served while you keep them waiting. Tell the slaves to make a feast of smoked fish and stewed fowl and dried apples, whatever can be readied quickly. Bring in torches and have fresh mats and rushes laid in here. Stoke the fire. When this place is aired and warm, if anything on this island can ever be warm, only then bring in the guests. Make sure they eat well, get drunk, and have a selection of women. And—don’t wake me.” He wondered if Bresal would remember half of these instructions, and sent for a slave and repeated all to her after the shaman left the hall mumbling.

Elcmar strode to his sleeping chamber, where he slammed the door and barred it.
Sure, it’s a grand welcome for me here, their champion. Bru na Elcmar, is it.
Safe inside walls, he let his leather leggings and shin guards and tattered shoes fall from his body. He swayed with fatigue. Inspecting the Lake mine had been easy enough, but not the trip back to the Boyne.

After sending Gebann off with Cian held hostage, Elcmar searched for gold in the southwest with Creidhne. Then word reached him of distant troubles with Starwatchers at the Boyne and he departed quickly for the north. The only good boat at that coast, he had already sent to the Continent with Lir and Gebann. Elcmar loaded his men and gear into the battered currach that they used to arrive at the copper mine before autumn, but that boat barely held together for a few days of pounding by winter swells before it had to be abandoned, banjaxed. They had to travel over land for the rest of the journey. His small party made their way north slowly against heavy rains and fierce winds. Starwatchers attacked them in the mountains before they descended to the Liffey river plain.

Blood that had dried on Elcmar’s worn tunic caused it to stick to his skin. As he struggled to peel it off, sharp pain doubled him over. He had killed the Starwatcher who dropped onto him from a tree and broke his rib. After grappling with relentless adversaries, his warriors left only two dead Starwatchers along a mountain stream. Every breath tortured him but Elcmar bound leather strips around his ribcage and kept walking, barking orders. He focused on getting out of those mountains alive while the rain turned to sleet needles and then pelting snow.

His men’s wounds made it tough going. Elcmar and his warriors detoured off Starwatcher trails and followed the streams, their knives drawn, eyes scanning the trees and ridges. They salvaged scraps from their soaked, dwindling food supplies. Pain and hunger slowed their descent, the men needing to rest often. One complained loudly, “Your man Elcmar wouldn’t give you the steam from his piss.”

Elcmar marched on, leading them all away from danger and death. Cold, hunger and pain clawed at him. He discovered a desire to see Boann, to keep moving until he was safe at her side and warm, a home for him there and it drew him on like a small constant flame in the storm.

Then he saw it, shining nuggets of sun metal in the swift waters they followed down toward the plain. Gold, but in a remote and hostile place. Elcmar saw again the dead Starwatchers’ faces: a worthy opponent protected this gold. He couldn’t stop to search for the gold’s source, not with his injured men and the weather. He carefully lowered his body to the stream and picked up the largest nuggets while he pretended to scoop up water to drink. Elcmar trusted no one well enough to leave a man posted at the gold-bearing stream. He chose distinctive rocks and trees, he tried to remember that very spot and that stream for his return, as he drove his warriors on through the snowstorm. Low clouds obscured the mountaintops and pressed close around them.

His find disappeared behind him in the white-shrouded valleys.

Now he rotated his knifewielding arm and grimaced.
Taranis, sending collectors here from the Continent! Why else would they travel all the way to the Boyne in the dead of winter? I’ll say we found no gold here—I’m not sending these few nuggets! We have little of anything to send back. The almighty Taranis will have to accept hides, pine marten or fox or the like. I must deal with that on the sunrise as well.

He stared at the chamber’s plank walls, more hollow than from just his empty gut. Traveling suited him better, he understood how to do that, how to survive. This Boyne camp had fallen apart in his absence, and Bresal with it. How he had looked forward to seeing Boann, and the stolid natives crisscrossing between their tidy village and the mounds and mountaintops to endlessly watch the skies. Like bees they were, always busy, and he knew it was best not to provoke the hive of quiet ones.

Instead he found his hall dark, his wife gone missing, her with her soft voice and pliant limbs. He had no comfort here, no reward, no constant flame. Elcmar did not like anything about this place now. So far he had refrained from dismantling the Starwatchers’ mounds to look for gold. Bresal and the others learned nothing of their gold in his absence.
Eejits
.

He threw his long knife into the plank wall and watched it hit exactly where he wanted it to hit. He knew how to tend to himself, he had seen worse times. This bad night like all the others would bring the dawn, bring a new sun for him.

A new son?
He fell onto the wide bed. He could smell Boann in the furs as he sank into deep sleep. Through the songs and feasting resounding from beyond his chamber, he slept until the full light.

He took his time before seeing to the guests lying about in the hall. He ordered heated water for himself to do a bit of bathing, and shoved some slaves in the guests’ direction in case they should awaken. Other slaves, he sent out of the hall with orders to heat stones and boil quarters of fresh beef in the cooking pits. One of the slaves whinged that Bresal had fouled all but one of the cooking pits with dyeing of cloth, and brewing beer.

Elcmar glared at the slave. “Then use that one clean cooking pit, so.”

The slave ran from his hard eyes.

His irritation grew when he stepped outside. “Where is Cliodhna?” he shouted. No one answered. The last slave in sight, he sent to bring the new shaman Ith directly to his chamber. B a c k in privacy, Elcmar dressed with difficulty over his bound ribs, and waited. He desired to gauge this newcomer’s reaction to Bresal, and more importantly to question his new advisor about the marriage laws. He soon got to the point with Ith, a lean grey blade of a man.

“I can see how it must have been for Boann, dealing with eejits while I was away. But that’s no excuse for the state of things in the hall, nor her absence. She has left this marriage, for all intents and purposes. The marriage agreement says she keeps her property. What are my rights?”

He listened to Ith’s impeccable discourse on their respective rights, given this novel situation. Ith summed up then added, “Of course, we are outnumbered here.”

Elcmar quickly made his decision. Yes, Starwatchers greatly outnumbered his warriors, but that concern was dwarfed by his desire to find gold before they would quit the Boyne, or Eire. Gold awaited them, or wily Gebann wouldn’t have stayed on Eire so long. And Elcmar had seen gold, touched gold in the mountains. He would talk about this later with Ith, and try to appease the men sent by Taranis. There was little chance that his overseers would soon depart.

They were interrupted by the arrival of Bresal, whose commotion awakened all the groggy guests. Elcmar stepped out, inquired of the guests and their rest, and made arrangements to humor their wishes for awhile. He placed the new shaman Ith in charge of things while he, Elcmar, would ride out for the day. He had heard enough for his purposes from Ith. He ignored Bresal; that fool could stew in his own juice. On this morning Elcmar’s concealed injury made his temper short indeed.

He eyed the cold, untended smelting pits on his way to the horses’ pen. Several warriors followed their champion clamoring to ride out but Elcmar waved them away. This errand would be taken solo. He chose a horse and mounted it stiffly, guarding his side. He wore a new soft leather tunic, under a short fur vest belted by a glossy strap that closed with a conspicuous gold loop. All around the tunic’s neck opening shone small plaques of gold sewn on with linen thread. He wore supple leather boots lined with fur over well-stitched leggings. He’d bought up most of the trader’s fresh finery from that last boat at the Lake mine and no mistaking the cost, he paid dearly for it from his champion’s share of copper. No bother. He could afford to be
flahool
. Hadn’t he located a mountain stream of gold?

Elcmar knew he looked impressive that morning, washed and fairly well clean shaven, his eyes and gold ornaments and long bronze dagger all glowing. No man on this island could best him; Boann would see that, so she would. Off he rode. The sky held a pale wintry blue and for the moment he wouldn’t have to worry about lashing rain.

He felt gratified to be riding again rather than walking, and with care he cantered his horse across the river plain to the shimmering emerald mounds and the Starwatcher village beyond. As he neared the area now frosted and sere where he had found Boann lying in tall scented grass of the past summer, he felt a sharp longing. Or was that his sore rib? He dismissed his pain. His anger whetted itself on his memory from the prior night, of Boann’s faint, herbal scent left in their marriage bed.

He did not dismount at the cleared lawn that marked the village entrance. Heavy silence met the advancing hooves and closed behind Elcmar’s insolent back as the animal carried him through Starwatchers interrupted in their morning routines. Elcmar rode his horse right up to the house of Boann’s father. The trespass or disrespect to the quiet ones from this act, he ignored. It was time for him to exercise possession, to show his dominion here. Sunlight flashed from the gold adorning his person and from his metal weapon.

Let these Starwatchers see me coming here to take my wife and child, so
. He slid expertly off his white horse, and hid the stab of pain. He waited only the shortest interval to enter the dwelling when the door slowly opened to his shout. Elcmar immediately found the infant and snatched him aloft.