Daughter Of The Forest (69 page)

There was nothing I could say. I stumbled ahead with words, anyway. “I didn’t know—how could I know?…Do you remember everything? Then why—”

“Who would believe the truth?” he asked, and the blue eyes were for a moment as deep and stark and lonely as his brother’s. “This way is easier. Who would believe, but you?”

We rode on in silence. Ahead of us I could see Red riding alone, leading the way, and behind him four of my brothers, Liam and Diarmid, Cormack and Conor, their horses following his along the track, which had narrowed as the terrain grew steeper. We rode on through the woods, until we reached the place where the trees opened up, and you could see the wide expanse of the sea before you. Across that shining water, in the west, was home. And the forest. My forest.

“We used to come here long ago,” said Simon. “There are seals, sometimes.”

“I know,” I said.

His gaze sharpened. “He brought you here?”

“I have seen the cove,” I said, thinking,
I cannot go back there. Don’t make me say good-bye there. I may be strong, but I am not strong enough for that
.

“Nobody else knew,” said Simon very quietly. “We told no one of this place. Even Elaine, we never told.”

I said nothing. A little further along the track, the others waited for us. Behind us, Ben and Padriac emerged from the trees and came up at a crisp canter. I saw a huge grin of delight appear on Padriac’s face as he got his first glimpse of the wide, glittering expanse of water which had so astonished me when I had first seen it. As we sat there, looking out to the west, Finbar rode up slowly behind. His eyes showed nothing, and his expression was blank.

“It’s just up there to the north,” said Red. “We keep a boat in the next cove, not far from here. Our man should be ready. You have a good day for it; a fair wind.”

“Have a mind to your sister’s stomach,” put in Ben. “She’s not overkeen on sea voyages.”

All too soon, it seemed, we were gathered on the shore, and by the sea a dour boatman I had met once before was readying his small craft. Padriac, whose ventures had hitherto been confined to the calmer waters of the lake, sprang to help him, and was soon busy with ropes and oars. The horses grazed further up the hill, too well disciplined, or too weary, to wander far. Red had walked away from us, and stood alone on the rocks, looking out to sea.

I said good-bye to Ben, as Liam took my pathetically small bundle of belongings down to the boat, and the others stretched cramped limbs and gazed into the west, across the tumbling waves, across the wide water, straining for some glimpse of the land they knew lay there. Ben hugged me, and said, “Don’t forget us,” and I said how could I forget such a fine head of hair, and that I would pass all his jokes onto my brothers. He turned away and made himself suddenly very busy with a troublesome piece of harness.

“Good-bye, Simon,” I said. He had tucked the little pouch under his shirt again, out of sight. Each of us wore our memories of what might have been.

As I turned away he said, “How can he do this? If you were mine, I would fight to keep you. I would die, before I let you go.” Then Liam called out from down by the water, “Hurry up, Sorcha! We’re almost ready.”

The moment was finally here. Red waited, a still figure on the rocks, his gaze turned on the distant horizon. The gulls screamed overhead. This was a different cove, but the memories still lingered, of that other day. Somehow, I was standing before him, and we looked at each other. Looked at each other, and there might have been no world, save for the two of us. I could find no words. Not a single one. The Fair Folk had warned me my path would be hard. But nothing could have prepared me for something as hard as this. Red, too, was silent. It had been easier for us to understand one another when I had had no voice. Looking at him, I could see how his face might be, when he grew old. A face marked by grooves and lines, where his tears would have flowed, had he allowed himself to weep. His eyes were empty.

“Come on, Sorcha!” yelled Diarmid.

I can’t go. I must go
. I blinked back tears, unable to move from where I stood.

“I almost forgot,” said Red. His voice sounded very strange, as if from a long, long distance. He reached into his pocket. “I have something for you.”

He put it into my hand. A round, shiny, perfect apple, green as new grass with a faint blush of rosy pink. And now his eyes had changed so that I saw what lay there, hidden deep, so deep only the bravest or most foolhardy would seek to find it.

He had always understood me better, without words. So I laid my hand on my heart, held it there for a moment, and then moved it over and touched my palm against his breast.
My heart. Your heart
.

“Come on, Sorcha, we haven’t got all day!” Padriac shouted.

I turned away, just before the tears began to well in my eyes and spill down my cheeks, and I ran to the boat and was hauled over the side. They pushed it forward, and the wind and waves took us and began to carry us westward, westward over the sea and home to Sevenwaters. And I sat with the apple in my hands, and my eyes fixed on the shore, where he stood like a man carved in stone. Tears blurred my vision, but still I looked back, until all I could see of him was the small bright flame of his hair against the gray and green and white of the shore line.
All that he had of her was his memory, where he held every moment, every single moment that she had been his. That was all he had, to keep out the loneliness
. But Red would forget. Now that I was gone, he could begin to forget. As for my own heart, it had been torn in two, and I did not think even the best healer in the world could mend it.

We sailed on through the day and into the night, and when we made landfall it was on our home shore and in darkness. Once at sea, it had become quickly clear that it would be Liam who was in charge from now on, and at the end it was he who directed the boatman by means of precise gestures to a wild stretch of coastland apparently peopled only by wind-battered vegetation and scattered stones. Cormack lifted me out of the boat, and Conor took my bag, and there were the seven of us, standing in the cool of the night on the ground of Erin once more. The small boat vanished away into the darkness with a faint splashing.

My brothers had not been sick. They had enjoyed themselves, almost. Between spasms of retching, I had had time to see the glow of excitement on Padriac’s face as he was allowed a turn at the tiller, as he took his place with sail or oar. Not that my brothers were unfamiliar with little boats; a family of boys does not live so long close to a great lake and not teach itself some skills in going by water. But this was different. I could see in Padriac’s face a vision of far wider seas, a yearning for wild adventure and mysterious lands beyond the reach of maps. I read in his eyes a reflection of what I had seen long ago, when he released the owl from his glove and she spiraled up, up into the endless sky. And I heard Finbar’s inner voice.
Soon enough he, too, will fly away
. My brother sat silent in the boat, his dark cloak not quite concealing the sweep of white feathers.
Be glad of Padriac’s joy. For this homecoming cannot be a triumph
.

We had been well provisioned by the household of Harrowfield, and once we had reached the shelter of a patch of woodland, my brothers made camp with the quiet efficiency of long practice. A small lantern was lit, and shielded so that its light spread no further than the little grove where we sat.

“No fire,” said Liam. “Not tonight. And we will not seek horses, though I am eager for home. It is best that we arrive unannounced, and on foot.”

“Sorcha will be tired.” Conor was keeping a close eye on me; watching that I finished every mouthful of the barley bread and bean curd he had given me. “It is a long way; four or five days’ journey, even for us.”

Liam frowned. “These Britons will pay for what they have done to our sister. But that must wait. We have more pressing business.”

“My hands itch for the sorceress’ neck.” Diarmid clenched and unclenched his fists. “Cannot we ride there openly, and see justice done swiftly? I would tell our tale to all, and make the lady Oonagh pay the penalty where all can witness it.”

“You’re too hasty,” said Cormack, breaking off a piece of his bread and chewing thoughtfully. “We don’t know anything about what’s happened at Sevenwaters yet. Liam’s right. We can’t just rush in with swords raised. That approach tends to lead to slaughter, and not always of your enemy.”

Conor regarded his twin levelly. “You’ve learned something, this long time away,” he observed with a little smile. Cormack threw a crust of bread at him, and missed.

Padriac nodded agreement. “The element of surprise might help us,” he said. “Best if the lady Oonagh is not forewarned of our arrival.”

We fell silent for a while. The memories hurt, and the fear was not altogether gone.

“Still,” said Diarmid, “it seems too long to wait.”

However long, it can never be long enough. Long enough to walk through the forest, and to come home. Long enough to be ourselves again
.

I had heard Finbar’s voice, if the others had not. “We must do as Liam advises,” I said quietly. “After such a long journey, we must go home the right way. I can walk the distance. I’m quite strong, really.”

“Hm.” Conor was eyeing me up and down. “Perhaps we should extract a promise that you will eat five good meals a day until we get there. But she’s right, Diarmid. This is the only way.”

So we moved on foot across the land, and my brothers took their pace from me. This was a different way from the one I had taken when I left the forest, when the river had borne me so swiftly away from my home and deposited me into the hands of a passing Briton. This way took us across open ground, moving from one rocky outcrop to the next, taking what cover could be found in isolated groves of storm-bent trees, camping at night and moving off soon after dawn. We avoided the tracks of men, moving like seven silent shadows, our progress witnessed only by cliff and rock and tree. And on the third day we came to the edge of the forest.

We paused on the crest of a rise as sun broke through the clouds, and watched a solitary hawk balance its wings on the air, high above the vista of gray and green and autumn gold that stretched before us as far as the eye could see.

“We’re home,” Conor said. I breathed deep, and felt a cloak of stillness settle on my spirit. Then we started to walk, down between moss-covered stones and under the blanket of the trees, and we made our way homeward on tracks that were plain to us without map or guide, though no stranger could have followed them. The trees shivered in the cold autumn wind, and voices followed me.
Sorcha, oh Sorcha. Home. You are home at last
. The wind rose, and leaves fell about us in a bright rain of scarlet and gold.
Little sister, why are you still sad? For you have come home
. If you looked up, you could almost see them. They moved in the cool sunlight, on the wind between the bare bones of birch and ash, always just on the edge of sight. If you turned to look, they were suddenly gone.

“The lookouts are unmanned,” observed Liam, frowning. “That is folly.” And as we came closer and closer to Sevenwaters, the faces of my brothers grew still and watchful.

Three nights we spent in the forest, and my brothers made sure I had a comfortable bed of bracken, and ate what I was told to. Our pace was slow, for I was not the only one weakened by hunger and lack of sleep, and the journey was not an easy one. Here, we could make a small fire, and brew a kind of tea made from whatever herbs were to hand. This warmed the body if not the spirits. Here in the forest it was quite safe, and my brothers slept well at night. All but Finbar. For him there was no rest. By day he walked as if in a dream. By night he sat cross-legged, looking into the distance with eyes that did not seem to be seeing. He had eaten nothing; had spoken not a word. It was as if he were not really there at all, his body a hollow shell whose spirit inhabited some world the rest of us could not touch. As for me, I lay there open-eyed in the darkness, waiting for sleep to come. I should have been joyful. Was I not back where I belonged, in the place of my spirit, with my brothers all safe around me, ready to start their lives anew? Had I not saved them and achieved the task against all odds? But my heart was shriveled and cold, my mind was unable to see a future that was not one of stark loneliness, of half being, of dreams unfulfilled.

The further time took me away from that far shore, the more I recognized how much I had given up. I told myself not to be stupid. Not to be selfish. What did I expect, that Red would have begged me to stay? Even in that most unlikely event, I would have been obliged to refuse him. How could I have remained there to drag him down, a burdensome wife, object of hatred and distrust to all his people? I could not have done that to him. What I wanted didn’t matter. If I had stayed, I would have destroyed him. So why did I feel so miserable? What was wrong with me? Anyone would have thought
…anyone would have thought you were no longer afraid of men
.

That was the small voice of common sense, like a dash of cold water.
I am. I am still afraid
, I said to myself, for I still remembered how those men had hurt and shamed me, the ugly things they had said, in every vivid detail. The memory still turned my body cold with disgust. It would never go away. That was one side of the balance. As for the other side, for there was now another side, I thought I would give almost anything to have that one moment again, the moment when I had felt Red’s arm around me like a shield against the world, and his lips against my hair, and his heart drumming under my cheek. In that moment, he had not wanted to let me go.
It’s all right. It’s all right, Jenny
, he had said. But it was not all right. I lay in the darkness under the trees, and silently cursed the Fair Folk for the way they used and discarded us in their strange games, heedless of the damage they did.

It was the seventh day, and we were coming close to the keep of Sevenwaters. Between the bare branches of the willows the waters of the lake glinted bright, and ducks dabbled in the shallows. It was very quiet.