Irish Lady (26 page)

“Nuala is my wife.”

The
blood
flowed
freely
now. Speech was no longer possible. His mouth opened, shut, and opened again. I released the pressure of the blade.

He
gasped, breathed deeply, and spoke. “Kill me and raise my son. 'Tis the law. Is that what you wish for, Rory, to watch Nuala mother the lad she bore me?”

The
truth
was
always
hardest
to
bear. I stared down at my cousin's sharply hewn features, struggling to match the quickness of his mind. Like Nuala, Niall was swift to understand and unusually articulate of speech. I knew the law. Blood bonds of Ireland's high kings handed down from the Hills of Tara were unbreakable. Niall was my cousin, son of my father's brother. Only the death of the lad would release me from fostering Niall's son. Much as I relished the thought, I could not murder Nuala's child. She had already lost too much, but neither would I take him into my home. Niall Garv must be spared.

Slowly
I
withdrew
the
knife
from
his
throat. The only sign that he had feared for his life was the brief, nearly imperceptible flickering of his eyes. Before he could move, I lifted the handle of the dirk and brought it down against his temple. I watched his mouth slacken and his skin grow purple before I backed out of the tent.
The
blow
had
been
intentionally
hard. He would not wake for several hours, enough for me to reach safety. Meanwhile, tomorrow was Christmas Eve, and William Mountjoy waited at Kinsale with an army of three thousand.

Meghann closed the book and looked up at Nuala. Her eyes were unnaturally bright. “There was great goodness in Rory. Thank you, my dear. I knew nothing of this.”

Meghann nodded. “I envy you.”

Nuala's eyes grew round with astonishment. “Rory would never have done for you, lass. The man you've chosen is much more suited to your temperament.”

“How can you possibly know such a thing?”

“I know this.” Her image was blurry now and her words a mere whisper. “For Michael Devlin there will never be anyone but you.”

She was gone, and with her went the light and the warmth in the room. Meghann looked at her watch. It was late, and Annie had invited her for dinner.

Nuala, 1601

After it was over and all was lost, Rory said that Macha's curse of the silver mist was on the Irish army that day. How else could their defeat be explained? They had twice the men, the support of all around them, and a knowledge of the glens and boglands that no Englishman would ever have. Still, in less than three hours, they lost the day and with their defeat the course of Irish history would be forever changed.

They had marched south to find Don Juan de Aguila and the Spanish troops imprisoned behind the walls of Kinsale. Mountjoy's army, camped outside the walls, had ravaged the countryside to prevent provisions from being smuggled in to the starving Spanish. Without the Spanish troops the Irish were outnumbered, forcing the O'Neill to return to his old tactics of surrounding the enemy and starving them until they surrendered.

It was very nearly successful. Reports told of horrendous losses, of wasted men and lingering illness. But on Christmas Eve, pleas from the Spanish imprisoned in Kinsale could no longer be ignored.

The night was violently stormy. Lightning flashed from Irish spearheads, and in the darkness the English saw the lighting of their fires. Mountjoy was ready. He launched a furious cavalry attack on the Irish infantry, knocking the men off balance and scattering them to the four winds.

From Rory's position at the head of his mounted troops, he could hear the cries of battle. Leading the charge, he followed the sounds of shouting men and clashing blades. His sword slew many that day, but in the end it was all for naught. The Irish could not regroup quickly enough and for the first time my father, the great battle tactician, exposed his troops in the open with fatal consequences.

His men were not suited to fighting in the snow-covered fields. They had camped at Coolcarron on the low ground while Mountjoy's troops had the advantage of a camp at Ardmartin. The Irish had to cross the low ridge and break through the English lines at Camphill or Ardmartin to reach the Spaniards. Our men had been trained to ambush and retreat, melting into the forests like the shadowy ghosts of our legends. The English mowed them down like cattle.

Rory's command became separated from the rest, and by the time they came around, Irish bodies littered the snow and the Bandon River ran red with the blood of Ireland's best. He tried to rally as many men as possible to continue the fight, but there were few left to obey. Many a family name disappeared that day, never to recover. The magnitude of such a loss had never before been experienced in Irish history.

In less than three hours the battle was over. The Spanish surrendered and the Irish retreated north with those who had survived.

It was the passing of an era, the end of Irish Catholic supremacy in Ireland, and it was to have consequences more far-reaching than any other event in our history. The Franciscans recorded it in
The
Annals
of
the
Four
Masters
far more poignantly than I ever could:

Manifest
was
the
displeasure
of
God… Immense and countless was the loss in that place; for the prowess and valour, prosperity and affluence, nobleness and chivalry, dignity and renown, bravery and protection, devotion and pure religion, of the Island, were lost in this engagement.

The battle was an even greater disaster for Spain than the loss of her Armada in 1588. With France paralyzed by a religious civil war, Kinsale turned the tide in favor of England. Philip was forced to make his peace with his archenemy. But first the subjugation of Ulster was executed.

For nearly a year after Kinsale, Rory and my father, with a few loyal men, held out in Glenconkeyne and then in the woodlands of Fermanagh. Meanwhile, Mountjoy destroyed our castle at Dungannon and the ancient coronation sight of the O'Neills at Tullahogue.

I cannot speak of that time without a coldness surrounding my heart. The ancient circle of stones where the High Kings of Ulster took up the scepter, walked three times around the stone and placed a gold-cased slipper into the footprint of every O'Neill king who had ever been crowned, came to us a thousand years before Saint Patrick set foot upon our shores. The coronation stone was said to be a living thing. Only when it cried out in the voice of Macha, goddess of Ulster, would a man be recognized as the O'Neill. It had happened so with my father and with his before him and so on in an unbroken line of succession so far back into the mists of time that only Cia'ran, the oldest of our bards, could recite the entirety of our lineage without reading the scrolls.

After Kinsale it was over, the stones scattered, the posts burned, the legacy of our people destroyed. I came to believe during those trying years when my husband was on the run, before my father surrendered to Mountjoy at Mellifont Abbey in Drogheda, that life is more a question of character than a series of incidents and there is little we can do but learn to bear what we must. And so I did.

My burdens were light compared to the peasants of Ulster. Mountjoy concentrated on burning fields and seizing cattle until the famine was so widespread there was no relief in sight. I did what I could for our own tenants until there was nothing left in the larder of Dun Na Ghal. It was then that I saw a spectacle so horrible that to this very day I can see the details vividly in my nightmares.

While returning from Newry on a futile quest to learn of my husband's whereabouts, we came upon a village of women and children so thin they resembled living skeletons. They looked upon us strangely, and I was relieved when they were behind us. We made our way down an embankment and were ready to camp when I noticed a multitude of decaying bodies with mouths stained green. Before I could question my guard, he had reined in his mount to block my path. His breathing was labored and his face deathly pale.

“Please, my lady. Do not pass this way. 'Tis a sight unfit for human eyes.”

“You've seen it.”

“Aye, and I wish to God I hadn't.”

“Move aside, knave,” I commanded him. “We are on O'Neill land. Who better to see what takes place here.”

Reluctantly he pulled back his horse and I looked upon a travesty that surely transgressed every law of God or man be he Protestant or Catholic. Three small children, the oldest no more than six or seven years, sat beside a dying ash-white fire. Before the fire were the remains of half a woman. Her head, torso and arms were whole, although black with death, but her legs were missing and below her waist, her belly and hips looked as if they had been torn apart. In the midst of the fire lay the charred remains of her entrails.

At first I did not understand and then when I did, I would have given much of my share of heaven that I did not. The children, desperate in their starvation, were eating their dead mother's body. Holy Mother of Jesus. I should have prayed. I should have fallen to my knees for the children, for myself, for Ireland, that her people should be reduced to such atrocity. But I could do no more than slide from my mount, lift my skirts and run behind a thick oak, where my stomach revolted and I heaved up every bit of food I'd taken in since morning.

My escorts indulged in no such weakness, but they were kind enough to ignore mine. I, who had cleaned out maggot-infested wounds, seared flesh, and ordered plague-ridden bodies burned, could not touch these hell-damned children. I ordered that they be fed and put up behind three of the men but Siobhan, my maid, advised against it.

“There are a thousand more just like these, my lady. 'Tis no service that you do them. The men will talk and no woman will take them. Leave them food. We will find a priest in the next village. He will know what to do.”

To my shame, her words brought me great relief. I did not want these children behind the walls of Dun Na Ghal. I did not want these children nor any like them in all of Tirconnaill. “Have you ever seen the like, Siobhan?” I asked, watching her rub the gray from her lips.

“Nay, my lady. But the travelers brought word of women who lured the cowherds from the pastures.” Her voice dropped to a whisper. “They killed them, cut them up and cooked them in their soup kettles.”

Once again the gagging feeling clutched at my throat and I turned away. What had our grasping power wars done to our people? Did Elizabeth in the opulent comfort of her palace think of the motherless bairns of Ireland? Did Mountjoy or my father or Rory? Did I? Holy God, perhaps we were past prayer.

Perhaps we were all damned.

*

Tirconnaill, 1605

“Connor Maguire, you are a fool.” Rory's words, as always, were inflammatory. He would have said more, but the slight pursing of my lips warned him to keep silent.

“Mountjoy's treaty with the O'Neill is still good despite Elizabeth's death,” I said. “Surely, there is no need for flight.”

Maguire slammed his fist down on the table. “Those who fought against us are uneasy, Nuala. They feel slighted and stir King James against us. Your father keeps his lands and strengthens his control over his tenants and subchieftains. But his good fortune cannot last. Fermanagh has been portioned among two hundred freeholders, leaving me with half the land that was mine. Niall Garv holds the lands above Lifford, the jewel of Tirconnaill. Even now there is talk of granting Inishowen to Sir Cahil O'Doherty. Will you watch while Protestants encroach upon us until there is nothing left?”

Again I answered his impassioned speech with a single reasonable question. “Have you proof of this, Connor?”

“My lands are gone. Is that not proof enough?”

“Perhaps.” I spoke gently. Connor Maguire was not a man to offend. “There is also the possibility that it is our company you wish for on your journey to Spain. I am not certain that a military career in the service of Philip of Spain is in Rory's best interests.” I smiled at him. “'Tis nothing which must be solved tonight. Come, Connor. Sup with us. At last there is enough for everyone.”

Rory was not deceived by my diversionary tactics. We would speak of Connor's visit later. He had given me food for thought.

I came to him later that evening, wrapped in wool against the chill of an early autumn. “What would you have us do, Rory?”

He grinned and shook his head. “In many ways you are predictable, my love. You decide what we shall do and pretend that the idea came from me.”

“That isn't true,” I protested.

He sighed. “What are your thoughts on the matter, Nuala?”

“We are greatly beholden to Spain, and I cannot believe that Philip will reign for long.” I twisted the fringe of my shawl. “We have gold in Rome and we owe no one there. Rome would be a better home for us.”

Dismay showed on his face. I hurried on, not allowing him to speak until I finished. “I know the pain it must bring you to leave Ireland, Rory. But since we were born we have known how it would be. Three hundred years ago, when the first Red Hugh O'Donnell acknowledged Henry of England to be his overlord, the Irish chieftains were doomed. You have done more than any man in Catholic Europe to hold this land. But you are not God. 'Tis time to give up the fight and live a life that does not include bloodshed.” I fixed my eyes on his face, forcing him to meet my gaze. “Do you ever sleep without a sword by your bed or a dirk beneath your pillow? When have you closed your eyes for an entire night? 'Tis time, Rory. I fear that if we do not go now there will be no life for us at all.”

He knew that everything I said was true, but he did not answer immediately. It seemed a long time before he stood and rested his hands upon my shoulders, testing the small bones beneath his large hands. “What of you, Nuala? It has been many years since we have lived together as man and wife. Will you come with me to Rome or will you stay in Ireland?”

The golden light of the candle danced in the blue of his eyes. “Have you been faithful to me, Rory?”

“I have loved only one woman, Nuala, and she stands before me now.”

I sighed. “'Tis not precisely what I asked you.”

“It is to me.”

“Then why—” my voice broke.

He folded me into his arms. “Don't cry, beloved,” he whispered into my hair. “When you told me of Niall I felt as if my heart had been torn from my body. But I never stopped loving you.”

My voice was muffled against his shirt. “I am no longer your wife.”

His arms tightened around me. “You will always be my wife. Having you beside me, even when you are angry and willful, is better than not having you at all. You are everything to me, Nuala.”

I lifted my head, my eyes burning from the tears I would not release. “I will not go to Rome with you, Rory, unless we go as man and wife in every sense of the word. It is more my choice than it is yours.”

“Aye, love.” Gently he put me from him. “You are still very beautiful, Nuala. I understand your reasoning, and you must understand mine. Without you I will never leave Ireland.”

“Then we will stay.”

“So be it,” he said. “There is nothing I would not give you, Nuala, nothing except this.”

I did not weep. I never wept. Instead, my lip curled contemptuously and I pulled the wool shawl close around my shoulders. “You are a fool, Rory. No woman on earth would choose the life of a clam over the dance of the firefly.”

The night we left for Rome, Rory burned Dun Na Ghal Castle to the ground. I watched the rashes catch fire, sending the shooting flames across the wooden floors to the tapestry-lined walls. I had set great store by my Flemish tapestries. Greedy flames licked at the costly thread before gobbling them completely. The fire leaped to the roof. Walls, weak from fire, collapsed, while chairs, tables, footstools, bedstands, mattresses, portraits, everything that was mine, fell down around me.

It seemed that not even the loss of his children caused Rory more pain than losing this place where centuries of O'Donnells had walked, slept, mated, and given birth. To be forever known as the last O'Donnell chief, the one who had lost Dun Na Ghal, shamed him sorely. Only the Norman tower remained standing when he rowed the boat across the Eske to where the vessel that was to carry us to Rome waited. We had lost it all. Never had we needed each other more.