Princes of Ireland

  “I should rule Leinster as well as Munster then, while you keep Connacht and Ulster,” Brian solemnly agreed. “Which means,” he pointed out to his followers afterwards, “that I shall control all the chief ports, including Dyflin.” Without having to strike another blow, he had just gained all the richest prizes in Ireland.

  Or thought he had.

  Morann stayed two days at the farmstead. He tried his best, but nothing that he or his wife could say would persuade Astrid to come with them. She did agree to bury some of their valuables. “Leave some for the Munster men to find,” he advised her grimly, “if you don’t want the farm burned down.” Morann stayed there as long as he could in the hope that Harold might return; but when he could stay no longer, he begged her a last time at least to seek a place of sanctuary.

  “There’s Swords nearby,” she remarked. This was a fine little monastery with stout walls and a high round tower, which might have offered sanctuary. “But we aren’t Christian. Or there’s Dyflin. That’s where Harold will be coming. I don’t mind going there.”

  Morann sighed.

  “Dyflin will have to do then,” he answered. And it was agreed that the family would occupy Morann’s house in the city.

  The following day, he continued on his way. They passed the monastery at Swords—secure enough, but too close to Dyflin for his liking—and headed north. They did not stop until that evening, when they slept below the Hill of Tara.

  The High King might have meant well, but when he gave the overlordship of their kingdom to Brian, the proud men of Leinster were unimpressed. Nobody had asked them. The king and the chiefs in particular were incensed. The new overlord, you could be sure, would be wanting tribute and taking their sons as hostages for their good behaviour, in the usual way.

  “Give our sons to the man from Munster?” they cried. The upstart? “If the O’Neill can’t defend us, what right have they to give us to this fellow?” they demanded.

  Whatever the Leinster men might have felt about the Vikings of Dyflin when they first arrived, the two communities had been living together for generations now. They’d intermarried. Indeed, King Sitric of Dyflin was actually the King of Leinster’s nephew. True, many of the Vikings were still pagan, but even religion had to take second place where matters of honour were at stake. As for the Vikings themselves, they had been stubbornly resisting the control of the High King for a long time. They were hardly likely to submit to Brian Boru just because the O’Neill High King, who was too weak to fight, told them that they should.

  So it was that autumn that the King of Leinster and the King of Dyflin had decided to refuse to recognise the Munster man. “If he wants a fight,” they declared, “he’ll get more than he bargained for.” And now the Munster man was coming, and they had gone out to meet him.

  The sky was overcast the next morning when Morann and his family crossed the River Boyne; it was still dull grey at noon. Their spirits were not high. To the children, the journey seemed long; and he suspected that his wife would secretly have preferred to remain inside the walls of Dyflin with her neighbours and Harold’s wife. More than once she had asked him doubtfully about the place to which they were going. Could it really be any more secure than Dyflin? “You’ll see. We’ll be there before nightfall,” he promised them. The afternoon wore on, the horse pulling the wagon seemed to plod more slowly, and though his children dared not say so, they were wondering whether they would be spending another night out in the empty landscape when, as the darkness was closing in, a shaft of vivid evening sunlight suddenly pierced the cloud and they saw, illuminated upon a hill some way ahead, the great walled sanctuary that was their destination.

  “The monastery of Kells,” Morann announced with satisfaction.

  If the journey had been gloomy, the effect of the great monastery upon his family made up for it now. The children gazed at it with awe. Even his wife turned to him with a look of respect.

  “It looks like a city,” she remarked.

  “It is a city,” he said. “And a sanctuary. You can sleep easy tonight,” he added, pleased by the impression he had made. “It’s almost as big as Dyflin, you know,” he said. Soon, while it was still light, he would give himself the pleasure of showing them around.

  But they had only gone a hundred paces when they heard the sound of horse hoofs cantering behind them, and turned to see a man wrapped in a cloak, his face pale as a ghost, his horse all in a lather, about to overtake them on his way to the monastery. He hardly seemed to see them as he came past, but in answer to Morann’s calling out to ask him if he had news, he cried back, “We’ve lost. Brian Boru has smashed us. He’s on his way to Dyflin now.”

  The room was silent. Looking at the monks in their woollen habits, sitting stooped over their desks, you might almost have taken them for five huge mice trying to burrow into the vellum before them.

  Vellum—skin of the newborn calf—pale and smooth; for the hair had been removed by soaking it in excrement or lime before scraping it with a sharp knife. Everyday documents and accounts were written on ordinary cattle skins, which were plentiful and cheap on the island. But for copying sacred texts like the Gospels, only costly vellum would do. And they could afford the finest vellum here, in the scriptorium of the great monastery of Kells.

  Glancing outside now, Osgar saw flakes of falling snow; swiftly, with only a faint scratch, his hand moved to and fro. It was nearly two months since he had come to Kells; soon he’d be leaving.

  But not just yet. Not if he could help it. He stared at the snow outside. The weather had changed abruptly that morning, as if in reaction to the news of the night before from Dyflin. But it was not the snow that concerned Brother Osgar, but the person who was waiting for him out there. Perhaps the snow would be a deterrent. If he waited in the scriptorium until the bell for prayers, he could make his escape without getting caught. At least, he hoped so.

  He had changed in the last decade. There were some grey hairs now, a few stern lines on his face, a quiet dignity.

  His eyes went back to his work. The pale vellum had been neatly ruled into lines with a stylus. He dipped his pen in the ink. Most scribes used a quill pen, made from the tail feather of a goose or swan; but Osgar had always favoured reeds and he had brought a good supply with him, cut from the edge of the lake at Glendalough. The ink was of two kinds: either a brownish colour, made from oak apples and sulphate of iron; or a jet-black, made from holly.

  Osgar was a skilful calligrapher. Writing in the clear, rounded script of the Irish monasteries, he could copy a text at roughly fifty lines an hour. Working six hours a day, which was certainly the maximum possible during these short winter days—for good calligraphy needs natural daylight—he had almost finished copying the book of the Gospels for which he had come there. Another day and it would be done.

  He paused to stretch. Only those who had tried it understood—the calligrapher might seem only to be moving his hand, but in fact the whole body was engaged. It was hard on the arm, the back, even the legs.

  He settled back to his task. Another dozen lines, a quarter-hour of silence. Then he looked up again. One of the other monks caught his eye, and nodded. The light was fading; it was time to stop work. Osgar started to clean his pen.

  On the floor at his side were two bags. One contained a small, workmanlike text of the Gospels, another of the Pentateuch. The Psalms, of course, he knew by heart. There were also two little devotional books that he liked always to have with him. The other bag, into which he now dipped his hand, contained his writing materials and one other item. And it was upon this object that his fingers fastened.

  His secret sin. Nobody knew about it. He had never even mentioned it in the confessional. Oh, he had confessed the sin of lust itself, a hundred times. He was rather proud of it—the pride was a sin, too, of course. And yet, wasn’t his concealment of the secret in a way even worse for having been repeated so many times? Was there anything else, his confessor would ask? No. A lie. A hundred lies
. Yet he had no intention of confessing his secret, for the good reason that if he did, he would be told he must part with it. And that he could not do. His talisman. Caoilinn’s ring.

  He had always kept it. There wasn’t a day when he didn’t take it out and look at it. Each time, he would give a little smile and then, with a sweet sadness, put the ring away again.

  What did she mean to him now? She was the dark-haired child he had planned to marry; the girl who had shown him her nakedness.

  He wasn’t shocked anymore. If, for a little while, he had thought of her as a crude woman, a vessel of sin, her marriage soon afterwards had obliterated the idea. She was a respectably married woman, a Christian matron. Her body would have thickened now, he supposed. Did she sometimes think of him? He felt sure she did. How could she not, when he thought of her every day? The love he had given up.

  The ring was not just a sentimental mascot though. In a way it helped to regulate his life. If at times he thought of leaving the monastery, he had only to look at the ring to remind himself that, since Caoilinn was married to another, there was hardly any point. If, as had happened once or twice, he found himself attracted to a woman, the ring reminded him that his heart was given to another. And if perhaps some monk—like the young novice who had first shown him round Glendalough—if such a one seemed to be drawing too close, and if he, out of kindness, was drawn to return a gentle look or a touch, he had only to take out Caoilinn’s little memento to relive the feelings he had experienced for her all those years ago, and to know that he would not be going down that other road which some of his fellow monks were travelling. So if he had first denied her by entering the monastery, and she had then made herself unavailable through marriage, it seemed to him that in this impossible relationship he had been granted a protection against greater evils; and he even dared to wonder whether, in his present small disobedience and sentimental lust, he might perceive the hand of providence itself gently helping him, poor sinner that he was, along his sometimes lonely way.

  There was still an hour before the bell for prayers. The other monks were shuffling towards the door, but he did not follow them. For he knew exactly how to employ the time. In the corner, on a lectern, lay a large volume. It was kept in the sacristy of the big stone church normally, but it had been brought into the scriptorium for the time being. It was encased in a silver cover which was set with gems. Taking up a candle from a table now, he advanced towards it.

  As he did so, he noticed with pleasure that one of the gems caught a glow from the candle’s flame.

  The greatest treasure in the monastery of Kells: the Gospel book. It was the chance to spend time with the magnificent illuminated text that had brought him to Kells two months ago. His skill in calligraphy had advanced so rapidly at Glendalough that he had branched into illustration, at which he had shown talent also. In return for two months’ work copying texts, he had been granted leave to study the treasury of illustration in the Kells collection, and in particular the great Gospels, which he normally did for two hours every morning. This extra hour was a bonus, therefore. He reached the lectern and was just stretching out his hand when he heard a hiss at his ear. It was the elderly brother in charge of the scriptorium.

  “I’m locking up now.”

  “I could lock up later and give you the key afterwards, if you like.”

  The old man treated this suggestion with silent contempt. Osgar knew better than to argue. He sighed and, after lingering hopefully a few more moments, went outside.

  Silence. The light wind had stopped. The snow fell softly, caressing his face. The last remains of daylight gave the pale scene an eerie glow. His eyes scanned the street and peered down the slope towards the monastery gateway. There was no sign of Sister Martha. Nobody about at all. He sniffed. The air wasn’t very cold. Perhaps instead of returning to the dormitory where he was staying, he’d stretch his legs and go down to the gateway. Pulling his hood over his head, more to hide his face than to protect it from the light snow, he began to walk down the street.

  There was no doubt that it was comforting, in these dangerous times, to find oneself safe within the great walls of Kells. Even in the snow shower, it was an impressive place. Extending all over the low hill, with its stout buildings, stone churches, and well-laid streets, not to mention the market and suburbs that lay just outside its high walls, the monastery was not only a walled sanctuary, like Glendalough, but like several of the other great religious houses, it was really a medieval city.

  As Osgar knew, this idea went back to the early days of the Christian mission on the island. For when Saint Patrick had begun his mission, he had come as a bishop. All over the crumbling Roman Empire, the pattern was the same: Christian priests and their flocks were guided and led by a bishop, who would be based in the nearest important Roman town. It had been vaguely assumed, therefore, that even in the distant western island, matters would be organised in a similar way. The trouble was, of course, that the island, never having been part of the empire, did not possess such things as towns; and though the first missionary bishops tried to attach themselves to the tribal kings, these Celtic chiefs were always moving about their territories. It didn’t suit the Roman priests at all.

  But a monastery was a permanent, year-round centre. You could build a church, living quarters, even a library there. It could be protected with walls. It was self-sustaining, providing workers, priests, and leaders from within the community. The abbot could act as the local bishop himself, or provide a house for a bishop within the safety of the monastery’s walls. For a long time the bishop who oversaw Dyflin had kept his house up at Glendalough. Craftsmen and traders were attracted to settle by monasteries. Markets appeared; whole communities grew up in suburbs around the walls. No wonder that within a century of Patrick’s mission, these monasteries were rapidly becoming the main centres of the Christian community on the island. Until the first Viking coastal settlements, centuries later, the larger monasteries were the only towns in Ireland. Kells had been built upon this pattern.

  He went through the gateway into the marketplace. It was empty. Near one side, like a priest at a snowbound offertory, stood a handsome stone cross, and behind it several covered wagons, already white. He looked around. All the stalls and workshops were closed. A solitary lamp shone from a cowshed, but the only signs of human life were the wisps of smoke from the thatched roofs of the surrounding cottages, shuttered against the snow and the dying day. Osgar turned round, took three deep breaths, decided this was enough exercise for the present, and would have been gone in another moment if he hadn’t noticed, just then, a figure emerging from one of the wagons. It wasn’t Sister Martha, yet the figure looked vaguely familiar.

  It was Morann, the goldsmith from Dyflin. It had been years since he’d seen him, and he’d only known the man slightly, but his face wasn’t one you’d forget. The craftsman was surprised but seemed glad to see him and explained his own reasons for seeking sanctuary there.

  “I supplied the abbot with some fine candlesticks last year,” he added with a grin, “so they’re glad to give me shelter.”

  “And you really think Brian Boru will destroy Dyflin?” Osgar asked.

  “He’s too clever for that,” Morann answered. “But he’ll teach them a terrible lesson.”

  “You think the religious houses are safe, don’t you?” Osgar asked, thinking of the little family monastery.

  “He has always respected them in the past,” said Morann.

  They had paused now, in front of the great market cross. Kells had several of these elaborately carved stone crosses which, like the round towers, had become a feature of the island’s monasteries. The arms of the cross were set in a ring of stone—an arrangement which, though known as a Celtic cross, went back to before the time of Saint Patrick, to the Roman wreaths of triumph, and echoed the symbol of the sun god earlier still. But the truly remarkable feature of the island’s crosses was their carving. Some were incised with the interlaced patter
ns and swirling spirals of the ancient days. But the crosses at Kells were typical of the finest work: arranged in panels, every surface, even the plinths on which they stood, seemed to be covered with sturdy reliefs: Adam and Eve, Noah and his Ark, scenes from the life of Christ, angels and devils; the base of the market cross showed a striking scene of warriors going into battle. Like the statues and carvings inside the churches, the figures on these great ornamental crosses were brightly painted. The spears of the warriors were even tipped with silver. Morann looked at it with approval. Though on a much bigger scale, the arrangement of its parts was not unlike the jeweller’s art.

  They were about to return when they saw her, standing in the gateway. Sister Martha. Osgar cursed under his breath.

  He liked her. With her broad face and kindly grey eyes, the middle-aged nun was a good soul. Sister Martha, the nun from Kildare. The Abbess of Kildare had given her permission to visit Kells to attend to an aunt who was thought to be dying there. But the old lady in question had recently made an unexpected recovery, and Sister Martha was now anxious to return. If only, in a moment of weakness some time ago, he hadn’t promised that he would accompany her back.

  There was certainly every reason why he should do so. He had almost finished his own work at Kells; he could, without going much out of his way, travel back to Glendalough by way of Kildare; and it was unquestionably his duty to accompany the single nun across the countryside in troubled times like these. He had originally expected to be ready to leave by now, but his work had taken a little longer than he had thought. When he had explained this, she had accepted it cheerfully enough, but he knew very well that she was anxious to be gone, and she had been gently asking him for some days when he thought he might be ready to depart. He suspected that she knew he would complete his copying the following day, so she must reasonably be expecting to go the day after that.