“Armorica,” mused Gull one night, picking up the idea he had mentioned about Ardal’s possible origins, “now that sounds like a place with some good tales. Corentin had a few. Full of people turning into creatures, or creatures turning into people. One in particular I remember, where a whole city was sunk beneath the sea by a woman’s disobedience. It ended by telling that if you sailed in a particular bay under certain conditions of wind and tide, you could still hear the sound of bells ringing from under the water. I don’t know if that’s true or just part of the tale. It would be more than a little disturbing.”
“Douarnenez,” said Ardal. “The bay of Douarnenez.”
We were by the fire, the three of us, Ardal propped in the chair, Gull on the bench and I cross-legged on a mat before the hearth. Fang was in her usual spot, curled on Ardal’s knee.
“You know this tale?” Gull’s tone was calm; several times now we had trembled on the brink of a discovery, a moment of revelation as Ardal seemed to recognize something, only to see him retreat almost instantly into silence.
“Perhaps I have dreamed this. The bay . . . the bells . . . the waves washing over . . . ”
I watched the flames licking the turves of peat. I listened to the night sounds of the infirmary, the faint hissing and crackling of the fire, the creaking of timbers in the wind, the dog’s steady breathing. I thought of home hearths and times shared. The past had shaped me: the family, the keep, the forest, the tales and songs, the joys and sorrows and challenges. The loss of my twin brothers within a day of their birth, when I was hardly old enough to understand what death meant; years later, when my mother had almost believed it too late, the wondrous arrival of baby Finbar. Cousin Fainne’s brief, turbulent stay in our household. The fire that had scarred my sister Maeve, and her painful journey to recovery, one of the few times I had seen Muirrin cry. Ciarán’s decision that he would teach me. Clodagh’s quest to save Cathal from his father. My own father, so steady and wise, the strong center of household and community. Eilis’s irrepressible love of life. Everything was part of me, every little thing. I could not think of any safe question to ask.
“Breizh,” Ardal said. “That is the true name. Armorica is a name given by the Romans.”
“Your Irish is fluent, Ardal,” Gull said. “It’s not a particularly easy language to learn. You’ll discover, once Evan lets you out of the infirmary, that we’re a community of folk from everywhere. In the early days, Bran’s men spoke an interesting blended tongue, mostly Irish, but with words borrowed from here and there, a contribution from everyone. We used to be on the move then, keeping one step ahead of trouble, taking on one mission after another, running from one bolt-hole to the next. That’s changed now. We’re settled here, and everyone speaks Irish, since we provide a service for Irish kings and chieftains who need their men trained up. You can see from the hue of my skin that I’m not from these parts, and nor is my wife, who lived in Britain before we brought her here. We’re like pebbles on a riverbed, all shapes, sizes and colors thrown together. Among us we get by in a dozen different tongues. Corentin’s the only fellow we’ve had from—what was it, Brez?”
“Breizh.” The response was little more than a whisper.
“Breizh.” Gull tried the odd word, attempting Ardal’s rolled “r” and soft ending. “Corentin spoke good Irish, too. Perhaps the men of Breizh have a scholarly streak. He learned his at the court of an Irish king, before he came to us. We were sorry to see Corentin go.”
“Why did he leave?” I asked. Once a man was accepted into the Inis Eala community, it was extremely unusual for him to depart by his own choice.
“He went home. A message came to tell him that his father had died, and his mother was having difficulty holding on to the family land. Some kind of territorial struggle. Pity we couldn’t send a band of fighters to help him, but I expect he put what he’d learned here to good use.”
“An Irish king,” Ardal said, turning his deep blue eyes on Gull. “What was the king’s name?”
“Ah, that I can’t tell you,” said Gull. “Johnny might remember, or Sigurd, when he gets back. Sigurd was Corentin’s friend.”
“Ardal,” I ventured, “I did wonder if some of the items washed up on the shore here, after the shipwreck, were gifts from one person of high standing to another. They did not seem to be trade goods. Knut didn’t know who they belonged to or what their purpose was. Do you think, if you looked at them . . . ?”
A shiver ran through Ardal. His right hand curled around the dog, as if he sought comfort in her sleeping warmth. “I cannot yet walk more than the few paces from bed to fireside.”
“They could be brought here. There are lengths of silk, once lovely, I imagine, but ruined by the sea. A box containing silver adornments, earrings, armlets; the remains of a book in jeweled covers, the ink all washed away, so there is no telling if it was a Christian psalter or a collection of ancient tales.”
“Paul,” whispered Ardal all of a sudden, staring into the fire. “Where is Paul?”
Silence, broken only by the sound of the night wind beyond the four walls. My heart stood still.
“I don’t know, lad,” said Gull quietly.
“He was a good swimmer,” Ardal said. “Only a year my elder, but far stronger in all ways. We would go, sometimes, to Yeun Ellez, to the place where they said the Ankou dwelt in the swamp, rising when he chose. We feared him, and yet we were drawn to that forbidden place, enthralled by the terror of it. I dare you, Fe—” A sudden halt, as Ardal tripped on a word he did not want to speak. The eyes went down again. “I dare you, he would say. I dare you to go right down to the edge, all by yourself, and stand there to the count of twenty. How could I not meet that challenge? I did what he bid me, my knees knocking in terror, the dark water spreading out before me. Any moment the Ankou would rise, I knew it, he would come out of the water and seize me, and he would take me down below, never to return. I imagined drowning, how it would feel, the water coming over my head, into my nose and mouth, the pain in my chest like fire, the cold knowledge of death . . . I counted, one, two, three, all the way to twenty, and the Ankou stayed under the water. Then I turned and bolted. But Paul was gone.”
A charged silence.
“Your brother?” Gull’s voice was soft.
“My brother. My big, strong brother, who challenged me and teased me and looked after me. I shouted, Paul! Paul, where are you? But the only answer was the silence of the trees, and the darkness of Yeun Ellez. While I was counting, while I was waiting, the Ankou had taken him. I ran home alone, weeping. It was my fault. I had not kept him in sight, I had not thought, I had let him be stolen away and drowned . . . ” His face was sheet-white. He was right there, living it. “And when I got home,” Ardal said, “there was Paul sitting on the step waiting for me, grinning from ear to ear as I ran up with my nose streaming, my chest heaving, my face all over tears. He had always been a fast runner. I was so angry I hit him. Then he took me off to wash my face, so that nobody would know I had been crying.”
“Oh, gods,” I said after a moment. “So he played a trick on you. Children do cruel things sometimes.”
“Ardal,” said Gull, “what is this Ankou?”
“He is the helper of Death. In the swamp, yes, but more often on the road, in a cart full of stones. Coming for a man, a woman, a frail child. Coming to take you away. At night, in bed with the covers over our heads, we would listen for the rumble of the wheels, the shifting of the stones.” Ardal lifted his head and looked straight at me. “And he comes in the sea. A great wave. Smashing, crashing, over our heads. Sibeal, where is Paul?”
How much did he remember? Childhood and adulthood, past and present seemed mixed in his mind. I imagined him listening now to the creaking and rattling of roof and walls in the wind, and hearing the voice of the Ankou calling him. It is your time. If I spoke a wrong word here, if I trod too heavily, I might send him into a place darker than this Yeun Ellez.
“Ardal,” I sa
id quietly, “your brother—Paul—was he with you on the ship?”
“My brother,” Ardal said, his voice unsteady. “He was strong. Always a strong swimmer. But not . . . nobody could . . . I tried to untie it, I tried, but it was too tight, and the wave came . . . ” He put his hands over his face.
“Oh, for a jug of Biddy’s best mead,” muttered Gull. “Pity is, a man in Ardal’s condition isn’t allowed strong drink.” He glanced at me, perhaps thinking the same thought: that man who had lain among the drowned, a tall young man with hair of the same brown as Ardal’s, could have been his brother. The man before us seemed too frail to hear it, too distressed to answer the question that might make it fact. The Ankou came for your brother. He came from the sea.
“We need not speak of this now, Ardal,” I said, moving to crouch by him and laying my hand on his knee. Fang stirred, growling in her sleep. “It’s good that you are starting to remember, but there’s no rush.” Knut had said those two drowned men, the nameless passengers, were traveling with Ardal. I shrank from the need to tell him what I knew; yet as a druid I must summon the fortitude to do it. I remembered Knut suggesting Ardal’s memories would be confused when they returned, the truth wrapped up in the garments of nightmare.
“As we’ve told you,” I said gently, “there were only three survivors from the shipwreck: Knut, Svala and you.” There was no kind way to say this.
Ardal lifted his head; took away the screen of his hands. “In the water . . . how long was I in the water?”
“A long time. The ship struck in the morning. Knut and Svala were picked up not long afterward. I found you late in the afternoon, close to dusk. But they say you couldn’t have been in the sea all that time, not even if you were holding onto floating timbers. No man could have survived so long. Johnny thinks you may have been on that beach for some time before I found you.”
For a moment, Ardal’s thin features looked ferocious. “He was strong. He could have swum to shore. They killed him. They drowned him. The knots . . . ”
“So your brother was on the ship?” Gull asked. “The two of you were traveling together?”
A long silence.
“When I go home,” Ardal said, “perhaps he will be waiting again, on the step, and he will laugh at me. Tricked you, F—” That catch again, before he could say the word he did not want us to hear. His name? “He will get up, a tall man now, and put his arm around my shoulders. Dry those tears, brother. The Ankou doesn’t take me so easily.”
I had to tell him. I had to say it. “Ardal, we brought some men here for burial; nine of them in all. There was—” My voice cracked. “According to Knut, two of those drowned men were traveling companions of yours. He did not know their names. One was young, a tall, well-built man with brown hair and pale skin. He looked quite like you, Ardal. If it was your brother, I’m deeply sorry that you have lost him. There was an older man, too. Knut said you were going somewhere as a group.”
“Older . . . I do not know . . . ” The strong planes of Ardal’s face were bathed in tears. “I do not know what came before. Only the wave, and Paul . . . If my fingers had been quicker, if I had untied it . . . So strong, he would have swum to shore . . . I could have saved him.”
“Untied what?” asked Gull after a moment.
“The—the—” Ardal faltered. “No, I cannot speak of this. No more, no more of it.”
“I’m sorry,” I said inadequately. “Your brother was laid to rest with prayers and respect. I’m sorry it had to be done before you were well enough to know, and to be there. When you can walk outside, I’ll take you to see the place.” I wondered why Ardal blamed himself for his brother’s death. I had seen the ship crash onto the reef. I had seen how quickly the sea devoured it. Doubtless there had been other strong swimmers among the crew, but they had drowned nonetheless. “I understand how sad you must be, and I won’t talk about this any more, not tonight. But I would remind you of the runes and what they said for you, Ardal. A mission. Courage in the face of adversity. As the memories return, as they stir in your mind, fix on that. You were saved for a purpose.”
Gull had got up and was quietly preparing for the night, checking the door and the shutters, quenching the lamp so we were left in candlelight and firelight, tidying Ardal’s bedding.
“You truly believe that, Sibeal?” Ardal’s voice was a murmur. He dashed a hand across his cheeks. “If there is a mission, a quest, why not Paul? Why me?”
“Here, take my hand. There is no saying why one man dies before another. The gods make their choices, and we are powerless to gainsay them. All we can do is live our lives the best we can. With love and courage and goodness. I can see you loved your brother very much. He would want you to go on in hope; to fulfil your mission, whatever that may be.”
“What if I do not remember? What if the past is lost forever? There are so many pathways, mazes, traps. I could wander until I am old, and never find a way out.”
I could feel the fine trembling in his hand. “It is not lost,” I said firmly. “Already it is coming back to you. You will remember. You will fulfill your mission. We believe in you, Gull and I. Believe in yourself; make it so.”
None of us slept a great deal that night. Each time Gull got up to visit the privy, with Fang pattering after him, I woke. Twice I heard the two men talking and went through to see if all was well. Ardal had been disturbed by dark dreams whose details he would not share. My own dreams had been of an endless search along twisting pathways, for what I did not know. I had heard Ciarán’s voice saying, The true mission lies within you, Sibeal. If you have not learned that, you have learned nothing. After that, I was glad to sit awhile before the fire, my cloak around my shoulders. Gull heated up the rest of the soup and the three of us shared it.
“Had some odd dreams myself,” said Gull. “Past acts of violence. Sorrows best left sleeping. It feels as if we’re stirring up monsters.”
The day dawned fine and sunny. The wind had died down and the sea around Inis Eala sparkled under a cloudless sky. I made my way to the dining hall, yawning, to find Clodagh in excellent spirits.
“I thought we might gather mushrooms this morning, Sibeal.”
“Mm.”
“It’s an ideal morning for it. I can show you a part of the island where you’ve never been before. You’ll like it; there’s a little grove of apples, circled by hawthorn.”
“Really?” The rocky shores and whipping winds of Inis Eala did not seem conducive to the growth of anything beyond the grasses that nourished the hardy island sheep. I had seen twisted thorn trees, their roots lodged deep in rocky clefts; I had seen a few lone junipers leaning before the gale, like bent old men. Apples, I had not seen.
“Bring a basket and I’ll show you.”
By the time we had gathered baskets and cloaks, most of the men were heading off to another day’s hard work in the practice yard. On the way out of the infirmary I met Kalev coming in. Knut was behind him; both men bore swords.
“You’re starting early,” I observed. Gull would be as tired as I was. Just as well he was not required to give practical demonstrations.
“I am sorry to disturb you.” Kalev was as courteous as ever. “The Connacht men learn certain tricks with the sword today, and my services will be required soon. Now is the only time to work with Knut.”
“Of course. Knut, I didn’t see Svala at breakfast.”
Kalev translated this, but Knut answered me direct, in Irish.
“Wife sad. Not want food.” He took in the shawl tied around my shoulders and the basket over my arm. “You go walk?”
“With my sister. I’ll bid you both good day.” Was I wrong in thinking his question somewhat inappropriate? Since he had begun training with Gull, Knut had been unfailingly polite to me, but I was finding that each time I met him I liked him a little less. That made no sense; there was no foundation for it save a casual remark or two and an oddity in the way he dealt with his wife. And Svala was odd enough in herself to
make that almost inevitable.
Clodagh was waiting for me, her basket over her arm.
“Are you sure you’re up to a long walk?” I asked.
“I was the one who suggested it, remember? If I had to lie down and rest all the time I’d go crazy. Even Cathal can hardly disapprove of a gentle stroll to pick mushrooms.”
We made our way along the westward path, leaving the settlement behind us. Years had passed since my last visit here, and I realized the island was bigger than I had remembered. We skirted the place of the boat burial and headed across an area of gentle dips and rises carpeted by scrubby grass. For some time we walked in companionable silence. Sheep exchanged quiet bleats as they grazed; a flock of geese honked warnings at us from the shores of a reed-fringed pond.
“There’s a spring over this next hill,” Clodagh said. “The fresh water brings all kinds of birds. I knew you’d like this walk. You miss the forest, don’t you?”
“Inis Eala is very different. A challenge.”
Clodagh smiled. “Spoken like a druid, Sibeal. You treat every experience as an exercise in learning. You never seem to lose your temper or feel doubt or have a bad day as the rest of us do; you think everything through like a wise old person. But then, even as a child you were unusually self-possessed.”