Lockeran (Prince Ciaran the Damned Book 2) Read online

  I lit the fire and skinned and cleaned the beast and jointed it. Had I any company, it would have been well enough for two. I was in the process of prepared a stew when a traveller appeared, in fairly short order. It wasn’t a surprise - the content of the horses, munching away at the grass, the strangely inattentive but undiseased rabbit, large enough to share, the ready supply of wood suitable for a fire - a collection of small signs that told me to expect companionship. The newcomer was wearing the robes of a Christian monk of the Irish church - stained with mud, torn and patched here and there; a testament to his role as a wanderer. I had encountered his sort before. They were generally harmless, although some could be zealous to the point of tedium. No matter how Damned I supposedly was, there was always a Christian missionary eager to recover my supposedly lost soul. He was wary, as any solitary wanderer would be, when presented with an armed man in the woods, sitting out in the open, apparently carefree. It could have been a trap, an ambush - such a scene often was. I tried to reassure him.

  “Good afternoon, magister,” I said. He had the shaved forehead favoured by the monks of the Irish church, rather than the bald tonsure at the crown that the Roman Christians preferred. “Come and sit down. Take the weight off your feet. I expect you could do with a rest. Have you come far?” The monk looked momentarily surprised. I had spoken to him in Latin but he recognised my accent and replied in Gaelic.

  “Thank you. A few miles this morning. It seems you were expecting me?”

  “Not you, personally, but someone,” I replied. “As you can see I was just cooking a meal for us - yes, for us. I am alone. You have nothing to fear from me; you have nothing I either need or want. But I might have something you want; rabbit stew. With garlic, some local herbs. Mushrooms, of course - there are plenty of mushrooms around here. Parsnip, and some beans. It will be ready soon. I hope you’re not fasting? I don’t think I could eat all of this myself!” The monk smiled and replied that Easter had been and gone so he could eat whatever was available, so long as it wasn’t Friday. I assured him that it wasn’t Friday.

  “No turnip?”

  “No. No turnip.” Something that could have been relief flashed across his face. “I can’t abide turnips!” I added.

  “Me neither,” he smiled. “I shall be pleased to join you, then. It smells delicious. Looks good, too!”

  We ate our meal without exchanging formalities, continuing to refer to each other as ‘magister’ and ‘my lord’. We washed down the last of it with some young wine from my wineskin. I cleaned the plates and cups and then we settled down to the unavoidable exchange of information.

  “What should I call you, magister, and where are you from?” I asked.

  “Dougald. My name is Dougald. I am from Connacht but it’s a long time since I was there. I have been this side of the British Sea for a decade and more.”

  “I am - “ I began.

  “I know who you are,” he interrupted. My hackles rose immediately. “We have met before.” I didn’t Feel any malice or ill intent from him but I checked that my Big Blade was where it was supposed to be - hanging from my horse’s saddle - and I may have inched my hand towards my dagger. The monk probably noticed but he made no comment.

  “I don’t remember meeting you, magister - Dougald - and I am usually pretty good with names and faces. When was this?”

  “Maybe I exaggerate a little. I didn’t meet you formally but I have seen you before. About 10 years ago, on Innis Vannin, the Isle of Man.” I shifted a little at this. There was only one reason why this monk would have known me from that time. “I was there when the Christians, the Irish kings and some from Britain, as well, attacked the base at the Ballaugh. You were there - some say you turned the day. I remember seeing you walking across the field by the camp and up onto the knoll, where the kings and the leading friars were.” I relaxed, a little. It sounded as if he was on the right side.

  “I don’t know exactly what you did but it took a lot out of you - all of you. But we destroyed that nest of Druids and their evil practices,” he said.

  “It was a nest of vipers, magister. Don’t call them druids - they were no more druids than any of your kind is a Christian, after selling their soul to your Enemy, Satan, or whatever you call him,” I responded, with some heat. “There were Druids with us on that knoll, and Christian priests and monks who had been Druids in the past. Some of them gave their lives; all were prepared to. We were up against a formidable enemy. I am a Druid. I was instructed to a high level, although I never undertook the formal hermitry or served as an ollamh. But I am a trained Druid. I would not have been able to do much if I wasn’t, and I won’t hear words spoken against the memory of those brave men.”

  “I beg your pardon. Yes, of course. There were Druids on our side, the side of Light. We won the day but it was at some cost, to our allies among the good Druids as well as to us,” Dougald conceded. “I still remember walking through the dead - and among the deranged, who were even worse. Stumbling around, lashing out at horrors only they could see.” I remembered my friend and former mentor, Diarmuid, in particular. It was he who had persuaded me to come and join the fight, with promise of safe conduct to and from the island. He was among the fallen. Among the faces of the dead on the other side were Lucius, Cormac, Sean and others from Innisgarbh. “But the victory was worth it,” Dougald continued. “It was essential. What that nest of dr- vipers, I beg your pardon, were doing was unspeakable.”

  “Human sacrifice,” I nodded. “I thought the Romans had suppressed that monstrosity, once and for all.”

  “People will do dreadful things when they want something enough,” he replied. “Their religion - that old religion - was dying out and some used that as an excuse, saying they just wanted to survive. But I don’t think that was it. It was about power. Worldly power and wealth. You could see signs of it around the place. They had to be defeated. More than that - they had to be crushed, so completely that they will never rise again.” I had to agree. In Innisgarbh, twenty years before, they had used the power of sex - sex with boys in particular. They had little choice: there were no women in that place.

  No other choice? What was I saying? Of course they had a choice - they could have chosen to follow a path of good, rather than debasing themselves and corrupting those in their care, for whom they had responsibility and over whom they had power. But they had moved on. At the Ballaugh they had regressed to human sacrifice. It did give them power, no doubt, but the cost - the cost was enormous.

  “You are right - but it is always so…banal. In a way, it’s disappointing, because it’s so predictable. They want power, over the Land and over others. They want sex, of course. And they want riches.” Lucius and his gang had accumulated more than a king’s ransom in their caves and were holding large areas of the countryside in a tight grip of fear. The farmers and fishermen were feeding their oppressors before they fed themselves or their families. It had been the cries of the starving, their agonies reaching into the Otherworld, that had raised the alarm. The evil horde had got very strong, quite quickly. It would have been only a matter of time before they reached out to the mainland and established a beachhead there. What then? Would all hope have been abandoned and the land condemned to the Dark? I would not have been the only Damned Irishman, if that had happened.

  “May I ask what you did, then? I never did find out. No-one wanted to tell me.”

  “And nor do I wish to talk about it, either,” I said. After a moment, I yielded a little and spoke again, reluctantly. “We had a monstrous battle in the Otherworld. I used the other priests, Druids and monks with the sight and other Gifts to build a force the enemy could not resist. We overcame them.” I finished, simply. I didn’t explain that I had used the others to magnify my own power, which was by far the greatest of any on our side. The priests, seers, Druids and ollamhs I had used knew - not in an abstract way, but with the certainty that came from the Sight - they were risking their lives and their sanity in handing themse
lves over to me; they did it anyway. They were the bravest men - and some women - I have ever encountered, before or since. After a moment, I spoke again. “You say you were there? What were you doing?”

  “I was praying, of course. I couldn’t help you with your Otherworld battle and I’m not the greatest swordsman, so I helped with prayer. And with the wounded on the battlefield - as far as I could. The physically wounded, I was able to give some aid to. The deranged…” his voice tailed off into an uncomfortable silence. Then he spoke up again. “Yes, I saw you then, and I know who you are - Prince Ciaran of Donegal. Ciaran the Damned, I have heard people call you. But I saw you fight the forces of darkness and I will not believe that. You are on the side of Light.” I shook my head.

  “I have done enough to earn that title, Dougald. More than the other. I did nothing to become a prince other than to be born of my mother’s womb. I won’t deny that there are plenty of people around who believe they have reason to curse me. They may be right. Probably are. I probably am Damned.” I reached for the wineskin and took another slug of it. I wasn’t bothered whether I was damned or not. I was bothered about getting to Spain. Dougald wasn’t ready to let it go yet, though.

  “Don’t presume to give yourself that power of judgement, Prince Ciaran,” he said. “Such a thing is way beyond our estate.” He paused for a moment and I passed the wineskin over to him. He took a mouthful and handed it back. “Despair and hopelessness - they are the devil’s tools. They lead to desperate, hopeless acts. What you saw at the Ballaugh. They had been recruiting among the locals - the very people whose lives they were destroying. Did you know that?” I knew vaguely and I wasn’t very surprised. The monk was right - people in despair will do anything they can to survive; even turn to their oppressors. Or turn into them. But that was 10 years ago - dead and buried in the past. I sincerely hoped we had got the entire coven but you can never be totally sure. Ambition and greed are always with us, which means there is always going to be someone, somewhere who will delve into the depths of Evil.

  “Tell you who you remind me of,” he said. “Ishmael.”

  “Who”

  “Ishmael. Abraham’s son, in the Bible.”

  “Wasn’t Abraham’s son named Isaac?” I didn’t know Christianity in depth but I had been around monks - and spent time in the household of a Cardinal, of course - long enough to have picked up some of it. “Wasn’t Abraham going to sacrifice Isaac or something? But he did a goat instead?”

  “Isaac was Abraham’s son, yes, but he had another: Ishmael. His older son. By his handmaid - his wife’s servant. When Abraham had a legitimate son - Isaac - with his wife, Sarah, Ishmael was exiled, with his mother.”

  “Seems rather harsh,” I said, as I took another drink from the wineskin. I handed it over to Dougald. “The handmaid did what was asked of her and gets exiled, along with her son, for her pains.”

  “They were spared death by thirst. They were led to a well. Isaac was spared by God but the prophecy was that every hand would be against him.”

  “All very interesting, but I suspect there’s more to it than we know. History is written by the winners, isn’t it?” I shrugged.

  “Are you the older son?” he asked, as he handed the wineskin back. I explained my background - I was the only child of my mother I ever knew. I was brought up with my cousin, Coivin, as his foster-brother, in his father’s house.

  “We were Dark Twins, born in the same hour.”

  “But were you the older one?”

  “I don’t know. Does it matter?”

  “Just curious. Were you the older one?”

  “Yes. I think so. Maybe. Really, I don’t know. I’m not sure.”

  “Who was your father?”

  “No idea. My mother was the Spring Maiden, the Virgin of Beltane. No-one ever told me who my father was. Not sure anyone knew - even my mother. Maybe they did, maybe not. All I know - all I remember - is my mother.’

  “You were close?”

  “Until we were parted. Until I was taken to be Coivin’s Dark Twin.”

  “And now…”

  “Yes. Every hand is against me, pretty much. Ishmael, you say? Yes, I think I understand something of what he went through.”

  “What happened to Coivin?”

  “He’s dead. I killed him.”

  “So the stories are true then?”

  “I expect so. Or maybe not. I can neither confirm nor deny things I take no notice of. He’s dead. Twenty years ago.” I took another drink from the wineskin. Dougald was saying something but I was almost hypnotised by the patterns the flames were making in the dying fire.

  “Where are you heading now?”

  “I’m trying to get to Spain but something seems against…” I started but there was something in the fire, something just out of vision, something shimmering and rainbow-coloured that I could not quite make out, something that I needed to see more closely -

  There were shouts coming out of the darkness; I could feel the cold wind and spray on my face. “There it is! See it?” I saw waves and spray on the dark horizon. “You fool, you’ve killed us all!”

  The child trotted over to the woods and waved at me to follow. I was surrounded by a mountain of corpses, eyeless but fixing me in their blind gazes. They knew I was there.

  “Why did you kill me brother?” They came in a deafening chorus - those words I had not heard for so long. That accusation that had died at last, with Coivin, my brother.

  I had to help the king, though it would destroy me. They were there - how could they have hidden from me? I was trying to fight my way out from the corpses that surrounded me on all sides, piled so high they blocked out the sun. I lashed out at the dead warriors who now assailed me. “Why did you kill me, brother?” You are not my brother! I don’t know you!

  A crimson tide gathered itself at the horizon and charged towards me. It was a tidal wave of blood. It fell upon me, washed me away, washed away everything I knew.

  Who are you?

  I don’t know who I am. Don’t chase me away! Don’t hurt me!

  The child came out of the cave and beckoned me to follow him. He pointed north, to the cold stars and dark woods. I tried to turn to the south but he would not have it. He grabbed my hand and pointed north. To the cold, cold stars and dark, untrailled woods. I tried to pull away but he was too strong and the waves were tossing the boat around there was no escape - no escape! - You have killed us you fool and then it was smashed onto the rocks but I was forward and held on as the waves crashed and all the pretty baubles were falling falling I woke up with the tidal wave of blood washing over me but it wasn’t it was a horse it was the water and the wind and the baubles falling I had to go to the cold stars and the dark woods of the north the child would not let me turn south -

  I woke and reached immediately for my bag and its precious contents, the small brown bottle with the medicine that would drive away the searing, blinding headache that gripped me every time I had the Sight. The monk was not by the fire. I took a swig of the drink and the worst of the pain eased. I looked around and saw him by the horses. I tried to stand up.

  “Thief! Leave the horses, damn you! They are mine!” I yelled and stumbled, fell over and almost stabbed myself on my half-drawn sword. I was still in the disorienting grip of my Gift. It drew a heavy price.

  “Don’t worry - I have no use for horses. I walk everywhere. You know that,” Dougald replied. “Take a moment and remember. You know we monks walk. I just came to calm the horses while you had your Vision. They knew something was happening and they were disturbed. All is well; you can check your bags - I have taken nothing.” I took another swig from the bottle and my head started to clear. I could think more clearly - I knew he was right. I sat down and took the time to recover my wits.

  “I have seen people with the Sight before. I knew what was happening,” Dougald said, even before I had the chance to ask the question.

  “How long was I away?”

  “
No more than a couple of moments. Not long at all.”

  “It seemed longer.” It is a strange Gift, the Sight. I could seem to be away for just a moment and come back to find a day had passed; or a Vision could go on for what seemed like hours, or even days - and then I would return to find that it had taken just a minute or two in the ‘real world’. (Which world was truly real? The apparent dreamland of the Otherworld or the seeming concrete reality inhabited by the great mass of people? Philosophers will be arguing that point until the end of time, I suspect.) Dougald asked what I had Seen and I told him, as far as it was possible.

  “A confused tumble of images, as usual. A ship. A shipwreck, maybe - I don’t know if I was on board it or I was Seeing something that will happen to someone else. Or already has happened - I don’t know. A child - I keep seeing that child. Guide or signpost? I don’t know. I think it is ‘good’ - or, at least, not evil. Maybe it’s neither.” I thought about it for a moment and then remembered that it was pointless. I had been trying to work out an answer to that question for years and was still none the wiser. “There seems to be some kind of battle coming - but when isn’t there? But this one might be different. I got the impression that I am going to be on the losing side.”