Son of Air and Darkness
Volume
I of Tales of the Dearg-Sidhe
by S.P. Hendrick
First Edition Copyright 2010
SmashWords Edition 2012
By Pendraig Publishing
All rights reserved
No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise without the prior written permission of the copyright holder, except brief quotation in a review.
Cover Design & Interior Images, Typeset & Layout: By Jo-Ann Byers-Mierzwicki
Cover Image Artist Keith Ward
Pendraig Publishing
Los Angeles, CA 91040
www.PendraigPublishing.com
ISBN: 978-1-936922-12-3
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Table
of Contents
More Great Books by S.P. Hendrick
Other Fiction Novels from Pendraig Publishing
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Dedication
I saw a young man one early afternoon at the Renaissance Festival of Kings in Hanford, California, tall, thin, somewhere in his twenties by the look of him. His hair was black, long, pulled back and tied at the nape of his neck. The white ruffled shirt and great kilt in the Royal Stewart tartan gave him an undeniably romantic appearance, and when he smiled at me I could not help but notice the fangs. Right there, in broad daylight, he stood, smiling, transfixing me with his blue eyes. Slowly he moved in around behind me, almost purring as he put his arm around my waist. I tilted my head slightly as he nuzzled my neck, and then I felt the most erotic sensation of my life.
He bit me, right there, on the neck, and I nearly swooned from the mixture of pain and pleasure. He repeated the procedure three times during the day, never breaking the skin, but drawing me deep into the world of imagination.
I never knew his real name, although someone said it was Bill.
No, I said. He is a Scottish vampire, out in the daytime. His name is Dubhghall. Now why is he out in the daytime, and what is his story?
To that young man this book is dedicated, and to Phil, without whose enthusiasm and knowledge of Roman Britain I could never have written this.
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Chapter
One
I drew my first breath with my mother’s last, as the red fountain which gushed from her side ceased its flow. The sword thrust which had cut short her life had likewise severed the cord which had bound me to her, and as my grandmother Scathach struggled to keep me from following my mother back into that world from whence I had just arrived, my uncle Cett hurried in pursuit of the assassin.
It seemed unlikely that a woman only one moon short of delivering her own child could escape my uncle, a warrior so fleet of foot he’d been overcome only once, but Aoife had also trained at my grandmother’s fortress, Dun Skaith. She was not only swift, but filled with uncommon wiles and cunning, and, it had even been rumoured, the power to cast a glamour upon her adversaries. My father alone had been her conqueror, and the child she carried was to be my only brother, Connlai. Perhaps it was for his sake the Gods decreed she should make good her escape.
It was often in my childhood that Scathach told me the story of my birth, of how she had cut her own wrist and added her blood to that which had covered me, in supplication to the Morrigan to let me live. I heard again and again of how the sky had grown dark upon that prayer as my body and my life had been consecrated to Her, the Goddess of Battle, Death, Sorcery and their mysteries. The Raven had settled upon the branch of the blackthorn tree before us and Scathach had known then that the bargain had been struck; I would live and be under protection of the Goddess, but I was Hers from that moment on, Hers to ask of whatever She would.
Other stories I heard also, of my lineage. My mother, Uathach, had been no warrior but a priestess of the Lady Whom now I served. My father Cuchulainn, perhaps the greatest warrior ever known in Uliad, had returned from his training at Dun Skaith to the Court of Conchobhar mac Nessa, unaware that he had sown two seeds upon Scathach’s island. Like my mother I was dark, though the grey-blue eyes which matched the mood and colour of the sea were the mark of the Sidhe blood I carried within my veins, the blood of my father and his father, Lugh of the Long Hand. Dubhghall mac Cu, I had been named, and the only geasa put upon me were to serve my Lady with all my might, and never to leave Scathach’s island while my father lived.
As I came of age I saw the latter prohibition to be a terrible burden, for I had trained all my life to make war, and could have split a man in two with my spear in the time it takes a crow to caw but once, yet upon this island there was no battle, no war from which to gain my glory. Other men’s sons and grandsons sallied forth and returned with heads, tales of bravado, even gold, while I stared out to sea from the tower of Dun Skaith and awaited my call to a destiny befitting one who served the Morrigan.
It was, however, on a day of peace that my life began to change forever. A clamour arose from the gatehouse of the keep. A young man, about my age and stature, had arrived from the landward side, demanding his right to an audience with Scathach. Such a commotion he caused that day, making his demands and refusing to state so much as his name to any but Scathach herself, and she would be told only if she did not ask it.
A storm was upon her face as she looked across the chasm which separated Dun Skaith from the rest of the island. The tide was well away, and the rocks were jagged and cruel between the land upon which the young man stood and her position above the gate. Her long grey hair rode upon the wind about her face and shoulders, and her stern visage gave her the appearance of the formidable adversary she could be. She motioned me to her side and looked first at the young man and then back at me.
“You claim to have business with me, boy?”
She hurled the insult at him. He took no notice.
“I have.”
Only the whistle of the wind and the splash of the waves upon the rocks gave sound as she studied first his face, then mine.
“I see. And you will not or cannot speak of it if challenged.”
“Cannot.”
“And for the same reason you cannot reveal your name when asked.”
“You have the whole of it.”
“No, boy, but I shall have. You are under a geas, and I respect that. Now why would you be under a geas if you were not important in your own right, or the son of someone of worth? Are you permitted to tell me this much? Do I know your family?”
He looked relieved.
“Yes, and yes, though I may not speak their names if asked. Both my mother and father were in your training, as it is in my desire to be.”
My grandmother suddenly stiffened, colour draining from her face until it all but matched the white tunic she wore.
“Aoife had a son,” she whispered.
It was a thought supposed to have been shared with only the Gods and the wind, so softly did she say it, and yet I heard, and the red rage filled me as I thought of my mother, by Aoife’s hand and jealousy slain. And as the rage boiled within me I heard the wind whisper as through my hair it played...
“Patience,” it said with an unearthly voice. “Patience. He is not the enemy.”
...and I remembered the words of Scathach, that Aoife’s child was also my father’s, and the rage faded as love for my brother sprang up within me.
“If Aoife and Cuchulainn had a son, what would he be called?” she asked in a manner circumventing the prohibition.
“Connlai,” he replied, his smile the echo of my own.
“Then welcome to Dun Skaith, young Connlai. You are right welcome here.”
For a moment I believed she expected him to enter her fortress in the same manner as our father had done nineteen years before, the Salmon leap across the gorge and into our midst, but she signalled Domnall and Caoimhin to lower the bridge and watched almost absently as he crossed over into Dun Skaith.
There was something in her manner, as if she were torn by the same memories as came to me, yet she would not and did not give them voice, but strained at a smile until it manifested. Only fourteen, save for Scathach, Connlai, and myself were present that day, for Cett had taken the others to hunt boar in the north of our island. I wondered what he would say upon his return to the son of his sister’s slayer. Perhaps that was the thought behind Scathach’s impenetrable countenance as she embraced him with a measure of joy, yet I could see that within that joy another emotion lay cloaked.
“He is not the enemy.”
The words repeated within me in a voice that was not my own. Perhaps my grandmother heard it too, for her mood seemed to soften as the young man took my hand in friendship. He was my double, yet my opposite; my darkness was the shadow of his fairness, yet within him I felt even in that first touch something missing, some spark, some deeper meaning to his soul.
He was my age, seventeen, yet he was but a boy, no matter the words he spoke or the stance he took. His mother was a warrior, and her fondest wish was for his path to run as hers. Yet what had she been thinking to send him here, here where he could be taken hostage for her crimes? Was it arrogance or atonement? Scathach could have slain him at the gate, yet held her hand and welcomed him. Perhaps it was again Aoife’s cunning, for she knew my grandmother’s affection for our father and must be certain she would accept his other son as a fosterling. But why? What did she expect in return?
No matter; I had a brother.
He did not know the whole story, of course, not then. It was only after Cett’s return, when my uncle came from his mother’s chamber after a long and too-quiet discussion, that the tale was told to him in full. Such had been Cett’s only demand for the sake of Uathach’s honour, and my brother was deeply troubled by what he heard, yet he borrowed Cett’s harp and set forth another story, the one which had been told him as a child. It spoke of a fair warrior maiden, seduced and abandoned by the son of a warrior God, left pregnant and cast out because her condition had rendered her no use in battle.
I could see Scathach’s anger grow as she listened, burning within her with more heat than the fire around which we were gathered.
“Ridiculous!” she proclaimed at last. “I bore three children, a son and daughter now dead, whose names I shall not speak lest it disturb their sleep, and Cett. All the while I trained my warriors, fought at their sides, until my time was upon me to bring those babes forth. I would never have cast out a woman because she was with child.”
He did not touch the harp, nor speak of the matter again, but spent each hour of wakefulness practising with spear, with sword, with knife, and with an anger in his pale blue eyes, anger for all, it seemed, but me.
We worked well together for that year we had together, and his skills grew almost to match my own. We took turns with the chariot, one driving while the other practised at targets. We made trips together into the interior of the island in search of game, slept in the open beneath the stars, and talked of the romantic adventures we would have when our training had ended and we would sojourn forth into the world.
A year and a day passed as we learned and grew, and Scathach decided the time had arrived for our vision quest. For three days and nights we fasted, taking only water, and we kept our bodies as busy as we could to help us ignore the growlings of our bellies. The second day was easier than the first, though we tired quickly and slept much of the time. By the third night our bodies were light upon us and our minds lighter still.
It was Beltaine Eve, a time that is not a time, when the veil between the worlds is as thin as at Samhain, and the Sidhe walk freely among men, the attributes of their Godhood revealed to whom they will. It was a propitious time for the vision quest for that reason alone, and we were eager on that chilly night to walk the paths of spirit. Connlai and I sat naked and transfixed in the moonbright evening beside the blazing bonfire. Scathach’s knife shimmered silver, then red with death as she slit the throat of the young white bull which had been raised solely for such a sacrifice. His blood was caught in a basin of copper, and I watched in fascination as it streamed forth hot and dark, strong at first in its flow, and with each pulsation I felt my own body throb in counterpoint. The surge ebbed at last as the animal fell to his knees, then toppled, breathless and still to the ground below.
I marvelled at my grandmother, strong enough in her elder years to hold a bull with one hand while she dealt its deathblow with the other. Was she indeed fully human, or as the legends of the islanders hinted, herself of the blood of the Sidhe as was my father’s father? Truly, the island folk had spoken of her in that manner, and their word, Sith was merely the local variant of the same word used in my father’s tongue, or so Domnall had said.
These and other thoughts raced through my head as she divided the steaming blood into two bowls and gave one to each of us to drink. Connlai took his nervously, his face betraying his disgust at the idea, but I set my own determination to the task and found it not at all unpleasant. The liquid was hot and slightly metallic upon the tongue, slightly salty. The initial taste was unexpected to be sure, but it did not revolt me at all; to the contrary, I found it quite to my liking, and as I drank I found my thirst for it increasing. It was heady, intoxicating to the heightened senses of one who had been without sustenance for three days. It was invigourating, refreshing, as if the strength and life of that young bull were coursing through my veins, and I eagerly drained the bowl of that savoury liqueur.
Somewhere upon the battlements a raven gave voice and Scathach ceased flaying the bull to search out with her eyes the source of the bird’s call. Even the moonlight did not betray the shadowy witness, yet within my head I thought I heard the amused chuckle of a woman, and the phrase “well done.”
Connlai had to force the liquid down his throat, and, as he revealed to me the next day, it took all his force of will to keep it from coming up again, yet by that force of will he had done his duty, and by the blood of that bull as well as the blood of our father he was my brother.
After she relieved us of our bowls, my grandmother wrapped our naked bodies in the still bloody hide of the bull and bade us gorge ourselves upon his raw flesh. Some of it we were able to eat, but our stomachs had shrivelled from the fast and the blood alone had filled us. What we did not eat was heaped upon the fire which consumed the sacrifice greedily, for only warriors upon their vision quest might partake of that consecrated meat. As the flames partook of their feast we watched their red and golden dance, our sated bodies heavy as our spirits were light, and strong with the blood of the bull, and all around us soon faded as the fire filled our sight and the visions began.
It seemed as if I passed through that wall of flame, untouched and unharmed, for all about me was bright and warm, and my grandfather Lugh greeted me in a tunic of red and gold which flowed around Him like silk, but which was itself the very substance of the flame. He wore a torc of gold about his neck and wrist braces of the same, yet it was an unearthly metal of which they were made. I felt His burning touch upon my shoulders as He acknowledged me as His grandson, and promised upon His burning spear that neither flame nor light of sun would ever be my foe, for by the blood I carried I held power over them both.
Then the fire was gone and so was He, and the cold night took me in its blackness as the raven call came back and my ears rang with mocking laughter. A woman’s voice, the same voice as before, spoke once again within me.
“Yes, you are of His blood, but you are not His. The light will not blind you, yet in darkness shall you walk, and learn to love the night. Mine you have been from your birth, and I shall not renounce that claim upon you.”
The laughter did not die out as the voice faded, and I slipped into a dream. Once again I tasted the blood of the bull, revelled in it, bathed in it, but it was not Scathach who slew it but I, as I sank my teeth into its neck and drank at the fountain of its life. How long the dream lasted from that point, or what transpired thereafter I cannot say, for the redness of the blood became the red dawn and the laughter became the calling of the seabirds which hovered each morning above Dun Skaith in search of food.
Connlai slept peacefully at my side, but it appeared to me that Scathach had slept not at all, for she still stirred the ashes of the fire. All night she had stoked the fire, keeping it ablaze as both a pyre for the bull and a beacon for our wandering spirits. The only traces of the bull were a few fragments of bone the fire had not consumed, and the stiff raw hide which had covered Connlai and myself.
Scathach did not ask what I had seen; perhaps she had witnessed a vision of her own.
Connlai stirred at last, raising himself upon one elbow and looking first at me, then at Scathach, as if afraid to verbalise his thoughts. Finally, after a long sigh which sounded like the rending of his soul, he wiped the edge of his eyes with the back of his free hand.
“I must leave this place before the moon grows dark,” he said as he tried to regain a hold upon his emotions, “I must make my way to Uliad and seek out my father.”
He shot a quick glance in my direction.
“Our father, I mean. I will be standing upon a hill in a grove of trees, and I will see him below me, repairing the wheel of his chariot. I will know him at once. Come with me Dubhghall; we can find him together.”
“He may not!”
Scathach’s voice was as sharp as her blade, and I saw even in the rosy light of morning that she had paled at the thought.
I tried to grin, but it was forced. I don’t know if Connlai realised the effort I made to keep my true emotions from showing.
“She is right, my brother. You have your geasa; I have mine. I may not leave this island while our father lives. If you find him, tell him about me and that I would love to call him ‘Father’ to his face. Perhaps you can bring him back here with you. I am certain he would be welcome.”
Scathach nodded.
“Yes. He and his friend Ferdiad were my two best warriors, and your father saved the life of Cett and his brother. I have never had a quarrel with either of them, and would love to see their faces again before these eyes grow dim.”
The mood seemed to brighten somewhat at the prospect, yet Connlai was still loathe to take his leave of us three days later when he had arranged passage. It was on the twilight tide that he set forth upon the waves for Uliad, and before he sailed I clasped him as close to me as would any brother, and as the eldest of the two, tousled his golden hair for good measure as I bade him good venture.
I think within my heart I knew then it would be the last time in this life our paths would ever cross.
The war between Uliad and Connachta had filled and emptied the fields of battle a dozen times, and the hoodie crows and ravens grew fat upon the flesh of heroes. Conversation between Scathach’s small island and Erin grew less and less frequent, and what news reached us was unreliable at best, for with the change of sea tides the tides of war did also change. Yet when the story did arrive, we knew it to be as true as the pain that sprang from it.
Connlai was dead.
The geasa upon him had meant his death, for he had indeed found our father after many weeks of searching, and his discovery had followed the exact course of his vision. The results of this discovery, however, had proved disastrous. Cuchulainn, on edge from battles with Connachta’s best warriors, had taken Connlai for one of Medb’s spies and had demanded to know who he was and whom he served. Connlai, challenged in this manner could neither reveal his identity, nor refuse the battle challenge which followed.
Cuchulainn did eventually embrace his son, as he pulled his great spear, the Gae Bulga, from Connlai’s chest. Dying, my brother at last realised the geasa no longer bound him and as his life slipped from him he told his father all, all save for the fact that Cuchulainn’s eldest son still lived and awaited him at Dun Skaith.
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Chapter
Two
It was the day of the nineteenth anniversary of my birth. I sat upon the fortress wall gazing down into the sea below as the seals frolicked through the clear waters, chasing each other like happy children. My rough black beard drank in the heat of the midheaven sun and I felt its rays hot upon the white skin of my cheeks, reddening them with their persistent touch. Although I saw and heard no other near the wall upon which I whetted my newly gifted leaf blade sword, I distinctly felt a presence of incalculable intelligence and knew full well I was being watched.
I felt the shadow pass across me, cool and dark against the sun’s tireless attentions, and looked in the direction of that which must have cast it; nothing I saw there but a huge black bird circling overhead, calling after the manner of ravens and crows.
It was then the light around me began to dim, slowly, yet I could perceive it with my human eyes quite easily. There was no cloud, no fog, not any mist at all, and yet I felt the heat go out of the day as the light went slowly, steadily. The bird continued to circle around the walls of the fortress, and I followed it with my eyes, unwilling to disturb its flight by calling out to the warriors below me. As I watched I saw that the sun itself seemed to be dimming, and after what seemed to me a short while it appeared as though a large bite had been taken from that disk of light.
Like the moon, the sun showed me its phases, for below me all action ceased, and the men in the courtyard stood in positions formed by what their actions had been, with no motion nor action at all. Before my eyes the faithful sun waned, its light vanishing until it was barely twilight, and the night fell as the dazzling necklace of light glowed around the black disk which had been the source of all daylight. I called upon my grandfather, Lugh, the lightbringer of the Sidhe to return the sun once more, and it seemed as though red flames shot forth briefly from that dark disk, but that was all.
It was a time that was not a time, a place that was not a place, and even the grandson of Scathach and the son of Cuchulainn could feel a certain amount of fear.
I had not noticed the raven land upon the wall beside me, so I jumped noticeably when I heard that mocking caw, and yet more startling was what came next.
The mocking caw became a laugh, a laugh I shall not forget though I walk the Earth for all eternity, and the shape of the bird changed, elongated as I watched, and filled out until it was a woman’s form which stood before me, tall and pale and of an incredible beauty. She was garbed in a long cloak of black feathers which partially hid Her hair, the colour of the flaming leaves of autumn, and the long black robe She wore beneath it hugged Her form and showed it to be full and enough to stir any man’s desire. The mantle fell to Her shoulders, and I felt the flames of Her hair kindle a fire within me and fell to my knees before Her, laying my sword at Her feet.
“My Lady,” was all I dared to whisper, as I beheld the Goddess to whom I had been bound since birth.
Even in the darkness of this night within the day She glowed before my eyes, and the blackness of Her garments shone with an unearthly light.
“You know me then?” She asked.
I tried not to let the quivering of my soul reflect in my voice, for I was truly in awe of Her, loving Her with all I was or ever shall be, yet at the same time fearing Her for what She could be.
“My Great Queen, I am Yours and have been from the day of my birth, if You will have me.”
Her laughter was fierce and cut my spirit like a dagger.
“You are his son then? His other son?”
I did not ask to whom She was referring. I nodded.
“And you are dedicated to My will?”
Again I nodded.
“You have a tongue, young warrior. I would hear you use it.”
“My Lady, as long as I may serve You, and in whatever manner You ask of me, I am Yours.”
She sighed.
“Where is the fight in you, My little warrior? Your father fought with Me all his life, and I loved him for it. Such spirit! Such audacity, that I could only love him the more for his refusals. It was bittersweet, the moment when at last he accepted My embrace, for I realised that by winning at the game I could play it no longer. Your brother was but a child when I took him, as you are, but sweet he was, and sweetly he yielded to My kiss, yet he had within him that spark of your father, and bravely he held us both at bay for as long as he could.”
There was cold fire in her eyes, eyes the colour of mine, yet which possessed a depth I doubted mine could ever fathom, and I dared not fix upon them for too long. To my mortal knowledge I had never before beheld one of the Sidhe, and although my life, my love, my very soul had been dedicated to Her since the moment of my first breath, I could not help but tremble before Her. How long could mortal eyes gaze upon those fierce immortal eyes and still retain their own sight? And yet She sought proof of my courage, I, who feared to even look upon Her for too long, lest my blood boil or freeze in the beholding.
With all the life within me I summoned what courage was mine. If She chose to blind me She could do so whether or not I looked away.
Her skin was paler than moonlight, almost translucent, and Her lips the colour of fresh blood. The depth of Her eyes was the depth of eternity, and as She smiled at me for my boldness Her mouth opened slightly; Her milk white teeth were long, even, and looked as sharp as little knives.
“That’s better,” She said at last. “Now tell Me why you have never called upon Me. You clash with your friends in a mockery of battle. You whet your skills to the absolute degree. I have watched you with spear and sword and find your style delightful. Yet you have never slain a man, nor woman neither. I have never felt your blood burn with the red passion both your father and your brother knew, though the same Sidhe blood courses through your veins as did theirs.”
It was true, and my heart sank within me, for I feared Her condemnation would mean I had violated my geasa.
She stepped closer and began to walk around me, fixing me in a stare that was at once icy and hot. A dark pink tongue passed over the whiteness of Her teeth and the redness of Her lips as She walked slowly, spiralling slightly inward with each step. The scent of Her was intoxicating, sweet and musky, a scent for which I had no word for then but delicious, though each time I smell the smoke of burning myrrh I recall that moment and my loins tremble once more in memory of what took place next.
It was not only the pleasures of battle which had been denied me, but female companionship as well. The training of women as Dun Skaith had ended with Aoife’s murder of my mother, and the daughters of the island were forbidden to us lest we take advantage with our might and harm the rapport between the people of the fortress and the villages of the island. My fellow warriors often took their pleasures upon the mainland, both women who were eager for them and those who were the spoils of war, yet I, bound to the island by geasa, had known none of them.
I had never lain with a woman.
My heart pounded in rhythms beyond my understanding as my fear and desire struggled with each other, and it seemed that She and I were all that moved and breathed upon the island. Still slowly She circled me as I stood my ground, longing for Her touch though it might mean my death, and bracing myself against it, yet it did not come. She paused before me, so close that I could hear the sparks crackle in Her fiery hair, and as those same sparks lit the Sidhe-blue of Her eyes I could feel their icy fire pierce my soul. Although the world around us was still eerily dark, within my heart I saw Her brilliance.
It was a challenge, and I was bound to answer it as I was bound to honour and serve Her. If She sought to strike me dead for it, well, I was a warrior and She would do so someday in any event.
It did not feel awkward after all as my hand slipped beneath the feathery folds of Her cloak and pulled Her the few remaining inches to me. With that first touch I lost all fear, for it was replaced by something more profound, more urgent, as She responded in kind to the passion which I never before had dared to feel. I was fire to Her ice, and She hardened what had been molten in me even as I caused Her to melt.
With a wave of Her hand Dun Skaith shimmered and disappeared around us. We clung to each other against the blackness of the unnatural night as stars shone about us, above us, and beneath our feet. It did not matter any longer, for She was world enough to me, and if this was the passion of death then I died most willingly. Her kisses burned me, seared me as the kiss of a frozen blade, as the lightning of Her embrace made my body scream. There was neither hot nor cold, pain nor pleasure, but something which was all that and something more as we danced upon the air in the oldest dance of all. I plunged my very life into Her depths, shaking as my own lightning shot forth in response to Her whirlwind. When I thought I could take no more, She drove me further with Her frenzy.
Though Her kisses alone had been enough to give life or take it, She had merely toyed with me as a cat might play with a moth, yet I, the moth, could only pray that She would continue to rend me, for to have stopped would have been a cruelty beyond bearing.
We were suspended in the air no longer, but within a cave, lying together naked upon a pile of animal skins, soft and sensuous to the touch, yet softer still than those furs was the moonwhite skin of Her flawless body within which She still held me fast.
“Now my brave warrior, I shall give you that which your father refused and your brother had no right to claim: immortality.”
Again She kissed me and again I responded, my desire quickened by Her own. As we moved together between time and space, joined in the rhythm of both, visions swam before my inner eyes, visions which consumed me as I did them and as She did me. They were visions, but more also, for I felt them with all my senses and came to learn that they were Her memories, sent forth to me surrounded by the ecstasy we both felt, and I accepted them as my own. Though they were all of death and pain I saw and felt only life and pleasure.
My mother walked through the woods gathering wild berries, laughing with her friend Aoife. Both, heavy with child, struggled to bend for the sweet purple fruits, when suddenly and without warning Aoife pulled a long blade from its sheath at her waist, plunged it deep within my mother’s side, and ran as my mother screamed for Cett and Scathach. As Uathach lay alone My Lady, the Great Queen, revealed Herself to her and through Her sorceries caused my tiny form to be expelled from her dying body. As my mother stepped forth from this world I entered, bound in that instant and for all time to the Great Queen, and Scathach had merely acknowledged the contract verbally, for my grandmother had seen Her too; they were themselves kin.
The scene changed and the battle raged around us, for She was in its midst, embracing the dying in all Her forms, drinking the life from their blood and holding open the veil between the worlds as their spirits passed through. I was a warrior then, though whether it was my own past or I saw through the eyes of another, I do not know. In the distance another warrior appeared, glowing as brightly as the sun. His hair was limed and spiked, coloured in various shades from red through golden, all the way to white, giving the appearance of sun rays. The resemblance between him and my brother Connlai was tremendous, and I knew it must be our father, Cuchulainn. He screamed in rage and hurled his deadly spear at me, and as it impaled me I felt the Great Queen’s embrace and yielded myself to Her kiss.
Once more I was myself, and yet I was more, and still the passion grew until I thought I must explode, yet further and further She drove me, to the point where life and death are one. As I began once more to pour forth my very soul into Her I felt those sharp white teeth rip into my throat, and the light crescendo around me, until there was left only darkness. I wanted to float off into that happy darkness, for there was nothing left of me; whatever there had been of Dubhghall mac Cu had been drained utterly, gratefully, and without regret, and into the sweet sleep of death I drifted willingly until She called me back.
It was Her will alone which opened my physical eyes, and Her will which bade them focus to see Her mouth, freshly scarlet with my blood. What a beautiful colour, I thought, as I began to drift back into the comfortable silence.
“No My brave warrior,” She whispered huskily into my ear. “You shall not die. Trust me.”
Yes, trust Her, trust Her beyond everything else, for She was all that mattered, all that was. She placed Her mouth over mine and kissed me deeply, but there was nothing save a glimmer of consciousness left for Her to arouse.
“I have tasted the Sidhe blood within you, nearly drained it all. Now let me suckle you as your mother never could, and take back your life, a new life, immortal as the Sidhe from whom you spring.”
Like a newborn kitten, its eyes not yet open, I found Her breast and began, weakly, to drink. What came forth was neither hot nor cold but both at once and gave me strength with each small swallow I managed as its power worked its magic upon me. The taste was strangely familiar, salty and sweet as I paused to let it play over my tongue.
Do not stop, My Dark One. You must be filled, even as you have filled Me.”
I obeyed, the thirst for that wonderful liquid increasing with each mouthful until I recalled the dream I’d had not so many weeks before, the dream of drinking at the throat of the white bull.
It was blood which flowed from her breast, but blood more intoxicating than the brew distilled from honey. The blood of the bull had been but stagnant water compared to Hers, and I took it no more as a kitten but as a man, drinking it deeply by the cupful as it filled my mouth.
“Good. Good,” She sighed, pulling my head up gently at long last. “Now do not swoon again, for this must be done until the mortal part of you is gone, for that mortal part is tainted. Your father’s mother and uncle were cursed with insanity for Nessa’s meddling in the succession to Uliad’s throne, and I would not have the same curse fall upon your head. I tried to save your father for Lugh’s sake, but he was willful and chose the immortality of the legends that will follow his death, when he could himself have lived forever. Now relax, My Love, and feel your blood flow into me.”
I felt little pain as my heart pumped a steady flow from my body into Her eager mouth, for I had been fortified with Her own blood and was already halfway to immortality. After a time the beating grew slower and more faint and the thirst began to grow again within me until I could bear it no longer, and I sought Her other breast for nourishment. Once more it flowed from Her, heady and invigourating, and I was not only Hers, but She was mine. I dared to pull Her down to me, to kiss Her bloody mouth as a lover who knew the secrets of Her body, and She smiled as I imagined a mortal girl might have smiled on some secluded tryst.
We made love once more, this time slowly and gently, for time had ceased to be and the world would wait until the last languid drop of me had found its way into Her, and this time we were both utterly satisfied. Her arms were about me, as mine were about Her, and Her mouth was on my neck. The sensation of my blood flowing into Her was overwhelming in its pleasure. When She had finished draining me for the third time, She offered me Her own white neck.
“Now, My Love, you must learn to take blood in this manner, for this is the only way you will feed from now on. It is only the life within the blood which can sustain you.”
I did not question Her, but obeyed. My lips gently stroked her throat while my newly keen sense of smell sought out the carotid artery. My tongue probed slowly for the throbbing of Her immortal pulse, and when its presence was revealed I kissed the spot tenderly, and with a sense of wonder that a Goddess could inhabit flesh so warm and yielding. My teeth were longer and sharper than I had remembered, and it seemed to take only a small amount of pressure to break the skin and pierce the muscle and the wall of the artery itself. She rewarded me richly, for the fountain of Her immortality gushed forth into my mouth, spurting hot and delicious down the back of my throat, and I learned to time my swallows with the throbbing of Her heart as I drank my fill.
“Sidhe blood calls to Sidhe blood, My Love,” She sighed in contentment as we finished. “You are now ready to go forth into the world of men, not as an untried warrior, but as an immortal who has taken Death as his paramour, feeding upon mortals as you see fit. You can no longer be harmed in battle. No man may cause your death, for you are mine alone, and only I can release you from life. You will serve Me as you love Me. We will take pleasure from each other again as We have tonight, and you will be My Champion, helping me to reap the crops of battle.
She stretched, catlike and magnificent, and stood, and I rose to join Her, standing toe to toe with Her, my hands upon Her shoulders.
“No, Dubhghall. I have kept you here too long.
I did not see Her gesture, but the magic was worked and once again we stood within the walls of Dun Skaith, fully clothed as before. The sky remained dark, as the black disk still covered the sun, yet a sliver of light began to appear from its edge.
“Remember all that has transpired between us.”
The command was unnecessary, for She was indelibly etched within me. Our blood flowed as one. I was not only Hers, I was a part of Her as She was of me.
“How may I call upon you?” I asked.
“Sidhe blood calls to Sidhe blood,” She said again. “When you are in your passion, when the blood fills you with its life, then you will know I am beside you. More than that you do not need, or if you do, I will be there. Remember, none can harm you, not man, beast. or element. You are their master now. You will find the night most attractive, for in its shelter you will be able to seek solitude, and its stillness will let you concentrate more easily upon your purpose.”
“My purpose? And what may that be?”
She laughed that mocking laugh I had heard before only within my head, yet it seemed within that laughter was a new portion of warmth, of playfulness, even of irony.
“That is part of it, ever questioning yourself. I see I left a drop or two of the human in you. Good. You will serve Me well. There are things that even I may not reveal to you at present, things you will learn along the way, but I will share this much with you: change is upon Our worlds, and both Gods and men will find themselves affected.
“An East wind is blowing. It will arrive with battle tides, and I shall revel as the fields turn crimson with great pools of blood. My carrion crows will feast well upon fallen heroes, and I will have much to do to embrace them all. That which we have known will be swept away upon this coming tide and upon that which follows. The Sidhe will find it necessary to retreat to the Hollow Hills and walk but rarely among men. There We shall abide and await the day Our people call Us forth again.
“The Dagda has seen this, and Nuada too. Even your father. In the Halls of Annwn it is said that Our cousin, Gwynn ap Nudd has readied His hounds for the Great Hunt, but prepares also his chambers in the Summerland, and Cerridwen stirs strange potions in Her cauldron.”
“What must I do?”
“Endure. Beware the Roman slave who follows the carpenter’s son. He and his kind will preach peace and make war, even among themselves. They will hunt you down, but they cannot harm you. They will be dangerous children, wallowing in superstition, who toy with symbols they cannot comprehend and pretend the wine they drink is blood, thinking they can do magic and putting to death anyone they fear is stronger or know is weaker. If you can help those they persecute, Dubhghall, do so, for the torture they will be asked to endure is an abomination to Me. As for the rest, prey upon them as you will, and I shall do the same, for I alone of the Sidhe shall not retreat, but find glory in the battles to come.”
“Where am I to go?”
“Not to Uliad. Conchobhar is as mad as his sister and Uliad will soon fall. I have much work to do there for generations to come. A curse is upon that land and will remain until the Sidhe return to rule it and bring Their peace. Then I shall rest awhile, but in the meantime I will turn the fords red with garments I wash, and every household will hear Me wail. To Alba you must go, and to the rest of that island you call the mainland, and east beyond that, across the waters. Further still, in all directions shall you roam and seek your destiny, but for now seek your enemy to the North upon this island. She lives not far as I fly, in a cave, awaiting the arrival of Cuchulainn’s son.”
With that She transformed into that Raven She had been before, and as the sun was at last released back into the sky I watched the path of Her flight and followed.
* ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ *
Chapter
Three
Through the rest of the day I walked, over rock and bracken, through tide pools, furze and gorse, and into the blessed blackness of a night in which no moon shone. I did not need moonlight, for with immortality I had gained an eyesight so keen that light became a distraction. My hearing, too, improved with the surrounding silence; even the baffled wings of the owl drew my attention and I watched with interest as it flew against the midnight shrouded sky in search of prey.
I was a predator too, no longer just a noble warrior seeking to take life upon the field of battle, but one who thirsted, hungered for the life’s blood of others to sustain me, yet somehow I did not recoil from the thought. Those whom I killed for nourishment would surely come again into this world after a rest, just as did those I would kill in battle. Life was a resource without end, and it mattered little upon whom I fed.
Except for one.
My Lady the Morrigan had been right about my enemy. I would find her and delight in her demise. Oh how I planned to feast upon her! The thoughts danced within me of how I would confront her with her treachery against my mother, my brother and my father. Had her aim been better and My Lady not guarding me from before my birth, this life which now I led would not have begun at all.
In the firelight I saw her, sitting before the flames and stirring the coals not ten feet from the mouth of her sheltering cave. She was older than the vision the Great Queen had shown me, yet beyond a natural aging not much in her seemed to have changed. The colour of dressed flax was her hair and her frame still thin, and I judged by her arm’s length, tall. Her robe was the colour of sand, short in the sleeves and bound around the waist with a cord of the same colour. As she stood I knew I had judged her height correctly; with her feet unshod she was almost my own height. She appeared to be unarmed.
No matter. So had my mother been.
She looked surprised to see a stranger. Surely there was no way for her to recognise someone whose life she had believed she had ended before it had begun, so I made no attempt to disguise anything.
Her eyes were blue, yet the blue of the sky rather than the ocean, somewhat wide set, and her lips were thin and too quick to smile. Most of all I noticed her attitude, confident and forward, with a definite hint of seduction in the movement of her body. I sensed within her not the slightest notion of fear.
Had my father been attracted to her at the first meeting, I wondered, or had it been the passion of conquest which had lured him from my mother’s side to hers?
“Welcome to my fire,” she said in a voice attempting warmth. “I’m sorry the boar meat is all gone, or I would offer you some.”
“For the fire I thank you, but as for the boar meat, I’m not overly fond of it anyway,” I said, or something like that, and sat down near the burning wood.
“Oh?”
She flashed a knowing smile, some of the old glamour she had used with my father still sparkling about her. Strange, but I found I could actually smell the magic she was using, and I wondered where she had learned it.
She sat down beside me, the skirt of her robe lifted somewhat so that her legs were within my view. For a woman nearly twice twenty they were, I supposed, attractive enough, yet what did I know of mortal women? I had only a Goddess and a grandmother to go by, and my grandmother, I’d only just learned, was also an Immortal.
“Is it companionship you seek, then? If so, this is a rather remote place to seek it. Still, you are welcome. I have been too long alone, and a handsome stranger such as yourself does not pass this way often. I am called Aoife.”
“And I, Dubhghall.”
“Dark Stranger indeed you are. You are well called.”
I had no desire to go on with idle chatter. I wanted her life, her blood. Most of all I wanted to cause her pain, as she had caused it in others.
Too casually, it seemed to me, was the way she let her hand fall so near my thigh, as if she sensed but misread the emotion rising within me. It was lust, yes, but bloodlust. She wanted “companionship”? I would grant her that, but on my terms, not hers, and it would be the last thing ever granted to her.
I let my own hand find her knee and felt it warm beneath her linen robe. Her hand went boldly to my thigh and traveled slowly up, and I felt stirrings within me which demanded more than blood, though the feel of it pulsing through her femoral artery nearly drove me into a frenzy.
It took no time before our mouths were upon each other, and though I hated that woman as I had never before learned to hate anyone, I could not tear myself from the pleasure. As we lay there tangled upon the ground I found I could no longer smell the magic for the scent of blood pulsing strong within her body.
Had there been a moon I might have been distracted by its refection upon the blade in her hand. Had I not been newly made immortal its entry into my back could have proven fatal. As it was, it was only a twinge I felt, a wound which lasted for a moment only, and a stimulus for the frenzy which followed.
I held her by the throat with one hand, pinned beneath my body as I pulled out her knife with the other and flung it away from us, enraged at her, enraged at my own lack of caution. I could have easily crushed her throat, but that was not my plan.
“I was told you awaited the son of Cuchulainn,” I whispered in her ear as my hold on her changed from throat to both wrists.
Her eyes grew wide and wild as she hesitated in her struggle to free herself from my grasp.
“Connlai! What do you know of Connlai?”
I tormented her deliberately by refusing to answer at once. This was the concern of a mother for her son, the concern I had never known from my own mother because of Aoife’s actions. I let her beg, plead for the answer, and when I finally gave it I thrust the words at her like a knife and drove it home with the full force of my body entering hers.
“Only that he is dead, killed by his father because of your precious geasa.”
Her response was cold, both in body and in word, for she stirred not at all in return, but fairly hissed at me.
“It was his father I sought to destroy.”
I thrust again, as roughly as I could.
“As you did. They are both now dead”
Again she simply lay there in defiance with hatred in her eyes, hatred which reflected my own.
“As is my mother, whom you struck down as I struggled within her for life.”
A dim understanding seemed to register in those hating eyes as I continued to drive myself into her again and again, using her as she had used us all.
“Yes Aoife, Cuchulainn’s son has returned to you, but not the one you sought.”
She shrieked then in defiance of me, her wrists twisting in my clasp so her long claw-like nails became upturned, hopeful, perhaps, of an opportunity to use them against me as weapons. Yet something in our violent dance had changed. It was passion between us, raw and white-hot, but hatred was its name. I had never before realised that hatred alone could be so powerful an aphrodisiac, for her body at last had begun to respond, whether to mine or against it I shall never know. This was no Goddess with which I coupled, but a pale mortal, and I knew that only her blood would give me the release I sought.
“I’ll kill you!” she growled between quickening gasps.
“No. I don’t think so,” I whispered close to her ear as her neck turned to just the proper angle.
I caught it in my teeth, biting through to the carotid in one swift stroke, filling my mouth as fast as I could swallow, for the racing of her heart had itself hastened to match my thrusting. Her blood burned hot and satisfying within me, and I gulped it down greedily. It was not the elixir that My Lady’s had been, but it quenched my thirst and my passion. I devoured her life, never slowing my demand until her struggling had ceased and her heart had grown still, not allowing myself to fill her until I had first drained her entirely.
There was some satisfaction in it at least, not the magnitude I had felt with the Great Queen, but who could expect the blood of a mortal to equal that? No, it was the feeding upon this vicious creature, the satisfaction of honour, the feeling of conquest, of her life passing into mine, mine which she had sought to end before its beginning which made it all the sweeter.
The rape? Now that I look upon it the whole thing was the act of an inexperienced nineteen year old, recently relieved of his virginity and unable to control his desire to repeat the pleasurable experience. On one hand I am ashamed of my actions, for I honour the female principle in all things as I love and honour Her, My Lady. On the other, I could probably quote precedent if asked. It has long been the custom of the victor to rape the vanquished, yet again I do not use this to excuse my actions.
My only defence is that it had not begun as a rape, but as a seduction, and the doing of that was upon her own head, for she it was who began that action, only to end it with her treachery. I doubt a court of law in any age would convict me were all the facts revealed.
I suppose I should have allowed her to be satisfied before I took her life. That would have shown me to be a gentleman; however all of this occurred hundreds of years before the concept of “gentleman” had been thought of, and she was a deadly enemy.
I owed her nothing.
* ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ *
Chapter
Four
I left Scathach’s island soon after. I did not take leave of any at Dun Skaith. What had transpired in the darkness of the sun was between My Lady and me alone. My grandmother would understand; of this I was certain, and I knew she would make Cett and the others understand also, for she had been the one to give me to the Morrigan in the first place. Who else could understand the pact made at my birth?