Fergus saw this and rode the victorious Fir Thulach down, spilled their blood and their intestines as they screamed and lost their moment of youthful joy. The death of Donal revenged, he rode beyond the battle and called to the others.
Conan followed him, whooping and beating the flanks of his horse with his blood stained sword.
The Fir Thulach warlord’s head hung from his belt.
Only Niall Swiftaxe remained, and around him the pile of dead grew higher.
‘Come on Niall!’ bellowed Fergus, dodging the javelins that were thrown at him, then riding out of range again. Distantly, coming from the soldiers’ camp, a huge rank of men were running to the fray.
‘Come on Niall!’ cried Fergus and Conan together. But Niall stayed where he was, a creature berserk, the spray of red rising from where his sword flew through the flesh and bone of the Fir Thulach and becoming so dense that it formed a crimson mist above the ford.
Then Odin, always one to enjoy a prank to its limit, withdrew the Bear, and the madness, and let the sixteen-year-old boy-warrior emerge … just to see what he would do …
Niall Swiftaxe awoke as if from a horrific and blood curdling dream. The first thing he saw was a spear riding through the air towards him. He plucked it from its flight and swept the wooden haft around, knocking the helmets and brains from four heads. He heard his name called and glanced beyond the ford. Fergus and Conan were there, frantically waving at him; between them and the ford a rank of young spearmen waited.
An agonising pain in his side snapped his attention back to the issue at hand, and he saw an arrow sticking through the flesh. Bowmen were massing on a distant ridge and shooting at the three mercenaries.
With a cry, and thrusting the spear to both sides, he urged his cut and bloody horse from the water and rode full gallop at the spearmen. Twenty javelins converged upon him as he drew near and he swung himself to one side, brought the horse down heavily on to its left flank, so that the spears flew harmlessly above them. Then he remounted and hurdled the purple-cloaked rank with a cry, ramming his spear so hard into the groin of the nearest man that the point ripped out the other side, the warrior’s genitals dangling on it like a pair of ripe cherries.
Arrows sang through the air and he shifted his heavy shield of wood and
leather to guard his head and body against them, but this made riding difficult and it was some while before he reached safety.
Resting, surveying the ranks of bowmen on the distant ridges, they assessed their wounds, and discussed what needed to be done about them.
‘Who said it would be easy?’ said Conan, closing the flaps of flesh on his torso which swords had peeled back.
Fergus was staring at Niall, dark eyes angry, face solemn. He seemed to be arguing within himself, and finally Niall said, ‘Where’s Donal?’
He knew the answer, of course. The memories of what he did when berserk were always there, dreamlike, unreal, but accurately remembered.
‘He forgot that in battle you are nobody’s friend, all men’s foe.’ The bitterness in Fergus’ voice sent a chill down Niall’s spine. Would he expect revenge?
Conan said, ‘Donal knew as well as both of us, Fergus. He should not have gone that close.’
‘Perhaps … perhaps …’
At last the fixed gaze was withdrawn from Niall. The angry warrior turned away, rode off towards a mist-shrouded copse.
Here, in the cool of a glade, they gathered the herbs and stones that cleaned and sealed their many gashes. The arrow was withdrawn from Niall’s side, and he cleaned it and kept it, because the tanged and barbed head was cast from bronze, and such arrows were rare in the province that had been his home.
The following day they rose refreshed and without pain; the mist was slowly lifting, scattering before the warming rays of the sun, still invisible to them. They rode out of the glade and on to the dull, featureless lands beyond. Soon they reached hills and this was pleasing. They were drawing near to the land known as Meath, and to the winding Boann river where their destinies and quests were taking them.
Four days later, when the pale, winter sun was high, they came within sight of the great mound at Cnocba and the wooden walled settlement that stood on the top of it. Trees and steeply sloped ridges hid them from the eyes of the warrior bands that moved between the forts of the province. Word of their encounter with the army further west had not yet reached the king who currently reigned here.
They refreshed themselves in a clear tributary of the Boann and waded across this water in their haste to get to the hilly ground beyond. This would lead them to the several fords across the Boann on the southern side of the mound itself. They passed through a land rich with the signs of war: the carts and chariots discarded by dying men, the stones and standing weapons of the fallen, and occasionally heads, staring blindly, many quite decayed and corrupted, watching from their standing stones as the fiana rode past, a queit band of men, tense at the thought of the fight to come.
Soon they saw a dwelling, a crude affair of thatch and wickerwork, surrounded by dressed stones.
‘I know the man who lives here,’ said Fergus. ‘A Druid. He is very old, and not at all partial to my father and his rule. He was sympathetic to my mother, and I believe to me. I think we can trust him.’
He rode forward to the dwelling and climbed down from his horse; he made a proud sight, tanned and nude, his sword hanging from his left shoulder, touching the dark hair above his manhood. The muscles of his legs stood out tense and ridged; he was nervous of the meeting, for a single cry from the Druid could bring the forces of any nearby troop down upon them more quickly than the hawk takes a sparrow from its southwards flight.
‘Olchobor!’ called Fergus, and a moment later the old man appeared, dressed in white, the robe laced through with black thread. A heavy stone pendant, shaped like a boar, hung around his neck. The locks of his white hair were tied with ribbons of some herb that Niall did not recognise.
‘Fergus!’ said the Druid loudly, then looked quickly around. ‘Has my council to you given you no more wisdom than to come to Meath at the time of the great raid?’
‘We have a quest,’ said Fergus. ‘We have already fought off one army, posted to the west.’
‘The Fir Thulach,’ said Olchobor. ‘Not an efficient lot, but useful to Lugaid
for their muscle power. But Lugaid’s other sons, your half brothers Bresal and Blathmac, are back from Wales, back from a small skirmish in the north. They are angry, Fergus. There is a young warrior there, called Arthur, who has stopped them in their quest to regain the lost colonies of a century ago. And he is only fourteen! With his foster father Ambrosius he fights both the Erismen who invade his land, and the men called Saxons who sweep across from the east. Your brothers have been humiliated and will now take this out in the great raid to the west. But what a pleasure to them it would be to find you within a slingshot of their camp.’
‘We shall pass through quickly,’ said Fergus. ‘Once we have killed Grania and her warrior women, we shall be gone, beyond even Blathmac’s slingshot.’
The Druid nodded thoughtfully. ‘The women are living Badbs if there ever were such. Even the warriors of Lugaid’s house are in dread of them, but whether of their tongues, or their wombs, or their swords is difficult to say. Not one of those women has not slept with every noble on the hill at Tara, and not a one was satisfied. You find the kingdom in a strange state of unease. Warriors who doubt their sexual prowess make easy prey for the thrown javelins of enemies. This is all that holds them up, or so the signs tell me.’
‘If we kill the women will their pangs be finished?’
Olchobor twisted a lock of hair about his left index finger, thought hard. ‘I would have to consult the viscera of nothing less than a raven, but yes, I think that would probably work. You could then make your escape behind the moving troops.’
‘What is today good for, Olchobor?’ asked Fergus.
‘Ah,’ said the Druid, and smiled. ‘I thought you would ask me that. Let me fetch my knife. You, Fergus, run and snare a rabbit, a grey rabbit with brown tufts on its ears.’
Fergus vanished into the woodland and returned moments later with a grey rabbit, scrutinising the ears to ensure that the tufts were brown. Olchobor slit the squirming animal’s belly and shook the glistening viscera out, then cast the frantic corpse to the ground where the animal rewarded the onlookers with a minute of kicking and threshing before it was still, its guts spread haphazardly about the grass.
Olchobor bent down and traced the pattern of the tubes.
‘He who raises a sword against a woman today,’ he read, ‘shall know love as well as death.
‘He who understands the secret of a stone shall hear the stone speak before night. Hmm, that’s interesting. I hope it means something.
‘He who sires a child by a dark-haired woman shall see that child killed in its first year. That’s very nasty.’ He poked about among the guts. ‘He who puts aside his sword on this day shall die of the wasting disease before the coming
Lugnasid. I always get that one.’ He withdrew his fingers from the green mess and stood up. ‘That’s all I can learn. There is enough there to give you hope for your quest.’
‘Thank you, Druid,’ said Fergus. He turned to Niall. ‘Did you hear that? The stone will speak to you before the day is out.’ He slapped his flanks, excited and smiling. ‘By the Thunder God, I feel this is going to be an enjoyable day.’
‘Take care,’ said Olchobor, and made the complex hand passes at each warrior which linked their spirits to the flowing spirit of the Earth god, Lug, until sunset.
For as long as the oral tradition stretched back into time the three giant mounds, that lay in this tight curve of the Boann river, had always existed there. When the first warlords had built their forts on Tara, and to the north at Emain, even then the mounds had been old, a relic of the days of glory of the gods, the people of the goddess Danu who had occupied these lands for a thousand years and who had built these magnificent tombs to contain the sleeping bodies of their princes and princesses.
The largest mound was settled on its top, although it was still much revered, and the settlement was defended by a wooden palisade. This was Cnocba. Unlike the smallest mound, the central and most southern of the three, this had no open entrance to the strangely carved passageways within, which had been found only when storage pits had been dug. Such open passages existed in the other two mounds, where there were also fortified townships on the flattened tops.
Cnocba, however, the most elusive and magical of the three mounds, was also the most difficult to attack when it was properly defended. Now, with just the mercenary female warriors living inside the deserted town, it should be easy.
The fiana, Niall feeling excited and nostalgic for some unknown reason, led their horses through the tight woodland on the opposite side of the river to the hill that rose steep and green towards the southernmost mound, a great castle of the dead, still half covered with gleaming white rock that gave it the appearance of a beacon.
‘It fills me with anxiety,’ said Conan, crouching low in the undergrowth.
‘It is said to be the burial mound of the goddess Boann herself,’ said Fergus. ‘Her tomb is open, now, to the eyes of privileged men. It is right that it should fill you with fear.’
‘I have been there,’ said Niall, and as he spoke he wondered where the words came from.
Conan glanced at him sharply. ‘You’ve never been out of Connacht before we met you!’
‘True,’ said Niall. ‘And yet I have been there … I remember a woman, beautiful she was … red hair, like flame … like flame …’
In his mind burned an image of this woman, soft of thigh, and willing of sex, drawing him into her, loving him, lusting for him, her breath and the breath of his own body mingled in a single song of excitement …
The memory was there, but not from this life, not from this short existence in the Eriu of the fifth century. What he remembered was from the life of the being called Swiftaxe, and it choked him to realise how close, how important, that unknown warrior was to him.
He felt angry, scowled and snarled as he stared at the white-topped Brug na Boann.
‘Peace,’ said Fergus, restraining his tense body. Niall relaxed and stared at the older warrior’s placid face. ‘Whatever you remember, whatever you desire, all shall be given you afresh when we break through the palisade at Cnocba. There, beyond the fog.’
‘Good,’ said Niall, trembling as he followed Fergus’ glance towards the mounting mist. He knew his unbearded face was red and strained, and that he probably looked like the youth he was, desperate for manhood, afraid of the haunting ghosts of his past.
They crept along the shore of the river, keeping to the shadow of the forest, moving to the water’s edge only when a tall stand of reed and tangled thorn bush gave them some protection. They were moving to a less open ford than the one that faced the white-topped Brug to the south, and this brought them nearer to the mound of Cnocba. At last they could see the hill again, rising up above the slopes of the river shore, the artificial structure on its top barely visible through the low cloud, but clearly crowned with a spiked and crude wall of dark and ivy covered wood.
As it turned out they had no need to worry about fighting their way up the tomb’s slopes and through the wall. Their quarry came to them … unsuspecting.
The thin veil of mist slipped down from the hill and mingled with the forested slopes behind them, hanging across the river so that it hid their destination from their feasting eyes. Their naked skins glistened with damp and winter cold, but only Niall, as yet still unused to the bare skin riding, suffered at all.
‘This is ideal,’ said Fergus. ‘If the fog thickens a little more we will have a superb element of surprise.’
‘Listen!’ cried Niall.
As Fergus had been speaking, Niall’s attention had been taken by the sound of several riders. Pushing their own horses back into the undergrowth, the three fiana wormed forwards on their stomachs, through fern and reed and spiky grass, until they looked out over the bubbling waters of the river.