Lord of the Isles (Coronet Books) (26 page)

Somerled was applauding a wrestling-match on the grassy platform of the rock-summit before the castle drawbridge and gatehouse, when he perceived that two of the people being led up from the shore were women. As they came closer, it was also evident that of the others two were boys, or youths in their early teens, noticeable amongst the armed escort.

Suddenly Saor MacNeil, beside his foster-brother, gripped his arm, gazing towards the newcomers. Somerled stared, in turn, and then, drawing a quick breath, strode off in the direction of the oncoming party.

A few yards from him, the visitors, panting a little from their climb, halted, scanning his features keenly, almost tensely.

“Elizabeth!” he cried. “You—Bethoc!”

“Aye, Sorley—Bethoc, your sister,” one of the women answered. “I rejoice that you still remember me! It has been so long.”

There was undoubtedly criticism in that, but he went to embrace her. “My dear, long, yes. Too long. But here is joy! Surprise, indeed. Welcome to Argyll, at last! It is years . . .”

“Years, yes. Over many years, Sorley. You did not come. It is none so far to Fermanagh . . .”

“No. But I have been . . . occupied. So much to do here, Bethoc, to establish, to build. A whole kingdom to set up. I had hoped that
you
would come to me . . .”

“You had a son to visit—not only a sister!”

“Aye.” He drew back a little, his expression set, strained a little. He turned, to look at the two boys—and was appalled to find himself looking from one to the other, for the moment wondering. Then, of course, the thing was clear—and the old stab at the heart was there again. They were both good-looking, well-built lads, but the one, fair-haired and blue-eyed where the other was dark, was the taller, broader and finer-featured, features not unlike Somerled’s own. But there was a difference, something about the eyes and the set of the jaw, a vagueness of the one and a blurring of the other, an essential weakness which was not to be hid and was emphasised in this moment of emotion by a twitching at the corner of a slightly slack mouth.

“Gillecolm!” Somerled went to his son, to enfold him in his arms. “Laddie, laddie—the size of you! Save us—here’s a marvel! Colm mac Sorley—almost a man grown!” As he exclaimed it, the pain at the heart grew the sharper—for Gillecolm mac Somerled MacFergus would never be fully a man. The boy had been born just slightly lacking in his mental faculties, the tragedy of his young father’s life, responsible perhaps for much of what that man had become. Not a few had said that it was a pity that the child had not died with the MacMahon girl-mother who gave such difficult birth to him—although Somerled had steadfastly refused to admit to such a wish. Here was the answer to many a question.

Gillecolm gulped and mumbled something into his father’s chest, embarrassed, unsure. Still holding him, Somerled looked at the other boy, his nephew, and reached out to clasp his shoulder.

“So, Donald—you too, twice the size I last saw you. A fine support for your mother, I warrant. Two brave heroes to be.” He raised his eyes to their mother and aunt. “You have raised these warriors well, Bethoc.”

“Pray God I have not raised them to be warriors and heroes! I have had sufficient of such in our family,” the Countess of Ross and Moray said. “We are on our way, even now, to visit that other fallen hero, Donald’s father, in his captivity.”

“Ah—so that is it? You go to Malcolm.”

“Yes. Since it seems that he cannot come to us. I am still his wife. David has sent for us. No doubt for his own purposes. But . . . I could not refuse. Malcolm left it to my choice. It was not easy—to go into perpetual captivity . . .”

“You mean—it is not just a visit, then? You intend to stay? With Malcolm.”

“I am his wife. And Donald is his son. Perhaps it is Donald whom David wants, in truth? That there be no more attempts on his throne, by the MacEths.”

“M’mm. It may be so. But David is a fair and honest man. There will be concern in it, too, for Malcolm and yourself, I think. He much loved his own wife. He would not wish you to be parted for all time.”

“Does such concern enter into the thinking of kings?”

“This king is different, Bethoc—that I have found out. He can act the good-hearted man as well as the monarch. The very fact that he spared Malcolm’s life shows that, when the others were clamouring for his death. And this of perpetual captivity is none so ill. Malcolm lives as one of David’s close household—as his nephew, indeed. Even, he accompanied us on the invasion of England.”

She shrugged. “We shall see . . .”

The celebratory proceedings continued and the newcomers were drawn in, in some measure, the two boys at least appreciative.

In the early evening they sailed back across the Sound to Ardtornish.

Later, relaxed, in the lesser hall there, the boys bedded down, brother and sister watched the sun sink behind the mountains of Mull, in the company of Somerled’s close companions, Saor, Conn, Dermot and Cathula. Presently Somerled asked,

“What caused Malcolm to attempt to unseat David, Bethoc? I could not understand it. He was never a fighting man. He loved hunting and ease, not kingship. He could not win—I told him so . . .”

“It was the MacMahon, your goodsire, who persuaded him. At the behest of the High King, Muirchertach. They say that it was the English King Stephen’s doing, behind it all. To cause trouble in Scotland, so that he himself might take and rule there. The Irish High King sorely requires Norman help against the Norse. This was part of the price.”

“So that was it! I might have guessed.”

“That Stephen is a craven, I say. He gets others to fight his battles for him,” Saor commented. “The sorrow that it had to be the Earl Malcolm.”

“I tried to dissuade him,” the Countess said. “But he can be obstinate. And he owed much to the MacMahon, of course—who provided ships and men, as ever. Moreover, Malcolm wished to avenge his brother Angus. It was a sorry business—he was made a sacrifice, just. Can you wonder if I have no love for kings?”

“David you will find . . . different. You will fare none so ill at Rook’s Burgh, Beth. It is a fair place in a fair land. In David’s house, I swear, you will live better than at Enniskillen.”

“Perhaps. I am not sorry to leave Fermanagh. Since our father died, it has not been the same. And with Malcolm gone, I have been the less welcome there. I had even thought of coming to you, Sorley—although you did not ask me!”

Uncomfortably, he stirred. “I should have done, yes. There has been so much to do . . .”

“I would have thought that at least you would have sent for your son.”

He spread his hands, wordless.

“I have carried the responsibility sufficiently long, Sorley. I love Colm—he is a gentle, amiable lad, warm of heart, but easily hurt. He says little but his wits are sharp enough in some matters. He and Donald are very close. But now that he is growing apace, he needs a man’s guidance, his father’s. So I have brought him to you. I shall miss him—but this is best, now. I cannot take
him
into this captivity.”

From the moment they had arrived, Somerled had recognised that it must come to this. Yet even so, his reluctance could not be hid.

“Yes,” he said.

She looked at him, as did Cathula. The men looked out at the sunset.

“Your son,” the Countess added, deliberately.

“Yes. To be sure. He must stay.”

“What else?” she asked. And when he did not further respond, went on. “You have put this off over-long, Sorley. The boy deserves better of you.”

“Yes, yes. I know it. But you must understand, Bethoc—it will not be easy. Living as I do . . .”

“Easy? It has not been easy for me, either. Is it ease that you seek—Somerled the Mighty, Norse-Slayer, Lord of the Isles, King of Argyll? All this you have done, achieved—and you say that it will not be easy. To take your own son to you.”

He rose abruptly and went over to the window, to stare out at the gathering night. “You make it sound so simple. It is not. Colm is not . . . as others. He requires much heeding, care. Which I will find it difficult to give him. I am but seldom here, at Ardtornish. I am a man with much on my mind. It is, in the main, a woman’s work, is it not?”

“Perhaps you should find yourself another wife, then?”

He turned, partly at Cathula’s sudden hoot of laughter, and stared from one woman to the other. Saor came to his rescue.

“Sakes—there are some cures worse than the disease!” he observed, grinning.

“I . . . we shall make do,” Somerled said shortly. He came back to the fireside circle. “When do you sail, Bethoc?”

“In a day or two. To Eskmouth, in Galloway. I must go. Already I am delayed . . .”

Before the Countess left, Somerled was in one respect less concerned over his son’s arrival and in another, more so. He found himself to be more at ease and in sympathy with the boy than he had expected, more
close
to him. But that was also the trouble, the very closeness. Gillecolm, in fact, clung to him all too closely. Wherever he turned the lad was there, both lads until Donald left with his mother. Clearly Somerled was hero and paladin to his son as well as long-lost father, not to be let long out of his sight now that he had been found again. This was obviously going to create problems; but the man was loth indeed to seem to repulse the youngster in any way. The hope was that in time this too close dependence would lessen.

After the moving, indeed all but tearful parting with aunt and cousin, however, Gillecolm clung but the closer to his father, his only anchor in abruptly changed waters. The boy demonstrated a sort of dumb anxiety, like a dog which fears that it will be locked away. Somerled’s friends sought to help, Cathula in especial; but the lad was only marginally responsive, seemingly suspicious. He was young for his years, of course, and his mental handicap almost certainly emphasised by this drastic change in his hitherto sheltered life. Somerled’s forebodings grew, however much he felt for and cherished the son he had fathered.

In these circumstances he was more receptive, perhaps, than might otherwise have been the case, when a longship arrived at Ardtornish from the south, bearing a message from Olaf, King of Man. This was to the effect that his new abbey of Rushen, which he had built to the glory of God and in memory of his late wife Ingebiorg Hakonsdotter, was now completed and was to be consecrated by Archbishop Thurstan of York, on St. Barnabus’ Eve, the tenth day of June. Olaf hoped that his ally and friend, the King of Argyll and the Isles, would honour the occasion with his presence. He suggested that it might be wise, as well as suitable, that he should do so, if possible; for he understood that the Archbishop, as well as consecrating, intended to use the occasion to advance Bishop Wimund to be Bishop of the Isles, in addition to Man, no doubt for his own purposes, and his friend Somerled might have his own ideas about this, being of a different faith. This invitation came in the form of a letter penned by Olaf. But the longship’s master added a verbal message. The Princess Ragnhilde had asked him to say that she hoped very much that King Somerled would come.

Normally, to travel one-hundred-and-fifty miles and more to attend such an affair would scarcely have been considered. But this of Archbishop Thurstan and a new Romish bishopric of the Isles required some examination. Also, an excursion to Man might be helpful with regard to young Gillecolm, a distraction which could possibly widen the boy’s outlook and loosen this utter dependence on his father’s company. Somerled did not so much as admit to himself that the verbal message from Ragnhilde might be the true deciding factor. He agreed to go.

Cathula MacIan, however, although she was not informed about that postscript, was not to be misled about motives. When she heard that her lord actually proposed to sail all the way to Man for an abbey-opening, she was typically direct and scornful.

“You are not going there to see any archbishop, nor yet to talk about church matters, Sorley MacFergus!” she exclaimed. “You are going because of that chit of a girl, Ragnhilde. A child, young enough to be your daughter! I have not forgotten how you mooned over her, the great Somerled! I knew that you had not forgotten her either, and her whey-faced simperings. That is why you consider going to Man. You have been but looking for excuse.”

“You talk nonsense,” he said, but mildly enough.

“Do I, then? Do you think that I am a fool? Or blind? Can you say in honesty that when you have been lying with me of a night you have never wished it was that daughter of Norse pirates you had under you? I have seen you, felt you, watched your eyes . . .”

“You
are
a fool, Cat! If you believe that. In your bed, you are sufficiently potent to keep any man’s wits from straying, I assure you! Besides, the Princess Ragnhilde is not to be considered so. She is . . . different.”

“
Princess
—oh, yes! Different, indeed! No mere cot-woman nor ship-woman, but a female Viking, of a long line of cut-throat ravishers! Different . . .!”

He left her while still he had his temper under control.

They would sail in three days, calling on the way at Castle Sween in Knapdale, where old King Ewan MacSween was said to be sick, failing and wishful to see Somerled.

The Argyll flotilla reached St. Michael’s Bay of Man the day before the consecration ceremony. So far the excursion had been a success. Young Colm was excited and happy—after all, aboard ship he had his father close at hand all the time; and the voyage down through the island-dotted and most colourful sea in the world, in fine weather, could scarcely fail to delight. Cathula, although subdued, had made no more outbursts. Somerled had said that she could remain behind at Ardtornish if she so disapproved of this Manx visit, but she had elected to play her accustomed role of master of the dragon-ship, at which she was notably proficient. The Castle Sween interlude had been moving, distressing after a fashion but eminently satisfactory after another. Ewan was obviously dying, well aware of it, and anxious that Somerled, in taking over his lands and nominal kingdom, should do so in trouble-free style and with full respect for his chieftains and people, as according to their compact of seven years before. They had parted with a good understanding, the old man reassured, Somerled confirmed in a large increase in his territories and influence, to which he had little doubt that David, as overlord, would agree.