Sword in the Storm (10 page)

“Close by. And I have seen you, swimming in the lake, leaping from the falls, running through the woods with your half brother. You are full of life, Connavar, and destiny is calling you. How will you respond?”

He stood silently for a moment. “Are you a witch?”

“Not a witch,” she said.
“That
I promise you. Tell me what you wish for.”

A movement came from behind him, and Conn spun. Standing behind him was the Rigante witch Vorna. Her hands were held before her, crossed as if to ward off a blow. But she was not looking at him. She stood staring at the old woman. “Move back with me, Conn,” she said. “Come away from this place. Do not answer her questions.”

“Are you frightened to voice your wish,
boy
?” asked the crone, ignoring Vorna.

Conn was indeed frightened, though he did not know why. But when fear touched him, it was always swamped by anger. “I fear nothing,” he said.

“Conn! Do not speak,” warned Vorna.

“Then tell me!” shrieked the old woman.

“I wish for glory!” he shouted back at her.

A cool wind whispered across the clearing, and a bright light flashed before his eyes. He fell back, blinking.

“And you shall have it,” whispered a voice in his mind.

“You should not have spoken,” Vorna said sadly.

Conn rubbed at his eyes and looked into the pale face of the witch. Her long white-streaked hair was matted, her cloak stained by mud and frayed by the years. She looked soul-weary. Conn flicked his gaze back to the crone. But she was gone.

There was no wicker chair, only an old decaying tree stump, and no fishing net. But joining the stump to a nearby bush was a huge spider’s web, the dew upon it glittering in the sunshine.

Fear of the supernatural brushed over his bones like the breath of winter. “Who was she?” he whispered, backing away from the small clearing.

“It is best we do not speak her name. Come with me, Connavar. We will talk in a place of safety.”

Vorna lived in a cave a mile from the falls. It was wide and spacious, with thick rugs on the floor and well-crafted shelves lining the western wall. There was a small cot bed covered with a blanket of sheepskin and two simple chairs fashioned from elm. A spring flowed from the back wall, trickling down into a deep pool, and sunlight shone through three natural windows in the rock, shafts of light piercing the gloom above their heads like rafters made of gold.

Conn was nervous as he followed the witch inside. To his knowledge no Rigante male had ever been inside the home of Vorna the witch. As his eyes grew accustomed to the gloom,
he saw that some of the shelves were filled with pots and jars, while others held clothing, carefully folded. The cave was neat and surprisingly free of dust. Against one wall stood a broom, and by the rock pool were two buckets and a mop. Conn looked around him.

Vorna moved to a chair and sat down. “What did you expect?” she asked. “Dried human heads? Bones?”

“I don’t know what I expected, save that this is not it,” he admitted.

“Sit down, Connavar. We must talk. Are you hungry?”

“No,” he said swiftly, unwilling to contemplate what a witch might keep in her food store. He sat down opposite her.

“The woman you saw was a spirit—a Seidh goddess, if you will. Listen to me carefully, and when you guess her identity, do not say it aloud. The name alone is unlucky. As you know, there are three goddesses of death. She was one. Sometimes she is observed as an old woman; at other times a crow is seen close by. In terms of the soul-world and its magic she is the least powerful of the Elder Spirits, but when it comes to the earth-world and the affairs of men, she is the most malignant of beings. I first knew of her interest in you when I saw the crow fly over the home of your father, Varaconn, on the night of your birth. She summoned the storm that night, the storm that destroyed the blade that would have saved Varaconn’s life. I saw her again on the day your mother spoke those awful words to Ruathain. You see, Connavar, she is a mischief maker, a breaker of hearts. When she is close, dark deeds are born where before there was only light and laughter. You know her name?”

Conn nodded. All Rigante children were taught of the Morrigu, the bringer of nightmares.

“How can you be sure it was her?” he asked.

She sighed and leaned back in her chair. “I am a witch. It is my talent to know these things. You should not have spoken of your deepest desire to her. She has the power to grant it.”

“Why would that be so terrible?”

“A long time ago a woman prayed to her, asking to be loved by the most handsome man in the world—a rich man, kind and loving. The wish was granted. He loved her. But he was already wed, and the bride’s brothers rode to her cabin and cut her into pieces, the man with her. Now do you understand?”

“I asked for glory. There is no price I would not pay for it.”

Anger showed briefly in Vorna’s thin face. “Can you be so stupid, Connavar? Of what worth is glory? Does it feed a family? Does it bring peace of mind? Fame is fleeting. It is a harlot who moves from one young man to the next. Tell me of Calavanus.”

“He was a great hero in my grandfather’s day,” said Conn. “A mighty swordsman. He led the Rigante against the Sea Wolves. He killed their king in single combat. He had a sword that blazed like fire. He knew glory.”

“Yes, he did,” she snapped. “Then he got old and frail. He sold his sword to a merchant in order to buy food. His wife left him; his sons deserted him. When last I saw him, he was weeping in his cabin and still talking of the days of glory.”

Conn shook his head. “I will not be like him
or
like Varaconn. My enemies will not see my back, and men will not spit on my name. Banouin has promised me a sword of iron. I will carry it into battle. It is my destiny.”

“I know something of your destiny, Connavar. Only a little, but enough to warn you. You must seek a higher purpose than mere glory. If not, you will merely be another swordsman like Calavanus.”

“Perhaps that will be enough for me,” he said stubbornly.

“It will not be enough for your people.”

“My people?” he asked, confused now.

She fell silent for a while, rising from her chair and moving to a stone hearth. The light from the windows was fading, and she laid a fire but did not light it. “Last year,” she said, “a starving pack of wolves attacked a lioness with five cubs. She
fought them with great ferocity, leading them away from her young. She was willing to die to save her cubs. But she did not die, though she was sorely wounded. She killed seven of the wolves. But four others had moved around behind her. When she limped back to her cave, her cubs were dead and devoured. It could be argued that she earned great glory. But what was it worth? Her injuries meant there would be no more cubs. She was the last of her line, a line that stretched back to the first dawn. You think she cared that she had killed seven wolves, that her courage shone like a beacon?”

Vorna gestured with her right hand. The fire burst into life, causing dancing shadows to flicker across the far wall. With a sigh she pushed herself to her feet and walked to the western wall. Taking a small box from the first shelf, she opened it and lifted clear a slender chain of gold from which hung a small red opal. “Come close to me,” she ordered him. Conn did so. He could smell wood smoke in her faded clothing, mixed with the sweet scents of lavender and lemon mint. In that moment his fear of her drifted away, and he felt with sudden certainty that Vorna was not merely the witch everyone feared. She was also a lonely, aging woman, unfulfilled and far from happy.

He looked into her bright blue eyes. “I thank you for helping me,” he said.

She nodded and stared into his face. “I do not need your pity, child,” she said softly, “but I welcome the kindness from which it sprang.” She fastened the golden chain around his neck. “This talisman will protect you from her. But nothing I can do will prevent her manipulation of those around you. Show me the knife, Connavar.”

He winced inwardly. She had not said “your” knife, but “the” knife. Did she know?

Slowly he drew the silver blade from the sheath he had made. She took it in her thin fingers. “You were born with luck,” she said. “Had you not rescued that fawn, you would
have died in those woods, your blood drawn from your veins. Did you guess that the creature was a Seidh?”

“No.”

“No,” she echoed. “They would have known. Your thoughts would have been loud to them, like the music of the pipes. They are a fey people. They kill without mercy, sometimes with terrible tortures. Yet they can allow a stupid child to live because he saves a fawn. And even reward him.” With a sigh she returned his knife. “Go home, Connavar, and think on what I have said.”

Everyone said that Riamfada was a happy youth, always smiling despite his disability. Women prized the brooches and bangles he created, and men marveled at the sword hilts and belt buckles cast from bronze or sometimes silver. His father, Gariapha the Metal Worker, was proud of the boy and praised him constantly. That said much for Gariapha, for not many men, seeing their sons outshine them, would have been so generous of spirit.

When Riamfada was seventeen years of age, his talents had made his family almost wealthy. Banouin the Foreigner had taken his work and sold it across the water for what seemed to Riamfada fabulous prices. It was those profits which enabled him now to begin working in small amounts of gold.

The boy had been born in the Year of the Crippling, when two in three Rigante babes had entered the world paralyzed or stillborn. As was the custom, the disabled babes were laid on a hillside to die in the night. Alone among the deformed and crippled Riamfada had not died.

His mother, Wiocca, had gone to him at dawn, cuddled him close, and held him to her breast, allowing him to suckle. Everyone thought she had lost her mind. She ignored them. The full council debated her actions and called on Gariapha to give evidence. The balding, round-shouldered metal
crafter stood before them and defended his wife’s right to nurse her son. “He was placed in the hands of the gods,” he said. “They did not take his life. Now his life is hers.”

“How can he ever contribute to the Rigante?” asked the Long Laird.

“In the same way that I do,” said Gariapha. “I do not need the use of legs to create brooches.”

At the request of the council the Long Laird sought out Vorna and asked for a prophecy. She refused to give one. “You may call upon me only when the people are threatened,” she said. “This babe threatens no one.”

The council debated long into the night. Never before had such a seriously crippled child been allowed to survive, and there was no precedent to call upon. Finally, as Riamfada’s second dawn approached, they made their judgment—by a vote of eleven to ten—in favor of Wiocca’s right to raise her son.

By the age of six Riamfada had shown great skills in the crafting of wax and the preparation of casting shells. He had a good eye, nimble fingers, and a creative talent his father could only envy. By the time he was ten he was designing complicated patterns and knots, creating brooches of exquisite beauty. Every day Gariapha would carry him to his workshop and set him down in a high-backed chair. A woolen blanket would be placed over his stunted, useless legs, and a long belt would be wrapped around his frail, emaciated body, holding him in place. Then he would lean forward and begin his work.

And as everyone observed, Riamfada was always happy.

It was not true, of course. He seldom knew real joy, not even when he created delicate pieces that brought gasps of admiration from those who saw them. Riamfada was never truly content with any of his designs; that in part was the source of his genius.

But had people asked him what was his first great moment
of joy, he would have told them of the day, one year earlier, when he had run in the hills and learned to swim in the pond below the Riguan Falls.

He had been working at his bench when a shadow had fallen across him. He had turned to the window to see a wide-shouldered boy with strange eyes, one green and one gold.

“I am Connavar,” he said. Riamfada knew who he was. On warm days Gariapha would carry him out onto the open ground beyond the workshop, and there father and son would eat their meals in the sunshine. Often Riamfada would see the village boys running and playing. None ever approached him.

“I am Riamfada. What do you want?”

“I was curious to see you,” said Connavar. “Everyone talks about you.”

“Well, you have seen me,” said Riamfada, returning to his work by dipping his brush into the mixture and applying it to the crafted wax.

“What are you doing?”

“I am painting a mixture of cow dung and clay on the wax.”

“Why?”

“So I can gradually build up a shell around the wax. When it is thick enough, I shall fire it. Then the wax will melt away, and I will have a mold into which I can pour bronze or silver.”

“I see. It must take a long time.”

“I have the time.”

Connavar stood silently for a moment. “I am going to the waterfall,” he said. “To swim.”

“Good. I hope you enjoy yourself.”

“Would you like to come?”

Riamfada forced a bright smile. “That would be pleasant. You go ahead. I will finish this and then run along and join you.”

“You cannot run,” said Connavar, ignoring the sarcasm. “But why should you not swim? It is only a matter of floating
and moving your arms. And I am strong. I could carry you to the falls.”

“Why? Why would you do this for me?”

“Why should I not?” countered Connavar.

“You do not know me. We are not friends.”

“That is true, but how does one get to know anyone save by talking to them? Come with me. Learn to swim.”

“I don’t think so.”

“It is very beautiful there, the sunshine sparkling on the water, the silver-backed fish, the willows. Are you afraid?”

“Yes,” admitted Riamfada.

“What of?”

“I am afraid that I will enjoy it. That I will happy there.”

“Afraid of being happy?” said Connavar, surprised.

“Go away. Leave me alone,” said Riamfada.