Maire Read online

Everyone knew the number of colors in a person’s cloak was a sign of nobility and wealth.

  “And so he was carried away to the land of Egypt.”

  Egypt, now she’d heard of that place.

  “But even being forced to live among strangers in a strange land, he never blamed God for his misfortune. He never stopped worshiping the Lord of hosts.”

  “Your god?”

  “The One God, my queen.”

  “So you say.”

  Maire thought better of further questioning, at least aloud. Feeling like a chastised child, she settled back, her hand resting on her sword, lest the Cairthan offer further threat.

  Gradually, sheer wonder overtook her and she listened as attentively as those around her. This Joseph, despite all the horrible things that happened to him, still clung to a god who, for all sight and purpose, seemed to have abandoned the lad. In fact, he had more troubles than Crom had toes, what with his master’s wife chasing after him and him being put in prison falsely charged. It looked like nothing was ever going to go right for this lad again.

  Were it her, Maire would have found another god. She repressed her thought though, for the story was flowing over them like a soothing brook on a warm day—and the Welshman made it clear he didn’t take kindly to interruption. He talked like a bard, played like a bard, and acted like one, to be sure. He also mesmerized like one.

  She had no idea of how much time passed as the story of how Joseph’s faith in this invisible god delivered him from slavery and treachery to the highest esteem in the king’s court. His god spoke to him with his dreams and gave him counsel, which saved an entire nation from starvation. The Egyptians had put enough away because of the warning in the dreams, then they shared their stores with people who suffered in neighboring lands when the seven years of blight struck.

  “It was then that Joseph’s brothers came to him, not knowing who he was, and asked for help.”

  “And he gave it?”

  Rowan smiled at her and strummed across the strings. “Aye, he gave it.”

  “He should have cut them up and sewed the barren fields with their blood and flesh!”

  To hear the indignant huzzahs in agreement with Declan’s fervent opinion, one would think the men here were Joseph himself!

  “He could have, but he didn’t because his God is one of forgiveness. There had been enough trouble and heartache without bringing more about by taking revenge.”

  “Aye, one act of vengeance will beget another.”

  “Which is why we’re sitting here now, thanks to the wisdom of Maire and Lorcan rather than drawing each other’s blood.”

  The Welshman blessed both the Cairthan chief and her with his approving gaze. Maire wondered if Lorcan felt half as good as she did at that moment.

  “So when did Joseph tell them who he was?” Garret prompted. The lad leaned forward eagerly waiting.

  Maire was at least glad the man put his brothers through a scare before revealing the truth of his identity and that he intended to forgive them. It was only fitting. That they’d not killed youngest Benjamin, now the old chief’s favorite, and that they’d been so distraught when Joseph held the lad hostage were good signs the lot had changed for the better.

  It was a shame Brude was not here to hear this tale, not that the bard could tell it better. The only noise, save the harp and Rowan’s voice, was the occasional dollop of drink being poured into the listeners’ cups. The bard, however, could make a fine rhyme of it, so that it could be passed down, word for word, without the slightest change or embellishment in the way the Celtic past was preserved. And this story should be preserved, she thought, blinking away the emotion that blurred her vision as Rowan stood, signifying the approaching end of his song.

  “And he fell upon Benjamin’s neck and wept, and Benjamin wept upon his neck. Moreover, he kissed all his brethren and wept upon them. And after that, his brethren talked with him.”

  “Ah, preserve us, ’twas a damp time,” Eochan exclaimed. “Here, little flower. Let me get that.”

  The burly warrior took up the hem of his brat and leaned forward to wipe a tear from the cheek of a brown-haired young maid, who’d been giving him special attention since they’d arrived. He’d introduced her earlier as Blath. Maire smiled. At least that was one pair of Cairthan and Niall that wouldn’t be warring tonight. And a strange mix they were. One was as small and delicate as the other was large and hearty.

  “So, Rowan ap Emrys…” Lorcan cleared this throat before going on. “Is it time now?”

  “Aye, son, it’s time.”

  “Maithre!”

  Maire rose, uncertain which shock to react to first. An older woman stood at the edge of the circle, her salt-and-pepper hair braided and wrapped in a crown about her head. It was her only adornment, save the silver broach holding her cloak around thin shoulders. She smiled through tears, and with the smile seemed to grow younger before Maire’s eyes. Furrows plowed by age and worry faded, revealing what once must have been a youthful beauty. The woman stepped forward, extending her hand to Rowan.

  “I knew ’twas you the moment you began to play.”

  “’Twas you who taught me, Maithre.”

  Maithre? But Delwyn ap Emrys was Rowan’s mother, not this woman. Maire compared the woman’s face and coloring to that of the Welshman. It was the same, as was the Cairthan chief.

  “By my father’s blood… Maire, ye’ve married a Cairthan!”

  Declan moved up beside her. Although he was as taken aback as she, Maire was glad to have him at her back because she wasn’t so sure of her knees at the moment.

  Rowan had deceived her and her clan. No wonder he wanted peace between their peoples!

  “And will you be speaking with me, brother, like in the story?” Lorcan asked.

  Maire wondered at the odd note of hope in Lorcan’s voice.

  “Aye, but I’ll not be weeping on your thick neck!” Rowan released his mother from his arms and turned to his brother to embrace him. The two clapped each other on the back soundly. Around them, emotions as mixed as those Maire felt were reflected in murmurs and oaths of surprise.

  “He’s my uncle?”

  “Aye, lad,” Lorcan assured his son. “And king of Gleannmara.”

  “But under false pretenses.” Maire moved forward. “I agreed to marry no Cairthan.”

  “You married me, Maire,” Rowan reminded her sternly, “and I am Cairthan by blood.”

  “You said the Roman and his Welsh wife were your parents.”

  “They were. They bought me and then raised me as their son rather than a slave. But my real mother is Ciara of the Cairthan, wife of Bearach.”

  Garret looked at his father in disbelief. “You sold your own brother as a slave?”

  “I’m not proud of it, lad. I’m just grateful to the stars that I’ve had the chance to right things.”

  “Not the stars, Lorcan,” Ciara said gently. “Thank God. The same God who saved Joseph and his family.”

  “This story was real then?” Maire asked. “Not some farce ye spun to pass the night?”

  At that moment, if someone told her Declan were a ghost and his brother a faery, she’d not dispute them. All the faith she’d built in Rowan crumbled in confusion. Maire wished she’d insisted on Brude accompanying them, but the trip across the sea had worn the old druid out. She had to consider his age.

  “Maire, by following God’s will, Joseph saved not only his people but his captors as well.”

  Rowan took her by the shoulders, his fingers tightening as though he could force her to believe in him.

  “Maire, I believe God sent you to me so that I could help the people of Gleannmara… not just Cairthan or Niall, but all those who depend on this land as home.”

  “We have a common enemy,” he shouted above the growing din of disbelief and doubt. “This enemy has bled Gleannmara! He has robbed all her people of food and of dignity. He is the blight we must unite to extinguish.”

  “
Extinguish a druid?” Even Lorcan was hard pressed to believe what he heard, though it benefited him to do so.

  “The God of Israel gave Joseph the meaning of dreams the pharaoh’s magicians and soothsayers could not discern. He is greater than any druid, for it was He who created them, as well as us. Who knows better how to deal with them than the Creator of all?”

  “So he talks to you in your dreams?”

  Rowan shook his head at his brother. “Nay, but…”

  “The Lord God answers prayer,” his mother finished. “And if you do not believe the story of Joseph, then believe this.” She laid her hand on Rowan’s arm. “I never thought you dead. And when Father Tomás told me of this God, I prayed that somehow you would return to Gleannmara someday and set things right.”

  “You suspected me, Maithre?”

  Ciara smiled sadly. “Nay, Lorcan. I thought you had been fooled as well. I did not think you had a hand in Rowan’s disappearance. Looking back, I should have. I have seen you brood in the still of the night, tortured by a deed or memory you kept to yourself. Now I can praise God that I may someday lay my head to rest without the pain of knowing one son exacted deadly vengeance on the other.”

  “Maithre!”

  Rowan and Lorcan reached for Ciara as she swayed unsteadily. The latter stepped aside so that his younger brother might assist the woman.

  “Sit, Maithre.” He eased her onto a skin-covered rock, which served as a bench for the chief and his guests. “You’ve overdone yourself.”

  The temper that tried to muster over Rowan’s trickery would not form. Instead, compassion forced it aside. Maire knelt at the woman’s knee.

  “Here, take my horn and sip. ’Twill give you strength.”

  Instead of taking the drink, Ciara brushed Maire’s cheek with the back of her fingers. “Do you know God, daughter?”

  It shamed Maire to shake her head in denial. The more she heard of him, the more she desired to know him. Yet there was something frightening about it that held her back.

  “I welcome his help, though,” she answered lamely. “What Rowan says is true. We have a common enemy, more than one, by the look of things. Morlach and the deprivation he’s wrought upon us.”

  Maire shoved up to her feet, accepting Rowan’s helping hand.

  “Emrys may have misled me, but his reason is sound. The Niall have a druid and he says that our king is the one who will lead Gleannmara back to peace and prosperity. Emrys’s god will show him how.”

  “If he really did create the druids,” Eochan murmured, not fully convinced.

  “But He did, you red-headed oaf!” The girl Blath thumped the warrior’s thick biceps with her fist. “He created the world and all its creatures, man included, in six days, no less.”

  “Ach, a man can’t build a house in six days, much less a world,” Declan sneered. “’Tis a faery tale, I’m thinking.”

  “An almighty, all-powerful God can do anything,” Rowan reminded him patiently.

  Declan pulled his cloak tighter about his shoulder. “Then have him rush in the summer a bit quicker! ’Tis no night to sleep outside.”

  “Our old women sleep out in nights worse that this, Drumkilly.” Garret boasted. “My grandmother only uses the lodge because she’s mother of the chief. It’s station, not fragility, that puts her there.”

  Eochan hooted with laughter and called out to his brother. “Come on, little miss! We’ve chased the moon from one side of the sky to the other, with all this talk of gods and brothers. Time we tucked ye in, lest ye take a chill!”

  Laughter cut loose on both sides of the camp. Some men started to take Eochan’s advice to heart and wandered off.

  “Queen Maire, will you and Rowan share my humble lodge?” Ciara asked. “It’s the largest and warmest we have to offer.”

  “Nay, Maithre.” Rowan placed his arm around Maire’s shoulders. “We’re newlyweds. We need no lodge to keep us warm yet.”

  Maire colored as the direction of the amusement turned toward her. “Aye, he has more hot air than one of those furnaces his folks use to heat their baths.”

  “Heated baths?” Garret echoed, the idea clearly a novelty.

  “Aye, he left a near palace to come back and play this Joseph.” She elbowed Rowan playfully. “My guess is, he’s either daft or there is some merit to this god he rambles on about. I’ve yet to decide.”

  Rowan bent down and rumbled against her ear. “But we’ve just begun to get acquainted, right, muirnait?”

  Beloved? He called her beloved? Oh, that a word should wreak such havoc with her mind! She felt as bubbly inside as shaken beer, and near drunk from it! Since there was no hope of coherent reply, Maire suffered this sweet torture in silence.

  SIXTEEN

  Wait now. You mean to say ye want them what has a knack for working the land to move to lower lands and them that is cattle folk to tend to the livestock in the high pastures?”

  The Cairthan chief expressed the same doubt Maire kept to herself. Rowan had worked miracles thus far, but when would he overstep the patience and cooperation of the two rival tribes? How far would his god allow the man to go? Lorcan’s reaction was the exact one she expected of her own people when they heard the plan.

  “What have they got to lose here?” Rowan swept his arm across the landscape of tumbledown lodgings. “Certainly not their homes. And at least they’ll have decent ground to work. Pasture grass will grow wherever there’s a patch of earth in the rock, but not so corn, at least to any useful quantity. And cattle can be moved much easier than crops to better land, once they’ve chewed down their current place.”

  “To the innocent ear, this plan has merit.” Lorcan’s thick brow knitted, foretelling his objection. “But this ear isn’t innocent, brother. Ye’d have my people grow corn for hers.”

  “And hers tend cattle for you, the combination of both our herds. While closer to the rath, we grow enough grain to last both clans and livestock through the barren winter months.”

  “And what do you think of this, Queen Maire? Will your people come up here to live with mine and keep track of the herds?”

  Maire wasn’t certain, but Rowan had not misled her yet in the welfare of Gleannmara’s people. “Perhaps as hostages of goodwill at first. We’ll exchange our cattle tenders for your farmers and builders.”

  Rowan’s approving gaze took the early morning chill away from her bones. Maire gave him a hint of a smile in return, but he’d already turned back to his brother.

  “You see, Lorcan, we’ve more than one enemy between us. Aye, we have Morlach to contend with, but we have the survival of our peoples to consider as well. I want more than survival for them. I want prosperity. So long as you keep to the highlands, you’ll never be able to support yourselves with any success except by digging out scraps from the wilds or stealing the fruits of another’s labor.”

  “It has kept the Cairthan alive and well for years—”

  “Alive, aye,” Rowan cut in, “but hardly well. How many did you lose this last winter?”

  Garret, who stood behind his father, spoke up. “Some twenty, not countin’ the babes.”

  The lad had been listening all the while the men spoke, as had Declan and Eochan. In fact, it astonished Maire that her foster brothers hadn’t objected from the moment the ideas formed on Rowan’s lips.

  Rowan nodded. “The boy makes my point. What have you to lose?”

  “Our pride.”

  Declan broke his silence at last. “By our mother’s gods, man! The Welshman—” He broke off, realizing that was no longer the case. “Our king is offering you an alliance, not charity. I’d wager there’ll be those at the rath who’ll not take to coming up here and staring at the backside of cows all day as something to be proud of either. But I’ll tell ye this.” The fair-haired warrior leaned forward. “By the looks of things, we’ve less reason to come up here than you have to come down to us.”

  “Aye, think, man,” Eochan agreed. “Our peoples will sha
re the best of both worlds.”

  Lorcan was not as optimistic. “If Morlach lets us live long enough.”

  “Your brother stood up to Morlach’s apprentice without so much as a blink when the druid put the curse of boils and plague upon him. See ye any blemish, Cairthan?”

  Maire ran her hand over the muscled plain of Rowan’s bare arm. All that her tactile senses registered was smooth skin, bristled with a manly scatter of hair. Suddenly, as if the warmth of his arm were as hot as the coals smoldering in the cook fire nearby, she snatched her hand away.

  She was not the only one disconcerted, however. Rowan glanced at her and their eyes locked for what seemed the balance of the day. Yet the sun still held its spot in the morning sky, still as Maire’s breath.

  “Is this true?” Lorcan asked skeptically. Garret stepped closer to look at his uncle’s arms, which were bared by the short sleeve of his sackcloth robe.

  “I saw it with me own eyes,” Eochan averred.

  “And I.” Declan’s echo seemed to repeat itself among those of the Niall who’d been with them the day of the beach landing.

  Maire found her voice. “He told Cromthal to tell Morlach that neither he nor any of his kind was welcome at Gleannmara and ordered the man away.”

  Odd that she’d once thought the man fey, crazy as a swineherd, yet now she spoke of the incident with pride. She’d chosen well. But then, there hadn’t been many other choices, had there?

  She watched her husband’s face as he continued to present his case to the assembly of men. Its strong, masculine features were those of a leader, well placed, chiseled by a masterful hand. His god? If this god was truly the creator of man and woman, he’d done a fine job with Rowan ap Emrys… or should she say O’Cairthan?

  “I think Rowan has a sound idea.” Ciara stepped into the circle with a large pot of porridge hanging from her arm. “And I’ve see more years than either of you.”

  The men took bowls and cups from Blath so that Ciara might dish them out their share of the meal. Chunks of meat left over from the night before had been put in the mix for additional flavor.

  “Things are not always as good as they look, Maithre,” Lorcan reminded her.