Heart's Blood

Anluan had bunched his good hand into a fist. His eyes were cold as frost. “There is no doubt that Nechtan wronged her,” he said. “But this is indeed a long and bitter vengeance.Where is she now?”

Seeing the fury on his face, no less alarming for the obvious control he was imposing on himself, I was glad I had not mentioned that Aislinn had threatened me with a carving knife. “I don’t know,” I said. “But she’ll be watching. We need to be careful right up until the words of the counterspell have been spoken. She doesn’t like things to deviate from the pattern she has established here. She will fight to keep her curse in place, though I think it has caused her only misery. She tried to make me give her the book by tormenting Gearróg, and then by hurting the little girl. In the end I passed it over and she ripped it up.”

A silence; five pairs of eyes were turned on me in question.

“So she believes we can’t do it,” I said. “She saw me using the obsidian mirror with her book open; she must know, or guess, that I’ve seen the ritual. But from what she said, it’s plain that she doesn’t credit me with the wit to remember the words of Nechtan’s invocation after one hearing and a glance at her book. The counterspell is very simple: the chieftain must speak the Latin invocation backwards. I imagine the other elements of the ritual would need to be the same, the pentagram, the snake circle, the herbs and so on. There is a woman of the host who might be able to assist with that.”

Anluan was still staring at me. “You memorized it? All of it?”

I nodded.“And now you must do the same,” I said.“In private, behind closed and guarded doors. Aislinn won’t want us to do this. If she believes it’s a vain attempt based on little more than guesswork, we might manage to finish it.”

“Are you certain this will work, Caitrin?” Eichri’s voice was unsteady.

“Not certain, no. But I am sure I have the words correct, and I am sure about the form of the ritual.What remains to be tested is Aislinn’s conviction that the counterspell is something so obvious. It seems surprising that Nechtan did not think to try it.”

“He probably didn’t want to,” Magnus put in. “He may never have given up the idea that he could some day turn the host into the mighty army he wanted.And if that was his thinking, he probably never told Conan the words of the original invocation—why would he? Most likely, there was no written record of it apart from these notes of Aislinn’s. Of course, there was the book Nechtan got it from in the first place, but Conan may not have known about that.”

“Besides,” I said,“she did pronounce the curse, a hundred years of sorrow and so on, and perhaps the counterspell wouldn’t have worked until that time was up.”

“Which it is tonight,” observed Olcan from his corner. “All Hallows’ Eve.”

“If Muirne—Aislinn—is as clever as you say,” Eichri said, “she must know that.Why is she fighting against it?”

I could not think how to put it into words: my conviction that Aislinn was trapped in her own spell, that her wish to punish and hurt each chieftain of Whistling Tor in turn went parallel with her love for them. I imagined her dropping the poison into the jug as tears welled in her eyes.

“Aislinn is not part of the host,” Eichri pointed out.“The counterspell might not work on her. She might linger on forever, casting a blight on the Tor and all who dwell here. Don’t look at me like that, Caitrin.”

“She will be gone from here before the sun rises again,” Anluan said, his voice like iron. “As for the threat today, while I am on the Tor Muirne must comply with my will.We must prepare to enact this ritual, and when we need her to come, I will summon her.” He looked at the others, each in turn, his eyes resting last on Eichri and on Rioghan. “You understand that I must do this,” he said.

“Ah, well,” said Eichri with a forlorn attempt at nonchalance,“I’d best claim on that last wager, Councillor. Pay up!”

Rioghan thrust a hand into his robe and drew out a shining silver coin. It danced across the tabletop into his old friend’s hand.

“What was that one for?” I asked, blinking back tears.

“Whether you’d be back before or after Anluan won his battle.”

I stared at them. “You all believed I would come back?”

“You belong here.” Anluan’s fingers tightened around mine. “Sending you away was the worst error of my life, as our friends here have been reminding me regularly ever since the day we found you gone. I did not consider that in losing you, we lost our beating heart.”

“It was right for me to go.And right for me to come back.”

“Did you find that sister of yours?” Magnus asked. “I liked the sound of her.”

“There’s a whole story there, part sad, part happy, part in between. When we have time, I’ll tell it.” I glanced at Anluan. “I should teach you the charm. It’s in Latin, and you have to say it backwards.”

“Brighid save me.We’d best start straightaway.” Anluan rose to his feet. “Or almost straightaway; I must wash and change, at least. Olcan, will you need help . . . ?”