Scathach looked at the boy on his hands and knees in the mud. He was exhausted but would not admit it to her or himself. The druidess Dornoll had sent him. She said he was not of the correct mindset to learn martial arts from a druidess and needed a firmer, less conscientious teacher, a teacher like the Shadowy One. Her school on the Isle of Shadows taught the young men and women only how to fight. Scathach did not hold with the niceties of battle; for Scathach, the warrior code was so much hot air. Kill or be killed was the only code a warrior should live by.
The boy did need to learn, though.
He did not understand boundaries or when to yield so he could fight anew with increased vigor and a little more experience. Scathach knew being unwilling to back down in some situations was a blessing, which could lead to victory. But it could also be a curse, leading to utter destruction.
"You must admit, he has heart," her daughter Uathach said. It had been Uathach who put the boy in the dirt while practicing with wooden broadswords. Uathach had sidestepped a reckless lunge and slapped him across the back with the flat of her sword hard enough to knock him from his feet.
Scathach looked at her daughter and did not miss the glint in her eye. Even covered from head to ankles in mud, the boy was good-looking. He looked like a prince of the Tuatha Dé Danann with hair tied down to his forehead, a muscled abdomen, and muscular arms. The girls, training to be warriors, giggled behind their hands whenever he was nearby. He never noticed their flirtiness, but Scathach put that down to inexperience rather than disinterest.
"What he needs is the intelligence to know when it is futile. He needs to cross the bridge from student to master. The bridge all pupils must cross if they are to succeed."
"Yes, yes, the pupil's bridge," Uathach scoffed. She had heard her mother lamenting the same since she opened the school. "What he needs, mother is what all hot-blooded youths need. A snatch to plunder."
"Not any old snatch though, eh, daughter?" Scathach asked with a knowing smile.
"You must admit, he is a rather pretty boy, even though he does not seem to know it."
"Do you not think him a little young?"
"Judging by the pole I saw in his triús this morning when he caught me washing my teats, he is old enough," Uathach laughed.
"That is as maybe, daughter, but do not distract him too much from his studies."
Scathach knew that being a good warrior was not only about physical prowess. Mental agility would often save a hopeless situation. She needed the young would-be hero to be clear-headed as she tried to force that information through his pig-headedness, not full of the joys associated with the discovery of sex.
"You must rest now. We will begin again at sunrise," Scathach called as the boy climbed to his feet and assumed the stance.
"I do not want to rest."
"I am not having a debate about it, boy. You will rest now. We will begin again at dawn."
"But…"
"No buts, Hound. Go now and wash."
Setanta threw the practice sword in the mud and turned his back on the women. "I will be in my cell," he called over his shoulder as he walked away.
The crowd of trainee warriors gathered to watch the contest jeered at his retreating back. His good looks might interest the females in the group, but the other boys saw them as threatening their masculinity.
He ignored the jeers as he walked away from the training square, head held high, his pride evident to all who saw him.
"I thought Dornoll said he was a farmer's son?" Uathach asked as she watched him climb the stairs into the castle.
"Not according to the king of Ulster. If Mac Nessa is to be believed, he is the son of the king's long-lost sister, Deichtine."
"Long lost what?" Uathach snorted in disbelief.
"Conall Cernach found him in the aftermath of the invasion and returned him to his true heritage, or so the king would have us believe."
"Now there is a man worthy of a woman's interest."
"Who, Mac Nessa?" Scathach jested, but her daughter missed the sarcasm.
"Ulster, no. Mac Nessa is a fat lump. His long-lost sister? Where do men like that come up with their transparent stratagems?"
"It does not matter that they are transparent. The traditions must be seen to be upheld. No one cares if they are upheld. You think the Elder Council did not see through the ruse?"
"That is as maybe, mother, but the way that lump manipulates to suit his own needs is a menace to the Five Kingdoms. Anyway, I meant Conall."
"Conall trained with Dornoll, and she says she tried everything she knew to get into his triús."
"His interests lie elsewhere? Other than cutting the throat of his liege, I mean?"
"It is true, daughter. The champion will kill him one day. I think Ulster went too far when he ordered Conall to die. Anyway, The Hound is about as royal as my arse."
"I have frequently heard warriors claim yours to be the most royal arse they had ever clapped eyes on," Uathach laughed as she danced out of her mother's reach.
"He struts about the place because he believes the story of his origins."
"Well, he certainly has the arrogance of royalty," Uathach laughed again. "I will go and help His Highness to wash."
***
When she entered his cell in the castle, Uathach found Setanta sitting on his bed, still covered in mud. The skins that kept him warm at night were smeared with the grime of their pretend fight. Uathach shook her head and wondered why boys did not consider cleanliness a necessary virtue.
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"So, his royal highness is fond of sleeping in muck, is he?" she asked with her hands on her hips.
"What do you want, Uathach? Have you not humiliated me enough for one day?"
"No, as it happens, I have only just begun. Get your clothes off, boy."
"You are not my liege; what makes you think I will jump to your instructions," Setanta said as he turned his face away.
"If you do not remove your clothes, I will do it for you."
"I would like to see you…," the boy did not even finish his protestation before he found himself nose down in the dust of the cell floor with one hand behind him and a knee in the small of his back.
"You will remove your clothes and wash yourself, as my mother instructed. Then, when you are all clean and ready, you will come to the Great Hall to dine with the others, but not before."
"I will not."
"You will, boy, of that I am certain," Uathach said as she pressed her knee harder into his back and twisted the arm further behind. He tried to struggle, but it was hopeless. He could not get any leverage from the position he was in.
A short time later, Uathach walked into the Great Hall to be met with knowing smirks from the older students. Each had been subjected to the daughter's ministrations after a training day. They had all tried to fight against Uathach's instructions, only to have their rebelliousness beaten from them. Each remembered the ache in their shoulder that stayed for days after they had yielded, a testament to how far back an arm would bend before the shoulder popped. None of the students noticed the frown on Uathach's face, though.
"How was the lesson?" Scathach asked as her daughter sat beside her and began breaking her bread.
"He is washing, but it took much more effort than usual."
"He is a fighter, you think?"
"Yes, mother. He will not be easy to break."
"But break he must, Uathach. Otherwise, my training will be in vain."
A short time later, the boy walked into the hall with his head high. The gathered company started to whisper to each other, causing a rise in the noise. Mother and daughter could not see what they were whispering about until Setanta arrived before them.
"Can I sit down to eat now that I have washed?" he asked.
Uathach had to concentrate hard not to laugh. She could sense her mother frowning at the youth as he stood before them. He was clean. He had changed his besmirched clothes and washed, but a thumbprint was on his forehead between his eyes. Apparently, he put it there when walking from his cell to the Great Hall.
"No, you cannot, as Uathach told you. You will not be able to eat until you are clean. Return to the hall when you have cleaned yourself."
Scathach watched as the boy walked from the hall. She expected his stomach growling at him would force the boy to surrender and wash the thumbprint from his forehead, but she was surprised when he did not return.
"Go and see what he is doing, Uathach."
Uathach nodded and left the hall. She returned a short time later and sat beside her mother with a contemplative expression.
"Well?"
"He is in the sea."
"Washing?"
"No, mother. If I were to guess, I would say he is fishing."
"Fishing with a rod?"
"No, mother. He is standing in the shallows with a spear, waiting for the fish to come."
"Do you think he will succeed?"
"Who can tell? I have never caught a fish that way, but I have never tried."
Scathach sat at the table with her chin in her hand, thinking. Uathach watched her, wondering what scheme she would devise to subjugate the boy to her will. She knew it would be a scheme. Her mother could not allow one of her students to defy her. Despite Scathach repeating that it was because he needed to cross the bridge of pupils, Uathach knew it was also because she could not afford a student to challenge her authority successfully. The other trainees were all pretending not to be listening, but Uathach could see the suppressed excitement in how they were gripping their cups and knives.
"Is he naked?" Scathach finally asked.
"Yes."
"Go down to the beach and take his clothes. Take the clothes and the hides from his cell, too."
"Mother, he will freeze."
"Not if he bends to my will."
Uathach nodded and went to do her mother's bidding. She returned to the feast hall and nodded to let Scathach know she had done as asked. A short time later, a wet, naked, and shivering Setanta arrived in the feast hall with a face like thunder, holding his spear as though he intended to exact a heavy price from the person who had dared steal his clothes.
"Where are my clothes?" he demanded of Uathach.
She shrugged.
"I saw you take them. Where are they?"
Again, Uathach shrugged.
"Do not force me to use this spear," the boy raged.
"You cannot use it in any meaningful way, boy. Much like that worm dangling between your legs."
Setanta roared and lunged with the spear, only to find himself in the dust at Uathach's hands for the third time in a day. When he lunged, she had grasped the shaft, stood up, pulled the spear from his grasp, and tripped him without effort. Now laughing at his nakedness, Uathach used the spear to prod his buttocks.
"Up, boy, and try that again. Nothing I like better than a novice trying to stick his spear into me."
The boys in the feast hall roared and began to bang the eating bench with their wooden cups. To see the arrogant Setanta ridiculed was a sight they would each remember for the rest of their days. The girls in the hall were craning to get a look at his buttocks, a sight they had dreamed of since he had arrived on the island a few days before.
The boy pulled himself onto his knees and scuffed tears of anger from his eyes. "You will pay for making me an object of ridicule," he shouted over his shoulder as he ran from the hall once more.
"See where he goes," Scathach told her daughter before returning to her meal.
"Well?" Scathach asked when her daughter returned.
"He went to his cell. When he found his clothes gone, he ran out in a rage and up into the hills."
"What do you think he will do?"
"He will light a fire and keep warm away from the castle."
"Yes, I agree. Boys," she called to the excited crowd. "I have a task for you. Tonight, each time you see a fire lit, you are to go out and douse it. I do not care how you organize it, but I do not want The Hound to benefit from the warmth of a fire this night."
The male trainee warriors ran from the hall, cheering. It would be a night of fun and frolicking, no matter how it worked out. The girls sat and watched, resigned in the knowledge that they could not resist the temptation to take him into their arms to warm him during the night's chill.
The following morning, Scathach and Uathach rode out of the castle in search of the boy. The other boys were sleeping. They had spent the night chasing and dousing fires. Setanta had been unable to keep a blaze for more than a few minutes before his peers located him and doused it with buckets of water.
"I hope he is alive, mother," Uathach said with a frown.
"What will be will be, Uathach. I cannot have an unruly pupil in my care. It is not good for them, the others, or the school. If he is dead, it would have been a worthy death, and Donn will accept him."
They found him shivering beside the wet embers of his fire. His mouth was clacking so violently that for the first few moments, he was unable to speak.
"I surrender, Scathach," the boy eventually heaved between each gasped breath, "I will let you be my teacher."
"Do not fret on it too much, Hound. Each of my pupils must cross the bridge or die."