Medb was propped up on one elbow, watching the rise and fall of Ailill’s chest as he slept. She could not sleep. The following day’s events weighed too heavily on her mind and heart. Six years had passed since the death of the High King—six years since the last time she had seen Mac Nessa. She was not looking forward to seeing him again. The last time she saw the king of Ulster, he had been doing up his triús after raping her.

Ailill still did not know.

The following day, her husband would be in the feast hall with the other kings and the chieftains of the Five Kingdoms would arrive from far and wide. The Assembly would receive proposals for a new High King. The Elder Council had not found a suitable candidate in opposition to Ulster. There would be some half-hearted nominations, probably arranged by Mac Nessa to lend the farce an element of authenticity, but the main thrust would be behind a proposal for Ulster. There would be no dissent, and then the kings would vote.

The chieftains believed him to be a strong man.

The chieftains believed him to be a fair man.

Medb knew him for what he was. Not a protector of the weak but a defiler. A man who uses power to get what he wants. A man who wants to be High King because it will make him richer than he already is. A man who does not believe in any other’s ability to rule. A man whom Medb knew was the puppet of a druid; only he was too arrogant to see it or believe it.

Ailill needed to show strength.

The Assembly required a unanimous vote to elect a High King. Her husband needed to veto the proposal, and she was unsure he had what it would take. She needed Ailill to stand up to Ulster’s scheming. She thought she needed to give him an incentive. Through no fault of his own, Ailill did not understand why Mac Nessa should not be High King. Despite saying he would not vote for him, Medb knew her husband would yield if the pressure became too much.

She could think of only one thing to incite him.

The queen did not want to tell Ailill what had happened on the banks of the Boyne six years before. It was not that she was protecting Mac Nessa, but Ailill. Her husband had a strong heart and was a good man, but he was no warrior. If he went up against him, the king of Ulster would crush Ailill, and Medb did not want to lose another of her men. Mac Nessa would not wield the sword, not the fat king. One of his champions would kill Ailill. Conall or Fergus would do it in good faith, or perhaps the new one, the so-called Hound of Chulainn.

Leaning over, Medb kissed her husband’s brow and gently stroked his face. He came awake slowly. His dreams seemed good because his eyes smiled as he looked at his wife.

“Medb, what is it?”

“We need to talk about tomorrow.”

“I know what I am to do. I must oppose the proposal of Mac Nessa for High King,” Ailill sighed and rolled over with his back to Medb.

“Yes, that is true, but I think it is time you knew why you need to oppose him.”

Ailill turned back and propped himself on his elbow. Medb could see a slight look of confusion clouding his face. He thought Mac Nessa’s part in their son’s death was why Medb was so against the king of Ulster. He had accepted the story of the bruise in the river without question. In some ways, his naiveté had hurt her as much as the pain in her cheek had.

“It is not then because he executed Mane?”

“The humiliation he put our son through should be enough for the people to know he would make a bad High King, but no, it is worse than that.”

“What could be worse, Medb, than the loss of a son?”

“It is not worse than the loss of a son. It is worse than the humiliation of a son. Do you recall when a log struck me while washing in the Boyne?”

Ailill nodded. Medb could see the cloudiness of his face was becoming worse. She suspected he knew deep down what was to come. Perhaps he had not been wholly convinced when she first told him about being struck by a log. Now she watched doubts surfacing in a face too innocent to hide his true feelings.

“It was not a log that gave me the bruise,” she said, trying to build up the courage to tell her husband and ready herself to prevent him from reacting in a way that would get him killed.

“What do you mean, not a log?”

“I went to the secluded clearing, where the river runs through, like you told me. I was lying with my head on the bank, and Mac Nessa surprised me.”

“Surprised you how?”

“He said he wanted to barter for our son’s life. I refused, and so he struck me. When I awoke, he was on top of me—”

“You mean…”

“Yes, Ailill. Mac Nessa took by force what I would not agree to give him. He raped me.”

Medb watched her husband’s face take on a rigidity before becoming suffused with anger. She watched his naked torso as it became red with the heat of his rage. As he tensed, ready to leap from the bed, Medb threw her arms around his waist.

“No, Ailill, that is not the way. His men will crush you, and I cannot stand to lose you either.”

“Get off me, woman! You think me weak? You think I will stand by and watch my woman defiled by the likes of Ulster?”

“No, Ailill, but think about what you mean to do. He has Conall and Fergus and that new boy with the dead eyes. You are no match for them; they are born killers. Your strength lies in other areas.”

“I am not a coward, Medb.”

“No one thinks you are a coward, Ailill.”

“That is not true. The other kings think my wife governs me. They laugh at me behind my back. They think me not only a coward but weak.”

“Let them laugh, Ailill. Mesgegra and Dáire are weak. A fat fool governs them, who, in turn, is governed by an old man. Better a strong woman than a fat fool, surely? Where will I be if an Ulster champion kills you? We must be wily and do this thing cleverly. We cannot just run at him with a spear and hope to succeed. Please, Ailill, you must trust me in this.”

Slowly, Medb could feel the tension of imminent battle ease out of her husband. As she talked, he began to accept the wisdom of her words and relax into the necessity of a discussion.

“I must do this,” he persisted, but Medb could feel the doubt beginning to gain the upper hand.

The tale has been illicitly lifted; should you spot it on Amazon, report the violation.

“We will avenge ourselves on him, but we will do it in a way that means we will not be hurt, and none in the Five Kingdoms will know it was us.”

“But how?” Ailill slumped back into the hides of the bed, ready to listen to reason.

“We will hurt him through wiles. We will take everything from him with our superior cunning. And when that is done, we will crush him like the worm he is.”

“And where do you think we should begin this destruction?”

“We will begin with his son, Lugaid.”

Medb could see that she had yet to convince her husband. Ailill shook his head in confusion. He could not see where Medb’s mind was taking her. She admitted the boy was a youth with his head in the clouds, not a warrior or a politician. She read in his expression that Ailill was wondering how they could hope to use him in a fight against his father unless they just killed him. Undoubtedly, he thought Ulster would shrug off anything that happened to Lugaid with a laugh and a determination to get a stronger son.

“Lugaid is weak and can be manipulated. He is a dreamer, not a fighter,” she said.

“But how will we manipulate him?”

“We can think about that as soon as we have him where he can do the most damage.”

“And where is that, my queen?”

“We should convince the Assembly of Kings to make him High King.”

***

The following day, tempers were running high in the feast hall of Temuir. Kathvar knew that while the Five Kingdoms remained divided by lack of a High King, they were at significant risk. The druid had warned them of the gathering Roman storm. The small men from beyond the southern mountains had already subjugated the tribes of Gaul and had twice invaded Alba. It would only be a matter of time before they returned for good. And then Ériu, too, would be vulnerable. Kathvar was convinced he was the only man in the Five Kingdoms who recognized the threat. Mac Nessa paid lip service to the druid’s fears, but that was because he saw it as his way to gain the throne in Temuir.

“And why can we not agree on Mac Nessa?” the druid asked again.

He had put forward the king of Ulster as the best candidate after the death of Connery six years before. He had been proposing Mac Nessa since and was running the risk of expulsion from the council because he was present at the Assembly of Kings against their express wishes. The elders felt the choice needed to rest with the people, as represented by the chieftains. Most elders felt that they had intervened on too many occasions. It was time for the kingdoms to decide their fate.

“The druids have said no. Mac Nessa is not a worthy king,” Mesgegra, king of Leinster, said. “He conspired with Nuadu to kill Eterscel and then tried to kill Connery long before any Britons arrived on our shores.”

“That is conjecture, Mesgegra. Mac Nessa’s part in that coup was only ever in the mind of the late High King,” Kathvar argued, ignoring the frown of Conall and Fergus, who had both been directly affected by Ulster’s plotting.

***

Ulster’s king listened to the damning words but said nothing. The morning was a charade the druid had orchestrated to convince the chieftains the vote was legitimate. Only the kings had a vote in the election. However, letting the chieftains at the Assembly know it was all for show would be madness. The chieftains needed to believe they were represented by their kings, however far from reality.

“Still, the druids have made their wishes known.”

“And what do I look like to you?” Kathvar asked with as much scorn as he could muster. “Am I not a druid?”

Unlike the rest of the elders, Kathvar did not think the people were sound enough to manage their affairs. The previous Taidle Ulad had been of the same mind, but the reaver cut off his head.

***

“You are more Mac Nessa’s man than a druid of the council,” Ailill said, beginning to tire of the game.

Medb had calculated Ailill’s interjection to incite a reaction from the crowd, and it did not fail. The kings and the chieftains in the hall all started to talk at once. The king of Connacht was breaching etiquette by suggesting Kathvar was anything other than an impartial witness. It did not matter how valid the claim might be. The interference of the druids was not something anyone should raise during an Assembly of Kings.

As each chieftain raised their voice, the noise became a cacophony. Ailill sat calmly in his place with a smile on his face. Medb had predicted this occurrence down to the slowly rising voices.

Ailill smiled at the noise, happy in his seat at the end of the table furthest from Mac Nessa. It was the place with the least honor, but Ailill did not mind. Medb and he had known what honor Ulster would give him. His place at the table would not lessen his satisfaction at having questioned the process.

Ailill could not look at Ulster. If he were to look at Mac Nessa, he would be unable to keep his face neutral. Whatever else he might be, Ulster was paranoid. He would immediately suspect what any ill looks from Ailill would mean. He would assume that Medb had finally told their shared secret, which neither had agreed to keep but both needed to keep. At least the king of Ulster would have assumed. He needed Medb to keep that secret because had she not, he would have incurred the wrath of the Five Kingdoms. Mac Nessa would not react in the feast hall. He would not risk the secret Ailill exposing the secret in front of the kings and chieftains. He would do nothing openly, but an assassin would be dispatched at night to provide the king of Connacht with a new smile.

“I would like to make a proposal,” Ailill shouted to be heard.

The noise stopped abruptly.

The kings and chieftains all looked at him with surprise. Ailill was not supposed to make proposals. The election was supposed to have already been decided. For him to first throw the process into question and then make a proposal was, at the very least, a strange turn of events.

“Who?” Mac Nessa asked with a smirk. “It cannot be you, Connacht, who does not even rule in his own kingdom.”

There was a hiss of indrawn breath as the men in the feast hall now expected Ailill to take offense. However, the king of Connacht had been well prepared by his wife and let the words of Ulster wash over him.

“No, no. I am too old to accept such a responsibility. No, I was thinking of someone much younger.”

“Who, man? Spit it out!”

“I was thinking of your son, Lugaid.”

***

The chieftains held their breath as if a sudden backdraft had stolen the air from the feast hall. They each wanted to laugh and tell Ailill he was mad, that it would never work, but they could not. They could not because it was not mad, and it probably would work. As the seconds passed, they each began to wonder why they had not thought of it sooner.

Mac Nessa sat in silence with the other men in the feast hall. He was thinking the same thing as the others present. Why did I not think of it before? With that weakling as High King, I can rule from the comfort of my roundhouse in Emain Macha.

“Are there any objections?” Kathvar asked the assembled kings. They shook their heads. None could think of anything to say.

“Do any chieftains have an issue to raise with the proposal?” The chieftains also shook their heads. “We will vote. All in favor of Lugaid for High King, raise your right hand.” The four kings each raised their hand. The chieftains began to cheer and stamp their feet, falling into the mood of the Assembly with fervor.

***

Mac Nessa and Kathvar had adjourned to the king’s roundhouse. The druid poured them each a cup of mead. His expression was contemplative as he handed the king his cup.

“Do you think it will work?” the king asked.

Kathvar shrugged and nodded. He could think of nothing that would stand in the way of Ulster ruling the Five Kingdoms with his weakling of a son as his puppet.

“It does not matter what I think now, though, sire. It is done.”

“There are ways around that, Kathvar, as you well know.”

“There is no need for violence. I would have raised an objection during the Assembly if I thought it would not work. No, I do not think Lugaid will be interested in ruling the Five Kingdoms and will welcome your support and guidance. Nothing could be easier than controlling the rule of a fop.”

“The Hound is his foster father. Do you think that might cause an issue?”

“The Hound is your man, sire. I do not think he will present any problems.”

“Why did Ailill propose Lugaid?”

“I think that Connacht has finally had enough of listening to his wife. He stood up for himself for once. I would surmise that he thought suggesting Lugaid would circumvent your ambitions. In many ways, it has, but only to the outsider looking in,” the druid smiled.

“I must admit, Kathvar. I never thought I would rule the Five Kingdoms as a puppeteer.”