Furbaide rode through the night to reach Temuir. He had never known such anger. Had the young warrior stopped to think, he might have considered the story flawed at best. Questions as to why Mac Nessa would have ordered Ethne drowned just did not enter his mind. The king had no motive for killing Ethne, but that lack was concealed behind the boy’s rage. Medb was his aunt and to think that she might be deceiving him was not conceivable.
He had no real idea what he would do when he reached the capital. He did not even know where the king of Ulster might be. He would not be too near the royal roundhouse, not so soon after he had denounced the High King as the get of incest, surely? There were many guest roundhouses not too near the royal house and the king would more than likely be occupying one of those. Furbaide decided to wait near the Mound of Hostages until he saw some signs of his father.
The night was nearing its end when he threw his reins to the stable boy by Grainne’s Fort and entered the Fort of Kings. It was a time of peace and the gatekeeper was sleeping at his post, unaware that death was stalking the night.
He will pay for that laxity in the morning, Furbaide thought as he passed him.
The youth found a likely spot beside the Mound of Hostages that seemed shadowed and not visible from most parts of the fort. He sat down to wait, resting his back against the mound. He did not think he would see his father but suspected he would see the druid Kathvar sometime close to dawn. He knew Kathvar attended his father each morning not long after sunrise. Before the full light of day, where he was sitting would remain in shadow. He could follow the druid and then overpower him before killing his father. He did not think an old man and a fat king would present much of an obstacle. He was young, strong, and determined to avenge the death of the only woman he had ever loved.
He had only been sitting for a short time when he was surprised to see Mac Nessa flitting between roundhouses, if a fat man could flit? It seemed obvious he had been on one of his famous midnight assignations, and was only now returning to his roundhouse. Furbaide could not believe his luck as he stood up and followed his father down an alley between two guest roundhouses.
When he entered the alley, he was surprised to see two doors opening onto where he stood, one on each side. The king could have entered either door. The sun was yet to provide the settlement with meaningful light, so he could not see any clues as to which the correct roundhouse might be. He decided he could enter either, because if it was the one the king had entered, he would still be awake and if it was not, whoever was in the roundhouse would surely be asleep, and he would have enough time to withdraw.
He chose the house to his left and entered.
As the oxhide cover fell back into place the gray light of an early dawn was replaced by a blackness that was complete. Furbaide stood with his back to the entrance and stared into the dark, willing his eyes to adjust. But they did not.
It was as though the Tuatha Dé Danann had struck him blind for entering a forbidden place. He knew there would be a torch and a flint near the entrance and groped about for them in the dark. Finally, he found a torch in a bracket and a flint at its base. He used his years of experience fumbling in the dark to strike a light.
As the torch flared and his eyes adjusted to the sudden light, Furbaide could see a bed piled high with animal skins. There was no sign of his father, unless he was already buried deep in the bed.
“Who is there?” a muffled question from the heap of hides, which confused Furbaide, because it sounded both feminine and weary, almost as though just rising out of a deep sleep. The king had only just entered the roundhouse, so he would be fully awake. He realized Mac Nessa must have entered the other house. Furbaide had already turned towards the entrance when he heard a scream from the bed.
He turned back. His aunt Clothra was sitting up in the bed, her naked torso dancing in the torchlit shadows. He had to run before she came fully awake and recognized him. If he were discovered in the roundhouse of the High King’s mother at dawn, with her naked under animal hides and screaming, he did not want to imagine what would happen to him.
“Furbaide, what are you doing here?”
He looked back at his aunt but said nothing. He was now resigned to his awful fate. He could not be discovered in this roundhouse with this woman. It was unthinkable, but there was only one solution the youth could think of, however drastic and horrible. He drew his knife and walked over towards the bed.
“Furbaide?” Clothra asked, pleading in her eyes. “What do you intend?” He could see she knew what he intended, and he ran, placing his hand over her mouth just as she opened it to scream for help.
“I am sorry, aunt Clothra,” he said as he stabbed the blade into her larynx and sawed it across her throat, severing her jugular and preventing her screaming. He had remembered his training and put it to good use.
Her blood, though, splashed all over his hands and across his tunic, turning him into an image of gore. He turned from the bed and vomited between his feet. Training was all very well, but it had not prepared him for the blood or the stench, or the proximity of a family member who had done nothing more than be in the wrong place.
He looked back at Clothra. The pleading was still in her eyes. She seemed to be choking and bleeding to death at the same time. A lump leaped into his throat and he stood up and ran from the roundhouse, tears streaming from his eyes.
***
The High King saw Furbaide run out of his mother’s roundhouse with blood over his hands and tunic. He did not understand. Why his half-brother was running from Clothra’s roundhouse covered in blood? It did not make any sense. Why would Furbaide even be in his mother’s roundhouse? And who was bleeding? They must be in a bad way to have lost that much blood.
As High King, Lugaid had decided to confront his mother and order her to tell him truthfully whether she had slept with her brothers as the king of Ulster had claimed. With Dervla snoring gently beside him, Lugaid had lain awake throughout the night thinking about how the confrontation would unfold. When the birds began to sing the arrival of the dawn, he thought he heard a scream and ran from his roundhouse to investigate.
“Furbaide, what is wrong?” he shouted from his roundhouse door.
Furbaide looked up, a mien of blind panic flashed across his face. He did not need to speak. Lugaid could see the unspeakable horror in the look. Furbaide ran for his horse without saying a word.
Lugaid ran towards the roundhouse crying, “Mother!”
He came to an abrupt halt as he made it through the door. He had known what he would find when he watched Furbaide running for the stables by Grainne’s Fort, but it did not make it any easier. Clothra was lying in a pool of blood. Her hands were at her throat trying to stem the flow from her severed jugular and desperately trying to drawer breath through her ruptured windpipe. It was a vain attempt to hold back death. She looked at him with pleading eyes. She was not ready to join the Tuatha Dé Danann in their mounds. There was so much left for her to do.
“Why?” Lugaid cried as he fell to his knees beside her and took her head in his arms.
She opened her mouth as if to answer, but all that came was a gurgling noise and a swell of blood. As the blood washed into his lap, he watched his mother’s eyes flutter. From him seeing his half-brother run from the roundhouse to his mother’s dying breath, took only seconds.
***
Setanta found Lugaid in his mother’s roundhouse when he went to investigate the scream. The boy was sitting on his mother’s bed with what appeared to be a bloody mess cradled in his lap. “Lugaid, what has happened?”
The boy looked at him but did not seem to see him. It was as if the trauma of his discovery had knocked him senseless. He stared with his mouth open and no words.
“Lugaid?”
Finally, the High King shook his head, clearing it from whatever had it gripped, and said, “It is mother, she is dead.”
Setanta looked and realized that the bloody mess was Clothra. He had not been able to decipher the scene before him when he entered the roundhouse. The mother of the High King murdered in her bed was not something that would spring to mind when entering a guest roundhouse in Temuir. Bloody murder in the capital? Of kings and warriors, of course, but of the High King’s mother. It did not make any sense. Who would kill a king’s concubine and for what possible reason? And then he thought he knew.
“What happened?” he asked, thinking Lugaid had killed his mother because of the rumors. But as he looked down on the boy, he realized it would be unlikely. Lugaid was a man of music and poetry, not daggers in the dark.
“It was Furbaide,” the boy confirmed Setanta’s suspicions.
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“Are you sure?”
“I saw him run from the house covered in blood.”
“He might have found her and panicked.”
“No, she was still alive when I entered the roundhouse and the look in his eyes spoke of guilt.”
“Even so, panic can make men do the strangest things.”
“Why was he here, in Temuir? They did not attend the wedding, so why would he come here, in the dawn, in secret? He came here to kill my mother.”
“But why, Lugaid? What possible motive could he have had?”
“I do not know, but I will find out before I kill him, you can be sure of that.”
“You cannot kill him, Lugaid, he is a trained warrior. You are good with the lute, the harp and stories, not the sword.”
“I am good with the bow, Hound. I am a good hunter and I can track as well as any man.”
“Granted, you are good with the bow, but how can you question him if you kill him with an arrow?”
“I will think of a way.”
Setanta tried to think of some way to discourage his foster son from his chosen course. Were he to take on a trained warrior, he would surely die. Unless he took the way of the coward and fired an arrow into his brother’s back, he stood no chance. And not killing him face to face would be unthinkable. To kill in such a fashion would ruin a High King. The people of the Five Kingdoms would have no respect for any man who took such a course.
“Go back to Dervla and leave me time to think on it. Do you promise?”
Lugaid nodded. Setanta took both his wrists in his hands and held them tight. “I need you to swear to me that you will not do anything stupid.”
“I swear I will not do anything stupid.”
“Good, now go back to Dervla and wait for me there.”
It was well after sunrise when Setanta walked into the royal roundhouse and found Dervla alone and sleeping. He had had to prepare everything for Clothra’s passing and explain to the Assembly of Kings what he suspected to have happened. He made no mention of Furbaide, only that someone had stolen into the queen’s roundhouse during the night and cut her throat. The strangulation of the gatekeeper had taken more time, so he had been gone much longer than he would have liked. He had hoped the boy would have the good sense to stay in his roundhouse. As he stood looking down at Dervla’s blond locks splashed across her pillows, he realized it had been a vain and stupid hope.
He shook her gently to wake her.
“Setanta, what are you doing here? Where is the king?”
“I was about to ask you the same question.”
“What do you mean? I have not seen him since he ran out this morning during the dawn chorus.”
“He did not return here?”
“No, Setanta, he did not.”
“I should have seen it coming,” he sighed.
“Seen what coming. Setanta, tell me what is happening.”
“Furbaide has murdered Clothra in her roundhouse. Lugaid has gone seeking vengeance.”
Setanta watched the color drain from Dervla’s face. She realized as well as he did what it would mean.
“Why would Furbaide murder Clothra?” she repeated Setanta’s question from earlier.
“I do not know. I only know that for Lugaid to survive with his reputation intact will take a miracle.”
***
“Are you trying to tell me that you murdered my sister?” Medb asked from beside the entrance to the feast hall. The guards had forbidden Furbaide access, because he was covered in blood and looked to be mad.
“She was in the wrong roundhouse. How was I supposed to know?”
“What do you mean, in the wrong roundhouse?”
“And then she started to scream. I was just trying to keep her quiet.”
“Furbaide, what do you mean the wrong roundhouse?”
“I followed my father to his roundhouse, only when I went in he was not there. It was very dark, and I could not see anything, so I struck a light and there she was, naked in her bed.”
Medb could sense the panic in her nephew. She understood it. He should be panicking. But she also needed to know whether she was implicated in any way. She needed to know exactly what had happened before Furbaide met with a tragic end.
“How did she die, Furbaide?”
“I cut her throat.”
“Does anyone know you were there?”
Furbaide looked at the ground and did not react. Medb grabbed him by the shoulder and gave him a shake. “Does anyone know you were there.”
Her nephew nodded, not raising his head. Medb’s heart sank. There had been some small chance her nephew could have been saved, but only if he had not been seen. With a witness, he was doomed. To prevent him from speaking, Medb had to do it herself. Whatever else might have been true, Furbaide would not see the light of another dawn.
“It was Lugaid,” he said without prompting.
Medb’s heart skipped a beat and she looked over at the forest, as though she expected the High King’s champion to come riding out from under the eaves. She had only encountered Cú Chulainn once and did not want it to happen again. But more than fear of the man, she knew Cú Chulainn was tenacious and would not stop until his goals had been reached. She put her hand on the hilt of the bodkin she had kept in her bodice since the day she had been raped by Mac Nessa and was about to pull it when a horseman rode out of the forest.
***
Lugaid could see Furbaide standing beside the feast hall of Crúachain with Medb and Ailill. They seemed to be having a heated debate, but from this distance, the High King could not hear what it was about. He did not care what it was about.
Furbaide had cut Clothra’s throat and would pay.
If Lugaid had doubted his ability to track a quarry it would not have mattered. His half-brother had dripped blood from the queen’s roundhouse until he reached the road that led to Crúachain. Any fool could have guessed where he was going and followed him at their leisure. Without the need to track, Lugaid had ridden hard and was sure he was not far behind his half-brother, which proved the case when he reached the edge of the forest and looked over the Plain of Sheep to the capital of Connacht.
The High King rode out from under the eaves, dismounted, tethered his horse to the nearest tree, and took the quiver of arrows he had grabbed from the armory at Temuir off his belt. To get the mid-afternoon sun behind him, he walked a few paces onto the Plain of Sheep. Satisfied, he stuck several arrows from his quiver into the turf and lifted his bow off his back.
He could see the queen staring intently at him as he nocked his first arrow. She said something to Furbaide, and he turned to look over his shoulder. He shielded his eyes from the mid-afternoon sun for a few seconds before he dropped his hand, turned and ran towards the stable where Lugaid assumed he had tethered his horse. The High King tracked his brother’s run as he drew and loosed three arrows in quick succession. He knew Setanta would be proud of the speed.
***
The queen watched the rider tether his horse to the nearest tree, take a quiver of arrows from his belt, and walk a few paces from the forest edge. He took the bow from his back and she watched him nock an arrow before she said, “Who is that?” nodding at the man, bringing Furbaide’s attention to his imminent death.
Furbaide looked back and covered his eyes to protect them from the mid-afternoon glare. It took him only a few seconds to realize it was Lugaid and that he had an arrow nocked and drawn. He ran. His horse was in the stable, easily a hundred paces from where they were standing. He knew that Lugaid was no warrior or swordsman, but he also knew that with a bow, there was no one in the Five Kingdoms who could compete with him.
Furbaide was an athletic man. He had always bested Lugaid when they were competing. True he was older by two years, but even so, he had been proud to always win. He could not outrun an arrow, though. As he ran he heard a whoosh and heaved a sigh of relief as an arrow appeared to sprout out of the ground two paces to his left and in front by ten.
Another whoosh saw another arrow, six paces to his right and three in front. He was nearing the stables, starting to believe he would reach his horse, when he was punched in the back and knocked from his feet.
An arrow had taken him between the shoulder blades and pierced his spine with enough force to traverse his torso and come out through his sternum. He rolled over, the arrow snapping under him. Medb walked over with Ailill at her side.
Furbaide looked up at her, pleadingly, “I cannot feel my legs or move my arms.”
***
The queen looked down at her nephew where he lay whining. He was looking up, pleading in his eyes. She could see he knew what his fate was to be. There was no way the queen could let him live with the knowledge he possessed.
“Let him pass,” she heard Ailill call as he walked towards the gate. “He is the High King, Sidhe damn all your hides.”
She looked over briefly to see a group of warriors had armed themselves and were preparing to intercept the rider at the gate. She knew she had very little time. She knelt beside her nephew’s head.
“You know I cannot let you live,” she whispered in his ear as she stroked his forehead. She slipped her bodkin from the bodice of her dress.
“I am sorry, nephew,” she said as she lifted his head slightly and pushed the bodkin into the back of his neck at the base of the skull. There was no blood. The puncture wound where the blade had entered would be visible only to the most detailed scrutiny.
She laid his head back down and closed his eyes just as Lugaid reined in beside them and jumped from the saddle. “Is he dead?”
“Yes, Lugaid. The arrow pierced his heart. He was dead before he hit the ground.”
Medb looked up at the High King and blanched. There was a look of utter fury on his face, as though he held Medb responsible for the death of Furbaide.
“He killed my mother. I needed to question him to find out why.”
“I am sorry, sire, but nothing could have been done,” Medb responded, with what she hoped was a sympathetic expression.
“What were you discussing when I arrived?”
“I was trying to get him to talk. He was covered in blood. I needed to know why.”
“What did he say?”
“Nothing. He was in shock, sire.”
The High King did not acknowledge the response. He mounted his horse and rode from Crúachain without a backward glance.