Rise and Fall of Empires

Quintus didn't wander aimlessly after he returned to the West. For most parts, he was quite industrious. The idea of doing nothing as he waited for events to unfold was not appealing.

After leaving the mountain, it took him a year to return to the Roman Empire, which by then had taken up Christianity — a faith he came to appreciate for its demand for human decency.

He found this new religion exalted kindness and mercy as opposed to the old Roman pagan rituals accepted by the culture of his youth. After hundreds of years on the mountain learning the Way, his own beliefs in deities naturally moved on from what he was born into. Now he understood that gods and enlightened beings were unseen and unknown but at the same time were righteous and compassionate — qualities they wished humankind was more attuned with.

In that new Roman Empire, Quintus established a life of sorts in the ancient metropolis of Aleppo in what is today Syria. He stayed there for a decade before moving on. In his next location, he altered his identity by changing his surname only. To retain some sense of self, he retained his first name. It was a pattern repeated over and over every ten years or so.

It was in Aleppo that his career in construction began. It was a decision that proved fruitful. From there, he worked his way up in the building trade around various parts of the eastern Mediterranean, and after a hundred years or so, he became a fine builder as well as an accomplished architect.

In the years that followed, buildings accompanied him throughout history. They easily outlived people and outlasted empires. Their durability comforted him in an ever-changing world. Through late antiquity, he went on to build some of the grandest structures of the period, the third Hagia Sophia in Constantinople being a notable example.

Much of Quintus' time was spent within the boundaries of the Eastern Roman Empire, which eventually became known as the Byzantine Empire. Among his favorite cities that he lived and worked in were Jerusalem, Barca, Germa in Galatia, Mokissos, and Mystras in the southeast of the Peloponnese.

From the seventh century onwards, the Byzantine Empire's borders gradually contracted due to invading Islamic armies and infighting. Eventually, the last vestiges of what was the Roman Empire succumbed to the Ottoman Turks in 1453, but by then, Quintus was already long gone. Two hundred years earlier, he left Constantinople and traveled through Eastern and Central Europe to assist with the rebuilding of what the Mongol invasions had destroyed. Given the amount of destruction and slaughtering done, he was busy for some time.

A century later, just after the worst of the Black Death cut Europe's population by half, Quintus headed towards the Italian peninsula. It was overdue that he returned to the land of his birth, although the attachment he once had about returning was no more. For just over a hundred years, from Rome to Bologna, he built hundreds of castles, places of worship, and homes. He similarly influenced dozens of Italian architects who went on to design some of the definitive structures of what would be known as the Renaissance period.

Around 1460, Quintus ventured back north, this time through the Old Swiss Confederacy and then the German states. He kept heading up into the unions of Denmark, Sweden, and Norway avoiding trouble while doing good deeds, his Tao Yin exercises and meditation, as he went. He then did a U-turn and arrived in what is now the Netherlands in the uneventful summer of 1472.

A year later, Quintus was in France, where he spent some 20 years before he moved to Spain, arriving just as Christopher Columbus stumbled upon the New World.

After some time there and in Portugal, he sailed across to England, where he once again applied his building skills, which attracted the attention of a certain King Henry VIII, who had him work on construction projects at King's College Chapel and Westminster Abbey. Quintus spoke with the Tudor king only on one occasion during some renovations, sometime before the monarch's 40th birthday when he was still thin and respected. As they talked, Quintus noted the king's mood was off, something one of the monarch's counselors attributed to an old jousting injury.

Four years later, with the king's mood worsening, that same counselor lost his head for treason, as would many others, queens included, in due course. By then, Quintus had traveled north to the Scottish Highlands, where he lived for several decades as a challenge, before migrating to Ireland, which he called home for more than a century. During this period, he repaired old Norman castles for Irish nobles and taught construction techniques to common folk. He also built several churches and cathedrals for the faithful until 1649, when Cromwell's invading forces put an end to that. Eight years earlier, ethnic and sectarian violence were omens of things to come. He had hoped it wouldn't get any worse, but it did.

However, I can tell you nothing is by chance. All his building — especially places of worship — and his many acts of selfless charity, unmentioned here, had upset the 13 Demon Kings of the Pit, who were good to their word in watching him. The shadowy demons couldn't tolerate so much goodness coming from a single individual and one who was near immortal. Feeling unbound by heavenly rules and any past assurances they made with Tai, they maliciously set a path for Meng and his two henchmen to return to the human realm. This one called Quintus, favored by above high, needed to be sternly tested, they thought.

The Island, the Gibbet

The wooden gallows-type structure built on a small rocky island was the only unnatural feature on the lake in Ireland's Wexford county. It was a gibbet built by English parliamentarian soldiers from Cromwell's New Model Army, an outfit I must say that I had no hand in creating.

On a summer's day in 1652, such men rowed out in boats to hoist a man-sized iron cage onto the gibbet. Inside the cage was Quintus. Apart from a loincloth, he was naked. Filthy and disheveled, he held no malice towards those who had beaten and mistreated him or who were about to hang him out in the elements.

As they hoisted him up onto the gibbet, most of the red-coated soldiers turned their eyes away. Some were even fearful that their God would strike them down for what they were doing. Many of them witnessed how Quintus' bruises and cuts healed fully within a day or, in some cases, just hours. They had to come to appreciate why the Irish referred to him as a living saint.

Despite this, all 13 men on the rocky island that day were more afraid of their commander than heavenly retribution. Their leader, Colonel Alcott Entwistle, watched them intently. Entwistle had a reputation even before coming to Ireland. But he didn't, at least at first glance, appear nefarious. He was tall and thin with clipped, dainty features.

The colonel earned his early infamy by burning at the stake a dozen elderly women accused of witchery in East Anglia. Rumor had it he did so to cover up his own occult activities. Yes, I can confirm Entwistle dabbled in the dark satanic arts, as did his two provost guards who were always by his side.

But it was his more recent acts in Ireland that shocked most of his soldiers. He'd made it his goal in life to reduce the Irish population in the county by half, and his preferred ways of doing this was either through inducing mass famine or hangings.

Now, as he stood overseeing Quintus' punishment on the island, he and his two provost guards took pleasure in yelling at a couple of soldiers arriving in the final rowboat.

'Hurry up, get those rotting things up here!' Entwistle yelled.

'You're late!' a bodyguard bellowed.

The soldiers alighted from the boat, dragging with them a large wicker basket.

'Give them a hand,' Entwistle ordered his provost guards.

Dread washed over Quintus as the men brought the wicker basket to below his cage. They upended the basket and from it spilled a dozen decapitated heads onto the stony ground.

Quintus closed his eyes and bit his lip in anguish, which caused Entwistle to chuckle.

'I guess you now wish you didn't hand yourself into me don't you saint? You should have run and gone into hiding, but too late now,' Entwistle said. 'Now I've made any mention of your name punishable by death, so you've only got yourself to blame,' he said. 'And the rule of law needs to be enforced. You may notice numerous familiar faces among this bunch, even that Englishman, the Royalist Edward Hyde is under there somewhere. Was he a friend of yours? I was told he was.'

Quintus didn't reply, nor did he look at the heads eight feet below him. He could only think the worst and presume they were folk from the county who had wanted to hide him from the likes of Entwistle.

'The Irish simpletons say you're blessed with everlasting life. How can one fight against such extreme beliefs?' Entwistle chuckled. 'But I must admit, I'm intrigued how you even survived in this wretched backwater. The papists would typically burn someone like you, insisting you were in league with the devil,' he said. 'Therefore, it's up to me to do what they failed to do.'

Entwistle paused, waiting for some reaction from Quintus, which was not forthcoming, so he resumed speaking and raised his voice by a decibel or two.

'All this talk of everlasting life does fascinate me, though. We should wager on who will die first out of the two of us,' he taunted. 'I'll even gamble a farthing on it.'

Again, Quintus did not react.

That frustrated the colonel, who ordered his provost guards and the other soldiers back to the boats, leaving just himself in front of Quintus. He stared hatefully at the caged man.

'Listen to me, saint, and listen intently. If you escape from this island, I will kill every living being in a ten-mile radius. Every child, every swallow, every lamb. Even the butterflies won't be safe,' Entwistle said.

Each of his words carried a malevolence that was centuries old.

Entwistle turned and made his way to the boats. Just before getting into one of them, he took a final look at Quintus and chuckled bitterly. It wasn't long before the colonel and his soldiers rowed away.

Quintus wouldn't have any more visitors step foot on that small rocky outcrop for another 12 years.

When Endurance is Everything

With no water, a normal person perishes in three days. Deprived of food it takes a human around three weeks to die. Given Quintus' abilities, he would not have to contend with such scenarios while locked in the cage. Physically and mentally, he was equipped to cope with such an ordeal, at least for a decade or so.

Due to his training, his body could continuously repair itself from any abuse suffered in the cage. But that doesn't mean he didn't feel the pain and discomfort of his predicament. He tolerated and endured it.

But I don't think I can do justice describing to you what Quintus went through. I'd say most of you would not make it past 48 hours in a similar situation before your mind unraveled.

In contrast, after his own 48 hours in the cage, Quintus managed to get himself into a steady frame of mind. He put aside the grief for those who Entwistle had murdered and whose heads were below him like rubble. Quintus looked at his situation for what he understood it to be. Meng had finally come back for revenge in the form of another megalomaniac, that being Entwistle. It was no surprise. Entwistle even looked like Meng, just a Caucasian version.

To keep his mind clear, Quintus recalled his time on the mountain. From the Tao Yin exercises to talks on philosophy, he recollected them all in accurate detail. If any moments in the cage kept his mind strong, it was when he thought of his teacher and his own responsibility to mankind at the end of time.

He reminded himself repeatedly what Tai had told him: 'You must be able to endure the unendurable.' He was determined he would outlast Entwistle and remain true to the Way. He would endure and come out on the other side not only intact but stronger.

Well, that was the plan anyway.

Why Entwistle had chosen such punishment as gibbetting, Quintus was unsure, but he simply reminded himself it could be worse. It wasn't a dark, dank dungeon, and it was not as extreme as the crucifixions he witnessed as a centurion.

In the cage, he had at least the days and nights and the four seasons to keep him entertained. Apart from decaying skulls below him, he found the view quite pleasing. On sunny days, the lake and its surroundings were beautiful enough to help him forget his predicament and to disregard the pain.

As the years went by, Quintus got to know each and every tree around the lake. He watched some sprout and saw others fall to rot and feed the soil.

The closest thing he had to a social life was befriending birds, especially bullfinches, who he taught to sing. He welcomed the white swans visiting for winter and generations of swallows who built mud nests under his gibbet's beam during warmer months.

Even a bunch of fairies — who watched him for years before making themselves known — offered their friendship. Several of these diminutive folk occasionally visited him at night, their flapping silver wings shining in the dark.

While Quintus saw such fantastical sights, he saw no people, not a soul, not at least during the first seven years. He presumed Entwistle had made the lake off-limits. It felt at times as if he was the last person on Earth.

The Wall

During Quintus' seventh year in the cage, a single rowboat manned by Entwistle's two provost guards came out onto the water and rowed close enough to check that he indeed remained in the cage. They noted that the naked, bearded, and longhaired man was alive and then rowed back to shore.

A week later, more men arrived, this time laborers who began cutting down trees around the shoreline. After the trees were cleared, another gang of laborers began building a 10-foot-high stonewall circling the lake. It took them three years to finish the wall, which threw the natural dynamics of the lake out of kilter. The water silted up, and an algae bloom killed the fish. The swans and the bullfinches no longer visited him, while the swallows went elsewhere to build their nests. The fairies lost their home among the trees, and they, too, had to relocate.

To fill the vacuum, hundreds of crows arrived. They insidiously cawed day and night, taking turns to perch on the gibbet or on the wall.

Quintus rightly assumed Entwistle was behind the building of the wall, which he grudgingly recognized was weakening his resolve. A gnawing sense of unease began to chip away inside him, and by the time of his 10th winter on the island, cracks finally began to appear in his mental state. The monotonous horror of it all had become like sandpaper upon his soul.

The first thing to go adrift was his perception of time. Everything seemed to slow down, which magnified his suffering even more. Short periods of mental instability and acute restlessness followed. The shells of what remained of the skulls below began to haunt him, as did the incessant caws from the crows. A mild form of simmering panic set in.

A case of content theft: this narrative is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.

Sometimes, Quintus thought he saw soldiers patrolling the wall, tossing rocks at the crows, but he wasn't sure if he was hallucinating or not. On other occasions, he thought he heard the music from an erhu just as he did way back on White Dragon Mountain. It seemed to drift in on the northerly breeze, pushing out the nightmarish tones of the crows. It brought him some comfort. Revitalized him to a point.

He likewise began sleeping, something he hadn't done for centuries. It was another way for him to escape the misery and mind-numbing boredom he faced. Be it in his dreams or his waking hours, more than once, he called out to his teacher, Tai, for help. However, by his 11th year, it got to the stage where he wasn't sure if anyone was listening or not.

Midway through the last month of the year 1664, one of the coldest in a century, the rope that held the cage snapped. He and the cage dropped to the stony ground. The cage smashed the remains of the skulls of his friends before it came to a rest in an awkward position between two slabs of dark rock.

Gravity pushed his body into the top of the cage, which now was pointing in a downward direction. How he had been for the previous 12 years was positively more comfortable than what he now had to deal with. Quintus attempted to summon his abilities of levitation to budge the cage, but it was useless. Not being able to do his exercises or meditation for so long left him worn out and disconnected from his talents.

As for the crows, they just laughed at him.

An hour after his fall, it began to rain lightly, heralding what would be five days of non-stop drizzle and sleet. As the cold began to further soak into his bones, Quintus asked himself how much more slow-motion obliteration he could endure. He didn't dare answer himself. His sanity was now hanging by a thread.

A day after the rain ceased, he finally had visitors.

Given a Choice

As he lay in a semi-consciousness state, Quintus heard two separate sounds. One was of agitated crows; the other was of paddles hitting water. He opened his eyes, tilted his head towards the noise that was not so typical. Moments later, three rowboats emerged from the morning mist, scaring a half-dozen crows off the gibbet.

At the bow of the lead boat was Entwistle, who wore a fancy collared cloak trimmed with braid. Now aged in his 50s, his thinning grey hair was mostly hidden underneath a beaver hat.

A shivering, naked Quintus could do naught but stay fixed to where he was and wait for them to land. The first on the island was Entwistle. His two bodyguards and five other soldiers followed. Soon enough, they found Quintus wedged among rocks in the rusty cage.

'Oh dear, oh my, did the rope fail you saint?' Entwistle asked, not expecting an answer. 'You look a right mess, in fact, more like a filthy animal than a man. What are we going to do with you, eh?' he mocked. 'How about you have a bath or a splashdown?'

And with that, Entwistle pulled out his private part and urinated on Quintus.

'Splashdown it is,' Entwistle mocked.

The urine bounced off Quintus' matted hair and beard. Dribbled off his cheeks, his chest, and shoulders. The humiliation of it all brought him to his senses, but he refused to respond, instead choosing to bury his rage.

Entwistle finished urinating but continued his heckling.

'If you plan on hanging there for another dozen years, I should have a chain made of iron,' he taunted. 'But until then, we will have to make do with some more rope.'

Entwistle nodded for three soldiers to pick Quintus up and carry him back to the gibbet, where a soldier with a fresh coil of rope waited.

Entwistle followed, talking as he went.

'In old age, I find myself softening, so I'll offer you something saint. Let me end your needless suffering, all of its loneliness,' Entwistle said.

As the soldiers got to the gibbet and stood Quintus upright in the cage, Entwistle drew out his thin-bladed sword.

'It would only take a quick pierce to the heart to finish it all or are you fine with rotting away some more in the cage? This is the opportunity of a lifetime here.'

Quintus remained silent and blank-faced.

'So, what's it to be saint?'

Quintus still didn't reply. Instead, he turned his head to look at the soldier applying the rope to the cage. This infuriated Entwistle.

'Give me an answer!' he screamed. 'A liberating death or more of the cage?'

Quintus then looked squarely at Entwistle. From somewhere deep inside himself, he discovered his long-neglected voice.

'I will never give up. I will endure,' he whispered.

'Endure? A fool's reply, but as you so wish,' Entwistle snorted. 'Either way, I will grind your bones to dust one day.'

Entwistle ordered his men to rehoist Quintus onto the gibbet. He next told his two provost guards to retrieve something from a rowboat.

Moments later, they returned with a large basket filled with severed heads. They upturned the basket, spilling the heads onto what remained of the old pile of skulls just below the rehoisted Quintus, who let out a moan of distress.

Delighted to get a reaction, Entwistle burst into a fit of laughter that lasted for at least a minute. His jackal-like howl dug into Quintus, niggling away at the mass of emotions that now simmered inside.

The still-laughing Entwistle gestured towards the heads.

'Now, if you look closely, there's an Italian among this collection,' he said. 'A priest sent by Rome to confirm rumors of your pathetic existence.'

And with that, Quintus snapped.

'You butcher! I will follow you to Hell if that's what it takes. Mark my words, Entwistle. You will pay for what you have done!' he exploded.

Everyone, including Quintus, has a breaking point. The mass of fury he'd stored away had nowhere to go but out. Unrestrained, he screamed, he shouted, he shook his cage with what strength he had left.

After the initial surprise, Entwistle began to enjoy the moment for the victory he perceived it to be.

'Finally, where's your goodness now?'

Quintus roared and shook the cage some more.

'Goodness? Goodness has nothing to do with it!' Quintus screamed.

'Oh, yes, it does. For you, it means everything,' replied the man below him.

Quintus spat at Entwistle, but the phlegm went nowhere near its intended target.

'A saint no longer, just a madman stuck on a rock. My work is done!' laughed Entwistle, who waved for his men to return to their boats and leave the island.

Quintus continued screaming and shaking the cage as they rowed away. It was pure rage, uncontrollable anger. Something he'd never felt before to such an extreme. He would go on in such a manner for the rest of the day until he blacked out from exhaustion.

Three days later, he woke to find his small island and the surrounding countryside dusted with snow. It was the first time he had seen anything like it since being in the cage. It was a novelty, but it was certainly no comfort. It was just another indicator of the harshness of that winter.

The sight of the fresh heads below him, now speckled white, renewed his loathing for Entwistle. The hatred, the disgust, consumed Quintus day and night like a fever, at least until the arrival of spring when it stealthily retreated somewhere inside his humanity.

By the time summer arrived, his exhausted soul was as fragile as a gossamer thread. Luckily for him, sometime midyear, he had another visitor but one more benevolent.

The Visitor

The lake was chilly a foot beneath the surface, and Alba O'Malley caught her breath as the water rose above her chest. At her feet, cold mud squished between her toes until she lunged forward to swim. The 22-year-old managed to keep her head above water as she dog paddled towards the small rocky island where the gibbet stood. She paddled as fast as she could, mindful that a patrolling soldier might see her.

Earlier, from the shoreline, Alba could see that there was a human figure inside the gibbet's cage. But the young woman knew she had to get onto the island to learn beyond doubt it was no myth that the 'saint' was still alive.

Twelve feet from the island, she could see the caged man was breathing. His chest sucking in and then expelling air. He was filthy, long-haired, and naked. The legend wasn't pretty, but it was true.

With such information, Alba hoped to rally family and friends to free the saint. No longer would they allow him to remain in such an evil condition.

The crows on the gibbet ignored her as she got onto the island, and as for Quintus, his mind was so scrambled it took him several minutes to register he had a visitor. Eventually, he managed to open his eyes. Initially, he could only make out a blurry profile. Whoever it was, they began saying something, and initially, it was difficult to understand. It sounds like a young woman praying, Quintus thought.

A minute later, his eyes adjusted, and he saw Alba. Her head was lowered while she recited prayers. He noticed that her underclothes were soaked and muddy and that she quivered slightly. The morning sun's rays highlighted her auburn hair.

Upon finishing her prayers, she looked at him in the cage.

What a pathetic sight I must be, he thought.

Quintus wanted to call out to her but found he couldn't utter a single word. He could only look at her and meet her gaze. He noted her strong jawline and her friendly eyes.

After several minutes, the young woman softly spoke in Gaelic.

'I'm sorry I'm unable to help you now; forgive me,' she said. 'But we will be back to rescue you. I promise.'

Alba then turned away and searched the shoreline for patrolling soldiers, and once confident there were none, she began her return.

Just as she reentered the water, Quintus found his voice.

'Thank you,' he said, but it was far too soft for her to hear.

He watched her paddle and then wade back to the shore, where she put on her jacket bodice, and petticoat that were waiting for her on a rock.

Once dressed, she returned to the wall where a crudely made nine-foot ladder awaited. She climbed up it, and when she got to the top of the wall, she pulled it over with a short rope, so she could use it to get her down to the other side.

And then she was gone.

The important thing about Alba's visit is that it gave Quintus hope. After living so long in that cage, hope in himself, others, and his mission had nearly run dry. Without hope in goodness, a human is prone to, sooner or later, smash themselves to pieces. No matter how mythical or mystical he or she may be.

Quintus now had enough hope — in himself, in the Gods, and his master — but only just. Despite Alba's good intentions, he had two more years alone on that small rocky island.

Free

It was just after midnight, and the glow of a full summer's moon guided two small rowboats toward the island. Each boat carried three young Irishmen. Among them, a large red-headed individual named Seamus O'Malley held a lantern.

The boats reached the island, and the men hopped out. They made their way toward the shadowy outline of the gibbet. Yes, they were fearful and cautious.

They were likewise appalled when the lantern's light revealed the pile of rotted and crumbling skulls under the cage. More than one of them made the sign of the cross across his chest.

Seamus lifted the lantern up high. Its light allowed him to see Quintus' figure in the cage. The 17-year-old cleared his throat.

'You have suffered the unimaginable. Finally, we have come to set you free,' Seamus said.

Quintus was unable to reply. His sanity, by this stage, was frayed. He remained detached from reality. Even as they freed him from the rusty cage and carried him to one of their boats, he was unsure if he was hallucinating or not.

Saint or No Saint

Sitting in a wooden bathtub half-filled with water, Quintus leaned forward as a stout woman of age used a sponge to scrub layers of filth and dead skin from his back.

Using a sharp knife, she had already hacked away at his matted hair and beard, which were both filthy with a vast array of minute critters.

The water in the tub would have to be changed five times that day to clean him properly.

The tub was set up under an apple tree in between the stone hut that sheltered the animals during the winter months and two larger windowless cottages that housed the O'Malley clan.

There was no way that the ruddy-faced woman was going to permit such a grimy body into their home in such a state. Saint or no saint.

Quintus did not protest. In fact, he had not yet said anything since being freed from the cage.

Midway into his third bath, Seamus brought another pail of water and some fresh clothes for Quintus to change into. After putting them aside, he sat on a stool and pulled out a clay smoking pipe from his pocket. He offered it to Quintus, who, with a shake of the head, declined while saying his first word to them, which was 'no.'

'Yes! Good, you can talk,' Seamus said, grinning.

The woman rolled her eyes at her nephew.

'And where'd you get that tobacco from, Seamus?' she asked.

'It's from Youghal in County Cork.'

'Who gave it to you?'

'Can't give away all my secrets now, can I? I only thought that maybe our good guest would fancy some.'

'Have some respect; he doesn't want nor need your pipe or your silly ways,' she scolded him.

Seamus' grin only got bigger.

'Oh, now Aunt Mary, he can surely make up his mind on that; he's a big fella and now a man of liberty,' he cheekily challenged while packing tobacco into the pipe.

'Don't mind the boy, sir; he knows no better,' the aunt told Quintus.

Seamus good-naturedly winked at Quintus.

Such unabashed friendliness forced the filthy man not only to smile but to burst out laughing and then laugh some more as it truly dawned on him that all the horrors of the cage were now behind him.

Quintus' laughter continued for 15 minutes and was so contagious that Aunt Mary and Seamus joined the hysterics. Other family members, ranging from toddlers to the elderly, exited the cottages and joined in laughing with the saint. They laughed the way only survivors can appreciate.

The Church Ruins

It took Quintus and Seamus ten minutes to stroll from the cottages to the ruins of the parish church. While they walked, the young Irishman did most of the talking. All the O'Malley clan were talkative, but Seamus was the best of them. They were a rowdy and cheerful bunch despite what they had endured since Cromwell's armies first arrived.

Beyond 'yes' or 'no,' Quintus had spoken little during the past seven days since he was cleaned in the bathtub. He just wasn't used to talking yet. Seamus' aunt told the family to be patient, as the poor man had suffered unimaginable horrors.

From the youngest to the oldest, they understood Quintus was more than a man. He was considered a saint, set apart by Heaven. Someone able to survive years in a gibbet. But given their salt-of-the-earth qualities, the O'Malleys naturally viewed Quintus as one of their own and not someone to be revered. They quickly and quietly accepted his perceived oddities, his strange standing exercises, and how he would sit eyes shut with his legs folded upon each other under the apple tree for hours on end.

Seamus' childhood was full of stories about the saint locked in the gibbet cage. A legend now living with his family, it was the finest thing that had occurred in his short life thus far. So, it was a welcome development when Quintus began talking just as they arrived at the eastern side of the church ruins.

'Last time I saw the church, it had been set on fire,' Quintus said quietly, nodding at the ruins. 'They'd already put the priest to the sword, laid waste to most of this side of the river. It was horrific. This whole area was once prosperous and peaceful. Hopefully, one day it will be thus again,' he added.

'There have been whispers about rebuilding the church, but there's little chance of that happening any time soon,' Seamus said. 'Whether we like it or not, we're a subjugated people.'

That simple fact left a silence between them for several minutes until the sound of a large bird landing nearby caught their attention. By the heavy beat of its wings, Quintus knew it was a crow. From the corner of his eye, he saw it perched on the remains of the church's sole remaining spire. He picked up an acorn-sized stone and threw it at the bird, which flew off unharmed, cawing as it went.

'I loathe crows,' Quintus said.

Seamus grunted in agreement.

'Aunt Mary believes they're a servant of the devil,' he said. 'Hand reared and trained by Entwistle himself, she'd say.'

It was the first time anybody had mentioned Entwistle's name in Quintus' company.

'Entwistle — what happened to him?' he asked. 'I've been under the presumption he's dead. The air is lighter, and there's less dread than there once was.'

The young Irishman scowled.

'That feckin' fop and his two lackeys are no more. Some say the fairies got to them, others say it was his own men that did them in after discovering he was in league with the devil,' Seamus said. 'It's a pity they didn't end them earlier. Some believed they'd been already cursed because of what they did to you,' he added and then continued. 'After Entwistle was gone, some of his soldiers opened the wall's gates so we could come and get you. There were earlier attempts by others to free you or to even just see if you were alive, which mostly failed,' he said. 'Some doubted you even existed. But Alba, she never doubted the truth of the matter.'

Quintus looked at Seamus and asked a question he intuitively already knew the answer to.

'Who is Alba?'

'She visited you out on the lake around two years ago. She swam out there to see if it was true about you. You remember?'

Quintus softly gestured, acknowledging that he did.

'I initially thought I was imagining things,' he replied.

'She wanted to free you, but us — all da boys — were hesitant, afraid of Entwistle if I'm, to be honest. By herself, she couldn't do it, but she could learn the truth,' Seamus said.

'She family?'

'Older sister who was truly the best of us. She died three months after visiting you. Plague got her.'

Learning of what happened to the young woman cut Quintus deeply. She was like an angel to him when she visited. He subtly shifted his stance and turned so to hide his sadness while offering commiserations.

'I'm truly sorry to hear that,' he said.

Seamus nodded.

'Before she saw you, she'd been dreaming of a funny old man with a long beard riding a half-dragon half-lion looking kinda thing,' he said. 'This old fella was talking to her in Latin, she said. Begging her to go see you,' he added.

Quintus mulled over what Seamus had just told him and the significance of it, but he didn't share his thoughts. Instead, there was sad quietness between them that lasted for several minutes before he spoke.

'I'm in your debt Seamus, and I'll be eternally grateful, but I'm putting your family in danger. I should go soon,' Quintus said.

The Irishman shook his head.

'The English now no longer bother us so much. Unlike Entwistle, the new man in charge is not the murderous type, he knows he needs laborers for tilling the land, so you're welcome to stay as long as you like. Y'know, you're the perfect guest — you don't eat food, and you don't need a bed,' he quipped. 'We'd love you to stay forever.'

That made Quintus smile.

'I will have to leave one day, but I'll never forget what you and your family have done for me,' he said.

'Where will you go to Quintus? France or Spain?'

'I'm not sure.'

Further South

Quintus was in no great rush. He never was. Time, he had plenty of it. It would be another five years before he left Ireland and the O'Malley family behind.

On the day he finally did depart, he was taken in a dingy by two Spanish sailors to a galleon anchored not far off the port city of Kinsale. Watching from a rocky beach was Seamus with two of his cousins.

Earlier, it took Quintus and his friends eight days to travel from Wexford county to reach the rendezvous point at the beach where they said their final farewells. Plenty of district folk wanted to be there for the sendoff, but they didn't want to attract undue attention from the English.

Quintus was well-loved by the people of Wexford, to whom he offered hope. He set up a secret school that gave Irish children in the area a chance at an education. There, he taught Latin, history, reading, writing, and calculation. For a dozen or so adults, he also taught advanced building techniques, including masonry. To assist those seeking a new life abroad, he gave Spanish lessons. In all, it made it possible for the O'Malleys and other Irish folks to one day become industrious and respected citizens in the Spanish city of Malaga.

As for Quintus, he was going in the opposite direction, somewhere into the unknown. Seven weeks after leaving Ireland, he landed in the New Kingdom of Granada (today's Colombia) and steadily made his way north, biding his time for the end of days. He just hoped he'd never run across Meng's reincarnation again.