CHAPTER 12
THE CHAMPION FALLS

Did Maeve hate my father for humiliating her army? Or perhaps her attack on him was more impersonal, simply a way to strike a great blow against Ulster. What is certain is that she enlisted any who had ever suffered a loss at my father’s hands and invaded Muirthemne set on one prize: Cuchulainn’s head. And though Conchobor and Cathbad and my mother, and many others who loved my father, tried to keep him out of the battle for just this reason, in the end it was impossible. He was a warrior. He was born to fight.

So we were once again fleeing Dun Dealgan. My mother did not protest this time. Not that it was any easier for her to abandon her home, but the command came from Conchobor and she well understood his intention. It was no secret that Maeve’s quarry was the mighty Cuchulainn himself, and Conchobor was determined to keep my father out of the conflict. At the first news of invasion, he was ordered to Emain Macha, to take council with Cathbad and Conchobor and the other advisors, and it is with no little reluctance he obeyed. My mother went along as much to ensure my father did not turn back as for fear of the invaders.

It was a more comfortable journey, at least, for I had my own horse now. Orlagh was my pride and joy, a blond beauty with black points and an eager heart. Remembering the long weary vigil we had kept before at Emain Macha, my mother took her best maidservant and said that Roisin should come too. Tullia stayed behind to nurse Eirnin, who was ill with a racking cough.

Roisin was beside herself with excitement at the prospect of going to Emain. She was a woman of good rank in her own right, daughter to one of the smiths who supplied my father’s warriors and of an age to be thinking of marrying. She tried hard to restrain herself, for the occasion was hardly a happy one, but she was an adventurous girl who had never been away from Muirthemne, and here she was heading to the king’s own court. Was there anywhere in Ulster more likely to be well-stocked with comely young men? I did not begrudge her eagerness, though I could not share it.

We were in my chamber, sorting through clothes and Roisin peppering me with questions, when my mother came to me.

“Luaine, leave Roisin to do the packing. I want you to ride out with me now, before we leave Dun Dealgan.”

She would not speak of our errand—not one word—while the horses were saddled, but set out at a great clip north toward the Cooley Mountains.

It was nearly summer, a humid warm morning, and by the time we slowed our horses the sweat was trickling down my back. My bafflement had turned to hot irritation, and it told in my voice as I asked again, “Ma, what is this about?”

She half-turned in her saddle to face me. “There is something I must show you,” she said. “And you must pay attention, in case you ever have need to find this place by yourself.”

“You see this low hill before us—it’s the first foothill of the Cooleys.” I knew the hill well—had looked out at it from Dun Dealgan every day of my life—but I scanned it now with new interest.

Emer continued. “You see that place where the gorse ends and the forest comes down in a point to meet it?”

I nodded, trying to fix the spot in my memory. “The hill looks like a giant woman lying there,” I said, sweeping my hand in an imaginary caress from ankle to shoulder. “The trees are like her belly and the gorse her thigh.”

My mother raised an eyebrow at that. “If you say so. But yes, that place. It’s only a rough landmark, for the vegetation pattern will change year by year. But we start by making for the tip of that line of trees.”

We rode on, much slower once we reached the hill and found the narrow path that threaded its way between trees and head-high thickets of gorse, its flowers so intensely yellow when the sun caught them they almost hurt my eyes. As we rode, my mother told me at last what we were there for.

My parents had realized early on that a border fort like Dun Dealgan was vulnerable to sudden raids, and they had made a cache for their accumulated wealth. There were two such caches now, about a half-mile apart, and my mother took me to both, pointing out in each case the landmarks that would lead me there and the inconspicuous but unmistakable marker that pointed to the exact spot.

“The wealth we have at Dun Dealgan is only a portion of the war-prizes and rewards your father has claimed,” Emer explained to me. “Even if Dun Dealgan is burned to the ground and every goblet looted, what we have hidden away here is enough to start again. There is a bride-portion for you here, and more. Do you understand me?” And her green eyes searched mine, luminous with a message of their own.

“Yes, Ma, I understand.” I didn’t though, not completely. Not until later. My mind was busy memorizing locations, and marveling at this sudden revelation of riches, and worrying about the threat to my father. I was too preoccupied to hear what was between my mother’s words.

My father knew well enough that death awaited him on our own plain of Muirthemne. There were omens and portents enough to write doom for any fool, and Cathbad’s warnings as well. Of course a champion will seek a great name, even to his downfall. But I do not believe it was a warrior’s bravado that made my father shake off our restraining hands. When he said to Cathbad, “I am glad and ready enough to go into the fight, though I know as well as you yourself I must fall in it,” I believe he spoke simple truth.

He had given his life to the warrior’s code, you see, to a dream of glory and honor and high deeds. But when Conlaoch died, the very foundations of that life were shattered. What was honor, or the truth of a warrior’s word, or great feats of arms—what were any of them worth, if what they led to was shame and horror? He had killed the boy he longed to love, the son he dreamed of, the one who should have been fighting at his side.

He was glad to go down fighting. Better the sword and the spear and the next life to come, than to carry such pain.

It is no honor to the tribes of Ireland, though, the way they killed my father. The poets are respected for their great learning, and this is why no one should lightly refuse to grant a boon to them. And yes, perhaps they are feared a little too, for their satires bring dishonorable acts to light, and can bring down the highest leader. But it is Maeve used her poets for blackmail and deceit. And I myself have seen how this corruption has spread, and tasted its black fruits.

So she set her three poets against Cuchulainn in the battle. Each called out and asked for a boon, and each time the boon requested was his spear. For it was foretold that only Cuchulainn’s own spear could kill him. And they threatened to put a bad name on him and on his kin if he refused. And my father, knowing that death was on him, would not have his name sullied in any way, and so he gave up his spears—making sure each one found its mark in its new owner’s head as he threw it.

Those spears were given to Maeve’s greatest warriors. One killed Laeg, who had never wavered from my father’s side. The second pierced The Gray, a king among horses. The third, thrown by Lughaid, gave my father a deadly wound.

Still his enemies feared to come near him. My father was unhindered as he took his belt and bound himself to the tall pillar-stone that thrust like a giant’s finger out of the battlefield, the way he would die standing on his feet, a proud warrior to the end. And the men of Ireland circled around, but did not dare approach until the hero-light faded from Cuchulainn’s face and they were sure he was dead. They say that the Morrigu’s crow of death came and settled on Cuchulainn’s shoulder as he stood tied to his pillar, and that he gave a great laugh when he saw it, in defiance of death itself.

Crow, indeed.

That was my Fintan, sent to watch over my father and to bring word of the outcome to my mother and me, where we waited in Emain Macha. And the one small comfort I gain from this whole sad tale is that my father laughed at the sight of him. He recognized Fin. And if he recognized him, it may be he understood the message of love Fintan carried, from my heart to his.