Nuala O'Malley Part 31

"Lady Nuala," he said quietly, "I promised you that when I slew the Dark Master I would tell you my name. Before another day has pa.s.sed I shall have slain him; and now I tell you and your kinsmen that I renounce all fealty to you."

At this the Bird Daughter started, staring in amazement, while an abrupt oath burst from Lame Art. Brian went on calmly.

"This I do because it is not meet that The O'Neill should give fealty to any, Lady Nuala. I am Brian O'Neill, of right The O'Neill and Earl of Tyr-owen, though these are empty t.i.tles. And this night you and I shall fall on Bertragh together, Bird Daughter, and when we have won it again it shall be yours as of old."

And amid a great roar of shouts welling up around him Brian bowed to Nuala.

"Then, Brian O'Neill," she said, quieting the tumult a little, "am I to understand that you wish to make pact with me, and to receive no reward?"

For a moment he gazed openly and frankly into her eyes, and under his look the red crept into her cheeks again; yet her own eyes did not flinch.

Brian laughed out.

"Yes, lady! It may be that I shall have a reward to ask of you, but that may not be until I have won back what I have lost for you."

"And what if the reward be too great?"

"Why, that shall be for you to say!" and Brian laughed again. "Is it agreed, Bird Daughter?"

For an instant he thought she meant to refuse, as she drew herself up and met his level eyes; the men around held their breaths, and the O'Malley chiefs glanced at each other in puzzled wonder. Then her quick laugh rippled out and she gave him her hand.

"Agreed, Brian--and I hope that you can shave that yellow beard of yours by to-morrow!"

And the great yell that went up from the men drowned all else in Brian's ears.

CHAPTER XX.

THE STORM BURSTS.

"Now, the first thing is to see what force of men we have," said Brian, after the midday meal. They were all gathered in Cathbarr's tower before a log fire, and were preparing the plan of campaign.

"I have my hundred and eighty men," said Nuala. "When that last pigeon came from you I set out at once. With the hundred men under Cathbarr, we have close to three hundred. You can take them all, for my kinsmen here have enough and to spare to handle my two ships as well as theirs."

"Good!" exclaimed Brian, as the two O'Malleys nodded. "I think that by striking at dawn we shall find most of the O'Donnells ash.o.r.e or in the castle, and if you time your sailing to strike on their four ships at the same time we may easily take castle, camp, and ships at one blow."

"If all went as men planned we would not need to pray Heaven for aid,"

quoth Shaun the Little sententiously. Brian glanced at him.

"Eh? What do you mean by that?"

"Nothing," returned the wide-shouldered seaman with a shrug. "Except that there may be more to it than we think, Brian."

"The Dark Master will not suspect your return so suddenly," spoke up Nuala. "Pay no heed to Shaun, Brian--he was ever a croaker. When think you we had best start?"

"I am no seaman," laughed Brian. "Get there at dawn, that is all. I will send on my men at once, then; since we have only two horses, Cathbarr and I will ride after them later and catch them up. Will you take the men, Turlough, or bide here out of danger?"

"I think it will be safest with the Lady Nuala," hesitated the old man craftily.

"Little you know her, then," roared Lame Art, his cousin joining in the laugh.

So Turlough had decided, however, and he stuck to it. Brian then described closely how the four pirate ships lay in the bay under Bertragh, while Shaun went out to arrange the distribution of his men on Nuala's ships.

The arrangements having been perfected, Brian saw his three hundred men troop off on their march over the hills, after which he told Nuala at greater length all that had taken place in the castle since his parting with her at sea. Bitter and unrestrained were the curses of the O'Malleys as they heard of how his men had been poisoned, while Nuala's eyes flamed forth anger.

"There shall be no quarter to these O'Donnells," she cried hotly. "Those whom we take shall hang, and the Scots with them--"

"Not the Scots," exclaimed Brian quickly. "They are honest men enough, Nuala, and may serve us well as recruits. If we find them in the castle, as I think we shall, we may leave them there until we have finished the Millhaven men; however, it is possible that my men will find the castle almost unguarded, and so take it at the first blow. However that turns out, the Dark Master shall not escape us this time."

During the afternoon, when the two O'Malleys were busily getting their ships in order for the coming fray, Brian sat in the tower with Nuala.

He told her freely of himself, and although neither of them referred to that reward of which he had spoken at their meeting, Brian knew well that he would claim it.

He did not conceal from himself that the Black Woman had guided him to more than conquest by sword. The Bird Daughter was such a woman as he had dreamed of, but had never found at the Spanish court, and he knew that whether there was love in her heart or not, his own soul was in her keeping.

Perhaps he was not the only one who knew this, for as Lame Art rowed out with his cousin, the latter nodded back at the tower.

"What think you of this ally, Art Bocagh? Could he be truly the Earl's grandson?"

"I know not," grunted the other. "But I do not care whether he be Brian Buidh or Brian O'Neill or Brian the devil--he is such a man as I would fain see sitting in Gorumna Castle, Shaun!"

And Shaun the Little nodded with a grin.

When the sun began its westering, Brian and Cathbarr rode back from the tower with food and weapons at their saddle-bows, and they paused at the hill-crest to watch the four ships weigh anchor and up sail, then went on into the hills. They were to meet their men at that valley where the Dark Master had been defeated and broken in the first siege, and jogged along slowly, resting as they rode.

"Brother," said Cathbarr suddenly, fingering the haft of his ax and looking at Brian, "do you remember my telling you, that night after we had bearded the Dark Master and got the loan of those two-score men, how an old witch-woman had predicted my fate?"

"Yes," returned Brian, with a sharp glance. In the giant's face there was only a simple good-humor, however, mingled with a childlike confidence in all things. "And I told you that you were not bound to my service."

"No, but I am bound to your friendship," laughed Cathbarr rumblingly. "I can well understand how I might die in a cause not mine own, since I am fighting for you; but I cannot see how death is to come upon me through water and fire, brother!"

"Nonsense," smiled Brian. "Death is far from your heels, brother, unless you are seeking it."

"Not I, Brian. I neither seek nor avoid if the time comes. Only I wish that witch-woman had told me a little more--"

"Keep your mind off it, Cathbarr," said Brian. "In Spain the Moriscoes say that the fate of man is written on his forehead, and G.o.d is just."

"What the devil do I care about that?" bellowed Cathbarr. "I care not when I die, brother--but I want to strike a blow or two first, and how can that be done if death comes by water and fire?"

"Well, take heart," laughed Brian, seeing the cause of the other's anxiety. "You are not like to die from that cause to-night, and I promise you blows enough and to spare."

Cathbarr grunted and said no more. The last of the storm had fled away, and the two men rode through a glittering sunset and a clear, cold evening that promised well for the morrow.

They traveled easily, and it was hard on midnight when a sentry stopped them half a mile from the hollow where the men were resting. Brian noted with approval that no fires had been lighted, and he and Cathbarr at once lay down to get an hour's sleep among the men.

Two hours before daybreak the camp was astir, and Brian gathered his lieutenants to arrange the attack. Thinking that the Dark Master would be in the castle, he and Cathbarr took a hundred men for that attack, ordering the rest to get as close to the camp as might be, but not to attack until he had struck on the castle, and to cut off the O'Donnells from their ships. Then, a.s.sured that the plan was understood, he and Cathbarr loaded their pistols and set out with the hundred.