The King of Ireland's Son Part 30

When Fedelma and the King of Ireland's Son came to the Spae-Woman's house, who was the first person they saw there but Gilveen, Fedelma's sister! She came to where they reined their horse and smiled in the faces of her sister and the King of Ireland's Son. And she it was who gave them their first welcome. "And you will be asking how I came here,"

said Gilveen, "and I will tell you without wasting candle-light. Myself and sister Aefa went to the court of the King of Ireland after you, my sister, had gone from us with the lucky man of your choice. And as for Aefa, she has been lucky too in finding a match and she is now married to Maravaun the King's Councillor. I have been with Caintigern the Queen. And now the Queen is in the house of the Spae-Woman with the youth Flann and she is longing to give the clasp of welcome to both of you. And if you sit beside me on this gra.s.sy ditch I will tell you the whole story from the first to the last syllable."

They sat together, and Gilveen told Fedelma and the King's Son the story. The Spae-Woman had sent a message to Caintigern the Queen to tell her she had tidings of her first-born son. Thereupon Caintigern went to the Spae-Woman's house and Gilveen, her attendant, went with her. She found there Flann who had been known as Gilly of the Goatskin, and knew him for the son who had been stolen from her when he was born. Flann gave his mother a token which had been given him by a young woman. The token was a handkerchief and it held seven drops of heart's blood. The Spae-Woman told the Queen that these seven drops would disenchant her brothers who had been changed from their own forms into the forms of seven wild geese.

And while Gilveen was telling them all this Flann came to see whose horse was there, and great was his joy to find his comrade the King of Ireland's Son. They knew now that they were the sons of the one father, and they embraced each other as brothers. And Flann took the hand of Fedelma and he told her and the King's Son of his love for Morag. But when he was speaking of Morag, Gilveen went away.

Then Flann took them into the Spae-Woman's house, and the Queen who was seated at the fire rose up and gave them the clasp of welcome. The face she turned to the King's Son was kindly and she called him by his child's name. She said too that she was well pleased that he and Flann her son were good comrades, and she prayed they would be good comrades always.

Fedelma and the King of Ireland's Son rested themselves for a day. Then the Spae-Woman said that the Queen would strive on the next night--it was the night of the full moon--to bring back her seven brothers to their own forms. The Spae-Woman said too that the Queen and herself should be left alone in the house and that the King of Ireland's Son with Flann and Fedelma and Gilveen should go towards the King of Ireland's Castle with MacStairn the woodman, and wait for the Queen at a place a day's journey away.

So the King of Ireland's Son and Flann, Fedelma and Gilveen bade good-by to the Queen, to the Spae-Woman and to the Spae-Woman's house, and started their journey towards the King's Castle with MacStairn the Woodman who walked beside their horses, a big axe in his hands.

At night MacStairn built two bothies for them--one covered with green boughs for Fedelma and Gilveen and one covered with cut sods for Flann and the King of Ireland's Son. Flann lay near the opening of this bothie. And at night, when the only stir in the forest was that of the leaves whispering to the Secret People, Gilveen arose from where she lay and came to the other bothie and whispered Flann's name. He awakened, and thinking that Morag had come back to him (he had been dreaming of her), he put out his arms, drew Gilveen to him and kissed her. Then Gilveen ran back to her own bothie. And Flann did not know whether he had awakened or whether he had remained in a dream.

But when he arose the next morning no thought of Morag was in his mind. And when the King's Son rode with Fedelma he rode with Gilveen.

Afterwards Gilveen gave him a drink that enchanted him, so that he thought of her night and day.

Neither Fedelma nor the King's Son knew what had come over Flann. They mentioned the name he had spoken of so often--Morag's name but it seemed as if it had no meaning for him. At noon they halted to bide until the Queen came with or without her seven brothers. Flann and Gilveen were always together. And always Gilveen was smiling.

III

When Caintigern had come, when she knew her son Flann, and when it was known to her and to the Spae-Woman that the token Morag had given him held the seven drops of heart's blood that would bring back to their own forms the seven wild geese that were Caintigern's brothers--when all this was known the Spae-Woman sent her most secret messenger to the marshes to give word to the seven wild geese that they were to fly to her house on the night when the moon was full. Her messenger was the corncrake. She traveled night and day, running swiftly through the meadows. She hid on the edge of the marshes and craked out her message to the seven wild geese. At last they heard what she said. On the day before the night of the full moon they flew, the seven together, towards the Spae-Woman's house.

No one was in the house but Caintigern the Queen. The door was left open to the light of the moon. The seven wild geese flew down and stayed outside the door, moving their heads and wings in the full moonlight.

Then Caintigern arose and took bread that the Spae-Woman had made. She moistened it in her mouth, and into each bit of moistened bread she put a piece of the handkerchief that had a drop of blood. She held out her hand, giving each the moistened bread. The first that ate it fell forward on the floor of the Spae-Woman's house, his head down on the ground. His sister saw him then as a kneeling man with this arms held behind him as if they were bound. And when she looked outside she saw the others like kneeling men with their heads bent and their arms held behind them. Then Caintigern said, giving the Spae-Woman her secret name, "O Grania Oi, let it be that my brothers be changed back to men!"

When she said this she saw the Spae-Woman coming across the court-yard.

The Spae-Woman waved her hands over the bent figures. They lifted themselves up as men--as naked, gray men.

The Spae-Woman gave each a garment and the seven men came into the house. They would stand and not sit, and for long they had no speech.

Their sister knelt before each and wet his hand with her tears. She thought she should see them as youths or as young men, and they were gray now and past the prime of their lives.

They stayed at the house and speech came back to them. Then they longed to go back to their father's, but Caintigern could not bear that they should go from her sight. At last four of her brothers went and three stayed with her. They would go to her husband's Castle and the others would go too after they had been at their father's. Then one day Caintigern said farewell. The thanks that was due to the Spae-Woman, she said she would give by her treatment of the maid who had given the token to her son Flann. And she prayed that Morag would soon come to the King's Castle.

She went with her three brothers to the place where Flann and the King of Ireland's Son, Fedelma and Gilveen waited for them. A smith groomed and decked horses for all of them and they rode towards the King of Ireland's Castle, MacStairn, the Woodman, going before to announce their coming.

The King of Ireland waited at the stone where the riders to his Castle dismount, and his steward, his Councillor and his Druid were beside him.

He lifted his wife off her horse and she brought him to Flann. And when the King looked into Flann's eyes he knew he was his son and the son of Sheen, now known as Caintigern. He gave Flann a father's clasp of welcome. And the queen brought him to her own three brothers who had been estranged from human companionship from before he knew her. And she brought him to the youth who was always known as the King of Ireland's Son, and him his father welcomed from the path of danger.

And then the King's Son took Fedelma to his father and told him she was his love and his wife to be. And the King welcomed Fedelma to the Castle. Then said Gilveen, "There is a secret between this young man, Flann, and myself."

"What is the secret?" said the Queen, laying her hands suddenly upon Gilveen's shoulders.

"That I am his wife to be," said Gilveen.

The Queen went to her son and said, "Dost thou not remember Morag, Flann, who gave the token that thou gavest me?"

And Flann said, "Morag! I think the Spae-Woman spoke of her name in a story."

"I am Flann's wife to be," said Gilveen, smiling in his face.

"Yes, my wife to be," said Flann. Then the King welcomed Gilveen too, and they all went into the Castle. He told his wife he had messages from the King of Senlabor about his other sons Dermott and Downal, saying that they were making good names for themselves, and that everything they did was becoming to sons of Kings. In the hall Fedelma saw Aefa her other sister. Aefa was so proud of herself since she married Maravaun the King's Councillor that she would hardly speak to anyone. She gave her sisters the tips of her fingers and she bowed very slightingly to the two youths. The King questioned his druid as to when it would be well to have marriages made in his Castle and the druid said it would be well not to make them until the next appearance of the full moon.

IV

As for Morag she went by track and path, by boher and bohereen, through fords in rivers and over stepping-stones across them, until at last she came to the country of Senlabor and to the Castle of the King.

No one of high degree was in the Castle, for all had gone to watch the young horses being broken in the meadow by the river; the King and Queen had gone, and the King's foster-daughters; and of the maids in the Castle, Baun and Deelish had gone too. The King's Councillor also had gone from the Castle. Morag went and stayed in the kitchen, and the maids who were there did not know her, either because they were new and had not heard her spoken of at all, or because she had changed to such beauty through eating the berry of the Fairy Rowan Tree that no one could know her now for Morag who had cleaned dishes in that kitchen before.

It was Breas the King's Steward who came to her and asked her who she was. She told him. Then Breas looked sharply at her and saw she was indeed Morag who had been in the King's kitchen. Then he said loudly, "Before you left you broke the dish that the King looked on as his especial treasure, and for this, you will be left in the Stone House. I who have power in this matter order that it be so." Then he said in her ear, "But kisses and sweet words would make me willing to save you."

Morag, in a voice raised, called him by that evil name that he was known by to the servants and their gossips. But the servants, hearing that name said in the hearing of Breas, pretended to be scandalized. They went to Morag and struck her with the besoms they had for sweeping the floor.

Just then her foster-sisters, Baun and Deelish, came into the kitchen.

Seeing her there they knew her. They spoke to her quietly, but with anger, saying they had not wanted her to go on the journey she had taken, but, as she had gone it was a pity she had come back, for now she had behaved in an iii-mannered way, and they who were her foster-sisters would be thought to be as ill-mannered; they told her too that before she came back they were well-liked by all, and that Breas had even ordered a shady place to be given them at the horse-breaking sports, and they had been able to see the two youths who had broken the horses, Dermott and Downal.

"It was for a benefit to you that I came back," said Morag. "I shall ask one of you to do a thing for me. You, Baun, sing for the foster-daughters of the King. Before they sleep to-night ask them to tell the Queen that Morag has returned, and has a thing to give her."

"I shall try to remember that, Morag," said Baun. Morag was taken to the Stone House by strong-armed bondswomen, and Baun and Deelish sat in corners and cried and did not go near her.

That night the King's foster-daughters kept awake for long, and after Baun had sung to them they asked her to tell them what had happened in the Castle. Then Baun remembered the tumult in the kitchen that had come from the name given to Breas. She told the King's foster-daughters that Morag had come back. "She was reared in the same house with us," said Baun, "but she is not of the same parents." And then she said; "If your Fair Finenesses can remember, tell the Queen that Morag has come back."

The next day when they were walking with the Queen one of the King's foster-daughters said, "Did you know of a maid named Morag? I have heard that she has been away and has come back."

"How did she fare?" said the Queen.

"We have not heard that," said the maiden who spoke.

The Queen went to where Baun and Deelish were and from them she heard that Morag had been put into the Stone House on the charge that she had broken the King's dish when she had been in the Castle before. Now the Queen knew that the dish had been safe after Morag had left. She went to the King's Steward and accused him of having broken it and Breas admitted that it was so. Thereupon he lost his rank and became the meanest and the most despised servant in the Castle.

The Queen went to the Stone House and took Morag out. She asked her how she had fared and thereupon Morag put the Rowan Berry in the Queen's hand. She hastened to her own chamber and ate it, and her youth and beauty came back to her, and the King who had grown solitary, loved the Queen again.

Then Morag came to great honor in the Castle and the Queen asked her to name the greatest favor she could think of. And the favor that Morag named was marriages for her foster-sisters with the two youths they loved, Downal and Dermott from the court of the King of Ireland.

The Queen, when she heard this, brought fine clothes out of her chests and gave them to Baun and Deelish. When they had dressed in these clothes the Queen made them known to the two youths. Downal and Dermott fell in love with Morag's foster-sisters, and the King named a day for the pairs to marry.

Morag waited to see the marriages, and the King and Queen made it a grand affair. There were seven hundred guests at the short table, eight hundred at the long table, nine hundred at the round table, and a thousand in the great hall. I was there, and I heard the whole story.

But I got no present save shoes of paper and stockings of b.u.t.ter-milk and these a herdsman stole from me as I crossed the mountains.