Princes of Ireland - Edward Rutherfurd [62]
Her father arrived the next morning. There was still a mist on the sea, as the boat came round the headland. It was a small vessel, with leather sides and a single square sail with which it could run, in a somewhat ungainly fashion, before the wind—hardly different from the curraghs in which her distant ancestors had first come to the western island. Her father had bought it from a fisherman at the southern end of the bay. He sailed it himself, accompanied by her two brothers. They all stepped ashore, looking pleased with themselves.
“Here is your boat,” her father said. “The wind’s from the west but it’s light; the sea is calm. You needn’t worry about making the crossing.”
“But where is the crew you promised?” she demanded.
“Why it’s your father and your brothers, Deirdre,” he said, as if it were the most obvious thing in the world. “Put your trust in your father, Deirdre, and I’ll put mine in Manannan mac Lir. The sea god will protect you. Is that not good enough for you?”
“Perhaps with just yourself,” she suggested, looking doubtfully at her brothers. “The boat is small.”
“Would you have me leave your brothers behind,” he asked, smiling, “all alone in the world?”
And then Deirdre understood. “You mean you won’t be coming back?”
“To face the king after I helped you escape? No, Deirdre, we’ll go together. I’ve always had a mind to go on a voyage. I just left it a little late.”
“But the rath, your lands, the cattle …”
“At Dubh Linn?” He shrugged. “It’s not much of a place, I dare say. It’s too marshy. No, Deirdre, I’d say it’s time to move on.” And looking into the little boat, she saw that it was stocked with provisions, and a small sack of silver, and her father’s drinking skull. So she kissed her father and said not another word.
There was only one problem. Conall wouldn’t go.
He was very quiet about it. The depression he had exhibited the evening before seemed to have subsided into something else. He appeared sad, perhaps a little absent, but calm. And adamant. He would not go.
“By all the gods, man,” cried Fergus. “What’s the matter with you? Do you not see what we’re doing for you?” And when this did not work: “Must we carry you into the boat by force?” But a look from the prince told him that, even in Conall’s weakened state, this would not be a good idea. “Would you at least tell us why?” Fergus finally asked in despair.
For a few moments it was not clear whether Conall would answer, but in the end he said quietly, “It is not the will of the gods that I should go.”
“How would you know that?” Fergus demanded irritably.
“If I cross the sea with you, it will not bring you any luck.”
While her father cursed under his breath, Deirdre’s two brothers looked at each other anxiously. Had the gods cursed their sister’s man? Since Conall looked like a druid, it seemed to them that he would know.
“There’s no point in getting drowned, Father,” one of them said.
“Are we to take Deirdre then, and leave you behind?” Fergus almost shouted. Conall did not answer but Deirdre took her father’s arm.
“I cannot leave him, Father,” she murmured. And though he cast his eyes up at the sky with impatience, she led him to one side and continued, “Wait one more day. Perhaps he will feel differently tomorrow.” And since there seemed to be no alternative, Fergus could only shrug his shoulders and sigh. Before he left, however, he warned, “You have not much time. There’s yourself to think of Deirdre, and the child.”
For some while after her father and brothers had gone, Deirdre said nothing. There was a flock of seagulls on the shingle beach. Again and again they rose up, crying into the blue September sky, while Conall sat watching them as though in a trance. Finally they departed, and then she spoke.
“What is to become of us, Conall?”
“I do not know.”
“Why wouldn’t you leave?” He did not reply. “Was it a dream you had in the night.” He did not answer, but she suspected he had dreamed. “Is it that you have spoken with the gods?