Princes of Ireland - Edward Rutherfurd [64]
“He will come at midwinter,” she said happily, “like the promise of spring.”
“You say ‘he,’ ” Conall remarked.
“It will be a boy, Conall,” she replied. “I can feel it.”
They would walk together along the Liffey where the willows trailed their branches, or into the groves of oak and beech. Each day they would also visit one of the three little sacred springs and Conall would gently anoint her swelling belly with water, running his hand over its roundness. There were days of mist and days of sunshine, but the breezes were very light that month, so that only a sprinkling of leaves had fallen from the trees still heavy and thick with the rich gold and bronze of mellow autumn. Only the gathering of the migratory birds foretold that the inevitable coming of winter was close.
It was two days before Samhain, when crowds of starlings were wheeling around the trees at Dubh Linn, that the three chariots arrived.
Deirdre could see her father was pleased; he had never travelled like this before. The three chariots, each with a charioteer, were splendid indeed. He and his two sons were carried in one, Deirdre in the second; the third chariot, the finest of all, was Conall’s own with its two swift horses harnessed to the shaft.
The day was fine. The sun glinted on the Liffey’s wide shallows as they crossed the ford. Their path lay north-west. All afternoon they made swift and easy progress past rolling grasslands and wooded slopes. In the early evening they found a pleasant place to camp in an oak grove. The next morning the weather had changed. It was dry, but the sky was overcast. The light was leaden and grey; the slanting shafts of sunshine that sometimes broke through the clouds seemed to Deirdre to be vaguely sinister and threatening. But the rest of the party were in good spirits as they continued north-west towards the valley of the River Boyne.
“We shall be there by afternoon,” her charioteer remarked. “We shall be at royal Tara.”
And just afterwards, her father called out cheerfully, “Do you remember, Deirdre? Do you remember Tara?”
Of course she did. How could she forget? It had been years ago, when her younger brother was eight, that Fergus had taken them all, one summer’s day, on the road to Tara. It had been a happy time. The great ceremonial centre had a magnificent site—a large, broad hill with gentle slopes that rose above the valley of the Boyne half a day’s journey upstream from the ancient tomb with its midwinter passage where the Dagda dwelt.
Except for a guardian, the huge site had been deserted at that summer season, for apart from their inauguration, the High Kings usually only came to Tara for the festival of Samhain. Fergus had led his little family up as proudly as if he owned the place, and shown them its principal features—the big earthwork circles in which the shrines and banqueting hall would be erected for the festival. He had also shown them some of the magical aspects of the site.
“This is where the druids choose the new High King,” he explained at one small earthwork. “One of them drinks bull’s blood and then the gods send him a vision.” Showing them a pair of stones set close together: “The new king has to pass between these in his chariot. If he gets stuck, then he’s not the rightful king.” But the most impressive feature to Deirdre had been the ancient standing stone near the top of the hill, the Stone of Fal. “When the true king’s chariot comes and touches the Stone of Fal,” he