“They meant only to maim?” Conor’s voice has raised an octave in outrage; he quickly glances around and lowers his voice again, but the usually ebullient young man is livid. “Fiachra sent men in secret to do that to you, toembarrass your father?”
“Fiachra, and Ruarc. With Gallchobhar’s help. So that the king would be put in an impossible position.” My half-absent murmur attracts the attention of the others, and I grimace. “It’s the kind of behaviour I would expect, where I come from.” This is why Tara was so sure Gallchobhar is serving Fiachra.
“From your homeland?” asks Tara curiously.
“From its conquerors.” My brow furrows and I look across at Tara. “You saved your father. By coming here, you ensured a good man would continue to rule.” At the expense of her own position. Her own happiness.
She would have been fourteen. Same age I was when the Hierarchy attacked.
I’m not sure I would have been brave enough to make the same decision, in her shoes.
“Well I, for one, am glad you are here, Tara ap Rónán.” Conor is still indignant but seems intent on smiling despite it. “We would be a worse warband without you.”
“You would be a dead warband without me.” A slight flush to her cheeks indicates she’s pleased, despite the retort. She looks over at me. “And my father would have made the right choice. He mourned my injury and my leaving, but he is a strong ruler.”
I nod at her mild rebuke. She doesn’t like me suggesting he would have faltered, certainly not in front of the others. I can understand that.
There’s just the crackle of our small, flickering fire burning the dark press of mist around us, for a while. No breeze or other sounds from our protected little hollow. Then Conor stirs. “My father mourns my return more than my leaving.” He shakes his head. Chuckles, but it’s muted. “Each winter, he is disappointed I am not wearing a torc. My brother was already leading his own warband when he was my age. My sister is barely two years older than me and is already serving in Caer Áras. He barely pretends interest in what I have to say, when he sees I have not yet been Called.”
“What about your mother?” asks Seanna.
“Aillean ap Marcan? She does not pretend at all.” Still with a smile, but it’s impossible not to see the pain in it.
“At least your father wanted you,” Seanna says absently. “I am here because mine was sick of not being borne a son. He thought that if he offered me up, I would either die or become strong—and either was acceptable to him.”
And so they talk. Softly, and honestly. There’s no reason to bring up any of it. They’re simply sharing. We have fought and bled and killed together, and now in the quiet of the aftermath, there is an unspoken bond. Not perhaps as meaningful as my love for Emissa, or Callidus, or Eidhin. But something special, regardless.
At some point Fearghus wakes and joins in. He is from a simple farming village to the north. Misses his family, but had a talent that he knew he couldn’t ignore. When I ask him why he chose to fight for King Rónán, I expect the answers I would get from a Catenan. The honour of serving. The glory that can alone be found in battle. Extolling his leader’s qualities, the reasons Rónán is such a strong king. But Fearghus says none of that.
“I will not fight for him,” he says, puzzled. “I will honour my oath to him, but I will fight to protect my home, and my family, and my friends. For what other reason would a man kill and die?”
A murmur of assent from the others. My respect for them, already high, grows.
And then it is my turn. An implicit obligation to open up as the new silence signals Fearghus’s finishing. I almost don’t. From instinct. From touching that pain so briefly earlier and having to recoil so hard.
But eventually, I tell them. I tell them until my voice is hoarse and there are tears running down my cheeks. I tell them about my life on Suus. The invasion. The Hierarchy and their terrible power. Why I have the scars on my back, which they have all seen but never pried about. The running, the Academy. The Labyrinth and my being brought here. I leave nothing out. Once I start, it is impossible to stop. It flows out of me. I am not sure why the dam breaks, tonight. Perhaps it is the rush of the fight. Perhaps it is the comradery I feel, that we all feel. But whatever the reason, for the first time, I keep nothing back.
And they listen. Not disbelieving, not judging. Not, I truly believe, caring that I am so different from them. When I am done, I feel naked. Not vulnerable, exactly. But exposed.
It has been almost five years since I have been honest about who I am. Five years since I wasn’t hiding something.
I am almost lost without the need to lie.
When I finish, Conor shifts. Comes to sit beside me and puts an arm around my shoulder.
“You are here now,” he says softly. “We are all with you, brother.”
Seanna smiles. Tara and Fearghus nod.
And I know I am home.
“YOU MUST SPEAK TO THEDRAOI, WHEN THEY COME,” SAYSTara as we walk the rolling hills. “You must convince them to teach you.”
We are slightly ahead of the others. The mists have been burned away by the morning sun, and only rippling green lies around us. Fearghus is still weak, but well enough to move again. We have travelled cautiously, but there has been no sign of pursuit.
It’s given me time alone in my head to think about last night. To try and resolve that moment of utter certainty with what I know to be true. The man I saw could not have been my father, years dead and unimaginable miles away. Yet Cian, all those months ago, did say we were going to meet someone I knew. And I have seen so many things over the past couple of years that have taught me not to think anything is impossible.
But I also know how much I want it. How desperately I wish for it to be true. And the logic always intrudes. He is dead, and I am unknowably far from where he would be if he were not.
