CHAPTER TWO
“You’re one lucky man,” said a cultured, nasal voice. Very proper. Oxford or Cambridge. The clerics at Douai would be surprised to know St. Peter was an Englishman.
Wesley tried to lift his eyelids. Tried again. Failed. Exasperated, he used his fingers to pry them open. Blue sky and billowy clouds. Dull white wings stretched against the wind. Had he somehow escaped Satan’s horseman, after all?
“What’s that?” His voice rasped from a throat scoured raw by the hangman’s noose.
“I said,” came St. Peter’s voice, “you’re a lucky man.”
Wesley frowned. Why was St. Peter talking like a Gray’s Inn barrister? A cool shadow passed over him. He blinked, and the shape came into focus. A high-collared cloak, not an angel’s robes. A face he recognized, and it wasn’t the face of St. Peter.
“God’s blood!” he said. “John Thurloe! Are you dead, too?”
“I wasn’t the last time I checked.”
Wesley propped his elbows against hard wood and struggled to rise. Pain? No, pain couldn’t follow him into the light, where the sky shone blue and distant and his heart beat vibrantly in his chest. “By God, I used to hate you, sir, but now you’re as welcome as the springtime.”
Wesley heard a creaking sound, the groan of thick rope straining against old wood. Canvas luffing in the wind.
“Jesus Christ, I’m on a ship!” said Wesley.
Thurloe bent his legs to absorb a swell that rolled the narrow deck. “You must keep your popish confessor busy, priest, with all the swearing you do.”
The sin was minor compared to others Wesley had committed. “Last I remember, I was swinging from Tyburn Tree.” He touched his stomach and chest through the shirt he wore. The executioner’s sword hadn’t so much as split a hair.
Thurloe’s features pinched into a frown. “And your various parts would be spiked on Tower Gate and London Bridge if not for the tender mercies of myself and our Lord Protector.”
The cobwebs began lifting from Wesley’s mind. He remembered himself moving, as if he were galloping toward an eternity of regrets, of half-finished business. The terrible journey had taken him past the fair-haired child he had left behind, past words he should have said, past a crown he had tried to defend.
He asked, “Cromwell arranged a pardon?”
“A stay of execution.”
A memory flashed through Wesley’s mind: the hooded giant, the weeping masses, the jolt of the cart. His feet kicking at empty air, the wheel of green leaves and blue sky overhead, the burn of the rope around his neck.
After that, a muddle of pain. His body dragged to the block, the black hood looming into view, a blade glittering against the clear sky, steel slicing toward his bare flesh.
Then a shout: Hold thy stroke!
An ugly blur followed: horses’ sweaty hides, soldiers’ buff livery, clenched fists and muttered curses. Questions, protests, speculation spoken over his limp body. A dark robed man arguing with the sheriff at Tyburn.
“It was you, wasn’t it?” he asked Thurloe. “You stopped the execution.”
“I did.”
“I can’t say I’m fond of your timing. You might have come earlier.” Wesley cocked an eyebrow at Thurloe. The wind plucked at his wispy brown hair arranged in a tonsure around the balding top of the man’s head. “Just a stay?”
“That will depend on you, priest. Or should I say Hawkins?”
Damn. “Who’s Hawkins?” he asked.
“Don’t be lame, sir. Several of the ladies present called you Wesley. Lucky for you, I quickly deduced the truth.” Thurloe spun in a shimmer of dark velvet and brass buttons. He set a hat on his head. Wesley recognized the tipped brim fastened with a palm-sized brooch. “Come with me.”
Wesley dragged himself up on wobbly legs. The ship strained at her cables. His vision swam, then resolved into a view of a narrow deck and an aftercastle rising beyond a web of rigging.
To his left the sea swelled out endlessly. To his right, a small town huddled a stone’s throw away.
“Milford Haven,” said Thurloe.
“Milford Haven! My God, that’s two hundred miles from London,” said Wesley. Lost miles, during which he had imagined being borne to hell in the devil’s chariot.
“You see, we’ve not even left port.”
“Why not?”
“Because not all of us are going with you, Mr. Hawkins.”
“Going where?”
Thurloe made no response, but led the way down a hatch and through a companionway that smelled of wet timber and moldering rope. Two men descended on Wesley with soap and a razor. Fifteen minutes later, he found himself thrust before the Lord Protector of England. The sight of Oliver Cromwell freshened Wesley’s fears that he had gone to hell, after all.
Framed from behind by a bank of diamond shaped stern windows, Cromwell stood at a burl writing desk. Reddish brown hair, cropped to his shoulders, framed a bold-featured face ornamented by a curling mustache and pointed beard. The Lord Protector’s eyes had the gleam of ice-coated rock.
“Bit of an improvement.” His gaze sharpened on Wesley. “Ah, Mr. Hawkins. I’ve got you at last, after all these years.”
In the wells of the desk sat an array of crystal ink bottles with silver stoppers. The gilt-edged blotter and the straight-backed chair bore an imprint of the lions of England. The trappings of royalty.
Wesley planted his feet on the red Turkey carpet of the stateroom. “What ship is this?”
Cromwell’s lips tightened as if he found the question impertinent. He drew himself up proudly. The pose looked faintly ridiculous on the Lord Protector. His plain cloth suit appeared to be the work of a country tailor. “It used to be called Royal Charles but it’s been rechristened Victory.”
“And where are we going?”
“You are sailing west as soon as I’ve given you your instructions.”
“You’re sending me into exile?”
Beneath the legendary ruby nose, a controlled smile tugged at Cromwell’s mouth. “Exile? Too easy for the likes of you.”
“You obviously want something from me, else you’d not have spared my life,” Wesley reminded him. The truth hit him suddenly, a swift blow to his empty belly. He was alive! Laura. Laura, darling. The thought of her clasped him in an embrace of both joy and dread.
“You royalists are always so astute,” said Cromwell, his voice sharp as an untuned viol.
Wesley ignored the taunt. He had been astute enough to elude Cromwell for six years.
“Sit down, Mr. Hawkins.”
As the Lord Protector lowered himself to the richly carved chair, Wesley took a three-legged stool opposite him. Thurloe poured brandy into small glasses.
“The Irish problem.” Cromwell pressed his palm to the map before him. The chart depicted the island, with stars drawn at the English-held ports and hen-track markings tracing the route of Cromwell’s dread Roundhead army.
Ireland? Wesley frowned. Perhaps the pressures of his office were weighting Cromwell’s reason.
“I know nothing of Ireland,” said Wesley. Almost true. A hazy memory came to him, filtered by the years. His parents’ stern faces and cold eyes as they informed him that England was not safe for Catholics. His banishment to Louvain on the Continent, where Irish friars had put him to work printing outlawed books in Gaelic. The kindness of the brothers had almost filled the void in his heart. And the strange, lyrical language of the Gaels had lingered like a never-to-be-forgotten song in his mind.
“You stand to learn more than any civilized man ought to know.” Cromwell jabbed a thick finger at the map. “Dublin, Ulster, all the major ports belong to us. The Pale is ours. We gave the rebels a choice of hell or Connaught, and most of them made the mistake of choosing Connaught. And that’s where the problem lies.”
The west of Ireland. Wool, peat, herring…what else? He could not think of a commodity that would induce Cromwell to risk his men. But that was the Lord Protector: all-powerful, enigmatic, consumed by ambition, and unwilling to explain his motives.
“Galway,” said Wesley, deciphering the upside-down word near Cromwell’s finger.
“Aye, and the entire coast of Connemara. I’ve garrisoned troops at Galway. The Irish were driven out of the city long ago. But we’ve had resistance.”
The Lord Protector looked as if he could not comprehend this defiance. Why, Wesley thought ironically, wouldn’t the Irish wish to give up their age-old way of life, their tradition of self-rule, and their Catholic religion in order to embrace a revenue-hungry Protestant conquest?
Wesley realized he knew more about the Irish than he had thought. He took a drink. The brandy dropped like hot lead in his empty stomach.
“The heart of the resistance,” said Thurloe, “is a band of warriors called the Fianna. Do you know the legend?”
“No.” Wesley suspected it had to do with dark magic, fey folk, and shadowy deeds.
“It’s a medieval order of warriors, bound by blasphemous pledges and initiated in pagan rites. They fight like devils. Our captains swear the villains hold their horses under a spell, so fierce are the beasts.”
One corner of Wesley’s mouth lifted in a half smile. “I think your captains have been in the bogs too long.”
“They do God’s work,” Cromwell retorted.
“The Fianna use antique weapons,” Thurloe continued. “Broadswords, slings, cudgels, crossbows—and violate every rule of war. They strike like a sudden storm in the dark: swift, unexpected, devastating to men who pursue victory with honor.”
“And where do these warriors come from?” asked Wesley.
“Some are Connemara men. We know this because of the unique horses they ride. The Irish call them ponies, but the beasts are as large and thick as cavalry horses. Other warriors might have been recruited from the exiles of Connaught to the north.”
“And your army can’t contain them?”
“My army has righteousness on its side,” Cromwell insisted. “But they’re not trained in dirty, sneaking, bog-trotting tactics.”
And you think I am, Wesley silently observed. He took another sip of brandy. Resurrecting an ancient order was, he decided, an act of political genius, a clever way to remind the despairing Irish that they were the sons of warriors.
“They have a weakness,” Thurloe said.
Cromwell picked up a quill pen and brushed it over the map. “They have a blind, pagan devotion to their leader.”
Thurloe nodded. “The man has already achieved the status of legend. Our soldiers hear ballads sung about him. His Fianna will follow him to the very gates of hell and beyond.”
“Who is he?” asked Wesley.
“No one knows.” Thurloe’s sharp, Puritan features drew taut with chagrin. As master of protectoral intelligence, he prided himself on knowing the business of every last mother’s son in the Commonwealth. He resented the elusiveness of the Fianna. “We suspected the hand of popish priests in this, but we’ve culled every cleric from the area, and still the rebels ride.”
Cold distaste turned the brandy bitter in Wesley’s mouth. England was not the only dangerous place for the Catholic clergy.
“I want the devil taken.” Cromwell’s ruddy fist crashed down on the leather blotter. Crystal ink bottles clinked in their wells. “I want his head on a pike on London Bridge so all England can look upon an Irish thief and murderer.”
Wesley winced at the contempt in Cromwell’s voice. “He’s only a man fighting for his life and his people.”
“Bah! Honest Englishmen lived for years among the Irish, who enjoyed equal justice from the law. The rebels broke that union, just when Ireland was in a state of perfect peace.”
“Or perfect suppression,” said Wesley.
“I did not bring you here to debate questions of justice. I can drastically shorten your stay of execution.”
“Sorry.”
“Once this chieftain is taken,” Thurloe continued, “the Fianna will disintegrate.” A tight smile played about his mouth. “The Irish are sheep who lose their way without their shepherd.”
“Then from Galway we’ll take all the coastal districts of Connemara,” Cromwell stated with an air of finality. “We’ll put a noose around the rebels in Connaught.”
Wesley no longer wondered why Cromwell had cut him down from Tyburn Tree. He knew.
“Mr. Hawkins,” said Cromwell, “do you value your life over that of a murdering outlaw?”
I’m a Catholic, not a madman, thought Wesley. “Absolutely, Your Honor.”
“I thought so,” said Cromwell. “You’re to find the chief of the Fianna and bring his head to me before the year is out.”
The ship’s timbers creaked into the silence. The smell of brine and mildew pervaded the air.
“Why me?” asked Wesley. “I’m a king’s man, and one of the few left in England who’s not afraid to say so.”
“Where’s Charles Stuart now, eh?” Cromwell sneered. “Helping the man who helped him escape Worcester?” He planted his elbows on the table. “He’s wenching on the Continent, Mr. Hawkins, and doesn’t give a damn about you.”
Wesley wouldn’t let himself rise to the taunt, wouldn’t let himself think of the night spent in an oak tree with a frightened young prince. “What makes you think I’m your man?”
“I’ve learned much about you. Your parents sent you overseas for rearing among papists. You returned to England to become a thief taker, growing rich on bounties and blood money.”
Tightening his muscles, Wesley fought to govern his emotions. Few knew of his parents or of the deeds he had done, tracking thieves, hauling them kicking and screaming to justice.
“Then you threw in your lot with the royal tyrant,” Cromwell went on. “We lost track of you. But we knew you were in England, spreading sedition and popish idolatry.”
“I seem to have been a busy man,” Wesley said wryly.
“It’s your reputation for tracking that put the idea on us,” said Thurloe. “Men swore you were capable of finding the path of a snake over stone, or a bird’s flight through a cloudy sky.”
“I think that’s overstating my talents a little.”
“In your time, you were the most successful thief taker in England.”
“There are others who have given their loyalty to you.”
“True, but you’re fluent in Gaelic. From your training in Louvain.”
Wesley made no reply. This was no bluff, then. Thurloe was conscientious indeed. He had done his research.
“Ah, and one final thing.” Cromwell smiled, the drawn-back grin of a viper about to strike. “Your success with women. Even as a postulant you couldn’t resist.”
Wesley went cold inside. He wondered how much the Lord Protector actually knew of his lapse.
He found out when Thurloe presented him with a letter. “From William Pym,” the Secretary of State announced in a voice hot with venom. “You seduced his daughter, Annabel, and she died three years ago birthing your bastard.”
Wesley closed his eyes as shame scoured his soul. Here was his penance. He forced his eyes open. “I comported myself poorly. How will that help me corner an Irish outlaw?”
Thurloe produced another letter. A whimsical script danced across the page. “There is a reference to the Fianna in this, from a woman of Connemara to a Spanish gentleman in London.”
“You intercepted it?” Wesley asked.
He nodded. “The woman’s name is Caitlin MacBride. She’s mistress of a coastal stronghold called Clonmuir.”
“An excellent place to start your conquest,” Thurloe put in. “The attacks of the Fianna began not long after the English burned the fishing vessels of Clonmuir.”
“If you can sweet-talk your way into her bed as easily as you did into the beds of English ladies,” said Cromwell, “you’ll be able to coax secrets from the Irish whore.”
“You’re enjoying this, aren’t you, my lord?” asked Wesley.
The Lord Protector lifted his glass. “An unenviable task. Irishwomen are Amazons—dirty and ugly—and this Caitlin MacBride will likely be worse. She’s twenty-two and unmarried despite her holdings. But you’ll put up with her barbaric ways. Knowing your proclivities, you’ll probably find her interesting.”
“I cannot seduce a woman,” Wesley stated with a rush of guilt. The appearance of Laura in his life had made him swear off meaningless dalliances.
“You’ll do as I say now, my friend,” said Cromwell.
“And if I fail?”
Cromwell smiled grimly. “You won’t. My commander in Galway is Captain Titus Hammersmith. I sent letters ahead, explaining what is expected. You are to cooperate with him in every way.”
“I can’t work with Roundheads breathing down my neck.”
“Believe me, Mr. Hawkins, you won’t have to.”
An arrow of suspicion embedded itself in Wesley’s mind. Cromwell was too confident. Something rang false. “What’s to stop me from losing myself in Ireland?”
Cromwell waved a summons at someone standing outside the door. Wesley heard the sound of approaching feet, one pair heavy, the other light and rapid. The back of his neck began to itch. He rose from the stool and turned toward the door.
“Papa!” A tiny girl burst into the stateroom.
Wesley’s legs wobbled. He dropped to his knees. She leapt into his arms and pressed her warm, silky cheek to his.
“Laura, oh, Laura.” He kissed her, then pressed her face to his chest.
“Papa, you sound funny,” said Laura. She touched his throat. “What happened to your neck?”
“I’m all right,” he whispered. Tears needled the backs of his eyelids but he conquered them. Think. Cromwell had the child. Wesley raised his eyes to the woman who stood wringing her hands. He held Hester Clench captive with the same furious thief taker’s stare he used to employ on recalcitrant prisoners.
The truth shone brightly on the woman’s frightened face. She had told Cromwell everything.
Every blessed detail she’d vowed to take to the grave.
“Damn you,” he said quietly.
She had dark eyes and a handsome face he’d once thought kindly. Her chin came up, and she said, “It’s best for the child. Lord Cromwell swore he’d keep her safe and save her immortal soul from your popish training.”
Wesley regarded her over the top of his child’s head. “You lied to me,” he said in a low, deadly voice.
“For the sake of this innocent babe, I had to,” the woman said with conviction. At a nod from Cromwell, she withdrew.
Wesley’s faith in human mercy withered. Cromwell had outbid him for the loyalty of Hester Clench. He buried his face in Laura’s peach-gold hair and inhaled her fragrance of sea air and sunshine. Her soft curls bobbed against his face, and then she pulled back, regarding him through gray-green eyes that were mirrors of his own.
The miracle of holding his daughter in his arms once again brought on a rush of memories. Living as an unordained Catholic novice in England had been a dangerous business. The nomadic life had been hard, the temptations many. Nearly four years before, in High Wycombe, he had strayed from his path and bedded a woman named Annabel Pym.
Months later he had returned to the town to be confronted by the lady Annabel, her belly great with his child, her face a mask of censure. Annabel died giving birth. Her parents, furious with grief, had thrust the baby into Wesley’s arms and summoned the priest catchers.
Those early months on the run passed through Wesley’s mind in a blur of frantic action. He’d engaged a slovenly, illiterate wet nurse, then dismissed her as soon as Laura could tolerate cow’s milk. When people demanded to know what a cleric was doing with a child, he had passed Laura off as a foundling.
Most especially, he recalled the cherished moments—holding his tiny daughter close at night and breathing in her scent, noting the imprint of her ear on his arm when she fell asleep against him. Marveling over each little milestone, whether it be a first smile, a first tooth, her first tottering steps, or the first time she gazed up at him and called him Papa. The pure intimacy had planted a seed of paternal tenderness so deep that nothing could touch it. The seed had flourished into a strong, vigorous, protective love.
“Auntie Clench said I’d never see you again, Papa.” Laura’s voice, calling him Papa, made him believe in miracles again.
“We’re together now, sweetheart.” But for how long?
“I cried and cried for you. Then Master Oliver promised he’d let me see you again.” Laura peered over her shoulder. “Thank you, Master Oliver.”
The words of gratitude knifed Wesley through with fury. But his arms were gentle as he cradled his child, treasured her, felt his heart spill over with love for her.
“Look, Papa,” said Laura, holding out a silver bauble on a ribbon. “Master Oliver gave me a locket. Isn’t it pretty?”
Fury stuck in Wesley’s throat.
While Cromwell and Thurloe conferred over their maps and their plans, Wesley and Laura shared a meal of biscuit, small beer, hard cheese, and grapes. She chattered with the blithe innocence of untroubled childhood, and he listened with a smile frozen on his face. It would serve nothing to let her glimpse the black hatred that gripped his soul, to confess the loathsome thoughts that claimed his mind. To Laura this was all a great adventure. She’d had them with him before, fleeing priest catchers and Roundhead huntsmen, sleeping in haylofts, and bolting down meals in rickety farm carts. She had no idea she was a pawn in Cromwell’s deadly game.
At length the rocking motion of the ship lulled her; she settled her head in his lap and tucked her tiny hand in his.
“I love you, sweetheart,” he whispered.
As she fell asleep in his arms, Wesley felt the walls of the stateroom pressing on him, squeezing at his will. Cromwell had trapped him in a prison more confining than the dank stone walls of Little Ease in the Tower of London.
The Lord Protector broke Wesley’s reverie by calling out an order. Two burly sailors appeared in the doorway.
Wesley drew his arms more protectively around Laura.
“Restrain him,” said Cromwell.
Big sea-hardened hands grasped Wesley by the arms while Cromwell pried the sleeping child from his lap.
A roar of protest rose in Wesley’s chest but died on his lips. If he awakened Laura now, she might forever be plagued by the nightmare of being wrenched from her father’s arms. The less she knew of the sinister plot, the better chance she had of surviving the ordeal.
Cromwell held her in the crook of one arm. He looked so ordinary standing there, an indulgent uncle with a favored niece. Except for the stone-cold glitter in his eyes.
“You know, Mr. Hawkins, it would be beneath me to harm a child. But have you ever considered the fate of foundlings in London?” Without waiting for a response, he went on, “Lost children become virtual slaves.” He gazed tenderly at Laura, smiling at the way her golden eyelashes fanned out above her freckled cheeks. “This one is pretty and could escape the drudgery. It’s said that dwarves and children are used to serve people in brothels because they’re too short to see over the edge of the bed. Then when she grows too tall…we can always hope she’ll stay as pretty as she is now.”
The implied threat hit Wesley like a cannonball. “No, goddamn you—” He strained against his captors. The muscles in his arms braided into taut, trembling cords. Hard fingers bit into his flesh.
“If you succeed in bringing the Fianna to heel, you’ll win your own life, and that of your daughter.”
“You’ll have to put that in writing,” Wesley snapped, his mind galloping ahead. Seeing the expression on Cromwell’s face, he gave a bitter smile. “I’m well aware that you’ve been offered the throne, which means you’ll be guarding your reputation like the crown jewels. I want your sworn and witnessed statement that if I do as you bid, neither I nor my kin will be harmed.”
Reluctant admiration glinted in Cromwell’s eyes. “The Lord Protector always keeps his promises. You’ll have your statement. But if you fail…” His voice trailed off and he backed toward the door, pausing in a flood of sunlight through the hatchway so that Wesley could have a last glimpse of his beloved child.
“You accursed son of a—”
“Don’t let me down, Mr. Hawkins. You know what’s at risk.”
* * *
She had failed again. Caitlin had searched the high meadows for the bullock she’d promised Logan Rafferty. But the shaggy beast had vanished like St. Ita’s stag beetle.
Now Caitlin would have to endure more of Magheen’s strident complaints about being set aside by her bridegroom. Stabbing a shepherd’s staff into the loamy ground, she made her way back to the stronghold.
Springtime blew sweet upon the heaths. On the morrow would come the feast of the planting, and Seamus MacBride had decreed it a high holiday. But what sort of holiday would it be without food?
She found her father in the kitchen, a vast stone room connected to the great hall by a narrow passageway.
“More sage, Janet,” he said, peering over the cook’s shoulder into a bubbling iron pot. “Don’t skimp, now. It’s a feast to be sure we’re having tomorrow.”
“Daida.” Caitlin rubbed her palms on her apron. “Daida, I must speak to you.”
He looked up. Vague shadows darkened his eyes, his mind off on another of his mysterious quests. Then he smiled, giving her a glimpse of the handsome lion he had been in his youth. A lion with the heart of a spring lamb.
“Caitlin.” He spoke her name suddenly, as if he’d just remembered it. “Ah, ’tis a grand day, and praise the saints.”
“Yes, Daida.” Although Curran’s warning hovered like a bird of prey over her thoughts, she forced herself to smile and nod toward the door. “If you please, Daida.”
They stepped outside to the kitchen garden. The tops of Janet’s turnips and potatoes reached desperately for the weak rays of the spring sun. The sight of the sparse planting depressed Caitlin, so she looked out across the craggy landscape, the rise of mountains skirted by stubbled fields and misty bogs coursing down toward the sea. The late afternoon sun gilded the landscape in a rich mantle.
Seamus’s gaze absorbed the view. “Devil so lovely a day as ever you’ve seen, eh, Caitlin? Isn’t it grand, the broadax of heaven cleaving the clouds, and the great skies pouring pure gold into your lap?”
Why was it, she wondered sadly, that the splendor of the land moved her father to poetry, while the privation of his people affected him not at all? “Daida, about tomorrow—”
“Ah, it’ll be fine, will it not, colleen? And isn’t it we Irish that are brewed from God’s own still?”
She rested her hand on his arm. The muscles lay flaccid, the flesh of a man who shunned hard work as a monk shuns women.
“Tom Gandy says you’ve invited everyone in the district.”
“Tom Gandy’s a half-pint busybody, and a sorcerer at that.”
“But you did, didn’t you?”
“Of course. Your mother—St. Brigid the holy woman keep her soul—always planned the grandest of feasts. Now that she’s gone, ’twould be a sad and cruel thing for us to do less.”
“Daida, since the English burned our fishing fleet, we can barely feed our own folk. How can we—”
“Ach, musha, you worry too much. We be under the sacred wing of providence. We’ll feast on fresh meat, see if we don’t.”
Suspicion stung her. “What do you mean?”
He spread his arms in a grandiloquent gesture. “I’ve had Kermit slaughter that young bullock.”
Caitlin pressed her fists to her belly to keep her temper in check. “Oh, Daida, no! We needed that bullock for Magheen’s dowry. Logan won’t have her back without it.”
Seamus dropped his hands to his sides. “But won’t it be grand, the sweet taste of it and all our neighbors and kin toasting the MacBride. Think of it, Cait—”
“That’s just it, Daida,” Caitlin cut in. She had been raised from the cradle to honor her sire, but she had learned on her own to speak her mind. “You never think.”
She stalked off toward the stables. It was wicked to speak so to her father but she couldn’t help herself, any more than she could quell the impulse to run free along the storm-swept shores.
In the dim fieldstone stable, the black stallion waited in anticipation, muscles gleaming, nostrils flaring. Sunlight bathed his hide in gold as if he had been singled out by the gods to ascend to the heavens on wings of mist.
Caitlin walked between the stalls past the large strong-limbed ponies. For generations untold, Connemara horses had borne heroes to victory. But the stallion was different.
His velvet lips blew a greeting to her.
He had no name. He was as wild and free as the kestrels that combed the clouds over the mountains.
Black he was, the color of midnight, the shade of eternity, as beautifully formed as nature could manage.
“There, a stor,” Caitlin crooned, slipping a soft braided bridle over his ears. She used neither bit nor saddle. When she mounted him they became one mind, one soul, one will. Her bare legs against his bare hide formed a pagan bond of two spirits which, though as different as human and beast, melded into unity. The black needed no more than a touch of her heel to urge him out of the stable and across the rock-strewn fields.
The smells of the sea and of dulse weed enveloped her; the scent of greening fields should have reassured her, but didn’t. The Roundheads could, at any moment, swoop down and destroy the tender plants and subject Clonmuir to a starving winter.
Caitlin rode west, into the shattering colors of the sunset, toward the surging iron-gray sea. She let her hair fly loose, free as the mane of the black, free as the mist in a windstorm.
Her troubles lay behind her, an enemy she had left in her dust. Her swift rides renewed her spirit, made her feel capable of confronting and besting any problem that arose. So Seamus had wasted the bullock. She had faced troubles before. Despite the danger, she knew where she could get another.
The black’s gallop gave her the sensation of flying: a lifting glide that made the air sing past her ears. She abandoned thought and surrendered to the pulse of hooves, the rush of wind through her hair, the tang of salt on her lips.
They reached the coast where cliffs reared above the battering sea. Riding the wind, the black sailed over a ravine, then tucked his forelegs in a daring descent that made Caitlin laugh out loud.
On the damp sandy beach, she gave him his head. He arched his neck and leapt with breath-stealing abandon. He crashed through the surf, a black bolt of living thunder, full of the rhythm and mystery of Connemara’s wild, god-hewn coast.
The English claimed the coast from the shore to three miles deep. Caitlin scoffed at the notion. This land belonged to forces no human could claim.
The sun had sunk lower when the black slowed to a walk. Deep bronze rays winked like coins upon the water.
Caitlin dropped to the sand, the chill surf surging around her ankles. She patted the stallion’s flank. “Off you go,” she said. “Come back when I whistle.”
His tail high, the horse trotted down the strand. Tears stung her eyes at the sheer beauty of him. He was as full of magic as the distant lands of Araby, as handsome and noble as the man who had given him to Caitlin, the man who claimed her heart.
Alonso Rubio.
Come back to me, Alonso, she thought. I need you now.
“Sure there is a way, you know,” said a sprightly voice, “to summon your true love.”
Caitlin spun around, her gaze darting in search of the speaker. A chuckle, as light as the land breezes, drew her to a spill of rocks that circled a tangled, forgotten garden. Once this had been a place of retreat for the lord and lady of Clonmuir, a place of welcome for travelers from the sea. But time and neglect had toppled the rotunda where her parents had once sat and gazed out at the endless horizon.
“Tom Gandy,” she said. “Blast you, Tom, where are you?” Tidal pools were reclaiming the garden, and she stepped around these, lifting the hem of her kirtle. Crab-infested seaweed draped the stone blocks, and gorse bushes grew in the cracks.
A brown cap with a curling feather bobbed behind a large boulder. A grinning, leather-skinned face appeared, followed by a thick, squat body.
Glaring, she said, “You’re a sneak and a busybody, Tom Gandy. Cromwell would have you burned as a witch if you were worth the kindling.”
“No doubt he’d be after doing that if he could lay hands on me.” Tom climbed over the rocks and dropped beside a clump of briars near Caitlin. Even with the lofty feather, his head barely cleared her waist. Like the rest of him, his fingers were stumpy and clumsy looking, but he reached out and retied her straggling apron strings with the grace of a lady’s maid.
“Ah, but it’s a sight you are, Caitlin MacBride. Ugly as a Puritan. When was the last time you took a comb to that hair?”
“That’s my business.” She tossed her head. “Yours is as steward of Clonmuir, and you’d best see to your duties.”
“What duties?”
“Finding another bullock for Logan MacBride, to start with.”
“We know where to find plenty of healthy cattle, don’t we?”
She ignored the suggestion. “Perhaps I’ll banish you to Spain. I’ve heard King Philip employs dwarves as playthings for his children.”
“Then we’d both be playthings for Spaniards,” he observed, shaking his head. “Twenty-two years old and still not married.”
“You know why,” she said. “Though I still don’t know how you found out about Alonso’s pledge.”
“Pledge! You little oinseach—” He tilted his head back to gaze up into her face. “A hot young man’s promise has as much substance as the dew in summer. But we’re not here to discuss that. You wish for your true love—”
“How do you know what I wish?”
“—and I’m here to tell you a way to summon him.”
Caitlin regarded the little fellow warily. Some swore Tom Gandy was endowed with fairy powers. But not Caitlin. She had seen him bleed when he scratched his finger on a thorn; she had nursed him when he lay weak with a cough. He was, despite his extraordinary appearance, as human as she. If he possessed any gift, it was only the ordinary sort of magic that allowed him to come and go soundlessly and unexpectedly; his powers were those of a wise and wonderful mind that allowed him to see into people’s hearts as a soothsayer sees into a crystal.
“And how might that be?” she asked teasingly. “It’s the eve of a holiday. Have you a pagan sacrifice in mind?”
“Horror and curses on you, girleen, ’tis much simpler than that. And all you’ll have to sacrifice is… Well, you’ll find that out for yourself.” Tom swept off his hat and bobbed a bow. “Sure I’ve been furrowing my poor brain with great plows of thought, and I’ve found the answer. You simply pluck a rose at the moment the sun dies, and wish for him.”
“Pluck a rose, indeed!” She swept her arm around the tangled garden. “And where would I be finding a rose in this mess?”
A mysterious smile curved his lips. “You’ll find what you need in your heart, Caitlin MacBride.”
She rolled her eyes heavenward and spoke to the painted sky. “Such nonsense as that…” She looked down again, and her words trailed off. She stood alone in the bramble-choked garden. Without a sound, without a trace, Tom had vanished. A few moments later she saw the stallion vault back up to the cliffs, enticed back to the stables for a measure of fodder from Tom.
“Odd little imp.” Caitlin plopped down on a rock and stared out at the gathering mists of evening. “Pluck a bloody rose indeed.”
She drew her knees to her chest and sighed. Once, this garden had been a necklace of color and grace. The fallen rocks had been terraces dripping with roses. Her mother, the lovely Siobhan MacBride, had tended her flowers as if they were children, nourishing them on rich, lime-white soil and keeping back the weeds like a warrior staving off an invasion.
But the garden and everything else had changed when the English had claimed the coast in a choke hold on Ireland. The garden seemed to be eaten up by the pestilence of disorder and conquest. Weeds overran the delicate plants, trampling them just as Cromwell’s legions trampled the Irish.
I will rebuild my home, she vowed. Alonso will come. He promised…
Tall grasses, ugly and dry from winter, rattled in the wind. The sea crashed against rocks and slapped at the shore.
The wind shifted and its voice changed, a sigh that seemed almost human. A shiver scuttled like a spider up Caitlin’s back.
Deep inside her lived a dark, Celtic soul that heard ancient voices and believed fiercely in portents. As a haze surrounded the lowering sun, the secret Celt came awake, surging forth through the mists of time. On this night, the gates stood open to the fey world. Unseen folk whispered promises on the wind.
A curlew cried out, calling Caitlin back from her reverie. She blinked, then smiled wistfully. The world was too real to her; she knew too many troubles to escape, as her father did, to realms where bellies were full, grain yields bountiful, and cattle counts unimportant.
Still, the charged air hovered around her, heavy as the clouds before a storm, and she remembered Tom Gandy’s words: Pluck a rose the moment the sun dies, and wish for him.
Foolish words. Fanciful beliefs. There wasn’t a rose within miles of this barren, windswept place.
You’ll find what you need in your heart, Caitlin MacBride.
The sun sat low, a golden seam between earth and sky. A single ray, powerful and narrow, aimed like a spear of light at Caitlin’s chest. She felt it burning, the heat of it pulsing. She stood and stepped back so that the sunbeam dropped to her feet.
And there, straining through the thick briars and reeds, grew a perfect rose.
Caitlin dropped to her knees. She would have sworn on St. Brigid’s well that no rose could grow in this unkempt bower, nor bloom so early in spring. Yet here it was, white as baby’s skin. Secreted within the petals were all the hues of the dying sun, from flame pink to the palest shade of a ripe peach. Painted by the hand of magic, too perfect for a mortal to touch.
The breeze carried the scent of the rose, a smell so sublime that a sharp agony pierced her. All the years of waiting, of struggle, seemed to wrap around her heart and squeeze, killing her hopes with exquisite slowness.
The sun had sunk to a burning sliver on the undulating chest of the dark sea. Day was dying. A few seconds more, and—
Pluck a rose the moment the sun dies, and wish for him.
Without forethought, Caitlin grasped the stem of the flawless rose and squeezed her eyes shut.
A thorn pierced her finger but she didn’t flinch. She gave a tug and the plea flew from her lips. “Send me my true love!”
She spoke in the tongue of the ancients, the tongue of the secret enchantress buried in her heart.
Caitlin clasped the rose to her chest and repeated the plea. She touched the petals to her lips, anointed it with her tears, and spoke three times, and her voice joined the voice of the wind. The incantation flew on wings of magic to the corners of the earth, from her heart to the heart of her true love.
The sudden chill of twilight penetrated the spell in which, for the briefest of moments, she had been beguiled, helpless, wrapped in an enchantment against which she had no defenses.
She opened her eyes.
The sun had died in flames of glory, yielding to the thick hazy softness of twilight. The last purpling rays reached for the first stars of night. The mist had rolled in, carried on the breath of the wind, shrouding the rocks and sand and creeping toward the forgotten garden. Long-billed curlews wheeled black against the sky. Caitlin stood rooted, certain beyond all good sense that the spell had worked. She searched the desolate garden, the cloud-wrapped cliffs, the hazy shore.
But she stood alone. Utterly, desolately, achingly alone.
The wind dried the tears on her cheeks. The hopeful sorceress inside her retreated like a beaten horse.
Blowing out a sigh and an oath, Caitlin glanced down at the rose. It was an ordinary plant, she saw now, as common as gorse, pale and lusterless in the twilight.
There was no more magic in Ireland. The conquering Roundheads had stolen that as well.
She opened her hand and drew the thorn from her finger. A bead of blood rose up and spilled over. Furious, she flung the flower away. The wind tumbled it toward the sea.
Abandoning whimsy, she turned for home.
A movement on the shore stopped her. A shadow flickered near a large rock, then resolved into a large human form.
A man.