Peter Tremayne - Dancing With Demons

As he looked cautiously at the drop he suddenly noticed that a candle stub stood on a stone by it. Bishop Luachan had doubtless left it on his excursion into this peculiar uaimh. Eadulf lit it from his lamp so that Fidelma, following him, would be able to see the drop. Then he descended to the next level which was more easily negotiated than he had anticipated, since, albeit awkward, the drop was only a waist-high one. He turned along the new tunnel and found it sloping upwards slightly before emerging into the curious stone-walled chamber. As Brother Céin had said, it was a beehive shape, almost conical, and he was able to stand up in it quite easily. A moment later, Fidelma joined him.

The flickering light of the oil lamp caused a myriad of shadows to dance on the walls as they peered around. The walls were filled with strange carvings, lines of spiral patterns and odd symbols.

‘This place is very ancient,’ Fidelma observed, finding herself whispering.

‘What would it be used for, if not as a storage place for some nearby dwelling?’ asked Eadulf.

Fidelma had moved forward to a place where stones had been grouped to form a box-like area on the ground at one end. A large flat stone was discarded nearby and it took her only a moment to see that this was the lid. She had seen ancient graves formed much the same way, but this was too tiny to hold any human remains.

‘I think that is where Bishop Luachan must have found the silver disk,’ she said.

Holding the lamp high, Eadulf bent down to examine the receptacle.

‘Are you saying that we are in some ancient pagan temple?’ he asked, a little apprehensively. Eadulf had been converted to the New Faith when he was a youth, but emotionally still felt the power of the old gods and goddesses of his people.

‘I think it was a sacred place. Perhaps not a place for people to worship. Have you noticed that some of these walls have carvings on them?’

Eadulf had certainly noticed the strange motifs that spread around the interior. The shadows were not simply cast by the lamp but came from deep grooves in the rocks, depicting curious faces and symbols.

‘Do they mean anything?’ he asked, suppressing a shudder.

‘Probably to someone who can read the signs of the old religion.’ Fidelma pointed to the flat stone lid. ‘Do you see the carving on the topof this stone? I know what that represents: it is the sign of the old sun god, the symbol of knowledge and wisdom.’

Eadulf peered down. From a central point, it appeared as if three arms or legs emerged and each arm had a little tail which gave the symbol its momentum.

‘Is this why Bishop Luachan felt that he had discovered the ancient wheel of fate which Brother Céin mentioned?’

‘It is logical,’ agreed Fidelma. ‘I have seen this motif many times on old coins, and even on one of the ancient crowns of the High Kings.’

At that moment, they heard Brother Céin’s voice echoing faintly from above, apparently anxious that they were so long in the chamber.

Fidelma gave a last look round. ‘Well, we can learn no more here,’ she said.

‘Was there anything to learn?’ Eadulf asked with a sigh.

Fidelma looked at him reprovingly. ‘There is always something to learn, and everything is interrelated in life, Eadulf, you must know that. An investigation is like unpicking a tapestry, tracing a strand here, and one there; sometimes they are not joined and you have to come back to the start; sometimes they are joined and you can move onwards.’

‘Do you really think there is some connection here?’ he asked doubtfully. ‘That this is where the motivation for Sechnussach’s assassination originated?’

‘Too early to say. We only know that Bishop Luachan made a find here. He took it to Sechnussach. The latter was assassinated and the item is now missing. Then Brother Diomasach, who helped make the find, was killed and now Bishop Luachan himself is missing.’

‘So …?’

‘So before any conclusions can be drawn, we need to find more information.’

‘But the only person who can give us that information is Bishop Luachan himself,’ Eadulf pointed out.

Brother Céin was calling again.

‘Let us hope that he is still living and that we may find him, then,’ Fidelma replied briskly, before turning to the passageway and beginning to move back out of the chamber.

Eadulf glanced around a final time. The grotesque carvings seemed to unite, their distorted features staring down at him accusingly from his own pre-Christian past.

He shuddered and quickly followed Fidelma.

It was good to be back out in the light.

Brother Céin was waiting anxiously for them. ‘Well?’ he asked. ‘Does the place tell you anything? Did it help at all?’

Fidelma grimaced. ‘It only supports your story about Bishop Luachan and his discovery, but has revealed little else.’

The steward sighed a little forlornly. ‘I was hoping that there would be something else to learn down there.’

‘When the bishop disappeared, where was this farmstead that he was supposed to have been called to?’

‘Not far north of here. It is a place called the meadows of Nionn, Cluain Nionn. You will pass through there if you are determined to continue your journey northward.’

‘I see no reason not to. We will go on.’

Brother Céin glanced at the darkening sky and the lengthening shadows.

‘Not tonight anyway. You may recommence your journey in the morning. Let us offer you the hospitality of our community.’

‘Which we will accept with pleasure,’ replied Fidelma.

With Brother Céin leading the way, they walked back to the wooden buildings that constituted the settlement.

Before the evening meal, the prainn, which was the principal meal of the day, Fidelma allowed herself be conducted by the steward to the community’s tech screpta or library. It contained some forty books, all hung in rows in their leather book satchels. Brother Céin was enormously proud of the library.

‘Bishop Luachan was intent on building up our little community as a repository of knowledge,’ he announced. ‘Alas, these are the first things that will be destroyed, should the dibergach attack us and we are not able to hold them off. We have one of the great collections of books in the five kingdoms.’

Fidelma, who had seen many greater libraries in her travels, did not disagree with him. Any centre where books were gathered was a special place in her eyes.

‘It is well worth defending, Brother Céin,’ she agreed. Then a memory stirred. ‘I was told this place had a connection with my own kingdom. Do you know the story?’

Brother Céin nodded. ‘But that was in ancient times. It is one of those legends handed down by the local people.’

‘Tell me.’

‘It is said that long ago, so long that the facts have become myths, there was a chieftain in the north of your brother’s kingdom of Muman. He was called Lugaid mac Tail. He had five sons and a daughter. The daughter was married to an ambitious warrior called Trad mac Tassaig. The daughter was also ambitious for her husband and, moreover, she was a great Druidess, adept in the magic arts.

‘One day she claimed that she had had a vision that unless her father, Lugaid, handed over his chieftainship and land to her husband, then a flock of demons would come and destroy it and all the family. In fear, Lugaid did as she asked and fled north with his five sons.

‘They came to Loch Lugborta and here Lugaid lit a magic fire to seek guidance. The fire spread in five directions and in those directions his five sons went and set up their homes. Lugaid stayed in the place where he had kindled the fire and thus the lake was named after him — Loch Lugborta. But he decided that he should take the name Delbaeth, from the ancient form dolb-aed — enchanted fire. Today, after many centuries, the name has been distorted and it is now called Delbna Mór.’