Peter Tremayne - The Leper's bell

Surprisingly, Gormán did not look astonished at this information.

‘I do not think one will have to look far for the culprit. There have been rumours about Fiachrae of Cnoc Loinge for some time. He believes that he should be of the rightful line of the Eóghanacht kings. He also dwells too close to the border of the Uí Fidgente country.’

‘Fiachrae?’

Eadulf suddenly sat bolt upright and let out a curse in Saxon. While Gormán did not understand the meaning of the words he recognised the tone and looked at Eadulf in mild surprise.

The clues were facing me the whole time,’ groaned Eadulf. ‘Capa told us during the council meeting that riders had ridden as far west as Cnoc Loinge with the news the morning after Sárait was found. Then, when we were at Cnoc Loinge, Fiachrae pretended he knew nothing of our missing baby until I told him. Yet his manner did not suggest undue surprise. Also, he told me that no itinerants had passed through the place. I had not even raised the matter. He knew. He knew, and is the man who betrayed Alchú to Uaman! And didn’t the steward of the abbey of Coimán tell me that a messenger from Cnoc Loinge had brought the news about the missing baby? It must have been Fiachrae … but no. That can’t be. How would he know that Corb and Corbnait had picked up Alchú? Not even they knew the identity of the child.’

‘You should have spoken more closely with the herbalist Corb,’ said Gormán. ‘He told me that when they passed through Cnoc Loinge on their way here, they told one of the women of Fiachrae’s house about their discovery of the child in the hope of having the baby adopted there.’

‘Fiachrae will be tried and punished for his betrayal,’ Eadulf vowed. ‘But it doesn’t help us to find my child now, or the person who killed Sárait.’

‘I pray God I will be there when we do find the murderer,’ Gormán said with vehemence. ‘I will do what I have to do and I will have no regrets.’

‘Well, I regret that Uaman perished with his foul secret still within him.’

‘Uaman must have said something that might lead you further?’ pressed Gormán. He suddenly started forward. ‘Perhaps the baby is still in the Tower of Uaman?’

Eadulf shook his head. ‘He has given the baby to some shepherd and his wife to raise without knowledge of his origins. The child will be raised herding sheep on some mountainside … but where? I could spend a lifetime searching the mountains of this land. Those raising him know only that Uaman provided them with a child. There will be no way of identifying him. He will bear another name.’

‘How did you learn this?’

‘From what Uaman told me.’

‘I once heard the lady Fidelma say that if you study carefully the exact words that someone says, then clues may be found there.’

Eadulf stared at the warrior in surprise. The man was right. That was precisely what Fidelma would say.

‘Think, Brother,’ urged Gormán quietly. ‘Think of the words.’

Eadulf closed his eyes and tried to recall what Uaman had said.

‘He did not mention any names of places. There were no clues. Just that Alchú would be raised by a shepherd and his wife, herding sheep in the mountains. And…’ He paused.

‘Have you thought of something?’

‘He said something about the mountains being haunted.’

Gormán gave a cynical grimace. ‘What mountain in the five kingdoms is not haunted by some wraith or other? Mountains are old and have seen countless great kings rise to lead their people and then be blown away like chaff from the wheat. They have memories, the mountains. They are haunted, right enough.’

Eadulf was shaking his head. ‘He said the daughter of someone haunted them.’

Gormán leant forward eagerly. ‘That is more promising, Brother. Whose daughter?’

The name came in a flash.

‘Dáire Donn.’ Eadulf was triumphant. He looked expectantly at Gormán but the warrior only shook his head.

‘We will have to make inquiries,’ he said. ‘Meanwhile, we must sleep. In the morning, if I have understood your friend Basil Nestorios, he has a horse and some precious objects that he left in the tower yonder. We will wait until the low tide and then go to fetch these.’

Eadulf agreed. Then another thought occurred to him.

‘We imprisoned one of Uaman’s warriors in the stranger’s cell. He might be a means of leading us to Alchú.’

Gormán was cheerful. ‘In the morning, while we are awaiting the change of the tides, I can ride up to the little settlement that I saw up in the mountains behind us. They should be pleased to hear that Uaman is no longer chieftain over them. Moreover, they might be able to help identify this Dáire Donn.’

‘Agreed.’

Eadulf realised, however, that the rest of the night was going to be cold in spite of the wood that Gormán was throwing on to the fire.

The night passed in fitful sleep. It was too cold to rest for any long periods and, as each wakened, they helped to keep the fire well fuelled. As well as the cold there were the cries of nocturnal animals, the howl of wolves and the cry of a wild cat to disturb their slumber. Eadulf was almost thankful when the sky began to lighten and grim, grey streaks started to appear from the east.

‘Tonight we find an inn,’ he announced, as Gormán set about making breakfast. ‘I will perish if I have to pass another night in the open.’

Basil Nestorios was already up and stamping his feet to restore some circulation. He seemed to guess what Eadulf was talking about.

‘I swear that I never knew it could be so cold,’ he said, reverting to Latin as their common language. ‘In my country, the icy hands of night may clutch you but as soon as the sun rises you will be warm again.’

Eadulf gestured to the thick grey clouds above them.

‘Here we do not always have a sunrise, my friend. The clouds always seem to cheat us by hiding it from us.’

Gormán had taken some salted slices of pork from his saddle bag and was turning them above the fire on the end of his sword. Basil Nestorios sniffed suspiciously and frowned.

‘I have noticed that you eat a lot of pig meat in this land. Pig is regarded as an unclean animal in our country.’

‘A strange land, this Jundi-Shapur,’ muttered Eadulf, helping himself to the drinking horn of corma and taking a sip of the fiery liquid before passing it to the physician. At least the alcohol gave him warmth.

Basil Nestorios sniffed in irritation.

‘I told you that Jundi-Shapur was simply a city in the land of Persia. It is also called Genta Shapirta, which means “of the beautiful garden”. It was the king of Persia, Shapur the second of his name, who first allowed the Nestorians to teach medicine in the city.’

‘Nestorians? Your own name is Nestorios,’ Eadulf pointed out. ‘What is signified by this?’

Basil Nestorios raised his brows in surprise. ‘You have not heard of the Nestorians and yet you are a brother of the Faith?’

Eadulf admitted his ignorance.

‘Nestorios was a monk of the east. He taught the Faith in Antioch. He was a learned and wise man and was appointed patriarch of the great city of Constantinople.’

‘When was this?’ queried Eadulf, who never missed an opportunity to expand his knowledge of the Faith, even when his thoughts were only half engaged.

‘About two centuries ago. Nestorios was condemned by what the Church called a heresy. He denied the complete emergence of the divine and human natures in Christ.’

Eadulf smiled tiredly. ‘I thought that the great council at Chalcedon had agreed that Christ was born of a mortal woman but possessed two natures — that divine and human united in one person without losing any of their properties.’