Andrew Offutt - The Mists of Doom

“Aye, lord King.”

“With many years ahead of him.”

“Lord King, yourself has said it.”

Aye, and a threat to the highest crown , Lugaid did not say, a threat to me!

“Now… Milchu… this is fact…”

“Lord King, the information comes from one in my service, and him of Connacht, close to Lord Art.”

“You will tell me his name.”

Milchu bowed to that and made answer at once, for it was no question but a command.

“Eoin mac Gulbain, High-king.”

“Gulban! Ah.”

“Even so, my lord King. The Lord Gulban’s son Eoin is a weapon-man among those who serve the lord Art. A brave man and a loyal warrior, Eoin… though he wears another name, keeping his own under a cloak of deception. For he has with Art a blood-feud-”

“Ahhh. And this time Lugaid did not smile, for possibilities of counteractions took shape in his mind nigh as swiftly as plots.

“Aye, lord King,” Milchu said with a nod. He knew he need not explain the significance to this ever-mistrustful man, this calculating plotter on Eirrin’s highest throne. “Aye. Nor would Eoin mac Gulbain wish good on Art, for he feels that Art was responsible for the ruination of his father and the sinking of his family.”

Now Lugaid straightened. Now he took note of his mug, with beaming eye. He drank off a draught of wine.

“What said ye, Milchu, of God’s placing tools before us…”

Milchu smiled, very thinly, as if with reluctance to allow such interference with his ascetic mien.

“Even so,” he said. “And it is of interest that Eoin is baptised as one of us, one of the Saints.”

Lugaid was grinning. Shoulders hunched, he leaned forward on his table. “And will do as bids a priest of his faith?”

“It’s only a priest of Connacht has stayed him from having his feud-vengeance on Art, lord King. Nor does he refrain with much willingness on him. This has he said of his lord, Art: ‘If he did fifty good deeds on me, surely this would be my thanks, I would not give him peace, and him in distress, but every great want I could put on him.”’

“A fine worthy young son of Eirrin! And does he have a brain within him, as well?”

“He stays his hand, lord King.”

“Umm. But unwillingly.”

“Even so, lord King.”

“Ho.” Lugaid drank. “Ha. And were a priest to speak otherwise, counsel the opposite course, perhaps point out that Art is a great enemy of Iosa Chriost-”

“In truth, lord King, he is no friend-”

“Surely then would be this fine young man’s holy duty to avenge his poor father!”

“Surely, my lord. Were he to be so convinced.” And as if he’d forgot and only just thought of it, Milchu coughed again.

“A bad cough,” the High-king commented.

“The… night air… the fog,” Milchu said weakly, bent forward so that his chin was nearly on the table.

He did not move from that strange posture, for the other man’s eyes were upon him. The two gazed steadily at each other. Nor did either misunderstand the other. The fire crackled and played games of light and shadow with their faces, though not with their eyes.

So , the Ard-righ of Eirrin thought, so simple it appears, and now we are come down to it. Will it be so simple, Milchu’s agreement to gain? Methinks not. He waits now… for he wants something. And that something, whatever it may be, lies here in these hands, for I am High-king in Eirrin!

“Shall I ask, Priest?”

“My lord?”

“Seek ye not to play at games with me, Milchu, who has played so many for so long, and who wears Eirrin’s highest crown!”

“My lord High-king. I-”

“Nor will I bargain as with some merchant over pigs or embroidery-work! Ye know well my meaning. What is it ye’d be having, Milchu, Priest, to… counsel with Eoin as to his honour and his duty?”

“My lord! ”

Lugaid said nothing. Again his fingers were tracing out the shape and the inlays of his tankard’s handle. He waited.

At last Milchu leaned back, though he did not relax. “Great honour would accrue to my lord God,” he said reflectively, “and to my lord High-king and thus to Eirrin, were it Lugaid. Laegair’s son who approved my buiding a fine church in the town of Ath Cliath, with myself as Bishop once it’s done, to do glory to both God and the High-king who pleases Him.”

For a time Lugaid remained as if frozen. Then he too sat back. He bethought him. Well he knew that men said his crown rested shakily on his thinning russet locks… that he was a man who like a child abroad alone at night saw demain shapes in every shadow…

Such men of course were fools. The demons of treachery, Lugaid was convinced, did lurk in all places. The cleverer he, who with such hidden eyes as those of Milchu could pierce the shadows and draw away the dark veils from those who made plots against him. Fail to discover them and surely he’d not be toppled, for there was his uncle Mac Erca with the weaponish host But… if Muirchetach mac Erca decided that a High-king who had to be protected, nephew or no, were not, worthy of remaining enthroned?

Besides, Lugaid was sure that it was Mac Erca’s plan to make the High-kingship more than it was, not only the highest seat in Eirrin, but actually king over the other kings of the Emerald Isle. And were a western ui-Neill to be no longer available to defend that land against Picts… or… others, and his heroic son to be nipped whilst still abudding like a rose never to be seen, an acorn fed as mast to the pigs rather than allowed to grow into a great strong oak…

Aye.

Not shaky my crown; neither is my seat on Eirrin ‘s highest chair. Solid both, and to be made the more so for my sons to follow. That is, if I prepare the way for those to follow me… preserve crown and throne and thus serve Eirrin best; for how could I do elsewise, the High-king?…by removing any who offer the slightest threat to crown, or throne, or honour, and future… suzerainty!

Art mocks me by naming his son Cormac!

Cormac mac Art challenges me by bearing the name, by his feat, by suffering himself to be called Cuchulain…

Art and his weaponish son threaten Eirrin!

“It seems to me that Art and his weaponish son, Cormac and Cuchulain all combined, are threats.”

Milchu had but waited for him to speak it aloud. “It is why I’m after coming direct to yourself, High-king.

“The best time to meet such threats is before they become manifest and thus even more dangerous and harder to remove.”

“The thinking of a King of Kings, lord King,” Milchu said, and was careful to let his eyes remain flat and bland, lest they bespeak his true opinion of this… this fearful puppet of Mac Erca!

“Methinks the god of Rome-and of Eirrin-should be honoured with a fine chapel in Baile Atha Cliath… would ye be taking such a commission, Priest?”

“My lord King does honour on me!”

“Assuredly.”

“And should I wend my way eastward to Ath Cliath by a westward route, by way of… Connacht, lord King?”

The High-king’s eyes were hooded, but he leaned forward to end the game with plain words and royally extended forefinger.

“Eoin mac Gulbain were better and covered surely with honour an he avenged his father’s loss of honour on the man who replaced that father-and on the son!”

“Milchu nodded. His eyes were agleam. He rose.

“Soon, lord High-king of Eirrin, there shall have been but one Cormac mac Art in Eirrin, and him that great king dead these two hundred years! As for the other… none shall remember him, after his death at age fourteen!”

Chapter Two:

The Bear