Book of Kells by R. A. MacAvoy

Author:R. A. MacAvoy
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Open Road Media Sci-Fi & Fantasy
Published: 1985-01-01T05:00:00+00:00

Chapter Ten

May the Gods get rid

Of this ruling reaver!

Let the heavens hang him

For highway robbery.

Egil’s Satire Against

the King of Denmark

Translators: A. Palsson and P. Edwards

“A corduroy road, Johnnie. What do you think of that?” Derval tapped the first log with one sore toe and turned to find Ailesh and MacCullen staring without comprehension. She stepped around to see whether the small Canadian was concealed behind MacCullen’s pony. The hinny bawled protest, for Derval had not released her hold on the animal’s tail. “Where’d he go?” she asked in Irish.

Both Ailesh and the poet looked over their shoulders. MacCullen rolled his eyes in his head ludicrously. “Abducted by a cow again, no doubt,” he said.

Derval put her knuckles in her mouth and turned away from the ships and water, back into the crowd through which they had just passed. There was no blond figure in trousers and heavy brat to be seen. No friendly face save that of a smiling pigherd beating his charges along with a thorn stick just behind them. Nothing but cows far away on the long grassy decline to the Liffey. Nothing at all on the straight sweep to the eastern sea. Her perfect fear for him turned into perfect anger. “Shithead,” she announced. “Absolute shithead action. Just like Johnnie.”

MacCullen smiled at her heat. “But Scholar, what do you expect? Our Eoin is no ordinary man, I have it on authority. And I myself would be willing to wager that he returns to us, and in better state than when he left.”

The authority’s cheeks grew as red as her kinky hair, and she shot a glare at MacCullen. “I don’t think anger is the proper feeling to show, Bhean Uasail. After all—not eight hours ago it was you who were lost.”

Derval blinked, remembering. “That’s right.” But then the memory came in full and she added, “But about my getting lost: I think I could perhaps phrase that another way.”

MacCullen nudged his pony between the women. “Perhaps you could, Iníon Cuhain, and have the right of it. But we have not yet heard Eoin’s side of the story, either, and we may be at fault once more. Tell me, when last did you see him?”

Derval screwed up her black brows. “I… heard him. Mouth breathing, as we came out of the trees and sighted Christ Church—I mean, sighted Olaf Cuarán’s Hall.”

“We were all breathing heavily,” Ailesh had to say. “It had been no easy descent. I saw Eoin after that, under sunlight. He stopped to pick a flower.”

Derval groaned. “You go on to the brehan’s house. I’ll have to go looking for him.”

The girl’s resentment of Derval turned immediately into concern. “Bhean Uasail, I don’t think that’s necessary. As the Ollave says, Eoin can take care of himself very well, and surely he will remember the name of the woman whom we go to visit now.”

“Will he?” Derval pushed her hair back from her face. Both the face and the hair were greasy, and her fingers were cold against them.

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