Tír na nÓg Trilogy, Book II: The Rising Dark

Naoise

Hard rain fell the next two days. The weather had grown quite cold, and the girls spent much time huddled around their fire. Emery wondered what winters were like, here. Oonagh had seen snow, but she'd never known it to do much more than melt on touching ground. But the rains--they could go on for days with only short breaks of mist. Still, life had to go on. Even in the rain, animals needed tending, and food had to be preserved, and cloth had to be woven. Emery tried to be patient when Oonagh attempted to teach her at the loom, but she didn't have a knack for weaving, unlike Tess, who seemed to quickly catch on.

They talked about many things over those three days. Emery easily explained what had happened in the faerie hall, and she'd also discussed the fetch that had lured her into the forest. Tess had found it difficult to listen to the part where Charlie's image had turned into a pile of filth, and Emery had reassured her more than once that whatever that thing was, it had not been her brother. Emery also left out the part Cullen had said, about the fetch indicating Charlie's life was at risk. Tess had to know that, already--why rub it in?

And they'd talked of what had happened when Emery ran off the night of Samhain. People had seen her head toward the forest, and they'd also seen Cullen arrive and immediately run off after her. No one knew what to do. Cathbad was at once consulted, and he went into the forest with some soldiers to attempt to locate Emery and Cullen, but by the time they'd really begun to worry, Cullen had found his way out. They'd spent the next several days venturing as far as they dared into the forest so as not to get lost, the druid casting and divining and coming back with the consistent message that Emery was alive and would return, which gave them hope. After two soldiers wandered too far into the forest and one died while the other came out half-crazed, Cullen forbid anyone else from searching it and instead set up guards along its perimeter while Cathbad continued to monitor Emery's well-being with his druidic means.

He'd been a wreck--Cullen. At least, that was what Oonagh told her. No one had seen him eat or sleep the entire nine days; he'd just moved erratically back and forth between Dun-Dealgan and the forest, spending little to no time in his roundhouse.

Emery felt guilty for the worry she'd caused, and especially for what she'd said to Cullen about him being her real curse, but she couldn't talk to Tess and Oonagh about that. She wasn't exactly sure she'd been wrong in saying it--hadn't her apparently perfect life been shattered the minute he'd appeared in it? Even if that life had been an illusion, she'd been happy in it. And now she found herself on a neverending roller coaster with this difficult man, one moment wanting to run to him and tell him things she hardly knew how to put to words; another moment wishing to get back on his horse and ride out of Dun-Dealgan and never look back; the next moment wistful for those few brief hours of camaraderie they'd seemed to gain in the forest; many other moments drowning under waves of humiliation at her inability to look anything but foolish in front of him. And there were the moments, too, where she was just afraid . . . afraid of who she was, and of who she wasn't.

Wasn't all that curse enough?

But there was also the weight of that spear, which sat in the middle of their roundhouse and just glowed with all its fiery blue, seeming alive in its silent motion, as if it were watching them and waiting to be used. Emery hadn't touched it since placing it there two days earlier for fear she'd hurt someone with it. Cathbad had sufficiently scared her about the weapon, and even though she'd wanted someone to take it away, the druid had forbid it, not wanting anyone else to go near the thing until they could figure out what to do about it.

When a third day dawned gray and rainy, Oonagh went to visit her family and returned with happy news. For whatever reason, the feasting hall was to be used that night, and anyone of age, man or woman, was invited to attend. While Tess and Emery were mildly surprised, Oonagh re-explained that on official visits--from kings or other people of importance--the no-women rules of the feasting hall were strictly enforced, but every so often, especially during the cold months, communal feasts were held for entertainment as well as social gathering. Tess and Emery caught Oonagh's excitement; getting out of their roundhouse and seeing other people was just what they needed to lift the dreary aura that had descended upon them.