Silver's Lure. Anne Kelleher

wasn’t the High Queen when she bore you—she was years from that, a thin slip of a girl, she was, with a head like flame. Her mother Margraed who was as fine a piece of flesh in her day as Meeve, was High Queen and she demanded such a high son-price it would’ve beggared us. Now Meeve was a pretty girl, and all that, but not worth every thing I had. So I told Margraed we’d take you instead, and that was one time her strategy backfired. You should’ve seen her face when I looked at her and said ‘no.’ See, she thought she was going to get her hands on Far Nearing that way—establish a foothold, so to speak. Fooled her good, we did. And when we told you your mother was a Beltane-bride, it wasn’t a lie, for that’s how it happened you were made.”

      Just like my boys, Cwynn thought. “Why didn’t anyone ever tell me?” Cwynn asked. But he thought he could guess the answer. His grandfather was proud like all the people clinging to a precarious existence on the windswept neck.

      “Didn’t much like Meeve,” the old man said. “Didn’t much like her mother.”

      “Those men brought this?” Cwynn peered at the gems. They were set at seemingly random intervals and he realized, in a flash of insight, that they represented places where the line diverged or crossed with another. The disk seemed to whisper to him, teasing him. Even the gold and the gems only seemed to imply that the information they encoded was even more valuable. He had to tear his attention away from it to listen to his grandfather.

      “Oh, no, lad, that came with you. Shane was a child himself. He never knew about it, and I never had a reason to take it out before this. Meeve’s invited you to a family reunion of sorts, at MidSummer. In Ardagh.”

      “I can’t be going off to Ardagh—MidSummer’s less than a fortnight away. The fish are just starting the summer run at last—”

      The old man exploded into another coughing fit. A late spring cold had settled in his chest, and nothing the old women did eased it. The fact that he refused to allow Cwynn to ride to the mainland and find a druid didn’t help, either. “No, no, there’s more to it. Seems she’s got a girl in mind for you to wed.”

      “What?” Cwynn leaned forward, then peered over his shoulder, as if expecting someone to materialize on the spot. “How—Who—What if I were already wed?”

      “Well, boy, that’s why the men are here, so they say.” The old man hawked and spit again. “Throw another log on, boy. I can’t seem to get warm tonight. But Meeve wouldn’t much care, I can tell you that. She won’t see young Ariene as any impediment, believe—”

      “I don’t know Ariene would see herself an impediment,” Cwynn said softly. The accident that had taken his hand had also taken both her brother and his rival for her affections, and Cwynn was always bothered by the feeling that Ariene believed he’d dispatched Sorley as coldly as Shane had his own brother.

      “That’s for you to say. You should consider the one Meeve has in mind for you, though. I’m sure you could do a lot worse.” He cleared his throat, gesturing for the cup again. When he’d had another long drink, he said, “And it’s an interesting knot right there. She’s suggesting a match ’twixt you and the daughter of Fengus, chief of Allovale.”

      Cwynn shrugged. The name meant nothing. “So?”

      “If there’s anyone Meeve despises, it’s Fengus, mostly because he’s been hankering after the High King’s seat for as long as Meeve’s been on it. Ever since she made it clear she wouldn’t marry him, he’s been trying to drum up rebellion—even tried to drag me into it. Told him I wanted no part of it.”

      “You don’t like Fengus much, either?”

      “He’s one of those kind who doesn’t like no for an answer. He just keeps coming back, hoping to badger the answer he wants out of you. Never much cared for badgers.”

      “No, you prefer fish, don’t you, grandfather?” A blast of wind and another deluge of rain shook the window frame and Cwynn reached over the bedstead and checked the latch as Cermmus pulled his shawl tighter around his shoulders. “So what do you think I should do? Go with them?”

      “No, you’re meant to stay here until Meeve’s escort comes. She’s sending your sister and your brother after you. But you can’t wait. You have to get out of here.”

      “Why?”

      “Cat’s out of the bag. Shane knows who you are.”

      “He didn’t, before?”

      Cermmus could only shake his head. Cwynn reached for the basin, held it beneath his grandfather’s chin. “’Course not,” he answered when he could. “If I didn’t tell you, did you think I’d tell him? I don’t want you here, boy. It’s good Meeve’s acknowledged you. But it’s better you get out of here. Shane might get it in his head you’re worth more dead than alive.”

      “What do you mean?” Cwynn frowned.

      Cermmus met his eyes. “Something happens to you, now that it’s out you’re Great Meeve’s son—what do you suppose your head-price’s worth now?”

      “What are you talking about?”

      The old man leaned over and smacked his head. “Would you get the fog out of that skull and think, boy? Shane arranges to have you murdered—he kills you himself—some day, out on the ocean, say, when there’s no one else around to say it wasn’t a freak wave come out of nowhere and take you away with it, or mermaid swim out of the water and pull you down with her. You have two sons—Meeve’s grandsons—and you’re valuable here, aren’t you? With no proof of murder—or even any suspicion of one, who do you think will benefit from any head-price Meeve’s bound to pay?”

      “You really think Shane would do something like that?”

      “I know my son. I think Shane is very capable of arranging to have you killed, if he thinks there’s something in it for him. Even without a hand, you’re yet a queen’s son, and you do bring in quite a bit of fish, even so. He’d have no trouble finding three adults to swear to your worth.” Their eyes met and the memory of that terrible night rose up unspoken between them.

      “So where do you expect me to go?”

      Cermmus leaned forward, his voice a rough whisper. “Get yourself to Ardagh. Leave the house tonight—go sleep in the village, at Argael’s house if you will. As long as you have that disk, none’ll question who you are. And besides, you favor her about the chin.” The old man fell back against his pillow, and Cwynn noticed a grayish pallor around his mouth that even the firelight didn’t seem to redden. “She can make you a chief in your own right, give you land and cattle—you’ll never need to fish again.”

      “I like to fish.”

      “Ocean’s already taken your hand. How many chances will you give her to take the rest?” The old man rolled on his side. “The life Meeve can set you up in is a better one than this.”

      “But—but what about this?” Cwynn raised his hook.

      “What about it?”

      “I thought one couldn’t be king—”

      “Can’t be High King if you’re maimed, but you can be chief of finer fields than these.”

      “But what about my boys? Ariene and her mother? Her aunt?” It was the death of the brother whose loss affected the family most keenly, for he’d been the one to keep his mother and sister and aunt all fed. It was a role Cwynn tried to take on, and though Argael, the mother, appreciated his efforts, it had little effect on Ariene.

      Cermmus clutched his arm with surprising strength. “You do what I say, boy—Shane’s already gotten away with one murder. You think I’d let my own great-grandsons starve? You have to live long enough to reach Meeve. You do this for them, too, you know.” Cermmus gestured to the flagon beside the fire. “Pour me more.”

      The cup shifted in his hook, and the liquid sloshed as Cwynn