The Lions of War
All Rights Reserved.
Copyright © 2000 - J. A. Dempsey Author
And the day began in a most extraordinary manner. I was wakened from my bedroll by a great crying out of many voices, all of which blazoned my given name, “Ewyn! Come face yar doom, Ewyn!”
I chuckled and went forth from my tent to face the mob, my fearlessness born of my enthusiasm to confront my death. Who that has naugh a lick o’ sense would naugh weary of war and welcome the crack o’ doom?
What an angry mob I did indeed face that soft morn, they to shake clubs and long spears threatening me as I stepped out upon the dewy grass.
“Ye have brung the Vikings down upon us!” a red-faced fellow whom I knew blazoned, his name GuilBruin.
I put on a big smile for GuilBruin. “O, and I suppose the buggers would ‘ave left us alone if I ‘ad naugh sacked their camp? Do ye really believe they would ‘ave left us alone, Guilli? I mean, were they naugh equipped for war, and in our very back door gardens? Are ye blind man? Or just witless? So now they are alack a few hundred. What disadvantage to that, friend?”
“They are too many!” a woman blustered.
“Aye, they are, but they ‘ave naugh the will and fire which inspires US! They ‘ave naugh the knowing o’ these lands and its brave lot o’ folk. So I dare, I DARE to fight and keep us free!”
It was then they braved to attack me. I can naugh say it was a fair fight, their fifty against my one, and I naugh having the will to kill them who opted to slay me. Luck had it that the commotion had woke my men, who came running up the hillside to aid in my defense, while I staid off the many blows from their clubs, and parried the thrusts of their spears. I swiveled, I dodged, I dove, I scrambled, I ducked, I kicked, I punched, I clawed and I bit. I did whatever was necessary to stay alive. One bloke bludgeoned my temple and I nearly swooned, I to counter his blow with a knee to his groin. The next bruising was from a large stone, a woman slammed into my back, I to backhand the lass. Her lover threw a fist into my cheek that laid me out flat, I to take on the lot thereafter kicking aloft at them like a mad mule. The last thing I remember was a crushing blow to my head from behind as GuilBruin clobbered my skull with a pry iron. I really did see stars.
I roused some ten hours later upon the bed of furs in my tent. The whole of my body hurt so bad I could naugh move. It even pained me to open my eyes.
“He is stirring,” I heard someone whisper nearby, then my best mate Cairraige leaned over me.
“GuilBruin took us over, Ewyn. He has given us over too.”
“To the Vikings?” I asked, my voice hoarse as willow reeds.
“Aye, and Feodha the Lion.”
“Then we are...”
“Their prisoners, my king.”
“How is it I am alive to suffer this shame?”
Cairraige shook his head. “The Gods must have a plan for yeh.”
I laughed and it effected me great agony. I tried to sit and swallowed a scream. I stood and collapsed to the floor. My friend helped me back onto my furs, hence I drew a blanket over myself and I curled into a knot and wept quietly, so no one would hear.
Two days later I was put on a wagon with my men and we were taken to a catacomb and lowered within, chains biding us. Food was thrown down to us every day, and every man who attempted to escape, by climbing the stone walls to the open hatch far above to greet the sunlight, was beheaded only moments after he was seized. We could hear our fellow’s screams as they were bludgeoned before being executed; their heads tossed down into the tomb for us to see. At least we were fed, for if naugh, I would naugh have restored my strength. Water we had to provide for ourselves, and luck had it that a spring flowed from the wall in the deepest quarter of the catacomb. The dead, their bony remains shelved within the walls, their skulls stacked in columns against the walls, remained as a constant reminder of our mortality. Yet while life had surpassed them, WE were still alive. O’ aye, we lived a terrible nightmare, but as long as we drew breath we still had the chance to avenge ourselves, of attaining freedom.
How shall I illustrate how awful our duration was in that timeless place? It was a crypt without light, but for the hazed sunbeams which filtered in from the impassible entry far above us. A dank, musty vapor hung in the air, and the only life which shared our prison, were the worms. Those worms which waited, eager to bore into our flesh. Food for worms we had no intent of becoming, still my men’s morale dipped into the dusk of the coffin which threatened to imbibe us forever more. We could hear the dead. Naugh in the dark of the night did they wander with us, for then they rambled the earth. It was by that light of day which did not visit us, that they haunted us with their moans, groans, wails and spine-chilling mutterings. Of their misery I did speak to my men words to uplift them.
“Fear naugh the voices of those who were shirked by the gods’ and their embrace, for ye should pity them. Aye, pity those poor souls who wander the earth, lost and forsaken. Pity them that they must suffer the taunting of our breath, of our tender flesh, our love, for what a pitiful creature it is that is within reach of that which is water to them, where alas they can never taste of life’s sweet spring. For those lonely spirits as well as ourselves must we away from this place, that we naugh suffer their misery as they must suffer our beating hearts.”
No more did my men shudder in fear whence the ghosts sang their dirge, but instead prayed for them that their spirits would be welcomed in the hereafter.
In the days to come Sickness crept o’er us, got into our lungs and rattled them, crawled into our throats and made them raw, soaked into our bowls to make water of our excrement, effecting our guts to wretch and twine, and it kindled in our flesh to set it on fire. We quarantined our visceral mess to a recessed vault and washed ourselves and our garments in the spring water, and in another month the fever left us, twenty of our fifty having died from that plague. We counted our blessings that more of us lived than died.
The food we were provided with was mostly rotten; some of it inhabited by maggots. On one occasion three live hens were dropped into the pit, stones tied to their scaly legs enabling their fall. Not long after we received the birds, we heard a woman scream far above, as she was slew for abetting us. We gave thanks to her for her sacrifice, her head delivered to us anon.
A second month in that murky hole elapsed. They stopped feeding us and sealed the gateway to our dungeon. Dread entombed us then, for our only source of light was lost to us, and I had hardly recouped my vitality when deprivation threatened us anon and I again. Nevertheless I was equipped to plot our escape and acknowledged that we had to act quickly, before starvation took our strength from us, naugh to mention the stench from the rotting heads was now restricted with us without benefit of fresh air.
The catacomb which immured us was immense. The ten-meter high walls, bored in solid bedrock of basalt, stretched almost half a league underground. Cairraige and I undertook an expedition in those dark confines to see if there was another way out. On the second week of our quest, we found, or rather felt, a ladder which ascended into the black heights, for we had no light. No torch to light our way. We had only our hands for eyes; ergo we had to feel our way around our cryptic dungeon. I tried the ladder first. I was about a third of the way up when my balance was lost, for the crack I had received on my noggin made me prone to dizziness in the dark. I hugged tight to the ladder, the wood moaning as my weight shifted in the near fall. Cairraige called up asking if all were well, and I answered aye, then continued to scale the old rungs. My foot went through a rotten rung, and I planted my step high on the next, and twenty rungs later, three more of them rotten, I reached the top of the vault. Feeling with my hands I discovered that a large stone slab covered an opening, dirt falling into my eyes as I traced the edge of the square cover with my fingers. I descended the ladder carefully to report my discovery to Cairraige, who went swiftly to get the others.
All of us endeavored together to unearth any weapons that may have been buried with the dead, and Lugh must have been smiling down upon us that day, for we found each of us a sword, and shields enough for half of our thirty. The sword I found for myself was a heavy one, but perfectly balanced and the hilt felt as though it was made to fit my clasp. I used it to unhinge the slab of rock and to slide it away until a sliver of moonlight shone down upon my face.
O' that breath of fresh air did to renew my spirit and give glorious courage to my lungs and limbs. I thrust the sword in my belt and clutched the edge o’ that rock with both my hands and shoved with all my might! Scarcely could I budge it but move it I did, and with the next lunge o’ my weight it slid over a good breach. I labored and gritted and groaned until the entrance was ajar enough for a man to squeeze through. I went back down to join my fellows below, then motioned to Cairraige to go up first. He refused, saying he would only go up just before me. So it was young Murtagh was the first to ascend the rickety ladder and worm his way through the breech to taste the fresh breeze, which tossed his firebrand hair. Feargus was next, and after him Neese, then one by one the others made their escape.
Ah but luck is a flighty thing and when the twentieth, Ronan scaled the ladder, the ladder cracked then broke, my dear Ronan the brave to plummet a good six meters before the stony ground caught him. His left leg was broken above the knee; his right arm snapped in two between the wrist and elbow. He was a sore sight but bore his pain with courage.
Murtagh called down from above swearing he would go fetch us a rope while the others stood guard nearby. Thus we waited...And we waited. We did in fact wait for five days, catching rats for fodder, and making splints for Ronan's damaged limbs out of the bones of a corpse, tying them with strips of burial cloth. Cairraige fashioned our war mate a crutch out of a section of the broken ladder. On the fifth day, (we marked off the days by scratching marks in the wall) a voice called down to us, and anon a rope was lowered to us. It had been tied with knots to make it easier to climb; still it was arduous to ascend, hand and foot above hand and foot all the ten meters of that lifeline. Ronan had to go up last inasmuch as the rope was to be tied round his waist while we hoisted him up.
Fresh air welcomed us one and all at long last. So overjoyed were we that we hugged one another and swapped kisses, keeping our mirth as hushed as possible. Neese warned us that we were naugh too far from our enemy’s encampment. We were in no shape to fight to be sure, so we headed north for a place that would heal a leper, the Connemara Mountains of Galway.
The beautiful slopes of Connemara protected us and gave us back our strength, and in three months times we were ready for battle. We hated to leave heaven, for Connemara was indeed pure heaven, but to overstay our welcome with her faery spirits was a sin, thus we thanked her for her gifts and tread a path south to reclaim our lands in Eoghanacht. Aye, my castle of sod, wood and stones missed me dearly, and I her. Munster was calling us home.
It was worse than we thought when we arrived in Eile, just north of Caisil. A fellow we met along the road informed us that Glennamain had been taken as well, and that the enemy was riding to Locha Lein to take her territory as well. Eoghanacht Locha Lein was where my wife and two children lived. A dreaded ill omen shivered my soul as we hiked southward. They had horses. We did naugh. They had two hundred soldiers. We had only thirty warriors. So it was we gathered arms upon our way, in every borough and clan’s settlement we happened on. It’ll ne’re be said that the Eiresh are cowards, for naugh a man who was fit to fight rejected our pleas.
We were a hundred strong by the time we approached Caisil, they having left behind them only fifty to guard her. They were lambs to the slaughter, and the day after we reclaimed Eoghanacht; we were riding to Eoghanacht Aine on the horses we captured. No mention had been made by a soul of Aine, the village where our arms were cached, but it only made sense that the enemy would take her for she was en rout to Glennamain.
We were met by a hundred there, and what was a savage, bloodbath commenced. We had passion on our side, while they had better weapons and more horses. When we had slew a third of them, their cavalry lit out to ride hard southwest. We knew what the deserters were about. While the levy held us back fighting, the outriders would deliver themselves to their leader to inform him of our presence in Munster. The knowing o’ that put the fury in our blood, and we fought the rest like mad lions. We massacred the lot in three days time, and took after the living as they retreated. Naugh a man survived that stood to fight us when all was said and done, while we lost only twenty-five in the conflict. We set aside a day for prayer, and to paint our half-nude figures in woad paint. The tincture o’ that paint imbibed our blood to a tempest furor, and carried us onto the field with fearless purpose. We meant to slay the lot o’ trespassers and take back what was ours!
We rode, our infantry jogging after us, to Glennamain, and fought the hundred there with all our heart, losing thirty in the battle, which put us down to forty-five men at arms. We inducted twenty o’ the men who lived in that territory and pushed on for Locha Lein.
I prefer naugh to recount those battles, which followed, for it was WE who were defeated at Locha Lein. They had many more arms than reported to us, three hundred at Locha Lein. I could naugh surrender, but Cairraige forced me to fathom that they all would die with me if I pursued my suicide, thus we retreated in the curtain of darkness as it fell around the blood sodden battlefield. They pursued us of course, then oddly they let us go. This baffled me. It was a tactic to be certain, but to what purpose I did naugh know. Feodha Corca the Lion, who was their leader, a north-man who had made some sort of pact with the Viking raiders, had proved a cunning warrior, and he’d naugh let us away erst it suited his plans. I had at least the comfort that my wife and children had gotten out of Locha Lein before the invaders took the province. Kairraighn my beloved must have known Feodha Corca was en-rout to the hamlet.
We marched east to Eoghanacht Rathlind, my coastal territory, praying the warmongers had naugh set their sights on her yet, but knowing they would get around to it. They were clearly out to claim my entire kingdom. They were already there when we arrived. I was sick. Disgraced and beaten to despair. I told my men to abandon, that the war was lost and no reason abided that they should all lose their lives. I threw stones at them when they refused to forsake me, telling the lot they were a worthless mob o’ flower petals that had lost the war for me. After an hour of insulting them and threatening their lives, they parted ways with their fallen chieftain, all that is but Cairraige and Ronan. They dodged my hurling stones and fended them off with their shields like it was a happy game. They laughed and jeered and made quick quips in retaliation of my slurs. I had no choice but to accept their faith and love, and allow them to accompany me to my surrender.
I can naugh express how dreadful it was for me to surrender myself to my victor. To humbly turn myself over to Feodha Corca’s men at arms, and permit them to usher myself and my two escorts to his tent in servile posture. The sun was setting in a glorious array of red and oranges when we were brought before him, and how like my bleeding heart I thought the sky, as a triumphant smile lit Corca’s puffed vermilion lips. I knelt down before this man, who it was said was cruel as a Stone Demon, and presented him my sword.
“Ewyn territory is yars, Corca the Lion. I, Ewyn the Dragon do surrender myself to the Lord o’ these lands. May Corca and the Gods have mercy on the folk o’ Munster.”
Corca did naugh take my sword, or acknowledge my surrender in any way. He did kick me though, hard in the face. His men hawed and scattered as I was sprawled at their feet. I clutched onto Cairraige’s leg as he sprung forward to defend me, towing him back to my side as I sat up.
“Easy mate, that is just what he wants,” I warned.
Ronan snarled. “If he wants an excuse to kill me, I shall be glad to offer him one up.”
“I order yeh to stand down, man,” I growled at him.
Ronan gritted his teeth but obeyed.
Confounded horror filled my eyes and broke my expression as I lifted my eyes to behold of Corca as he pulled my wife out of his tent, towing her forward with the chains which bound her wrists, her ankles also bound. Her head hung down low and bruises were evident on her face and arms. With but one glance I knew what he, and maybe others, had done to her. Tears compelled of rage stood to burn in my eyes. My death was sealed in her semblance. But in the words he braved then to utter’ was HIS doom also assured.
“Yer daughter was much more enjoyable than this plump tart. That one I will keep for awhile.”
My fury exploded that instant, as well did Ronan and Cairraige’s tempers gust, all three of us to charge the bastard at once. He was a horror master is what Corca was. It was just a simple fact that men like him lived in the world. There was no sense or reason in it, it just was. I ne’re tried to make sense of senseless matters, for it only makes one insane to do so. I did naugh wish to make sense of it, I just wanted to crush the vile beast like a snail! Hear his shell pop and his innards squish beneath my foot! I wanted to exterminate his kind of plague!
What the three of us got was hurt. Cairraige and I were thrown to the ground side by side, and my friend got his throat slit and died before my eyes, while my face was mashed in the ground and my body clubbed to a bruised, bloody, and cut pulp. My one eye they gave me to watch my best mate die, Ronan to suffer the same treatment as I. When Cairraige drew his last breath, Corca delved the side of my head a cracking blow that should have killed me, but it didn’t, it blinded me, then he laughed uproariously and commanded his men to desist and step away from us.
“Ye like to die hard, ey, Ewyn Glennamain? That was some escape ye pulled! Well, I shall give yeh one last chance to prove yerself immortal. Get free o’ this next ordeal and I shall let yeh live forever.”
“I would rather yeh showed us the same mercy as Cairraige,” I wheezed, scarcely able to breathe much less speak.
“Ye are a great man, Ewyn, and great men must die as colorfully as possible. Ronan shall be yer company in pain, for torture suffered alone is naugh as magical as agony suffered in company.”
“What crack is to send us to our doom?” Ronan asked, his voice stronger than my own.
“Ah, ah, ah. I can naugh foil the element o’ surprise,” Corca noted and grinned. “Take them to their grave,” he ordered hence.
We were secured with chains to mooring posts in a small cove. So tightly were we shackled and bound that we could hardly move. My gaze thinned and followed after Corca as he spread a large fur blanket out on the sand within arm’s reach of me, had I been capable of freeing an arm, at what time his manner bespoke of tarrying, of waiting for something. My stomach upturned as my wife and twelve-year-old daughter was ushered forth. I struggled against my binds as the blanket wrapped round my beloved wife of twenty years was torn from her, the same treatment to follow for my sweet, little girl. A child who once glowed with bliss and whose heart was as innocent as a rose, whose soul knew only kindness. Sobs gushed from me as they were both raped before my eyes, Ronan to weep quietly beside me. I prayed with all my soul for the tide to roll in and drown us.
but to die filled with such bitter seething anger! To die without the slightest peace of mind! “Ye monster!” I bellowed amidst my raging tears. “I shall come for yeh, Corca! I shall bring the wrath of Ewyn and Lugh down upon yeh, even AFTER I am dead! Engrave these words in yar mind, Corca! Ye shall ne’re know peace again!”
Corca laughed and threw back his head, driving himself hard into my wife, while his lackey beside him had his way with my daughter. The tide started rolling in and still they tormented us with their vile display, I closing my eyes tight, Ronan staring at the sand as the waves washed over it to lick at his legs. A man tried to force our eyes aloft with the razor edge of his sword, and we ignored him. He slashed my shoulder and I clenched my teeth, shutting my eyes tighter. He cut my cheek, I remained fixed. He raised his sword to stake my leg and Corca bellowed for him to stop.
“I do naugh want him to bleed to death before he strangles, yeh dunce!” he scolded, then moaned feverishly and exuded a feral string of grunts as he filled my beloved with his foul seed. The guard on top of my daughter slashed her throat then went wild inside her corpse.
I shuddered violently at the sounds, which did not blind me. I wailed miserably as the guard howled in degenerate bliss. Then the waves sloshed over our torsos to wash against their horror bed, and they picked up and left. I could hear Corca in the near distance shouting at the guard that he had wanted to keep the girl, then heard the guard cry out as Corca slew him.
A vast silence remained with my fellow and I, and then I heard a long shaky sigh escape him. “That bastard’ll pay for this,” he guttered venomously.
“Aye,” I agreed, my tone stone cold.
The salt water rose to our chests, the waves spraying our faces as they collided with our bodies. Anon the sea came to our necks, breakers to wash over our heads every so often. Silently we welcomed our deaths. There was no struggle left in us even when the air no longer frequented our company. The strangling moments were too few between for us. Breath was a taunting reflex we could do without. The water swelled over us and when our lungs were bursting with the dire need to take air, the curst air would come to our rescue in the nick of time. We waited for that moment when our need would not be met, when all we sucked in was salt water. Our one solace was that it was inevitable that our wish would be granted, and thus it was.
The tide gave us no more promise of oxygen. Instinct compelled us to hold our breath; also it forced us to inhale the brine. Drowning is not something I would wish on anyone, after having suffered the horror of it myself. My lungs filled with salt water, which set my lungs on fire. My body flailed uncontrollably; every muscle winding so tight they cramped. My entire body then felt like it had been set ablaze, as salt water went into my nasal passages, my throat, my lungs, my stomach, and before I swooned it was coursing in my bloodstream. The water permeated the whole of my body before I died. I became the ocean as it became me.
Water dripped from my tattered tartan in large droplets onto the sand, and I lifted my gaze to behold of Ronan who stood several paces from me, vomiting sea water upon the beach. I was stooped upon one knee; a foot planted in the black sand, he standing doubled over at the waist. Hence I stood to gaze upon him with austere scrutiny.
“Ye wretch for naught, Ronan. We are dead, ye and I, ghosts,” I told him.
My mate straightened his posture ever so slowly and swung about as torpidly to meet my gaze. “Do naugh be absurd. If wishes were words I would agree, but we live as we stand.”
I directed a ridged finger at the posts, which hitched our temporal forms. The tide had receded long ago. Ronan followed my gesture to regard the two bloated corpses lashed to the posts. “By the spirits...” he gasped.
“By the spirits, we ARE the spirits!” I triumphed. “As we were chained to those poles are we chained to this earth to seek our revenge!”
Ronan glowed as a crafty smile lit his lips. We both spun around swift as we heard Corca’s voice, he leading a troop to the beach to examine the results of his execution. May Lugh whip me; the man walked right through me. A chill shook him and he peered about nervously. “Yeh felt that didn’t yeh, Corca?” I hissed, and as I spoke he stumbled rearwards to steady himself on the arm of the man nearest to him.
“Who said that?”
“Said what, My Lord?” his first man at arms queried in return.
“Someone said that I felt aught.”
All of his men shook their heads, each vowing in turn they had uttered naugh a word.
“’Tis I who speak, Corca. Ewyn,” my name I spoke with a ghostly accent.
Corca tore his cloak away, hurled it on the sand and brandished his sword. “Who dares to gamble a hoax with me!?” he ranted; his men to exchange bewildered looks.
Testing my new entity, I picked up a handful of sand and flung it in his face. The man flew into a rage, swiping his sword at the fellow nearest him, opening his gut, his intestines spilling out. His first man finished the poor bugger who fell victim to Corca’s temper then took a wary stance of his confused leader.
“My Lord, what is up wit’ yeh?”
“He threw sand in my face, and spoke asinine words to me!” Corca fumed.
I crept up behind my sworn foe and whispered in his ear. “Ye slew an innocent man, Corca, naugh that ye would have a care, but ‘tis a ghost that taunts yeh. I told yeh ye would have no peace, Corca. And none ye shall have.”
The warlord whirled around but there was naugh a soul that was closer than ten paces from him. It was then I wanted him to know beyond a doubt that he was being haunted. I clutched him arm firmly. “I shall bloody make yeh go mad, Corca. I will make yeh walk with death.”
Corca shook off my hand and staggered back, chuckling inanely. “Ye just try it,” he hissed and stormed away.
Corca’s best man swapped a puzzled glance with his mate Theogh. “We best stay close to him. He is walking a narrow ledge,” he advised, Theogh nodding in accord.
Corca was just sitting down to partake of his dinner when I recommenced with the ruse. The dusk was settling fast as I took a seat beside him upon an upturned pail.
“That venison looks delicious. Will yeh have a bite for me, Corca? For a specter misses what he can no longer enjoy,” I spoke as an old chum.
Corca jumped, spilling his victuals onto the ground. I watched as his men regarded him closely. “What goes Feodha?” his best man Mordraigh queried; his leader to return him a pale stare.
“I...the food tasted of rot,” he lied.
“My Lord?”
“’Tis spoilt,” he uttered, then tossed up his arms. “Dispose of it! Feed it to the dogs!” he roared.
His men exchanged puzzled glances then obeyed his flippant command. I hence leaned upon his shoulder. “I am going to cut thy ears off when ye chance to sleep,” I told him matter of factly.
Feodha stood fast. “Who of ye heard that what was here spoken to me?” he questioned with fearful animosity.
Mordraigh shook his head. “None spoke to yeh, My Lord. Come, come man and confide what pothers yeh,” he invited.
“I am haunted then...Surely,” he confessed with trepidation.
“Haunted?”
“Aye, by Ewyn. He taunts me...and just now threatened to cut off my ears. He has sworn vengeance upon me.”
Mordraigh stood to face him. “Perhaps yar conscience haunts yeh, My Lord,” he braved to say what no one else would dare.
Corca’s gaze keened on his mate and he grappled his tartan to jerk him near. “Say again,” he dared.
“Ye are sure then?” Mordraigh spoke cooley.
“Aye, I am certain,” he vouched. “He means to make me suffer madness and pain.”
“I shall stand nigh, My Lord, to stay my wakefulness whence ye sleep,” he volunteered.
Corca smiled and cuffed his fellow’s back. “Ye are a good man, Mordraigh.”
I spirited away as they broke out the wine, to steal into Corca’s tent. Hither found I my poor wife, chained to a stake driven into an outcropped boulder in the center of the seal skin pavilion. I summoned the life force and made myself visible to her, then knelt down to brush a finger against her cheek, rousing her. I bid her shush with a finger to my lips then produced a key, which I had stolen off of Corca. I uncoupled the shackles, her gaze fixed round upon me as I did so, and when she was free she lunged at me to embrace me. I sprung away whereat her smile altered into a mask of woeful shame.
“Ye loathe me now...” she whispered.
“Nay, my love. I adore yeh, but Kairraighn, I am a man no more. A ghost stands before yeh. Now away, swiftly, while the chance abides. Hurry,” I urged her.
My only love blew me a sweet kiss and obeyed me, slipping out underneath the back of the tarpaulin. I traced after her until she was safely away, and as I turned to leave her, she called out.
“Oh embrace me one last time, Ewyn,” she pleaded, I to with a sigh oblige her entreat.
I swept her into my cold spectral arms then kissed her with all my immortal passion. Her warmth infused me, my essence to transcend into her flesh, into her being, whereupon I loved her as only a ghost can love another, by stimulating her tender woman-hood with my soul’s force. We were one as never we had been before, or would be again. When she was spent, I parted from her body, which lay upon a soft layer of leaves. “I love yeh sweetheart,” I whispered, then without further adieu, I parted ways with her forever more.
Corca was snoring like a goblin when I returned to his tent. Many hours had elapsed since I retrieved my wife; our coupling having exhausted a duration I had naugh counted for. In any case, my archenemy slept soundly, while Mordraigh watched over him faithfully. A cunning joy enlivened my soul, and I bent over Corca to take up his hand ever so gently, and place it upon a dagger handle, which projected from beneath his covers. I then carefully wrapped his fingers around the hilt, at what moment he stirred.
I clamped down his had firm upon the knife as he sat bolt upright, and wrestled it to his left ear. Mordraigh leapt up from his station in the corner of the tent, he to cry out at the same time as Feodha. “Ach! The ghost is upon me!”
“My Lord! What madness? What madness holds to yeh?!”
Mordraigh stood a moment in confounded horror as Feodha cut off his own ear, or so it appeared, hither he lunged forth as Corca raised the dagger to his other ear, screaming all the while for Mordraigh to “Help me! Help me!”
I acted quickly and jammed my celestial leg beneath Corca’s own, to heave it fast as Mordraigh sprung nigh, whereby Feodha delved his mate a swift kick which sent Mordraigh sprawling onto the ground. Before he had regained his footing, Corca sliced off his other ear, howling like the devil. Hence I stood awry to mind the outcome of my first act.
Corca hurled the dagger abroad then buried his face into his hands. Mordraigh was stagger struck. He feared to approach his leader when he was clearly taken by madness, for where he was a danger to himself, he was most assuredly perilous to anyone within his reach. Mordraigh was no coward, nevertheless; therefore he collected his wits and stepped just out of reach of Corca’s powerful arms.
“My Lord...What has taken yeh? I...I fear for yeh, my friend,” he spoke with cool compassion.
“Ewyn...” he gasped.
“Sir...I sawr no one. It was yar own hand, which wielded the dagger, and it was ye kicked me when I attempted to hinder yeh.”
Corca wearily lifted his green eyes upon Mordraigh, blood streaming over his temples and onto his shoulders. “I am naugh mad, Mordraigh. Ye must believe me, mate. I am a blackguard, a tyrant and an evil son of a troll, but insane I am naugh. Ewyn wants me to appear mad. It was HE forced my hand and my leg, I swear to yeh upon my black soul. This,” and he pointed with both his hands to the side of his head, “was naugh my doing!”
Truly Mordraigh wanted to believe him, and a part of him did, but even if he were to trust his word, the other men would never believe it. “I will tell the men...” Hence he shut his trap and looked over his shoulder to glimpse the tent’s entry. Four peered within; many others crowded behind them. The whole camp had come to their Lord‘s cries, Mordraigh guessed, and he was right. The commotion had roused everyone, and the four at the doorway had witnessed Corca cut off his second ear. Mordraigh wetted his mind and returned his intelligent regard upon his troubled leader. “I will tell the men, the truth, My Lord, like it or naugh, that I saw that specter which does to torment yeh. It was Ewyn all right, only I did naugh wish to believe it, or admit it myself,” he pretended cleverly as he could the situation notwithstanding.
Mordraigh proceeded to the corner of the tent to collect a medical pack, and hence doctored his leader’s wounds. Corca gritted his teeth as the open lacerations were closed with stitches. As his mate tied of the last stitch, I advanced to lean near Corca.
“The ruse has only just commenced, Feodha. Ye have hardly fathomed the pain yet to come,” I promised him.
Feodha trembled and clutched Mordraigh’s arm. “He torments me with bitter words even now,” he whispered coarsely.
Mordraigh grimaced and honed his posture. “Ewyn...I know ye are here. How now ghost, may we satisfy yar vengeance?”
“Naught but Corca’s misery and death shall satisfy me,” I hissed, the words for Corca’s ears alone.
“He shall naugh be satisfied until I am dead,” Feodha muttered.
“My Lord...Perhaps if yeh confessed to him yer sins, and begged o’ his pardon, would he be content to go hither into the beyond,” he suggested.
“Would that satisfy yeh, Ewyn?” he asked.
I whispered my answer into the hole that was now his ear. “Save yar confessions for God, Corca. Of my pardon, it shall naugh be had. Ye are the worst kind of wicked, and yar death alone shall betray to yeh yar own true face.”
I then straightened and began to swat the crown o’ his head o’er and again, he shrinking fast from each swipe, I to consummate the taunting with a harsh blow to his face, knocking him side-long. The men at the entrance, eight of them now, watched in alarm as Corca jerked about then toppled rearwards. The one named Theogh came forward to aim a shaky finger at his deranged leader. “He ‘as gone mad, Mordraigh, can ye naugh see that? I demand he stand down as our chief until a time his mania has ceased!”
Mordraigh whirled round to snatch up a fistful of Theogh’s tartan and jostle him. “Ye fool, he is haunted by Ewyn’s embittered spirit! Would yeh give tribute to the specter’s foul purpose by yielding to ‘is artifice?! Would ye honor a ghost what torments the man who ‘as won yeh Munster?! Be naugh a coward, Theogh. Stake naugh thy faith in the scheming pretense of an angry soul! We are the Lion‘s o‘ War and shall naugh be had by one solitary apparition!”
I had to give Mordraigh credit, for he was a bold fellow, a clever man, and honorable in his own rights. It was a pity he served a demon. Still...Did he truly know just how evil Feodha the Lion was? I picked myself up and left Corca to the judgment of his men for a little while. I to ponder upon my current notion of Mordraigh's honor. I spirited myself to a rock barren hillside and waited for the night to get on to a later hour.
I wondered when Ronan would return. I sent him to find Neese; to tell him Ewyn’s spirit walked the earth with them still, and that we would still have our reprisal. He was to advise them to gather warriors and journey with their army to Eoghanacht, where they would hold off any assaults attempted thereafter by Corca. Above all he was to assure them that I would disarm Feodha of his power.
My thoughts then shifted to Mordraigh. He was Corca’s only true loyalist, the others granted him fealty out of fear; I had no doubt. He was a severe and unforgiving man; one whom I meant to rattle until he was incapable of sustaining a single adherent.
I looked down at my feet where I sat. They were so white they looked a pale shade of blue, yet they looked human. I was naugh transparent to my own envision, although none could see me erst I willed it. What was I? Was I a ghost, or aught else? Whatever I was or was not, I was thirsty. Thirsty like I had ne’re been hitherto fore. I got up and strolled down to a spring brook, and when I drank of its crystalline waters, I nearly gagged and spat it out. It burned in my throat and tasted caustic! The Gods help me I was desperate to quench my dire thirst! I collapsed upon my knees as I recalled something. Something which had spoken to me from death’s barren when the tide took me. It spoke in a very ancient language, but somehow I understood it. It said to me; “Thy soul is heavy with anger and hatred, thus ye can naugh be one with the Celestials. Go thee, Ewyn Tellurian, and make peace with thy soul, and thou shalt be reborn with us. Go forth in enmity and thou shalt abide eternity as an immortal vampire. The choice is thine. What is thy will, Ewyn, and it shall be done”
I shuddered and hunkered down to entomb my face within my palms. I had chosen revenge. I knew now from whence came my thirst. It was for blood I thirsted, naugh water.
“O’ what have I done?” I lamented. I then lifted my immortal eyes upon the face of the moon, a tear to roll down my cheek, and a conquered chuckle rattled in my throat. “Corca shall be my first victim, and henceforward shall other fiends nourish me.”
I taunted and tormented Corca in a multitude of cruel and crafty ways in the days I waited for Ronan to return. And in the darkest hours of the night I drank of his blood. Of Mordraigh, I got into his head to influence his dreams whilst he slept, betraying to him Feodha’s worst sins. Came a dawn when Mordraigh woke in a sweat to go outside and strike a fire, Corca to join him anon to warm his chilled body over the welcoming flames. I sat across from them, needing the heat from the blaze myself, and observed them.
“Ye look the picture o’ death this morn, My Lord,” Mordraigh noted, his tone frosty as the morning air.
Corca too marked the distaste in his voice and cast a honed eye on his mate. “What vexes yeh, Mordraigh, that ye speak so crossly with me?”
“We should be riding North, Feodha, to secure Corca Glennamaire, yet we tarry here whilst ye are beset by disgraceful shenanigans and grow sickly and confounded for all yar affliction. If ye must be ill with yarself, why naugh suffer en-field? Why sojourn in this curst place?!”
“Ye are right, my friend. We shall break camp today and ride for Caisil. I only pray Ewyn does naugh follow.”
“What did ye do to attain his wrath, Feodha?”
“I took his lands is what.”
“I think there is more to it than that, My Lord. How did yeh wrong him? What horror aside of his death did ye inflict upon him?”
Corca’s temper cleaved his expression into a feral one, hither he stood quick, his muscles tense. “Ye questioning my honor, Mordraigh?”
“Aye, I am. No soul would walk the earth to persecute another erst he died with fury in his heart. As a warrior, we expect death, therefore even the most painful demise would naugh invite our revenge succeeding death. Pray ye confide in me how yeh wronged him.”
Corca sneered at him. “I stole his woman.”
“And did yeh rape her in his presence? Was naugh his daughter there as well, the executioner to rally with yeh in yar depraved venture? Did he naugh slay the lass and take liberties with her still, whilst Ewyn watched?”
A snarl rose in Corca’s throat and he charged Mordraigh, the limber fellow to spring from harm’s reach, both of them to draw their swords as they fell apart. Mordraigh pointed at Corca with his sword’s tip. “Answer me, damn yeh!”
“Yeh traitor! Yeh spied on me! I ordered that none were to follow us!”
“Then it is true? Ye did those things?”
“Wait...Who told yeh that which ye accuse me of?” It was clear to Feodha that Mordraigh had naugh seen his atrocious act with his own eyes.
“Nevermind...Ye are guilty and that is all that matters. Ye deserve all that Ewyn possesses to make yeh suffer. My fealty is yars no more. I can hardly bare to look upon yeh much less serve yeh another instant! Hell alone will have yeh, Feodha Corca.”
Corca’s muscles sprang and he attacked his best man with all his rage, their swords crashing one upon the other with a tempest ring. Their men flooded into the clearing to watch the bout, naugh a solitary soul to interfere. At his best, Corca would have defeated Mordraigh, but he was weak from loss of blood; Blood I drained him of only hours before he roused. The skirmish was short lived, Mordraigh disarming him in less than a dozen strikes. After a mighty uppercut ripped Feodha’s sword from his grasp, Mordraigh clobbered his skull with the hilt of his weapon, the blow hazing his former chieftain. Corca’s legs collapsed underneath him, he to sit dazed as the mutineer nestled the tip of his blade upon his bosom.
“I declare Feodha Corca the Lion, mad!” he announced to the witnesses. “I can lie for him no more! There is no ghost! The demons which dwell therein his soul alone haunt him and have brought him to this! He disgraces us as he disgraces himself! I, Mordraigh Uaithne, denounce him as my Lord. Now who here will stand with me in this verdict?” his voice bracing a strength which was profound.
“Will ye stand in his place?” Theogh moved.
“If ’tis the will of this army, I shall supplant him as yar chieftain, and I give yeh my solemn pledge that honor shall bind us so long as I lead yar brave souls.”
The host’s voices rose in laud of Mordraigh, and in denouncement of Feodha. Had the conquered chief’s heart naugh been so black, I would have pitied him, but be it as it may, I knew only contentment and satisfaction.
“What’ll we do wit’ him?” Theogh queried. “He is too dangerous to leave alive.”
“We shall execute him as Ewyn and Ronan were executed, by drowning,” Mordraigh imposed, his fellows eager to oblige their new leader’s first behest.
Feodha fought them fiercely as he was wrestled down to the seaside, his eyes bulging out of their sockets as he watched two men remove what was left of me and my mate’s remains. Their faces curdled from the stench, I to turn away from the morbid sight of our corpses.
Feodha was secured to the post with the same chains which bound me. I deemed Mordraigh very wise in his choice of execution, and admired his deployment of irony. Once Corca was chained, the men left him to the tide. As the last man vanished over the dunes and shelves of stone jutting from the embankment, I appeared before Feodha, kneeling down at his side. It was the first occasion he’d had to see me as well as hear me. He lifted his gaze to meet my regard and to my wonder; he smiled.
“Come to finish yar bitter reckoning, Ewyn?”
“Fate has scored us even, Feodha,” I deemed.
“Fate had less to do with it where it was yar doing,” he grunted.
My eyes dropped as a wave caressed Corca’s knees, his legs folded beneath him. “What makes a man evil, Feodha? Truly, what did the world do to cross yeh so?”
Feodha chuckled. “My mathair was a sweet woman and my Da a goodly man. I just saw things different. The Gods mean for good and evil to dwell side by side, that we naugh forget the difference between the two. What ye should be asking, is what we would be if we could naugh tell the difference between a rose and nightshade anymore.”
I shook my head. “I still do naugh understand how a man can embrace acts so corrupt that the devil would cringe. How could ye have done what ye did?”
“I have naugh the weakness ye might call moral hiatus. If I know it can be done I do it without compunction. I set myself free by doing that, which none other would. I would fly if I knew I could get away with it. Also; I would test the courage of every last living soul on this earth, just to prove to them their honor and virtue can naugh save them from pain. Ye, Ewyn have courage, even as a phantom. Suffering shows us who we really are, Ewyn, and I showed a lot o’ folk what they were made of.”
“What of atonement, Feodha? I pray ye realize that we must atone our actions in life, just as we must suffer our choices in death. Do yeh naugh fear for thy immortal soul?”
“The Gods made me what I am, Ewyn, thus I dread naugh my passage into whatever place awaits me, be it the underworld or Avalon. I am only as wicked as I was born and was probably born as mean in a past life. The only thing I ever feared was ye, Great One, for ye showed me what I was. It was naugh an easy thing to face myself, but alas, I made my peace with what I am.”
“And what is that?”
“What would ye presume me to be?” he asked in return.
“A Monster.”
He laughed, though it was jaded. “And what would Hercules or Cuchuilain be without the Gorgons to test their salt, ey Ewyn? What would the Christian David be without Goliath? Perhaps I am a monster, but mostly I am the thorn of Gibraltar, the arrow of ordeal. I am in essence the brand which marks true champions.”
“And what of those people whose souls could naugh withstand the ilk o’ trials ye imposed upon them? Did they deserve to suffer yar cruelty?” my voice cold.
“If perchance they were naugh worthy of my mercilessness, then it was to their ill fate that they crossed paths with me. Misfortune too is an intrical part of life. Ill fortune makes folk who are blessed with good luck appreciate their good fate.”
“Ye have an answer for everything to justify yar wicked deeds, do ye naugh, Feodha? Death shall set yeh to rights where ye are mistaken; and that ye are, man, terribly mistaken. Naugh a man, maiden or child abides that deserves to be tormented erst they bring it upon themselves. Whither ye invade their quiet lives to force yar twisted ideals and ruthless feats upon them, ye are upsetting the order of providence. Take it to heart, Feodha, that the divine ones will naugh tolerate thy sins in the heavens any more than they did upon this earth.”
His temper flared though he kept it in his eyes and taut muscles, his tone to sustain a frosty edge. “I have lived a long life for one who was naugh tolerated by the spirits. I am two score and five years of age, and few warriors much less common men live so long! What is yar age, Ewyn? Twenty and eight if that; and did ye naugh perish with raging fury in yar heart? And what of the curse ye brought upon thyself in death? Does it please yeh that ye must drink the blood of life forever more? Tell me again who had the best o‘ this world!”
I stood and watched a wave wash over Corca’s thighs. “I am twenty and five, and aye I died with such anger in my heart as cleaved my soul, but I shall rejoice in draining the blood from every man as vile as thee. As I had a divine purpose in life, so do I possess a divine purpose in death!”
Feodha then betrayed his illustrious charm. “Of course yeh do, but so do I. Ye and I are Lions of War. A proper war must have a righteous honorable side and a wicked tyrannical side. We are opposing sides of the same sword, good man. Ye are gravely mistaken however if ye think my part ends with this tide. The Gods shall bestow me my reward for being a proper monster. Trust me in this; Eternity has a place for me just as it did thee.”
A scowl marred my expression. “I pray ‘tis a proper one,” I growled and left him to Death.
Epilogue
This chronicle I write in a time far removed from those centuries of old, when folk knew the difference between good and evil. This modern time has given birth to generations who fathom naugh the true meaning of the dark and the benign forces inhabiting this earth. They see wickedness in everything, even themselves, thus confuse the contrast between veritable corruption and inherent human nature, while goodness is trodden upon more than it is rewarded. I, who am a vampire would be marked by most as an evil manifestation, for the simple reason of what I am, whilst my old rival would be looked upon as an agent of God. Feodha Corca strangled with the tide that day, to be raised from his death as an angle. If folk could opt to bed their trust with either a vampire or an angle, which would they choose? The angle of course, neglecting that Lucifer was God’s most beloved angle.
Feodha tortures, torments and crucifies folks to this day, also he corrupts, seduces and leads them astray, while I fight him, hinder him and vex him in every known way. He was accurate when he bespoke of proper goodness and wickedness, for am I naugh the epidimy of righteousness, and he the perfect example of evil’s finesse? Am I naugh trod upon as benign folk are trodden upon, and does he naugh control power by fear and ruthless ambition, as corrupt folk attain power by fear and ambition? What sense then in redemption? Where lies the reason to be a benediction? What difference between the angel and the vampire? My rest is peaceful whence I retire, whilst his repose pits him in eternal fire. I embrace and exalt in the beauty which abounds, whilst he envies and despises the magnificence all around. My heart is naugh angry anymore, whilst his enmity he feeds evermore.
I contend with him now naugh out of spite, but to abet his victims’ blight. Aye, I still drink the blood of evil persons to survive, but I drink naugh the blood of the innocent, good or wise. I live my immortal life at peace, whilst he chases an achievement he can ne’re reach. Hell abides within him, and heaven within me, our fates twined in condemnation, and a contest that is scored by eternity. As for my mate Ronan? I never heard from him again. I have not a doubt that he delivered the men my message, for Neese and Murtagh had their warriors well equipped when Mordraigh raided Eoghanacht Glennamain in an attempt to take control of my kingdom. His legion was crushed by my own nevertheless, my men sparing Mordraigh’s life when all but thirty of his army remained. The noble warrior retreated nor-west in Kerry, whither he was allowed to settle with respect in a territory of his own.
I like to think that Ronan undertook his passage into the kingdom of the celestials when our men had satisfied their conquest. I speak to he and Carriage oft, and though they ne’re speak back, I keep them in my heart as my guardian spirits. I can sense their strength sometimes, when despair presses upon me. ‘Tis a most arduous thing to be immortal. I am naugh alone, for there are others, some like me, others much more powerful. Corca’s name alone will I utter, for we have a history together, whereas I dare naugh to whisper the identities of the others.
Do Bheatha - Bless thy life.