In Praise of the Bees Read online

‘Cuimne!’

  Cuimne looks over and sees Lassar leaning on her stick, a dark brat thrown around her shoulders. Her whole face is creased into a frown. ‘Would you please come here a moment?’

  ‘I’ll just help Aed take the ponies to the field.’

  ‘Let Aed take the ponies by himself, I need you to come now.’

  Cuimne sighs, gives Aed a rueful look and hands over the rope. With a deliberate pace, she makes her way over to Lassar. ‘What is it you want?’

  ‘It’s not for you to run raggle taggle with Aed, or anyone else who works on this farm,’ Lassar says in a low voice. ‘You’re no longer a wild seven-year-old, or even a twelve-year-old child with a father who knows nothing about what is appropriate behaviour for the daughter of a king.’

  ‘But I’m no longer the daughter of a king,’ she mutters.

  ‘Perhaps not, but soon you will be someone’s wife who wouldn’t appreciate that sort of conduct.’ Lassar throws in the last comment as she stalks off back to the house and her seat by the fire.

  Cuimne watches her retreating back, struck by the parting words. She has been a fool not to realize her potential marriage was the main reason for the welcome here, such as it is. She would be a tool to bargain for the tuath, to secure a marriage for her that would benefit Ailill and his family. She knows it’s only to be expected, she’d been raised in the hopes of an advantageous marriage. It is her duty, a duty that includes providing heirs for her husband. Almaith had spoken truth about what Cuimne must face on her return home when she spoke to her a few days ago.

  She puts her hands to her face, and lets the darkness it provides fold over her, like a cloak. If she must make a marriage she will do it, but it will be on her terms and serve her purpose as well, if she can manage it, though she concedes that her aunt and even Ailill are forces that will take careful planning to overcome.

  ‘Is there something amiss?’

  She lowers her hands and sees Colmán standing before her. She attempts a smile and greets him. ‘I’m still a little tired, I think. I didn’t sleep that well.’

  He nods. ‘I suppose there are some changes to get used to.’

  ‘Yes, even last night I could see that.’ She gives a rueful smile. ‘Thank you for remaining here for a few days. It does help me to deal with all of this, if you’re present.’

  ‘I must leave tomorrow, though. I’m sorry.’

  ‘I understand.’ She sighs. ‘You’ve done much for me.’

  ‘I hope you’ve dropped the idea you must find out more about your brother’s death? I’d hate for you to do something foolish.’

  She gives him a steady look. ‘I promise you I will do nothing that’s foolish.’

  ‘What you and I think is foolish, might be two different things altogether.’ He frowns and his face fills with concern. ‘I mean what I say. I would not have you plotting to kill anyone, or even injuring them.’

  ‘Colmán, your rank, law experience and the help you’ve given me earn you the right to voice your opinion to me, but that doesn’t mean I must be guided by it.’ She pats his arm. ‘But I do appreciate your concern. I must find my own path here, and I will. I would ask only that you leave me a knife. For my protection.’

  He narrows his eyes and frowns. She assembles her face into a passive look but refuses to be drawn by his expression. He sighs and passes over his knife silently. It is the one he’d given her on their journey and she notes the fine workmanship. She quickly blinks back the tears that come to her eyes.

  ‘If you should ever need me,’ he says, ‘you’ve only to ask.’

  She smiles and stretches up to kiss him lightly on the cheek. ‘I will.’

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  She feels bereft after Colmán’s departure. All her energy and desire to come home and pursue her plans evaporate in the wake of his leaving. Now, she feels her last connection to the woman who was Áine, the person who loved Sodelb so well and flourished under Gobnait’s nurturing, vanishing with the last sight of Colmán.

  Leaning against the doorway, she watches the rain running off the thatched roof overhang to the stone gutters below. Colmán will have a wet ride. He said little to her when the time came to leave, something she marked down to the presence of Ailill, Sárnat and especially Lassar. He only clasped her to him briefly and gave her a meaningful glance, before turning to the others for a more formal farewell. And now she is alone and must make her own way.

  ‘Come away from the door, Cuimne, you’re blocking the light.’

  She turns and looks over at Lassar, who sits in her chair, spinning the wool. ‘Instead of standing there like a door, put yourself to use and comb some of this wool in the basket. Better yet, sit at the loom and weave for a while. I presume you learned that much from your muimme.’

  Cuimne glances at Sárnat who sits on a bench on the other side of the fire, sewing a fine léine for Ailill. She can see some of the embroidered tracery at the neck and cuffs. Though this fine work is more fitting for a daughter of the king, she has no stomach for it, not for lack of ability, but because it reminds her of Sodelb’s skills. She sits down on the small stool by the basket after a dark look from Lassar, and begins to card the wool. She tries to lose herself in the repetitive motion. Forward, backward, forward, backward, the words fix in her mind and remind her of her own situation. Sárnat says little besides expressing the hope of improved weather. She casts nervous glances towards her mother-in-law, her words eliciting no response from Lassar, who appears lost in thought.

  ‘Colmán seems a clever enough man. Do you know anything of the law cases he’s worked on?’ Lassar says eventually.

  She thinks of Fionn’s theft. Such an odd case, with subtle political overtones, yet Colmán had made no enemies there. That in itself counts for something. But is it his law experience or his cleverness that Lassar is curious about? Is there some angle of the law that might suit her situation, and Colmán either hadn’t mentioned it or didn’t know it himself? ‘No one in particular,’ she says, finally. ‘But I understand he is well respected by the law courts and other legal representatives.’

  Lassar seems satisfied with her answer, for she falls silent again, her gnarled hands working the wool with practiced ease. ‘And what is his father like, his family? Is their farm as prosperous as this one? What cows have they?’

  Cuimne blinks under the force of the questions and strives to answer them as evenly as she can, while her mind searches for the cause that prompts the questions. Status and comparisons seem foremost in Lassar’s mind and she assumes that Cuimne had spent these past months with Colmán’s family. It is natural enough for her to be curious about it. She digs through her memory and tries to answer Lassar’s questions calmly, while feeling gratitude that Colmán hadn’t mentioned Máthair Gobnait’s community. Besides the desire to avoid the snide remarks, comments and biting questions that Lassar would have tossed around, she also wants to keep the memories and experiences of Máthair Gobnait’s community for herself, to take out and examine privately in her own time. Even now, one of the psalms threads itself through her mind, keeping her company.

  It is there that Ailill finds her, sitting on the stool, her hands going backwards and forwards carding wool, while a psalm sings its way through her mind. He comes through the door, shaking his hair free of the rain and stomping his feet. Sárnat looks up, the pleasure written on her face, and goes at once to lead him to the warm circle of the fire before whisking off to get him a hot drink from the kitchen shed.

  ‘Let the rectaire do his job,’ says Lassar when she reaches the door. She motions to the young man, who scuttles forward from the water vats where he was overseeing their placement. ‘Give Barrdub a shout,’ she says to him. ‘She’s probably over with the girls who tend the cows. Aren’t they churning today?’

  ‘Oh yes, I forgot to tell you that they said some of the cheese from this last batch has failed,’ says the young man.

  ‘They did, did they?’ Lassar rises and takes up her
stick. ‘I’ll just have a look at this failed cheese. More than likely one of them has spirited it off. Even so, we can’t afford to have carelessness of that sort.’ She pulls her brat over her head and makes her way out of the door. The rectaire looks after her helplessly.

  Sárnat bites her lip. ‘Do you think she’ll tell Barrdub to come?’ She looks over at Ailill. ‘Perhaps I’d better go anyway. It’s partly my responsibility.’

  ‘It is your responsibility,’ says Ailill in a gentle tone. ‘It is your responsibility to instruct young Liam to do his job properly.’

  She nods and hastily takes up her brat, wraps it around her and motions to Liam to follow her. Ailill sighs and shakes his head. Clearly he meant for Liam to go on his own.

  The exchange comes as no surprise to Cuimne. Lassar’s authority over the household is clear. Now, with her father and brother dead, she has free rein to apply her harsh judgements and reprimands without restraint.

  Ailill rises and moves over to the bench, where he pours himself a mug of beer. He picks a poker out of the fire and places it for a moment in his mug, heating it up. He drinks in silence for a while, while Cuimne observes him from the other side of the fire. She can see he is tired and remembers the bothach, fuidir and ócaire who work the land and give portions, and the aire déso, the bóaire who lease farms under her father’s care when she was young that seemed to bring no end of work for everyone. It is a hard task to eke a living from land that might be less boggy than Boirneach, but still has its share of rain and damp. At least her father had always claimed. He had argued it was best to accumulate more land inland where the trees and fields weren’t bent over by the winds in the winter. He’d looked ever eastwards. Even her own fosterage had been contracted to further those plans.

  ‘You are settling well?’

  Startled, she looks across at Ailill and tries to collect herself. ‘Well enough,’ she says at last. Her brother had once described Ailill as sly. She has no idea why he thought that, but she remembers his words. They were close enough in age, he and Diarmait, though what little she recalls of Ailill makes her think of him as much older. Still, with little enough to go by, she will watch her words carefully.

  ‘I know it must be difficult for you to return home with many things changed.’

  ‘I’m managing, thank you.’ She continues carding the wool and starts to count her strokes.

  ‘Still, I would like to give you some time before we think of your future.’

  She keeps her head lowered so he will not see the defiant flash in her eyes. ‘We?’

  ‘All of us, since all of us will be affected by the decision.’

  ‘I will have some say in this decision,’ she says, her voice firm.

  ‘You will, of course.’

  She looks up now and studies his face. She can detect no mockery, no lie there, but still she can’t be sure.

  He returns her stare with a mild look, but she finds she can’t trust it, though she reminds herself not to make an enemy of him yet. ‘I’m sorry,’ she says. ‘As you say, there’s still a lot to get used to.’

  He raises a brow that says he hopes her words are truth, but she can see now there is caution in his face. The man is no fool. ‘You have no need to worry,’ he tells her. ‘Soon you will have your own household to run as you please.’

  ‘This is my home.’

  ‘You would have had a new home someday, whether your father lived or not. You know this.’ His voice is mild still, but she knows there is steel behind it.

  ‘I do know it. I’m just not ready to leave this home yet.’ She thinks to play for time, show a little resistance so that he might agree to her choice of husband.

  ‘I’m prepared to give you time, but we need to set things in motion soon. Negotiations can last months, even years.’

  ‘You have someone in mind?’ Though she knows he’d said he would defer the discussion, she is curious about his choice. Would his strategy be her father’s? A link with an Eóganacht in the east had been his plan, a family related to her foster father. Though she’d been happy enough with that plan in the past, now she looks to an entirely different direction.

  ‘I know your father had begun negotiations with a family, but they had progressed little. And in the time since his death and your disappearance I believe the man in question has found another wife.’

  It’s a tidy solution, already accomplished, and she is glad of it. Though her father would have been disappointed, the situation is much different now than when he was alive. ‘So you would look elsewhere?’

  ‘I would look where it would most benefit us now. In my view that might be someone from the Corco Duibne, or the Eóganacht of Raithlinn.’

  She nods. Diarmait’s foster brother, Óengus, was of the Eóganacht just north of here and she wonders what Ailill thinks of him. ‘I see. There is no one specific, though.’

  ‘No, not as yet. Is there someone you have in mind?’ He gives a slight smile. ‘A certain legal representative, perhaps?’

  ‘What? No, not at all. He has a wife. I wouldn’t want to look there.’

  ‘You’re certain? It appeared a little differently when he was here.’

  She bristles at his words. It’s certainly not the case. What she would wish, deep in her heart, is impossible now. She could never be Áine again.

  ‘There is no need to look in that quarter,’ she says. ‘I’m surprised you would consider it, for I would be at best a second wife. That’s hardly worthy of the status of the family, or me.’

  ‘I’m not so sure. They are an influential family and would be a good alliance.’

  ‘What would be a good alliance?’ Lassar comes through the doorway. She removes her brat and shakes out the raindrops, leaning heavily on her stick.

  ‘I was suggesting a few possibilities for Cuimne’s future.’

  Lassar draws herself up, the stick in front of her. ‘We are Uí Chearbaill. She will marry someone to our advantage.’ Her tone is firm.

  ‘That’s what I was just explaining. I wondered if perhaps she was considering a match with Colmán.’

  ‘Colmán?’ Lassar moves over to the bench and sits, landing with a thump, as if to emphasize her view. She asserts that they can do better. A strong ally is needed in such times.

  ‘The Eóganacht of Raithlinn are not strong enough?’ asks Cuimne. She wonders if there is dissension between mother and son and if she might use it to her advantage. She tells Lassar that accepting Colmán as a second wife would not place her in any position of influence.

  Lassar concedes the point and says they should look away from the Eóganacht of Raithlinn, but find someone who would meet with the approval of the king of Mumu.

  ‘You feel he carries that much weight with Fiachra, though we are so far from Cashel?’ asks Ailill. ‘I’m not so sure. I feel Fiachra would just as soon we look closer to home.’

  ‘No, don’t be foolish, Son.’

  ‘Would you consider Óengus?’ asks Cuimne. In some ways she finds their wrestle for power amusing, but mostly she would rather just get on with the matter and settle it to her liking.

  ‘Óengus? But he’s an outsider, one of the Múscraige.’

  ‘Does that really matter? I’m sure his father will pay a handsome brideprice that even Fiachra or the king of Mumu wouldn’t object to.’

  ‘But Óengus was Diarmait’s foster brother,’ says Ailill, a slight edge to his tone.

  ‘Yes, so you know him, Cousin, and see that he is a fine and honourable man. And he will assume his father’s role and will have some of the choicest lands.’

  ‘Óengus is unsuitable,’ Lassar says curtly. ‘He’s far too hot-headed. He’d quarrel with a snail for crossing his path if he could.’

  ‘We’re in agreement on that,’ Ailill says. ‘I don’t think he would be suitable, on many counts.’

  Cuimne flushes. ‘You’re being unfair. Óengus is an honourable man and I’m sure he’d be glad to have me as his wife.’

 
‘Oh I’ve no doubt of that,’ says Lassar. ‘He’d do anything to secure a future with a family such as ours. But I won’t be dragged into his fights, or his father’s. No matter that he was a good friend of your father.’

  Cuimne wonders if it is jealousy that makes them object so strongly. Óengus was tall, broadly built and handsome, and could charm people effortlessly. In short, he was nothing like Ailill.

  ‘Have you seen Óengus of late?’ asks Cuimne. ‘What I remember is that he was given to high spirits, like my brother.’

  ‘He was here just after your brother died,’ Lassar says darkly. ‘I saw no remarkable change then.’

  She doesn’t leap at the mention of her brother’s death, though it galls her that they should even remark on it so casually in her presence. She uses the opportunity instead to study their faces in an effort to detect anything that might be deemed suspicious.

  ‘He is—was—my brother’s closest companion, so I would at least like to meet with him. It would bring me some comfort to spend time with someone who knew my brother so well.’

  Ailill glances at his mother, a frown on his face. Lassar narrows her eyes and casts a sceptical look in Cuimne’s direction, but Cuimne keeps her face impassive.

  Lassar starts to open her mouth but Ailill nods. ‘I suppose it could do no harm.’

  ‘Thank you,’ says Cuimne.

  ‘We’ll ask him here,’ he adds. ‘I’ll send word when one of the men is free.’

  ‘On one condition,’ says Lassar. ‘When he comes, you will meet him only in our presence. Is that agreed?’

  Cuimne forces a smile. ‘Of course.’ She will agree now, and in the meantime, she’d think of some way to meet with Óengus on his own, without Lassar and Ailill’s knowledge.

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  ‘The harp, where is it? It wasn’t among my things.’ Sárnat stares up at her from her seat at the loom, her face every bit as startled as a deer about to leap away. Lassar continues with her spinning as though no one had spoken.

  Cuimne had looked for the harp the first night she’d arrived, searching among the large chest that contained her possessions, pulling out the fine embroidered léines, the brightly coloured gowns in red, blue and green and her old plaid brat so they lay scattered on the floor. At the bottom, among a small pair of leather shoes and the odd sandal she had only found her pouch of copper brooches and her old comb, given to her when she was young. Angered, her first impulse had been to run out to Lassar and Ailill and demand the harp’s return. Her father had promised it to her, after all. In the end, she’d decided to bide her time and look for it about the house, and when she found it, decide what to do then.