“I was with the young King—King he is, lord—until I took to the roads. And I have lodged under hedges and among old stones and now and again in Luel and Donn, aye, and An Beag’s steadings too, so never name me coward, lord. Two years I have come and gone and not all in safety.”

“Stay,” Niall said. “Lad, stay here.There is no safety else.”

“Not I. Not I, lord. This place is asleep. I have felt it more and more, and I have slept places round about Donn that I would never cross again. Leave this place with me.”

“No,” Niall said. “Neither Caoimhin nor I. You will not listen. Then never think to come back again. Or to live if you once pass the gates of Caer Wiell. Have you thought how much you could betray?”

“Nothing and no one. I have taken care to know nothing. Two years on the road, lord. Do you think I have not thought? Aye, since Dun na h-Eoin I have thought and come on this journey.”

“Then farewell, friend’s son,” Niall said. “Take my sword if it would serve you. Its owner cannot go.”

“It is a courteous offer,” the harper said, “but I’ve no skill with swords. My harp is all I need.”

“Take or leave it as you will,” Niall said. “It will rust here.” He turned away and went toward his own nook back along the halls. He did not hear Caoimhin follow. He looked back. “Caoimhin,” he said. “The lad has a long way to travel. Go to bed.”

“Aye,” said Caoimhin, and left him.

The harper left before the dawn—quietly, and taking nothing with him that was not his—“Not a bit to eat,” Siolta mourned, “nor anything to drink. We should have set it out for him, and him giving us songs till his voice was gone.” But Aelfraeda said nothing, only shook her head in silence and put the kettle on.

And all that morning there was a heavy silence, as if merriment had left them, as if the singing had exhausted them. Scaga moped about his tasks. Beorc went down to the barn in silence and took Lonn and, others with him. Sgeulaiche sat and carved on something Sgeulaiche understood, an inchoate thing, but the children were out of sorts from late hours and sulked and complained about their tasks. And Caoimhin who had gone down with Beorc never came to his work.

So Niall found him, sitting on the bench at the side of the barn where he should have gathered his tools. “Come,” said Niall, “the fence is yet to do.”

“I cannot stay,” said Caoimhin, so all that he had feared in searching for Caoimhin came tumbling in on him; but he laughed all the same.

“Work is a cure for melancholy, man. Come on. You’ll think better of it by noontime.”

“I cannot stay any longer.” Caoimhin gathered himself to his feet and met his eyes. “I shall be taking my sword and bow.”

“To what use? To defend a harper? What will he be saying to An Beag along the way?—Pray you never notice that great armed man: he set it on himself to follow me? A fine pair you would be along the road.”

“So I shall follow. A winter I said I would stay. But you have stolen a year from me. The boy was right: this place is full of sleep. Leave it, Cearbhallain, leave it and come do some good in the world before we end. No more of this waking sleep, no more of this place.”

“Think of it when you are starved again and cold, or when you lie in some ditch and none to hear you—O Caoimhin! Listen to me.”

“No,” said Caoimhin and flung his arms about him briefly. “O my lord, one of us should go to serve the King, even if neither sees his day.”

Then Caoimhin went striding off toward the house, never looking back.

“Then take Banain,” Niall cried after him. “And if you have need then give her her head: she might bring you home.”

Caoimhin stopped, his shoulders fallen. “You love her too much. Give me your blessing, lord. Give me that instead.”

“My blessing then,” said Cearbhallain, and watched him go toward the house, which was as much as he cared to see. He turned. He ran, ran as he had run that day long ago, across the fields, as a child would run from something or to something, or simply because his heart was breaking and he wanted no sight of anyone, least of all of Caoimhin going away to die.

He fell down at last high upon the hillside among the weeds, and his side ached almost as much as his heart. He had no tears—saw himself, a grim, lean man the years had worn as they wore the rocks; and about him was the peace the hillside gave; and below him when he looked down was the orchard ripe with apples, the broad meadow pastures, the house with the barn and the old oak. And above him was the sky. And beyond the shoulder of the hill the way grew strange like the glare of rocks in summer noon, the sheen of sun on grass stems, so that his eyes hurt and he looked away and rose, walking along the hill.

Then a doubt came gnawing at him, so that he passed along the ridge looking for some sight of Caoimhin, like a man worrying at a wound. But when he had come on the valley way he saw no one, and knew himself too late.

“Death,” said a thin small voice above him on the hill.

Niall looked up in rage at the shaggy creature on the rock. “What would you know, you croaking lump of straw? Starve from now on! Steal all I have, creeping thief, and starve!”

“Evil words for evil, but only one is true.”

“A plague on your prophecy.”

“Ill and ill.”

“Leave me.”

The Gruagach hopped down from the rock and came nearer still “Not I.”

“Will he die then?”

“Perhaps.”

Then be clear.” Hope had started up in him, a guilty desperate thing, and he seized the Gruagach by its shaggy arms and held it “If you have the Sight, then See. Tell me—tell me—was there truth in the harper? Is there hope at all? If there was hope—will there be a King again? Is it on me to serve this King?”

“Let go!” it cried. “Let go!”

“Be plain with me,” Niall said and shook it hard, for a terror made him cruel, and the creature’s eyes were wild. “Is there hope in this King?”

“He is dark,” hissed the Gruagach with a wild shake of its shaggy head, and its eyes rolled aside and fixed again on his. “O dark.”

“Who? What meaning, dark? Name me names. Will this young King live?”

The Gruagach gave a moan and suddenly bit him fiercely, so that he jerked his hand back and lost the Gruagach from his grip, holding the wounded hand to his lips. But the creature stopped and hugged itself and rocked to and fro, wild eyed, and spoke in a thin, wailing voice:

Dark the blight and dark the path and strong the chains that bind them

Fell the day that on them dawns, for doom comes swift behind them.

“What sense is that?” Niall cried. “Who are they? Do you mean myself?”

“No, no, never Cearbhallain. O Man, the Gruagach weeps for you.”

“Shall I die then?”

“All Men die.”

“A plague on you!” He sucked at his wounded hand. “What chains and where? Is it Caer Wiell you mean?”

“Stay,” it said, and fled.

He almost had the will to go. He stood on the hillside and looked down at the dale that led away toward the outgoing of the hills. But that Stayrang in his ears, and his bones ached with his running, and Caoimhin was nowhere in sight

He sank down there, and watched till sundown, but the courage for the road grew colder and colder, and his belief in it less and less.

At last a boy came running, jogging along by turns and running as if his side hurt, down in the place between the hills.

“Scaga!” Niall called, rising to his feet.

The boy stopped as if struck, and looked up, and began to run toward him, stumbling as he ran; but Niall came down to him and caught him in his arms.

“I thought you had gone,” the boy said, and never Scaga wept, but his lip quivered.

“Caoimhin is gone,” Niall said, “not I. Is supper ready?”

For a moment Scaga fought for breath. “I think so.”