A Game of Sorrows

Prologue

Coleraine, Ulster, July 1628

The bride’s grandmother smiled: she could feel the discomfort of the groom’s family and it pleased her well. This wedding feast was a sickly imitation of what such things should be – her father would have been ashamed to set such poor fare before his followers’ dogs. But no matter. The music had scarcely been worthy of the name, and of dancing there had been none at all, for fear of offence to their puritan sensibilities. It was a mockery of a feast; she should not have permitted it, regardless of what her husband had said. It might well be politic to pander to the ways of these new English settlers, but it was not the O’Neill way, not her way. She should have insisted that the marriage took place in Carrickfergus, and according to her own customs. But the girl too had been against it – like Grainne, she would reap what she had sown, and she mattered little, anyhow.

Maeve looked down towards the far end of the table – they should not have put him there; he should have had the place of honour – these people knew nothing. Finn O’Rahilly was resplendent in the saffron tunic and white mantle, bordered with golden thread, that she had gifted him for the occasion. He would be paid well enough too, although it was not seemly at such times to talk of money. Regardless of all that her granddaughter and her new husband’s English family had said, on this one point the old woman would not be moved. There had been a poet at every O’Neill wedding through all the ages and, despite all that had happened, there would be a poet at this one, to give his blessing on the union, to tell the glories – fallen, broken though they now were – of the great house of O’Neill. As Finn O’Rahilly rose and turned to face her, Maeve felt the pride of the generations coursing through her: her moment had come.

He spoke in the Irish tongue. Everything was still. All the guests, even the English, fell silent as the low, soft voice of the poet filled the room. Every face was turned towards the man with the startling blue eyes whose beard and long silver hair belied his youth. No hint of the chaos he was about to unleash escaped his countenance, and it was a moment before any but the most attentive auditors understood what was happening. But Maeve understood: she had understood from the shock of the very first words.

The poet turned and left, without further word, and all for a moment was silence, save the sound of Maeve O’Neill’s glass shattering on the stone floor.