The First Protector

CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR

Ma'el Report. Day 112,353…

Contact is being maintained between the vessel in orbit and the sailing craft bearing my wagon, where Declan has ostensibly developed the habit of muttering to himself at odd times of the day or night. Since the revelation of his origins, the majority of the conversations have been between him and Sinead, who was irritated at him for not first telling her of his intentions regarding setting up a home for them. His response was that, to avoid disappointing her, he had not wanted to reveal his hopes and plans until they had a reasonably good chance of coming to fruition, which they now have. She said that if he got into trouble he would need a healer and she wanted to return to the surface and accompany him on the venture. I advised against this because of her physiological condition, and Declan agreed with me and expressly forbade her to do so.

"On a surface voyage as well as in orbital flight there is little for such short-lived, impatient people to do except look at the sea or, in her case, the stars, so that they have begun to discuss my problems, although often it felt to me like an interrogation in depth rather than a discussion. It is becoming increasingly difficult to conceal information from them and they are learning more about my work than subjects of an investigation should be allowed to know.

"They are engaging my mind with the empathy and persistence of Companions, and with the counsel of my fellow Taelons no longer available to me by my own choice, I find their concern strangely warming.

"Sinead had another timesighting. The episodes are spectacular in their detail but irregular in the intervals of manifestation. It frightened her badly, as it frightens me, because if my planned recommendations to the Synod are to be followed, she should not be able to foresee these future events because they should not happen.

"With advancing age and the diminishing faculties that isolation from the Commonality brings, I am becoming increasingly dependent on them, and again considered investing each of them with a Scrill weapon and the cyberviral implant which together would greatly increase their physical and mental powers as well as binding them emotionally to me to the exclusion of their present feelings for each other. But this would not have been fair to them because, as well as the strong emotional bond they have formed for each other, they remain faithful to me and their minds are already of admirable quality. I have finally decided to let them follow their own inclinations and not to interfere in any way.

"By Earthly good fortune rather than through the intervention of Taelon technology, the surface vessel Orla carrying my equipment made a fast and uneventful journey to Cobh."

Once again Declan strode through the wide, cloth- and garment-hung entrance of the tailoring establishment and bath house of Padraig of Cashel to stop before the long garment cutting table. The old tailor and his seamstress wife looked as though they had not changed position since the time of his first visit. Padraig moved his work aside, climbed stiffly to the floor.

"A good day to you," he said, smiling, "and pleased we are to see you again. You show a few more scars, and that helmet has seen serious use, but otherwise you look well. Is the young servant who was with you also in good health?"

Declan nodded his appreciating of the other's careful choice of words because at that time he had thought Sinead was a boy and the old tailor had known she was not.

"She fares well," he said, returning the other's smile, "in spite of now being my wife." He tapped the side of his helmet. "She sends her sincere thanks for your contribution to keeping my head intact. I regret my haste and seeming discourtesy, but there is an urgent service that I would ask of you. That is if you and perhaps your many relatives are capable of performing it."

Padraig inclined his head and waited for him to go on.

Lifting his heavy satchel onto the table, Declan opened it and withdrew a scroll which he unrolled and held flat while the other read it with a face that grew paler by the moment.

"I can provide all that you need," Padraig said finally, "but it will take time. I will have to employ many of my female relatives as seamstresses, and my brother will need more help at the smithy to beat out all these weapons. The horses and other equipment are less difficult to obtain, but expensive. Have you considered the cost?"

"Yes," said Declan, reaching into his satchel again.

"And you must realize," Padraig went on quickly as if ashamed of having mentioned the subject of payment, "that with the best will in the world these arrangements cannot be kept secret. There will be talk and it is sure to reach the high and powerful of this land." He tapped the list with a bony index finger. "Declan, are you preparing to fight a war?"

"You have been honest and even kindly in your previous dealings with me," said Declan, temporarily avoiding the question, "which is why I am asking for an additional favor. I know there will be talk, but I would like you to do most of the talking and to guide any wild rumors there may be back onto the paths of good sense. You might point out that I am not a threat to this province since I will be equipping and training my men outside Cashel and in full view of the King of Munster so that my warlike intentions must therefore lie elsewhere, and in the meantime the traders of this town will be benefiting from the gold I shall spend. If asked I would be pleased to explain my plans to your king, but not the position of their objective.

"The answer to your question is that I am preparing to fight a small war," he went on. "I will prepare for it so well, with cavalry and foot soldiers dressed and equipped uniformly and trained so highly that their very appearance and bearing will instill fear in an enemy, that it might not be necessary to fight it. At least, that is my hope.

"And to answer your unspoken question," he ended, "I have no purse of gold for you this time, but I hope that these, when melted down, with the gems and precious metals they contain, will cover the cost. If it should be necessary, more of them will be provided."

From his bag he took the golden shield, helmet, and wide, ornamental cuffs that had been given to him by the Aztecs and laid them on the workbench. Padraig's wife rose from her seat and hobbled forward for a closer look. For a long moment they neither breathed nor spoke.

"They, they are beautiful," Padraig said when he had again found his voice. 'The craftsmanship, the delicacy of the embellishments… I have never before seen or heard of their like. It would be a crime beyond crimes to melt them down. If I may ask, how and where did you come by them?"

"They are gifts," said Declan in a voice that politely discouraged further questions, "from the rulers of a far country."

"My apologies, I did not mean to pry," said Padraig, and suddenly he smiled. "But you will not be surprised to discover that I have another cousin, a distant one who moves in high places, too high for us to have need of him, until now, that is. He is a usurer, a money lender among other things, and a provider of services to those in the highest places. In these islands and in Gaul he will know of rich Roman governors and kings who would welcome these as unique additions for display in their treasure vaults. Even with the exorbitant fee my cousin will charge for making the arrangements, the sale of this strange helmet and these accessories undamaged and whole as they are will bring you a goodly sum that should be enough for your purposes.

"It will, however, take a little time."

It took more than a little time. On his return, Brian and Captain Nolan said that it might take anything up to a year, and agreed with him that he should not begin choosing and training his force until he was able to pay and equip them. Black Seamus would not have been averse to a long stay in Cork, since it would have allowed him more time with his Maeve. But Brian, regrettably, would shortly have to separate from them because he had to report back to his principals without further delay. So they sailed east and then northward past the ragged western edges of the kingdoms of Munster and Connaught to the harbor of Sligo. There Declan and Ma'el's wagon were disembarked in pouring rain within a short drive from the Strand Hill, their final destination, before Orla continued to its home port of Donegal town in the Kingdom of Tirconnel.

The night was wet, heavily overcast, and Ma'el's sensors reported nobody within visual distance but themselves when he drove the wagon into a narrow, steep-sided ravine and released the horse to find its own way home just as the space vehicle dropped to a silent landing beside him. Sinead ran to him and wrapped her arms so tightly around him that she seemed intent on squeezing the life out of his body while complaining that listening to him in her earpiece was not the same as having him there. Declan had no argument for that But they had to prise themselves apart to help the old man transfer most of the wagon's contents to the space vehicle, after which it was concealed as it had been earlier in the desert by collapsing the walls of the ravine and covering it. Sinead made the dimensional jump into the laboratory where as soon as possible they resumed trying to squeeze each other to death, among other delightful things.

The days and nights, which were the same inside Ma'el's caverns, passed happily through the late summer into the autumn and winter with Sinead seeming to grow larger by the day. In a poor attempt at humor he had once called her "fat boy," but she had cried sorely and he did not do so again. She was afraid, or at least deeply concerned, and he thought he knew why. But in the intensity of his own concern his manner in broaching the subject that night was direct and not as gentle as he would have wished.

"I am a very large man," he said, "and you are a small woman. My own mother was small and perfectly formed and, I was told, very beautiful as are you. She died bringing me into the world. I have felt the movements, the kicking in your belly, and they are very strong. I-I am fearful that it will happen again."

Sinead blinked and looked away for a moment, and when she turned her eyes on him again they were wet.

"So that is what has been eating at you for these past weeks," she said gently. "I, too, am concerned but not afraid. Ma'el says that it seems to be a law of nature on this world that small women are attracted to large and even ugly men, look at Seamus the Black and his Maeve…" she smiled impishly, "… although you are not quite as ugly as he is. They mate with men who will give them big and healthy children, they have been giving birth to such children since time began, and as a rule they do not die while doing so. The deaths that occur have other causes. Besides, you forget that I am a healer, that Ma'el's scanner enables me to look inside myself, and that so far all is well."

"You are sure?"

"As sure as I can be," she said, moving closer to him, "so ease your mind because there are other matters to concern it. And speaking of which, are you not being overambitious? I would be happy with you on a small farm or a…"

"No," said Declan firmly. "I want a secure home for my family to be, not one that can be threatened by robber bands or wars between neighboring tuaths. Besides, I do not see myself as a farmer

…" He broke off, then went on in an excited voice, "… You said that Ma'el's scanner showed you that everything was all right. Could you see if… Is it a boy? Or a girl?"

"Yes," she said.

"I meant," said Declan, "if you could see which it was?"

"Yes," she said again. "It is, or rather they are, one of each."

On Declan's next interdimensional visit to Cashel- Padraig no longer remarked on the fact that he appeared suddenly out of the darkness on foot and departed in the same fashion-Sinead warned him that she was nearing her time and would not be able to fly him there again until it was all over. But it transpired that Padraig's cousin, after an initial lack of success throughout Roman Britain, was reporting serious interest in the Aztec treasures from their own Hibernian Kingdom of Dalriada that was being led by an unobtrusive court advisor and diplomat called Brian O'Rahailley, but that the transaction was not expected to be completed until the late spring. Padraig, who seemed unusually knowledgeable about such matters for a tailor, listed the strategic and tactical advantages of fighting a war in the summer. Declan received the news with happiness and relief because it meant that he would be close to Sinead when she needed his reassurance most.

But when the time came, he was terrified rather than happy because she wanted more from him than spoken reassurances.

"Listen closely to me, Declan," she said in a voice that was firm and impatient between her increasingly frequent gasps of pain, "and stop shaking as if you had an ague. We cannot bring another woman in here even if I would trust myself to a local midwife, which I would not. But you are level-headed, have steady hands, and are not afraid of the sight of blood, all of which you proved when we took off the leg of Tomas the helmsman. This will be much easier for you, so stop shaking your head." A grimace of pain tightened her mouth for a moment before she turned it into a smile and said, "After all, you are only helping to take out what you already put in, so just follow my directions and we will both be all right…"

She continued to give directions, not only during the double birth itself but for cutting and tying off both umbilical cords and slapping the newborns' bottoms until they cleared the fluid from their lungs with thin wails of protest, and for removing the afterbirth. Again at her direction, Declan and the old man gently washed the blood from the infants' bodies, and the boy, who was in Ma'el's arms, began crying again until a thin, Taelon fingertip was placed gently in his mouth and he sucked at it and was quiet. Declan placed the girl on Sinead's breast, and Ma'el, his eyes seeming to be larger and softer than usual, did the same with the boy before they tucked a warm blanket around all three of them.

Declan looked down at Sinead, unable to find any words that would convey what he was feeling while she looked up at him. Never before had he seen a woman look so pleased and proud of herself.

'They're very hungry," she said finally. "I'm fortunate that there weren't more than two of them."