Cian’s grin of cynicism broadened.
‘I can tell by your reactions that you did not. I see hatred in your eyes. There can be no hatred without love. It is the same meal. Anyway, we were young then. Youth makes a lot of mistakes. ’
Fidelma now raised her head to meet his gaze, astonished by his calm assurance. She found her anger welling.
‘Are you attributing your callous behaviour simply to your youth?’ she demanded.
Cian was almost patronising. ‘There, now,’ he countered. ‘And I thought that you had put the matter out of your mind.’
‘So I had, but you apparently have a wish to raise it,’ she replied. ‘If that is so, then do not expect me to agree with any justification which you wish to put forward for your behaviour. I didn’t accept it then, I won’t accept it now.’
Cian raised an eyebrow. ‘Justification? Do I need justification?’
Fidelma felt a hot surge of anger well in her again, along with an overwhelming desire to hit his smiling face as hard as she could. She fought against the impulse. It would have gained her nothing.
‘So, you feel that you do not need to justify your behaviour?’
‘One doesn’t need justification for the follies of one’s youth.’
‘A youthful folly?’ There was a dangerous glint in Fidelma’s eyes. ‘Is that how you saw our relationship?’
‘Not our relationship. Merely the way it ended. What else? Come on, Fidelma; we are adults now and wiser. Let the past be the past. Let us not be enemies. There is no need. We do not want enmity between us on this journey.’
‘There is no enmity between us. There is nothing between us,’ replied Fidelma coldly.
‘Come.’ Cian was almost cajoling. ‘We can be friends again as we were at first in Tara.’
‘Never as we were at Tara!’ she shuddered. ‘I have no wish to talk with you. You were arrogant and insufferable in your youth, and it seems that you have not altered as you have aged in years.’
She turned swiftly on her heel and walked rapidly away towards her cabin before he had a chance to respond.
Arrogant and insufferable. Yet the words seemed mild compared to the rage that she had felt, the humiliation, the mortification she had suffered during those lonely days waiting for him as she sat in the room she had hired in the small tavern near Tara after she had been expelled from the college of the Brehon Morann. She had moved out of the college hostel after her talk with Brehon Morann. Only Grian knew the truth of the matter, for Fidelma did not even let her family know what had happened. She became a recluse within her tiny room and, apart from Grian, she isolated herself from her family and friends.
Cian came and went as he pleased. Sometimes she did not see him for several days, even as long as a week or more. Other times he appeared and stayed a day or two. One afternoon, they were lyingtogether in her room when Fidelma raised the question of marriage. She had sacrificed her studies for Cian, and knew that the situation into which she had been precipitated could not continue.
She had turned to Cian, as they lay together, and demanded: ‘Will you love me for ever?’
Cian smiled down at her. Always that same, slightly cynical smile.
‘For ever is a long time. Let us live while we live.’
But Fidelma was serious. ‘You really believe that we should think only of the present? That is no way to plan a life of fulfilment and contentment.’
‘We exist only in the present.’
It was the first time she had ever heard Cian express something approaching a philosophy of life. She disagreed adamantly.
‘We may exist in the present but we have a responsibility to the future. I have completed three years of study and was about to achieve the degree of Sruth do Aill this year, which meant that I would be qualified to be a teacher, possibly a minor teacher at my cousin’s College of Durrow. Perhaps I could find another college where I could finish that degree. We could get married then.’
Cian rolled over on his side, away from her, and reached out to find the goblet of wine. He took a long draught from it and sighed softly.
‘Fidelma, you are always dreaming. Your head is always in your books. For what purpose? You are too intellectual.’ He made it sound like a dirty word. ‘Get rid of your books. You do not need them.’
‘Get rid of …?’ She was astonished and words left her.
‘Books are not for the likes of you and me. They destroy happiness, they destroy life.’
‘You can’t mean that,’ protested Fidelma.
Cian shrugged indifferently. ‘It’s what I think. They give false dreams to people, make them have visions of a future which cannot be, or a past that never was. Anyway, soon I shall be returning to Tir Eoghain with my company of warriors, in the service of Cellach the High King. I will not have time to think of such matters as marriage, far less the ability to settle down. I thought you understood that from the outset. I am not a person who can be possessed or tied down.’
Fidelma sat up abruptly in the bed, feeling cold inside.
‘I do not want to possess you, Cian. My intention was to go into the future with you. I thought … I thought we shared something.’
Cian laughed in amusement.
‘Of course we share something. Let us enjoy that which we do share. As for the rest — have you not heard the couplet? Wedlock, Padlock.’
‘How can you be so cruel?’ She was aghast.
‘Is it cruel to be realistic?’ he demanded.
‘I swear, Cian, I do not know where I stand with you.’
He smiled mockingly.
‘Surely, I cannot make it plainer?’
She did not believe his cruelty. She did not believe the words he had spoken. She did not want to believe. It was merely an act he put on, she told herself — an immature act. He did love her. They would be together. She knew that. She was still possessed of a youthful vanity which refused to admit that her feelings were not based on sound judgement. So their meetings continued as and when Cian felt inclined that they should.
Fidelma found herself leaning on the rail of the ship on the small bow deck, gazing out onto the limitless expanse of the ocean before them. She was not aware of how she came to be there, so immersed in her memories had she been.
She was startled by a hand falling on her shoulder.
‘Muirgel?’ It was a low, masculine voice.
She turned enquiringly.
A young religieux stood there. He was in his mid-twenties, she estimated quickly. The wind caught at his wispy brown hair. He had a flushed, boyish-looking face, freckled, with dark brown eyes. His eyes widened with consternation as she turned.
‘I thought you … sorry,’ he mumbled awkwardly. ‘I was looking for Sister Muirgel. You had your back turned and I thought — well …’
Fidelma decided to put the young monk out of his embarrassment.
‘It is of no matter, Brother. The last I saw of Sister Muirgel was below. I believe she has seasickness and is indisposed. My name is Fidelma. I have not seen you before, have I?’
The young man jerked his head in an awkward, formal bow.
‘I am Brother Bairne of Moville. I am sorry to have disturbed your thoughts, Sister.’
‘Perhaps they needed disturbing,’ murmured Fidelma.
‘What?’ Brother Bairne was taken off-guard.
‘It is of no significance,’ she replied. ‘I was just musing. Are you well now?’
A frown crossed his brow. ‘Well?’ he echoed.
‘I understood that you did not join us for the midday meal because you also had a sickness.’
‘Oh — oh, yes. I was feeling queasy but I am better now, though I do not think I am recovered enough to eat anything as yet.’ He grimaced ruefully.
‘Well, you are not alone in that.’
‘Is Sister Muirgel still in her cabin?’
‘I presume so.’
‘Thank you, Sister.’ And Brother Bairne scurried along the deck towards the stern, terminating the exchange in a manner bordering on rudeness.