"Morgs," Collun interjected.
"There was suddenly a great commotion," Nessa continued. "Another large group of Scathians arrived, and at their head was a tall, fair woman. She wore a strange war helmet with two silver horns rising from the crown. It hung low on her forehead and over her nose, curving into the beak of a large bird of prey.
"I did not know at first who she was," said Nessa, "but then I heard one of the men call her queen, and I knew she must be Medb."
"You saw Medb herself?" asked Collun, his eyes wide.
Nessa nodded, her hands clenching and unclenching. Her face had gone white.
"What did she do to you, Nessa?" Collun cried out.
The tears came again. "I'm sorry, Collun," she whispered. "But her eyes..." Nessa faltered. "They were so pale, almost white, like her hair. And when she stared down at me I felt so cold, colder than I've ever felt before. I almost fainted, I think." She paused, then began again, her voice still a whisper. "I could bear Bricriu's needles better than those eyes..."
Brie poured Nessa a cup of chicory and handed it to the trembling girl.
"I was lying on my side, near the fire, my hands and feet bound. Medb stood looking down at me; she took off her war helmet, and her hair fell straight and white to her shoulders. She was beautiful, but in a cruel, frightening way.
"Then she leaned over and picked me up. Her arms were like iron. She carried me as if I were a baby and walked to the edge of the causeway. She lowered me into the rancid water until I was completely submerged except for my head. Then she took hold of my hair with one hand, pulling it so tight I cried aloud.
"With the other hand she rummaged in the folds of her white cloak, then pulled out a stone. She held it up in front of my face. Something about the blue stone looked familiar to me, but I was too terrified and ill to remember what it was. 'Where is the stone like this one?' she demanded. I told her I didn't know. With the hand gripping my hair she pushed my head underwater and held it there. I was on the verge of losing consciousness when she roughly pulled me up again. I gasped for breath and she stared down at me, no expression at all on her face.
"'Where is the stone?' she said again. I told her I didn't know. Then she changed tack and began asking me the same things Bricriu had—where I was from, if I had a brother, if my mother was Emer. And on and on. She would ask, I wouldn't answer, then she'd put my head underwater just to the point when I thought I was dying. Then she'd pull me up and ask again. Finally, I broke. I told her about you and Emer and Aonarach. When I finished, all she said was, 'Does he have the stone?' And suddenly I remembered where I had seen a stone like the queen's: in the handle of your trine. I did not speak, but she abruptly let go of my hair. 'Yes,' she said. 'I thought so.'
"She lifted me back up in her arms and carried me across the causeway. I saw the Firewurme then. It was watching us. I think I was in a state of shock. I remember looking at the Firewurme's tongue and wondering what you and Mother were doing in Aonarach. Medb took me into this cave. She told me I would stay alive only if I remained inside. She pointed to a clear, wet-looking substance that lay on the ground, the Wurme'ssram; she said it would burn me.
"As she turned to leave, I finally found my voice and asked the queen why she was doing this to me. She smiled again, her eyes like ice. 'A little experiment,' she said, 'in brotherly devotion.' Then she was gone. I went to the cave's entrance and watched her cross the island. She walked directly up to the Firewurme. They seemed to be communicating in some way, then the Wurme opened its horrible maw and slid its tongue to one side. I'm not sure what I saw next. It was like a nightmare. But I could have sworn that the queen reached her arm into the Wurme's mouth, right up to her shoulder. She kept it there for only a moment and then turned and left the island.
"I saw her ride off with her men. When they were out of sight, I tried to leave the cave, in spite of what she had said about the sram." Nessa lifted her feet, showing them the burn scars on her soles and on her knees and the palms of her hands. "When my feet could no longer hold me, I crawled. But the Firewurme came with its yellow eyes and black tongue..." She faltered.
"How did you live?"
"There was food left for me at the back of the cave—salted meats and hard biscuits. And there was the spring with an occasional fish I caught with a spear I made out of driftwood. But the food ran out some time ago, and there haven't been many fish..." Her voice trailed off, then she fixed her eyes on Collun. "Why did she bring me here?"
Collun picked up the dagger. He told Nessa about the Cailceadon Lir. "Medb had you kidnapped believing you might have it, or at least would know where it was. When Bricriu told her you did not have the stone and would not tell him of your family and home, she had you brought to Scath. Then she sent the morg Urlacan after me, keeping you here as bait just in case Urlacan was to fail."
Nessa absorbed the information in silence.
"The wizard Crann also wondered if Medb thought to use us to flush out our father," Collun added.
"Our father? Why should she care about Goban?"
"Not Goban," Collun said softly, and then he told Nessa everything. He told her of their true father and of the chalcedony that had been passed down through Cuillean's family. Nessa listened quietly, shaking her head in wonder. She wept when she heard Emer had died, and for the first time since hearing of his mother's death, Collun was able to let his own unshed tears fall.
Then Nessa wanted to hear more of Collun's journey, but before he could begin, Brie interrupted. There was a note of suppressed excitement to her voice.
"I had forgotten all about it until now," she said, reaching into a pocket, "but I found this caught in a fold of your tunic after you killed the Wurme."
Collun took the object she handed him with an instinctive twitch of revulsion. It was a stone, covered with the oily black fluid that had gushed from the Firewurme's eye. Then he remembered the sharp object that had struck him on the forehead just before he lost consciousness. He rubbed the stone, and as the oily fluid came off he saw a glint of blue. His heartbeat quickened. Using the corner of his jersey, he began rubbing harder. When he was finished, a dull blue-gray stone lay in his palm. With trembling hand, Collun reached for his dagger. Though slightly larger and rougher, this stone was the mirror image of the one embedded in the handle.
Collun looked up at Brie. Her eyes were bright. "When I heard Nessa say the queen had put her hand into the Wurme's mouth, I wondered."
"Then," Collun said slowly, "the Firewurme was guardian not only of Nessa but of Queen Medb's shard of the Cailceadon Lir as well."
A silence filled the small cave as the realization of what they had found sunk in. If they could carry the stone out of Scath and to Temair, Medb would have lost both the Firewurme and the chalcedony. And perhaps then Eirren would be safe.
TWENTY-SIX
Wurme-killer
"We must leave here," Collun said. "Now."
Brie shook her head. "You are not ready to travel. The burns—"
"It doesn't matter. She will come for us. She may even be on her way."
"Surely Medb could not yet know about the Firewurme."
"We can't be certain," Collun argued. "She has many spies. Or she may even have felt it when the Wurme died. She has great powers."
Nessa's eyes had grown wide and staring. She was again clenching and unclenching her hands. "Medb come here?" she said in a whisper. "We must escape. We must get away!" The girl's voice was edged with hysteria.
Brie looked from brother to sister and shook her head. "We can try," she said finally.
They quickly prepared to depart. Collun placed the cailceadon shard in his wallet of herbs. Brie used up the last of the mallow making a large batch of the burn paste. Then she hastened to the entrance of the cave to call for Fiain. The Ellyl horse was already heading toward them.