"Ah," he said, "so you have listened to some of our old tales. Riata-he was the last, and perhaps the most powerful, of the Bunus cloudmages. The mage-lights vanished for us a scant three generations before you Daoine came. If they hadn't, if we had our mages wielding the clochs na thintri when the Daoine came, then perhaps all that would be left of your people would be a few haunted barrows. Or perhaps if we hadn't become so dependent on that magic, we would not have been so easily displaced when you came." He lifted his hands and let them fall again like wounded birds. "Only the gods can see down those paths."
"Do we have to stay here?" Jenna asked. "It's getting late." The entire valley was in deep shadow now, and Jenna felt cold, though the sky above was still bright.
"It's late," Seancoim agreed, "and it's not safe to travel here at night. We'll stay there." Seancoim pointed to the ridge beyond the valley.
Mac Ard grimaced. "That's a long climb, and close to this place."
"They say restless ghosts walk here, and Ruaidhri is among them," Seancoim answered. He cocked his head at Mac Ard. "If I were Daoine, I might be afraid of that."
"I'm not afraid of a spirit," Mac Ard said, scowling. "Fine, old man. We'll stay here."
"Aye, we will," Seancoim told him, "unless you want to go back on your own." He turned away, calling Denmark back to him, then walking on through the dolmen. After a moment, Jenna and the others followed, though Jenna walked carefully around the dolmen rather than going under its capstone, and didn't look into the cold archways of the barrow graves at all.
Jenna had thought that it would be impossible to sleep that night, unpro-tected under the oaks and so near the Bunus tombs. Exhaustion proved
stronger than fear, and she was asleep not long after she lay down near their tiny fire, only to be awakened sometime later by a persistent throb-bing near her leg and in her head. She opened her eyes, disoriented. The fire had died to embers. Her mam and Mac Ard were asleep, sleeping close to each other and not far from her; Seancoim and Denmark were nowhere to be seen. Jenna blinked, closing her eyes against the throbbing and touching her leg-as she did so, her hand closed on the stone under the cloth. It was pulsing in time with the pain in her temples. As she lay there, she thought she heard her name called: a soft, breathy whisper wending its way between the trunks of the trees. "Jenna…" it came, then again: "Jenna…"
Jenna sat up in her blankets.
There was light shifting through the leaves: a rippling, dancing, familiar shining high in the sky and very near. She thought of calling to her mam, then stopped, knowing Mac Ard would awaken with Maeve. Part of her didn’t want Mac Ard to see the lights, didn’t want his interference. Jenna rose to her feet and followed the elusive glimmering.
A few minutes later, she stood at the rim of the valley of Bunus tombs, looking out down the steep, treeless slope to the circles of graves and the dolmen at its center. She could see them very clearly, for directly above the valley the mage-lights were shimmering. Their golden light washed over the mounds of earth and rock in waves, as if she were watching the surface of a restless, wind-touched lake. The valley was alive with the light.
"Jenna… " She heard the call again, more distinctly this time, still airy but now laden with deeper undertones: a man’s voice. It came from below.
"No," she whispered back to it, afraid, clutching her hands together tightly. The stone pulsed against her hip, cold fire.
’Jenna, come to me. ."
"No," she said again, but a branch from the nearest tree touched her on the back as if blown by a sudden wind, pushing her a step forward. She stopped, planting her feet.
’Jenna… "
The lights flared above, sparks bursting like a log thrown on a bonfire, and a tree limb crashed to the ground just behind her. Jenna jumped at the sound, and her foot slid from under her. She took another step, trying to recover her balance, only now the ground was tilted sharply down, and she half ran, half fell down the long, grassy slope to the valley floor, land-ing on her knees and hands an arm's length from the rear of one of the barrows.
"Come to me. ."
The mage-lights splashed bright light on the dolmen, sending black
shadows from the standing stones twisting wildly over the mounds. Jenna
could feel the stone throbbing madly in response, and she took it in her
and. The pebble glowed with interior illumination, bright enough that
she could see the radiance between her fingers as she held the stone in her fist. Having the stone in her hand seemed to lend her courage, and she walked slowly between the graves toward the dolmen, though she could feel every muscle in her body twitching with a readiness to flee.
As she stepped into the open circle around the dolmen, she saw the apparition.
It stood before the barrow of Riata: a man's shape, long-haired and stocky, clad in a flowing cloca of a strange design which left one shoulder bare. The form shifted, wavering, as if it were formed of clear crystal and it was only the reflection of the mage-lights on its polished surface that rendered it visible. But it moved, for one hand lifted as Jenna recoiled a step, her back pressed up against the carved surface of the standing stone. There were eyes watching her in the spectral face. It spoke, and its voice was the one that had called to her. The words sounded in her head, as if the voice was inside her.
"You hold the cloch na thintri," it said, and there was a wistful yearning in its voice. Its face lifted and looked up at the mage-lights, and she could see the glow playing over the transparent features. "They have returned," it said, its voice mournful and pleased all at once. "I wondered if I would see them again. So beautiful, so cold and powerful, so tempting. ." The face regarded Jenna again. "You are not of my people," it said. "You are too fair, too tall."
"My people are called the Daoine," Jenna answered. "And how is it you know our language?"
"The dead do not use words. We lack mouth and tongue and lungs to move the air. I speak with you mind to mind, taking from you the form of the words I use. But I feel the strangeness of your language. Daoine… " It said the word slowly, rolling the syllables. "I knew no Daoines when I was alive.
. There were other tribes, we knew, in other lands, but here there were only the Bunus Muintir. My people."
"You’re Riata?" Jenna asked. She was intrigued now. The ghost, if that’s what it was, had made no threatening moves toward her, and she leaned forward, trying to see it more clearly. The ghosts and spirits of the tales she’d heard in Ballintubber were always bloody, decaying corpses or white vapors, and they cursed and terrified the living.
This, though. . the play of light over its shifting, elusive form was almost beautiful, and its voice held no threat.
"I was called that once," the specter said, sounding pleased and sad at the same time. "So that name is still known? I’m not forgotten in the time of the Daoine?"
"No, not forgotten," Jenna answered, thinking that it might be best to mollify the spirit. After all,
Tiarna Mac Ard had known of him.
"Ahh. ." it sighed. A hand stretched out toward
Jenna, and she forced herself to stand still. She
could feel the chill of its touch, like ice on her
forehead and cheek, then the hand cupped hers and
Jenna let her fingers relax. In her palm, the stone
shot light back to the glowing sky. "So young you
are, to be holding a cloch na thintri, especially this
one. But I was young, as well, the first time I held it!!
"This one?" Jenna asked. "How. .?"
"Follow me," it said. Its hand beckoned, and from fingertips to elbow the arm seemed to reflect the intricate curls and flourishes of the lights above, as if the patterns had been carved into the limb. The phantom glided backward into Riata’s tomb, its cold