A full score of Forgall’s men had been slain, and but eleven of the total remained unscathed. On them all was the sour taste of defeat-and weariness, to the bone. They came in like so many hounds who had tracked the quarry long and long, and had lost it. For Leinstermen in the matter of Boruma, victory and honour were elusive quarry indeed.
Shocked at how few returned, shocked at those who did not return, Cormac and Cond, heard the order that went out to all the other Fifties, to all the army. The tribute was to be delivered.
Those who had fought remained in camp while those who had been herdsmen continued, now moving the cattle and the wains containing the other portions of the tribute up northward. The Leinsterish force was most heavy of heart and hardly swift in the performing of that unwelcome task. Without spirit in eyes or gait, Cormac and the others herded the livestock across a plain become a lake of blood.
A great greyed Ogham stone marked Meath’s southern frontier. There, sore longing to draw steel and be men though it meant their deaths, the men of Leinster watched while the jubilant Meathmen took possession of cows fatted on Leinster’s good grass.
Cormac stared deep in thought on the ways of men. He stared at two, for there side by side stood General Fergus of Leinster and Lord Conor, the High-king’s cousin and commander of his force.
Would be a great shame on me, Cormac thought, not to stand well apart from that man who commanded the slayers of my comrades. The ways of nations of men are more strange than those of any man, and the ways of generals and kings are stranger still!
By this little battle, he mused, all was settled. All? What? The battle was hardly war though to mothers and wives and sweehearts of dead men it was hardly so minor an encounter. How was anything settled by such? What could a limited war prove? Why then war at all, with boundaries around it, with rules and less than a total commitement?
And the youth of Connacht thought, for the first but not the last time: Kings are fools, and nations of men greater fools, to do the bidding of such men and be commanded by their pettiness-and to die for their whims.
And then the Boruma was in Meathish hands.
Meathmen went to their camp with the noisy enthusiasm born of the joy of battle-winning. Leinstermen turned and tramped silently back to their encampment. Such a vast herd of cattle was not easily driven, and the sun was nigh to the horizon when they reached camp once more.
Spirits around the campfires that night could not have been lower. Though it was not cold, men wrapped their bodies in their cloaks and their minds in cloaks of dark thoughts. Among them, near Forgall, Cormac sat and pondered. Only partway he heard the Captain of Fifty-which was fifty no longer-swear by the blood of the gods, and bemoan the fact that once more had Meath set the bloody crown of defeat on proud Leinster.
“My grief! Once-oh but once in my life would I fain see Leinster prevail!” And Forgall kicked out at a burning log, so that sparks leaped up in spots of bright yellow and ruddy gold. And Cormac sat and pondered.
“As fresh malt is ground in the mill, so shall Meath one day be ground by the steel of Leinster!” So spoke Bress of the Long Arm, for he bore but a scratch on his sword-arm, and that not deep.
No, Cormac thought, not with steel. It’s never with the sword that Leinster will best Meath!
“Och,” groaned Cas mac Con, wearing an ugly wound that would scar his face and likely draw the left corner of his mouth, “weariness is on me like a-a cloak of wet woollen… but how can a man sleep on such a night?”
“How can any of us sleep?” This from Cond the Hair-trimmer, who had not fought.
And Cormac sat and pondered, and thought of battle, and honour, and kings, and generals and of sleep, and he looked round about him with dull eyes. He gazed, hardly seeing, on the squat plants that the cows had refused to eat. And he blinked. He stiffened, and blinked again, and there was a light in his eyes.
Into his mind came the final words of Sualtim Fodla, spoken less than twenty-four hours agone. Why aye, Cormac recognized that plant Sualtim had called blasreng-blath: boar-blossom. Of old had Sualtim told him of it. Those furry leaves, when chewed or crushed for their mucousy juice, were used by the druids and the better leeches-to induce sleep! A man could undergo surgery and not…
An idea circled about at the perimeter of Cormac’s mind, and nipped teasingly in the manner of a dog.
The brain; use the brain when the sword fails…
The nipping dog could not breach the defenses. What seemed an idea could not pierce into his mind. Surrounded by forlorn men who stared drearily into their fires, Cormac wrestled with his own brain.
“Ale!” Forgall called, without enthusiasm. “Ale, that I may drink to forgetfulness of disgrace and sorrow for comrades done to death.”
“Aye-ale!”
Ale!
In the darkness a wounded man groaned Then did Cormac gasp, for he knew that man could be helped a bit or eased at least, by chewing leaves of boar-blossom… or drinking ale into which their juice had been pressed…
Cormac mac Art’s eyes snapped wide. With a lurch, he was up and at Forgall’s side. The youth bent. He murmured to his captain. Few men so much as glanced that way, to see the face of their leader show puzzlement… and then seem to take on a glow of happiness. Of a sudden. he struck grinning at Cormac’s leg, clutched a leathered ankle.
“It’s no proper or decent notion ye’ve had, Partha, nor yet a one for the consideration of sane men. But this is no sane day, and what we’ve done be not the deeds of sane or proper men. And sure your idea’s one that warms a heart heavy within me… and soothes the aches of wounds put on us by Meathish swords and taunts!”
He looked into Cormac’s face, and their eyes flashed.
As though well rested, Forgall sprang up.
“Ale! ALE!” he bellowed. “Casks and casks of ale, lads, and hie-put bounce in your step!”
Darkness lay on the Plain of Sorrow, and through it rattled a cart behind two plodding horses with drooping heads. The cart creaked under burden: a full score stout casks that sloshed with liquid sounds. Atop the cart, hunched, sat two peasants roughly clad in their russet and dirty leathers and mist-hoods.
The rising of a drepanoid moon saw them approaching a broad cluster of campfires, just north of Leinster’s northern border. Not the main encampment of the Meathish army this, but that special space apart from it where the stenchy tribute was under guard. Well away from the sprawling encampment of the High-king’s troops it was, that the nostrils of triumphant soldiery might be spared animal odours and night-noises.
A sentry came abruptly alive. He challenged; the carters halted their dray-breasts. The sentry half turned to call to his superior. That man came, stared, frowned, set his fists against his hips, and stared on.
“What means this? Who be ye? What is this load?”
“We be but two good honest men, Captain your worthiness,” one of the carters said, adding swiftly, “and us unarmed! ’Tis the cart of our master. We would but pass, Captain. It’s good honest men we be, but honest peasants, and-”
“Yes, yes, and unarmed, as if we’d be fearing ye two if ye bore axes and swords both. And why would ye be passing along here at this hour, two good honest men?”
“We… we’re to be paid well by an honourable innkeeper but a halfscore or so miles hence, good Captain, up beyond yourself. Mightn’t we be passing, Captain? We be no army, to be rousing noble well armed weapon-men such as yourself.”
“Ah-huh. An innkeeper, eh?” The captain’s eyes seemed to gleam, though the moonlight scarce touched them. “And what is it ye be fetching to a moneygrubbing brughaid but a half score or so miles hence, eh, eh? Brion… go ye and rap on one or two of those interesting kegs.”