The path home wound its way through dense oak woods before descending to the lake shore. On another day I’d have enjoyed going slowly, drinking in the myriad shades of green, the delicate music of birdsong, the dappled light on the forest floor. Today I must make haste, for by nightfall our house would be full of guests and a long list of tasks lay before me. I owed it to my parents to ensure the domestic arrangements went as smoothly as if Mother herself were supervising them. I knew Father would have preferred Deirdre’s wedding to be later, perhaps in the autumn, and not just because Mother was so frail right now. But once Illann had set eyes on my twin he’d wanted to marry her without delay, and Father had judged the alliance to be too valuable to be put at risk by insisting they wait. Illann was a chieftain of the southern Uí Néill and a close kinsman of the High King. It was the kind of match people called brilliant. Fortunately, Deirdre seemed to like Illann almost as much as he liked her. She’d been bubbling with excitement since the day she first met him.

The oaks towered over me, their mossy boles glowing in the filtered sunlight. My feet were quiet on the soft earth of the forest path. Between the trees, on the very edge of sight, moved evanescent beings, gossamer fine, shadow swift. In the rich litter of debris that lay around the roots of the great oaks tiny creatures stirred, scuttling, creaking, whispering. The forest of Sevenwaters was home to many. Badger, deer and hare, beetle, warbler and dragonfly lived side by side with the more otherworldly inhabitants of the wood. It would be strange for Deirdre to leave all this. Her new husband’s holding, Dun na Ri, shared a border with the southwestern part of Father’s land, but I knew nowhere could be like Sevenwaters.