And now I can no more tell her I must leave the island than I can summon the hundred stars I sang of. I should go away. I must go. I am the ill luck man, bringer of doom and destruction. I am the one who should have drowned with the ship; I am the one who should have fallen from the cliff. But I live, and every moment I am here I put her life at risk. Say it, Felix. I cannot. For tonight, let me pretend that I can stay here. Let me pretend that I can hold her in my arms again; let me dream of a future with the two of us in it, together. Let me believe in miracles.

CHAPTER 8

~Sibeal~

Rodan was buried among the island’s own departed, who lay in an area sheltered by a dry-stone wall, on a rise with a fine view westward over the sea. A message had been sent to his chieftain in Connacht, carried by a man from the mainland settlement. As for Rodan’s comrades, they would stay and see out the full period of their training. All of them said that was what he would have expected.

Too much death. Too much unease. Each morning I got up, intending to walk to the seer’s cave and spend the day in meditation and prayer. Each morning I found a reason not to go: Clodagh had a sore back; Muirrin was busy with injured men and needed help; the garden had to be weeded; I should be keeping an eye on Ardal, who had developed a sudden fierce will to be strong again and was inclined to exhaust himself working too hard at it. He could walk out into the garden now, and sit in the sun watching as I dug and pruned and harvested. Whether he had remembered any more of his past, I had no idea. He had gone very quiet, even with me.

In this manner days passed, days in which I became more and more aware of the mutterings in the community about ill luck and who might have brought it to Inis Eala. Now every accidental fall, every dispute, every small reversal seemed to reinforce the belief that an evil had come among them. Johnny told me that the foolish talk would pass, and that I should not let it concern me. My sisters dismissed it. Cathal’s mouth grew tighter, his face paler as he heard it. His eyes were haunted. I knew he was thinking about his father.