Her manner is that of a person used to giving orders and accustomed to being obeyed. I close my eyes and lie still as she bustles around the chamber performing various tasks. I play games with fate. If I can hold my breath to a slow count of thirty, Sibeal will come. If she tells another story tonight, I will start to remember . . .

~Sibeal~

The seer’s cave was at the northern point of Inis Eala. I reached the place through a narrow aperture in the rocky headland, from which a dark tunnel wound further and further in. Eventually I rounded a corner and stepped out into a hidden cavern. The walls curved up and in; it felt like standing inside a flower. In the center of the floor lay a still pool. Light entered through an opening at the roof’s apex and the cloudless sky turned the water beneath to a sweet blue. I stood for some time, looking, sensing. Here was profound quiet, deepest serenity. I could feel a presence, something wise, old and somehow sad.

I set down the bag I had carried, spread out my cloak on the flat stones by the pool and sat there, cross-legged. I would meditate. I would pray. Perhaps I would scry. I was certain my kinsman Finbar, the one after whom my little brother had been named, must have used the water of this pool as a dark mirror, a tool for the seer’s eye. He had dwelt here alone for many years, sheltered on Inis Eala by the kindness of Bran and Liadan. It was commonly believed that the forces of good that kept the island safe were centered in this cavern. Long before the coming of Bran and his band of outlaws, Inis Eala had been spoken of as a sacred place, a place of old gods. But it seemed to me, as to all my family, that Finbar’s tenancy had strengthened the spiritual power of the cave and indeed of the island itself.

His story was a sad one. As young men, he and his brothers had been turned into swans by a vindictive stepmother. After three years they had been saved by their sister, but Finbar had been left with a wing in place of one arm. He was condemned to live between worlds.