Lamma's Night (anthology)

stared, trying to remember.

Before the memory could come into focus we heard hoofbeats, and Lord Skein's factor careened around the bend. Something seemed to click into place in my awareness. McMurtry turned to his son, the high color fading from his cheeks.

'Luke, lad, ye've never gone and stolen this bull from Lord Skein?'

The young man stepped between his father and Bailey, who had leaped from his cart and was advancing with fists balled, looking himself rather like the bull. Some of the girls covered their ears as a stream of profanity curdled the air.

''Tis a sale and no thievery!' exclaimed Luke. 'I left the beast's price behind him!'

Bailey's hand plunged into his pocket and came back with a small pistol. 'I'll take the bull and the money, for damages, and you yourself to the magistrate to answer for the crime—'

'Lady of Carricknahorna—' McMurtry turned to me, his face working. 'Stop them—'

He had invoked the ancient contract between lord and people, and though the law of this time gave me no authority, I could not deny his appeal. But as I walked towards the antagonists, I felt myself becoming part of a pattern that was older still. The clouds had drawn in again, stealing the brightness from the day. From beyond the hills came a mutter of thunder.

The crowd stilled. I took a deep breath, let it out slowly as my guru had taught me, and felt the familiar shift of awareness. Consciousness floated on a plane from which I could observe all things, myself included, a state, I noted with a detached wonder, in which I could also remember my dreams.

'The bright god and the dark must do battle to release the harvest. The Goddess will judge between them....'

I felt Father Roderic very near, as if I need only turn my head to see him. But vision was fixed on the two men before me.

'This is the assembly of Lammas Eve. I invoke the ancient law of the feis, that supersedes all others,' I said clearly. 'Let the two men fight, body to body, for possession of the black bull.' I reached out, and Bailey, as if mesmerized, dropped the pistol into my hand.

With a care that had become ceremony, men assisted the two combatants in taking off their shoes and upper garments while others marked out a circle. With the same deliberation, I took my seat on a boulder at the base of Stirring Rock.

'Let the combat begin.'

Bailey set his feet and with a growl threw a cut that would have shattered Luke's chin if he had not danced out of the way. He responded with a swing that glanced off the factor's bicep. For a few moments they circled, feeling out the ground; then came another flurry of blows.

At first it seemed an even matching. Bailey's stocky frame was heavy with muscle, his efficient punches proclaiming the victor of many taproom brawls. But young McMurtry fought with a gaiety that exasperated the older man, and most of the time his whipcord quickness kept him out of trouble. Still, as the fight went on, the factor's blows began to land, and red blotches appeared on Luke's fair skin.

'Soon the lad will tire,' said the voice in my head. 'As I did. I knew nothing of fighting then, but I have had fourteen years to watch and learn. Call me, Lady, and I will join with him. For the sake of land and people, he must win. And when he has won, my dear one—then, wearing his flesh, I will come to you....'

It was true. In the ancient rites the priest of Lugh was required to win in order to release the harvest, and surely if this year's yield was ruined the people here would be destroyed. And I had come to know this man, reading his books and his writings, sleeping in his bed. The possibility of meeting face to face as well as mind to mind was a temptation that could not be denied.

'Michael Roderic—' I whispered. 'I summon you. Into the body of the man who stands where you stood, who fights the battle you fought, I call you to descend. Wandering spirit, take flesh again and win the harvest!'

Luke McMurtry stumbled; Bailey's next punch caught him full in the chest and he reeled. Then he blinked and pulled himself together, both less graceful and more focused. He lifted his fists to defend once more, and the smile with which he faced his foe transformed Luke's youthful features into a face full of passionate self-mockery. I had seen it in my dreams.

Laughing, he began to beat back his enemy. The part of me that was Miss Anna Erne exulted, but that part that floated above all this was one with the gods, and as Bailey began to falter it came to me that this too was wrong. The fight must be a fair one, whether man to man or god against god. I resisted the knowledge, but my teacher had trained me too well. In India they teach that a human soul can become one with its god; it was the Goddess within me, the Lady of the Land, who spoke now.

'Crom Dubh, Dark Lord of Land-wealth, arise to defend your own....' The words seemed to reverberate between the worlds. 'Lugh, Lord of Light, descend to challenge him. To the winner the fruits of the earth shall belong!'

A spear of flame shattered the world into patterns of dark and brightness; hearing exploded into thunder. In the next moment the heavens opened. Through veils of rain I saw the struggling figures distorted, towering above the earth in interlocking spirals of light and shadow. Around us raged the storm, but its fury was less than that of the spirits that strove beneath it. I was on my feet now, arms lifting. Lightning bloomed again, and as the thunder followed I felt the charge flare through my outstretched hands and down to earth beneath my soles.

I saw Lugh's long arm strike, his fist smashed into the Dark God's chin. He reeled back, and then, like a tall tree falling, went down. Shadow swirled around him. The victor turned, his radiance sending rainbow flickers through the storm, and the goddess in me saluted the god.

'Bright One, my thanks to you—' I murmured. 'Go now, and release the body you have worn. You have the victory.' His smile, like the world seen by lightning, was imprinted on my soul. Then he swayed and gently crumpled to lie beside his foe.

Wind whistled around me, and then suddenly the rain was lessening. I ran to the fallen men, and the others, sensing something beyond their understanding, gave way.

'Michael....' I whispered, recognizing the gleam in the blue eyes that met mine. He lifted one hand to touch