Biddy was shaking her head. 'This is one use I can't be. I haven't the power to pull matter here from the heart of time, or its beginning either! And wizards or not, not even the Seniors have that kind of power!'
'I know someone who does,' Nita said, 'at the moment, anyway.' Kit glanced at her, uncomprehending for a moment — then got it, and his eyes glittered. 'Never mind that now. The memories may ebb — but you can't have forgotten how you made that.' Biddy's eyes lingered on Fragarach. 'No,' she said. 'That I remember very well.' 'And the Spear,' Kit said.
'I remember some of the details,' Biddy said softly. 'But I had that other Power to help me, the one they called Lugh the All-Crafted.'
'I can't get you someone who knows how to do everything,' Nita said, grinning, 'but I can sure get you someone who thinks she does. Second best, maybe. But take it or leave it.'
Biddy stood there, her eyes downcast, irresolute. 'Come on,' Nita said. 'We could require it of you, in the One's name. Once a Power, always a Power, regardless of how much or little of it you have left. Those are the rules, as you say. But. .' She broke off.
Nita and Kit stood quiet. Biddy stared at the ground.
She looked up, then. 'It's better than doing nothing, I suppose. Tell me what you want of me.' 'Come and have some tea at my aunt's,' Nita said. Kit groaned.
Some hours later almost all the free chairs in Aunt Annie's kitchen were full of wizards, all talking hard. Most of them there knew Biddy, and there had been some shock at Nita's announcement of who else she was besides the local farrier, but Fragarach's response to Biddy couldn't be explained in any other way. Shock had been quickly put aside in favour of plan-making. 'It was Ronan's idea,' Nita said, and Ronan blushed right out to his ears. 'We can make another. We can!'
'I'll entertain explanations of how,' Johnny said, sitting back and stroking his moustache. 'Don't tell me you're thinking of pinching some ur-matter from Timeheart, either, because it won't work. That matter is structured differently from the way matter was at the beginning of Time in this universe.'
'Timeslide, then,' Kit said.
Johnny shook his head. 'We would need a wizard with enough power to drive that kind of a slide back far enough. You're talking billions of years.' Kit bent over to Nita and said, 'Should I?'
'I think you'd better,' Nita said, and sighed. It had been so quiet until now, relatively speaking. 'It's after dinnertime. See if you can do it without raising the alarm, if you know what I mean.' Kit nodded and went out. 'It might help,' Aunt Annie said to Johnny, 'if we understood a little more about exactly what kind of matter's needed.'
'Well, you've got a bard around here somewhere, haven't you?' he said. 'Let's hear the authorized version first, and then Biddy can give us what she remembers of the technicalities, so that we can work on the spelling proper.'
'Hmm,' Aunt Annie said. She went to the door. ' Tualha! Kitty kitty kitty! Tuna!'
The kitchen immediately began to fill with meowing cats. 'Do you really think this will work, Shaun?' Doris said.
He stretched, then shrugged. 'It's our best chance, I think, considering that no envelope presently extant seems to be suitable. It seems as if the Spear's soul burns out its containers the way — well.' He looked at Biddy, then away.
The catflap clattered as Tualha scrambled in through it. She stood there, very small and black, with her small tail pointing straight up in the air, and said, 'Mew.'
Nita burst out laughing. 'Oh, come on, Tualha. It's the Senior for Europe, and he wants your advice.'
'Oh, well, that's different,' Tualha said. She looked up at Aunt Annie and said, 'First things first. What about that tuna?'
'There was a time,' Johnny said, 'when bards performed first, and then the lord of the hall gave them largesse.'
Tualha looked disdainfully at him. 'Tuna,' she said to Nita's aunt. 'And then cream, please.' Aunt Annie raised her eyebrows, and went to get it. It was astounding how fast such a small kitten could eat, especially in contrast to all the other cats, who had to be fed too so that they wouldn't steal Tualha's food. Eventually she was lifted up on the table and given her saucer of cream there, and she lapped it with a thoughtful air, burping occasionally, while the human wizards sat around and nursed their tea. 'Now then,' Johnny said.
Tualha sat down and began washing her face. 'What do you want to know?' she said. 'Tell us if you would, oh bard, the forging of the Spear Luin.'
Tualha began washing behind one ear. 'The Spear of Victory itself came from the city Finias; Arias the poet- smith made it there. The song says that Arias took a star and hammered it on the anvil, and so made the blade of the spear. Then the Tuatha de Danaan brought it with them through the air and the high air when they came to Ireland. And with them it stayed, and gave light to any place it was in, for the burning that was in it.'
Tualha stopped, yawned, and then started on the other ear. 'Then came Balor, and made a tower of glass for himself and his creatures in the sea near Ireland. Balor's likeness was that of a human, but gross and misformed, and one eye squinted away almost to nothing for the hugeness and horribleness of the other. So great was it that it took four Fomori with forks of iron to pull the eyelid up when Balor wanted it so. And when it opened, what its glance fell on scorched and burned and was poisoned, and blasted off the world and out of it.'
Glances were exchanged around the table. 'It was foretold by other wizards,' said Tualha,'that only fire and the spirit of fire would end Balor, and that one would come who had all skills, and was kin to Balor, and would make that end of him. So the Tuatha waited, looking for that one to come.' 'Another of the Powers,' Aunt Annie said, 'by the sound of it. And a fairly central one, if Balor is another version of the Lone Power.'
Johnny nodded. Tualha had tucked herself down into meatloaf shape. 'Nuada the King did not know who that one might be,' she said,'so he gathered to him all the great Powers that were in Ireland in those days: Diancecht the physician, and Badb the lady of battles, and the Morrigan, the Great Queen; he gathered in Go van the Smith, and Luchtar the Builder, and Brigit whose name meant the Fiery Arrow, who was healer and smith and poet all together; and cupbearers and druid- wizards and craftsmen of all kinds. And one day they were feasting when a young man came to the door of their great rath and asked to come in. The doorman asked what skill he had. He said he was a warrior, and a harper, and a storyteller too, and a champion in the fight, and a smith, and a cupbearer and a doctor and a wizard and a poet. And when the Powers heard that, They said, 'This must be the All-Skilled, our deliverer. Let him in so that we can test his power.' They did that, and the young man could do everything he said he could: and the Ildanach, the all-crafted, is what they nicknamed him. Then they started their plan to drive out Balor and the threat of his Eye, and his creatures the Fomori from Ireland forever.'
Tualha looked thoughtfully at the saucer, then at Aunt Annie. Aunt Annie poured her some more cream. 'Thirsty work,' Tualha said, and had a brief drink. 'Then,' she said, licking some cream off her whiskers, 'Lugh went off in private for a long time with Go van the Smith; they took counsel and made a plan, and Lugh had the Spear of Victory brought to him. In secret Lugh and Go van laboured for three years, or some say seven, forging the Spear anew. Unquenchable fire they forged into it, and a fierce spirit. .' Tualha yawned, and crouched down in meatloaf shape again. 'Then, when they were done, Lugh returned to the great rath of the Tuatha with the Spear, just in time to meet a party of the Fomori that had been sent there by Balor to demand a tribute of slaves from the Tuatha. He unwrapped the Spear and called on the Tuatha to cover their eyes, and the Spear roared with rage and blasted the Fomori to ash on the instant — all but one that he sent back to Balor to tell what had happened, and bring the message of Lugh's defiance to him.' Tualha rolled over on her side, and yawned again, blinking at them. 'Then the war starts. Did you want anything else?'
'No, that'll do for now. Thank you.'
Something went POW! out in the front yard. All heads turned at that, and there were some concerned expressions; but a moment later they heard the front door slide open, and Kit walked in. 'Noisy, that,' Johnny said. 'You weren't so loud when you left.' 'Not my fault,' Kit said, jerking his thumb over his shoulder.
Behind him, Nita's sister Dairine walked into the kitchen: ten years old, small, skinny and bright- eyed, with a shock of red hair, wearing shorts and trainers and a Batman T-shirt three sizes too large for her: one of Nita's, actually. Nita started to fume slightly — Dairine had started 'borrowing' her clothes lately, and returning them in less than pristine condition — but there were more important things to be concerned about at the moment; she kept her annoyance to herself. Dairine glanced around the kitchen with interest, then said, 'Hi, Neets. Hi, Aunt Annie!' And she put down the portable computer she was carrying, and went and gave her aunt a hug.
