had won; my runehand had been the first to touch the Castle shore. I had won -that was the last thing that went through my mind as I splashed unconscious into the reddening water.’
Chapter Nineteen
‘You did it to yourself?’ I almost shouted. ‘You cut off your own hand?’
‘Yes,’ Father said.
‘But didn’t you realise that you couldn’t take the Choosing without a right hand, or that you would become the one-handed prince?’
‘No.’
The look on my father’s face made me realise how insensitive my questions were. Of course he realised these things-now.
‘At the moment I raised the sword,’ Dad confessed, ‘the only thought that went through my mind was winning-or more to the point, beating Cialtie. All thoughts of Runechoosing, or prophecies, or even the pain, were superseded by the desire to win. It was foolish.’ I could see in his eyes, he had paid dearly for that impulsive act.
‘It was courageous, Lord Oisin,’ said a voice. It was Araf. I had almost forgotten that the others were there.
Dad gave him a soft smile. ‘Thank you, Araf. You Imps and Leprechauns are a romantic bunch. You have always considered my moment of madness as courageous. It wasn’t, it was stupidity.’
‘Is that why Lorcan’s army is called the Army of the Red Hand?’ I blurted, without thinking.
Mom, Dad and Aunt Nieve simultaneously shouted, ‘What?’ Araf and Essa gave me a very dirty look. I had made a solemn vow to keep Lorcan’s army secret.
Fergal tried to change the subject. ‘It must have created quite a commotion at the finish line when you threw your hand to shore.’
Dad ignored him and looked directly at me. ‘What did you just say?’
‘Me?’ I squirmed. ‘I didn’t say anything.’
‘You did,’ Dad said, ‘you said something about Lorcan and an army’
‘No, I didn’t,’ I interrupted. ‘I do have a few secrets that I have kept from you, Father. Most of them, like what happened at the party I had in the house when I was sixteen and you were out of town, I keep so I will not get into trouble-others I keep because I swore an oath on the House of Duir. There are things it is not in my power to tell.’
I wanted to tell him all, especially now that he was finally telling me the truth, but I had sworn an oath. Dad looked me deep in the eyes and I saw that he understood.
‘You had a party in the house when I was out of town?’
I smiled.
‘Seriously,’ Fergal said, ‘I want to know what happened after you threw your hand to shore-there must have been pandemonium.’ He looked like a little boy being told a bedtime story.
‘I wouldn’t know,’ Dad said, ‘I was unconscious at the time.’
‘I was there,’ Mom said. ‘I wouldn’t say, Fergal, that it caused a commotion, at least not at first. Everyone was stunned into silence. You have to realise that only a handful of us knew how important this race was-most people thought it was harmless family fun. No one could understand what made Oisin do such a desperate thing. Lord Finn and I dived into the lake and carried Oisin to shore. He was bleeding terribly. Finn tore off a strip of his robe and tied a tourniquet around the wrist, but the bleeding would not stop. I thought he was doing to die. I had some tree sap hidden in my satchel, I used it on the wound and incanted a Shadowspell. I heard Ona and Nieve gasp, “Shadowmagic!”
‘Lord Finn looked at me and asked if this was really Shadowmagic. I told him it was and saw the conflict in his face. I had just saved his favourite son, but I had also just performed an act that was punishable by death. Since the damage was already done, I picked up Oisin’s hand, and using Shadowmagic again, I preserved it in amber sap.
‘Finn came close and whispered in my ear, “Do you have a place to go?” I nodded. He said, “Go there and never come back.”
‘There were tears in his eyes when Lord Finn stepped back and announced to all that I was banished, and my name was to be purged from our minds, and my memory was to be purged from our hearts. That was the last I saw of anyone from The Land, other than Oisin and the Fili, until the Shadowrunes told me to rescue you and your father from Cialtie’s dungeon.’
‘How could he do that to you?’ I said. ‘Finn sounds as bad as Cialtie.’
‘Do not judge your grandfather harshly,’ Mom said, in that motherly tone that made me a bit ashamed of myself. ‘He should have had me executed on the spot. I am sure many thought he was wrong to let me live. You must remember how much pain Maeve and her Shadowmagic had caused. It is hard to be a good man and a great king. Your grandfather Finn was a great king.’
‘So you came back here?’ I said.
‘Banishment was not really that much of a hardship for me. I came back here to live among the Fili. I had found peace here. The only hardship was that Oisin was not with me.’
‘I didn’t find out about all of this for two days,’ Dad said. ‘After the boat race, Ona gave me a tonic that made me sleep.’
‘Who broke the news to you?’ I asked.
That question sent a shiver down my father’s back. ‘When I awoke, I was in bed being nursed by Cialtie.’
‘Cialtie! What was he doing there?’
‘Oh, I’m sure he put on that sickening Cialtie charm, and convinced the nurse that he should look after his poor brother for a while.’ Dad’s face hardened. ‘When I opened my eyes, my first sight was his glaring countenance.
‘“Well, well, little brother, what were you thinking?” Cialtie asked me.
‘I was terrified,’ Dad admitted. ‘I tried to shout but my throat was so dry, I could hardly make a sound.
‘“Shhhh, don’t exert yourself, little brother, you have been through an ordeal. What I can’t figure out is, what were you, Daddy and that witch Ona concocting that made winning that race so important? Or was it that you just hate me so much that beating me was worth losing your hand?’”
Dad’s voice faltered. ‘All of the realities of what I had done crashed down on me like a wall of stone. I could hardly breathe.
‘“Oh my gods,” Cialtie said, smiling, “you didn’t think about this before, did you? It’s just occurring to you,” and then he laughed. “Well, let me sum it up for you-without a runehand you can never take the Choosing and without a Choosing you can never be king, and because you are a one-handed prince, you can never have an heir. If I didn’t know better, I would have thought you did this as a present for me.”
‘When I finally found a whispering voice, I said, “Where is Father?”
‘“Oh, Father dear is off talking to the other lords, trying to explain why he didn’t have Deirdre killed.”
‘I tried to sit up and failed.
‘“Oh, I forgot,” Cialtie said, “you have been out of it for the last two days. How can I break this to you? Deirdre is gone. You’ll never guess-that little vixen is a Shadowwitch.”
‘I panicked,’ Dad said, ‘I couldn’t breathe.
‘“Oh my, little brother, I can see that you already knew. Shame on you. You see, she performed a little Shadowmagic show with your wrist and hand. You should have seen it. It was quite a demonstration. I thought our big sister Nieve was going to pee herself. I expected Daddy to chop her head off right then and there but instead he just banished her. He is as weedy as you.”
‘I gathered up all of my strength and took a swing at him. I would have connected, too-if there had been a
