Myler, frustrated but outwitted by Sir Hervey, reluctantly agreed that he would muster what force he could in the time available. We would depart in mid-august 1167, a month from that day.
Chapter SevenTHE RETURN TO IRELAND
August 1167
‘All is ready, Aoife. You must be ready in two days.’ Myler spoke softly, for there were ears that would be rewarded for passing word of our plans to return to Ireland. With such a small force, we could easily be taken upon landing. My pleadings with my father had fallen on stony ground—he was going. It was madness. Our only chance was to land undetected and to move quickly to Ferns and hope that we could persuade some of the old allies from our kinsmen to join my father’s cause. Even then, I saw little hope of success.
The sun had crept higher that morning; the courtyard was coming alive with the bustle of men and the exited stamping and muttering of the horses in the courtyard below my open window. Le Gros shouted over the din, trying to put some order to things. Myler lay beside me, stretching in that last luxurious moment of fulfilled exhaustion before he would silently creep away, unseen, to join his uncles who were mounting jumpy stallions, ready to begin another gruelling day’s practice.
Rising, he dressed quickly. I watched, relishing the beauty of the man whose warmth still clung to the bed beside me. Bringing me a mug of fresh water, he then sat wearily at the table away from the window, his shoulders slumped. He would normally bound through my door after the nights we snatched together.
‘Aoife. Sit with me . . . we must talk.’
I rose and joined him, draping a light robe around my shoulders, comfortable in my near nakedness.
‘There will be five knights in all, a score of archers and a body of foot soldiers,’ he said, looking down at his large hands spread on the table between us. ‘It’s a small enough force but should be enough if they aren’t waiting. Ferns is only a couple of hours march from the landing.’ He did not look at me as he said this, and there was an unusual gloominess about him. The sigh of the wind through the open window deepened the silence that filled him. It was a silence I could not penetrate, and a darkness lurked in an arch of that gloom.
Our bodies had touched, merged. The rhythms of our breathing, our very heartbeats, coupling, unlocking a deep well of comfort, a precious pool of certainty in a raging sea. It was pure joy, sending waves of sensation through every sinew and nerve ending in my body while bathing my spirit in an unfamiliar restful calmness.
With Myler by my side, I felt that challenges could be faced and weathered, come what may. In that, I think there is the tender hand of the Goddess Danu, the earth goddess. The ancient Irish mother goddess from which all the Tuatha Dé Danann—the first Irish tribe—claimed descent. She was a triple Goddess—a concept borrowed by the Christian church—who controlled the rain, sunshine, and harvest; the health and fertility of man, women and beast. She had placed man and womankind at the heart of her earthly realm as her appointed custodians of the soil, the waters, the land’s bounty and the beasts who roamed. A realm blessed and beset in equal measure, the universal balance of beauty and horror.
My feelings for Myler were such. I could not say I felt happiness, not with Eanna in captivity. Yet I knew I could face the challenges with him by my side. I felt a profound connection with him, a comfortable familiarity that was troubled by his bleak silence now.
His eyes found mine, and before he spoke again, I could see the sorrow in their depths. ‘Aoife, I can’t go,’ he said softly. How I loved those soft eyes and the gentle tears now flowing, resting on his lips. Shaking his sunken head, he added, ‘I’m sorry, so sorry.’
‘But why? Why not? What’s happened?’ I pleaded, panicking now, for not to have him by my side in this was unthinkable.
Leaning forward, he took my hands in his and kissed them. I could feel his tears on my fingers and I buried my face in his thick, scented hair, so familiar now.
After a moment he straightened, looked at me and said, ‘Please, Aoife, forgive me, but it’s not possible.’ The distress was etched into his face. He could barely speak. ‘My uncles say the connection between our family and Strongbow is too strong. He couldn’t credibly deny any knowledge of it if the king becomes aware.’ He was silent for a while, as melancholy as I had ever seen him. ‘So I can’t, I just can’t. Please forgive me. I love you so much.’
Shocked, crestfallen, no words would come. I sat there and looked at him, and he leant forward and kissed me. Our tears mingled on our lips as we sought each other. He rose and took me in his arms, folding me closer to still my trembling body. If only my life could be this: deep in the safety and warmth of his embrace. Damn them, but I knew what he said was true, and to press him to accompany me would be to ask him to betray everything he held dear. I gripped him, knowing I had to release him from the obligation he felt.
Eventually, easing myself from his embrace, I reached out and took his face in my hands, feeling the moist tenderness of his skin.
‘Myler, mo grá. I see, I understand . . . it’s just that I have come to rely on you, to need you.’ I paused, seeing the pain pulsing through his eyes. I was despairing, but my words were hot irons in his heart. I had to stop. ‘Myler, I know you love me. That will sustain me.’ I smiled. ‘I understand, I do . . . we both have our duties. Your uncles are right. If you came, it could ruin everything for us.’
‘It won’t be for long. I promise you, Aoife. As soon as I can, I will come to you,’ he said, smiling gently now. ‘And you will be in good hands in the meantime.’
‘Yes,’ I said. ‘In this way maybe someday we can, somehow, be together.’ I paused but did not have the strength to contain my sorrow any longer. ‘I will miss you, miss you so much . . .’ I wept bitterly now, clutching him tightly.
Releasing me, he gently stroked my hair, which hung loosely down my back. He went on to describe how we would be accompanied by Richard FitzGodebert and four other knights. He was a capable and trustworthy ally and could be relied upon. Of Flemish origin, he could not be easily connected to Strongbow. He had also asked his uncle, Raymond Le Gros, if Rob Smith could lead the archers and accompany the party. Permission was granted and Rob, as Myler’s childhood friend, had readily agreed, as he wanted the experience of his first combat command without the oversight of his father. He had also given his word to Myler that he would protect me with his life.
Myler said he would remain at Chepstow and work with his uncles to prepare the army for when Strongbow secured the permission of the king to lead the support for my father to regain his crown and kingdom. I dearly hoped that would be soon, as our prospects in Ireland, a hostile land in turmoil with a perilously inadequate force, were none too good, to say the least.
We embarked for Ireland on an unseasonably cold day in August 1167. The light south-westerly wind would allow us easy passage to sail on a beam reach directly across the sea from St Davids at the westerly tip of Wales.
Our plan was to avoid the busy ports and docks and land at a quiet strand just south of the wooden pier at Glascarrig, the small port on the east coast that served Ferns. A day’s ride north of the busy Norse walled city of Wexford with its bustling quays, our landing should go unnoticed by watchful eyes in the pay of O’Rourke for signs of the return of Diarmuit MacMurrough. He would hear of our landing as fast as a horse could travel after we beached our boat, but we should have reached Ferns by then. There, we hoped to quickly gather a force to discourage any early attempt to attack without a considerable force behind them, and that would take time to assemble.
Despite Myler’s precautions to conceal the preparations for our return, the ports of Wales swarmed with all manner of people. Information was a valuable commodity there, and O’Rourke’s spies would have paid well for news of our plans. Word would have reached them of my father’s pleadings to King Henry for his assistance in regaining his crown. We were also sure they would be aware of our presence at Chepstow Castle as guests of Strongbow. That alone would signal my father’s intent to gather Norman forces to his cause. They would be hungry to know as to when and how he would act.
All was made ready as the boat was held by its lines to the dock. Myler shouted a few last instructions to FitzGodebert and Rob and helped the dock men pull the gangplank. There could be no embrace; even our eyes could not betray our pain. We had tried to make up for what would be a season’s worth of lost intimacy before he had left my room before dawn that morning; my body ached pleasantly from his urgent lovemaking.
There was ample room in the boat. No horses were to be taken, as Myler, with limited time, could not secure a barque with the harnesses to hold them suspended in the waist during the crossing. The Normans had perfected this way of transporting their valuable warhorses to avoid injury and panic in heavy seas. The heavy armour of the knights was to be distributed amongst their attendants to carry. The archers were leaden with longbows and sheafs of arrows and, to my relief, were led by Rob Smith, as Myler had promised.
There was no better longbow man for this dangerous task, and he had also become a good friend. He was a light-hearted big-boned lad, with the biggest barrel of a chest I had seen on any man. He had the strength of a draft horse from his years of practice with the longbow. He was good company and seemed to be taking his promise to Myler as a sacred duty; he was forever in my wake.
There was nothing out of the ordinary about our vessel as we sailed for Glascarrig. A regular trading barque, its brown sail looked like any other which daily ploughed the coast and waters between the islands. It would raise no suspicions. But as the land drew steadily closer, we were wary that word of our coming had reached Ireland. There were many who would not welcome my father’s return.
We had learned that Eanna remained unharmed and that he had been given as hostage to the rival king of the lands bordering western Leinster, Mac Giolla Patrick. He had long coveted our land and had been granted the western half of my father’s kingdom of Leinster by Rory O’Connor, the high king, and his henchman, Tiarnan O’Rourke. O’Rourke was a cruel man and a sworn enemy of my father, and while I was happy to hear that Eanna was no longer in his hands, Mac Giolla Patrick was no better. However, Donal thought he had more interest in keeping Eanna from harm so as to have some leverage over our father should he return to reclaim his kingship.
The other half of my father’s kingdom had been given to my father’s brother Murchad, as was commonly the practice of the high king. His intention was to divide the family, weakening it as a combined force. A proven tactic, a defeated enemy’s kingdom would be split between two rivals, who would inevitably weaken each other and any further threat to the high king.
In our case, Murchad would not oppose my father. He had remained loyal, and we hoped enough of our kinsmen would come to my father’s side if he returned with a real prospect of regaining his throne, more from fear than from loyalty.
The bow of the boat dipped into the waves as the sail dropped. The gusts whipped the silver sands across the lonely strand as the oarsmen drove the boat onto the light shingle in a crunching, lurching halt. All was still. The grass dunes beyond the beach betrayed no sign of danger, with the birds drifting leisurely on the winds above. Watchful, Donal was pleased. The birds would have been screeching if there were strangers hidden there, watching us. Ever cautious, he set a small party to scout the area before we went ashore. We would be most vulnerable with our backs to the sea. If we were ambushed there, there would be little hope.
The scouts returned and, satisfied that all was clear, Donal ordered us out, and we jumped into the shallow rippling water. Picking our steps, we slowly waded to the beach. I carried Conor on my back and then set him on the soft sand, where he took off laughing at the joy of the clear day. The Normans were tense and readied themselves for a fight. Rob Smith arranged his archers behind the knights, ready to repel any attack as the foot soldiers quickly unloaded the boat. If there was an ambush waiting, it would be now. With the boat most vulnerable while lodged on the shingle, the shipmaster was eager to be gone and urged his crew to pass the arms and provisions ashore. Rob shouted angrily when a large sheaf of arrows was dropped, the soaked fletching on the arrows making them useless. Precious few had been brought, as with no packhorses, they were limited to what they could carry. Each archer hefted enormous burdens of bundled arrows onto their backs. That done, the shipmaster shouted his farewells, and the powerful strokes of the oarsmen pulled the boat slowly and then quickly into the swell of the bay.
The long waves brushed across the shingle behind us, sucking and gurgling noisily as they retreated to the sea. A tense stillness hung in the air. And then a sudden flurry of birds rose a screaming alarm from the dunes directly in front of us. The men dropped their loads and scrambled into a defensive semicircle formation around us. Unsheathing their longswords, the knights discarded the scabbards and spaced themselves in front of the foot soldiers, to afford them the space to work the swing of their swords. Standing behind the array of foot soldiers, the archers stuck their arrows into the sand, placing one in the bow, ready to loose a deadly volley at whatever emerged from those dunes.
‘Hold steady, lads,’ Rob ordered calmly. A scrambling noise rose from the dunes.
