“Curious,” said Yarlaith. “So, what brought you across the Glenn?”
Fionn sighed deeply. “Both Slaíne and I were being transferred to the Penance Chapter. I’m going to study become a master Pyromancer. She was supposed to….”
Fionn’s voice trailed off to a whimper before he could stop himself. His eyes went wet with tears.
“It’s okay,” said Yarlaith, closing the notebook and placing it back inside his cloak. “We can continue this another time. Please, get some rest. I’ll bring you something to eat.”
As soon as Yarlaith stood, a door from across the room slammed shut, followed by a quick pitter-patter of footsteps against a wooden floor.
“What was that?” asked Fionn, craning his neck to see behind Yarlaith. The healer turned to look back at the closed door.
“That’s just my niece,” he said. “She must have been eavesdropping.” He smiled at Fionn, eyes twinkling in the dim light. “Her name is Morrígan. I’m sure she’d love to meet you.”
***
The next few days passed by in a blur. Fionn could barely keep track of the time between Yarlaith’s medical procedures, with his strange salves and poultices. Whenever the old healer came to Fionn’s bedside, he either had another alchemical brew to try, or a salvo of tests to carry out on the arm.
My arm, Fionn tried to remind himself when Yarlaith first came poking it with needles to test for sensitivity to pain. Each sharp prick was another reminder that this was indeed his arm, and he would have to get used to it.
After Yarlaith’s first set of examinations, his niece, Morrígan, came into the room. She was a strange girl. With a perpetual dark expression and eyes that never quite met his own, it seemed she had been exposed to far too much for someone her age.
“Why were you travelling through the Glenn?” she asked, approaching Fionn with hardly a “hello.”
“It’s a long story,” said Fionn, nursing the numb ache that still ran through his arm. “I’d rather not elaborate right now.”
Before he had a chance to change the subject, she was gone, rushing through the clinic door, her black feathered cloak flowing behind her.
She was there in the field. The troll almost killed her, too.
Yarlaith had told Fionn that Morrígan’s mother died in the attack, leaving the girl an orphan. Her father had fled the scene, and he hadn’t been heard of since. He was Yarlaith’s brother, but if the old healer was upset over his disappearance, he certainly didn’t show it.
The voices had been silent since Fionn had first awakened; he hesitated to tell Yarlaith about them at first. Eventually, he did, and although the white mage listened intently as Fionn described the words each voice said, it was clear that it wasn’t a medical concern.
“Just a side effect of being asleep for so long,” he had said, clearly trying not to sound too dismissive. “Sometimes our dreams can leak into our waking minds in the morning, as we re-adjust to reality.”
But Fionn insisted they were real, that the voices stopped talking when he told them to ‘shut up.’ Yarlaith’s expression darkened more than ever, but he reassured Fionn that it was nothing to worry about. Fionn had heard enough stories about people being locked up for claiming to see things that weren’t there, so he left the topic alone after that.
On the morning of the Harvest Moon, Yarlaith strolled into the clinic as he always did and made the same routine checks of Fionn’s condition.
“You seem to have made a full recovery,” said the healer, examining the stiches that bound the muscular arm to Fionn’s shoulder. “Have you adjusted to your new limb?”
“I guess so,” said Fionn. He had asked Yarlaith many times where the arm had come from, but the healer always dodged the question, assuring Fionn that everything would be all right, and that this was a perfectly normal medical procedure.
“You can reach Penance by tonight if you leave now,” said Yarlaith, gathering Fionn’s few belongings. “It’s a full a day’s walk to Point Grey, and there’s a regular trains and ferries from there.”
“Sure,” muttered Fionn, staring at the clothes Yarlaith had set out before him. The Pyromancer hadn’t carried much when he left Dromán, as he assumed his needs would be tended to once he arrived. All he brought aboard the airship was a pair of boar-hide travelling boots and an old red travelling cloak, which Yarlaith had apparently washed thoroughly, for the stains of blood and mud he had gathered from the Glenn were nowhere to be seen. He had always brought flint-rings, of course, and had never taken them off. Those, unfortunately, were on the right hand, the one he lost out by the cliffs.
“Come,” said Yarlaith, offering Fionn an arm. “I’ll see you to edge of the village.”
They walked out through the clinic, down a narrow hallway leading to the entrance to the house. At the front door stood Morrígan, dressed in the same black cloak as before. Her arms were folded, her face contorted into a frown.
“He can’t leave yet,” said Morrígan to Yarlaith, as if Fionn wasn’t there. “He hasn’t told me about the Glenn!”
“Fionn is in a hurry, Morry,” said Yarlaith. “He has important business in Penance. Business that is certainly none of yours.”
The two passed the young girl, out into dreary garden, with patches of grass scattered amongst mounds of dry dirt. Wattle-and-daub walls surrounded the house, separating the garden from a winding, dusty road leading downhill towards some more squat buildings not too far away.
“Come back!” cried Morrígan, following Fionn and Yarlaith out into the road. “I need to know about the troll!”
“Please,” said Fionn, trying to force the memory from resurfacing. “I don’t want to talk about it.”
“But you must!” said Morrígan, catching up to his side. “I need to know about the troll that killed my mother!”
Your mother wasn’t the only one the troll killed, you little brat!
Fionn gasped in terror, holding a hand up to his mouth. That thought was not his own.
“I told you,” he whispered. “I don’t want to talk about it.” He realised he was shaking, so folded his arms
“Leave him be,” said Yarlaith.
Desperately wanting to be alone, Fionn told the girl that he was in a hurry and needed to reach Penance soon. But this didn’t satiate her curiosity. Morrígan narrowed her eyes and studied Fionn for some time.
Eventually, she asked, “Why are you going to Penance?”
Where do I begin? I just wanted to be a Pyromaster, but now I need to bring news of Sir Bearach and Sláine….
“That’s enough, Morry!” cut in Yarlaith, before Fionn had a chance to speak. The girl protested, but Yarlaith insisted that she leave his patient alone. Fionn didn’t hear the words, for another voice began speaking into his ear.
