Holder of Lightning

They met other Bunus Muintir: they crossed the River Teann in a currach oared by a Bunus they met on the shore, apparently waiting for them. Seancoim and the other man spoke in their own language briefly, the Bunus occasionally glancing at Jenna, but he either didn’t speak the Daoine language or had nothing he wanted to say to her. When she thanked him for his help, he merely grunted and pushed his boat away from the shore, paddling back the way they’d come. Jenna remembered the maps she’d seen in Inishfeirm and Dun Kiil.

Though she couldn’t read the markings on them, both Ennis and Moister Cleurach had pointed out to her the townlands and geography of Inish Thuaidh. Ingean na nUan, through which they walked now, was a lush land of rolling hills, punctuated here and there by the wide, checkered expanse of farmed lands, with small villages that reminded Jenna achingly of Ballintubber, tied together with the narrow ribbons of rutted dirt roads They avoided the settled areas, keeping to the forest that wound in and around the farmland. As the nights passed, they moved steadily eastward and the land started to rise again. With each dawn, as they settled in to rest, Jenna could see the mountains ahead of them less blue with distance, looming higher until their path started to lift toward them and they were walking in green, narrow valleys where rills and brooks rushed frantically down steep slopes toward them, half-hidden in bracken and thickets. They turned northward now, and when they were forced to climb up to one of the ridgelines, Jenna could glimpse off to the east the shore of Lough Athas; then, a few days later, to the north, the endless expanse of the Westering Sea, its waves touched with the milk of moonlight. Jenna wondered if, somewhere out there, Thraisha or her kind swam. But they never came close enough to the shore for Jenna to call for the Saimhoir with the cloch. Seancoim now turned north and east, roughly following the coastline but staying with the spine of mountains, steep hills, and drumlins bulwarking the island from the winds and storms that the sea often flung at it, and passing into the townland of An Ceann Ramhar.

This townland was sparsely settled, and the villages grew even smaller and farther apart as they continued north. They began seeing large herds of storm deer, their hooves striking thunder from the land. Wind sprites wafted in clouds through the branches of trees, and the red, glaring eyes of dire wolves could be glimpsed watching them as they passed, though none attacked. There were other sounds and calls in the dark, and glimpses of creatures Jenna couldn't identify. Even the more normal crea-tures seemed strange. She saw eagles flying high overhead with wingspans wider than she was tall, and they called to each other with voices that sounded almost human; there were enigmatic ripples in the dark lakes, odd footprints in the earth.

"The land has almost fully awakened here," Seancoim said one morning as they settled into an overhanging hollow in a hillside to sleep. He lit a small fire with dead branches, striking the tinder into reluctant flame with flint and steel. Denmark flapped over to roost on a nearby branch, his head down on his breast. "It spreads slowly, but soon all places will be like this. When the mage-lights last faded, hundreds of years ago, these creatures faded, too, remembered only in the tales of the old people. In a few generations, they were nothing more than myths and legends, and those who claimed to see them were ridiculed and laughed at. Now the mage-lights bring them back from the hidden, lost places where they rested."

"All the fables are real?" Jenna remembered the tales she'd heard back in Tara's Tavern: from Aldwoman Pearce or Tom Mullin or in the songs Coelin sang.

"Not all. But most are based on some truth, no matter how twisted and distorted they’ve become over time. In another twenty or thirty turns of the seasons, everyone will have seen the real meaning of the Filleadh." Seancoim groaned as he settled back against the rocks. He rummaged in his pack for an earthenware pot, filled it with water from one of the skins, and set it at the edge of the fire. He unrolled a packet of dried fruit and meat and passed it over to Jenna. "In Thall Coill, the awakening is nearly complete."

"Tell me about Thall Coill," Jenna said, breaking off a bite of the smoked meat. "Tell me about the Scrudu. 1 asked En-" She started to say the name, and her throat closed. She forced back the sudden tears, swallowing.". . Ennis," she continued, "but he didn’t know much about it, and Moister Cleurach simply wouldn’t talk about it at all."

Seancoim shook his head, his white, featureless eyes seeming to stare at the fire. "I won’t, either," he said. "Not until it’s time."

"Moister Cleurach believes that it’s not real, that it’s a Bunus Muintir trick to kill the Daoine Holders."

"Is that what you think?"

"I don’t believe you would do that to me."