Lion of Ireland Read Free

smallness. Even Anluan, nearest him in age, only paid him the attention of sticking out his tongue as he shoved past to salute Bebinn.
    Cennedi would not come in to his own hearth and dinner until the men of Boruma were home and the day’s business ended. Bebinn believed in discipline and self-restraint for her sons, but she did not expect the impossible; as soon as Mahon arrived she began handing out the crusty loaves of bread, and ladling thick chunks of meat from the pot.
    Every edible that came to her hand was simmering in that pot: beef and fowl, with grain and herbs and mushrooms from the woods beyond the compound. Niall had even devised a little tray that his mother could put beneath roasting meat, so that the drippings could be caught and saved for her fragrant stews.
    The meal was not a quiet one. Each boy customarily strove to outdo the others in his ability to talk with his mouth full.
    “There will be too many cows of breeding age this spring; the red bull can never cover them all.”
    “Nonsense! You’re just saying that because you want to try that gangly brown calf of yours on some of the cows. But he’s no good for breeding; you’ve spoiled him rotten and ruined his temper.”
    “I have not! I raised him myself because he was orphaned, but I never spoiled him. He’s the best young bull we’ve ever had, and he’ll be given the entire herd someday. Just ask Mahon, if you don’t believe me!”
    The two boys—neither of whom had any say over the
    policies of breeding—turned to Mahon as the final arbiter of their dispute. Mahon helped himself to a steaming goblet of meat, chewed it reflectively, winked down the table at Brian, and began wiping out his bowl with his bread.
    “It seems to me,” he said at last, “that there is something to be said for both bulls. We must observe Liam and our father closely and see what they decide. Perhaps they will use the red one on the majority of the herd, and try the brown on the cows who need more vigor in their calves. But we’ll wait and see, and I’m certain we’ll all learn something.”
    The air grew thick with the smell of food, and smoke, and damp clothes drying on warm young bodies.
    One of the tribeswomen arrived to help Bebinn just as Cennedi himself ‘ appeared at last in the doorway, followed by a stooped graybeard wearing a silk-lined bratt.
    “Welcome, Fiacaid!” Bebinn hailed the oldster in the nightly ritual. “Will you do us the honor of sharing our evening meal?”
    The old man bowed his acceptance and took the seat of honor at Cennedi’s right hand, the place that was his from long custom. He was old, and frail, the nobly sculptured bones of his face hidden behind a network of lines like the creases in parchment, yellow and dead. Only his bright eyes were alive, glittering wetly beneath his tangled brows. The years of his maturity had been given in service to the Dal I Cais as their seanchai, their historian and storyteller, and on a night such as this he often congratulated himself for having a talent that earned him a place at the table and a dry bed.
    Bebinn selected the choicest contents of the pot for his bowl, and poured his mead herself, rather than entrust it to the serving woman.
    “Will he tell a tale tonight?” the woman asked eagerly, almost treading on Bebinn’s heels.
    “How can I tell? The physician lives with your family, does he not? And does he set a broken bone every night, or brew a potion at each meal? It is the business of the tribe to care for the members of the filidh, the artists and physicians, the poets and harpers and students of the law, and in return for that they share their talents with us when they are needed. It is not my place to tell the seanchai that one of his stories is wanted tonight, Maire. Nor is it yours.”
    The woman snapped her lips shut and returned to her chores, but she frequently rolled her eyes toward Fiacaid, alert to the possibilities of his magic. If he began to talk she would