Especially, he had added more soberly, when this might be the last festival. "Another failed harvest, lass, and we'll all be taking ship for America. And I do not think Lord Skein's sheep dance..."
I had slept badly, haunted by dreams of blood and fire. The priest had been there; it was his need that had called me. I remembered my own sorrow and confusion, but not what had caused them, only his appeal—
"I can save this land, lady, if you will call me back again!"
There was no point in going back to bed. I pulled on my walking skirt of dark green twill, did up the buttons of the matching jacket with its high neck and flaring peplum, and looked around for my cape and hat. By noon no doubt I would be envying the local girls in their stuff skirts and shawls, but they expect me to dress like a lady, and at least I would be warm.
When the trap drew up at my door I was surprised to find McMurtry driving. But seeing his scowl, I decided against asking after his son. According to the folklorists, Lughnasa celebrations were a traditional time for courting. Perhaps Luke was sparking a girl of whom he did not approve. I wondered why the thought should give me a pang.
Clouds still hung behind the escarpment, but the meadow below Stirring Rock was ablaze with sunshine. A blue trail of smoke from the bonfire hung in the bright air. As we drove up I heard the lively lilt of a fiddle; a few of the merrymakers were dancing. Cheerful voices hailed McMurtry as he reined in, faltered as they saw me and altered to a more sober tone.
"It's welcome you are, lady," said Rose Donovan, whose mother cleaned for me. "Come and sit if you will. The first of the new potatoes are roasting and will be ready soon."
I nodded and clambered down. The girl had always been guardedly friendly, but now there was a kind of grave courtesy in her manner that reminded me of ancient tales. I looked up at the gray bulk of the rock with the odd sense that all of us here were moving back in time. In this ancient place we were bound to old relationships of lord and leige that this new century had forgotten. My ancestors had ruled here. What did that mean to me?
The weather was changeable, blue sky half-veiled by opalescent cloud that thickened at times to release a misting of rain. They had stretched canvas near the fire to protect the fiddler, and someone set a wooden milking stool there for me. I was finishing my first, ceremonial bite of the new potatoes when shouts and laughter erupted from down the hill.
The girls ran towards the noise and I got to my feet, wishing I could kick off my shoes and join them. In a few moments they reappeared, dancing around a heaving knot of young men, McMurtry's son in the lead, who were hanging onto ropes tied around the neck of a young black bull. It was not entirely clear who was leading whom, but someone had tossed a garland across the curving horns. I thought suddenly of the sacred bulls I had seen in India.
"He's a fine beast, my son," said McMurtry, "but not from my byres. Where does he come from, and why have you brought him here?"
"As to his origins, where he comes from he will not be missed, and I left compensation," said Luke. "As for his destination—was it not you yourself who told me of the great bullfeasts they used to have on these heights? It seemed to me that maybe if we made the feast in the old way our old luck would come again."
"That's heathen talk—" McMurtry began, but the boy shook his head.
"We shall eat and drink in the name of the lord of glory and his blessed mother, and where's the shame in that?" He laughed, and at that moment the sun came through the clouds again and blazed on his hair. I blinked, and a voice I remembered from my dreams seemed to whisper, Now it begins.... I shivered despite the brightness of the sun.
"If you mean to feast this evening you'd best be butchering him now," said Rose. "And we'll be needing more wood for the fires—"
"Take the beast back, lad. There's no good can come of this—" McMurtry interrupted. But Luke was hauling on the ropes, laughing. Bright hero and black bull—I had read something of this in one of Father Roderic's diaries. I stared, trying to remember.
Before the memory could come into focus we heard hoofbeats, and Lord Skein's factor careened around the bend. Something seemed to click into place in my awareness. McMurtry turned to his son, the high color fading from his cheeks.
"Luke, lad, ye've never gone and stolen this bull from Lord Skein?"
The young man stepped between his father and Bailey, who had leaped from his cart and was advancing with fists balled, looking himself rather like the bull. Some of the girls covered their ears as a stream of profanity curdled the air.
"'Tis a sale and no thievery!" exclaimed Luke. "I left the beast's price behind him!"
Bailey's hand plunged into his pocket and came back with a small pistol. "I'll take the bull and the money, for damages, and you yourself to the magistrate to answer for the crime—"
"Lady of Carricknahorna—" McMurtry turned to me, his face working. "Stop them—"
He had invoked the ancient contract between lord and people, and though the law of this time gave me no authority, I could not deny his appeal. But as I walked towards the antagonists, I felt myself becoming part of a pattern that was older still. The clouds had drawn in again, stealing the brightness from the day. From beyond the hills came a mutter of thunder.
The crowd stilled. I took a deep breath, let it out slowly as my guru had taught me, and felt the familiar shift of awareness. Consciousness floated on a plane from which I could observe all things, myself included, a state, I noted with a detached wonder, in which I could also remember my dreams.
"The bright god and the dark must do battle to release the harvest. The Goddess will judge between them...."