The Chronicles of Iona

The Hall of the High-King
Council of Teilte, Hibernia
Beltane, May 563

He was a spectacle. Columba knew it.
Abbot! Prince! Cousin to a king!
On trial … on suspicion of murder.

It was not only extraordinary, it was unprecedented. So he could not overly blame the men, all these clerics, who had taken over the high-king’s hall. They crowded in, so many that the stout benches had had to be removed. The bishops, stewing in their silken finery, had elbowed to the front, taking pride of place, which was not surprising: it was high time he was taken low, and they were delirious to witness it. But there were priests without number too, fidgeting close behind their superiors, as well as many—too many—of his fellow abbots, their simple, white woolen tunics little points of light in the press. He had even drawn out the hermits from their inaccessible rock-stacks and their solitary forest musings. The hermits! Men who, by and large, could not much tolerate other men. Even more had been denied entry, and they waited anxiously for word outside the hall’s doors.

Columba had long counted many of these men as brothers. That they should be so quick to turn on him! So quick to judge matters of statecraft, matters of kings—matters, as he well knew, of their god.

Their prurient interest was overwhelming. The air was thick and close, the mood fevered. Outside, rain lashed. Nevertheless, Columba was determined to keep hold of his dignity, a tree unbent by storm, even though his rough linen tunic stuck to his skin and sweat trickled down his spine. Even though, in all that convulsing company, he could not find the man for whom he truly looked.

Ainmire mac Setna. His beloved cousin. His king.

Instead, his gaze snapped to the man who had so hastily convened this ecclesiastical council, and who was now presiding over it with an imperious disdain: Dermot mac Cerball, Hibernia’s high-king. His rich red cloak was a swirl in the otherwise muted company, his gold glimmering where all save the bishops eschewed finery as a manifestation of pride.

But now men were speaking, voices were raised. Some to condemn, others to defend. First to declaim was Budic, Columba’s childhood companion, now the high-king’s bishop, fleshy and bejeweled.

“My friends!” Budic said. “In your love for Columba—in your desire to spare him a fate he wholly deserves—do not forget that which is demonstrable! Remember the charges against him!”

Columba shivered. A fate I wholly deserve? I don’t. I can’t.

An old man shuffled forward in rebuttal: Brendan the Elder, the abbot of Birr, Columba’s anamchara, his soul friend, his confessor, bent nearly double now with age.

Columba’s hope rose. Brendan understood. He would set them all to right.

“You claim to speak of facts, brother Budic,” Brendan began, his ancient face soft and conciliatory, his hand out to Budic in friendship, “but there is no proof that our Columba intended that the counselor die.”

At the old abbot’s measured words, Budic lofted his hands in protest, sweat staining in pools under his arms. “The high-king’s counselor was gutted by his own dagger!” he said. “By whose hand? Whose hand? Clearly, not his own!”

“By Columba’s hand … ” Brendan conceded, his tone matter-of-fact.

Budic pounced. “Ah!”

“It is a question of intent, Budic,” Brendan countered swiftly. “Had Columba not acted, Ainmire would be dead.”

This made Budic sneer. “Ah, yes! Ainmire! Mighty king of the Northern Ui Neill. Columba’s cousin. We can believe neither of them: the one speaks to protect the other.”

His old friend’s tone made Columba wonder, not for the first time: what had made Budic hate him so?

How had Columba failed in his love for him?

But “No!”, Brendan was saying. “Columba is a man of God, beholden to the higher law. He may be a ‘prince-of-the-blood’, like his cousin, but he is not above us.”

Brendan’s hands swept the muttering clerics, including in his statement even the lowly hermits who nodded, honored to be included in such vaunted company. “Make no mistake, my friends!” he continued. “There is more at stake here than the life of one unfortunate man, one would-be assassin, whom it is convenient for Budic, here, and the high-king, to say that Columba has murdered.” The old abbot picked out Dermot, who pointedly looked away. “So much more!”

Yes. This was the crux of it. Brendan did indeed have the right of it. Could the people also be made to see?

Brendan began to pace, his face shining with fervor. “The faith of Christ,” he cried, “ablaze after our beloved Patrick, sputters like a torch about to go out! Soon it will either sweep the land like a cleansing fire or be extinguished like a puff of smoke, its light too weak, too transitory, to dispel any darkness. You know this! The people know this!”

He indicated the hall’s doors and, by implication, the mass of Columba’s supporters on the other side of them. The din they were making was growing louder by the minute. “It is why they love him!” Brendan said. “Why they crave the life he offers, inside his monastery’s gates. The peace there—the peace of Daire! Our Columba is a beacon! A fire-arrow! A torch held aloft at the end of a defile, beckoning one through to safety on the other side! They know—as should you!—that this is a matter above the petty squabbles of kings!”

At Brendan’s words, Columba’s heart stirred with its old longing. Daire of the Oaks! To return to her, clean again, a forgiven man! His monastery of Daire was heaven—or as close as one might come to it this side of the veil. Or so he had always found.

But the kings? The men of power, like Dermot, the ard-ri?

His eyes were drawn back to Dermot. The high-king’s hand was on the pommel of his sword, the only weapon there. He glowered back, his hatred of Columba so evident it was nearly alive. Once again, Columba marveled at the chancy good fortune that had spared this grasping man death on that battlefield.

Columba knew about men of power. He was one. Theirs was a different path. With his mouth, with his tongue, with his words, Dermot made love to Christ. But with his body, with all his torn soul, it was the older gods for whom he lusted, for the earthly power they promised him. To claim the high-throne of Hibernia, had he not bathed in the white mare’s blood in the great cauldron before all his people, naked as a new-born babe, pale skin luminous in the bloody broth, and eaten the floating chunks of her flesh?
He had. Not two years back, Dermot had, as had every high-king before him. At the Feast of Temair, Columba had witnessed this still insistent tug of the old ways. There, with sick revulsion and a psalm on his lips, he had watched Dermot strip himself bare and ascend the stool to drape himself over the mare’s broad rump in a suggestive way, then wrench back the poor beast’s head by the mane to slash her throat with the sacral knife pressed into his palm by the chief of the druidi. The mare had fallen, blood was everywhere, drenching the white-robed druidi, drenching Dermot, and then he had bathed in the steaming cauldron, in the mare’s body and blood; had climbed right in.

Thus was Dermot made high-king—Dermot, whose handy conversion to the faith of Christ had been false, meant to appease the people. Then everyone had eaten of the mare’s flesh and had drunk of her blood, acquiescing to his ungodly reign. Everyone, that is, but Columba and his cousin Ainmire.

Oh, yes. Columba knew about men of power.

Brendan, impassioned, had them all entranced. “My friends!” he was crying. “You must remember that our Columba is a man who has been predestined by our god to be a leader of nations into the Life! His coming was prophesied by Mochta and Bec Macc-De! And—and!—by Patrick, not so very long ago. Think on it! Patrick! I, for one, have seen a very bright column of fiery light over Columba, and holy angels as his companions traveling over the plain! He is such a man as we should not dare to spurn! Remember: Columba is rigdomna: he is king-worthy. He could be ruling his people, the Cenel Conall Gulban. He could be ruling the whole mighty federation of the Northern Ui Neill, should he choose to. In fact, he himself could be high-king … ”

Dermot fumed at this. Brendan acknowledged the high-king’s outrage with a knowing dip of his chin, then said, “But instead, Columba has renounced worldly power to devote his life to our Christ. Everything he does, he does for our god. It would be utter foolishness for us here, today, to sacrifice him, a soldier of Christ, an intimate of kings, for one man lost to war. He must be allowed to continue his mission!”

There was excited rustling from the crowd. This was a high reasoning, in fact was justification for what had happened, should any of them need it. And indeed, some of the southern bishops, the high-king’s bishops, those Columba needed most to sway, were nodding.

But not Budic. He stormed about, the rings on his fingers flashing with his wild gesticulations. “If we permit this travesty,” he cried, “our churches are next! If there is no difference between a warlord and a priest—if we, the bishops, do not enforce a distinction—then the tribesmen will wipe Patrick’s church from the face of Hibernia! You know that they shall! It is not so long ago that this island had no Christ! The old gods persist! Their druidi wait for us to falter! Which is why Columba must be held accountable for his crimes! Come, brothers! Come! Let us vote!”

Old Brendan shot forward, his hand outstretched. “Before we do,” he said, “I ask that the council first hear from Columba himself.”

The crowd fell instantly silent. All eyes turned to him. And into Columba’s mind came the flash of that dagger, embedded in Crundmael’s gut. The gush of the blood. His innards, out. Crundmael fallen, dead.
What could he say?

There were many things, in fact; many things he might say. His mind, mesmerized by the rent body at its feet, rattled them off:

If not Crundmael, then Ainmire. Yes?
Please—don’t forsake me!
Don’t you know who I am?

He opted for none of these things. Tried instead for some kind of truth, though with every passing day he was less sure what that might be. So, what he heard himself say was: “Only this: If I could trade my breath for Crundmael’s, I would do it. But I cannot raise the dead. I have asked for our Lord’s forgiveness. I now ask for yours. I trust that your voice reflects the tangible voice of our Christ in the saeculum. I will submit to you”.

“Yes, you shall!” Budic cut in unkindly. “Now, brothers! Let us vote!”

With much whispering and conferring back and forth, they did. One by one, the bishops stepped forward to place a ball within the proffered bowl: white for innocent, black for guilty.

And then the votes were counted, Columba breathless as they settled evenly, white and black, white and black, white and black, until only one ball remained.

It was held up. The crowd gasped.

It was as black as night.

Columba’s heart heaved. His head reeled as the room spun. He would be sick.

Despair descending, Columba suddenly wondered: the encroaching darkness, the blight which he had sought to stem? To stop in its tracks?

Had he gotten it wrong? Had he instead ushered it in?

Excommunication. To be driven from the Church, from Christendom, shunned by all the faithful, even unto death. The most severe of the Church’s punishments, reserved for the gravest of sins.

It was a perilous fall for one who had climbed so high and so fast, and the men in the hall were stunned as they considered it. The lower clerics, those unable to vote, began to shout in horror as they absorbed the enormity of the verdict. The high-king was triumphant, and there was a mad, merry light in Budic’s eyes.

Columba looked for Brendan. Anguish twisted his old friend’s face, but there was no time to go to him because suddenly, a terrible rumble came from outside as word of the verdict swept through Columba’s already incensed supporters. They began to cry his name and beat against the doors.

Over the tumult a voice thundered. “Columba!”

It was Dermot. The high-king was surging through the crowd, his chest heaving as he scattered clerics.

“You!” he spluttered as he came at him, his face as red as his cloak. “You! For love of you, Ainmire tried to take my throne! Mine! For love of you, they rise up against me!”

He pointed savagely at the hall’s doors which had begun to reverberate ominously, as if they would shatter at any moment.

Uncertainty creased Dermot’s face—stupidly, he had left his retinue outside.

Brendan was right behind the high-king. “They need to see your clemency!” the abbot shouted.

At first, Dermot glared. Then his eyes narrowed and his head tilted in thought.

Until, “Yes,” he finally said. “Yes. Excommunication will not work.”

Columba sucked in breath. Could it be?

But someone was objecting violently. It was Budic, who had grabbed the high-king’s arm. “My lord! We have excommunicated him!”

“Budic!” Dermot said, shaking him off. “I have decided!”

“But, my lord! You forget yourself! A king may not overrule … ”

Dermot cut him off. “It is you who forget yourself! I have decided … ”

But Budic would not heed. Passion—for justice? For revenge?—was making him foolhardy. “No, my lord!” he said. “Where is the Rule of God? We might as well apostatize! Let us worship the older gods like the people do! Let us lie with animals! Let each of us—you! me!—take seven wives and rape our slaves and fornicate with whores!”

“Budic!” the high-king roared. “I said, leave it be!”

“But my lord! My lord! If you love me … if you love Christ … I forbid it!”

“You forbid it?”

As one, the clerics around Columba cried out. Dermot’s nostrils flared as he fell back to draw his sword. A ring opened around him as men scrambled to get out of the way. “I do love you, Budic,” the high-king growled, his tone white-hot. “But take care! I have spoken, and this man,”—the point of his sword swung around until it was level with Columba’s eyes—“this man should get down on his knees and kiss my boots for my clemency. But he will not. No, he will not—not him. Not our dear, brilliant, precious Columba.”

Dermot sheathed his sword with a furious snap. “But the abbot is right,” he said. The uproar from outside was so loud now that the high-king had to shout. “Excommunication will not work. I shall … I shall … ”

Columba’s incredulous heart roared back to life. Might I be free of this? I had only thought to do His will …

Hope was driving Columba forward when the doors suddenly gave a tremendous groan, the hinges beginning to buckle under the press. They all stared, aghast, especially the high-king.

Dermot turned. Came to a decision: “I shall exile him instead!”

Exile?

More swift calculation from Dermot. “To Dal Riata!”

“To which Dal Riata?” Brendan yelled, frantic. “To Dal Riata in Hibernia?”

“No.” The high-king’s smile was too mean. Too pleased. “To Dal Riata in Caledonia.”

Heathen Caledonia! Across the waves!

“And if he ever steps foot on these shores again, I shall hunt him down and disembowel him myself!”

As Budic triumphed, and the clerics shouted, and Brendan sagged against a table, poor support for his horror, a chill overtook Columba, as if someone had just kicked over the soil in which his bones would be lain to rest.

June, 567

The toes of his boots peering over the precipice, Aedan mac Gabran was pondering the rippling waters of the loch below, so distant, so dark, his thoughts far, far away, when a sound he had not heard in many long weeks caused him to snap instantly alert: the sigh of wood winging through air.

This caught him by surprise.  Few things did.  Wilderness, this heartland of the Caledonian Picts, stretched vastly around him, unkind and menacing.  He had climbed to the woods which cloaked the hillside above this grey loch to find the most isolated spot to brood with his memories, of her, and of the baby and his kin, and he thought that he was quite alone.

But, after countless years on the battlefield, he knew this sound: a spear splitting the air.  As soon as his quick mind recognized the threat, he was spinning around.  It was indeed a spear, hurled by a Pictish horseman lurking in the safety of the tree-cover.  The weapon arced for his throat, vulnerable between breast-plate and helmet.

Aedan cursed.  He was a fool to have let down his guard, here, deep in Caledonian territory where no other Scot dared to go, with his back now to the precipice and his only haven the dark water of the loch too far below.  He thrust out his shield just in time.  The Pict’s spear-point deflected off the toughened wood, then skittered along the stony ground before kicking up and tumbling over the cliff’s edge a hundred or more feet to the awaiting water.

Nearby a hound was barking frantically—Aedan’s wolf-hound, Ceo.  Ceo!  Where was she?  This was odd: she was never too far away.  Snapping down his visor, Aedan grabbed for his own spear, sunk into the thin soil beside him.  But the Pict, who had kicked his excited horse into a gallop, was already hurling his heavy axe.  Aedan thrust his shield up again and, as the axe embedded with a thunk, the muscles of his shoulder reverberated, absorbing the energy of the blow.  The axe hung from the shield, weighing it down, rendering it useless.  With another curse, Aedan flung it to the ground before him—anything that might buy him some time.  With luck it would trip up the Pict’s mount.

He hoisted his spear, studying the Pict sourly.  He was fit, young, about Aedan’s own age, wild brown hair flying freely, his teeth, sharpened to points, a grimace over the horse’s rippling mane as he wheeled it about.  His face and limbs swirled with the fantastic, be-magicked symbols of the Picts.  Able to read the blue tattoos, Aedan scowled.  He knew his attacker: it was Drust, son of Bridei, king of the Caledonii—Aedan’s brother-in-law.

Aedan smiled at the long, ugly scar which rippled across Drust’s forehead: it was a wound he had put there himself, many years ago now, back at home in Dal Riata; and then he steadied himself.

Drust had caught him unawares, it was true, but he was ready now.  Waiting until Drust galloped within range again, he hurled his spear with a grunt.  But Drust’s shield came up, deflecting the missile easily.  Drust grinned, a flash of white on a blue-tattooed face.  He was enjoying himself.  Bastard.  His sword drawn overhead, Drust continued his charge, whooping.

Panting in anticipation, Aedan crouched, waiting it out, diving to the side at the last possible moment, just as the horse was bearing down on him.  His brother-in-law’s triumphant sword-swipe cut only air.

With a roll, Aedan came to his feet.  His helmet tilted, momentarily obscuring his vision.  With another muffled oath he righted it.  The damned thing needed adjustment.  It was a hazard.  He was a fool not to have taken care of it sooner.

The horse wheeled, its hooves scattering rock and clumps of dirt over the cliff’s drop as Drust circled Aedan, backing him up step-by-step, herding him back to the edge.  Feet from the precipice, Aedan stumbled, landing heavily on the stony soil.  Down snapped his visor again.  As he righted it, he judged the distance left between them.  He would not be able get to his feet in time to repel the next charge.

He did the only thing he could: he stayed down.  Anything else would have been suicide.  Seeing this, grinning that damn grin again, Drust dismounted in full gallop.  He hit the ground at a run and leapt over the discarded shield, sword held high in both hands, whooping in triumph.

Aedan gave his own grim smile.  Although a beautiful display of his brother-in-law’s horsemanship, among the best Aedan had ever encountered, Drust had just made a mortal miscalculation.  There was little Aedan, or anyone, could do against a mounted warrior, but in hand-to-hand combat Aedan had yet to meet his match, even when arse-down in the dirt.  Drust should have remained on his horse until he had driven him over the edge.  So Aedan let him charge, leaving his chest unprotected to entice him even closer.  When the sword slashed down, Aedan grabbed Drust’s arm and, using his own momentum against him, heaved him over his shoulder.  Drust slammed into the ground, grunting in shock.  Aedan twisted and on bent knee jabbed the point of his sword at his brother-in-law’s throat.

Breath heaving, Drust gaped up at him, brown eyes wide, the tattoos of the elaborate sunbursts inked onto his face elongating with his surprise at being bested.  His sword clattered to the ground.  Hands raised in defeat, he panted in a heavily accented version of Aedan’s own speech, “I concede!”

“Damn right you do,” Aedan growled, pressing the point of his sword into the center of a sun on one of Drust’s cheeks.

“If you cut me,” Drust warned, “my sister will have your head.  Once was enough.”

Drust’s sister.  Aedan’s wife, Domelch.  The mother of his son.  The thought of her brought a wry smile to his face.  “She would, wouldn’t she?”

And, offering a hand to his brother-in-law, he hauled him to his feet …

Iona, 574

Oh! Dear God!

There! There! The boys!

The boys will die!

Not much time now. No time to race to them through the crush, to intercede, to step between them and those slashing swords. To save them.

Except … they are no longer boys. They are not as they are now. They are men. Valiant, vibrant men, in the prime of their lives; vital and strong. Look at them on their bright steeds! At the fore of the vanguard, laughing! Just as their father Aedan had taught them. Just as Aedan had done.

Aedan, Columba’s friend, his soul’s companion. His anam cara. None more dear.

These boys? These men! They are invincible! They will live long lives. No spear can reach them, no arrow; certainly not those horrible, relentless, hacking blades. They are safe from harm. Free from pain.

Aren’t they?

No. Blood is dripping from their beautiful faces. They are ripped from their horses. Their enemies have them now. They loom over them, taunting and laughing as they torment them.

He is too far away to save them. He will not be able to reach them in time.

He knows what is coming. So do they. There is anguish in their eyes as they look for one another; one brother reaching for the other.

Oh! No! No! No!

There go their heads.

It is too much. Columba forces open his eyes …