“Defend yourself if you can little fox.  I’ll make you famous,” shouted Fer Ulli, Champion of the Airgialla.

“You’ll never know the tenth part of my fame,” said CuRuada hefting his spear in an overhand grip and limbering his shield arm.

“Oh? Why is that?” scoffed Fer Ulli wading through the ford.

“You’ll not know anything beyond today.” CuRuada crouched as the big man came splashing toward him.

Fer Ulli drove his heavy headed spear hard toward CuRuada’s legs, hoping to wound him, but CuRuada knocked it away easily even as his spear dug a furrow in Fer Ulli’s shield.  The two men traded blows, each catching and diverting the other’s blows as they churned the water of the ford to brown mud.

Fer Ulli was the older of the two by far, so as the battle continued, and he could not get his spear past the boy’s shield to wound him, the shrewd champion attacked less and sought to conserve his strength for an opening.  Using his bulk he worked CuRuada into a deeper place in the ford, hampering his movements.  Fer Ulli feinted weakly with his spear and CuRuada struck it aside with more power than was needed.  Fer Ulli seemed to follow that weak jab, staggering and exposing his side.  CuRuada lunged and his spearhead grated along the rings of the champion’s mail.  Suddenly CuRuada was reeling from a shield edge smashed against his head on the way to striking his arm and carrying away his spear with his balance.

Fer Ulli pressed his advantage, thrusting again and again, but CuRuada’s momentary unbalance was gone.  Now with his short sword in hand, CuRuada began to press the older man.  Fer Ulli should have had an advantage in range with his spear, but CuRuada, angered now, seemed able to slip past Fer Ulli’s guard at will and his sword cuts were telling.

Worse yet, as Fer Ulli’s strength ebbed with each cut, flowing away like his blood on the river, CuRuada seemed to strengthen and his anger seemed to grow. 

To look on him now was a fearsome thing.  Where Fer Ulli had struck the young man was a deep bruise that had nearly closed his eye, but around the purple his face was almost as dark a red as the purple of the bruise.  While one eye squinted the other gaped wide with madness.  The boys hair stood on end like his name sake, and he now moved with animal quickness.

Gasping, Fer Ulli tried his best to defend himself.  CuRuada’s attacks seemed more like the maddened onslaught of a rabid animal than a warrior.  Then, for a moment, CuRuada seemed to slip and Fer Ulli tried to gather the last of his reserves.  He let his shield drop low and reared back to attempt a fight finishing thrust.  Too late, for CuRuada was already erupting from the water.  The feat was the Salmon Leap and last thing Fer Ulli ever saw was the arching body of his nemesis above him before the edge of CuRuada’s shield tore his shoulder from it’s socket and his sword found its way down beside his neck, through muscle and bone to find his heart.

“See you there,” asked CuRuada, “I see a man at the fording place.  What mischief might he be at here at the West gate of Ulster?”

“Not hard to learn,” shouted Felmid, “and with a whoop, he set the team to racing, the chariot leaping down the fall to the Ash Ring.”

“This is like to be trouble,” said Fionn to Conall.

“How could it be other?” said Conall, his face set hard and grim.  “Let us go quickly lest that youth leads all these others to death.” Nodding Fionn set the whip to their team and they started down behind CuRuada and the other two chariots.

The young men of the boys troop of Ulster rode down to the banks of the fording place of the White Dash shouting their battle crys and displaying their martial abilities.  As they went, at their head both in order and in ferocity, was CuRuada.  He it was who rode the chariot pole between the team and displayed his spear throwing skills and his spear catching skills as they went.

Felmid drew up at the edge of the water with the left side of the chariot to the man standing across the fording place at the edge of the pool of the Ash Circle.  CuRuada leaped from the chariot and stood in the waters edge facing the man who calmly leaned on his spear with his sheild resting under his hand.  “Who are you that stand at the West Gate of Ulster?” He shouted across the way.  But the man made no answer nor any move save to spit casually into the river at his feet.

“Hey you!  Speak or I’ll come and remove you from the way and your head from your shoulders,” shouted CuRuada.

“A mighty boast for an Ulster brat.  Aren’t you from the famous boys troop that play well at hurley and prance around patting each other on the back?” The thick armed man in mail that looked like the scales of a fish laughed low in his throat, but there was no humor in his eyes and he made no more move save to taunt, ”Any idiot but an Ulster idiot would see that I’m not standing at the West gate of Ulster at all.  You can be glad of that.  I’m standing here, guarding the East gate of the Tenth part of Airgialla.  Go on home to your nursemaids Ulster boys you’ve not the stomach for this, nor any fur on your balls either I’ll warrant.

Rinnchu stepped from his chariot and called, “Who’s the idiot?  Everyone knows that there are but nine parts of Airgialla and that it lays South of Ulster, not to the West.”

“Is that so?  Don’t look now, soft-headed Ulster welp, we are surrounding you!”  The man at the ford laughed a nasty laugh, “Are there any men at all among you?  I thought I might have to call for help, but I only see a pack of boys.” The man shaded his eyes and made a show of scanning the ridgeline, “Did you bring your mothers?  I’d like to meet them, seeing all you pretty boys.”

This taunt brought all the boys but Conall and Fionn out of their chariots and hot to fight, throwing insults back across the White Dash.  The man ponderously slipped his arm into the straps of his heavy sheild and made ready his spear, “Very well, I know you Ulster bleaters are going to want to rush me all at once, since any idiot knows that a fair fight in Ulster is ten ‘gainst one.  I’ll probably need my sheild.  Right, well come on boys, come get your whipping.”

“Hold up!” cried Conall, “don’t you know who that is? That’s Fer Ulli, the champion of the Airgialla.”

“I know him for a fact,” said Fionn, “He’s the one that  Concubar forced their king to excile when we defeated them and took the king captive.  Only Fer Ulli and the sons of Nechtan were not defeated, they only withdrew when we compelled their king to send them away.  I was there, he killed many many good men.  His armor is impenetrable and he is a demon with that spear of his.”

“What are you chatting about girls?  Come now Ulsterlings, my spear is thirsty.”  Then the man began to wade into the stream, “Uh oh, now you’ve done it, here comes the bear at the precious West gate of Ulster.  What will the boys troop do?”

“I claim this combat.  I will face this mocker.” Thus saying CuRuada charged into the ford.”

“Tell me your name boy!” Shouted Fer Ulli, “I like to keep track of all the Ulster boys I kill.”

“You’ll have no name from me but CuRuada.  I can say my true name to the King alone.  You are little better than filth so you’ll have to do with that.”

“Red haired hound?  Little fox is more like it.  You came a long way to die little fox.”

“You talk too much.  I’m going to let all the air out of you.”

“Defend yourself if you can little fox.  I’ll make you famous.”

“You’ll never know the tenth part of my fame.”

“Oh? Why is that?”

“You’ll not know anything beyond today.”

“I will take up my arms today,”  shouted CuRuada.  He pushed through the press of his boy’s troop brothers.  Man and boy alike stepped aside as he charged to the fore.  There was a heat on him, a heroe’s light that many would remember, CuRuada was not tall, nor thickly muscled, nor had he any beard, but he was, that day, a man, and none could stand in his way.

King Concubar drew himself up proudly, “Do you know the words of the Chief Druid’s vision?  The one who takes up arms today will die young.”

“I heard the words, not that they mean anything to me,” said CuRuada, “If I had planned not to take up my arms before hearing them they would lead me to this same decision.  I am a warrior, I am a man, better to be remembered for great deeds than to live a long life.  Better fame and a name then to die in bed with no teeth.  I will take up my arms today.”

Concubar beamed with pride, “So speaks a man.”

“Then you are a fool,” hissed the old druid.  he turned his back on king and assembly and walked off with the other druids.

Concubar embraced his son, any who saw might have guessed it, but he was the king facing a war with dire consequences, CuRuada had showed the bravery all his men would need.  Perhaps they all were looking to their own courage, they did not know it save Fergus.  Concubar called to the assembly, “Let us go to the armory of the Red Branch Warriors, there are men here who would take up their arms!” So saying they all went up to the great hall of the Red Branch.

CuRuada took from the many assembled death dealing spears one thick and strong, too heavy for him, one might have thought, but as he plied it in a most spectacular, hero-like, wonderously martial way it shattered in his hands.  “Here, have a go with this spear,”  Said Fergus, as he passed his massive, sharp bladed, wound-gouging, monsterous, five pronged spear. So the lad plied it and found it fit for him.

Next CuRuada took in hand one of the fine swords among those that awaited a warrior in the great armory of Ulster.  Then he worked his feats, his strikings and his thrustings upon the training butts of the Red Branch and too soon the sword was warped and its hilt crumbling in the fist of CuRuada until it was destroyed.  Then King Concubar offered his own long slashing, high hilted, razor sharp, magnificently glittering sword to the boy.  CuRuada took it in hand and with brilliance, his hero light plain for all to see, he showed his great skill and found that the great sword of the King of Ulster was fit for his hand.

Then CuRuada made to take down one of the shields from the wall of the great hall of the Red Branch Warriors, but the King, Concubar, cried, “Leave off lad, none of these will stand your rough use, I think.”  With a wave he had brought out a strong, bronze banded and painted sheild of ash and oak wood, strong was the boss of iron in the midst of the shield and also it was studded with iron as well.  Upon the face of it was emblazoned a red hound chasing a great red deer stag with red branching antlers.  “This I had in mind to give you soon, but today it is proper, you are the hound of Ulster now and not the little fellow we called you when first you came.”

Indeed he was not the same boy.  Though he was shorter than his fellows, CuRuada had grown from the boy he was into a man of strength at least.  With thoughts of war, perhaps there was no-one who remembered that he’d been with them less than a month.

CuRuada moved to the chariots that sat outside the feasting hall of the Red Branch.  Before he could test them, Concubar said, “Please CuRuada, will you leave us with but one chariot?  Leave off those others.  You shall have my chariot and my favorite team as well.”

Several of the other lads of the Boys Troop including Conall, the son of the champion, took up their arms that day.  Even Felmid, the lad who’s arm had not fully mended, though he could not hold a sword was swept up in the furvor, “I may not be able to hold a sword, but I can drive as well as any of you with just one arm.  I’ll be the Hound’s charioteer.  The king’s horses don’t much need the goad anyhow.” 

And so it was that Felmid proved his worth to drive Concubar’s own chariot with his best team and with him went CuRuada who astounded the assembly with his feats as Felmid drove magnificently in sweeping turns and slashing dashes with CuRuada howling his warcry running up and down on the tongue of the chariot and casting spears with deadly accuracy.

As so often happens, folk would remember this day as a bright shining, vigorous, heroic, magnificent, and awe-inspiringly brilliant day that all later days paled in comparison too, and its brilliance would make the dark days that fatefully followed from it all the more bleak by comparison.

Scota and Teutates fought side by side.  Wave after wave of Lyr’s raiders broke against their shields and were thrown back by spear and sword.  There were always more who came, pounding relentlessly like the sea.

“Too many,” panted Teutates, “They are like the endless coils of a snake.”

“We can beat him,” Scota cried, “Shut up and just keep fighting.”

“No, this is Lyr’s doing, but we could kill all his armies and not stop him.” Tuetates caught a heavy blow with his shield and casually stabbed the frenzied axeman in the unprotected thigh. The man howled in pain and rage, rearing back for another savage blow.  Teutates ducked past the man and drove his short sword through the man’s back and into his heart, his return stroke hamstrung another warrior.

Moira dispatched the stumbling cripple with a quick thrust through the man’s throat, “So we run?” The bitter contempt in Scota’s voice made Teutates shiver.”

“Not that,” Teutates pulled a spear from a corpse and hurled it through a skinny raider with a ridiculous horned helmet and a sword, “We waste our strength on Lyr’s coils,” Teutates pointed his bloody sword toward the cluster of sheilds and spears on a small rise around the standard of their brother, Lyr, the lord Balor to his raiders, “There is the head!”

“Cut it off and the serpent dies.  The bloody head is the thing,” Scota gathered like a storm cloud.

She was beautiful in her rage, but all Teutates said was, “I love you Ota,” his words were lost in the battle noise.  Louder he commanded, “Organize our guard into the kind of spear-point that can reach that standard, I’ll get with our commanders to thin our way.”  He did not look to see if she would do her part, he knew her.

The forces opposing Balor were hard pressed, but a line was formed and a broad push launched at Balor’s spear bristled hill.  A thin line of reserves was withheld and Teutates and Scota, with their guard, prepared to exploit their enemies lack of discipline from a tight packed wedge formed up behind the screen.  The push seemed to threaten to reach even to Lyr himself before it was thrown back.  With a nod from Teutates the recall was sounded and the assault seem to dissolve in disarray.

Teutates watched as the rabble around Balor’s command began to pursue what seemed to be their opponents fleeing after one last attempt.  Satisfied that all was well he ordered the charge and the war horns sounded the charge.

Beside him Scota screamed, “Crush the Head!” and as one they drove toward their brother Lyr’s battle standard, the bloody flag of Balor of the Fomor, with black murder in their hearts.

Their hand picked warriors surged after.  It was a hero’s charge, enemies fell to the left and right.  Their narrow wedge thrust into the confused Fomor ranks, bringing destruction.  Teutates’ powerful sword arm wrought death on the right while Scota’s brilliant sword work killed foes to the left, hundreds fell.  Nothing survived between them and Lyr’s shield wall, nor did it stand before the two gods of the Gael, but their guard was slaughtered behind them.

It only took a moment to see they’re success was a trap.  Swords pressed them on all sides.  They fought on, grimly taking wound after wound until Teutates fell unconscious and Scota’s sword slipped from her bloody hand.  She collapsed to the ground next to her husband and expected quick death.

It did not come for her.  “Good,” Boomed a commanding voice, “I wanted to have a word with you sister.”  Scota looked up to see a hulking shape that seemed to squat on a sort of mobile dais.  With a wave from lord Balor, who was her brother Lyr, the press of soldiery stepped back, “You’re looking lovely Scota.”

“I’ve looked better,” murmured Scota, “But you, Lyr, look like a hideous bloated toad.”  There were gasps all around.  Scota wiped the sweat from her face, replacing it with a smear of blood from her arm.

Lyr chuckled, unconcerned, “You see?  This is how we gods converse, one big happy family.”

Scota laughed without humor but made no more comment.

“I always admired you Scota. . .”

This she couldn’t let pass, “I’d rather die than let you touch me.”

“I do what I like,” said Balor without heat.

“Not to me . . .”

Balor shrugged his thick shoulders and chided, “I think you know better than that.  I can do to you whatever I wish.  Question is, do you want to live sweet sister?”

“I told you, I would rather die than sleep with you Lyr.”

Lyr laughed derisively, “You flatter yourself, it’s not your (body) I want.  I like your violence.”  Lyr rose and stepped off his dais.  He was very nearly seven feet tall, thickly muscled and massive.  Only a bloated paunch hanging at his waist spoiled the martial effect.  He hefted a huge double bitted battle-axe one handed, and with ease.  “Choose Scota, life or death, it’s up to you, sister.”  Lyr was a far larger man than Scota remembered, he’d not stopped growing in his over 200 years. “Killing you both just leaves me with two less headaches.” Lyr stepped closer, menacing, swinging his great axe.

Scota glanced around her feet, desperate to find her sword.  She looked up to see Lyr smirking, obviously reading her, but not caring.  Their eyes locked, but Lyr’s smirk didn’t change.  What was she missing? Did he want to kill her himself?

Lyr’s eyes flicked away and he nodded. A soldier with a spear, standing out from the general press, raised his spear and drove it into Teutates’ chest.  It must have killed him instantly because even the man twisting and wrenching the spear free of her husband’s body didn’t illicit any response from Teutates.

“No!” Scota heard herself scream.  Lyr’s laughter lent everything a nightmarish quality.  Scota threw herself across Teutates body.  His eyes were staring sightless and his jaw was slack.  Scota’s hand closed around the hilt of a sword.  As quick as thought and before the spear-man could bring his bloody spear to bear Scota shoved the sword into the man’s guts.  She leaned against the man, taking pleasure in watching the light go out of his eyes, before shoving his corpse back and off her sword.

Lyr seemed to find this extra measure of death even funnier.

Scota turned on Lyr, but made no move.  Balor, god of the Fomor, stood casually with his axe resting on his shoulder, “I never liked him,” said Lyr.

For a moment, Scota thought he meant the spear-man she had just killed, but Balor was looking at Teutates body, “Why did you kill him?”

“Because I do what I like,” Lyr stared at her a moment, during her perhaps, “It seems to me you’ve chosen life, wise.” Lyr nodded to the other body on the ground, “The man you just killed was the captain of one of my elite battalions.”

“Do you expect . . .”

“Shut-up Scota, I am the lord Balor and not even a goddess may interrupt.” Lyr shouted her down.  Lyr spoke loud enough for all to hear. “There is a price for raising your hand against a god, even if your are obeying the orders of another.  In this case death.”  Then to Scota, “You killed my captain, so I’m making you captain, his battalion is yours.”  Without another word Balor turned and walked to his dais.

“You’re mad!” Scota shouted, baffled.

Balor sat his seat and with a wave he was raised onto the shoulders of his bearers. “Use them wisely, sweet sister.”  The heavy platform turned slowly away so Balor had plenty of time to call back over his shoulder to where Scota stood stunned. “Your second is one of my sons.  I got him on some whore.  What was your mother’s name boy?”

“The lady Angelata Morel my lord.” called a handsome young man.

“Meet your second, Andalyr.  Andy, my sister Scota goddess of the Gael,” Balor chuckled to himself, amused by his wit or simply mad, “He’s half a god himself, so don’t kill him.  He’ll be of use to you.”

With blaring trumpets and shouted orders, Balor left the field.  Scota was left on the little hill with two dead bodies, and her five hundred.

A seanachie in brightly colored robes held a crowd of revelers in thrall, “Emain Macha is our home and the seat of our power,” chanted the seanachie motioning to the hill fort above the festival grounds, “Long ago and far away she walked among men and indeed was married to a thoughtless one,” women among the listening crowd nodded their understanding. 

The crowd calmed and the storyteller continued, “Foolishly, the king of that older Ulster, forced Macha to run a race against his finest horse, for the boast of her husband, she ran.  For her pride she won, for her pain, with child was she, she cursed that king and his men, and for the foolishness of a husband Macha, torn within, bereft of child, pale white and drained of blood, she died . . .”

It was the yearly funeral games of Macha, and a feis, and a fair were ever a part of it.  The law was read out, the genealogy of the king was recited, there were stories told by the bards, dancing, tasty treats, good cheer.

CuRuada would not be waylaid, there were things to buy of wonderful craftsmanship and art.  For this reason CuRuada had come to the fair.  He sought something that would please Emer.

Earlier CuRuada had won praise for his battle feats.  He had won the spear caste outright with no rival.  Perhaps  most gratifying for himself, he had lead the boys troop to the victory in hurling.  Though the boys troop won almost every year, there had been cheers on every side for his amazing skill. 

From all this glory had come a few purses, money, and there had been no question in CuRuada’s mind what he would do with his winnings.  Somewhere among the glittering trifles and baubles was a gift worthy of the woman he loved.

But he despaired, he had been looking diligently for more than an hour and though there were many many beautiful things nothing he saw was a fit gift for Emer. 

So it was that Cu stopped his searching and watched a smith at his work.  This fellow was different than others, he was short and squat and his hair and beard were black like many a Lokian of the mountains, but what set him apart for CuRuada was his exceptional skill.  And there, as the fellow fit the pieces of an ornate brooch together from several seeming unassociated parts, CuRuada saw through the magic of it and he gasped. 

At once the smith looked at him with piercing blue eyes a knowing smile on his face, “So young sir, what have you seen?”  The voice seemed absurdly deep from a fellow so short, so small.

“I perceive that your work is fine . . .”

“None finer, but what did you SEE,” The smith’s eyes bore into CuRuada’s.

“I saw,” CuRuada struggled to put words to what he had just seen, “That what looks like magic, how the parts fit together as one, is craft.” The dark man nodded but wanted more. Cu continued, “You use no rivet or clasp because each part is rivet and clasp that holds one to another not by magic, but by your craft.”

“Even so,” said the short smith, turning away and rubbing at the assembled brooch.  Without looking up the smith said, “I recognize my work on you.  That brooch you wear I made for King Concubar.

Cu nodded, “Even so, it was given to my mother by the king and by my mother to me.”  The boy saw that the smith looked at him again and would have had more from him, but he could think of nothing else to say.

The smith pondered a moment, shrugged, and casually tossed the beautiful piece on his work bench, “So you’ve come to spy out my secrets, is that it, boy?”  His words were challenging, but there was a twinkle in the man’s eye and CuRuada warmed to him.

“Not so, I’m no smith, it is for a gift that I’ve come seeking.  You have the best of the best,” At this the boy sighed, “and yet I’ve found nothing yet fit for Emer.” 

The little smith tugged at his beard, “No, it is true, you are no smith, but what you are is difficult to say as well.” Again CuRuada began to feel uncomfortable under the smith’s intense gaze. The dark man spoke as if his words were a magic incantation, “I saw you at hurley and the fine work you did with the spear.  No smith surely, but no common warrior either are you.  You wear a broch made for a king, a prince you must be.  Or a god.”  Cu blushed, the dark man smiled.

He turned away and ducked down beneath his work bench, “And a fine judge of craftsmanship too . . .” The little man brought out an ornately carved wooden box and with a flourish drew open the cover.

Within was a brooch of surpassing beauty, a true masterwork of the Lokian’s craft.  Golden jewel studded and enameled it was, but so much more. For the second time CuRuada gasped, the beautiful spiralings and clever twinings drew the eye deeper and deeper into details smaller and finer.

“You might not be a smith, but you know,”  The dark man drew out the brooch and showed Cu the elegant eating knife with a hilt that matched the brooch without being a copy, in fact, as the smith drew them together CuRuada could see that the one was nothing like the other and yet it was its perfect mate, like a duet in jewels, and for the third time the boy gasped.

“beautiful . . .” he breathed reverently.

“Will the gift outshine the gifted?” The Lokian smith asked.

CuRuada blinked stupidly, stunned until he realized that the smith was speaking of Emer.   He thought of her and imagined the brooch glittering at her long white throat and how it would look against her hair and the poniard in her elegant hand.  “No sir,” said Cu with conviction, “She is the only one who could complete them.”

Nodding, the smith handed the little box to him with a mysterious smile, “And so they shall.”