Fenian Tales - A Dumnonni Compilation

The Cairn

The Cairn was still there, as it was when she'd left. White Wall spread out beneath her, sunlight glittering off the river's distance surface, as she eased herself down onto the grass besides the grave.

"I'm sure it used to be easier than this, Orlaith," Aoife grumbled, feeling the bruises and aches in her joints protesting with every movement. "Do you think the hills get steeper each year to mock me? It certainly feels like it." She paused, letting the breath return to her chest after the walk up the hillside to her twin's resting place. "Well, I have finally visited Culhaven. A heavy place indeed, but a place of hope. I see now why Caelan sometimes returns with a little of his light gone." She sighed softly. "I wish you could have been there, dear heart. They'd have loved you far more than they liked me."

A sudden gust of wind at her back caught Aoife by surprise, and a rock atop the cairn tottered slightly, before falling down the side slowly. As it came to rest by her feet, Aoife picked it up, slightly bemused – sure, the wind had been strong, but it shouldn't have been strong enough to knock a cairn rock loose. She reached over carefully, stretching to put it back in place.

Another rock shifted.

She paused, stone held slightly above the cairn. There had been no wind that time.

The stones atop the cairn trembled slightly, and the rattling sound of them knocking against one another filled her with dread. She pulled her hand back slightly, still clutching the stone – should she try to replace it, and hope the rest would stop? Or should she simply flee?

This time, the rocks pulsed.

At first she thought she'd imagined it, it was so subtle and quick. She pushed herself to her knees facing the gravesite, watching intently.

The pulse came again.

The movement was unmistakable, a slight heave, as if they were being pushed upwards by something underneath, only to sink back down and subside back to where they should be.

When the rocks shifted for the third time, stronger still, she reached out and placed the stone she was holding on the top, and firmly pressed down. Maybe it just needed to be whole again to rest.

Gods, she hoped it was as easy as that.

To her surprise, the rocks did indeed settle beneath her hand, the pulsing ripple quieting almost immediately. She held her hand there a few moments, letting the breath she didn't know she'd been holding whistle out slowly between her lips.

The hand that emerged from the pile to grasp her wrist was, all at once, familiar, and so very, very wrong.

She tried to pull back, but the hand wouldn't release, and as she heaved in panic more of the arm was revealed, followed by a shoulder, a chest, and a face that Aoife would know even if she were blind.

Orlaith pulled herself free of the cairn she'd been laid beneath, never once releasing the awful death-grip on her twin's wrist.

Aoife could only stare in horror, all attempts at escape stuttering out like the last light of a candle. Orlaith was dead - her face sunken and grey, her dark hair lank and filthy – but she was unmistakably shouldering her way up through the rocks and stones meant to keep her down, bone-thin arms pushing them away as if they were simply a heavy blanket.

Aoife tugged one last time against the grip on her arm, and froze as Orlaith's head snapped around, the closed eyes finding her face with unnerving accuracy.

"You didn't save me," she whispered, and Aoife was immobile, watching a centipede emerge from between her sister's stretched lips. The hand on Aoife's wrist tightened, and she felt herself being pulled towards her dead sister's corpse.

"You won't save him," Orlaith whispered as Aoife got closer, and the hand that wasn't relentlessly pulling was reaching out to the side, closing on a rock, and bringing it up high.

"You won't save any of them," Orlaith hissed, almost nose to nose with Aoife now, who was unable to look away from the face before her, unable to blink or move or even open her mouth to scream.

There was movement, and Aoife managed to tear her eyes away and up to the rock that Orlaith now held above their heads.

She was sure it had been smaller than that.

She glanced back down, and instead of her sister, a grinning Northman corpse stared back at her. She flinched, feeling hard wood at her back and a heavy wooden shield pressed between them, rendering her unmoving.

"Pathetic," he growled.

The rock came down.

***

Caelan's hands were there before she was aware she was awake, gently holding her arms until she stopped flailing in a panic at the air.

"I'm here, love," he murmured, pulling her head in gently to touch his. She felt his breath on her face, and little by little, her own breaths slowed until they matched his. "You're safe. I'm here. We're almost home."

She took one more shuddering gulp of air, and nodded, feeling the dampness on her cheeks. At her nod, he gently released her arms, and pulled another blanket around her shoulders.

"You've not had a dream that bad for a while," he whispered, and on the other side of the campfire, Aoife heard the soft breaths and snores of Cormac and Fergus. "The usual, or something new?"

"Both," she muttered back, swiping at her eyes. "Orlaith again, sure... but then there was the thing in the gatehouse." Her fingers ran over the still-tender skin across her face, feeling the slight bumps and ridges of her new oaken skull. Caelan nodded.

"It'll pass, love," he murmured, pulling her into his arms. "It'll pass for us both."