Taliesin's Last Apprentice

Taliesin at Tara

I saw myself in the woods.

It seemed mad, but the more I looked, the more certain I became. I had stepped away from my chores to—well, I stepped away. Rain and nightfall would soon collide. A few stubborn sunbeams yet pierced the old, dark trees that covered the slope of the Hill of Tara.

One of those beams showed me myself, also standing close to a tree. He wore different clothes—a cleaner tunic, and trousers that covered his whole leg. Longer hair fell out of a hat with a broader brim. The shade from that hat hid his face until he turned.

I recognized him as I would recognize my own reflection. He saw me, winced, then turned and fled into the forest. I stepped forward to chase him, but my master’s voice stopped me.

Jack!

I sighed. If it were truly me, I could not catch myself given such a lead. I stepped back out of the woods to see the great bard Taliesin, my master, leaning against our cart. He scowled at my approach.

Can we be on with this? He waved at the drums still piled in the cart. As I came closer, his scowl dissolved. You seem troubled.

I saw—

Do not let yourself become spooked by the stakes tonight. This is just another performance. We play our best every time, be it for a hall full of nobility or a handful of beggar children.

I know. He had made a version of this speech many times. But I just saw—

Tara at Beltane, Jack! Taliesin turned and gestured at the great building topping the Hill of Tara. The light from within that building turned his thin hair into a golden corona around his head. A hall full of kings on their high holiday. That is where the whole of your mind must dwell now.

So, it’s not just another performance? I failed to hide my smirk.

Taliesin scowled anew. Get the drums.

I am not troubled by our show tonight, I said. I just saw myself in the woods.

You what?

Just over there. I pointed. Watering that oak. I saw myself, watering a different oak. I startled myself, it seems, then I watched myself run off into the woods.

Taliesin blinked and then cocked his head like he always did when considering something. You are serious… He stepped toward me, and took my shoulders in his hands, which was not his habit at all. Let us hope you are wrong, Jack. For seeing yourself is always a terrible omen, and we are about to perform before kings. Worse, our journey among these people and across these lands does not end here, but merely begins in earnest. No. Let us hope, let us assume, that you saw some scruffy local boy which the poor light and your own strange vanity convinced you to be somehow yourself.

So you say. I saw what I saw, but I will not argue with you.

That would be a new and welcome habit—not arguing with me. It will rain soon. Worse, they will start speeches soon, to which we must pretend to listen. Then we perform. So, test your new habit, and bring the drums in.

He turned and strode into the hall empty handed, as I expected. I took one last look into the woods but saw only shadows. With that small comfort in my mind, I grabbed a drum.

That night, a string long held taut finally snapped. That night, I fell in love with Mira while watching her dance as I played my drum. She spun, and her sea-green dress rose from her hips as her torch-colored hair flew around her head. Her legs, white as foam, whipped beneath her skirt as if held together only by the music we played. Her bare feet seemed to scarcely brush the rough stone floor.

As frenzied as such a spectacle might seem to the throng of warriors and retainers forming our wide-eyed audience, I knew her every move to be planned and precise. Every gesture from her small, strong hands, and every instance where her feet deigned to touch the floor was deliberate. The few Christians among us might have mistaken this for a dance. The Celts knew it for a spell. Mira summoned all friendly spirits to join us in celebration.

We had been doing this most nights for nearly a month since landing upon the Isle of the Eire. We had made our way, mostly on foot, through the sunless forests and rain-swollen bogs that separated the ring forts and common houses of one petty noble after another. At each stop, we would be obliged to perform, just as the noble was compelled to open his larders in feast.

Our first night on the coast, we entertained a handful of sailors and fishermen. Now we played the torch-lit halls of Tara itself, packed with the finest nobles and warriors from the five great houses of the Eire. In all that time, Mira had not changed one gesture. The spirits would join us, as they did every night.

Each night had been a feast. The great bard Taliesin had returned to the green hills of Hibernia after thirteen years, leaving a trail of slaughtered livestock, empty wine casks and hungover warlords wherever we wandered.

Yet it was this night, our greatest night yet, in the very halls of Tara at the feast of Beltane, that I came to realize that my love for Mira went beyond mere infatuation.

The trap had been partially laid by my increasing skill. By this point, I no longer needed my whole attention to keep rhythm on the wide, deep drum that I had to straddle as a horse while I played. My hands did as they were accustomed, leaving my eyes to watch the rest of the show.

My master, Taliesin, played three different drums at once, filling in and around my basic rhythm. His white-blond hair had abandoned his forehead but bounced merrily from the rear of his skull, where it hung past his shoulders. His thin arms and shoulders flailed inside his bright, green tunic as his long, thin hands bounced from the drumskins in a blur.

RoAnne, a close companion to Mira, blew out a winding, fluttery melody on her pipes. Shed now of her cloak, her thin frame showed her age, but moved easily to our melody. Streaks of brown persisted in her white hair, the same color as her wide eyes.

I hit my deep drum when I was supposed to and watched Mira whirl. Her hips and bosoms gyrating smoothly inside her dress would be entrancing enough, but her face sealed my doom that night. Even spinning, her eyes, like the sea on fire, found mine, and her soft, pink lips widened into a smile. I believed, in a way peculiar to boys just shy of manhood, that her smile was solely for me.

Doomed.

Mira’s wildfire hair lifted as she spun, revealing the pointed tips of her ears. While her father, she claimed, was a mortal, her mother was of the Tuatha de Dann.

Mira could pass for a young maiden, but her true age, as is oft the case among the Tuatha, remained a mystery. I’m fairly certain, in contrast, that I was fourteen at best. My people did not keep reliable records.

So old enough to imagine myself a man, but too young to convince anyone else. It did not help that, as my brothers often jested, I appeared to be made of wood—sticks for limbs, a plank for a chest, and on top, a wooden knob for a head. Any good Celtic warrior could lift me with one arm, as they often did. They are not shy when sober, much less drunk at a feast.

My hair hung from my wooden knob like mud-colored straw, bouncing around my face as I kept the beat. But I could still see her spinning and smiling just for me.

Taliesin tapped out the rhythmic cue signaling—to us—the climax of the summoning. Our cadence quadrupled in speed. Forty-eight beats on my drum, nearly as fast as my stick arms could hit them, while Mira spun so fast she became a vortex of fire and sea and foam. On my forty-eighth stroke, she froze in that same pose she always ended with. The press of drunken warriors surrounding us erupted with hoots and whistles and stomps and claps like they always did. Every one of them had fallen in love with Mira as well, but that revelation could not penetrate my stupid, smiling wooden knob.

Doomed.

A Song and a Story

Taliesin stepped toward me and snapped his fingers. When he had my attention, he nodded—my cue to start the next song. I tapped out those faster, lighter beats as my master strode to the center and positioned his lute.

Taliesin’s beak of a nose added resonance to his soaring tenor, which rang through the wooden rafters as he sang…

"I’m a travelling man

With a song and a story.

Sing Ti de la Tura ti yea!

And I’m bound down this road

Bring it famine or glory.

Sing Ti de la Tura ti yea!

Hi Ho! Sing a new song.

Yi Yo! Drink all night long.

The past holds us ransom

Tomorrow’s a phantom

You might as well live for today."

Our band sang along to that chorus, as well as our other companions spread throughout the crowd. I could pick out Prince Charein’s loud and slightly flat baritone. I knew, even if I couldn’t hear it, that his diminutive manservant mumbled the song through his beard. Last of our traveling troupe, a Christian priest called Bernard, warbled along in his reedy tenor, regardless of his professed disapproval of the lyrics.

"I’m a travelling man

With a word and a warning.

Sing Ti de la Tura ti yea!

Let your head guide your heart,

Lest you lose both by morning.

Sing Ti de la Tura ti yea!

Hi Ho! Sing a new song…"

On those first nights on the coast, only the few voices of our troupe would join in the chorus. But more of the crowd joined with every performance, and moreover, the song somehow spread ahead of us. That night in the halls of Tara, every drunken voice thundered with us.

"…You might as well live for today.

I’m a travelling man

With a sign and a portent

Sing Ti de la Tura ti yea!

Greet thy brother in love

For there’s naught more important.

Sing Ti de la Tura ti yea!"

Taliesin gestured, bidding the crowd to sing the Ti de la Tura lines as well—which they did. I caught Mira’s songbird soprano among the voices and watched the word Tura float out from her lips.

Doomed.

"I’m a travelling man

With my eyes full of wonder

Sing Ti de la Tura ti yea!

And I gaze without fear

Til the tide pulls me under

Sing Ti de la Tura ti yea!"

The self-proclaimed King of all the Eire stood unsteadily atop his chair—to better see over the crowd. He waved his arms as he sang along with the chorus, spilling his mead upon nearby attendants. Not all of the Eireann agreed upon his claim, but for context few Eireann nobles agreed on anything. Here, though, they sang together with enough volume to cause the torchlight to waiver along the walls. The Peace of Beltane was sacred, and they had all set aside their swords for drinking horns. Taliesin would not let them off that easily.

"I’ve climbed under oceans

And sailed over mountains

Sing Ti de la Tura ti yea!

And feasted in halls where

The mead flows from fountains.

Sing Ti de la Tura ti yea!

I’ve wandered through wars

Where no one is winning.

Sing Ti de la Tura ti yea!

As soon as one ends there’s

Another beginning.

Sing Ti de la Tura ti yea!

You heroes may feast

But your widows and orphans

Sing Ti de la Tura ti yea!

Must bury your fallen

And weep in the shadows.

Sing Ti de la Tura ti yea!"

A few murmurs started at the end of that verse, but the chorus swiftly drowned them out. Taliesin took a measure to bring our tempo back to normal and closed with the verse that he always closed with.

"Yet right here and now

Let us lift up our voices

Sing Ti de la Tura ti yea!

For happiness flows

To the one who rejoices!

Sing Ti de la Tura ti yea!

Hi Ho! Sing a new song.

Yi Yo! Drink all night long.

The past holds us ransom

Tomorrow’s a phantom

You might as well live for today."

He drew that note out until his soaring tenor was the last voice. When the confused tumult of applause allowed him, he sprang into a Eireann drinking song that all upon the island knew. He followed it with a pair of love ballads, the first sad, the second sadder. I knew Mira had heard it many times, but I searched out her face. Sometimes her eyes still widened and moistened toward the song’s sappy conclusion, but a huge Celtic warrior stepped in front of her. So it goes.

Taliesin completed the last sad chord of the ballad and shouted over the throng’s applause. And now, a story while I wet my tongue. Hear now the tale of my apprentice.

He stepped aside, and I bounded forward. I made certain my brown eyes caught the gray gaze of the king, and I bowed. I rose and showed my smile—which, at that age, consumed half my face.

Once there was a widow left with three sons, I spoke in the loud yet not forced voice that came from Taliesin’s teaching. "I am the youngest of them, called Jack. Hear now my true story.

My family fell into poor fortune. Who here has not known such ill times? I did not wait for an answer. We were forced to try and sell our one remaining treasure, our good milking cow. That task fell to me. But I never made it.

For on the road, I was stopped by a strange old woman. I summoned here my old woman voice, even imitating her stoop. Tell me Jack, where are you bound with such a fine cow? Bouncing back up straight, I continued. I stopped, startled, for I had never seen this woman before. How would she know my name?"

The outlines of this tale, however improbable, were essentially true, though I left out a lot in such telling’s. Partly to simplify the events, but mostly because Taliesin had decreed that my tale must fit within the time it would take to sing three songs, or rather, empty three horns of mead.

The old woman really did convince me to trade that cow for a bag of magic beans. I left out how several days of deluge had flooded out the market anyway. Even so, while I went to bed hungry, the beans—truly tossed out of the house by my livid mother—wound themselves together into a giant beanstalk that grew into the very clouds. I climbed that beanstalk, finding a magic land above the clouds where dwelt a giant and his ogress wife.

I omitted how Cumulus the Cloud Giant was a bitter, failed king. I skipped over how the ogress protected me from him only so she could eventually eat me herself. If there had been more children, I would have told of my perilous encounters with their pet tiger, but no children were present, so I skipped that as well.

As I tell it, I climb the beanstalk three times, even though in truth I only climbed it twice. Taliesin insisted that such stories go by threes—especially among the Celts. Thus, where I actually dropped a cap full of gold from the top of the beanstalk by accident, in the tale I climb down with it.

On my second trip, I came down with the cockatrice, a dragon-like bird that laid golden eggs. Only I had not the time to explain the cockatrice, so she became a goose, and mercifully, unlike the true creature, did not talk at all.

As I fled from the castle—my third trip—I noticed Mira ignoring my tale as a pair of warriors flirted with her.

Fee Fi Fo Fum! I shouted, doing my best to imitate the giant’s rumbling avalanche of a voice. This was the first time I had the giant shouting gibberish. In truth he made more articulate threats, such as Bread from your bones and a purse from your skin!

I tried to increase my size as I played the giant by leaping about and gesturing wildly, but this resulted in more giggles than gasps. Sometimes I forgot I was a little man made of sticks.

Even so, by the time my older brother wailed at the base of the beanstalk with his axe, as he truly did, Mira was cut off from my tale by broad backs.

The beanstalk fell and I fell with it. So it goes.

All of the treasure I had won—or more truthfully stolen—had been lost. The gold and golden eggs stolen by my mother. The poor cockatrice murdered by my brother seeking one last egg. I gave away the Harp as ransom for my life but even that simple act turned complicated because of, well, women. None of this was in my story.

My story ended at the giant’s death, having gone too long even then, judging by my master’s glare. I bowed to half-hearted applause.

Taliesin set aside an empty drinking horn to jump back to center and rescue his apprentice. We had many more songs and stories ahead, but that would be my only solo.

I sang along and beat my drum and forced my show smile across my face, even as my heart darkened. Mira, and her new friends, were nowhere to be seen.

The Horse Twins

Mira’s scream guided me through the forest of towering warriors to the Ulster Hall. None of the staggering heroes I wound my way through seemed to notice either the scream, or this boy darting between them, scampering over benches or rolling under tables in pursuit of the source.

I seemed to be the first to reach that dark, far-off kitchen at the end of the hall. Beyond the doorway, I beheld Mira in tears, between two warriors, one of whom held her firmly by the arm.

What goes on here? I demanded as I slid to a halt on the slate floor.

The pair of warriors turned to face me in one motion. They seemed to be identical in every respect save for which side of Mira they stood. Each had a long mane of spiked hair jutting out from the center of their scalps, while the rest of their heads had been shaved bare. Their torcs and the color of their cloaks showed them to be men of Ulster. The one closest to me, the one yet holding Mira’s arm, snorted.

Begone! He turned back to Mira.

My hand found a bowl on top of a nearby table, still half-filled with porridge. I threw it. The bowl bounced off his scalp and splattered its contents across his face.

I said… I started, but he charged me.

I can say, without boast or exaggeration, that I was nimbler than most men. Men might catch me across a long distance, where shortness of my stride would eventually betray me. Never, though, had any man caught me at a short distance. My ability to change direction abruptly seemed to be without peer. This counted substantially toward why I remained alive.

Even so, at a ten-pace distance he would have been upon me by my third step. Except he slipped on some oil spilled upon the stone floor. Fortune, in truth, had always kept me alive as much as dexterity.

Narrow windows lined the hall, and I made for the nearest with all the nimbleness I could command. I leapt, turning sideways as I did so, to clear the narrow framing, bracing myself to strike the muddy ground beyond.

I jerked to a stop mid-air. The warrior had grabbed my ankle with one hand and suspended me thus, holding me upside down with the mud just beyond reach of my fingers. I twisted to see his wicked grin fade as he tried to move. The realization crawled across his face. He had jammed himself stuck inside the window frame.

I spun my whole torso and thus managed to spin my ankle out of his grip. A hard, head-first landing in the mud rewarded my efforts. I scrambled up and fled into the rain, leaving him yet stuck in that window, and yet holding my shoe.

At some length, the cold rain compelled me back into the great hall of Tara. The congress of revelers had contracted to the central hall—the junction of the four wings. They formed a ring around some sort of spectacle occurring within. Finding no means to penetrate the wall of legs, I turned my gaze upward. Oak beam trusses supported the perimeter of the hall. By stacking a chair upon a table, climbing on top and leaping, I managed to grab one of the lower diagonal support beams. From there, I pulled myself up into the rafters.

One of the twins I had seen with Mira stood in the center of a space cleared by the crowd. His eye seemed to be swelling closed even as he had his arms outstretched in triumph. At his feet, some larger warrior from another tribe crawled away, blood pouring from his face.

The twin shouted at the assembled crowd, Is there anyone else among all you supposed heroes who would trade blows with Fomfor of Ulster? Murmurs from all directions answered him, but none stepped forward. Finally, Fomfor pointed at someone in the crowd. You—giant as you are! Step forth and prove your courage.

Hanging onto the beam, I stretched until I could see that Fomfor pointed to a man who stood, indeed, a full head taller than any other towering warrior present. That giant, though, stood fast and silent.

Come now. Fomfor touched his swelling eye with care. I have already taken one good blow. Perhaps it will only take one more to fell me. What say you? Still the giant would not move or speak. I will give you the first blow. If you fell me, you win glory without pain. What have you to fear?

Again, no answer, but others in the crowd, the giant’s fellow tribesmen it seemed, shouted encouragement and mockery. Finally, they pushed him when their words did not move him forward.

It took several of his fellows, pushing with their shoulders to shove the wide-eyed giant to the edge of the crowd. He took the last stride forward on his own, to the cheers of all those behind him.

His height put his head perilously close to the roof trusses. Had he been below me, I could have touched him with my hand. His wide shoulders hung over his rail-thin torso. His thin arms hung down near to the knees of his wide, short legs. He had no hair to be seen except broad, shaggy eyebrows, and his skin seemed closer to gray than white.

He took only one step within the circle. Fomfor strode to the center and squared his feet beneath his shoulders. I stand ready. Strike away.

The giant took one small step forward, reached out his long arm, and tapped Fomfor atop his spiked mane of hair.

Fomfor shouted, What was that? several times before he could be heard above the laughter of the crowd.

I dunna wanna hurt you, said the giant in a slow, rumbling voice.

Yet you wound my pride! Fomfor clutched his chest as if struck through the heart. We are warriors here. Know this, though: I care after your pride, for I shall give you a blow worthy of the best warrior. Stand ready.

The giant closed his eyes and nodded.

Fomfor had to leap a bit to connect with the giant’s lower jaw, but when he did, he struck it hard enough that the sound of flesh striking flesh echoed through the hall. The sound of the blow stunned the drunken warriors into silence.

The giant staggered back. His knees buckled, but he caught himself with one of his long arms before he toppled. He groaned like a millstone just starting to turn as he raised slowly back to his full height.

Fomfor stared, cradling his right hand in the other. As the crowd began to roar, his shook his head once, squared his feet, and nodded. The giant reached out once again and tapped Fomfor atop his spiked mane.

Fomfor’s rage lifted his voice above the laughter. Prepare yourself then! He took several steps backward and then ran at the giant, striking his supposed assailant in the chest with both fists.

The crowd behind him scattered or ducked as the poor giant flew—feet in the air—backwards through them. He struck one of the oaken pillars so hard it nearly knocked me from my perch halfway across the hall. As a thin cloud of dust descended into the torchlight, all eyes turned to the stricken giant. He moaned, then stirred, using that pillar to pull himself back upon his broad, bare feet to the thundering cheer of the crowd.

They parted reverently as he stepped back into the circle, where Fomfor held up both hands. Hold friend. I boast not when I say that blow would have killed an ox. I can hit you no harder without breaking my own arms—so I concede. Tell me your name, so I may greet you as friend and fellow, and truly the only man ever to stand after two blows from my hands.

Harded, the thin giant mumbled. I am called Harded.

Harded? When the giant nodded, Fomfor bowed. Well met indeed. I am…

Someone pulled me from the rafters. My assailant landed from his leap with me still bound in his hands. He took four strides away from the circle to slam me up against the wall. When the sparks cleared from my vision, I beheld the sneering face of the other twin.

The nerve of this insolent curr! He snarled to no one in particular. Our theatrics began to draw attention anyway. I thought you would flee into the wilderness never to trouble us again, but no! Now, your foolishness becomes my boon. I will have satisfaction.

Um … I’m sorry? I stammered.

He shook his head. Dried porridge still decorated his mane. Scratches crossed his shoulders from the window. Oh, we are past that, whelp. He noticed we were drawing an audience and raised his voice. What think you? Shall I end his life for his insolence, or shall I simply make him wish that I had done so?

Taliesin’s voice rang above the mumbling. Your answer is to put him down and address your grievance to me. The crowd parted, allowing him to stand before my assailant, where he made a short bow.

The twin turned yet kept his grip upon me. You are his champion, then?

Taliesin smiled. He is my apprentice, and thereby my responsibility. Tell me, my friend, what he has done to vex you thus?

Your fool spoke to me as if I were a servant. When I corrected him, he threw a bowl at my head. He fled like a coward, naturally, and I scraped myself in pursuit.

Taliesin turned his head to the crowd. So, your injuries are to your pride alone?

The twin dropped me as he spun toward the bard. I would not be taunted by servants—nor would you. Also—see my shoulders.

Take care, Fedach. Fomfor pushed his way through the crowd. The taunts, and the bowl—for those we can blame the boy. You stuck yourself in the window on your own.

The crowd laughed and my heart sank into the floor I lay upon. Taliesin looked down into my eyes. Jack? Is this true…? No—stand before you answer. The accused must stand by custom.

I lifted myself to my feet. I was trying to rescue Mira.

What? said Fedach.

What? Said Mira, stepping forth from the throng.

I heard you scream and found those two accosting you in the kitchen.

Mira’s mouth dropped open. What? No. No! You fool. We were yet hungry. I had burned myself on that pot. These two were debating a remedy when you interrupted us by losing your wits.

Taliesin glared at me, along with everyone else. My chin swiveled down to my chest. Taliesin sighed. Very well. If the foolish insolence of my apprentice has truly injured your great pride, give ear, while the deep wisdom of Taliesin shall build your legend.

Fedach squared his shoulders. Speak sense, little bard, or we shall trade blows.

Taliesin answered with a smile, then spun toward the crowd. Fedach and Fomfor, heroes of Ulster, do you know your lineage, truly?

Fomfor answered, We were found in a field as boys, running among the wild horses. All Ulster knows this.

Taliesin nodded as his show smile crawled across his face. As you say. But I tell you this, sons of the wild horses, that event is the middle of your story, not its beginning. Who among you would hear the strange, terrible but true history of the birth of Fedach and Fomfor?

The crowd shouted their encouragement, as Taliesin certainly knew