My Lady Judge by Cora Harrison Read Free Book Online Page B

and a half ounces of silver or two milch cows, but when the éraic was added, this amounted to forty-five séts, or twenty-two and a half ounces of silver, or twenty-three cows. That would be a huge sum for this young bard to find. Mara suspected that Rory earned very little money. He had no patron; what silver he possessed would come from the selling of his poems or ballads at fairs. He had no land, no livestock, no kin here in the Burren. It would be impossible for him to pay a fine like that. Rory, however, did not look worried; only annoyed and slightly embarrassed.
    ‘What evidence can you give in support of your innocence?’ asked Mara. She had been surprised when Nessa’s parents had accused Rory of this crime. Since he had come to the Burren a year ago all of the marriageable girls and a few of the married ones had sighed after him. He was an extraordinarily beautiful young man, his hair was a pale blond with a shade of red in it, his eyes were intensely blue and he was tall with broad shoulders and slim hips. Mara looked at poor little Nessa – small, fat, with the spotty skin of early adolescence. Would Rory really have raped her? she wondered cynically.

    ‘My first witness is Aoife O’Heynes,’ said Rory firmly. Mara tried to conceal a smile. Aoife was the only daughter of Muiris O’Heynes, a self-made prosperous farmer of obscure origins. Muiris and Aine O’Heynes had four hard-working sons and one spoiled daughter. Aoife was quite a beauty with long blond plaits and cornflower-blue eyes. Mara remembered now that she had seen Aoife and Rory together on that night of Samhain, the eve of All Hallows, on the last day of October. She had gone to the feast to keep an eye on her two young scholars, Hugh and Shane. They had both been desperate to go to the fair so she had promised them that they could stay until ten. Then she had taken them home, but before she left, she vividly remembered noticing Rory and Aoife kissing and cuddling in a dark corner of the field where the fair was held.
    ‘Yes, Aoife?’ she said. ‘Was Rory with you all of that night of Samhain?’
    Aoife blushed at the direct question, and the rosy colour enhanced her creamy skin and blue eyes.
    ‘Yes, Brehon,’ she said demurely. ‘Emer and I were with Roderic and Rory for the whole evening. We all went home together.’
    Hmm, thought Mara, my memory is that you split up, each couple going in different directions. But it didn’t matter. Would Rory have left the delicious Aoife for that spotty, pasty-faced child? I don’t think so. The memory of him disappearing into the bushes with Aoife was very clear in her mind. He had looked extraordinarily handsome. He had been wearing a saffron léine, she recalled, and a brat, a cloak, woven from purple and red strands of wool. She had wondered how he had got the silver to pay for them. She remembered thinking at the time that he had looked just like the picture of the hero king, Conor Mac Nessa, in her father’s copy of The Book of Ballymote. The thought of that beautiful illustration gave her an idea.

    ‘Nessa,’ she said gently. ‘What was Rory wearing that night?’
    Nessa stared at her blankly. ‘I don’t know,’ she said eventually.
    ‘Aoife,’ asked Mara. ‘Can you remember what Rory was wearing that night?
    Aoife’s colour deepened even more. Her eyes were fixed on Rory. In the background, Mara noticed Muiris shifting uncomfortably. Muiris had worked very hard to build up his farm. He would not want his daughter to marry a penniless bard. On the other hand, he was an honest, straightforward man. His evidence would be worth listening to. But not yet, thought Mara. Let me be sure in my own mind. She turned to Aoife.
    ‘Yes?’ she queried.
    ‘He was wearing a saffron léine and a red and purple striped brat and his hair was bound with a purple fillet and he had brown strapped sandals made from goatskin and he was carrying a satchel made from calf’s skin,’ said Aoife