Emer's Quest (Manannan Trilogy) Read online

  “Beacan divided the silver between Dag and me and he has paid his crew. They are happy men.” Hari turned to Edan. “He has your share and says you’d better get well, before he spends it all.” Edan’s lips twisted in what might have been a grin.

  “Are you upsetting my baby brother?” Dag stood behind him.

  “I’m telling him you’re going to spend his treasure.”

  “I’ll… get… well” The words came out as a hiss.

  Dag dropped on his knees beside the bed and took Edan’s chin in his hand, turning his head from side to side.

  “I thought I’d taught you how to dodge better than that. Renny will faint at the sight of your ugly mug. You know they broke your nose for you?”

  “Yessssss. Lucky… before.”

  “You’re lucky now. You’re alive and noses mend. Do you want to go home soon?”

  “To… Renny… yessssss!”

  “Good. Then do what you’re told for the first time in your life and I’ll ship you off to her.”

  “Have you decided then?” Hari asked and Dag nodded.

  “I’m staying here, for a while at least.” Dag grinned. “I like this place. It’s dark and wild. Reminds me of my childhood home. Not that you’d remember, Brodir, you’re too young. Fadir’s getting sick of me hanging around. Time I made my own life as he did and there’s a girl…”

  A faint hooting sound came from the patient in the bed.

  “Enough of that, Brodir. You’re in no fit state to give cheek to me or anybody else for a while.”

  “Dance… at… wedding.”

  Four days later, when the wind swung around to the north, Dag’s ship was loaded and ready for sea. Thorstein acted as captain in Dag’s place. Edan and the other wounded were carried aboard and made as comfortable as possible.

  “Tell Fadir I’ll return at Luanistyn, farewell Brodir. Gods keep you.”

  “And you.”

  The ship sailed swiftly. Their first destination was Myl, where they stopped to put Drifa and Halla ashore.

  “I paid Drifa her share of Fadir’s fortune, so she has no cause to stay on Skuy,” Hari told Emer. “Dag doesn’t want them and neither does anyone else. Let their own people feel the sharp edge of their tongues. We have felt it long enough.”

  It was a subdued Drifa, with the marks of her beating and Emer’s scarring blue and swollen on her face. She climbed down into the waiting skiff. Halla was carried aboard, for Emer had snapped the woman’s knee cap in two. It would be some time before she would be able to walk again. Neither of them said goodbye, but they shot poisonous looks at Hari and Emer as they left.

  “That’s that,” Thorstein said when he returned. “Good riddance to that pair of harridans. The lady’s brother didn’t look too pleased to see his sister. I pity him her company.”

  As the sun was setting on the third day of their voyage, Dag’s ship sailed into the great bay. He turned its prow into the Awin Vooar . The journey had been, for once, uneventful, for which everyone gave thanks. Emer and Hari were home again.

  That night they sat in Ragnar’s hall and told their story.

  “So the young hawk has left the nest at last.” Ragnar laughed when he found out that Dag had remained on Skuy.

  “There is a woman on Skuy who caught his fancy,” Emer said with a smile. “Her name is Romi.”

  “Good. About time he produced a son. Are you content that Dag remains and rules in the place that should have been yours?” Ragnar asked Hari.

  “I am. I don’t want to live there again. Dag asked me to bring back something for you.” With a grin, Hari swung two sacks onto the table and pulled them open. Silver coins, bracelets and goblets shone in the firelight. Everyone gasped. “This is part of Fadir’s hoard. He’d added to it since the last time I saw it. We agreed to split it into three parts and drew up another contract with the help of Beacan, my lovsigemann. Dag kept a third, one third is mine and this is yours.”

  “These are riches indeed and, by rights, should be yours, according to our original agreement.” Ragnar gave Hari a hard stare.

  “What I have is sufficient to buy the things my family needs now and in the future. Without your help, I would have retrieved none of it. This is yours. I call upon everyone here to witness my words.”

  A great shout went up. Hari sat down and smiled at Emer.

  Epilogue

  It was high summer when the dragonship returned from Skuy and the beginning of the harvest was approaching. This was the time of the festival called Luanistyn on the island and Lughnasa elsewhere. The name and the customs continued even after the Norsemen invaded. The newcomers entered enthusiastically into the events and produced many champions in the contests, whether they were runners or spearmen or poets.

  This year the event was to be held on flat land by the bay. People travelled long distances to attend. Their tents filled the meadows. Emer and Hari came with her parents. They stayed with Renny in the village. By this time, Edan was hobbling around on sticks, trying to look as if the effort did not hurt him.

  Thorstein had taken the dragonship back to Skuy to pick up Dag. Everyone was waiting excitedly for it to return. Once they had come back home, Emer felt as if she had been freed from some sort of prison. She shed the unhappiness and responsibilities of the last year and became a girl again, laughing and singing. Hari smiled to see her and her parents rejoiced, but Emer had a secret sorrow. Since she had lost her baby, she had not quickened again. Before they set out for the festival, she had spoken to her mother. Niamh went away and came back with a flask containing a small amount of liquid that smelt of herbs.

  “My father made me drink this potion, when I could not bear children,” Niamh said. “He taught me how to make it and I keep a supply for other women. It will bring a baby if you drink it after you lie with Hari.”

  Emer pulled out the stopper and sniffed. “It smells sweet.”

  “There is honey in it, as well as herbs.Athair wrote the secret down in the book I once showed you,” Niamh told her. “After I am gone the book will belong to you. Keep it safe so you or one of your children can use it to help others.”

  “Thank you, I will.”

  Emer took the flask and brought it with her to the festival. The family had spent Luanistyn at Ragnar’s village many times before, but now she was rich and Hari was with her. It was wonderful to introduce him to old friends. They feasted each night. New poems and stories were told, invented especially for this feast. There were ceremonies in praise of the gods and athletic events. Emer entered the archery contests and won. Her victory on Skuy had given her a new confidence. Olaf suggested to Hari that he tried sword fighting.

  “I will even wager on you,” he said and Hari laughed.

  This year would also see a number of hand-fastings. Chief among them, to Emer at least, were those of Freydis to Njall and Finnr to Pola. Her childhood friend looked intensely proud and Emer, on her husband’s arm, put away the past and wished him happy with all her heart.

  A shout went up from the beach and everyone turned to see the dragonship sailing into the bay, nosing its way towards the river. There was a great chorus of greetings. Dag came up to his father and greeted him. He embraced Edan and said how much better he looked.

  “Thanks to Renny,” Edan said. “Don’t tempt me to leave her again. My raiding days are over. My sons can go in my place.”

  “They are over for me as well,” Dag said.

  “What?”

  Dag turned and Romi came towards them through the crowd. She was richly dressed, wearing her kransen and her parents followed her proudly.

  “Fadir, I bring you my future wife. Today we will be hand-fasted and wed at the end of the promised time.”

  “My son, I am glad,” Ragnar said and hugged Romi. “Welcome to our family.”

  That afternoon, all of the couples came forward in turn. They put their hands through a huge stone with a hole in the middle, which was kept for this purpose. Then their wrists were tied
together. They plighted their troth, promising to be as man and wife for a year and a day.

  “Don’t think I am going to let you go, when that time is over,” Dag told Romi.

  “I wouldn’t want you to.”

  Emer and Hari stayed for a time with their friends, congratulating the newly joined couples.

  “You’re not sad, are you?” Finnr asked Emer, when the others were out of earshot. “If I could not have you…”

  She raised her finger to his lips, stopping him.

  “Today we are both happy. Who knows what would have happened if we had wed. Pola is a lovely girl and I love Hari. Let the past go, but remember we will always be friends.”

  She pulled his head down and kissed his cheek.

  Later on she sought out Hari, who was sitting drinking with Njall and Freydis.

  “Will you walk with me, Hari, while you still can?”

  “Where to?” Hari laughed, put his beaker down and got to his feet.

  “There is a well that is said to work magic if we visit it on this day. It’s not far.”

  The well was small stream that bubbled out of the earth. It had been ringed around with stones, so no one should stumble into it and foul the waters.

  “Is this it? What must we do?” Hari asked.

  “Take this.” Emer dropped a small pin into Hari’s palm. “Throw it into the well and wish for fine children.”

  Hari closed his eyes and threw. Then Emer threw her own pin.

  “Now you must take dip your heel into the water.”

  Giggling like children, they removed their shoes and, standing on one foot and holding onto each other, they put their feet into the cold running water. They started to sway. Hari slipped and pulled Emer down on top of him into a bed of fern, laughing and kissing.

  What better place to make a baby? Emer thought to herself as she responded to Hari’s passion.

  Afterwards, they walked back to their friends, nibbling bilberries that grew wild along the way. Emer had gathered a handful and gave them to Hari, knowing that they, too, were said to help women conceive. That night she found the little flask and drank the contents to the last drop.

  “Afi, thank you,” she murmured. “May the first of those children you promised me lie safe within my belly.”

  She also prayed to Frigg and Freyja that the potion would work. She wanted a baby so badly, a child who would not share her uncanny gift. She wanted him to live his life without knowledge of the future, in the same way as everyone else. She clutched her green stone tightly and wished as hard as she could.

  Please be kind and leave a review where you purchased this book.

  About Michèle McGrath

  Michèle McGrath is a Thursday’s child who has tried to live up to her birthday. Born on the beautiful Isle of Man, she was fortunate enough to ‘go far away’ and witness stirring events. She knew the Beatles in Liverpool. In California, she watched the Berkeley riots and she was in London during the Swinging Sixties. Living in Paris and Grenoble taught her how to make a mean ratatouille and she learned the hula in Hawaii.

  In 2007, she started to write fiction and enter writing competitions. She has won several competitions, had second places and been short-listed in others. Her first children’s book, “A Night in the Manx Museum” is being used in Manx schools. She won an international prize for ‘Kilmainham Dawn’ in 2008. Three novels were entered for the 2008 UKA Competition. All three were short listed. Gigi’s Guardian was a runner-up and Manannan’s Magic won the fantasy category. Recently, she has reached three shortlists and came second in another. She is currently working on sequels and a holiday romance in the summer of 1914. Her short stories have been published in anthologies and on the web. Although she writes in many genres from ghost stories to everyday life, her true loves are historical fiction and fantasy.

  Michèle is a qualified swimming teacher currently teaching three junior school classes. She also writes in the field of Management Training, having been a senior manager in a careers company.

  Books by Michèle McGrath

  Easy Business Skills:

  Easy Business Skills Box set

  Easy Self Confidence

  Easy Time Management

  Easy Assertiveness

  Easy Communication Skills

  Easy Presentation Skills

  Swimming:

  Learn to Swim Even if you are Terrified

  *Amazon Bestseller*

  Teach your Child to Swim: The Easy Way.

  *Amazon International Bestseller*

  Novels:

  The Manannan Series (Historical Fantasy)

  Manannan’s Magic: Manannan McLir flees from a blood feud in Ireland and finds a tragic love with a young Celtic girl, Renny. Betrayal, a Viking invasion and a narrow escape all feature in this novel.

  *Amazon Bestseller*

  Niamh of the Golden Hair: Niamh is captured by Viking raiders and unexpectedly falls in love with her captor. When he is badly injured, she must find her father, Manannan, who may be able to cure his wound.

  *Amazon Bestseller*

  Emer’s Quest: Emer, Manannan’s granddaughter, dreams that her father will be shipwrecked. She rides after him to prevent him leaving but she is too late. She persuades friends to follow him. On her journey she meets Atli, a trader who offers to rescue her father if she will marry one of his sons. Unfortunately his son Hari does not want her.

  Manannan Trilogy: Box Set

  *Amazon Bestseller*

  Ghost Diaries Series (Paranormal Romance)

  Gigi’s Guardian: A romp through an unusual sort of Heaven and Swinging Sixties London. Ariane helps Gigi choose the right man to marry, after many trials and tribulations. A comedy romance with serious overtones.

  Homecoming Queen (coming shortly)

  Duval Series (Napoleon’s Police)

  Duval and the Infernal Machine: Rookie police agent, Alain Duval investigates the attempted assassination on Napoleon Bonaparte. The book features romance, terror and an unexpected ending.

  Duval at Waterloo: The last Duval book. Duval travels to Paris and gets caught up in the preparations for Napoleon’s last battle.

  Duval and the Empress’ Crown (coming shortly): The crown is stolen two days before the coronation and Duval must get it back in time.

  Wakes Week 1914 (coming shortly): A holiday romance leads to terror and bloodshed on the battlefields of France.

  Victory Parade 1946 (coming shortly): Four nursing sisters are chosen to walk through the streets of London to celebrate the end of the war. They all have their own stories and the parade will change their lives.

  Books for Children:

  A Night at the Manx Museum: Meet Manannan, a Manx cat, the great deer and many more characters.

  Stories for Seven Year Olds: Three stories in one. A magical harp takes Shannon far away to a land of magic carpets and evil viziers. Rory is scared of heights, which is a problem because he is a robin who needs to learn to fly. Sun Sun Lau is a Chinese dragon who wakes up to find himself in the British Museum and has to escape from those who want to put him in a zoo.

  Short Story Collection

  Baker’s Dozen: Thirteen short stories in a range of genres including romance, fantasy, crime and history.

  All these books are or will be on Kindle and Kindle apps.

  Look out for free days and promotional offers.

  Gigi’s Guardian, A Night in the Manx Museum and Manannan’s Magic are available in paperback through Amazon and booksellers on the Isle of Man. The Manannan series will also be in paperback.

  Find out more on:

  Amazon / Kindle

  http://www.michelemcgrath.co.uk

  I would love to hear from you:

  email: [email protected]

  Table of Contents

  1

  2

  3

  4

  5

  6

  7

  8

  9

  10


  11

  12

  13

  14

  15

  16

  17

  18

  19

  20

  21

  Epilogue

  About Michèle McGrath

  Books by Michèle McGrath

  Find out more on: