“Which way were we meant to go?” Brigid asked.

  “Niamh told us to go straight,” Siobhan said.

  “This trail dead-ends at another road,” Brendan said. “Straight leaves us dodging tree trunks.”

  Donal stepped onto the crossroads and studied each direction. In truth, the road was two ruts of matted turf with a wider clearance than the trail and, unlike the trail, there were signs someone had cleared it by hand and maintained it. He looked down at the group’s new companion for its thoughts but all the hound managed was a twist of its head and a flop of its tail.

  “It’s such a sharp angle, though,” Donal said, pointing to his left. “That way almost sends us backwards. Anyone who comes our way without paying attention might naturally go right without knowing they turned at all.”

  “Awfully picky, brother,” Brigid said.

  “You call it ‘picky,’ I call it ‘precise,’” he said. “Such is the way for us who deal with advanced magic.”

  Brigid and Donal looked to Ciara. She squished her face and hitched up the side of her mouth. “Naw, Brendan, you’re being picky.”

  Even Brigid smiled at Ciara’s response—until the sorceress patted Brendan’s back. “It was a nice try,” Ciara said.

  Siobhan tilted her head. “It certainly was a try.” She looked at Maura. “Is there nothing more you can tell us about your mam’s travels?”

  Maura shook her head. “I’d ask her when I was wee, but I grew tired of hearing, ‘Never you mind. It’s rough business,’ so I stopped asking.”

  Siobhan gestured to the right, and the group resumed their trek deeper into Tír na nóg.

  “What was she like?” Donal asked. “Your mam, I mean? Growing up?”

  Maura knitted her brow. “Dya’mean by that? Is that judgment I hear on ya?”

  Siobhan raised her hand as she spoke. “He and I grew up around your da, who did his share of traveling, too. I believe Donal’s wanting to know how they were different.”

  Maura’s face relaxed as she bobbed her head. “Sorry,” she said to Donal. “She’s grand. I would have liked her to be around more, but she loves me and dotes on me and does most stuff I see Sorcha do for Caitlín.”

  “That sounds lovely,” Siobhan said.

  “Ah here, I should be the one asking you the questions,” she said. “About Da.”

  “He’s gruff,” Donal said with a chuckle. “Tough enough to bring down a small mountain if the mood ever caught him. Never one for wasting time or faffing about.”

  Maura’s mouth flattened. “Not one for fun, is what you’re saying,” she said. “Or softness.”

  “I wouldn’t say that,” Siobhan said. “Indeed, he’s always seemed a bit… hollow. It was only when my mam and he started planning this mission that Donal and I found out why. I don’t think he ever fully healed from losing yourself and your mother.”

  Maura looked back at Donal. He raised his eyebrows and nodded. “Looking back,” he said, “it makes perfect sense to me.”

  Maura turned to the road ahead, her eyes cast downward. Donal felt the hound drift towards her as the silence lingered.

  “So tell me this,” Maura said. “Does he live by himself? Is he just some angry man living up a mountain? You mentioned your mam and him—are they wed?”

  “Yes, no, and hell no,” Siobhan said. “My mom likely won’t re-marry and he never did. He grew close with Donal’s uncle over the years, but it wasn’t until their last fight that they ever acted like more than best friends around other people.”

  “Finn and I consider him another uncle,” Donal said.

  “But no other children of his own?” Maura asked. “I don’t have any brothers or sisters running around íriu?”

  “None,” Donal says. “Closest thing he has to that is our friend, Maeve. He said that you and she were roughly the same age. He does more for her than the rest of us.”

  Maura’s eyes returned to the ground. Donal bent over to stay in her periphery.

  “I think that’s a good thing,” Donal said. “If how he treats Maeve is any proof, he’ll be delirah for ya once the two of you meet.”

  Her face darkened as she raised her eyes. “I don’t recall asking that.”

  “You did not,” he said. “I still thought it was worth saying.”

  “Because you think that’s what I want to hear?” she asked, pointing at him with her far hand. “I’m thinkin’ you overstepped, lad.”

  Why is it always a fight with her? Donal thought. “Ah here, I’m thinkin’ you’ve got no need to be eating my head off about it. Maybe I should just understep for a while and give my head some peace.” He turned to Brigid. “Can you walk up here for a while?”

  Brigid traded a nervous look with her brother. “I supp—”

  “—Grand,” Donal said. He stepped toward the left edge of the road, slowed his pace until the entire group had passed him and fell in line behind Siobhan and Ciara.

  Siobhan turned her body enough to hold a conversation with Donal. “You know she’s lashing out at you because you’re likely right,” she said in a low voice. “She’s going through a lot in her head at the moment.”

  Ciara twisted her head. “It’s what I was thinking,” she said.

  “I thought it too,” Donal said. “It’s just rough whenever I don’t phrase something perfectly and she uses as a reason for a giving out, you know?”

  “Hai, I do know it,” Siobhan said, “though perhaps not as well as your brother.”

  “It’s pushing me to madness,” Brendan said.

  “That would be a quick trip, wouldn’t it?” Ciara said. She cleared her throat after noting the bemused expression on his face. “What is it?”

  “We’ve been hearing that rushing water for a while now, but we haven’t seen a drop.”

  “That’s because Maeve’s not here,” Donal said.

  Siobhan smiled, hunched her shoulders and dropped the timbre of voice. “Dya’mean you eejits can’t see it?” she said, her hands moving in exaggerated gestures. “There’s clearly three deer and a fox drinking from that river. And the fish! They’re jumping so far out of the water they could slap those stags in their snouts.”

  Brigid smiled. “So it’s not just a show for our benefit? She’s always like that?”

  Donal nodded. “Dya’know the worst part? She’d be bang-on about it.”

  Siobhan leaned toward Donal and nudged him with her elbow. “Between her and Finn, Niall must be in hell.”

  “What’s wrong with your brother?” Brendan asked. “Seems like a sound lad to me.”

  Donal stiffened his spine and lifted his nose. “I can’t believe you, Maeve. You’re worried about fish when we’re looking at the very river The Dagda used to wash his feet that one time after he had just done that thing with that yoke! How did you not know that?”

  Siobhan smiled. “He gets her goat so completely without even knowing.”

  “Sounds like it’s the same for her,” Brendan said.

  Siobhan chuckled. “Naw, she knows exactly what she’s doing.”

  “Oi! I see the water,” Brigid said, “and I’m not joking.”

  The road curved to the left and into a clearing blanketed with primrose. From the spaces between the bumpy white petals stretched checkered lilies and violets. On the far side of the clearing the road passed between a pond to its north and a lough along its south shoulder.

  “One of these is the headwaters of the river that’s seen and not heard,” Brigid said. “I’ll leave you lot to figure out which one is which.”

  Ciara rolled her eyes. “A more useful bit of information would be your estimate of the distance left to travel.”

  “To be fair with you,” Brigid said, “I’m rather surprised the house isn’t standing between us and thon lough on our left.”

  “More water for us," Maura said.

  Siobhan’s chin bobbed by fractions. “Grand idea,” she said. “Let’s sit while we take turns refilling our skins.”

  The group of six reached the narrow pass between the waters and sat down. One by one—except for their four-legged companion, which did not care for order—they downed the last bits of water in their skins and submerged the containers below the milky surface of the water until they were full once more.

  Donal could see every corner of the lough from this vantage point. “Not a house, not an outbuilding, not even a lean-to,” he said. “If not here, where would this person have built their home?”

  “People have different tastes,” Brigid said. “Perhaps this person wanted to surround their entire house with gardens instead of halfway.” She pointed to two breaks in the forest on the western side of the lough, one near the center of its shore, the other to the north. “If we had the capacity to wait another hour, it’s likely we’d see them emerge from one of these spots for the morning water.”

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  “But we don’t,” Siobhan said. “If we continue walking, we’re sure to meet them before that hour passes. Get you moving.”

  The party stood and, at once, all of them topped off their water supply and stepped toward the road. Donal looked back at the hound, which had rested its head on its paws while the others conversed. Its ears perked and it turned its head toward Donal, then back to the lough, and finally once more to Donal.

  “I won’t force you,” he said to the beast, “but I wouldn’t mind the company.”

  The hound groaned as it stood and trotted in the space between the two columns of travelers.

  “Donal,” Siobhan said, “I want you to mind that it’s likely that our new friend can’t return home with us.”

  “The thought’s occurred to me,” he said. “You don’t want me to get too attached.”

  She smiled. “Maybe I could stand to hear myself say it as well.”

  They had not traveled more than a quarter mile when they came upon another clearing. In the center stood a cottage with walls of smooth rounded stones. Its roof crested over a second story on its right side and its stone shingles pitched down toward the single story on its left. The extra spaces between the rounded stones provided ivy ample opportunity to climb across the left side of the cottage and up to the second story. The green wall covering cascaded down and obscured the edges of the home’s wooden shutters. A chimney built of square stones extended from the back side. It puffed white smoke into the prevailing southern winds.

  Red roses strained to reach the sills of the first-story windows under which they grew. Simple lantern hooks flanked an oak door with a rounded top. Between the door and the right window sat a bench wide enough for two people. Rope bound several debarked tree boughs to form its seat and back, anchored to its basic frame with wooden pegs. A long table sat ten feet from the cottage’s right wall, its benches tucked under. Lilies lined both the left and right sides of the house. Though surely planted with intent, these flowers and their leaves sprawled in several directions, giving the edges of the house an unkempt appearance to match the uneven flows of ivy down the front wall.

  “No fields after all,” Donal said.

  “None that we can see,” Brendan said. “Though that’s a fine-looking orchard to the north.”

  Donal had missed the orchard on his right, primarily because it held no more rhyme or reason in its planting than a natural forest. Nevertheless, round, ruby-red apples hung from many of the visible branches. He did not realize he had drifted past the table and toward the orchard until he heard the singing.

  “Oi, everyone!” he said as loudly as a whisper could carry. “Dya’hear that?”

  “That is rare,” Brendan said. “The sun’s not even over the trees yet. Too early for work.”

  “She sounds lovely,” Donal said. “Hang on, what were those things that sound like them horses that drag you into the water?”

  “Selkies?” Ciara asked.

  Brendan shook his head. “Those are women who turn into seals. He’s talking about the each uisge. They’re just horses, lovely enough to hypnotize their victims and drag their riders under the waves.”

  Ciara shook her hand. “Naw, kelpies can take on the female form as well. At least in the tales I’ve been told.”

  “Enough!” Siobhan said. “You lot are forgetting two important things: the closest water is out of sight and several hundred yards from where we stand, right?”

  “The second?” Brigid asked.

  “Yer wan singing in the trees is on the wrong side to be luring us into the water,” Siobhan said.

  “Nothing left for it,” Brigid said. “Let’s go pay our respects.”

  “Hang on,” Siobhan said. “Assuming Niamh didn’t lead us into a trap—”

  “—a brave assumption at that,” Brigid said.

  “Let’s sheathe our swords and flip our spears anyway,” Siobhan said.

  They found the woman six rows into the forest, standing on the taller of the two stools she had arranged into a staircase. She strained to reach the fruit hanging from the middle branches.

  “Excuse me,” Siobhan said as they slid under the forest canopy.

  Her back remained turned to the group. Her eyes never lowered, nor did her singing pause as they arrived at her tree.

  “Gabh mo leithscéal,” Siobhan said.

  The woman jumped from the shock and yelled. Her motion tipped the taller stool. She grabbed one of the branches with both hands to stop her fall. Donal hurried to her and wrapped his arms around her legs and squeezed.

  “Normally, I’d require a person’s name before I let them grab me,” she said in a voice worn perfectly by time and unnaturally deep for a woman of her stature.

  “Oh, sorry—I was… I’m Donal.”

  “Hello, Donal,” she said with a slight strain in her voice. She had yet to lower any of her weight into Donal’s arms. “Can you tell me what you’re doing?”

  “I learned it from my brother,” Donal said. “I always climbed higher than I should have when I was a boy. This is how he caught me.”

  “I’ll thank you for letting me go,” the woman said. “It’s what I deserve for not taking the time to bring a third stool out.”

  It was no trouble for Donal to help her down but he complied with the lady’s request. She lowered herself, branch by branch, as if she were descending a ladder with no bottom. The lowest branch sagged as soon as she held it in both hands. She let go before it could snap. She needed only a slight stumble to right herself.

  “See?” she asked, smacking the dirt from her hands. “No harm.”

  “If you don’t mind my asking,” Brendan said, “why are you working so early in the morning?”

  The woman continued to brush the dust off her linen dress. She stood more than a head shorter than Donal. Deep auburn hair fell around her heart-shaped face until it reached her shoulders. She pressed her thin lips together and narrowed the lids over her blue eyes until they hid the flecks of green in her irises.

  “Six people clad in armor and weapons, escorted by what I’m assuming is an ill-behaved Cú Sidhe, approach me in the last dark moments of the dawn and ask me what I’m doing,” she said. “Indeed, I do mind a bit.”

  Brendan swallowed his next syllable and stepped backward.

  “Forgive my brother,” Brigid said. “He’s fallen in with unsavory company over the past few years. A bad influence on his manners.”

  The woman’s eyes kept her squint as they shifted from face to face. The lines around her eyes, mouth and forehead formed patterns similar to the ones on Mrs. MacSweeney’s face. A grin formed under her wide, rounded cheeks as her stare lingered on Ciara.

  “You know she can hear you,” the woman said to Brigid.

  “I do,” Brigid said.

  The woman’s grin expanded into a smile as she bobbed her head. “I see.” She eyed them in silence for two more seconds. “You can call me Ana.”

  Siobhan started with herself and went down the line. “My name is Siobhan. Your hapless rescuer is Donal. That lad is Brendan, his untrusting sister is Brigid, and the so-called ‘bad influence’ only there is Ciara. What is this place?”

  Ana held her smile. “The docks of Manannán’s City, of course.”

  Donal twisted his head and wrinkled his nose. “I see no docks here.”

  “And that is why yer wan behind you is the leader of this group,” Ana said. “You’ve come a long, long way, considering that you’re a wayward group of mortals.”

  “And how did you guess we were mortals?” Brigid asked.

  “There was no guessing required for it,” Ana said. “There’s but one path that leads to my home which doesn’t require a lengthy trip through the rest of Tír na nóg. As you’re not accompanied by someone from the Tuatha Dé or an Aos Sí, you’d have to be mortal.”

  Brendan’s eyes twinkled as he raised a hand. “Ah, but we could be one of those very people ourselves.”

  Ana chuckled. “Eager and quick-witted.” She looked at Ciara. “I see it now.”

  For the first time since their meeting in the Mountsandel cell, Donal caught Ciara’s cheek redden.

  “I’ve lived here for many of your centuries, Brendan,” Ana said. “I’ve traveled to all four cities. The ranks of the Tuatha Dé or Aos Sí rarely change these days. And I know none of you.”

  Siobhan twisted her head. “So that business about the paths and escorts…”

  “It was myself having a little fun,” Ana said. “Forgive me if I took it too far.”

  “Nothing wrong with that,” Donal said. “Ana, who are you then? My brother likely would know you by name alone, but he’s lost in the east. Are you Tuatha Dé, or are you one of the Aos Sí?”

  “Now that’s a question!” Ana said. “In truth, I’m neither.”

  “But you live in Tír na nóg,” Donal said. “I thought they only allowed gods and demigods to live here.”

  “Let’s make a deal,” Ana said. “You lot help me finish picking this tree and two more and I’ll answer some of your questions.”

  Brendan and Brigid looked at Siobhan and pinched their faces. Ciara shrugged.

  “I see no harm in that,” Siobhan said.

  Ana took the shorter stool and handed to Brendan. “You take thon tree on the right.” She offered her hand to Brigid. “Up with you,” she said.

  “I could have sworn herself was the one who agreed to this,” Brigid said, her eyes flashing toward Siobhan.

  Ana used a hand on the back to guide Donal to the tree on their left.

  “Am I meant to get that third stool you spoke of from the house?” Donal asked.

  Ana wrapped both of her hands around his right hand and turned Donal’s spear angry side up. She put her index finger between the forks of his bident and shook her hand. “I would have expected more imagination from you,” she said. “You can pop off the lower yokes with a twist of the wrist.” She turned back to the others away from the trees. “Each of you can drop their picks in the basket. This will take but minutes.”

  “Your minutes or ours?” Brendan said.

  Ana smiled. “Fair point,” she said. “Either way, it will be quick.” She glanced back at the cottage. “Which is grand, because I need to get back. You have questions then?”

  Siobhan shook her head as she scanned the forest to her north. “This really is Tír na nóg.”

  “Of course it is,” Ana said. “Couldn’t you tell from the extra-fuzzy squirrels?”

  Donal turned toward Ana, unsure if she was serious. “The amount of squirrel fur didn’t make the tales, hai.” He waved a finger at the road by which they had entered. “So if we were to take that road south, we’d be in Murias, am I right?”

  Ana tilted her neck into a shrug. “Eventually, I suppose,” she said. “There’d be a lot of walking ahead of you, and that first stretch of road between Falias and Murias is quite hilly.”

  “Hang on,” Brendan said, stopping mid-pick, “You’re saying this area belongs to Falias?”

  Ana chuckled. “As much as the ocean belongs to the shore. Falias is the nearest of the Great Cities.” She shook her head. “Is this really the question you came all this way to ask me?”

  “Of course not,” Siobhan said. “Truly, can you fault our distraction, though? Given where we stand?”

  “It’s time to ask the questions you need answered,” Ana said. “Our bushel’s almost full.”

  “Do you know a woman named Caragh MacRannell?” Siobhan asked.

  “I do. How do you know her?”

  “Maura’s her daughter.”

  Ana’s eyebrows raised. “I see it now. That doesn’t explain the visit, or why a bunch of mortals followed her here.”

  “We need to find her,” Siobhan said. “For various reasons. When did you see her last?”

  “Right before I came out here to pick apples.”

  The rest of the group spun their heads in unison toward the cottage over Donal’s shoulder.

  Ana stepped toward Maura. “Lass, you should know—”

  “—that you’ve been wasting our time since we arrived?” Maura said. “I worked that out on my own, thanks.” She took three steps toward the house before her pace quickened.

  “Donal,” Ana said, “stop her inside the door.”

  Donal glanced at Siobhan, who narrowed her eyes at Ana before dipping her chin in Donal’s direction.

  Had Maura thought to use the wind-like movement that saved Donal from the crones in the mountain pass, his pursuit of her would have been pointless. Donal bounded toward the door and wedged his left shoulder into the doorway before Maura gained the threshold.

  “Enough, Donal!” Maura said in between grunts. “You have no reason for holding—”

  “Maura?” asked a woman from inside the cottage. Her voice creaked as she spoke. “Daughter, is that you I’m hearing?”

  The surprise distracted Maura from her struggle with Donal. He turned to glimpse his uncle’s long-lost love and found her lying on a linen sheet thrown over two bails of hay arranged in the near right corner. Caragh’s heart-shaped face strained as she twisted her upper body and neck to view the pair at the door. She pushed the ebony hair from her pale blue eyes. One was blackened and a small open cut traced the bump of her long nose.

  Caragh slid her left arm from the brown blanket that covered her upper torso. “Please slow down, lass. I still need my space.”

  “You’ve been gone for too long to say something like that to me,” Maura said. “What’s so special about this pile of hay that it keeps you from coming home?”

  “Because its owner is helping me grow my arm back,” Caragh said. “And she won’t let me leave until the job’s finished.”