Chapter 82: The Second Bloodline

I stood in the fog on the shore road with the old woman's hand on my arm and the whole of it turning over.

“Then my sister is on that headland now,” I said. “And she is going to fight.”

“She is on that headland now and she is going to fight and she has been in the north for four months and she has a pack at her back and she has a broken mark and she has nothing left to lose.” The old woman's blue eyes were steady. “And there is a thing about your sister that you do not know and that I am going to tell you now because there is no time. She came to me in the room above the hall this morning and she sat on the bed and she told me the whole of it. She said, Aunt, I have a child. I said, I know, and she said, no, you do not know. She said, the child I gave to Deirdre in 1976 was a boy and he is in Killybegs and he is called Daniel. And there is a second child.” The old woman put her hand on my arm. “She said, in 1979 I had a daughter and the Alpha took her out of this village and gave her to a woman from Galway and I have not seen her since. And she said, the woman from Galway was called Eileen and she took the child to the north and the child is forty one years old and she does not know what she is.”

The fog moved on the road.

“A daughter,” I said. “My sister has a daughter.”

“Your sister has a daughter and the daughter was taken out of this village in 1979 and the woman who took her was the woman who was going to Galway and who had taken the girl in 1975 and given her to herself.” The old woman looked at me. “And there is a thing about the second bloodline clause that no one in this village has said out loud since 1961. It is in the second charter and it is in the green book and it says that if the seat is vacant and there is no wolf of the first bloodline who can claim it, the seat passes to the next of the blood. And the next of the blood is not you and it is not your sister. It is the daughter. And the daughter is in the north and she has been in the north for forty one years and she does not know that she is the heir of Maeve.”

Declan was beside me with his hand on my arm.

“Then there is a thing we have to do before the moon is over,” he said. “We have to find the daughter.”

“The daughter is in the north and the north is a day's sail away and the moon is up at nine.” I turned round. “And there is a thing about the daughter that I have been carrying since the church and that I have not said out loud because I did not know what to do with it. Father Byrne told me that the woman who takes children out of this village has been taking them to the north since 1961 and that the family in the north has been bringing them up to be claimants. And there is a thing about the claimants that no one has looked at. Eileen is a claimant and she is not the heir of Maeve and she has been told she is. Daniel Flannery is a claimant and he is not the heir of Maeve and he has been told nothing. Korkut is a claimant and he is not the heir of Maeve and he has been told he is the son of a great pack. And there is a fourth child who was taken out of the house in Killybegs in 1979 by a woman from Galway and who is the heir of Maeve and who has been told nothing at all.” I looked at Declan. “And there is a thing about that fourth child that has been in front of me since the first night and that I have not seen. The woman who takes children out of this village and takes them to the north and brings them up to be claimants is a woman who has been doing it since 1961. And the woman who has been doing it since 1961 is Deirdre. Declan's mother. The woman who went off the cliff in 1981.”

Declan's face had gone the colour of the fog.

“My mother took children out of this village,” he said. “My mother took the girl in 1975 and she took the boy in 1976 and she took the daughter in 1979. And she took them to the north and she gave them to a family who brought them up to be claimants.” He put his hand over his mouth. “And then in 1981 she went off the cliff and the co-op was told she had a weakness of the heart.”

“And there is a thing about the daughter that I have to say and then we are going up that track,” I said. “If the daughter is the heir of Maeve and she is in the north and she has been told nothing, then she is the one thing in this village tonight that can stop the fight. Not a claim. Not a challenge. A bloodline. A wolf of the first blood who is the next of the blood after my sister and who can stand in front of the co-op and say, the seat is mine and I am not going to fight for it and I am going to give it to my mother.” I looked at the headland. “And there is a thing I have not told you either. In the room above the hall this morning, when my sister sat on the bed and told the old woman the whole of it, she said a thing about the daughter that the old woman has just told me and that I have been turning over since. She said, the woman from Galway who took my daughter in 1979 was called Eileen and she took her to the north and the child is forty one years old and she does not know what she is. And the old woman said, what is her name? And my sister said, I do not know. She said, I have never known. She said, Deirdre would not tell me and the woman from Galway would not tell me and the north has kept her and I have not seen her since the night she was taken.”

The fog moved and the moon came through it and the headland was a grey shape with the ring of stones on top of it.

“Then there is a thing about the daughter that we can do tonight,” Declan said. “We can put it in front of Ahern. Not a claim. Not a fight. A bloodline. A wolf of the first blood who is the next of the blood after your sister and who is in the north and who can be found and brought down this coast in a day. And Ahern can set aside the fight until the daughter is in this village and the whole of it can be done in a hall with a vote.” He looked at me. “The fight is at nine. It is eight now. We have an hour.”

We went up the track. The fog was thick and the moon was behind it and the whole co-op was on the headland with lamps and the ring of stones was full of wolves. And at the flat rock in the middle of the ring there were two women.

One was Mairéad. She was in her black coat with her silver hair pinned up and her pale green eyes on the track and she had shifted and come back and she was standing at the rock with her hands at her sides.

And the other was my sister. She was in a grey coat that had seen weather and her hair was gold and loose and going grey at the temples and she was standing on the rock with her head up and her hands at her sides and she was looking at me.

“You are late,” she said.