Chapter 89: The Night He Chose Me

I stood on the headland with the whole co-op around me and the moon high and the sea below and the whole of it in my hands.

“Send the boy,” Mairéad said again. “The boy knows the coast and the boy knows the families in the north and the boy is the only wolf in this village who can go up that hill in Killybegs at four in the morning and be believed. And you stay here and you stand in that hall in the morning with the book and the ring and the whole of it.”

“Cormac is not going to Killybegs,” Declan said.

The whole headland turned round.

“He is my son and he is twenty two years old and he has been used by a woman since he was fourteen and he is not going to be put on a boat in the dark and sent up a coast he does not know to bring back an heir he has never met.” Declan’s voice was flat. “Daniel Flannery can go. He knows the coast and he knows the family and he knows the woman. He is the brother of the heir and he is the one who has been hiding her since 1978.”

“Daniel Flannery does not know what a pack is,” I said. “He has been a lone wolf since 1994 and he has not been in a territory and he does not know the law. He can bring Mary Flannery down that coast. He cannot stand in front of her and tell her she is the heir of Maeve and make her believe it.” I looked at Cormac. “Cormac can. Cormac has been in a hall with the whole co-op watching and he has said the thing that no one else would say and he has signed a statement with the whole of it in it. And he has a face that a woman in a kitchen in Killybegs is going to believe.”

Cormac came forward out of the crowd. He was in his coat with his grey eyes steady and his face white.

“I will go,” he said.

“You are not going,” Declan said.

“Da.”

“You are not going.” Declan turned round. “I have stood in a door and let a thing happen to a woman I carried down a road and I have spent a month in an office going through it and I am not going to stand on a headland tonight and let my son get on a boat in the dark and go up a coast where there are hunters and a pack of banished wolves and a woman who has been taking children out of this village since 1961.” He looked at me. “Send Daniel. Send the salvage men. Send Padraig. Send anyone. Not my son.”

The whole co-op was silent.

“Declan,” I said. “There is a thing about tonight that you have not thought of. If Cormac does not go, then the heir is not in that hall in the morning and Kern comes down that shore road with a letter and the whole of it is lost. And if the whole of it is lost then this village is his and your son is in it and the woman who has been using him since he was fourteen is still in that chair.” I put my hand on his arm. “He is not a boy. He is twenty two years old and he has stood in a hall and said the thing that no one else would say. Let him be a man.”

Declan looked at me for a long moment.

“Then I will go with him,” he said.

“You cannot go with him. The Beta has to be in that hall in the morning to hold the seat and count the vote.” I took my hand off his arm. “And there is a thing about you that I have to say and I am going to say it in front of the whole co-op because it has been true since April and it is the thing that has been standing between us since the rope walk. You are a man who protects. You have been protecting your son since he was six years old and you have been protecting this village since your father went out in a boat and you have been protecting me since the first night and it is the thing that is best in you and it is the thing that is going to lose us the morning.”

The wind came up over the headland.

“You want me to let him go,” Declan said.

“I want you to let him be the man he has been trying to be since the hall.”

Declan stood on the headland with the wind in his auburn hair and his grey eyes on his son. And then he said a thing that I did not expect and that I have thought about every day since.

“No,” he said. “I am not going to let him go and I am not going to stand in that hall in the morning and count a vote for a woman who has been in this village for a week and who has been telling me what to do with my son since the first night.” He turned round. “You have been in this village for a week and you have pulled a safe out of a well and you have read a book in a cellar and you have taken the whole of it apart and put it back together and I have been standing beside you for every hour of it. And I am not going to do it any more. Not because I do not believe you. Because I have one thing in this world and it is that boy and you have just asked me to put him on a boat in the dark and send him up a coast where there are hunters and I am not going to do it.”

The whole co-op was silent.

“Then there is a thing I have to say,” I said. “And I am going to say it in front of the whole co-op because there is no time to say it in a kitchen. You told me on the rope walk that you were a man who did not say things for twenty years and that you were done with it. You told me on the shore an hour ago that you wanted a future and that you were asking me and not the bond. And I told you to ask me again when it was over.” I looked at him. “Do not ask me again.”

The wind came up. The whole headland was silent.

“Niamh,” Cormac said.

“Go to the boat,” I said. “Daniel Flannery is at the pier and the Star of the Sea is fuelled and the tide is on the turn. Go to Killybegs and bring back the heir and do not stop for anyone and do not come back without her.”

Cormac looked at his father and then at me and then he went down the track at a run.

Declan stood on the headland with his hands at his sides and did not go after him.

And I turned round and walked down the track alone with the whole co-op watching me and the moon on the water and the whole of the morning in front of me.