Dublin in the Morning

Emerging from the cathedral, Colman took a quick look around. The festival was over and Dublin was once more what it usually was. A city like any other. It may have been the capital of the Kingdom of Ireland, but it was still just another city. The baker was baking, the blacksmith was blacksmithing… The blacksmith… An odd man.

Walking over to the blacksmith, Colman watched as the man picked up a red-hot horseshoe from the fire without burning himself. The Young Poet had seen this happen many times before and could not understand it. When he had asked his mentor about, Gardiner had simply told him there were such people in the world, such a feat did not identify a woman as a pythoness or a man as a mage and Gardiner himself had seen a monk levitate while on pilgrimage with the previous dean John Rider. Gardiner no more thought of that monk or even the blacksmith as a mage than he did Pope Pius V for having had a vision of victory where a Christian fleet defeated the Turks.

Regardless what his mentor said, Colman still found it most strange. Ruby had been one of the Walking People by adoption her whole life. In her sixteen years had she ever seen anything so fantastic? If a simple blacksmith could pick up a red-hot horseshoe without burning himself and a simple monk could levitate, then could there truly be pythonesses, mages and even enchanters? Yes, what if the enchanters that Ruby's four-time great-grandmother had gotten the locket from truly were enchanters and not druids at all?

Druids that had survived into the reign of Henry VII or enchanters? Now that Colman thought of it, both were quite fantastic, but he still believed that any old druidic symbol could have found their way onto any old object, but would enchanters differentiate something druidic from something Christian or would they just see it as a great symbol regardless of its origins?

Alas, he knew not.

Running a hand through his short, curly red hair, Colman walked on. Ten years he had seen the blacksmith do that marvellous feat of his, but how he could possibly do it was something he simply could not understand. If God had made all equal, then why was everyone not capable of picking up red-hot horseshoes from fires without being harmed? Were the gods of old still at work? Was Gardiner wrong and deities like Jupiter were not simply monarchs who had been deified after their passing? Other scholars who had debated this belief with Gardiner, had said the pagan gods had merely been demons in disguise, so what was that the truth? Were they monarchs who had been deified after death, demons in disguise or had they truly been gods? There were many trees in the forest and they all shared the same sky, so could there not be many deities in the world? Were he to ask that to Gardiner in front of the rest of Saint Patrick's Cathedral's clergy, no doubt he would be branded a heretic for even asking such a question… Colman remembered learning that the Persian king Cyrus the Great had allowed for the worshippers of different gods to live in peace, as had Genghis Khan! Why was the God of Abraham so offended at the thought of their being deities besides Him? Why was He so opposed to such a concept as religious freedom?

Colman had not the answers, but he knew that the Christian God did not have a monopoly on morals, nor did any others. He had learned this from reading the Epic of Gilgamesh, a translation owned by Gardiner, and he quite agreed with the notion. Just because one was a deity did not mean they had a monopoly on morals. The tale of the Israelites and their battles with the various people in Canaan did not seem well to Colman. It was conquest and worse! Did all who worshipped those pagan deities really have to die? Wherefore? Because God had said so? If those Mesopotamians could question and even hold in contempt the actions of their deities then could not the Israelites have questioned God's order?

Sighing, Colman wondered what would happen if he were to ask such questions in a place of worship. He wished he knew, but he hadn't the heart to find out.

Suddenly, the sound of a flute came to Colman's ears. Growing tense, he remembered the talk of FitzGerald owning a magic flute. Could it have been true? He had no idea. Besides, it was probably just someone else. Yes, yes, some else completely it was not—

Turning a corner, Colman did indeed see FitzGerald playing a flute. Upon noticing him, the Old Beggar gave the Young Poet a smile that made his skin crawl.

"Good morning, Colman." FitzGerald sounded quite false friendly with his tone, though Colman could not imagine FitzGerald ever sounding genuinely friendly. "Have a good sleep? Did your morning lesson with Master Gardiner go well?"

"What interest do you have in such matters?" asked Colman.

"My interests are many, boy." Uttered the Old Beggar with a sneer. "And I have many subjects be they beggars, thieves, vagabonds, unfrocked priests, wastrels or Walking People. Your involvement with one of my subjects is of great interest to me."

"Wherefore?"

"My subjects are mine to do with as I please." Stated FitzGerald with a chuckle. "You wouldn't want to make pretty little Ruby a target of mine, would you?"

"The leader of the Walking People here in Dublin would see you stripped of your position and someone else in your place." Commented Colman.

"Aye, well, one has to live to do that." Laughed FitzGerald. "Or be in control of their senses." Returning to the playing of his flute, the Old Beggar kept his eye on Colman, who could do naught but stare at him in suspicion.

What was the Old Beggar planning? Colman knew not, but he believed that the Devil himself would be less sinister that Brian FitzGerald was.

"So why do you wear the eyepatch when both of your eyes are fine?" inquired Colman.

"I didn't like pretending to be fully blind, I didn't like pretending to be lame and I find I look quite dashing with it." Answered FitzGerald. "Now off with ye before I beat you to a pulp! Anymore fools know about this and I won't be able to beg at all in Dublin."

Colman failed to see a problem with that. Someone better than FitzGerald would make for a good change, perhaps the Chieftain of the Walking People himself.

Walking off, Colman thought about the Conquest that had ended six years prior. He had lost his parents, as had Gardiner and Hugh and probably Ruby as well. Had FitzGerald been reduced to being a beggar because of the Conquest? Colman could only wonder. It seemed everyone he knew had been affected in some way by the conquest carried out by the Tudor Huns. People like Apollo got to settle while people like them received losses of family and were forced to be beggars. FitzGerald may have been less than kind to Colman, but even then, the Young Poet could sympathize with him.

Upon seeing some of the Walking People trying to sell their wares, Colman approached and asked: "Have any of you seen Ruby?"

"Who?" asked a middle-aged woman.

"She'd be new to Dublin." Answered Colman. "Red hair—"

"We are in Ireland, boy. Many people have red hair." Stated an old man.

"She wears a locket." Said Colman.

"So do my daughters and nieces." Uttered the middle-aged woman.

"She dances." Added Colman.

"Ah, her." Commented the old man. "Quite odd, why someone would want to do anything else than make and sell ornaments, jewellery and horse harness is beyond me. Yeah, I've seen her."

"Where would she be, sir?" Colman asked.

"She is down by Sarah Bridge." Answered the old man.

Thanking the old man, Colman began to make his way to Sarah Bridge. It had been built during the reign of Bloody Bess by Henry Sidney, a kinsman of Apollo and the Lord Deputy of Ireland at the time. The current Lord Deputy was Arthur Chichester, who had more interest in Belfast than anywhere else in Ireland.

Spanning the River Liffey, Sarah Bridge was only a little way north of the cathedral. Colman had crossed it many times and he was not certain why Ruby would dance there. To his thinking there was not much to look at, who was she to dance for, the people crossing the bridge? The fishermen on the river? He did not understand it. In the vicinity of Saint Patrick's Cathedral seemed like a better place to his thinking, it was ever near Dublin Castle where King James stayed when in Dublin, just as the Tudor and Plantagenet monarchs before him had. It was a much more pleasant place, exactly why Colman had wanted to put his play on there the previous day.

Or maybe she was dancing for the washing women down by the river? Colman had no way to be certain, nonetheless he found Sarah Bridge an odd place for Ruby to dance.