The Maiden's Ritual

“Brother, please wait!”

Eanna cursed the cloak he had just started to latch for tangling his arms, the bench he had been peacefully dressing on suddenly becoming an obstacle between him and his brother.

“Why?” Columban asked cheerfully. “Surely you don’t deny me the right to pick my bride.”

“Of course not. It’s just…” Eanna got both the unruly cloak and bench under control and stood up to face Columban. “Doesn’t it strike you as a slightly… extreme solution?”

“What’s extreme is expecting me to marry any of the presented options ‘for the good of the clan’. Have you seen Mac Airt’s daughter? Let alone O’Brien’s sister!?” Columban squinted his eyes and minced across the floor to mimic the nervous movements of the near-sighted Muirgel Mac Airt, then rounded his shoulders and waddled about to show his opinion of the plump Bebinn O’Brien. “Neither one is fit for a stable boy, let alone a king!”

Eanna’s mouth twisted. Both ladies were excellent matches. Mac Airt’s lands were further west than the O’Quin’s had expanded influence to, while O’Brien’s lands would strengthen their own influence nearer home. Both ladies were educated in all manner of useful skills. Muirgel’s weak eyes did not prevent her hands from flying on the loom. Bebinn was clever with numbers and her brother proudly explained how much richer he had become since letting her figure accounts. But all the same, Columban’s impressions were funny.

He let out a grudging chuckle.

Columban smiled at him approvingly. “And some of the others! My exploits have half the men in Clare throwing their women at my heads. If I thought that was what I would get, I would’ve stuck with hunting boar instead of Norsemen.”

“Maybe you could have found your wife among the boar,” Eanna tried to show his contempt for his brother’s crazy scheme in his tone, but Columban didn’t blink.

“No, little brother. The ritual can only be done once and I know exactly what to perform it on. If I wanted a Boar Wife, I would just marry Bebinn!” Columban howled with laughter at his own joke and slapped Eanna’s shoulder hard enough to knock the smaller man back onto the bench.

“Now, I promise I have thought this through. I just wanted to tell you before I did anything, so you would know first. I thought you’d be supportive – maybe get Mother to start preparing for a wedding feast.”

Eanna shook his head vigorously. “You don’t even know if this will work. Mother can’t afford to waste her time cooking a feast for you to come home with a wild animal as your bride. What, are you going to drag a doe tied by her ankles into the hall? Perhaps drag a seal back in a sack?”

“Neither. And it will work. Our great-great-great-grandfather married a Selkie, did he not?”

“He did,” Eanna conceded grudgingly.

“And which one of us has studied magic?” Columban’s tone was pointed.

“You have.”

“And which one of us is in need of a fitting wife for a hero?”

Eanna didn’t answer that.

“Me. Therefore, it is a full moon tonight and it is several hours walk to the lough.” Columban paused and looked down at his brother. His smile crinkled his face and he gave Eanna an affectionate cuff on the head. “If you won’t trouble Mother until I succeed, why don’t you come with me?”

Eanna looked up sharply. “You would bring me along?”

“Of course! She’ll be your sister-in-law. And maybe we’ll need to perform another ritual for you, eh?” he elbowed his brother in the ribs. “Get your things together, we’ll head out after mid-day meal.”

The sun was near setting when Columban signaled to Eanna to stop. Walking to the lough instead of riding did take much longer. They had brought along a pack donkey to carry the magical implements Columban claimed he would need to perform the ritual, which could not be performed until the moon reached its peak. But they would need time to set up. Columban halted the donkey in a small grove where they could get a good view of the water, but could not be seen unless looked for.

Columban began to unpack his mystical apparatus: a silver knife to cut the cloak of a Beast Maiden, an enchanted cauldron to give the knife the power to free instead of to kill, sacred herbs and holy water to strengthen the spell, and a silver chain to bind the Maiden to him. Eanna pulled a woman’s kirtle from his bag, where it had rested on top of the food. He was glad he had thought to bring it, for it was the only spare piece of clothing they had. He also wondered how the newly freed Maiden would take the walk back to the castle and suddenly wished they had brought a horse for her to ride. The donkey didn’t even have a saddle.

Well, Columban had other things to think of. He had remembered to pack a bundle of sticks onto the donkey, but Eanna still had to help him make a fire pit where the cauldron could be brought to a boil.

“Why couldn’t you do this back home?” Eanna grumbled as he laid out rocks scavenged from the edge of the lough, each one obtained around Columban’s insistence that he not be seen.

“Because the spell requires one final ingredient, only obtainable at the site where the spell will be cast.” Columban reached into his pouch and flourished a long white feather.

Eanna stared at it and then stared at his brother.

“You are going to try to catch a Swan Maiden?”

“Naturally! Just think of it,” Columban’s voice took on a dreamy tone. “What is more beautiful and graceful in all our lands than a swan? I have already picked her name: Fionnualla. She will be the most elegant lady in Munster… no, in Eire. Every man will come to our court just to gaze upon her. Slim and swaying as a sapling in the breeze, skin as white as milk, her eyes dark as the night sky. I wonder whether her hair will be light or dark? It doesn’t really matter, but I think her hair will be the yellow of moonlight in the autumn. But I could see her having hair as black as the bands on her old wings, though.”

Columban spun his fantasies of the Swan Maiden out as the fragrance of the magical herbs began to permeate the air. Eanna began to feel silly for doubting him: clearly, this ritual must do something for Columban to be so sure of its outcome. It felt like something magical was happening at least.

The moon rose slowly, her light going from pale yellow to silvery white as she described her bridge through the night sky. Columban, chanting soft, strange words, tied the feather to the knife with the silver chain before dropping all three into the boiling cauldron.

There was a flash of white light and the fire extinguished. Columban plunged his hand into the cauldron before Eanna could scream to remind him of the boiling water. But no screams came. Columban’s hand was not burned. The knife and the chain shone with an inner fire that rivaled the light of the moon, but the feather had disappeared.

Eanna could only stare at his triumphant brother.

Columban did not gloat, nor did he waste time. He began to stalk along the shore, as if he knew exactly where his Swan Maiden awaited.

Eanna scrambled after him, not wanting to leave his entranced brother alone.

They were halfway around the lough when Columban stopped short. Eanna nearly ran headfirst into him, but the steady hand kept him at bay.

There in the rushes was the nest of a magnificent swan. The knife secured to the chain gently rocked towards her, indicating that she was the one whom had dropped the feather. Her head was tucked securely under her wing; her rounded form gleamed like a twin to the moon.

Columban crept up to her sleeping form and gently pressed the tip of the knife to the swan’s breast, right underneath the throat. He moved so silently that the bird never stirred.

“Swan Maiden, I, Columban O’Quin, free you from your guise and claim you to be my bride.” Eanna could just make out the whisper as Columban pushed the tip of the knife into the swan’s skin and cut up.

The swan’s head shot up at the same time her cloak began to fall from her body.

For a moment, Columban and Eanna saw the double sight of a woman becoming a swan or a swan becoming a woman: it was hard to tell which way she was going and the unnaturalness made Eanna feel sick.

The bright light enveloped the form before the sight of the transformation became unbearable, before finally coalescing around a singular figure.

Columban had scrambled back after making the cut, but now he stood, mouth agape, knife and chain dangling limply in his hand. He had been unable to throw the chain over the swan’s head without waking her, but now that she was a human, he readied his hands to ensnare her.

Eanna forced himself to look at the light as it began to dim. The form was curled into a tight ball still – as a woman, it was impossible to see what she would look like.

Slowly, the light dimmed, until there was nothing but a yellow-haired figure in a white feathered cloak curled tightly among the rushes.

“Once the chain is in place, I can’t undo it.”

Columban stepped forward, the chain at the ready to throw over her neck the moment the figure raised her head.

But she did not raise her head as she unfolded slowly from the depths of the feathered cloak. A foul odor crept into the clear night air as she stood, the brothers staring in horror as she continued to expand.

Columban stepped back towards Eanna, clutching the knife and chain tighter to him. Eanna could read the fear and doubt creeping in; brothers to the terror he felt in his own mind, to the absolute certainty that something had gone very wrong.

“Fionnualla?” Columban managed to squeak, the normal confident timbre gone from his voice.

The figure’s head snapped up at that.

The face was one of surpassing beauty: dark eyed, fine boned, with an aristocratic nose and a generous mouth.

The cloak slipped from her shoulders, revealing a nude human form. She was taller than Columban by a head, and he sometimes had to duck to get into doorways. The shoulders were as broad as a boar’s, her high breasts were dwarfed by the enormity of her pectoral muscles. Each arm was as thick as a man’s leg and more heavily corded than a sailor’s. Each hand seemed the size of a new lamb. Her waist resembled the feasting table of the hall in its squareness; her hips reminded him of the great stones of the castle wall. Both the heavily muscled legs were stained brown, explaining the foul odor.

The dark eyes narrowed and focused on Columban.

He regained some measure of his confidence and stepped slightly closer, holding out the chain.

“I name you Fionnualla, Swan Maiden. I have given you human form. I claim your hand by right of sorcery!”

The eyes bored into him as the Titaness released a resounding blast of flatulence in response to his words.

“I order you to bow to me! I am your master!”

Another flatus greeted his words.

Eanna began to back away from his brother as his brother advanced.

“Fionnualla! I have freed you and I claim you! Bow your head and accept your fate!”

The full lips parted, revealing a mouth of strong, white teeth.

“Shhhhhhhhhsssssshhhhhshshshhshhhhh….” the noise was uncanny from a human throat, as if an entire hive of angered bees were all the voice she had.

“I…” Columban glanced at Eanna, only to see him already far enough to run. He squared his shoulders and stepped closer. “I MADE YOU!” he shouted, moving to throw the chain over the beautiful head.

“SCQREEEKONK!”

Eanna did not see which of the huge fists hit his brother first.

Like a creature out of a nightmare, the giantess had sprung from her befouled nest and slammed her would-be bridegroom to the ground. She yanked the fallen body up by the hair and shoved him away again, alternating buffets from her great arms with vicious kicks from her spattered legs.

Columban screamed and tried to fight her off. He dropped both chain and knife, which the enraged Swan Maiden seized and threw far into the lough. Columban scrambled away in the moment of distraction, but she turned and grabbed his ankle.

She threw him over her shoulder, dangling by his ankle. He tried to kick, which she settled by sinking the strong white teeth of the full lipped, generous mouth into the meat of his leg. His head was in the right position to receive another of her sonorous blasts from her enormous, muscular backside.

She began trudging towards the lake, Columban gagging and spluttering, upside-down over her shoulder. It reminded Eanna of a hunter dragging a dead boar into the castle walls.

“Please…. Please, Maiden! Don’t hurt me! I beg of you! Don’t… don’t eat me, please!”

“SCQRONK!” was the only reply to Columban’s begging.

“Please…” Columban’s begging pierced Eanna’s heart, but how could he rescue his brother from this monster he had conjured?

The Swan Maiden reached the edge of the lake and hoisted Columban up.

For a moment, she stood in her full splendor in the moonlight: a Colossus of the female form, holding a masculine body aloft above her head.

With a triumphant, “SCRKEEEEE!” she threw him bodily in the lough.

She turned on her massive heel and walked majestically back to her nest. Eanna stared as she picked up her shed cloak and sniffed it, her lovely face contorting with disgust. She hissed a few times, turning it around.

“May… may I?” Eanna found his tongue.

The dark eyes turned on him blankly.

“I don’t know what to do… but, I think I can help?” Eanna crept forward on his knees, making sure not to look directly at her.

She held still as he came close. He tried not to react to the stench as he looked for the top of her cloak. He found it as a tiny silver clasp, undone.

“Lady… Goddess of the wild, if I may?” He stood slowly and threw the cloak around her shoulders, using his much smaller fingers to close the clasp.

The bright light swallowed her again. When it cleared, a filthy, disgruntled swan stood where the Titaness had.

She gave Eanna an unreadable look before sailing into the lake, swimming away as fast as she could. But as she swam past Columban, slowly picking his way back to shore, she stopped in her flight to bite his face and buffet him about the head with her wings. Satisfied with her work, she sailed on.

Eanna waited for her to disappear before he waded out to his battered brother.

One of Columban’s eyes was swollen shut. His nose was torn from the swan’s bite and at least one tooth was missing from the front. He simply floated on his back, looking for all the world like a casualty of battle.

“Perhaps…” he said weakly as Eanna gently gripped under his arms to pull him back to shore. “Perhaps I judged my matches too quickly. Bebinn is a very gentle lady.”

“Yes, brother.”

“Eanna?”

“Yes, brother?”

“I don’t think magic really solves problems like this.”

“Yes, brother.”