Triscatal
Áine chuckled. “Oh, that was a good one! I suppose it’s my turn now, eh?” Lodan nodded. “But what if I can’t come up with a story as good as that one?” He just smiled and gave her That Look. She knew what That Look meant. She thought for a few minutes while they were riding, then started speaking…
“Once upon a time, there was a young man named Triscatal. He was a mighty warrior, a broad-fronted, shaggy-haired man and his face was so fierce that it was said that in battle, he killed by his very glance. His two brothers, who were much more handsome fellows, teased him all his life about how ugly he was, that he would never find a wife, much less have children… they teased him so much, that he grew into a surly man who seemed always angry at everyone and everything. He especially wanted nothing whatsoever to do with women, and he made sure they knew that.
“It soon got so no one in his village could stand having him around, but everyone was afraid to tell him, and so they did their best to avoid having any sort of confrontations with him, for he was a very strong and muscular fellow. Eventually, though, his father mentioned that he’d likely be much better off if he stayed away from everyone, and so he took one-fourth of his father’s herd and moved to an island in the middle of a fierce river. Triscatal built himself a house of stone and wood, and made his living by cutting down trees and floating the huge logs downstream into town, where he could sell them for a good profit. He spoke to no one but the sawyer when he was in town, picked up whatever supplies he needed, and always went back to his island immediately after his business in town was finished. He didn’t even visit his mother and father, much less his brothers.
“He was alone in the world, and he liked it that way. He was free to be as wretched and miserable as his heart felt, and no one could complain about it if he was… and he often was. There was nothing he liked better than to stomp around and take out his anger towards the world with his ax on the trees. He was a very good tree cutter.
“One day, while he was in town conducting his business, however, a fair-haired young lass named Sinead, who had just the week before moved into the village, spotted him in the farmer’s market. Sinead noticed how everyone in town seemed to try to avoid Triscatal. She couldn’t understand how people could be so rude and unfriendly towards him just because he wasn’t handsome, though she didn’t think he looked that awful. And so she decided that she would follow him and try to get to know him, because everyone, after all, needs at least one friend in the world, even someone as disagreeable as Triscatal.
“She followed him back to where he crossed the river to get to his island, but she couldn’t cross the river as he did, it was too fast and the current was too strong… and she was a petite young thing, certainly not strong enough to fight the current in a boat by herself. Sinead called out to Triscatal. He turned around and saw the girl, waved her off, and with a grumbling voice like thunder he yelled, “Go home, I don’t need your kind here!” But she stood there on the bank of the river with her hands on her hips defiantly.
“Triscatal turned his back on her and made his way back to his house on the island. The next week, the same thing happened. “Go home!” he yelled, “You don’t belong out here!” Three or four times more she tried, but she got nowhere with Triscatal. And then she didn’t follow him anymore.
“The next week, however, when Triscatal was getting ready to bring the logs downstream to town, he found a crude little sailboat made of wood on the shore by his boat. It was just some sticks tied together into a raft shape, but in the center was a tiny mast with a sail made of paper. He picked it up and examined it closely. The sail was a note from the girl, Sinead. He didn’t think much of it, and tossed it aside.
“But the next week… there was another sailboat… and the next week, another. Each sail was a note from Sinead. In the notes, she talked about herself, her dreams, what her life was like… what she was doing each week… sometimes she wrote poetry… sometimes a story would be written on the sail. It got to the point where Sinead’s notes were something Triscatal looked forward to each week. He never saw her on the shore, but each week, there would be another boat with another note… and little by little, his heart softened towards Sinead. The sailboat notes went on for years, one each week. Triscatal could hardly wait until the next week to see what she would write.
“And then one day, the notes stopped coming. He thought that she must have forgotten, or something came up. But the next week, again, there was no sailboat with the note for a sail. Triscatal didn’t know what to think about that, but he was determined to find out what happened to the girl, so he ventured upstream along the shore to where he thought the notes might be coming from.
“Halfway there he found her, lying face down in the ice cold water. Sinead had drowned trying to use her father’s boat to come and see him. He turned the body of Sinead over and looked upon her beautiful face, and at once he felt a deep stabbing pain in his heart, for he realized that he loved her very deeply, but now she was dead.
“Triscatal unsheathed his sword, turned the blade towards himself and impaled himself on it and died, lying right next to Sinead. Triscatal’s father found him a few days later. And in Triscatal’s house, the friends of his mother and father found every sailboat Sinead had ever made… and they read every note… and they wept.
“They buried the bodies on the island together.”
Áine grew very quiet, and as the sun was setting, and the stars were just beginning to twinkle in the sky, she said, “This was the last note that Sinead had written.” And Áine began to sing a song.
