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Upon this the O'Malley rovers were impatient to revictual at Gorumna and be off to the south after plunder, so Nuala decided to leave Bertragh the next morning. That night, after Cathbarr had drunk himself asleep and the O'Malleys had sought their ships, the Bird Daughter unexpectedly became very cordial toward Brian once more, and they sat up late before the fireplace.

I am Brian O'Neill, of right The O'Neill and Earl of Tyr-owen, though these are empty titles. And this night you and I shall fall on Bertragh together, Bird Daughter, and when we have won it again it shall be yours as of old." And amid a great roar of shouts welling up around him Brian bowed to Nuala.

Cathbarr suggested an attack on Bertragh castle, but Turlough dissented. "When we strike, we must strike to win," he said shrewdly. "The Dark Master has more men than we, and the sea is at his back, and they say he is a warlock to boot." The giant stared and crossed himself at talk of warlocks, but Brian laughed out. "I have a plan," he said, fingering his sword.

Brian had lost in all fifty men in that battle, while the Dark Master had given Cathbarr a goodly thrust through the shoulder, which had let out most of the giant's vanity and promised to give the huge ax some time to rest and rust. So, then, Brian found himself heading two hundred and fifty men of his own, with Nuala's hundred O'Malleys, when they rode down again to Bertragh Castle.

It was arranged between them that in three days they would meet before Bertragh Castle, by sea and land, and the Dark Master would be speedily wiped out. With the morning Brian set forth to join his men in the largest sailing galley, for a wild gale was sweeping down from Iar Connaught.

While these things took place in the hall at Bertragh and they were told later to Brian by many who had seen them and heard them, all telling the same tale Brian and his sailing galley was making hard weather of it.

He forms an alliance with Nuala O'Malley, known as the Bird Daughter because of her carrier pigeons, for the purpose of recovering her castle, Bertragh, which O'Donnell had won years before from her parents by black treachery. By warlock arts O'Donnell More brings Brian and a handful of men through a snowstorm to Bertragh and makes him prisoner.

"Slay me, for I am helpless and cannot slay myself!" As if in answer, there came a soft laugh from somewhere overhead, and the voice of the Dark Master. "There is no God in Bertragh Castle save O'Donnell, Brian Buidh!" The blasphemy shocked him into his senses, which had wandered.

O'Donnell More is the master of all men at craft, and the match of most men at weapons. Beware of him, master, beware! I had thought that he was still under siege at Bertragh Castle, else I had never taken this road." "Nonsense!" laughed out Brian joyously, drinking in the clear afternoon air. "So much the more honor if we slay him, Turlough Wolf!

As he had thought, there was nothing supernatural about this weird Black Woman, except, perhaps, the manner in which she had contrived to keep close to him. She had warned him at the Stone Mountain, and she must have been keeping close to Bertragh ever since, unseen by any, with her unhinged mind driving her forward relentlessly. "Poor woman!" he thought darkly, gazing into the hills ahead.