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Updated: May 1, 2025
A swift look of warning flashed over the seneschal's face, and Brian laughed. "Lady," he said in the same tongue, "he is Cathbarr of the Ax, and he will be a good man to stand with us against the Dark Master." She betrayed no surprise, except that a little tinge of red crept to her temples. "I did not know you spoke English, Brian Buidh. Still, it was not to Cathbarr that I referred."
You are Brian Buidh, but to me you are my kinsman, the rightful head of my house. You can do two things, Yellow Brian either follow my advice, or go down to ruin with all Ireland. Now say, which shall it be?" Brian gazed at him with thoughtful face. What was the meaning of this dark speech? As he looked into the keen, death-smitten eyes of the man who might have saved Ireland, he smiled a little.
"Then it seems that I am held in a cleft stick," smiled Brian easily, "since I will give fealty to none save the king, or Parliament. You are allied with the Roundheads, I understand?" She nodded, watching him gravely. "Yes. Cromwell is master of the country, and I am not minded to butt my head against a wall, Brian Buidh.
Finding that the Dark Master stood out of his sight, Brian fired at two of the men under the door, and they fell; then he raised his voice above the shouting that came from outside. "O'Donnell, are you there?" The uproar died away, and the other's voice came to him. "So you are trapped at last, Brian Buidh! Now yield and I promise you a swift hanging." "Not I," laughed Brian curtly.
Brian was minded to answer curtly enough, but he looked at the seneschal and remembered the seaman's kindly warning. Under his eye the laugh withered suddenly on the seneschal's lips. "These ten men belong to me, Muiertach. Go, tell the Bird Daughter that Brian Buidh and Cathbarr of the Ax have come to her, bringing tribute as she demanded."
"Who are you?" she whispered. "Tell the Black Woman your name, if you are no ghost! For even as you stand now, once did these eyes see the great earl himself." "I am from Drogheda," answered the man, something very like fear stamped on his powerful and bitter-touched young face. "My name is Brian Buidh, and I ride to join Owen Ruadh " "Liar!"
Drawing his cloak farther about his hunched shoulders, the latter turned to Brian with a mocking sneer. "Now farewell, Brian Buidh, and forget not to repay that loan, if you can gather enough men together. When you come again, you will find me here. A merry riding to you. Beannacht leath!" Brian looked at him grimly.
"In the morning the message shall be delivered, Brian Buidh," returned burly Muiertach with a glimmer of respect in his voice. "And now render up your weapons, so that we may treat you as guests " "So you sea-rovers are afraid of two men, lest they capture your hold?" Brian's biting words brought a deep flush to Muiertach's face. "No weapons do we render," he went on, his voice cold as his eyes.
The sign falls on Eochoid Buidh, and the saint tells the king that all his other sons will come to a premature end, and they drop off accordingly, chiefly in battle. This power of fixing the evil eye, of prophesying death, is found in perpetual use among the early saints.
Brian Buidh, or Brian of the Yellow Hair, himself The O'Neill, comes home from Spain, where he had been brought up to fight for his country. After a mysterious warning from the Black Woman, an old hag, he wins forty men from O'Donnell More, the Black Master, by a trick, and wins the friendship of Turlough Wolf and Cathbarr of the Ax.
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