The Last of the High Kings Read Online Free Page B

looked at her wrist, but her watch was on the bedside table.
    â€œI know it’s late,” said J.J., “but this is important.”
    Hazel sighed and sat down on the step beside him.
    â€œDid you have a good night?”
    â€œBrilliant,” said Hazel. She was tempted to tell him about the gorgeous Desmond but decided, forthe moment at least, to keep it to herself.
    â€œGood,” said J.J.
    Hazel waited. J.J. rubbed his palms together between his pajamaed knees.
    â€œWell?” said Hazel.
    â€œUm,” he said. “Well…I know this is going to sound a bit weird, but how would you feel about becoming a teenage mum?”
    Hazel stared at him. In the pale glow of the landing light he looked old and tired. She could see dark rings beneath his eyes.
    â€œDad!” she said indignantly. In her wildest dreams she hadn’t gone that far. “I haven’t even got a boyfriend yet! Well, at least—”
    â€œNo, no,” said J.J. hurriedly. “I don’t mean really. I don’t mean—” He ground to a halt, and she could feel his embarrassment hanging in the cold air between them. He seemed unable to continue.
    â€œPerhaps you’d better start at the beginning, Dad,” said Hazel.
    J.J. stood up and stretched. “I think I’m going to let your mother do the driving tomorrow,” he said. “I think I’m going to make a cup of tea now and tell you a very strange story.”
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    Down in the big farmhouse kitchen J.J. told Hazel how, more than twenty-five years ago, he had gone to Tír na n’Óg, the Land of Eternal Youth, and how he had met Aengus Óg, who had turned out to be his grandfather and was therefore her great-grandfather. He told her how he and Aengus had gone to meet the Dagda, who was the king of the fairies, and how they had found the time leak that had been destroying the two worlds.
    The story, it seemed to Hazel, went from mad to worse. There were times when she feared for her father’s sanity and wondered whether she should slip off upstairs and wake her mother. The trouble was that some bits made sense. It explained why J.J. was such an exceptional musician and why his playing was so distinctive. It explained why the fiddle he played sounded so much better than any other she had heard. So she stayed and listened, and when he finished telling her about that visit, he told her some of the things that had happened since then and why it was so important that she play her part in the plan he was hatching.
    â€œYour mother can’t have any more children.” He finished up. “She had an operation after Aidan was born, and everybody knows that. Otherwise she could do it herself.”
    â€œBut I thought you said I didn’t really have to have a baby?”
    â€œYou don’t,” said J.J. “But your mum couldn’t even pretend to, you see? Everyone would know it wasn’t hers.”
    Hazel said nothing, and after a while J.J. went on. “Will you sleep on it, Hazey? Let me know tomorrow?”
    Hazel thought it would probably be easier to sleep on a barbed-wire hammock than on the bizarre stories she had just been hearing. But she didn’t want to say anything that would prolong the conversation.
    â€œI suppose so,” she said, and escaped to the relative safety of her bed.

1
    On a Friday afternoon in the middle of May a team of archaeologists walked up from the little car parking space at the entrance to the path that led to the ruin of Colman’s church. They didn’t follow the path but turned to their left instead, crossed a few hundred meters of limestone pavement, and began the ascent of Sliabh Carron from there. It wasn’t the shortest way to the top, but it was the easiest. This way there were no cliffs or craggy outcrops to contend with and only two low walls to climb over.
    There were five of them, two professionals and three students. They were heavily