Oaths That Bind
Contains references to.
"You're a long way from home, hunter," Tirlagh Hancóc said as he gestured for Marie Smith to seat herself in the small audience hall in Dún Másc. Rohan Hancóc cast a sideways glance at his cousin from where he stood beside his chair at the comment, because Marie Smith had clearly shown up on their doorstep under an assumed name. She had only revealed her true nature by drawing her long hunting knife - the blade that all hunter's carried with its witch blessing. Those at the door had recognized the Hancóc magic in the knife and allowed her in, respecting her decision to hide her identity.
The sect might be allied directly with the Smiths but they had helped any hunter who came to them since their inception.
Rohan had the distinct impression that there was something deeper going on here.
"I am," Marie said as she seated herself, settling her skirts around her legs. There was obviously either breeches or hose of some kind underneath, as many female hunters wore when they were afield. Then she folded her hands in her lap, sat up straight, and looked directly at both of them. "I am not here on official hunter business but I am asking for a favor."
Rohan's hand resting on the back of Tirlagh's chair tightened and he gritted his teeth together. His cousin turned his head slightly and held up a hand briefly in his direction, an obvious request for his patience. There was a reason that Tirlagh had won the vote to lead the sect the year previous and it was because - out of all of the children and grandchildren of Gréagóir Hancóc - he was the most level-headed and in control of his temper. Exactly the thing that the sect needed as signs were rising that things in Éire were going to change.
Turning back to the woman, Tirlagh said, "We have helped your family since Alexander Smith found us after his wife was turned. Ask."
She closed her eyes and was quiet for a long moment before she began, "My clan believes that I am dead."
Tirlagh sat up at the same time that Rohan stiffened and now he didn't keep his mouth shut. "What exactly does that mean, lass?" he demanded, despite his cousin's sharp look.
Marie opened her eyes, lifting her chin proudly, and replied, "It means exactly what I said." She then sighed and continued speaking. "You both are likely well aware of what my clan is like. They are proud but stern with little stepping out of line allowed. We are only allowed to be hunters and nothing else."
She swallowed hard and stated, "I have spent twenty-six years doing what my clan wished of me. The greatest hunter of those born this century according to our current leadership. And I am already tired of the hunt."
"But the clan will not simply let you retire," Tirlagh commented, his voice soft. He then leaned forward, hands folded together on the table, and asked, "What did you do make them believe you dead?"
"I made them believe that I went on a hunt for Itztli."
"Itztli?" Rohan repeated, concern in his voice.
Marie nodded slowly and said, "That is the story that my clan received from the papers that they found on the body they believe to have been mine."
"And what is the real story?" Tirlagh asked.
She stared right back at him for a long moment then replied in a flat tone, "I made a deal with Ebio. Her aid in faking my death so I could escape in exchange for my firstborn."
Gods.
Rohan ran a hand over his face in exasperation and looked down at Tirlagh, who was staring across the table at the hunter in surprise. Then his cousin said slowly, "You promised your firstborn? The heir to all of the abilities our magic blessed you with promised to a vampire?!"
Suddenly she snapped her chin up, eyes flashing, and there - there - was the proud hunter that was the pride of her clan. Marie hissed, "Why do you think I'm here, Tirlagh Hancóc? If I can avoid it, I never intend for her to have my firstborn child. After confirming that my clan believed the body was mine, I fled from England and ran hard and fast."
Leaning forward, she placed both hands against the top of the table and her voice lowered as she desperately said, "I'm here to beg for help in doing that."
"You're asking us to help you betray not only a deal you made with Ebio but to continue this charade and hide you from your family as well," Tirlagh stated flatly. "This is a very high asking price, Marie Smith, and give how you have already detailed your leaving from England, I doubt you left with very little to bargain with."
With a clatter, her long hunting knife hit the table as she tossed it casually. It rattled and rolled to lay in the center of the table between them as she said, "I have given you my truths, Hancóc witches, and now I give you the blade blessed by your magic. The blade my father gave me when I earned the right to bear it. On an oaken table."
Rohan smirked at that even as Tirlagh winced. Looking down at his cousin, Rohan laid a hand on his shoulder and murmured, "She is right, it is an oak table, cousin. Upon which she has given her truths and shown her courage. It takes guts to run from the life that's all you knew but a spine of steel to play the long game with a vampire like Ebio."
Amongst the Hancóc's, the ancient ways still ran deep. Both of them knew all of the meanings of the oak and what Marie was invoking by pointing it out to them. Rohan would give her credit, the woman had courage to spare.
Sighing, his cousin said the old rote aloud as he closed his eyes as it he had a headache.
"Speak your request, hunter of Smith's blood, and the blood of fire will honor it," he intoned officially, holding out a hand - palm up - across the table.
Marie Smith reached out to rest her hand on top of his own and answered in the same old rote, "I beg safety and protection from the blood of fire. For myself and all of my blood who may come from me."
"The blood will honor it by my order. Do you second this honor, Rohan Hancóc?"
Looking at her desperate eyes, Rohan nodded and replied, "Aye. The blood of fire will honor your request."
She slumped over the table then, her hand still outreached towards Tirlagh, and closed her eyes. As her shoulders slumped as if a heavy weight had gone fallen away, Marie breathed, "Thank you. I hope that I never have to call in this favor."
"I should hope that you don't," Tirlagh said in a steely voice, rising from his chair. He looked down at her for a long moment before adding, "The sect will honor your request, Marie Smith, but not you. There will be no more favors beyond this."
As he strode out of the room, Rohan watched him go and then he stepped forward to lean over the table. Marie's eyes darted up to him and he grinned before saying, "If you had a cock and balls, lass, you'd have earned his respect rather than his disdain. It was a bold move but it cost you because of your sex."
"Not the first thing that having a woman's bits has cost me," she grumbled. Then she sat up and looked at him, asking, "Why aren't you giving me the same treatment?"
"My cousin has to look after the well-being of the sect and our connection to your clan," he replied. "Dozens of lives here at Dún Másc. Hundreds more in the local area. Thousands across the shores of Éire and more beyond that. I just have to look after myself." Rohan's mouth quirked into a grin as he added, "And make sure my cousin eats when he gets caught up in work. He takes care of the sect and I make sure he's able to keep doing it."
She chuckled at that and then stood up, smiling brightly at him. "Well, I wish you luck in continuing to do that." Her eyes then looked at the long knife on the table for a moment before she grimaced, hissing, "I want to walk away from them but its still so hard to put the blade down."
Rohan didn't have children but he was currently courting a local lass and one day probably would help add more Hancócs to the sect. And he had taken care of many younger cousins growing up, as well as the occasional pair of little feet that went sprinting about Dún Másc as the sect took care of its own as one big community family. So he knew well the look in her eyes.
The look of a child who didn't know how to let go.
Marie Smith was no child but Rohan's voice was as gentle as it was when he was speaking to one as he said, "Duty and loyalty to ones family should never be forced. If you want to fly, Marie, then fly. Do not let the trappings of the past hold you down."
Her lower lips trembled slightly and she murmured, "I was only ever made to be a weapon."
Walking slowly around the table, he gently took her hands in his, holding them as if they were the delicate birds that he sometimes bandaged the wings of. Her eyes were wide as she looked up at him and Rohan firmly stated, "Weapons are forged in steel and iron, Marie, and you are neither." Reaching to a leather pouch on his best, he pulled out a sack of coin that was supposed to go towards a gift for his lady but this...this was a nobler cause.
"I..."
"Please," he interrupted before she could finish her protest, "take it. Safety in our oath also includes making sure that you have the means to survive from hereon out."
She managed to quirk an eyebrow at him and mused, "I'm fairly certain your cousin would disagree."
Rohan grinned and replied, "Well, my cousin isn't here to tell me that I'm interpreting things wrong, so he can't exactly tell me no." He folded her hands over the pouch and held them there, looking down at her with a soft smile. "I don't know anything about starting life anew but I know about taking risks. And a woman as bold as you should have no fear for where you will land."
Marie smiled up at him and nodded before saying, "Thank you, Rohan Hancóc, for this kindness."
"It's not a kindness," he reminded as he released her hands. "Merely what my oath demands. Ask and I will help you in any way that I can, Marie Smith. Now or in the future."
"I'm going to hold you to that," she said, tucking the pouch of coin brazenly away between her breasts above her corset. "But hopefully I never have to come calling in that favor."
Nodding, Rohan agreed, "I hope so as well, Marie. Be safe."
"You as well, Rohan," Marie said with a smile as she turned and left, leaving the last of her life as a hunter besides her own blood on the oak table behind him.
Timeframe: 1638
Location: County Laois, Ireland
Event: Marie Smith, newly fled to Ireland from her home of England after her deal with Ebio, travels to the home of the Hancóc witches allied with her clan to hopefully make a deal with them. Despite his reservations, Tirlagh Hancóc makes an oath to her that she and any children she has will be protected.
Consquences: The deal made between Tirlagh Hancóc and Marie Smith leads to the split of the Hancóc sect, between those who choose to honor the oath and those who don't. Rohan Hancóc makes his own promises to Marie Smith that will later come back to haunt him and gives her a portion of coin in order to help her survive in her first steps of her new life.
Marie Ó Conaill was the kind wife of farmer Uilliam Ó Conaill, known as little more than an English woman who separated the man from his family when he married her. Before coming to Ireland in 1638, however, she was Marie Smith of the Smith Clan and made a bargain with the vampire Ebio to escape from her life. She sacrificed herself to save her sons Darragh and Daman in 1653 when vampire Cael Ward found her...but also doomed her unborn daughter, Niamh, to a half-cursed life.
As the only other person present when Marie Smith came begging for Tirlagh Hancóc's aid, he was the first person she came to. Covered in blood and slowly dying, she begged him to save her daughter even if she was blood cursed. That her baby girl deserved to live. With a young son of his own, he swore that he could protect the girl with his life...and he also was the one who burned Marie Smith's body to ash at her request as she lay dying with her own knife in her heart.
Rohan Hancóc's cousin through Gréagóir Hancóc, the previous leader of the sect, he was voted into the position a year before Marie Smith arrived in Ireland in 1638. By 1646, he became the leader of only half the sect, remaining loyal to his oath to Marie Smith despite despising what had become of the sect thanks to her. When she appeared, bloodied and tainted by Cael Ward's blood, he proclaimed that taking in her daughter was the only payment she would receive in response to the oath they swore and would leave her sons exposed to whatever might come for them. When Ebio took Darragh Ó Conaill, he regretted the decision but knew there was nothing to be done at that point.
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