A Game of Sorrows by S. G. MacLean

begin to break and crumble: the barriers erected by the cold heart of my grandmother; by the priests and the beads and the incense and the oils; by the Irish tongue I tripped and stumbled over; by the sea separating me from all I had ever cared about. For here was my family, the only blood relations who remained to me in this world, and I knew in that moment that what they wanted me to do for them, that would I do.
    ‘Did I not tell you then?’ Sean’s voice was warm and happy.
    The girl continued to gaze at me, as if she could not believe what was in front of her eyes. ‘I could not have … I would not have …’ And then she smiled, a smile that reached out and held me, and sent warmth to every part of me. She took my face in her hands and was gazing up into my eyes with love that lighted the room. ‘Alexander. I could not have believed it. Alexander.’
    I could find no words, and stood there as one struck dumb, until a mighty slap on the shoulder from Sean brought me to my senses.
    ‘Do not tell me you don’t know your cousin, man. All I have heard since the day she was born is how like your mother she is.’
    ‘Yes,’ I said, stuttering a little, ‘yes … she is.’
    ‘Then I am glad,’ the girl said, ‘for you will have to love me now.’
    ‘You must never doubt that,’ I said. And I knew it was the truth.
    She searched my face as if seeking out the differences between myself and her brother. Each feature was studied, memorised.
    ‘It will take some of the pressure off me, I don’t mind telling you,’ said Sean. ‘He is not so handsome, of course, and his manners are utterly beyond redemption, but no doubt the ladies of Carrickfergus will not be altogether disappointed when they eventually lay eyes on him.’
    Deirdre gave her brother a withering look. ‘Are there ladies left in Carrickfergus? I am glad to hear it. You have surely been occupied elsewhere this last while, Sean. What ladies there are will not be allowed within a hundred yards of you, Alexander, if their fathers have any say in it. He ruins the family name nigh on every week.’
    Sean laughed. ‘Did I not tell you she was a shrew, Alexander?’
    ‘You said nothing of the kind, and I would not have believed you in any case. Deirdre, I am glad to see you at last.’
    ‘And I you. You cannot know the blessing it is to us that our grandfather lived to see you.’
    ‘I would have liked to have longer.’
    ‘You must not grieve over what has passed and cannot be changed. The sight of you will have healed a wound he carried with him thirty years.’
    We were all three silent a moment, before Sean spoke. ‘And yet we should not be sad, we three. He would not wish us sad. We are his legacy, and let it not be one of sadness; this is a joyful moment.’ He looked around him. ‘I suppose it would be too much to hope that Boyd keeps a drink in this room?’
    ‘I have never seen it if he does.’
    ‘All that Protestant discipline of his. It cannot be good for a man.’
    ‘You think your Catholic indiscipline keeps you in better health?’ Deirdre’s tone was severe, but her eyes were laughing.
    ‘I will go to my grave having known what it was to live.’
    It was as if a cold breeze had travelled through the room.
    ‘Please do not speak of it, Sean. You must take greater care.’
     
    His face became tender. ‘I take care where I must, little sister. You should not give so much credence to poets and their curses.’
    ‘And what of men and their muskets?’ she asked.
    ‘You know about that?’
    ‘The whole of the North knows about that, Sean. By the time the rumours of it reached Coleraine the tale was of twenty men with muskets, and that only some bewitchment, some pact with the fairy folk, kept you and your horse from death at the foot of the cliff.’
    ‘And do not tell me you believed any of this, you who laughed in the face of tales that sent me to my childhood bed in terror?’
    ‘Sean, I could sit here a month and still not