Hermes came back to himself choking on the smell of damp hay and horse dung.
And water. Cold water. Very cold water.
"Éirigh!" A voice snapped above him, sharp as the crack of a whip.
Something metallic clanged against the wooden stall post beside his head, and Hermes flinched instinctively, still clenching his glutes from Dante’s ridiculous last instruction.
When he opened his eyes, a bucket clattered to the floor and a woman was standing over him...
A sturdy maid with wind-chapped cheeks, her hair tucked into a linen coif. She held the handle like a weapon, one brow arched in suspicion.
She was speaking in a language he didn’t recognize—except...
Every word landed in his brain as if it had always been there. Early Middle Irish, rolling and rough at the edges, but as natural as breathing.
He knew her name. Sorcha. He knew because Heimon mac Cuan knew.
It took Hermes a moment to place the year—not from Dante’s muttered instructions, but from the rush of borrowed memories flooding in from Heimon mac Cuan.
In modern terms, this was 870 AD, the very heart of Áed Findliath’s reign.
The High King’s seat lay in Ailech, a fortress-crowned hill in the north of what would one day be called County Donegal. The air here always tasted faintly of salt from the western sea, and the talk in the halls was rarely of peace.
For years now, the northern coast had been raided by the Lochlannach.
The sea-roving Vikings—forcing the king’s men to sharpen their swords and sleep with one eye open.
The memories came like an untied rope, uncoiling fast. He and his twin brother, Ailbe, found half-starved in the woods at the age of eight after raiders had burned their village.
An old advisor to High King Áed Findliath had taken them in, clothed them, and set them to work among the castle’s outer staff. Not trusted enough to live inside the walls, but too useful to cast out.
And now, apparently, it was their duty to care for the king’s horses.
Heimon sat up, blinking the sleep from his eyes. Across the stable, Ailbe—Apple—was already awake, methodically pitchforking hay into a stall like it was a calculated experiment.
Sorcha barked something else in Middle Irish and stomped away toward the feed troughs.
Hermes—or Heimon—wiped water from his face and trudged over to his twin. His mannerisms and way of speaking was that of someone born in this time, but his memories and anger was still of his time.
"Sure ye could’ve given me a shake, now, couldn’t ye?"
Ailbe didn’t look at him. "Ah, ye looked comfortable, so ye did."
Hermes grabbed a pitchfork from the wall. "You do realize," he said, lowering his voice, "I’ve not forgiven ye yet for what ye pulled on Somner."
The rhythmic scrape of the fork paused.
"I mean it, Apple." Hermes said, forcing the old name back into his voice. "Swear to me ye won’t try somethin’ like that again, or I might have to put ye in the ground."
Apple finally glanced at him, a faint, amused glint in his mismatched eyes.
"Funny, that. If ye remember, I’ve the stronger Sirentone. Strong enough to drag the dead back to the livin’. So who’s buryin’ who, brother?"
Hermes jabbed the fork into the hay, irritation simmering. "Sirentone doesn’t work on someone who already has it, and ye know it."
Apple’s smirk widened. "Who said I would use it on you, brother?"
He tipped his chin toward the far end of the stable, where someone was sitting cross-legged on an overturned feed bucket, scribbling in a leather-bound booklet.
Or rather, Aifric ingen Donnchadha. A name soft and lilting, as befitted a child who, even in this time, was mistaken for a girl.
Born to parchment merchants in a bustling trade quarter, kept mostly indoors because his parents feared the cruel whispers of neighbors who thought his ambiguous features a sign of ill luck.
Just like in the present, Aifric avoided the noise of the world, preferring to bury himself in ink, verse, and paper. Now he was writing in a neat, looping script, a reed pen scratching quietly against the page.
Aifric looked up and waved shyly. "Do either of you know where Somhairle is?"
Hermes knew instantly.
Somhairle mac Domhnaill—blond hair, green eyes, the son of a respected warrior.
The memories from Heimon’s life made it easy to place him. Somhairle would be in the barracks, preparing with his father for the possibility of another Viking raid on the coast.
The morning passed in a blur of chores.
Shoveling muck, hauling water from the well, brushing down the king’s prized warhorses until their coats shone in the watery light spilling through the stable slats. The air was cold and damp, carrying the distant clang of practice swords from the yard beyond the outer wall.
By the time they finished, Hermes led Apple and Aphrodite across the muddy bailey toward the barracks.
The timber building stood low and solid, smelling of smoke, leather, and sweat.
Inside, men were oiling spears, checking mail shirts for rust, and arguing in quick bursts of commoner Irish that Hermes found a bit hard to understand, since he was raised around nobles. The slangs were truly something else.
And there, across the room... was Somhairle.
The boy spotted them instantly and bounded over, a grin growing on his face.
Before Hermes could brace himself, Somhairle leapt forward, arms locking tight around his neck.
"Ah, I’ve missed ye somethin’ fierce, Master!" He said in flawless Middle Irish.
Hermes’s face flushed. "Somhairle, people are watchin’—"
"Let them look, so." Somhairle said, squeezing harder.
Hermes pried at his arms, muttering, "Glad yo’re not mistakin’ Apple for me this time."
Somhairle stepped back just enough to glance over at Ailbe. "Easy job, that. I just look for the strange eyes. Makes it simple, doesn’t it?"
Apple raised an unimpressed brow.
Hermes straightened his tunic and lowered his voice. "D’you know where the Siren Knight is?"
Somhairle’s grin turned sly. "Oh, you’ll , so, you will."
He turned, gesturing toward a figure at the far end of the barracks. A massive knight, muscles straining under a padded gambeson, hair shorn close, face set in grim focus as he checked his sword belt.
"That’s him?" Apple asked flatly.
Somhairle laughed. "No, no. That’s Dubhán. The smith’s lad."
He pointed instead at a much smaller figure sitting cross-legged on a low bench. The boy couldn’t have been older than 21, maybe 23 at most. Slim, almost delicate, with hair the color of pale wheat and eyes so green they caught the torchlight.
He was adjusting the straps of his leather vambraces with the care of someone new to the weight of armor.
"That," Somhairle said with relish, "is Fionnghlas mac Niall. Glasán, they call him. Little green. My great great great great... ah, ye know the way of it."
Hermes stared. "That’s... the Siren Knight?"
Somhairle’s grin widened. "Soon enough, sure."