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known Nuala from the moment that she was born, the only baby to survive from Malachy’s first wife, the beautiful Mór, who had struggled with ill-health for years and eventually died from a lump in her breast. Mór had been the dearest friend that Mara had known and, for her sake initially, she cherished the daughter. Love for the intelligent, determined, passionate Nuala had grown, though, and now she was as dear to Mara as her own daughter, Sorcha.
    ‘Am I going to be a suspect?’ As usual Nuala was direct and uncompromising.
    ‘No, of course not,’ said Mara hastily.
    A wry smile twisted Nuala’s mouth and for a moment tears softened the direct look from her dark brown eyes.
    ‘Why not? I quarrelled with him. He tried to take my inheritance away from me. He banned me from his house. Replaced me with the sons of that woman that he married. He tried to deny me the possibility of being a physician when everyone knows that it was my dream since I was a child.’ Nuala enumerated the facts in a dry, hard tone and then dashed the tears impatiently from her eyes. Her tanned skin had a faintly sickly tinge and her eyes were deeply shadowed. ‘And I hated him,’ she finished, staring desolately out of the window towards the distant blue terraces of Mullaghmore mountain.
    ‘And you loved him,’ said Mara softly, and when Nuala said nothing, she stretched out and took the girl’s cold hand within her own two.
    ‘You’ve said all this to me, now,’ she said firmly. ‘You’ve said it to me, Mara, friend of your mother and cousin to your father. What do you say to me, Mara, Brehon of the Burren?’
    Nuala pulled her hand away and walked to the window. She stood there for a minute and then came back. The tears were gone now, but her brown eyes were wary.
    ‘What can I say?’ she demanded angrily. ‘I suppose that I should say that I had nothing to do with this death, and that I ask you to investigate the murder of my father and to bring the culprit to justice in front of the people of the Burren at the judgement place at Poulnabrone. That’s what you want me to say, isn’t it? But will I be believed? Do what you are supposed to do, but don’t ask me to help you.’
    Nuala’s voice rang out and Mara put a hasty finger to her lips, however, her eyes went not to the sleeping baby, but to the open window. Voices could be heard and heavy footsteps echoed from the paved path outside.
    ‘That’s enough, Nuala,’ she said softly, but with a note of authority in her voice, ‘go now, but ask Brigid to fetch the baby before she shows Fergus up here.’
    It wasn’t just Fergus, though. Brigid had barely removed the baby when the footsteps sounded on the staircase. Mara shut her eyes and groaned softly as the voices floated upwards. Siobhan, Fergus’s wife, a woman of unsurpassing dullness, was on her way up, also. Her voice, with pauses to recover from the steepness of the stairs, was as loud as always.
    ‘Poor thing . . . what I always say is . . . no life for a woman . . . and the king, too . . . of course, he is always away . . . these terrible battles . . .’
    And then there was a silence. Mara grinned reluctantly. Fergus, no doubt feeling embarrassed, poor man, had probably put a finger to his lips. Then her eyes sharpened. Someone else was coming up the stairs behind the MacClancy couple – a heavy footfall. Odd. Who could it be?
    ‘Ah, Mara. Good to see you looking so well.’ Fergus’s over-hearty greeting immediately convinced Mara that she was looking terrible. She sat up a bit straighter and wished that she felt able to get out of bed and be her normal self.
    ‘But where is the darling little baby?’ Siobhan looked all around the room as if expecting to see an infant concealed under some piece of furniture.
    Mara didn’t answer – her eyes were fixed on the man who had followed Fergus into her bedroom. He was of squat stature, quite young, but with a huge stomach, imperfectly