The Forest House (52 page)

He was not yet beaten. One way or another, he would have Senara, and he would have the boy, though all the Legions of Rome and warriors of the tribes stood between.

 

Eilan spent the days after Gaius's visit in seclusion. The priestesses thought that she was grieving for her grandfather, but although his death had left her shocked and startled, relief rather had predominated. Her reaction to Gaius, however, was another matter entirely. She herself had been as surprised by her own fury as he was. She had not realized how much she had resented his abandonment all these years. It was true that she had agreed to it, but surely he could have tried to contact her before now! How dared he think that he could walk in without a word of love and take her child away…

When her thoughts reached this point she would have to stop herself, walk a little or spend some time in the disciplined meditation Caillean had taught her, and try to recover her serenity. It was several days before she began seriously to consider what he had said to her. Who, indeed, would now feel himself privileged to instruct her in what she was to say in the name of the Goddess? The last she had heard, the Druids were still arguing. By now it had become clear that a new Arch-Druid would not be chosen until after Lughnasad, so she need not worry about preparing for the festival. But by Samaine, the new leader would be firmly seated in his power. And if it were someone like her father, he would demand that the Goddess call the tribes to war.

When Dieda returned to the Forest House and came to see her, Eilan found her own offers of sympathy quickly shrugged off.

“Ardanos is no loss,” said her kinswoman callously. “My father was always in the hands of the Romans. I wonder who will give the orders to the Oracle now?”

Ever since Gawen's birth, Eilan had felt constrained in Dieda's presence. Still, it seemed impossible she should have no feeling whatever for her own father. Eilan missed Caillean, who might have been able to make some sense out of all this, more with every passing day.

Dieda was still with her when one of the girls came in to tell them that Cynric had come.
So the Ravens are gathering,
Eilan thought grimly, but she greeted Cynric kindly as a kinsman when Huw brought him in. He looked older than his years, she thought painfully, shaggy as a mountain pony, his fine skin marred by old scars.

“What are you doing in this part of the country? I thought you safely away to the North, after things went wrong with Brigitta and the Demetae.”

“Oh, I can come and go as I please,” he said, “even under the Commander's nose. I am too clever for them.” He spoke with a kind of brittle gaiety she found disturbing.

“The proudest beast is soonest taken in the snare of the hunter,” murmured Dieda sardonically. She pretended to care nothing for Cynric, but Eilan thought she was not so indifferent as she seemed.

Cynric shrugged. “I might well think some god favors me more than common; it is true that I seem to bear a charmed life. I think I could go into Londinium and pull the Governor's beard.”

“I would not try it, if I were you,” Dieda said, and he returned her laughter.

“I do not intend to try it at this moment; in another month or two it may be a very different matter. I do not grieve at Ardanos's death; nor should you, Eilan. He was all too eager to have all things ordered as he chose.”

“He was indeed,” she said honestly, though her blood ran cold as she connected what Gaius had told her with Cynric's words.

“Good; you are honest so far,” he said. “I wonder, foster sister, how far your honesty goes.”

She said warily, “I, at least, know what I want.”

“Do you? And what is that, Eilan?”

“Peace!”
So that my son can grow to be a man,
she thought grimly. But there was no way she could say that to Cynric. Ardanos had blighted her own happiness, and that of Cynric and Dieda as well, but at least in the West, the tribes had been at peace for a dozen years.

Cynric grimaced. “Peace—women think too much of it,” he snorted. “You sound like Macellius's mouthpiece, as I sometimes thought old Ardanos was. But he is gone. Now we may have a chance to drive out these Romans. Brigitta waits, knowing what we want of her.”

“I should think Brigitta had seen enough of war,” Eilan said.

“Say rather that she has seen enough of Roman justice,” Cynric said bitterly. “But there are strange rumors going about these days. If the Romans do fight each other, perhaps we can free ourselves of what they call justice. Then every Roman home shall be laid waste as was the home of Bendeigid!”

Eilan interrupted. “Have you forgotten it was not the Romans who leveled the home of my father and killed my mother, but the Hibernians and the wild tribesmen of the North? The Romans themselves punished them.”

“For our own homes, who but we should be responsible?” asked Cynric. “It is for us to punish or to spare as we see fit. Are we to accept all this like tame dogs, and let the Romans determine whom we should fight and where?” An angry flush was building beneath the weathered skin.

Eilan said stubbornly, “However it comes, peace is a good thing.”

“So you will still speak the traitorous words of Ardanos? Or are they the words of Macellius, or perhaps of his handsome son?” he asked, sneering.

Behind him the giant bodyguard shifted weight uneasily. Eilan hardly noticed, she was so distressed. “At least Macellius has the good of both our peoples at heart.”

“And I do not?” Cynric demanded, his eyes flashing.

“I did not say that, or anything like to it.”

“But that is what you meant,” he threw back at her. “I know Macellius's cub came here. What did he say to you? With you in the high seat, it seems we hardly need the Romans. But we shall hear such traitorous counsels no longer. Bendeigid has been chosen as Arch-Druid—that is what I came to tell you—and he will give you a very different set of instructions at the next festival!”

Dieda was looking from one to the other, her face flaming. Eilan strove for calm, knowing that Cynric was simply trying to hurt her.

“It is true that Ardanos told me what he wanted and interpreted the Oracle's answers. But what the Goddess says while I am in trance is not my doing. I do not declare my own will, Cynric,” she said quietly.

“Are you trying to tell me the Goddess wishes for this treason?”

“Why should She not?” shouted Eilan. “She is a mother.”
As I am.
Eilan swallowed the words, and added angrily, “You have no right to speak so to me!”

“I am the vengeance of the Goddess,” snapped Cynric, “and I speak as I will—and punish—”

Before Eilan could react, his lifted hand had connected with her cheek. She cried out, and Dieda exclaimed in shock, “How dare you?”

“Cathubodva knows I dare deal this way with all Romanized traitors!”

A shadow loomed behind him. Still glaring, Cynric started to turn. Huw's cudgel caught him in motion and his head exploded in a shower of blood and brains. Dieda screamed, and Eilan lifted her hand, but it was too late.

For a moment Cynric's body stood swaying, a surprised look on what was left of his face. Then his body understood its death at last and he crumpled to the floor.

Shaking, Eilan touched his wrist, knowing already, as the gush of blood from his head slowed, that she would find no pulse. She looked up at her guard, who was beginning to turn a little green as he stared at the blood.

“Huw—why did you do it? Why?”

“Lady…he
hit
you!”

Eilan bowed her head. Even if the offender had been Ardanos himself Huw would have struck him. He had been taught that the Priestess was inviolable. But Cynric's death would have to be concealed. His followers were not many, but they were desperate. If they decide to avenge him, the precarious unity she had built among her people would be shattered. Cynric dead might be more dangerous than he had ever been alive.

Dieda turned away, weeping. Eilan felt that she herself was beyond tears. “Go away, Huw,” she said tiredly. “Go tell Miellyn what has happened and ask her to send a message to the new Arch-Druid.”
My father
…she thought numbly, but she had no time now to consider the implications. “Speak to no others,” she instructed, “and when you have carried this message, forget what has happened here today.”

She got to her feet, feeling suddenly a hundred years old. “Dieda, come to the garden. There is nothing you can do for him now.” She went to comfort the weeping woman, but Dieda jerked away.

“Is it so you reward faithfulness to our people? Then have your tame bear kill me too.”

Eilan winced. “I tried to save him. I would have willingly given my own life—”

“Oh indeed, that's easy enough to say—” Dieda turned on her. “But you take lives, not give them. You fed on Caillean's wisdom, and sent her into exile when you had drained her dry. You stole my reputation, and walked away with your honor as bright as a newborn babe's. And now you have taken the life of the only man I ever loved! Your Roman was lucky to be rid of you! Eilan the inviolate! Lady High and Mighty! If only they knew!”

Eilan said wearily, “None of us held a sword to your throat to bid you take vows here, Dieda. When it was clear they had chosen me, you could have been released, and when you went to Eriu, no force was used to bid you return. I have said this before, but I suppose you could not hear.” She tried to speak calmly, but the other woman's words struck harder than Cynric's blow.

“I told you once to beware if ever you betrayed our people. Was Cynric right, Eilan? Have you been working for Rome all along?”

Eilan lifted her head and, trembling, stared into that other face, so like her own. “I swear…that I have served the Goddess as well as I could,” she said hoarsely, “and may the sky fall and cover me, the earth rise up to swallow me, if I lie.” She took a deep breath. “I am still High Priestess of Vernemeton. But you may go to Caillean, or wherever else you will, if you feel that you can no longer serve the Goddess in my company!”

Slowly Dieda began to shake her head, a sly expression that Eilan liked even less than her rage creeping into her eyes.

“I won't leave you,” she whispered. “I wouldn't leave now for the world. I want to be here when the Goddess strikes you down!”

 

Senara was already waiting outside the hut in the forest when Gaius arrived, her bright hair like a flame against the dark trees. “I see you have come,” he said softly.

Senara turned and, although she had expected him, gave a small startled cry. “Is it you?”

“No other,” he said, almost gaily, “in spite of the evil weather. I dare say we shall have rain, and that speedily.” He looked at the sky. “What, think you, would Father Petros say to lending the shelter of his roof to a couple of wayfarers?”

“For converts I think he would be delighted. I do not think he would do so to pagans,” she said reprovingly.

They moved inside together. The hermit's furnishings consisted of some dilapidated benches and, against the wall, a clumsy box bed. But where, this evening, was Father Petros? Outside the storm broke with a rattle of wind and a slam of rain. Gaius winced, listening to the thunder.

“You see, we made it here just in time,” he said.
“Bellissima!”

“You must not call me so,” she said timidly.

“No?” he queried, watching her carefully. “But I thought truth was one of your Christian virtues. The Stoics say so, and even among the Druids, I have heard, truth-telling is valued. Would you have me lie to you, then?”

“You know how to best me with words,” she said crossly. “We came here to speak of the state of your soul.”

“Ah, yes, a thing that I am not yet convinced I possess.”

She said, “I am no philosopher. But do not even the Stoics whom you have mentioned, speak of that part of a man which deals with the evidence of that which you can neither see nor feel?”

“They do; it is that which convinces me that of all women you are the most desirable.”

He knew that he was pushing the girl, but the storm, rather than relieving the tension, seemed to have filled him with its own intensity. He had spent the days since his meeting with Eilan in turmoil, alternately raging and in despair. He would have taken her away and done his duty by her, but she had denied him. Julia too had forfeited her claim to him. Surely he was free now to seek comfort elsewhere! And when he told Senara she was beautiful, he had not lied.

She blushed and said timidly, “It is not well done of you to speak so to me.”

“On the contrary, I think it is very well done, and you would have me speak the truth. And for what else were you created as a woman?”

Now she was on familiar ground, having listened to many catechumens. “Scripture tells us,” she replied, “that we were created for the purpose of giving worship to the Creator.”

“How dull for him,” Gaius answered. “If I were a god, I would ask more of men than that they should spend their leisure in worshipping me.”