Mikantor began to believe they could actually bring it off as the tree allowed them to put some of their weight on the rope instead of having to support it against the current. The stranded travelers were working their way down through the tangled trunks. One by one they reached their rescuers, who braced themselves against the current and passed them along the upstream side of the rope to the other side. Eight men in all were saved. Three had been carried away earlier, and during the rescue a fourth lost his grip and was washed away.
It was not until morning that Mikantor learned that one of the survivors was Tanecar, son of the Ai-Ushen queen and King Eltan’s nephew and heir.
“IF YOU KNEW WHO I was, would you have gone in the river to help me?”
Mikantor considered the young man who had hunkered down beside him, cradling a beaker of steaming tea. Tanecar looked to be a few years younger than himself, shorter, but sturdily built, with a shock of dark brown hair.
“If I had known that this morning I was going to feel like a clout that the laundress has been beating against rocks in the stream, I would not have left this fire,” he replied.
“Prince of the Ai-Zir, that does not answer my question . . .” Tanecar smiled carefully. At some point he had hit his head against a tree and the side of his face was bruised.
Mikantor sighed. “I knew you were Ai-Ushen, but you looked pretty pitiful, hanging on to those trees. I would not leave any man to drown.”
“My uncle was Galid’s ally . . .” The Ai-Ushen prince sipped some tea and set the beaker down. “But my mother says it is time for that to end. She says that the other tribes have turned against us because of him.”
“Your mother is a wise woman . . .” With an effort, Mikantor kept his tone even.
“I was on my way to visit Pelicar’s people in hopes of a marriage alliance,” Tanecar went on. “That’s off for now, of course—all the gifts were lost in the stream. I’ll have to go back home once the floods go down. Come with me, Mikantor. I think it is time for the Wolf and the Bull to be friends.”
“I am not the Bull of the Ai-Zir,” Mikantor said soberly. “That title belongs to whoever my cousin, if she ever has her rights, may choose. I started out to bring Galid to justice, but now—I have run with the deer, if that means anything to you . . .”
“I had heard a rumor of it.” Tanecar drank again. “Perhaps you are meant to be a Defender, such as we hear of in the old tales, who in times of danger unites the tribes. This is a matter for the queens to decide.”
“Will he be safe?” asked Pelicar, who had joined them when he heard his name.
“I owe him a life,” said the queen’s son. “Mine will be his surety.”
THE SCENT OF THE boar, pit-roasted since early morning, mingled pleasantly with the resinous smoke of the fire. Tirilan took a bite of the generous slice on her wooden platter, blessing the hospitality that had seated her beside the Ai-Ushen queen. The beast was still lean from the winter, but they had packed it with herbs while it was roasting, and she had not tasted anything so good for a long time.
Ketaneket was a solid woman in her middle years, silver threading the hair that had once been the same seal brown as that of her son. Her daughter Tamar, who sat on Tirilan’s other side, was enough like him to be a twin. The queen’s household were behind them. Among them Tirilan recognized Saarin, the Sacred Sister who served the Ai-Ushen, but she had not yet had a chance to speak with her.
Certainly Tirilan could not complain of their welcome. The storms that had led to their meeting with Tanecar had finally passed, and the feast had been spread in a clearing surrounded by pine trees. Their sharply etched needles framed a sky whose fiery glow was just now giving way to a luminous blue. Perhaps this year would have a summer after all.
Mikantor, his lynx skin draped across his broad shoulders, sat with the men on the other side of the fire with his Companions behind him, except for Ulansi, who had been left at Three Alders with the excuse that someone had to stay with Tegues. The truth, of course, was that the Ai-Zir warrior could not be trusted to control his desire for revenge. There were many like him. The Wolves of Ushan had raided widely, and now that they wanted peace—if indeed they did—they could hardly expect the other tribes to welcome them with open arms.
A rumble of drums brought everyone upright as a dozen young warriors danced into the space between the men’s and women’s sides of the fire. They wore only loincloths and the skins of wolves, forelegs crossed over their chests and snarling heads drawn over their own. From their hands came the brown flash of knives. In a whirl of feigned attack and retreat they danced, adding their own howls to the music.
Was it their land that made them so fierce? The moors of Utun had been high and rugged, but Ushan was a country where rearing mountains brooded above deeply cut valleys. Forests clung to the slopes, and men carved out holdings wherever there was a little level ground. The mountain pastures and cold winters made it a good country for sheep. As evening cooled the air, Tirilan was grateful for the mantle of woad-dyed wool the queen had given her.
Mikantor watched the dancers as if he were evaluating them for a place in his band. That might even be true. He sat next to Tanecar, who himself had the place of honor next to the king. Eltan was not much like Ketaneket, being lean as an old wolf himself, his hair silver gray. It was said that they had different fathers. But whatever King Eltan might do on the war trail, he apparently deferred to his sister on their home ground.
“You are Mikantor’s cousin, they say,” said Tamar when the dancers had gone. As the member of the queen’s family closest in age, she seemed to have been assigned to question Tirilan. Or perhaps she was simply curious.
“My mother and his were cousins,” answered Tirilan. She did not feel quite ready to explain what else she was to Mikantor. When they arrived she had not objected when they gave her a bed in the Women’s House, but that might have happened even if she had arrived as his wife. “We grew up together at Avalon.”
“Then he must be like your brother!” the girl said brightly. Tirilan suppressed a glare. Could Tamar possibly be as ingenuous as she seemed? “He is very handsome.”
“Yes, he is . . .” Tirilan agreed. Royal women had a great deal of freedom in the tribes, but she doubted the girl would be allowed to sleep with a guest whose status was still uncertain. If they made a formal alliance, it might be a different story.
But for now, Tamar’s interest seemed no more than that of any young girl introduced to a handsome stranger. It was her brother who appeared to have fallen in love with Mikantor in the way of a boy for a slightly older man. His head was close to Mikantor’s now, eyes alight as he pointed to one of the warriors or whispered a comment that sparked Mikantor’s swift smile.
“He does not yet have a wife?” asked Tamar.
“He does not yet have a home!” she snapped. “Time enough to think of marriage when he has dealt with Galid,” she added more gently.
So far no one had questioned her presence with Mikantor’s band. Priestesses of Avalon, like the Sacred Sisters who served the tribes, traveled freely throughout the land. His men, whom she had healed and fed, whose clothing she had mended and whose troubles she had heard, honored her for her own sake. But she was beginning to feel the need for some more formal recognition of her relationship to Mikantor, whatever that might be. The role of wife did not quite seem to describe what she had become.
“I suppose that must be so. Perhaps they will arrange something for him at the festival . . . At Midsummer,” added Tamar in response to Tirilan’s questioning look, “when the queens meet at Carn Ava.”
Tirilan nodded. With so much rain, she had forgotten that the season was advancing. The Lady of Avalon attended every year, and she had gone with her mother several times when she was younger. It was a time of truce, and a time to make alliances.
“Will you be there this year?”
“Oh yes . . .” answered Tirilan. Mikantor must go to seek support against Galid, and she m
ust fight for her right to stay with him.
“THERE—” VELANTOS POINTED TO the excavation they had made in the packed dirt floor of his new smithy. “Put the stone next to the hearth.”
Grebe nodded and said something in the old dialect to the other men. Mikantor’s foster brother had been at the Lake Village, recovering from his wounds, when the smith had sent to ask for help in moving. He had organized everything, including the building of a new smithy. Only a moon had passed, but once the rain stopped the work had gone swiftly, and the mud plaster and limewash were drying on the interlacing of willow that made up the walls. Only the roof remained to build. Beyond the walls the beech trees whispered in the breeze.
Velantos took a deep breath, smelling dust and ripening grass from the downs beyond the grove. Through the open door he could see the great stones that fronted the old tomb near the White Horse. The downs were farther than he had expected to go, but when the elders suggested he build his smithy there, he had that sense of rightness that comes when the hammer hits true. They believed that the lightning stroke he had survived was a mark of favor from the gods, and the place where that happened clearly held power. Perhaps they were right, for the gods knew he needed help. The elder folk had given him the metal, but the one thing he needed most—the knowledge of how to craft it—they could not supply.
He turned at the sound of something very heavy being dragged across the ground. Half his height, the sarsen the men had on the ropes might once have been part of the tomb, but over the centuries it had rolled aside, and it was just the right shape for an anvil. If the ancestors approved him, surely they would not mind if he made use of one of their stones. Aelfrix and the other boys ran ahead of them, laying down dry grass over which the stone would slide smoothly until they heaved it upright and tipped it into the hole.
“Thank you!” he exclaimed, bending a little to pass his hands across the flat top. “This does very well indeed! Rest now, friends, and have some ale!”
His gut knotted with the knowledge that soon the smithy would be ready, and he would have to begin work on the metal shards. Before they exploded under his hammer the fire had changed them. The surfaces were smoother now, and in the broken edges he could see layering. He knew that he must somehow meld them together. But how much should he heat the iron? How hard should he make each blow?
Frowning, he sat down on the stone, staring unseeing at the rectangular hearth, long enough to hold a sword. The rim had been built up with boulders and clay. The charcoal to fill it was coming soon.
“Tomorrow we bring thatching and give you a roof against the rain, and put the hides beneath, so your sparks will not set it on fire—” Grebe smiled. The past few days had been fair, almost warm enough for comfort, but that would not last.
When he had installed his image of the Lady of the Forge in her niche, he would make her an offering and ask for inspiration. He had some bronze with him. Perhaps he could hammer out plates to armor a leather sark for Mikantor while he waited for the goddess to tell him what to do.
TWENTY-THREE
The stepped cone of the Wombhill rose white above the green grass as if one of the great clouds that still hung above the ho rizon had settled there. But beyond a few sprinkles that morning there had been no rain today. It was a good omen, thought Anderle. The surviving emmer wheat and barley were forming heads. If the Goddess was good to them, there would be no more floods until after the harvest, but even so it would be another lean year.
She cast an experienced glance over the women who had gathered on the green. Between them and the Henge of Carn Ava sprouted a flock of tents and bothies, their inhabitants clamorous as the waterfowl that covered the Lake each spring—but not as numerous. Once this had been a time of bountiful feasting, but in recent years the Midsummer Festival had grown smaller. No one could afford to feed a large gathering. A few more years of this and the system would break down entirely. Something had to be done.
Still, all the queens and clanmothers who were expected had arrived, even Ketaneket of the Ai-Ushen and her daughter Tamar. They must have come in the night before. Anderle nodded to the other priestesses and they took their places at the head of the procession. To the soft beat of the drums and the hiss of rattles they began to move. Soon the Wombhill rose before them, the chalk surface dazzling white in the light of noon. The drums fell silent as they moved sunwise to circle the mound. Anderle lifted her hands.
“We salute you, Great Mother, and ask Your blessings. Renew Your promise that life will go on. Grant us sunshine to ripen the grain. Keep our beasts and our babies healthy. And grant that our quarrels be no more than the spats of children—” Her voice strengthened at the murmur of agreement behind her.
She stepped aside and one by one the seven priestesses ascended the steps that made a winding path up the mound to lay their offerings at its summit. When the last of the Sacred Sisters had completed her task and returned, they turned to face the assembly.
“Children of the Goddess, hear Her promise—” she cried. As the priestesses joined hands she could feel the energy of the mound behind her as a child feels the protecting presence of her mother. She took a deep breath, letting awareness of the Lady of Avalon flow out and the Lady of Life flow in, sharing it with the others through their linked hands, for here at the mound the power was too great to be borne by any single soul.
“Listen, my children, to the promise I give you; hear, oh my beloved, the words that I say.” Eight voices resonated as one. “I see you more clearly than you can see yourselves, and I chastise your evils only that your good may grow. Know that there is nothing but your own wills that can separate you from My love, and even when you turn from Me, I sustain you still.”
Ni-Terat, bountiful Mother, hear us, called that part of her awareness that still belonged to Anderle. A multitude of faces glimmered before her like light on water; her ears sang with myriad names. Each one was different, and yet they all were One, as she and the Sacred Sisters and the women they were blessing were once individuals and components of a greater identity. Their linked hands lifted as the words of the promise rolled forth once more.
“Come to Me all you who are hungry and I will feed you from My own flesh, for My body is eternal. Come to Me all you who are thirsty and I will nurse you at My own breasts, for they are never dry. As you have brought these offerings to Me, so I give Myself to you. You have turned to Me at last, and behold, I welcome you to My arms.”
Power surged through their linked hands, burst free, and blazed outward to bless those who waited, and through them, outward through the land.
And then it was done.
Anderle swayed as the power departed and she was only herself once more. I hope they remember. If the queens and clanmothers could reach agreement, the men who were spending this day testing their strength against each other in warrior games would have to listen. And Velantos would have time to forge the iron sword. Her task now was to make sure that when Mikantor had a weapon that would command the respect of the warriors, the men would follow him.
As if the thought had evoked its own answer, Ellet fell into step beside her. “My lady, Mikantor is here! He and his band rode in with the Ai-Ushen!”
Anderle stopped short, staring. The last she heard, the boy had been on his way to Ilifen. How in the Lady’s sweet name had he pulled off this miracle? And if Mikantor was here . . . She turned, seeking the Ai-Ushen group amid the crowd, and saw among the dark heads the bright hair of her daughter, Tirilan.
SUNSET HAD KINDLED FESTIVAL fires among the clouds, outshining the bonfires on the earth below. The ruddy light reddened Mikantor’s hair and warmed the faces of his men, squatting by the Ai-Zir bonfire in attitudes of conscious relaxation. As Tirilan followed him into the queen’s tent, she blessed them with her best smile. The festival was under truce-bond, so they should have been safe even if Galid’s men had been there. But Galid never attended the festival. Beneath the banner of the Bull, Queen Cimara offered a meager hospitali
ty to the clanmothers who had joined her here while most of their sons and husbands prudently stayed home.
As Mikantor looked from one to another of the women who awaited him, Tirilan realized that he had never seen the queen before. She eased past him and bent before a faded woman who looked nearly Anderle’s age in a headdress of amber beads with lappets hanging to either side.
“Mother of Azan, we greet you. May your way be blessed—”
“That is a hope I lost years ago,” said Cimara, “but you are kind to say so. I welcome you to my fire. . . .”
“Hope is what I have come to discuss with you,” came Mikantor’s deep voice as he eased down beside Tirilan.
For a moment the queen looked at him with tired eyes. “Hope is a luxury. I am content to survive.”
“And your people?” Tirilan found herself speaking more sharply than she had intended.
“They too. Time will pass, and one day we will all die whatever we do.”
“Then you will die without having truly lived, and leave nothing behind you!” exclaimed Mikantor.
“That is a choice you can make for yourself, but you are a queen.” Tirilan echoed him. “You have no right to doom your people.”
Cimara gave her a pitying smile. “When I was your age I believed as you do. But I saw my mother’s life worn away by long years as a captive. I saw men killed for loving me. I perform the ceremonies, but I am a barren stock. My household has one small farm for its support. Galid does not quite dare to kill me, and I have refused to give him the name of king. That is the best I can do. Do not ask me to make you my king. He will kill you.”