The White Hart (The Book of Isle 1)

by Nancy Springer

  More than a fortnight after Bevan had gone, Ellid still lingered on the Downs with Eitha and Celonwy. A few of Dacaerin's retainers stayed to bring them meat, but all others had left. Kael had long since regretfully departed to his people in the far north, in company with the tribesmen of Romany. The Firthola had gone to their ships and the lords to their holdings. Young Dene had led away the remaining men of Wallyn. The birds sang through the days, but Ellid could not enjoy them. She had never felt so alone.

  Thus, on the day that Cuin cantered up from the west, she ran to greet him and kissed him joyfully, though she knew from his face that his news was bad. "What tidings?" she demanded as she released him.

  He spoke not to her but to her mother, who stood at her side. "My aunt, your husband is dead. I am sorry."

  "You have slain a dragon, you mean," Eitha replied harshly. "That is no cause for sorrow."

  "Nay, I slew him not. He had Hau Ferddas, and I could not stand against him." Cuin still faced his aunt. "Bevan overpowered him."

  "Then Bevan lives!" Ellid exclaimed thankfully.

  "Ay, but he is not well," Cuin would not meet her eyes.

  "Wounded? How?" She was frightened, not so much by his words as by his manner, for she had never known Cuin to speak to the ground.

  "Nay, not wounded," Cuin mumbled. "He is not well in heart."

  Ellid stared helplessly, and Celonwy grasped Cuin's arm. "Now tell me plainly what has chanced."

  Cuin met the deep-set eyes of this woman he had never seen before, and he knew at once that she would understand. "He sits by the sea."

  "Then we must go to him with all haste," said Celonwy.

  "Even so."

  They left with the morning's dawn. Frail as she looked, Celonwy would have nothing to do with the stuffy horse-litter. She mounted a steed lightly aside, letting her pearly skirts flow over her feet. Gladly Ellid did the same, ignoring the stares of the onlookers. Eitha said nothing, but waved a brave farewell. She was not coming; she would travel with retainers to her husband's estate. Only Cuin would go with the others to the bay where Bevan waited.

  Cuin led his party off with doubtful sighs. But he soon discovered that the women were good travelers. They forded the Gleaming River the first day and made the bay a week later. The sword still stood in its place on the beach, and Bevan waited beside it, gazing out to sea.

  "Bevan!" Ellid hailed him. All the harmony of youthful longing was in her voice.

  "Ellid," Bevan murmured as she sank down beside him. "How I have wronged you." But he scarcely turned to look at her; his eyes were on the waves.

  "Bevan," she asked him gently, "what is it that you see to delight you in that landless waste? It is a sight only of dread to me."

  "Waste?" Bevan smiled faintly, still gazing. "Look again, my lady." As he spoke, bubbles brightened the quiet waters of the bay and a sleek silver head broke the surface. Ellid gasped and jumped back from the shore; Cuin stiffened and stood his ground. But Bevan and Celonwy watched the sea-drake with smiling ease. Another joined the first; they stared at their leisure and then dove, putting up a rainbow spray fairer than the fountains of Eburacon.

  "The sea is a shining thing, yet vast and deep as the night," said Bevan in a low voice. "Worlds of marvel are hid on its reaches. The sea itself would be wonder enough, but I look also to what is beyond. To a sunset land called Elwestrand, a name I do not understand."

  Cuin cursed in pain and turned away. But Celonwy came and knelt by Bevan's side. "My son," she told him softly, "how well I know the call you feel. At the time of the Accord, when my people agreed to give the sunlit lands over to the race of man, many set sail upon the Deep, even as others took to the deeps of earth. It was the sea that first brought us to Isle. Ancient and mighty is the love of it in our blood.

  "Yet consider well, my son. Your father's blood first laid its hold on you, and you have cast in your lot with his people. His realm has bitter need of you; too long have its folk lived in bloody fear. Now men have found hope in you, and in your name they have lived a season of peace. Pel Blagden is laid low, but forget not that the Stone has spoken of worse to come. It has charged you above all to serve your father's folk and to strengthen them against the evil that will come from the east: for one who is called a King is one who is called to serve for all his life."

  "Though I could not give my heart to my people," Bevan answered heavily, "yet I would have given them the gifts of life and youth. I struggled to my depths for Coradel Orre, but it shattered with the strain of wills. That sundering ripped me like a leaf, but it was a twinge compared to the tug that is on me now. If I tear myself from the sea I will be a useless sundered thing, a half-King. The best part of me will die to haunt this place, even before I die entirely."

  "Folly take him who follows the sea!" Cuin exclaimed.

  "And folly follow him who does not know his own heart." Bevan met Cuin's gaze with rueful eyes. "I have done such folly aplenty this year past, but today my way is clear to me. I can be no King, nor longer cast my lot in Isle. The sea summons me. I will lay my life upon her tides."

  His words hung on the air like a doom. They all stood stricken with its falling. In her valley far to the north, Ylim sighed and started a new thread to her web, a blood-red skein. And in the treasure room at Caer Eitha, the Speaking Stone cracked in two. Ever after, water ran down from the break like mute tears.

  Bevan built himself a boat. With his argent hands he fashioned it out of the fairest woods of the Welandais Forest, and every gift of his power was in it. During the long month of its making his mother Celonwy lay serenely dying. She was sheltered by a hut Cuin had hastily built of saplings and bark. Ellid attended her, and Cuin brought them meat. Bevan seemed scarcely to eat or have need of food, still less of talk or companionship. He moved and breathed only for his ship and the sea.

  Those were dark days for Cuin and Ellid. They had tried every means of plea and persuasion on Bevan to no avail. Cuin's will was stubborn and set to angry conflict. But Ellid realized early that her husband's veriest heart had never been hers; she acceded to his departure with a proud grace that served to mask her floundering despair. All the structure that she had built for her life seemed to have come tumbling around her, and she moved in a directionless void. She clung to her daily tasks for comfort, and lavished her thwarted tenderness upon the frail woman in her care.

  "There is no need for you to fret so, dear," Celonwy told her placidly one day. "Death is no great matter, though Bevan seems to think it is. People die every day."

  Ellid shrank from her words. "Folk die commonly, indeed," she mumbled, "and that is frightful enough! But what must be our fright when a goddess passes?"

  Celonwy regarded her in gentle amusement. "Do you think the moon will darken when I go?" she smiled. "But it was there long before I lived, and long after I am gone it will remain."

  Ellid stared, trying to comprehend. "It is the moon that gives me light," Celonwy went on cheerfully, "not the contrary… I have been a moon goddess because I took the moon as my mentor. It has taught me wisdom enough to know that I am not very different from you, Ellid Ciasifhon. Had you been one of our fellowship, you would have been a deity of flight."

  "You mock me," Ellid whispered, dazed.

  "Nay, no whit! What is a god or a goddess but a person who dreams? We children of Duv are those who have lived long and remembered magics and mysteries out of the Beginnings. It was that which set us apart, but that is ended now that Coradel Orre is gone. I depart but a little before my fellows."

  "Does Bevan know?" Ellid asked in shock.

  "Nay, he does not. Keep it from him, dear. I fear he could not understand how rightly he has done. Coradel Orre became a horror in the hands of a god, and it could hardly have done better in the hands of men… It is well that it was destroyed, and it is meet that the children of the Great Mother should make an end. Our time is done, and another order of beings prepares to take our place."

  Ellid could not understand
half of what she had heard, but there was reassurance in Celonwy's friendly fortitude. She and the failing goddess talked often, and gradually Ellid came to better comprehend Bevan the son of the immortals: his long-standing quarrel with death, the overwhelming strength of the summons that drew him, and most of all his awful and abiding loneliness, he who was neither god nor man. "I scarcely touched the surface of his pain," Ellid murmured.

  "Nor shall any, until he lets them, dear. He has not yet learned the wisdom of surrender to the tides of his life."

  Cuin did not have the comfort of such talk. He moved through the days in hurt and solitary wrath. He would not lift a hand to help Bevan's labor, but lost no chance to sit by and speak his mind. Bevan responded with unfailing and indifferent courtesy, which galled Cuin to helpless fury.

  "Messengers bring word of your kingdom," he told Bevan bitterly one day. "There is rumor of war in the heartland. The stewards of the strongholds plot to move against the young lord of Wallyn. Eitha cannot control them."

  "I am sorry," Bevan replied, as if to news of a distant place.

  "You should be," Cuin retorted icily.

  Bevan faced him stoically. "Cuin, nothing binds you to me. Go set things to rights."

  The calm words struck Cuin like a knife. "I have never failed to follow you," he whispered tightly.

  "You cannot follow me where I go now." Bevan ran his hand over the smooth flanks of his ship.

  The truth seared Cuin like flame; he cried out with the pain of it. Bevan strode to him quickly and held him.

  "So you know at last that I must go," he breathed. All indifference was gone from his voice.

  "Ay." Tears choked Cuin, and he could not say more.

  "Then pray quarrel with me no longer, Cuin," Bevan requested gently, "for I would part from you in all love… Must you go to Wallyn?"

  "Nay." Cuin raised aching eyes. "The season moves on apace. Cold will put a halt to all such schemes of men… Bevan, I bow to your will, but still I do not understand. How can things have come so to naught for us?"

  "Fate turns quaintly." Bevan sat and quirked his grave face into a smile. "Yet there is this to think on: an end will ever be a beginning. You will be King, Cuin; mark it."

  "What?" Cuin whispered.

  "The heir of the throne of Lyrdion will wed the Queen of Eburacon, she who is fairer than the sunlight on the Downs… You will be doubly King, Cuin. You will have Hau Ferddas to enforce your will, though I think you might scarcely need it, for you are much man. May you yet bring peace to this blood-crazed land."

  "You burden me more than I can bear," Cuin groaned. "Hau Ferddas! I would rather hurl it into the sea!"

  "As you will." Bevan arched delicate eyebrows. "But surely you will better care for that other bright blade, she whom the bards name Ellid Lightwing."

  "Mothers help me," Cuin muttered, and wandered dazedly into the Forest. Singing softly, Bevan went back to his boat. Through the shortening days of autumn he wrought and sang:

  A speaking stone, a shining brand

  Summoned the lords of all the land.

  But what is this call that summons me

  Across the ever-sundering sea?

  What is this call of Elwestrand,

  A name I do not understand?

  Fate is a lovely woman, and

  Fair are her gifts to mortal man.

  A winsome Queen, a silver crown,

  A turn of the wheel; all tumbles down.

  Where is the friend who can come with me

  Across the ever-sundering sea?

  A sorrowing stone, a seeress' hand

  Grieve for my flight to seek the strand.

  For Death is a mighty doomster; still

  I may yet stand to foil his will.

  Is this the power of Elwestrand,

  The place beyond the sun's command?

  Two days before the full moon, on a night when golden leaves fell from the trees like snow in the pale light, Celonwy died without a sound. Cuin and Bevan buried her where great fir trees shaded the silver river as it widened to a silver bay. Ellid shivered in the brooding shadows.

  "It is a dreaming place," Bevan explained to her, "a place of the fair dark even in daylight, but never without a whisper of shine. It suits her. Let us go."

  The next morning, on a day that frost had turned to crystal, Bevan slid his ship into the gleaming waters of the bay. Like a new-birthed steed the craft shuddered, and like a fledgling swan it skimmed away. Of itself it swam, ever more graceful and dartingly swift. Ellid and Cuin stood agape with the wonder of its motion.

  "It lives!" Ellid gasped.

  "It is quick with all the surging life of the trees," Bevan said. "I but set it free."

  Cuin's heart ached. "Oh, Bevan, how you could have freed this Isle," he grieved.

  "Think of it no more, Cuin. What is gone is gone." Bevan turned and called a melodious command. The boat floated like a leaf to the shore by his feet, and Bevan set a plank to its side.

  "Would you go into the teeth of the winter!" Cuin exclaimed. "And what of provision?"

  "I will not feel cold or hunger. I will but gaze and dream. Fear not for me."

  "I am your wedded wife," Ellid whispered. "I should sail by your side." But her face was sick with fear at the thought of it.

  "Nay, Ellid!" Bevan earnestly took her hand. "You are wed to me only by empty words of men. Heed them not, but heed your heart. You are a creature of sunlight and firelight and all warm comfort; you have no abode in the dreaming twilit lands beyond the setting sun." His face was more than grave; it was sad with a sadness she had never seen in him. "Truly Ellid, I love you well even now, but in wisdom I never should have wooed you! We are different as day and night, you and I."

  "And I also am one who would live in the light," Cuin muttered.

  "Ay. You are much alike, you two, and alike in your loves. I know you have never ceased to cherish her happiness, Cuin, and I know she loves you well, though she does not know it herself…" Bevan placed Ellid's slender hand into Cuin's weathered palm and clasped his own fair hands over theirs. "She is not a thing to be given or taken, Cuin; court her for her consent, I charge you. May the Mothers bless you both and give you sons."

  Ellid laughed bitterly. "Mothers in a world of men! Reverence of women is gone, Bevan, and you might as well make a gift of me! Already strange shaven priests have come from the east to summon our people to their rites. They call their god Father, and speak of his tormented son."

  "I hope a time may yet come," Bevan murmured, "when all folk may speak only of the One who is father and mother of us all." He embraced Cuin and Ellid hastily, then turned to his waiting ship. Cuin stopped him.

  "Your crown," he said, and proffered the rayed silver diadem of Eburacon.

  Bevan eyed him quizzically. "I'll be no King where I go! Have I not said that you should have need of it?"

  "If I am truly to be a King, I can find a crown." Cuin faced him steadily. "But I'll not use yours, Bevan. Take it."

  Bevan smiled faintly at the stubborn glint in Cuin's eyes. "I will take the crown if you will keep the sword. Pact?"

  "Pact," Cuin acceded, and they touched hands. Bevan took the crown on his arm and once more turned to depart, but suddenly Cuin could not bear the silence. He seized Bevan and embraced him hard. "Forget not that you are loved here," he whispered fiercely.

  "I will not forget," Bevan replied softly, "but I will not return, Cuin; think not so. Farewell, good friend. Farewell, Ellid." Quickly he strode onto his ship and threw away the plank. Cuin went to stand by Ellid's side.

  "Go with all blessing!" she called.

  The ship started like a stag and leaped away from the shore. Cuin and Ellid waved, but Bevan stood like a shining figurehead in the bow. His hair parted like raven's wings in the breeze of his passing; his dark eyes were rapt. Far out in the bay the silver sea-drakes arched their glistening necks above the water in salute. The swift boat skimmed between them, then swirled away until it was but a
shape of grace on the water, soon lost in the sparkle of the sea.

  Cuin and Ellid blinked and faced each other with stunned eyes. "How could he leave you without a tear?" Cuin murmured.

  "By the Mothers, I scarcely knew him," Ellid replied heavily. "Nor has he known me, though I would have cleaved to him till death. Come, let us go. I cannot be soon enough gone from this place."

  They walked wearily to the horses. "I dare say you will want me on a pillion now," Ellid muttered.

  Cuin took her by her waist and set her on her steed for answer. "Let you ride like a Queen of the Mothers," he told her, "now and always. Hold your head high, Ellid." He went and tugged the golden sword from its place on the shore, wrapping it in his cloak. Then he stopped and stared at Ellid. Her head was bent, and great silent tears were slipping down her face. He went to her and held her hand, looking up at her in unspoken query.

  "Cuin," she sorrowed. "Dear Cuin. All powers forbid that I should hurt you ever again! But I am of as many minds as there are sparrows in the trees, and my heart is stone within me."

  "There will be time," Cuin told her gently. "Time for your healing, and time for me to woo you as you deserve, I who once thought you no more than my right… But do not think of me this day. I will attend you to your mother's home, no more. Are you ready?"

  She nodded, and they turned their horses to the north. By his side she rode through the dying days, and he reached out to her only with his glance.

  Epilogue

  A year later, when leaves once again hung golden on the trees, Cuin rode with Ellid to a little valley he had entered once before. On his head Cuin wore a golden crown. It had been a strange and bloody summer, and Ellid had held her head high against fearful strain; there had been talk of burning her as a witch who had destroyed her husband. Cuin had risen to power largely to protect her. At first he had sought only that the renegade stewards of Dacaerin should submit to the authority Eitha had given him. But battle led to battle, and then friends who remembered him from Blagden had upheld him and named him their High King. Even Kael had been drawn in. The outlaw chieftains were mostly quieted now; the realm was held in uneasy truce and winter would enforce it. But Cuin dreaded the coming of spring, and he craved the counsel of the seeress.