The greater part of the band rode ahead of them with Wulfstan in the lead. Fastila rode closest, and was just out of hearing. The air was penetratingly cold; Auriane was wrapped in a voluminous gray wool cloak that draped to the horse’s belly; to Decius she looked like some forest creature with bold, curious eyes, not quite certain it was ready to emerge from its burrow.
“You’re passing by ripe fruit ready to fall,” Decius said with weary annoyance, unmoved by the beauty all about. “The fort at Mogon will be without a commander for at least ten more days, and they drew heavily from it to defend the south. If we do not quickly follow up what we’ve done, when that festival’s done, they’ll have regrouped.”
“You are a magpie, making the same ugly noise over and over. We must return now. You’ve no understanding of sacred things.”
“This cursed festival comes every year, and it is always the same.”
“It should not surprise me a foreign spawn of a wolf has no reverence for Eastre.”
He grinned. In that moment she looked so queenly and so dear, with that stubbornly raised head, those clear gray eyes critically examining him. The spring sunlight burnished her chestnut hair to gold. So vulnerable did she appear then—she who worked so hard to make herself invulnerable—that he felt a jolt of love for her painful in its intensity. But he could not tell her of it; when he tried, he became speechless as a dumb beast.
“Eastre’s gift for me is that another year passes and I escape being offered in sacrifice. Who is the lucky wretch this year?”
“Our sacrifices are willing, at least,” Auriane replied. “Yours are not.”
“I have told you, we do not offer men in sacrifice.”
“That is not true. Your people set men to fight to the death. Your sacrifices are to a lesser god, that is the one difference.”
He shook his head with a patient, indulgent smile as if any attempt to explain her error would be beyond her capacity to understand.
“The gods want us back,” she said. “I will hear no more words about it.”
He was quiet for a time, lapsing into thoughtfulness. Then he said, “Auriane, do you believe in the gods? All the time, I mean?”
She frowned, truly surprised. “You might as well ask if I believe in the earth. Of course.”
“Some men do not, you know, where I come from. It is not a silly question.”
“But…I see them. They are quite noisy and noticeable. Look—there.”
“It’s just a stand of ash, in flower and quite beautiful, granted, but—”
“What is just? Do you not see their magic? The trees are Fria’s face, and the wind through them is her breath. She is content and pleased today, to show us that face.”
“I suppose there are moments when I could believe that. But you’d never catch me taking a child leading a procession in a hare’s costume for a divine being. For me it takes more than donning a mask to make a god.”
“But you do not understand. The child who leads the Eastre procession is only possessed with the great Hare spirit, and for a short time. All peoples worship the Hare. It is a mild and modest animal, with powerful birth magic, and it will die for you. If you are starving, a hare will come to you and ask you to cook it and eat it. Decius, you’d better be smiling because you’re glad to learn this, and not because you’re laughing at me.”
“By Minerva, you should be used to it by now, my pet.”
“I should not tell you,” she went on defensively, warily, “you don’t deserve to know…but a chosen few of those who follow the Hare through the forest have a chance to…to leave sickness and sorrow behind, and walk on through the rest of their days in holy peace. On Eastre’s final day, when the Blessed One rises…”
“You mean the poor wretch they killed.”
“He is a fortunate man, and he does not die!”
Auriane was frustrated but still hopeful of making him understand. “Do you not see the flowers that open in the places where death ruled in winter? It is the same. He lives again because Fria raises him up from the winter underground. Does not the moon die at its cycle’s end, only to be raised up again on the third day? So it is with the Blessed One, and so it is with all the earth when Fria comes as Eastre. It is the one time of the year that any of us, no matter how bitter or old, can come upon the Place of No Sorrowing. That is why the people call her Darling and Dearest Beloved and go up to the high places to couple freely in her name. Many have seen her, Decius. She is made entirely of flowers, and she rides round the fields in a silver cart drawn by white cats, and she sheds a soft spirit-light that heals suffering souls, for which they call her Light Bearer. The hares, because of their holiness, herald her and help her carry all that godly light. If that light touches you, then you will find the way you will be at death—it is a bright peace, the Holy Ones all say, and a firm knowing that all are one creature, that all are cherished, even the rats and worms. I knew it once, for an instant, so I know it is true.”
Desolation came briefly to her face as she remembered the state Ramis had shown her, then snatched away. Decius noticed her sudden sadness, and his mocking smile softened.
“Charming. It sounds to me like a primitive form of the Eleusinian mysteries for which Greece is famed. I always wished I could believe such things.” But then Decius shrugged, and all too quickly she thought, put it out of mind. Auriane felt a strange new gulf between them, and she disliked the feeling. Was it that she realized that, though outwardly his world might be larger than hers, in spirit matters it was not, and might even be smaller? That for all his seeming vitality, in some ways his soul was shriveled like dried fruit?
“Auriane, Sigwulf’s young son, the one taken captive, was he called Eadgyth?”
“Yes, he was Eadgyth. Why do you ask?”
“His name is in the books you brought me, or I think it is. Barbarous names have barbarous spellings, and it is hard to tell. I’ll have to take another look.”
“What is in those books, Decius? Secret spells? Stories of elves and heroes and ravening wyrms?”
“They are fascinating, my little sparrow. You brought me records of slave sales. I shall cherish them always.”
“You are never happy with what I bring you.”
“If you would let me teach you our alphabet, at least, and perhaps a few words—”
“Never. Words do not belong on paper, they die like captured birds.”
After a long silence her spiritedness gave way to a clouded look. “I have a whole crop of enemies now, Decius. It weighs upon me. Wulfstan, when he saw me take those books, looked at me as if I were a Roman spy. There are those who say I have fallen under your influence and that I like foreign ways better than our own. I know we have been seen practicing, and still I do not know by whom. Geisar watches me like a starved vulture. Only so long as my father lives am I safe.”
“Well, you know my answer to that. Let us be quit of this damp, rotting pesthole. We could found a farm in Gaul. How I despise this country!” Twice now, she had helped him escape. On the first try, her tribespeople recaptured him and brought him back; on the second, one of the senior officers at the fort of Mattiacorum recognized him as “Decius the traitor” and he had fled for his life back into the dark pine forests. “…a farm, yes, and then we could properly marry—”
Her troubled look gave way to one of sharp sorrow. He knew the idea was not wholly unattractive to her. At last she steeled herself and said with forced severity, “Are your laws more binding than ours? How many times must I tell you, I am married already.”
“Perhaps if I made the acquaintance of your husband, it would help.”
“If you ever do make the acquaintance of my husband, you will need help. Silence with your sacrilege.” Their mounts sailed over a crumbling stone wall covered over with playful, climbing vetch-plants studded with violet blooms.
They rode in silence. Once Auriane jerked her horse to a halt, eyes intent on the ground. The rest of the band traveled on at a trot; only
Decius and the ever-solicitous Fastila slowed their horses.
“Look. Sorcerer’s mushrooms,” Auriane exclaimed, dropping lightly from the bay mare to the mossy path. “Can you wait? I promised Thrusnelda…,” she said while rapidly picking mushrooms, “…I would gather these for her if I saw them. You know, they say that when you eat these, the things that Ramis says make sense.”
“Give me some—maybe you will make sense,” he said, smiling through his impatience as she dropped handfuls of mushrooms into her provisions sack. She tossed one of the mushrooms at him and vaulted back onto her mare. He smiled at her teasingly until, grudgingly, she returned the smile.
“I’ve some questions for you before we are home, and I can’t have words with you any more,” Auriane said after a time. “First tell me, do you know why your people abducted our greatest Holy One? Was it to learn her secrets of giving oracles?”
Immediately after they broke camp, one of Baldemar’s messengers overtook them and related the tale of a strange act of aggression—two Roman legions had marched far into the county of the Bructeres, their neighbor tribe to the east, and surrounded the tower of the Veleda on the River Lippe, seizing the great prophetess with the intent of taking her as hostage to Rome. To the tribes it was a terrifying and incomprehensible act.
“Nothing like that, I would wager,” Decius replied. “My guess is that it was because she never stopped exhorting your people to go to war, and she made vicious enemies out of even the more peaceful tribes. I would call it a brilliant tactic—one simple abduction, one holy woman removed—and the northern hordes are left in confusion, without shedding a drop of blood, Roman or barbarian. And then that council of sorceresses chose this woman called Ramis to fill her place, who inveighs relentlessly against war. I wonder if the military command knew her nature as well? If the government had shown as much wisdom in my day, that great massacre in Britannia might have been avoided.”
“It is disaster, and you act as if it were a fine thing. My people will not stop fighting, Decius. All it means for us is that now we battle Rome alone. And Ramis is no good to anyone, with her riddling advice. Now, you never told me why your people offered payment for the villagers. It’s not their nature to show regret after they murder.”
“You are right—my people are not in the habit of admitting to a great mistake. It is yet another sign of uncommon wisdom in this Emperor, or in whoever advises him. You see, this Vespasian has a churlish son called Domitian, a jealous prince who hates peace. He ordered the sacking of those villages in an attempt to provoke war so he would be sent to war, but his father, the Emperor, disowns the deed and has soundly chastised him. It would have been far, far better, Auriane, for your people to have accepted the payment.”
“You say my father is wrong?” She watched him intently.
“I do not judge his acts. I speak only of the path of coming events. You are now set on an endless course of strike and counterstrike—”
“But they keep us from new croplands! Are we to lie down and starve?”
“You’ll have to learn to make the land yield better or migrate anywhere but south. You have no true notion of the full size and might of your foe. I have grim forebodings of the days ahead—this cannot end mildly. It does not matter which side pushes the stone that starts the avalanche, once it is on its way. The wise man does not do battle with an avalanche. He gets out of its path.”
As they came within a day’s ride of the hall of Baldemar, they began to see great banners of red, white and black fluttering from the gates of every homestead in honor of the fourth moon, colors sacred to Eastre, who, the priests claimed, was mothered by the moon. They passed villagers who sang songs of the Hare as they gathered fuel for the bonfires that would crown every hill and cleared paths for the processions and dances. Auriane was intoxicated with potent childhood memories—of going through the forest with other half-grown maids, laying lilies on standing stones, plucking mugwort and vervain to be braided into chaplets, of watching the young men as they netted hares for sacrifice, of helping Athelinda bake the crescent-moon cakes, which her mother then left by the wells as an offering to Eastre. Athelinda by now would have readied her dyes, her arms stained red and blue up to her elbows as she colored the hallowed eggs of eternal life so they could be hidden in the forest for the children to find. Auriane felt an upwelling of old, well-worn joy, heightened by the pooled memories of all the festivals past. She remembered Thrusnelda saying to her when she was still small enough for Athelinda to carry her, “Joy is meant to rule—these are the words trumpeted by the lilies.”
The shouts of feasters could be heard across three fields as they neared the hall of Baldemar. It was late afternoon, one day before the Day of Sacrifice, when they rode wearily beneath the cat-skull gate and into the mist of high celebration.
The people came from five villages; they filled the yard and much of the barley field in back of the cattle sheds. Wood benches and long oaken tables were set before the hall; they were heavily laden with bread and meat. A line of villagers, arms linked, danced to a skin drum, occasionally colliding with the feasters. Songmakers sang, playing harps with dramatic, graceful strokes as they moved through the throng, telling tales of warriors, bold maids, testy trolls, evil elves, and wyrms guarding grave-fields. Near the mead shed an eager crowd gathered round a flaming cart, while Amgath, who claimed to be the strongest man of Baldemar’s Companions, prepared to clear it with one leap. Everywhere chickens fluttered, leaving trails of arcing feathers, children shrieked, chasing one another in games of tag, and skinny pigs darted between people’s legs. Atop one of the tables Sigwulf did a weaving dance, holding an aurochs horn aloft as he wailed a victory song that set Baldemar’s hounds howling.
Sigwulf saw Auriane first and called out to her. Then a good part of the throng rushed at the newly returned warriors, urging them to display their spoils. Her Companions were silent about the evil foretold by the bats; no one wanted to hear such things at a festival. During this reunion Decius unobtrusively left them, for his safety and hers, and resumed the role of humble thrall.
She slowly worked her way to the door of the hall, where she thought her mother would be, greeting everyone as she went. Sisinand’s daughters stopped her to show her their newborn babes, and she looked carefully into the eyes of her cousins’ children to see if poor Ullrik, the boy she had killed accidentally, had been reborn into the clan. But she did not recognize him in either child’s face. And then she saw Witgern.
He ran to her and lifted her up as they embraced. All bitterness between them had long since vanished; their friendship felt to her as old and comfortable as smooth river-washed stones. His love had mellowed to a tame affection that asked little but close companionship, though once she had seen a flare of hurt in Witgern’s eyes when he accidentally came upon her speaking to Decius. With a lover’s acute knowledge of the beloved, he knew the Roman thrall roused her affections more than he ever would.
Witgern’s boy clung to his leg; the child was old enough to shout her name, and she lifted him up. This child was living proof Geisar’s oracles were not god-inspired, she thought—the priest had insisted Witgern’s first child would be born blind in one eye as Witgern was, and he had refused to perform the boar sacrifice at the wedding. The child was exceptionally healthy and whole, as if to spite the bitter old priest. Behind Witgern was his wife, Thurid, the freed thrall-woman the Holy Ones had permitted him to marry in spite of his affliction; she smiled with simple pleasure, looking placid and pleased, her belly swollen with their next child. Auriane felt a momentary tug of longing, thinking: She stands in my place. Auriane envied Thurid the warm comfort of her life, the freedom from wandering. But in the next moment she knew she could not live so: She would be like the horses caught wild who were never easy with confinement, always galloping restlessly along the fence, pining for the open hills.
She gave the boy to Thurid, and Witgern began pulling her purposefully through the crowd, shouting over the din
, “Come and speak to your father. He will not heed me, perhaps he’ll heed you. Why must he get into these cursed contests!”
Her consciousness of Baldemar’s mortality, normally kept carefully submerged, surfaced dangerously.
They threaded their way through drinking bouts and tale-tellers, moving past a long table burdened with roasted pheasants, suckling pigs, haunches of oxen, great tubs of cheese, and flat loaves of festival bread imprinted with crosses, the potent sign of rebirth that aided the land in returning to life. Eager dogs pressed about the feasters, waiting for them to toss down the bones. As they slowly made their way around the hall, Auriane briefly saw Athelinda from too great a distance to call out. Her mother was laughing gaily at some warrior’s jest as she handed round a horn of her best mead, dispensing it as though it were the god-infused mead Wodan won from the Giants as she offered her always eagerly sought advice: This horse should be bred to that, that field should be burned and replanted. Her ornaments caught the sun as she gestured gracefully. She is like a dancer among them, Auriane thought—artful, balanced, and quick; at festivals she is at the center of life, where she belongs, doling out hope and blessings as though she were the great ghost of Eastre herself clothed in human flesh.
Witgern brought Auriane to a strip of ground marked off by ropes; a spear-casting competition was in progress. She squinted into the sun, and at the far end of the partitioned-off strip she saw the majestic form of Baldemar, his lion’s mane of hair stirred faintly by the wind. He stood unnaturally still, poised to launch a spear; the world about seemed to have eased into stillness along with him. His opponent, Gundobad, leader of a lesser group of Companions, a man with crudely rounded bear’s shoulders, a shock of red beard, broad pockmarked face and mead-reddened nose, had just completed a throw that sank deep into the oak post they used as a target.
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