Voices of the Stars

by Rowena Whaling

  Time flew by... We did go as far North as the uppermost Islands – to the land called Orkney, which, Bronte said, her Father called Arcaibh. This entailed yet more Sea rides for me. But, all in all, it was worth it. Once, we saw the great Northern Lights in the Night – albeit twilit – Sky.

  This Time was to me as if living in a Dream. But all Dreams must come to an ending. The Day came when we knew that we could tarry no longer. It was Time for Arthur to return home, to get on with the work of ruling his Kingdom.

  Bronte begged us to go, one last Time, to Croft Moraig. She so Loved that Stone Circle. Well, really it was not a true circle but was shaped more like the Roman letter C. There were round markings on the Stones. Some called them cup marks, but Bronte said they looked like flowers to her. She told us that her Father had taken her and her Mother to see Croft Moraig not long before her Mother had become ill and died. Always, she said, she had felt closest to her Mother there.

  Croft Moraig is near to the Southeast edge of where the River Tamia splits in two. It is a hard Day’s ride from her Father’s home. We agreed to go there.

  Nothing had ever been spoken between Bronte and me about the future. It was as if we had been frozen in Time – one Day blissfully flowing into the next. But now what? Could she be content to remain in her Father’s house, caring for the aches and pains of whoever lived nearby? After all of our long and wondrous talks of Magic, Cosmic Truths, and our shared past, we must finally speak of the future. But when we arrived at Croft Moraig and set up our camp, we, being weary from the long Days’ ride, went promptly to sleep.

  When Dawn came, Bronte went a-ways from the camp to a Stream where she could bathe herself as best she could. As I have already written, Bronte was a half Picti girl, while we all, or at least most of our company, had very Roman trappings about ourselves and our Horses.

  We will never really know and will only torment ourselves as to what happened next and why. Perhaps some of the Picti thought her traitorous to her kin by traveling with Roman men – who can know? All we heard in the early morning peace was the soft whooshing sound of an arrow through the Air, a blunt hit, and a moan.

  We were all up and out of our pallet rolls in a moment and at our fallen Bronte’s side.

  She did not die at once, but we knew that it had been a fatal blow. We were already stricken with grief while she lay there with laboured breathing.

  Her attackers were gone – fled like Harts into the surrounding Woods. No one was in sight or hearing of us. No matter... I held her head in my arms.

  “Bronte...”

  She looked up at me.

  “So it was not to be...”

  “Bronte... Bronte...” was all I could think to say – I had no words of comfort or Wisdom.

  She whispered again, “I will wait for you. No matter how long... Always...”

  It was then that once again, the Voices of the Stars shook the Earth beneath my feet. They said, “No, Gwyddion, she must not wait. She must not be bound to waiting because of her Love for you. She must return – and soon – for she will come as a Child of Promise – a Magic child – she has a great work awaiting her. Tell her, Gwyddion! Let her go!”

  But, she was already gone.

  Still I called out to her again, this Time to her Spirit, which I perceived was hovering just above her lifeless body.

  “Bronte, my dear one, before you leave you must know what the Voices told me. Can you hear me?”

  Silence... Naught but silence. Yet, all around us, hanging in the Air, was a mighty presence – rich, heady, transcendent, powerful, beautiful. We all felt it. I hurried before her Spirit fled.

  “BRONTE! They told me...” I whispered what they had said. Then suddenly, the presence was filled with the sweet smell of Summer Flowers although there were none around us anywhere. We each spoke at once: “Flowers.” Then, all was gone. She was gone.

  Lucian said, “It is said by the Christians in Rome that the Saints – their Holy Men and Women – are followed by the scent of Flowers and that by this they are known to be Holy.” Then the realization of her Death hit him.

  “The Flowers... they are gone... she is gone.”

  I wept first and then did Arthur, then Bedwyr. Lucian and the men of our Guard each walked away to their own privacy, with heads hung in sorrow, lest we see them weep.

  “We will bury her here by the Northernmost Stone,” said I.

  “Hurry, ride like the Wind to bring this sad news to her Father. It should take you one Day’s ride there and one Day to return. We will prepare for her burial. Tell her Father of her sweet memories of this place. I believe he will agree to bury her here. Now, go!”

  To preserve her privacy, we did not remove her shift, but only washed the parts of her body that would be proper for our eyes to see. She had just bathed the parts she had felt essential for her comfort. But her sweet face, arms, hands, feet and legs, we washed and rubbed with Oil of Rosemary, which I always carry with me for the sake of offerings and consecrations to the Gods. I placed her boots upon her feet. I removed the arrow and tried to clean the blood from her shift as best I could.

  My thoughts carried me to so many conversations that Bronte and I had shared. Know that they were not always about the Arts. Many talks did we have about her own feelings and observations of life, her own peculiarities and the like. Like how she Loved Frogs and other Animals usually disgusting to other people. She had Loved to observe the complete life cycles of Tadpoles into Frogs in her family pond and how Snakes shed their skins. She said that she thought it akin to Magic how at Night, there were no Mushrooms in her Father’s Field, and then in the morning she would see, in what had been an empty field, rings and whole bunches of fully grown and perfectly white Mushrooms. She would pick them for medicines – for she knew which were and which were not, the poisonous kinds – only to find that new rings had all grown back the next morning. She said she never picked Ferns, Tree leaves, Heather, Flowers, or Mosses for her own pleasures, because they were the adornment of our Earth Mother and were to be shared with all of her Creatures. Only those used for Healing were suitable to be picked in her way of thinking.

  Many Times she had spoken to me of freedom – a strange kind of freedom, which could only be felt from within and could not really be defined by a name or a word. With difficulty she tried and tried to explain this freedom to me. Indeed, she could not define it. But, to her it was the most precious treasure she could have.

  What was it she had said? Oh yes, she had said that “To stand upon a Rocky ledge high above all else with the Wind blowing my hair – or even to walk barefooted without my boots – these are things of my freedom. To swim naked in a River, the draw pulling me and my not resisting it, becoming one with it and going wherever it might take me, these are things of my freedom. Traveling as I have with you and our merry company – this, too, is freedom. My freedom is to be able to read and write, to search and find, to be kind but not to live for anyone else’s feelings, needs, or demands. My freedom, my Lord, is a being – not a having.”

  It was the freedom of her Spirit I suppose, a sort of independence. She said that without it she would wither and die. Was that why she had died – because she would have had to go back home now to a plain, boring, and ordinary existence?

  “But Bronte,” I cried, “you could have stayed with me.”

  Then I remembered that I had not offered. Oh Bronte... Was my solitude as precious to me as your freedom was to you? I am so sorry.

  Her grave was dug. A thing of rectangular perfection, three arms lengths deep so that no wild Animal could disrupt it. We laid her body on its side with her hands cradling her head, knees raised as a sleeping babe. That was how I had seen her whilst she slept at Night. We could not wait for her Father to lay her in her grave, as the Deaths’ stiffness would set in. We covered the bloody part of her shift, where the arrow had pierced her, with leaves that had fallen from the surrounding Oaks, Ash, and Rowans. Nothing had been picked. All had fallen – l
ike you my dear, beloved child. This covering we did for her Father’s feelings and all the more so of the fragile feelings of her sisters, should they come as well.

  Of a sudden I remembered what she had said about her freedom. It struck me that I could honour her freedom by removing her boots.

  “There my dear one, fly in your freedom...”

  I kept vigil by her grave. I did not sleep. Neither did Bedwyr nor Arthur. It was almost three Days before the riders reached our camp, just at Sundown. Her Father came alone.

  “Too hard a ride for two grieving young girls...” said he.

  He must have Loved Bronte greatly. Hurting too much to weep, he just stood stoically looking down at her body in the grave. After a long Time he said, “Thank you for your waiting.”

  When he felt ready he said: “I would cover her body with Earth myself. It is all I may do to honour her for now.”

  Something was missing... Her name! I never gave her a Magical or Sacred name – as it was my right to do, as her Teacher. When her Father had finished covering her with dirt, he asked me to say some words for her.

  “Freedom... Saoirse!”

  I yelled it to the four Winds and pounded my staff onto the ground, twice.

  “Saoirse... may you be blessed by this name which I, Gwyddion, your teacher, bestow upon you. So must it be and so it is!” I hit my staff upon the ground a third Time... The Earth shook. Then silently I said to her, “On an Isle of Mist you told me who we had been, but may you return quickly and may you not be lost in the Mists of Time. Find your way back soon, Saoirse. Do not wait for me in the Otherworlds. For, you have a great work to do. Bring with your Spirit this Child of Promise.”

  Chapter 30

  The Fortress & Liaisons

  Arthur

  After Bronte’s Death, I saw Gwyddion diminish. I thought hard and long of what task I could set him to to take his thoughts away from her – as much as was possible. I came upon an Idea that just might benefit everyone. So, I set The Merlin to drawing the plans and excavating for my fortress. I was as excited as a little boy.

  Until now, I have kept large barracks for myself as well as for my Guard in and near Aquae Sulis. I have also made arrangements for meager yet comfortable dwellings for those of my Warriors who have families with whom they wish to live.

  Aquae Sulis is still a truly amazing city. Yet it has always been sorrowful to me how Time and the course of history have affected the ruin of such powerful and magnificent edifices as the Roman Baths and the Temple of Sulis-Minerva.

  The Romans built the Temple of Sulis – whom they equated with Minerva – sweet Goddess of Wisdom. The baths were still supported with Roman money until they abandoned the Britons well over one hundred years ago. Then, for another long while, our wealthy Briton men and women kept both in operation.

  It falls now into disrepair – the heating system is breaking down – but, no matter to me. These Waters are heated from deep within the Earth. What Magic of the Goddess is this? Nowhere else on our Isles is there another hot Spring. The Waters relax my thoughts as well as my body, but it is not only for the baths that I Love this place.

  Its surrounding lands are beautiful. The River runs just beside the baths. Rundown market stalls still do business on market Day. Small cottages and huts dapple the countryside – and then, too, there are grand Roman-style Villas. It seems that, no matter what, life goes on. “She changes all She touches... And all who are touched by Her, change...” Are these the right words? I heard these words – or some alike them – in an old Chant being sung by those sitting around the Bel-fire one Night upon the Isle of Apples.

  I can still feel Sulis’ and the Gods’ presence here. I am sure their Spirits have indwelled these Springs from Times uncountable. I have walked deep within the Holy Sanctuary of the lofty, yet reachable image of Sulis-Minerva. Although her statue is now defaced, Her power and her presence are still there lingering. This place rings with echoes of Divine Love.

  Perhaps long before the masters built the Stone Rings and Star Temples, they too came to the Sacred Waters for health or to ask for their desires to be fulfilled. I wonder by what names they called their Gods? No matter that. I believe that those Gods are still here along with all the others brought by subsequent waves of believers...

  Gwyddion

  The Time of the Summer King – those years of peace, abundance, and prosperity of the land and of the people continued. But why must there have been so many Deaths?

  Of course, by the Time of my writing this, there have been ten years of peace. Where have they gone?

  Bedwyr married Freidl not long after we returned from our travels to the North-lands. It proved to be a good and happy match. Freidl has had two sons by him. They came a year apart from each other. Both children lived and they are a contented and happy family. They live in Bedwyr’s Dumnonian fortress. Not long after the second boy had been born both Bedwyr’s Mother and Father died. Their graves are near to Igraine’s, by Nodens’ Well.

  Arthur had had many lovers, but the liaisons never lasted long at all – and never had there been a hint of a child being made from any of these. Of course, he was kind and generous to all of these women, but there was only one great Love in his life. His pain and longing for her had never healed.

  Lucian had Loved or lusted for several women over the years but none of these liaisons lasted for more than a year or two. Something always held him back from commitment.

  Remembering back now, it too was not long after Bronte’s Death that Chronos, my old friend, had flown away one Night to hunt and had never returned. I missed her. I still do. Later that year another Owl came to stay with me. I named him Chronos as well.

  Soon thereafter, Arthur asked me to design a Fortress of State for him. As he put it, “It must be a place where we can offer to as many visitors as we wish a comfortable stay for as long as needed – just as large as Bedwyr’s fortress in Dumnonia, where I spent my childhood. It must also be a place that I can call home.”

  The fortress I would design for Arthur was to be in a more secluded place than the bustling town of Aquae Sulis, although Arthur generally liked to stay there. A Day’s ride – with everyone on Horseback, or two if with wagons – away from Aquae Sulis, there was a most perfect site. It was near to the old Roman Civitas of Venta Silurum, which still has a market and many dwellers.

  Within sight of Silurum is an enormous Hill, with a very flat plateau covering its whole length. I was very excited upon first seeing it for it looked to be just what Arthur wanted as a site for his fortress.

  This site was also interesting because it is, as well, near to Isca, where Arthur had long before established housing and a training area for his troops at an abandoned Roman amphitheatre and barracks, which he had renovated.

  When first excavating the Hill, I found the ruins of an ancient fortress and village upon its summit. I saw that the ancient fortress’ Stones lay in rubble but that they could be re-used for Arthur’s building. This was an excellent thing for it did save a great deal of labour in not having to haul that many Stones so far up-hill.

  Now, upon this great Hill – which seemed almost as high as a Mountain – was a most unusual feature. There was one standing Monolith at the Northeastern edge of the Hill’s summit marking an active Spring rushing with cool Water. It would be plenty for a main source.

  Arthur named his Hill Fort Llan-y-Gelli. Some have begun to shorten it to Celliwig – both of which names mean Forest Grove.

  After I had drawn the plans, excavated and made sure that the foundation was well laid and the building of the inner keep was well on its way, I asked Arthur’s leave to return to my Cave in the Snowy Mountain for a Time.

  “For you have little need of me now. Your fine Builders can complete the fortress as I have outlined in my drawings. Of course, I can come to their aid whenever I am needed.”

  He did not prevent me, although I knew that he would have rather that I stayed with him.

  I was more
than ready now for my much longed-for solitude. I went straight to my old Cave. Everything was as I had left it – in near perfect order – except that I would have to do something about the dust and cobwebs.

  I had paid a nearby Farmer and his wife to look after my Cave and keep things safe and in good repair. This they had done until the Farmer had died a year before. I had received word of this, but continued to send their annual stipend. After her Time of deep grieving had past, his widow continued to look in on things as often as she could. After my return, this same widow and her two daughters came once a week for a full Day’s work, to renew the Garden and clean the rest of my Cave. Even this Time I resented for the loss of my solitude, but cleanliness and order began to be restored to my surroundings and that added to my peacefulness. So, all things considered, it was good.

  Chapter 31

  Into the Halls of Paradise

  Gwyddion

  The Time came when I knew that I must visit my old friend, Princess Rowena. What state I found her in gave me much to be concerned about. She had aged more than I had expected. She was thin and frail. She no longer rode her Horses and could not walk unaided. Did she not have the breath for it? She would not speak of it and said only, “It is much too late…” when I offered Healing.

  “But you always come at the right Time. Gwyddion, you know that there is a Time to live and a Time to die. I have lived very well. Now I will die well. Come with me tomorrow to see what my Builders have finished for me. Perhaps in this way you can help me. It is a bit of a trip, especially now when I must ride in a wagon. My endeavour is waiting at the Western shore. I have been waiting for this. I am so glad that you are here.”

  Before we retired I saw that she was coughing blood, although she tried to hide it. I said nothing, but bid her a good Night’s sleep.

  The next morning, Rowena, her whole household, Guard, and I rode to the gates of her fortress together. But there, most of her household had been instructed to remain. Each one bid her a tearful farewell.