Please, Aunt Morgan. I want to be with you, wherever you are. Please?
Lucian – who has given me leave to address him so – has contrived with King Einion, that if I stayed at the King’s fortress, the Bishop might get word of it – and he is a dangerous man.
So I have been taken to the old Druid’s Isle to live at the Priory of the King’s brother, Father Seiriol. I giggle... He is but nineteen years old, yet people call him Father! He is very nice to me. I think he understands me well. He also hears the Voices and has Dream Visions. I am not so sure he is really a Christian though, such as Mother Mair or even Gildas. No, I believe he is of the Old Ones. But of course, this I will never ask him – I just feel it. He was delighted to know that I can read and write. He is very knowledgeable of many things and is also a Cleric, such as Gildas. He says that he himself will teach me for as long as I am here with him. He and his brothers will contact Gildas soon to let him know of my whereabouts.
I am well protected, Aunt Morgan, but I want so much to be with you.
I do not know how or where to find the Holy Mother on this Isle, but I will keep searching for her always. Please keep me in your heart.
Your niece, Rowena
Morgan
“Keep me in your heart?” My heart ached to be with her, to have her here with me on the Isle of Apples, but she was not yet fourteen year-turns. And, I had to know that it was indeed the Great Mother for whom she longed – and not only for me. For her to dedicate to our Order, she must truly want this with all of her being – not only the part of her who was “in need of a Mother’s Love.” I could show no favoritism to her, especially because she was of my blood.
I wondered if Rowena knew that Princess Rowena’s fortress was to be hers and if she knew that it was in ruins? I felt sure that Lucian, Seiriol, and his brothers, would keep her in safe ignorance until she was old enough to defend her lands, if that was her wish. For this reason, too – that she stood to become an extensively wealthy heiress – I could not bind her to a simple life here at the Isle of Apples without her full knowledge of what and who she now was.
I read all of these correspondences to Arthur at his beside, as if he could hear me. Then I spoke to him.
“Oh, Arthur, do you not tire of this endless sameness? – caught between the worlds as you are? I have never been able to find you anywhere in the Other Realms. It was not really you in the Land of Naught – only a specter of my own desire. Only here, alone in my cottage, in your slumber, do I find you. If you Dream, Arthur, I pray you Dream well of your golden Times. And – if, or when, you Dream, do you see me there? Do you hold me in your arms? Do you know that you are not alone? Can you hear me, Arthur? Do you feel my presence and my Love? This is my only hope for you – for now. If you hear me, remember that I have devised a plan to break the chains that bind you to this emptiness. I have promised. I have sworn it. I will not forget. I will not leave you caught alone in this waste-land, my Bear.”
I caressed his still golden, wavy tresses. Each Time was always the same. I kissed his cheek a good Night.
“Someday Arthur, we will walk the green Forests again, hand in hand. But not, I think, on this Earth, with you as a King, as Vivianne had hoped. For other Kings will be born, rise up, and will die. It is simply the way of things. Will there ever be another Summer King such as you? I do not know.
Later entries...
I received a messenger with a missive from King Einion, saying:
“Rowena did not stay long with Seiriol, for he recognized in her an itching for the knowledge which he and the other Brothers did not teach. I know that many Times in his solitude, he also itched for the Magic of his childhood training as an Oak Knower, but his work is here and now – and a good work it is. Seiriol has told me that there is a deep richness in the teachings of Yeshua. Words of Wisdom, such as – “Do to all others as you would have them do unto you.” So many words and actions of compassion. But really, these were similar sentiments to those that were placed in Seiriol’s heart by the old Druid who had been his childhood teacher. So, if he did not break the principals of his old teacher by serving a new master, what was the harm? These things he had taught Rowena. But as for her, he did not believe that she fit into their world. He told her, “You always go along with our disciplines respectfully, but I read the longings in your eyes, Rowena – a hunger for what you will not find here.”
At first Rowena took this as a rejection, but Seiriol reassured her that she could do better elsewhere.
“You will better find what you are seeking amoung the Druids.”
So it was that Seiriol wrote to Gildas, telling him all that had transpired with Rowena and of his thoughts that Rowena would do better with the Druids:
“There is a new Druids’ school across the Island from here. There she will be well educated and can live in safety while she finds within her heart what path is truly hers. As Rowena is your half sister and you have been her protector – along with Lucian – I think it best that you take her there.”
Gildas was very disappointed, but he had to see the logic in Seiriol’s thoughts. He could not force Rowena into becoming a Christian, especially not in her heart, so he came to get her to bring her to the Druids’ school.
“But she is a girl,” he reasoned with the high Druid there. The Druid answered, “There are many women Druids, although many more here are men. Do not worry for the girl, for our teachings hold that there is no preeminence of men above women. All are taught equally in the Arts of memorization, writing, mathematics, Healing, and Herbal lore. Our Wisdoms are solid and hold Mysteries of an age-old Tradition.”
“I see,” said Gildas, for what else could he say?
“I have brought gold for her keep.”
“That would be greatly appreciated, and wisely spent. However, it is in no way necessary, or expected. We care for our own. Many people bring gold, food, and other stipends to us because they hope for our success and longevity. If you wish to leave a gift, it will be spent to equally benefit all who live here. Fear not, brother Gildas, your sister will be in good and faithful hands.”
“I understand,” said Gildas, and he did.
As Gildas looked around at the High Druid’s quarters, he noted that, unlike Mother Mair’s, they were mean and humble and just as small as all the others’ quarters in their compound.
He asked Rowena once more if this was what she truly wanted. She nodded her head in agreement. Tears streamed down her face. She told me when she related all this to me, “My tears were not for parting from the brother I so truly Loved, but for the parting of our ways. For this I knew from the very marrow of my bones – Gildas’ and my paths had hit a fork in a road. We were traveling in separate directions now, never the two to entwine again.”
She said to him, “I Love you, my brother.”
“And I you,” he had replied. Then he placed a bag of gold on the Druid’s table and left.
As of the Time of my writing this, she has heard nothing more from him.
So many losses has my dear Rowena suffered.
She was eleven years when she began Druidical training. The High Druid wrote to me when she had finished her first year with them to relate his enthusiasm for her high intelligence and quickness of learning. He bragged of her many gifts.
“She far exceeds, in knowledge and practice, students who have been here four years to her one. Her memory is stunning. As you know, my Lady, we keep an oral tradition. It is forbidden and always has been for us to write of our Mysteries. Of course we are all literate here.”
Chapter 54
Lucian Arrives
Morgan
A year! So long, yet so quickly has it passed.
It was well past Winter’s End when Lucian arrived.
I remember chiding myself for foolishly worrying how old I must look in his eyes when first he beheld me. I fussed and acted like a young maiden trying on this robe and that to see which would better hide my sagging breasts and round belly, not that I was too plum
p – I was not – but age takes its toll.
I have always sympathized with our sisters who eat much less than I, but are always struggling not to become too fat. I admit I have been blessed in this way, for I eat all I wish to, I always have, but still – from my youth and many years beyond – I kept my beautiful body in fine shape. I am not conceited in this; my body was and is beautiful. All women’s bodies are. We are all reflections of the Goddess. So, no matter what size or shape, all are beautiful. This I have been taught, this is what I know, this I teach – so I am a hypocrite! I must be – fussing like this as an old woman about my belly and sagging breasts! What was I expecting? – for Lucian to come riding upon a great War Stallion, to offer his heart to me? I must be mad. I am an old woman and Lucian... well, he is old, too. And is that what I want from him? Of course not. I must be very bored with my existence these Days. No, Lucian was my friend, and that is all. Yet I suppose women are mostly very vain.
So then, I would choose the blue robe... or perhaps the yellow one…
Lucian did finally arrive, and riding a War Stallion! I had left word at our guarded entrance to allow him passage.
Later he told me of his ride, following the Tree line path and stopping at every Stone and Stream on our Isle.
“It was a perfect blue-skied Day. The earliest blossoms were just at their point of falling with the slightest breeze. So elusive are they – lasting only Days and then like large, gentle, fragrant Snowflakes, they fall.”
Before he reached our cottages, dairy, and barns, he veered off the main path to climb the spiral walkway to the top of the Tor to the circle of Stones. There, I suppose to speak with his Gods.
He told me that he saw my Beehives on his way there. Yes, I still care for them, but with much help now. Sometimes they come to me, to my cottage window and as if to call me, they buzz. Who will care for them when I am gone? But no, I have no Time for sad thoughts. These concerns will be for the living. When I am dead I will see all the long gone generations of my Bees in the Summerlands – where my Queens await.
Finally, Lucian dismounted in front of my cottage. He called to me, and entered.
“Why, Morgan,” said he. “I am shocked at your beauty – it has not left you! I expected… but oh, here you are – your long hair, thick as ever, only silver now, just as mine. We both smiled and embraced.
“Lucian...” I said with a crooked smile, “You look good too, even though it seems you do not see so well.”
We laughed and laughed.
“Perhaps,” he said through his laughter “it is a blessing we lose our clear sight when we begin to get old. The blurring softens the lines of our faces.”
More laughter.
“Perhaps this accounts for why I think so well of my own looks. I wonder...”
“But really Morgan, your eyes are clear and are even lovelier for the lines that frame them when you smile. I am so glad to be home. Thank you for allowing me to come.
“When may I see Arthur? I have heard he still lives but has no consciousness.”
“Yes, Lucian, Arthur still lives...”
I emphasized those words. A moment of silence hung between us. Our eyes met. He knew what I meant. “Arthur still lives.” But now it seemed not to matter. We were old friends – the best of friends and always would be.
Chapter 55
My Earnest Desire
Rowena
Three years later my fourteenth year-turn was fast approaching. I asked audience with our blessed High Druid and expressed my desire to go to my Great Aunt Morgan on the Isle of Apples.
“There I may worship and thusly discover the Ancient Goddess of the Old Dark Tribes – those who have inhabited these lands from the Time before the Clans and the Druids. Father Druid, it is just that I hunger for the ways of my other Ancestors. My Grandmother – or no, my great Grandmother – was Igraine, the great Seer of fame and Guardian of Nodens’ Holy Well at Dumnonia. I want to learn more about her from her daughter – Morgan, Lady of the Lake. Please, may I leave with your blessing, Father? – for it would break my heart should you not give it. You and everyone here have become my family. I Love all of you so much. I request never to be removed from our tradition. Is that possible?”
“Hmm, that is a good question, but one about which I must gain counsel. As for my blessing, child, of course – you have it always. You must know that this comes as no surprise to me. Your teacher and mentor, Gwern, has spoken of it for over a year now.”
“Yes, I knew, but it did not seem correct for him to act as a messenger to you on my behalf – as I said, I Love and respect you greatly. I had to ask for myself.”
“Rowena, you have passed your first initiations here. When you ask not to be removed from our rolls, are you asking for your Bard’s Apprentice Initiation – which is due to you, according to your progress – before you leave?”
“Yes, Father, I am.”
“And how would that title be, with the Lady of the Lake, I wonder?”
“I do not know Father, but I cannot leave behind what I have gained here. I do know that the Old Tribes are very ancient and they, as well as other races of old, recognize and hold in high esteem the Magi of all Traditions – or even a Magi’s apprentice. I have heard also that the Order has a saying they live by – ‘All paths are Sacred.’ So I will hold this thing called faith that I learned from my Christian friends – and enemies – in the hope that the Lady will accept me as who and what I am.”
“But Rowena, whose apprentice would you be? As if I do not know the answer to this already...”
“This, Sir, is the hardest thing of all, and this, my mentor, Gwern, the Bard and Druid, must speak about with you for himself.
“Thank you, Father. May I take my leave of your presence now?”
“Yes, Rowena, you may.”
As I have had extensive memorization training, I am able to write this conversation word for word, as it occurred. This skill comes easily to me.
The hardest thing was that my mentor, Gwern – who was as a Father to me and I a daughter to him – wished to leave the Druidical school as well. He had trained as a Druid for over twenty years and had served this new school as a Teacher for seven. He had his own reasons for wanting to go now to become a wandering Bard and Druid. This was his right to do. However he would be sorrowfully missed here, as he has great skills and is an exceedingly wise man as well. But this is his dilemma to solve.
Actually, what he wishes to do is to first bring me to the Isle of Apples and stay there with me for a month or longer, if he is invited to do so. He says that he must be sure of my acceptance and happiness there. Then he would travel to Pictland and Alba, returning in one half of a year to assess my status and wellbeing again. After that he will fulfill his lifelong wish to travel to Greece, Aegyptos, and the City of Old Jerusalem.
The thought of his long-earned freedom both excites and saddens me for the loss of him.
Freedom! This desire I understand. I treasure my freedom above all things. Oh, do not misunderstand – I consider it my freedom to worship the Goddess and serve the Order, for this is my greatest desire.
Funny that. It feels as if I have lived this moment before.
But now, once again, I am to go and serve for a commitment of at least four years, to what is essentially another Monastic life – although from what I have heard, a much more lighthearted and pleasurable one than I have thus far experienced.
I am so excited about this opportunity, but also am I for my Bard’s apprenticeship. Someday perhaps, if I diligently continue to learn and practice my art, I may be called a Bard, as well... In both meanings of “Bard” do I hold ambition and desire – in the singing and the telling of the traditional sagas and Myths as well as in the creating of Sacred Poetry. My Aunt Morgan does not know this of me yet.
Morgan’s note...
Ah…but so wrong was she about what I knew of her. She forgot the Sight I hold, or did not think I cared enough to watch her grow – but I had and
ever will.
Chapter 56
Rowena & Gwern the Bard
Gwern
My illustrious Lady of the Lake, High Mother of the Order of the Goddesses Nine, Lady Morgan – Your reputation and that of your Mother is legend in Gwynedd, as are the valorous tales of your brother, good King Arthur and his companions. Pray you not think I speak in flattery, I assure that I do not.
It is with me such an honour to think of being the recipient of your gracious invitation to rest on your beautiful Island for one Moon’s Dance. The honour is all the more special for the knowing that Gwyddion, the late Merlin, rested with you as well.
I never had the privilege of meeting him, although I Dreamt of the possibility of it my entire childhood and into becoming a young man. But I never had the means to travel to wherever he was. You see – I was fourteen years when I began my formal Druidical education at a small school in a remote location near to the most Westerly tip of Ynys Mon. Once there, I had to commit to staying there.
I could already read by the Time my formal Druidical education had begun, as my Father had taught me at home. He had been trained as a Druidical Bard, as too, had my Grand-sire, his Father before him, and his Father before him. But that was in the Days when all must be kept silent for fear of Roman persecution.
After being accepted by the school, there I stayed for the next twenty years, until I had accomplished my Bardic Arts, Theology, and the Druidical Laws, after which I was initiated as a full Druid. I then began to teach at the new University on Ynys Mon, where I accepted Rowena as my student.
I Love her as a daughter, so perhaps I have not the ability to be unbiased – but in my estimation, she is the most brilliant Star in my Sky. That is to say that, my own pride laid aside, she is nothing short of the most intelligent, quick witted, inquisitive Human I have ever encountered. To add to these qualities, she has compassion for man and Beast alike, and although I believe her thoughts, beliefs, and conclusions will ever be her own, she is always anxious to learn those of all other peoples. She and I make a good compliment to each other in our searching hearts.
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