White Mare's Daughter

by Judith Tarr

  “Yes,” said Catin.

  “But,” Danu said with a flash of impatience, “what harm can an animal do? They’re the Lady’s creatures. The stories never vary. They all say that the stranger was excited when he saw the Lady’s image; that he called her Lady of Horses. How can her own creatures be a threat to us?”

  “I don’t know,” Catin said. “That’s what we came for, to ask your Mother. She’s the wisest of all the Mothers. She must be able to answer. Why we all dream so black, with so much blood. Why when we look ahead down the round of the years, we see darkness.”

  “All of you?” Danu whispered. “Every one of you?”

  “Most of us,” said Catin. “I worst, I think; or the Mother, who is too strong to show it. My sisters once or twice. They’re young. They forget. My brothers have been spared it.”

  “Here,” said Danu, “no one else admits to dreaming of it.”

  “Maybe no one remembers.” Her hand lay on his shoulder still. She let it wander up to stroke his cheek, then down to rest over his heart. “Maybe the Lady favors you.”

  He shook his head. “No. I’m only the keeper of my Mother’s house. I have no greater place in the world, nor do I want one.”

  “The Lady doesn’t care what a person wants,” Catin said. “Why should she? She has her own purposes. We live to serve them.”

  Danu bowed his head in reverence at a truth he had been taught. But it did not prevent him from saying, “My Mother must be dreaming, too. It can’t have come only to me.”

  “Then she’ll know what to say to my Mother,” Catin said, “and we’ll discover what it is we have to do to turn this flood aside.”

  “Yes,” Danu said in a kind of desperate relief. “Yes, that is how it will be.”

  He paused. He should not say it, but it was in his heart, and it would not let him rest till he had let it out. “I thought. . . that you were less than you were. It was the Lady’s burden on you. So heavy—it’s a wonder it never broke you. And yet you’re strong.”

  “You have made me strong.” She silenced his denial, fingers pressed to his lips. They were warm. He could feel the Lady’s strength in them. “No! Don’t refuse it. I was wandering in the dark places. You came, and light came with you. The Lady sent you.”

  No, Danu wanted to say. My sister did. My sister who has never known the name of fear; who commanded me to make you speak.

  Ah, but had she expected such speech as this? A Mother might. But Tilia was far short of becoming a Mother.

  Maybe the Lady had spoken through her, after all. The Lady used such instruments as she pleased to use.

  Even Danu. Even the keeper of his Mother’s house, whose ambition rose no higher than that.

  “And maybe,” said Catin as if she had never paused, “the dream itself will fade in daylight, and the terror turn aside.”

  “The Lady will protect us,” Danu said. He willed himself to believe it. Willed so strongly that he almost laughed, dizzy with the effort.

  She did laugh, perhaps at his expression, perhaps for plain relief. Then laughter turned to something else; and he was ready for her: marvelous, the Lady’s hand in it surely, and her blessing.

  oOo

  “Well?”

  Danu was doing his best to walk steadily, let alone think clearly. He ached to the bone, and the manly part of him was the worst of it. But he kept smiling, and trying to hide it, because he was supposed to be overseeing the baking.

  Tilia trapped him in a corner of the kitchen, blocking his escape with her ample body. “Well?” she said again. “Did she? Did she talk?”

  Danu knew a brief, appalling impulse to deny it—to lie. To his sister. To the Mother’s heir. That was so horrifying that it emptied him of words.

  She took his silence for answer. She snorted in disgust. “They made that the Mother’s heir of Larchwood. Imagine it!”

  Danu could, easily. But Tilia knew what she knew. He did not try to convince her otherwise.

  She went away. He was glad. It saved his lying—and why he felt he should, he could not think. He could not think clearly at all. He kept remembering blood and fire, and Catin.

  11

  Danu performed his duties as he always had, or so he could hope. He was startled therefore, toward evening, to be summoned into the Mother’s presence.

  The acolyte who brought the message seemed rather too pleased with her errand, by which Danu presumed that he had committed some infraction. He could not imagine what it might be—unless Tilia had complained to the Mother of his apparent failure with Catin.

  He was not given time to make himself properly presentable. The acolyte was insistent. “She asks for you now.” In his ragged and flour-stained shirt, therefore, he went from the baking to the Mother’s presence.

  oOo

  Every house of any size or style in the Lady’s country kept a room apart, a shrine of the goddess like an image of the great one in the city’s heart. Yet while men were forbidden entrance into the temple, the shrine was open to any who wished to address the Lady face to face.

  The shrine in the Mother’s house was old, as old as anyone living could remember. Its altar was small, the image of the Lady ancient. Its stone was worn smooth, but its shape was clear still, great fecund breasts and huge thighs. Her signs were drawn about her, the magic that only Mothers knew.

  There was an offering of flowers in front of the image, and all the lamps were lit, burning sweet-scented oil. No memory here of blood and fire, death and terror. Only peace.

  The Mother sat before the altar, an image in living flesh of the stone-carved Lady. Her face offered Danu nothing. It was serene as always, the dark eyes focused inward, contemplating the Lady’s wisdom. She was the wisest of the Mothers in this corner of the world; she heard the Lady’s voice clearly, as few ever did, even those who were Mothers.

  Danu knelt in front of her, bowed his head and waited. He did not allow himself to be afraid. If she wished to rebuke him, she would.

  She laid a hand on his head. He bent beneath the weight of her benediction. “Child,” she said in her beautiful voice. “If I bade you leave this city, would you do it?”

  He did not move, though his body stiffened. He had learned somewhat from her: how to discipline himself. How to be still. “Have I sinned so terribly?” he asked, very low.

  “Oh, child!” said the Mother, and for once she seemed not so serene. She sounded, strangely, like Tilia; which made him wonder—

  But he could not let his mind wander, not now. “Child,” said the Mother, “you have done nothing at all to offend me or the Lady who speaks in me. Never fear that. I ask again: would you do it?”

  “I do as the Lady commands,” Danu said.

  She made him look up at her, took his face in her hands and raised it whether he would or no. He met her eyes, dark eyes, tilted up at the corners as Tilia’s were. They were not so serene now, and yet they were full of the Lady’s presence. “You know why the Mother of Larchwood came to Three Birds,” she said. Of course she would know that; she was the Mother. “The way of your knowing . . . did you like Catin?”

  He flushed in spite of himself, but she would not let him look away. “I like her well enough,” he said.

  “I see that you do,” said the Mother. He could hear no irony in it. “She has asked for you—to go with her on her return to Larchwood. Not bound to her; simply to go.”

  “Why?” It was the only word in Danu, the only one he could utter.

  “You dream dreams,” she said.

  Danu shook his head. “No. I know that. I meant—what is in Larchwood, that I must be there to see it?”

  “She said,” said the Mother, “that you would understand when you came to it. But you must go to Larchwood.”

  Danu sat on his heels. Only her hands on his cheeks held him up. Of all the things she might have asked of him, this was the last he would have expected.

  Leave Three Birds? He had been outside of it, of course he had: hunting, her
ding, traveling about visiting this city or that. But to leave it truly, to dwell somewhere else, that he had never imagined, nor wished for.

  He had been born in this place. He hoped to die in it. He had no desire in the world to leave it.

  Unless the Lady asked.

  “Do you wish me to go?” he asked the Mother.

  “What I wish matters little,” she said. “The Lady wishes you to go. There is somewhat that she would have you do, some thing that she requires of you.”

  Danu closed his eyes. Yes, he knew that. It was a fullness in his belly, a hammering in his heart. And, though it shamed him, a kind of dizzy excitement. To go so far on the Lady’s errand—to live in Catin’s city, among her people—how many of his people had ever done so much?

  He wanted to go. It shocked him a little; it was too much like disloyalty. But he wanted it.

  The Mother knew. When he opened his eyes, she was smiling. There was sadness in the smile, but pride, too. “You will matter in the world,” she said.

  That took him aback. “But I don’t want—”

  “Of course you do,” she said. “Everyone does. Go, prepare. There’s much to do; and the Mother and her children depart in the morning.”

  “So soon? But—”

  “They have what they came for,” she said. She set a kiss on his forehead. “Go now. Be quick.”

  oOo

  He had obeyed her before he thought; before it dawned on him what she asked. To set this house in order—to find someone to take his place— to see to the guests meanwhile, and the servants, and—

  They all knew that he was going. It was always so. Servants were keener-witted than their masters, more often than not; and quicker to understand subtle signs.

  These seemed actually to regret that he must go, though that perhaps was fear for their leisure. He had set Beki over them, Beki who neither knew nor understood the meaning of idleness.

  But even they did not know why Catin had insisted that he follow her to Larchwood. It could not be the spell he cast in the night. He was no such sorcerer, nor had any wish to be.

  “They have a secret,” Col said. Col had come from a city far to the west, long ago; he saw deeper than some, and his ears were keen. “None of them will speak of it, but they all know. It haunts them. I heard the Mother’s heir speak of you. ‘He is the one,’ she said. ‘He knows what no one else knows.’”

  Danu was aware of no such thing, and would tell her so at the earliest opportunity. But he was trapped in the bonds of his duty, and when he could escape it was deep night. There was no one in his bed, no sign that anyone had been there. He fell into it exhausted; was asleep before he touched the coverlet.

  oOo

  He woke shivering. The air held the chill of dawn, but the house was silent still. The Mothers had not risen yet, nor gone to call the sun.

  The lamp that he had left lit when he fell asleep was still burning. It illumined the pack that he had made, the belongings that he would take; and the many that he had left behind.

  He was not going away to be a woman’s chosen man, to remain with her in her city and never return to the place where he was born. He could come back. He would, he swore to himself.

  He rose and washed and dressed, too restless to lie abed; though it would be full morning before they set out for Larchwood. He kept having to pause. His heart kept hammering; dizziness kept swaying him as he stood or bent.

  He straightened at last, closed his eyes, breathed deep and held it. Just then he heard the sound that had comforted him all his life, the Mother’s tread as she went out to call the sun. That steadied him. He could open his eyes, let go the breath, go out to hear the morning song.

  Danu had not troubled to tell anyone that he was going. The servants knew. He had presumed that everyone else did.

  But when at last, after what seemed an unconscionably long while, he came out with his pack and his walking-stick to take his place among the departing guests, Tilia stared at him from among the acolytes and the younger sisters. Her expression was shocked—too shocked at first for anger.

  Danu stared at her, shocked himself. Tilia knew everything. She always had. Then how—

  There was no time to ask, nor was this the place to do it. Tilia might have cared little for that, but the Mother had come between. Her presence filled his vision. She embraced him and held him till the world shrank to the circle of her arms and the softness of her breast.

  She did not speak. All that was necessary had been said.

  She let him go. He maintained such serenity as he might, and walked to the place that waited for him among the travellers from Larchwood.

  He did not glance at Tilia. Still he could feel the heat of her temper, as if he passed a new-lit fire.

  She would never forgive him this, he knew in his belly. No more could he keep from doing it. This was the Lady’s will.

  She should listen, he thought. She should still that tongue of hers and quell that temper, and let the Lady speak to her. Then she would have known as the Mother did, as Danu himself knew, that he must do this.

  He had never let himself think such thoughts before. They came of his leaving, of the shock and the suddenness of it. He could see more clearly than he had before, or less kindly.

  And yet, for that, he could look on his sister with more compassion than he might have mustered before. She would be Mother in her time, but not until she learned to be quiet. To listen.

  While he wandered inside himself, the drums had begun to beat, the pipes to shrill, beginning the song of farewell to honored guests. As was both polite and proper, the guests—and Danu in their midst—danced to the music, a sweeping, swaying step that carried them lightly forward. The people of Three Birds, gathered along the eastward way, raised their voices amid the music.

  Even the Mother of Larchwood was dancing, ponderous in her dignity. Danu found himself handlinked with her, and Catin on his other side, and the rest in a skein winding along behind. Step and sweep, dip and sway, while the drums beat and the pipes called, and the voices of women wove in and about them.

  This was the way he wished to remember Three Birds: this bright morning, these people singing, and his body caught up in the dance. He would forget, for the moment, his sister’s anger, his own fear, the dark thing that called him toward the rising sun.

  Time enough later to remember. Time enough and more, to learn what the Lady intended for him.

  12

  Past the outermost limits of Three Birds, after the last excited child and barking dog had retreated in search of other entertainment, the travellers dropped out of their dance and settled to a firm and steady walking-pace

  Danu was breathing lightly. The wind felt cool on his sweating face. He was still, he noticed with a small start, handlinked between the Mother and Catin.

  They slipped free together, as if in the last movement of the dance. Danu would have been glad to hold back, to let the rest of the walkers pass him, but they made a wall behind, keeping him irresistibly in front.

  It was not so ill a place to be, once he resigned himself to it. He had walked as far as they would walk today, hunting or visiting cities eastward of Three Birds. Tomorrow again he would walk roads he knew. Thereafter would be all new, all unfamiliar.

  For now, and for tomorrow, he would let the walking be all he thought of. He did not look back to the city. He let memory limn it for him: the houses in their circles, the rise of the Lady’s house above them, and the birds that nested in the eves, hunted and mated and played in air blessed with their presence.

  Other cities were never so full of birds. Danu wondered if Larchwood would be blessed with trees.

  Here on the plain, trees were precious, cherished where they grew, worshipped as the Lady’s own. Larchwood was near the wood that walled the world. It might be all made of trees. What a wonder if it was.

  The farther the people from Larchwood walked, the nearer they came to their own city, the less dour their faces grew. Danu was
the stranger now, the quiet one. They seemed to have taken heart from their journey, though it had accomplished nothing that he could clearly see.

  oOo

  The first night they stayed as guests in a town called Two Rivers. Its Mother was young, almost as young as Catin, and uncertain of her powers as yet. She knew Danu, had been his sisters’ companion when she was small; but he had not seen her since he grew to be a man. Her eyes lingered on him at the feast that she had spread for the travellers.

  He did not know what to do with himself. Ever since his voice broke he had looked after his Mother’s house and taken charge of such occasions as this. He had never been a guest, never had to sit while others waited on him. A woman wanting him—yes, he knew the way of that, but not when he was twofold guest, of this house and of the company in which he traveled.

  At the time when it was proper, the Mother of Two Rivers rose and held out her hand to him. It was his place to take that hand, to go where she bade; but he glanced at Catin.

  She was not watching him at all. Her eyes were on her fingers, which had locked in her lap. She dreamed again, or remembered: blood and fire, present always just behind her eyes. He at least could forget. She never could.

  With a faint sigh he turned back to the Mother of Two Rivers, and clasped her hand just before it dropped. He had barely escaped impropriety. She smiled at him, a quick smile, as if she were uncertain, too; and led him away from his uncomfortable companions.

  There was comfort, yes, in one who had known him so long, who could ask after his sisters and recall with him this escapade or that. Her name had been Sana then, but all names vanished when a woman became the Mother. She gave them to the Lady with all of herself that had gone before.

  But this young Mother, who had been Sana not so long ago, still carried a memory of the self who had been. She did not ask him why he had come here, or what he did with the Mother and the people from Larchwood. She was content to remember things that had passed long ago. One thing only she touched in the time that was now. “I hope,” she said before she slept, “that this night’s work will make an heir.”