Charis brought her gray to a halt, stepping lightly from the saddle; she dropped the reins and walked to the quoit, putting her hands on the rough stone.
"I like to imagine that this is a cenotaph," said Charis after a moment, "that in this place, a long time ago, some great event or something very tragic occurred." Her eyes flicked to Taliesin, who sat leaning on the pommel of his saddle, watching her. "Do not tell me otherwise, even if you know."
"Undoubtedly," Taliesin replied, sliding down from his mount. "The world is made up of events both great and tragic. Some are observed and remembered, but others…others take place away from the eyes of the world and remain forever unknown. But tell me, what is it that you imagine happened here?" He stepped toward her.
Charis put her ear close to the stone and closed her eyes. "Shh," she whispered. "Listen."
Taliesin heard the sounds of the active wood around them, the buzzing of insects, the trilling of birds, the ruffling of leaves in the breeze. He gazed at the woman before him, thrilled by the sight of her. She was fair as a sun-bright summer day, with eyes as deep and clear and ever-changing as the sea; slim and regal, her every movement was endowed with grace. She wore a simple white garment with a green and gold girdle at her waist, but they were the raiment of a goddess. He had never seen a woman more beautiful or more beguiling. Merely to see her was to gaze upon a mystery. He felt that he would gladly give his life to simply go on looking at her as he stood looking at her now, knowing he would never discover the mystery.
"What do you hear?" Taliesin asked.
Her eyes opened and she said candidly, "There was a woman…" Pacing around the quoit she continued, "…who came to this place from a realm beyond the sea. Her life was hard, for the land was harsh, and she could not help remembering all that she had left behind. She longed to return to her home across the sea, but it had been destroyed by a great tumult of fire and she could not return. She grew lonely, and to ease her loneliness she rode her horse among the hills, searching for something—she knew not what.
"One day she met a man; she heard him singing here in this wood. He sang to her and captured her heart as easily as a fowler catching a bird in a silken snare. She struggled to free herself but could not. She was captured too well.
"She might have been happy with the man; she might have given all she possessed to remain with him…But it could not be."
"Why is this?"
"They were of different races," explained Charis sadly, and Taliesin heard in her voice the resignation of one abandoned to her fate. "Also, the woman was of a noble house whose dynasty extended back to the very gods themselves."
"And the man? Was he not of a noble house as well?"
"He was…" she answered, stepping away from him again. She moved slowly around the quoit, feeling the cool surface of the upright stones with her hands, as if tracing symbols carved there long ago and now obliterated by wind and time.
"But?"
"But his people were coarse and uncivilized—as their land was coarse and uncivilized. They were a warrior race, given to violence and passion. They were everything that the woman's race was not, and so there were things he would never understand about her.
"And while it is true that the woman's heart was captive to the man, it was also true that they could never be…" She paused.
"Happy?" he prodded.
"Together. This knowledge caused the woman great distress, and greater sadness. It made her exile more bitter."
"What of the quoit?" asked Taliesin.
"The man left," said Charis simply. "In time he went back to his own realm far away, taking the woman's heart with him. She could not live without her heart and so began to die. Each day she died a little more, and eventually the day came when she did not awake. Her people mourned, and they carried her body to this place where she had met the man. They buried her here and raised this cenotaph of stone over her tomb."
Taliesin began moving slowly around the quoit. "Indeed, that is a tragic tale," he said after a while. "Certainly if the man had loved the woman more he might have found a way to save her. He might have taken the woman with him, or they might have gone away together to a new place…"
"Perhaps," said Charis, "but both had responsibilities—responsibilities which bound them forever to their people and to their places. Their worlds were too far apart."
"Ahh," sighed Taliesin, and sliding to the ground he leaned his back against the stone and closed his eyes.
Charis watched him curiously.
Presently his eyes blinked open and he said, "Being dead and buried, the woman could never know what became of the man."
"I suppose he found another to take her place. One of his own, no doubt," replied Charis.
Taliesin shook his head gravely. "Not at all. He lived on miserably for a time, half-maddened in his anguish and torment. But he came to himself one day and returned to the woman. When he arrived, he heard that she was dead; so he went to her tomb and there he took his knife and laid open his breast. He took out his heart and buried it with the woman, and then he lay himself down…" Taliesin fell silent.
"What happened to him?"
"Nothing," replied Taliesin sorrowfully. "He waits there still."
Charis saw the glint of a smile in his eyes and the sly twitch of his lips, and she began to laugh. The doleful mood created by the unhappy story was shattered by soft laughter.
"It is no good trying to cheer him," Taliesin warned. "His heart lies with his lady, and he feels neither pain nor pleasure evermore."
Charis knelt beside Taliesin. He offered his hand and she took it in her own. He drew her hand to him and raised it to his lips. She watched as he kissed her hand. She closed her eyes and in a moment felt his lips on hers.
It was a gentle kiss: exquisite and chaste. But there was passion in it, an eager ardor that awoke a sleeping hunger in her.
Taliesin did not speak, but she could hear his breathing. He was close to her. She could feel the heat of his body on her skin.
"Neither pain nor pleasure evermore," she whispered and lay her head against his chest. Enfolding her into his arms, he very softly began to sing.
* * *
The shadows of the wood had deepened when they stirred. Sunlight slanted through the trees in radiant bands, and the clouds were gray and ruddy-edged. The horses had wandered a short way among the trees and stood with their heads drooping.
Taliesin raised a hand to her cheek. "Charis, my soul," he murmured softly, "if I have captured your heart, it is at the cost of my own."
Charis made to rise, but he caught her hand and held her. "No," she said, "I…I cannot bear it…"
She pulled away, rose, walked a few paces, stopped and looked back at him, her eyes growing hard as the stone of the quoit. "It can never be!" she said, her voice a quick knife-thrust into the silence of the wood.
Taliesin stood slowly. "I love you, Charis."
"Love is not enough!"
"It is more than enough," he soothed.
She turned on him. "More than enough? It does not stop the hurt, the sadness, the dying! It does not bring back what is lost!"
"No," agreed Taliesin. "All life is rooted in pain. There can be no escape, but love makes the hurt bearable."
"I do not want to bear it and go on bearing it. I want to lay it down, to be free of it at last. I want to forget. Will love make me forget?"
"Love, Charis…" Taliesin moved to her; he put his hands on her shoulders and felt the tension there. "Love never forgets," he said gently. "It never stops hoping or believing or enduring. Though pain and death rage against it, love remains forever steadfast."
"Brave words, Taliesin," replied Charis, her voice ringing hollow in the wood, "but only words after all. I do not believe that such love exists."
"Then believe in me, Charis, and let me show you this love."
As she turned from him, he saw in her face the years of aching loneliness and something more: a pain which bit deep, a wound raw
and open in her soul. Here was the source of her anger and also her pride.
"I will show you," he said tenderly.
For an instant she appeared to soften. She half-turned toward him, but the pain was too great. She stiffened and turned away, gathering the reins of her horse.
He did not try to stop her but merely watched as she rode through the trees. A few moments later he heard a splash as the gray entered the stream at the entrance to the wood. Then he swung into the saddle, turned his mount, and started back the way he had come.
He reached the hawthorn thicket and had no sooner entered the stream when there came a sharp, startled cry from the glen just ahead. Then he heard his name, "Taliesin!"
He pulled his horse to a stop and listened for more. Hearing nothing, he lashed the reins across the horse's neck and galloped forward. The thorns slashed at his flesh and clothing, holding him back. Heedless, he drove through the thicket into the glen.
At first he did not see her—only a gray mass writhing on the ground. It was her horse, struggling to regain its feet as three men clung to its head and neck. Four more men were stooped over, tugging at something on the ground. A flash of white clothing…Charis!
Taliesin raced to the fight. As his horse pounded closer he saw Charis break free of her attackers and step away. The men had spears and all four advanced on her, weapons ready. Taliesin was still too far away; he would never reach her in time. Pounding to her aid he watched in horror as one of the men charged and thrust his wicked spear at Charis.
As the spear slashed forth, Charis disappeared…An instant later in the air above the head of the attacker she spun, arms wrapped around knees, head tucked, braid flying. Unbalanced, the man tumbled forward, sprawling in the grass.
Charis darted away behind the others, who stood by in flat-footed confusion. One of the men holding the horse released his grip and lunged toward her. His arms closed on empty air and he fell to the turf.
The raiders rushed at her, their iron speartips glinting in the shadowed glen. One of them raised his spear and with blinding quickness drew back and let fly. The spear flashed.
But Charis had vanished again, leaving the spearshaft quivering in the ground.
The raider darted after his spear, but there was Charis, rolling to seize the shaft and turn it as he came flying toward her. The raider stopped abruptly, straightened, and staggered back. He turned to his comrades, screaming, his hands clenched about the spearshaft protruding from his belly.
As he fell, clawing at the spear, another leaped over his body and grabbed Charis from behind as she tried to dodge away. He held her by the arms and spun her toward the spearmen, the foremost of whom dashed forward, weapon leveled, to impale her.
The spear flashed, passing through the space where Charis had stood and burying itself deep in her captor's chest as she tumbled up and over his head.
Taliesin was close enough now to see the fear on the faces of the attackers. Thinking only to make a quick kill and take the horse and whatever other valuables Charis possessed, they had not been prepared to take on a she-demon that could appear and disappear at will.
With two of their members mortally wounded the raiders reconsidered. One of them dropped his spear and backed away from Charis in hopes of escaping into the wood. Too late he heard the thunder of hooves behind him. Taliesin glimpsed the wretch's face—eyes white-rimmed with fear, his mouth agape in terror—as he disappeared beneath the horse's churning legs.
The remaining raiders scattered, fleeing for their lives. Their shouts of terror could be heard in the valley long after they were gone.
Taliesin leaped from his horse and ran to Charis' side. She was shaken. Her clothing was torn and grass-stained, and there were welts on her upper arms where the raider had grasped her; but she otherwise appeared unharmed. He raised his hands to embrace her, but the gesture stopped halfway.
"I am not hurt," she told him, her eyes straying to the dead around her. "Who were they?"
"Irish sea-wolves. No doubt they came up Mor Hafren last night and have been looking for easy plunder." Taliesin glanced at the bodies on the ground. "I think they have had enough of plunder and will return home now."
"It happened so fast," said Charis, her breathing rapid and unsteady. "How many were there?"
"Seven," replied Taliesin. "There were seven and now there are four." The woman before him suddenly appeared inexpressibly alien, belonging to a world far, far removed from his own.
"If you had seen me in the bullring you would not look at me that way," she said and offered a weak smile. "I danced the sacred bulls in the Temple of the Sun." She shrugged. "There are some things one never forgets."
"We should go back now. I think they have gone, but there may be more nearby." He led her to her mount.
"Taliesin, were they the same—the same as those that attacked your lands?"
"No." He shook his head slowly. "These were from the south of Ierna, coastal raiders after quick spoils. They do not often come this far inland, however; most content themselves with taking cattle and gold, when they can find it, from settlements on the coasts."
She mounted the gray with some stiffness and looked down at Taliesin. "You will be leaving soon."
"Why do you say that?"
She raised her face and gazed into the dying sunlight in the west. "We are not meant to be together, Taliesin. My life ended out there—" She nodded toward the red-orange sunset.
"But here…here it begins again," Taliesin replied.
"We are each given only one life, singer." And with that Charis turned her horse and started back to the palace.
EIGHT
"WE CAN MAKE OURSELVES SECURE. WE HAVE WEAPONS; WE can raise an army if need be," said Belyn earnestly as he paced the length of Avallach's chamber.
Maildun was quick to side with Belyn. "Listen to him, Father. We can defend ourselves. Besides, the trouble here in the south is not as bad as it is in the north and may never be. There is no good reason to be giving land to these…these Cymry barbarians."
Avallach raised himself on his litter, shaking his head wearily. "You still do not understand. I give the land for the sake of goodness, not out of fear and not in hope of gain."
"It was always for gain," pointed out Belyn.
"Yes," Avallach admitted, "it was—at first. And it was a mistake."
"That singer has bewitted you." Maildun's accusation brought Avallach to his feet.
"We talked and I was persuaded," said Avallach, grasping the canopy frame for support. "Whatever you think of these people, they are an intelligent, honorable race."
"They are little better," Belyn scoffed, "than the cattle thieves and hill-haunters that plague us round about."
"Believe me, Father; the only honor they understand is a dagger in the throat or a spear in the back." Maildun crossed his arms over his chest; his sneer defied anyone to dispute him.
"Our future, if we are to have a future," warned Avallach, his voice quiet thunder, "lies in learning to live peaceably with them."
"Your mind is made up?"
"It is."
"Then it is no use arguing further. Give your land to anyone you choose. Give everything to that mumbling priest of yours for all I care. But, by Cybel, I will have no part in it! They will not have so much as a stone from me."
"Belyn," Avallach replied gently, "speak no disrespect of the priest. He is a holy man, and I have become a follower of the true God."
"What next?" cried Maildun in disbelief.
"That explains some of it, I suppose," mocked Belyn. "All this talk about giving and goodness and peace. But I still do not understand why you think this serves any useful purpose."
"Good has its own purposes. At any rate, I do not ask you to understand."
"Do as you will then, Avallach. Why even seek our advice?"
"I seek harmony among us," the Fisher King said simply.
"That you shall not have," snapped Belyn, "as long as you persist in this." He raised
a hand to Maildun, who stood scowling at his father. "Come, Maildun, we have finished here. There is nothing more to say." They started from the chamber.
At that moment Charis entered. Taliesin stepped through the curtain beside her. Avallach took one look at his daughter's stained, torn garment. "What has happened, Charis?"
"It is nothing," she answered, taking the angry expressions of her brother and uncle. "I was attacked while riding."
"You see!" bellowed Maildun. "And you still want to give land to these people? Sooner extend your hand to a viper, Father—you will receive more thanks for your trouble."
"There can be no peace between us," uttered Belyn darkly. He glared at Taliesin with open and unrestrained contempt. "While you contemplate peace, they devise schemes against you."
Charis turned on Belyn. "What are you saying?"
"I am saying this would never have happened if Avallach had not inflamed them with talk of land," Belyn answered. "I was wrong to agree to it in the first place."
"Do you think my people were somehow involved in this attack?" Taliesin took a step toward Belyn.
"Is that what you believe?" demanded Charis. "Is it?"
"It is obvious, sister," Maildun said smoothly. "You are still shaken and confused or you would see it too."
"You are confused, brother!" Charis turned on him, eyes ablaze. "I tried to escape, but there were too many. If Taliesin had not come to my aid, I would have been killed or carried off. He saved my life."
"There were seven of them—Irish raiders," said Taliesin.
"Irish, Cymry—what difference? These tribes are all alike," Maildun retorted, "all blood-crazed barbarians. Truth be known, he attacked her himself!"
"Liar!" hissed Charis.
"He is a fool who cannot tell friend from foe," Taliesin said coolly.
"Fool, am I?" Maildun started toward Taliesin, fists clenched, jaw outthrust.
"Stay, Maildun! You are put in your place. The bard has answered truthfully." Avallach inclined his head toward Taliesin. "You shall be rewarded for saving my daughter's life."
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