Then the lurching of the horse would disturb my dreams, and my body would complain loudly, and I would grit my teeth and study Coel’s straight, graceful back to distract myself from the discomfort. He always seemed to sense whenever I felt my muscles ache, for he would always pull his horse back until we rode side by side, and engage me in pleasant conversation until my aches were forgotten.
So we continued.
For several days we journeyed through wooded country in a north-easterly direction. It was not always as beautiful as that first day’s ride, for sometimes we rode through patches of woodland where the trees had died, and the grasses turned to mildewed mush. On these occasions, if I happened to see Coel’s face, I noticed that it was grim, and his usually laughing mouth closed in a thin line.
Often, as we rode through these dark patches, he would swivel about on his horse, his eyes seeking out Blangan, and send her a glance of such malevolence that it left me breathless.
It was the only time that Coel ever acknowledged Blangan’s presence.
The weather continued amenable, although it was cold at night, and I was glad for Brutus’ warmth against my back and the roaring fires that either Jago or Bladud or one of the Trojan warriors tended throughout the night.
The horse’s rocking gait and its slip-sliding spine continued to be very painful for the first two days, but after that I grew more used to my conveyance, and my muscles slowly ceased their grumbling.
Like a virgin who grows used to a man’s intrusions…as Coel had intimated.
For this period of travelling, Achates continued mostly in Aethylla’s care. After all, it was her breasts he fed from. Besides, she had a broader back than mine, and it was better he travelled bound tight against her than against my teetering form. But at night when we dismounted, and in the morning, I was glad to hold him and caress him, and sing to him the songs that my nurse Tavia had sung above my own cradle.
After three days the landscape changed. The woods fell back until we travelled over gently undulating meadowland, filled with flowers and birds and the most heady, sweet scent that rolled down from the highlands to our west. Now we rode into the land of people, for every day we encountered at least one collection of round houses atop a small hill or mound, often surrounded by a palisade of wood, and always with a patchwork of fields encircling the village compound.
The villagers were unsettled by us, and whenever we approached, Coel would hand my mare’s halter rope over to either Bladud or Jago and ride into the village. There he would reassure the villagers—I could always see their shoulders relax and their faces lighten as Coel spoke to them—and he would request from them some provisions, which they always seemed to provide willingly.
As we waited for Coel to return to our party, I would glance about at the village. All the houses were circular, their walls made either of stone or, more usually, wood or mud-packed wickerwork, with a single low door. They had no windows, and I thought that inside they must be smoky indeed, as the houses’ thatched conical roofs had no opening for their occupants’ cooking fires.
There were always flocks of sheep and goats and pens of massive, blotched and ill-tempered tusked pigs. Often some of the beasts looked sickly, and I wondered what ailed them.
One day, I saw a sheep attempting to suckle a lamb with five legs, and I felt sick to my stomach, and grateful that Achates was such a beautiful and healthy child.
Two days into the meadowlands, we camped for the night a little distance from a clutch of tumbled rocks which held within their midst a hot spring.
I could hardly believe my luck. After five days of riding, even though the pace had been easy and we rarely moved the horses out of a walk, I felt filthy with sweat—not only mine, but my mare’s as well, for she was much given to lathering and foaming. Brutus took one look at my face as I stared at the steaming pool some twenty or thirty paces distant, and laughed, and told me that I had time enough for a good soaking before our meal was ready.
It was bliss. I swear I almost tore off my robe in my haste to jump into the water—which jumping I instantly regretted as the overly hot water bit into my flesh. But within minutes I relaxed and closed my eyes, sighing with delight as I heard the distant sounds of people talking and working to set up our night’s camp.
When I opened my eyes again, I saw that Coel—completely naked—was sitting at the edge of the pool, about to slip in himself.
His nakedness—or mine, for that matter—did not perturb me in itself. Nakedness was never frowned upon in Mesopotama, and most of the court had spent their time in a state of near, and even complete, nakedness.
And on the voyage to this land, there had been little opportunity for privacy on board those crowded vessels. Every time I moved about the ship I stepped over naked men and women trying to wash themselves, or changing their garments, or simply enjoying the feel of the sea air on their exposed flesh.
Neither was it unusual to have to move over or about men and women coupling: every part of life had to be lived amid the crowd.
A naked body, whether a man’s or woman’s, simply did not bother me.
But Coel’s unclothed body made me very, very uneasy.
“Am I intruding?” he said.
“No,” I said, meaning “Yes!”, and then stared at him as he ignored my unspoken discomfort and slid slowly down into the water, closing his eyes in exquisite discomfort as the hot water crawled up his body.
I couldn’t take my eyes off him. He was like this land, almost an extension of it: powerful, mysterious, beautiful, haunting.
He slid under the water completely, his black hair floating momentarily over the spot where he had disappeared, then it vanished as well.
I felt a tingle of apprehension, and glanced about, hoping Brutus was close, and yet, at the same time, hoping he was far away.
His voice sounded, and I jumped, but it was indeed very far away.
And then I jumped again, even more so, for Coel surfaced in a foam of bubbles directly before me.
I slipped on the rock on which I had sat myself, and Coel grabbed at me, steadying me in the water.
His hands were about my waist, and we were suddenly very, very close.
“Do you know,” he said, “that in Llangarlia women do not take husbands? That there is no one to guard a woman’s bed in sustained and outraged jealousy?”
“I had heard that,” I stuttered.
“Instead, women take men as men appeal to them. There is no jealousy, no bad feeling. Merely,” his hands moved, running up my body to my breasts, “the seduction of freedom.”
“Coel,” I said. “Don’t.”
“You want to,” he replied, his dark eyes reading mine with a disconcerting accuracy.
“I—” I began.
“Your mind has barely strayed from the pleasures of the bed since we set out,” he said, my ever deepening flush all the confirmation he needed.
“I was thinking of Brutus.”
“Really?” he said. “And now?”
I hoped to every god I could think of that Coel could not read the images that filled my mind at this moment.
He smiled, very slightly, and I knew that he could.
Something clenched, deep within my belly; a tightness that I could hardly bear.
“The water is freedom,” he said, running his thumbs over my nipples. “Can you feel it?”
“Yes,” I whispered, closing my eyes. Damn him! I wanted to resist—it would be my death (or at least the death of my hopes) if Brutus found us together like this—but there was something in him that called to me as powerfully, as irresistibly, as did this land.
Was he the man I waited for in the stone hall?
No…no. That was Brutus. I was sure of it.
“Can you feel the power of the water?” he whispered.
Indeed, I could feel it. Come to that, I could feel the power that was in him.
“If you allow me entry to your body, if you allow me to slide deep inside you in this
pool, then it will not be a betrayal of your husband, but merely a prayer to Mag herself. A confirmation of your own womanhood and the power of your womb.”
I could feel his breath fanning over my face, feel his words—a prayer to Mag herself—vibrate through my body and touch something very deep inside me. Without thinking about it, without considering the consequences, I leaned forward, and let him kiss me.
And he kissed me as Brutus had never kissed me.
Oh, gods, his mouth tasted wonderful, his tongue as strong as his hands and as sweet as honey, and as he slid his hands behind my back and pressed my breasts against his chest I moaned, and gave myself up completely to the pressure of his mouth.
His hands, now on my hips, lifted me a little so that I floated up in the water, and then he brought them close to him, and my legs parted as if of their own accord, and wrapped themselves about his body and I felt the tip of his penis just, just barely, enter me.
I let my hips relax, and allowed him to thrust deep inside me.
Brutus’ voice sounded, a little closer.
I panicked, hardly believing I had allowed this to progress so far, and, pressing my hands against Coel’s chest, pushed him away with all my might, hating the feel of him leaving me, but knowing there was nothing else I could do.
Coel’s face was stunned, but it was not because of my abrupt rejection of him at a moment which would normally have driven any man into a grim, frustrated anger.
He stared at me, treading water a few paces distant. “By Mag and Og,” he whispered, “who are you, Cornelia? What was it that I felt just then?”
I clambered from the pool, drew on my filthy clothes directly over my dripping body, and ran back to camp and my husband.
When we sat down to our meal, Coel rejoined us and, as calm as if nothing had happened, I drank a little more liberally of the honey and meadowsweet wine than I usually did.
Later that night I found myself opposite the fire from Coel. Brutus was sitting next to me, and, the coldness of the night a suitable excuse, I pressed myself close to him, and was rewarded with a smile and the pressure of his arm.
But I could not look away from Coel, nor forget the feel of his hands about my breasts or his tongue in my mouth.
I could see him through the flickering flames, see his eyes on me, and I remembered even more intimately how it had felt to have him kiss me in the pool, and how our bodies had felt so good together, how we had fitted together so perfectly…
I still couldn’t believe I’d let him do what he had. Hera, had Brutus discovered us…
He would have discarded me utterly. Then and there. A few choice, harsh words, some flung recriminations, and then he would have turned his back and walked away and I would have lost the chance forever to have him hold me, and love me, and place me by his side as his equal.
I would have lost Achates, for my son had no need for my body; Aethylla fed him, and would no doubt have been pleased to see Brutus discard me as a piece of whorish trash.
I would have lost it all. Brutus, his love and regard. My son.
All for a moment’s pleasure with Coel.
Perhaps I was nothing but a piece of whorish trash.
I snuggled closer to Brutus, but still I could not tear my eyes away from Coel. Suddenly the gloom of the night swept over me and that was not Coel sitting across the fire from me at all, but a strange, terrible man with a head so repulsive, so deformed, he could not possibly…he could not possibly…I could not possibly…his eyes burned into mine…and, oh, Hera—
Brutus spoke, and broke the spell, and I finally managed to wrench my eyes away from Coel.
That night, when we had all eaten and bedded down for the night, I turned to Brutus, and placed his hand on my breast. Surprised, both that I should want to make love so soon after childbed and that I should be the one wanting in the first instance, he nevertheless responded, and I know that our grunts and breathless, muffled cries must have entertained our huddled fireside companions.
It was uncomfortable at first, this lovemaking (even though those brief moments with Coel had held no discomfort at all), but I soon forgot my soreness, and gave myself entirely to the pleasure that Brutus offered.
At the last moment, when reason had all but deserted me, the fingers of my hands tangled themselves in Brutus’ wild hair. But they did not encounter his wiry curls, rather the soft velvet of antlers…
Or the hard rasp of a bull’s horns, perhaps. I was not sure.
I was very quiet in the morning, subdued, and I would not meet Coel’s eyes.
CHAPTER TEN
The group was quiet as they prepared to break camp and move out, and Brutus wondered whether it was because he and Cornelia had made love so conspicuously the night before, or if the dampness of the mist had laid its heavy pall over everyone’s spirits.
Brutus himself felt edgy, and irritated with that edginess. Cornelia’s responses last night had surprised him, yet they had also made him wonder. There had been something about their lovemaking…something he could not recognise.
Something unknowable, and somehow dark.
And Brutus had hardly failed to notice the intense looks passed between Coel and Cornelia as they’d sat about their hearth fire. They’d been so intense he’d spent part of the evening wondering if Coel had been the face on the man in his vision of the stone hall…
Well, if he was edgy, then Corineus was in a completely black mood. Brutus heard him snapping at Coel regarding the way the three Llangarlian men were ignoring Blangan. Coel just shrugged and walked away which made Corineus curse foully—something Brutus had never heard him do previously.
And why was Corineus in such a mood? Just for Blangan’s sake—or because Corineus was jealous of Brutus’ lovemaking with Cornelia last night…or even of Cornelia’s heated glances to Coel?
Ah! Brutus shook off his unease. No one could wake into this thick, clinging fog, knowing they would have to spend the day trudging their way through it, and remain cheerful.
“How long now?” Brutus asked Coel as he slung a cloak across his shoulders, drawing it tight about his neck against the water droplets in the air. Behind him his horse snorted, then shivered, and Brutus felt it shift closer to him.
“Until we reach the Veiled Hills?” Coel asked, and Brutus nodded.
“Another seven days’ ride,” Coel said, then glanced at Jago and Bladud, standing silently by their horses’ heads, and then to Blangan who already sat her horse a little distance away.
Coel looked back to Brutus, then suddenly bent and scooped a small amount of loamy earth in his hand. “But in a sense, Brutus, we are here already.”
Brutus frowned.
“We are now within the circle of the hills’ influence,” Coel said, a strange half smile playing about his lips. “This land, this soil, is a part of the Veiled Hills. Feel the throb of the hills, albeit soft at this distance.”
Cornelia had now come to stand at Brutus’ shoulder, leaning against him as did his horse, seeking either warmth or reassurance. He hesitated slightly, seeing another glance pass between Cornelia and Coel, then slid a possessive arm under her cloak and about her waist, pulling her very close.
“This land is like a body,” Coel said, his eyes now resting on Cornelia, and Brutus felt her shiver under his arm, “and the Veiled Hills its sacred heart. At a vast distance you cannot even feel the beat of that heart, but here, closer, we can feel its throb. All of us.” Now Coel’s eyes slid to Blangan, who looked quickly away.
“This is all very well,” said Aethylla, who was sitting her own horse on the other side of Blangan, and so thickly wrapped with blankets about her and the two babies she had slung across her back that she looked like a grey tree stump tied to her horse’s back, “but I am cold, whatever heartbeat you feel. I would prefer moving to this standing about talking of throbbing dirt. Perhaps we can stay the night in a village for a change. My cold bones fancy a hospitable house with a broad and well-lit hearth.”
; Brutus laughed, gave Cornelia’s waist one last squeeze, and the group mounted and set off.
The fog lifted as they progressed, and by mid-morning Coel had led them on to a well-travelled trackway that wound north-easterly. Their way was easier going here, the road packed gravel, and the horses picked up both their ears and their stride as if they, too, sensed that heartbeat Coel had talked about. The land continued green and verdant, wildflowers spread in great blossoming drifts up the sides of the low hills. Here and there Brutus could see thin trails of smoke in the air, and knew that within the hills lay villages or scattered farming communities.
Just before midday, as the weak sun had finally managed to warm both riders and horses, they rode about the curve of a small hill. Before them the land flattened out a little, although it once again rose towards a mound some hundred paces distant.
A family group of aurochs—a bull, five or six cows and their young—grazed on the mound’s slopes, but even the sight of these huge black and tan, horned creatures could not distract the group’s eyes from what sat on the summit of the mound.
A circle of grey stones, twice the height of a man, and capped by lintel stones about the entire circle. On the eastern side of the mound there was an avenue of small standing and lintel stones that led into the stone circle.
Behind him, Brutus thought he heard Blangan murmur something—a prayer, perhaps.
He was about to turn to her when Coel spoke. “Behold,” he said, and indicated the mound. “That mound and its stones is a deeply sacred place.”
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