Clash of Kings (14 page)

The servant women ran to obey her, but the old midwife remained behind with her patient and examined the child’s caul. She shuddered at the strangeness of this aberration of nature. Children born with such a mark suffered from the gift of prophecy and, according to superstition, could not drown. The old woman had not liked to touch a child so drenched in woman’s magic.

‘Take care of this hood of skin, lady,’ she told Ygerne. ‘The legends says that if a caul should fall into the wrong hands, its owner will die or, at the very least, be under the power of the caul’s possessor.’

Ygerne took the ugly thing and hid it among her pillows.

‘Be very sure I will see it safely hidden, good midwife. For I swear that nothing will harm my child. Not in this life, or the next. Thank you, good woman, for your assistance and for your advice.’

‘It’s nothing, Lady Ygerne, nothing,’ the midwife protested, but when she left the castle the next day she felt released as if from a prison. She swore with her whole heart that Tintagel would not feel the weight of her shadow again.

CHAPTER VI

THE APPRENTICE

Two years passed quietly, full of the small triumphs and tragedies that all families experience in the daily trials of living. Olwyn bore another child, a third sturdy boy, but the birth was hard and taxed her body sorely so that she almost perished when she bled copiously after he was born. Annwynn laboured hard to save her life, using her full repertoire of herbs, heavy binding across Olwyn’s flaccid belly and a ruthless refusal to accept that her patient would die. Against all the odds, Olwyn survived, although she was very weak and would never regain her strength.

Once mother and son were safe, Annwynn drew Eddius out of the birthing room to speak to him seriously. Myrddion had been terrified during the ordeal, so he hid unseen behind a column to eavesdrop on their conversation.

‘Your wife mustn’t bear another child,’ Annwynn warned. ‘I can’t tell you why, for I don’t fully understand what the body demands, but I can promise you that Mistress Olwyn will bleed to death if she goes into labour again. I have seen her condition many times and the outcome is always death for the mother, and usually for the child as well.’

Eddius’s face screwed up with physical pain and he knuckled his weeping eyes like a small child. ‘I’ll avoid her bed. I’ll do anything you say, for I’ll not risk Olwyn. I love her, and I can’t imagine life without her.’

As he wept without shame, Annwynn reached across to pat his unshaven cheek.

‘Lad, you may swear that you will shun the marriage bed, and mean it, but the lusts of the body are strong. Better to avoid the pregnancy. Should Olwyn ever be with child again, you must inform me as soon as she knows. I have a potion that will kill the child, while saving the life of the mother. It’s sad for us to do, I know. But if your love is true, it’s better the babe dies rather than the mother.’

‘Aye! Anything you decide. I’ll do whatever you say.’

‘How is Myrddion? He must be terrified, for he loves his gran beyond reason. I sometimes fear that he would go mad if anything happened to her.’

Eddius smiled damply. ‘Once Olwyn promised him that he could learn some of your skills as soon as he had mastered his Latin, he turned into an excellent scholar. Even his tutor’s exacting standards are satisfied, and if you have no objections we will send the boy to you for five days a week for training and toil. Subject to your agreement, Olwyn asks that we should pay two pieces of red gold per annum for his apprenticeship once he turns nine years. It’s only two months, so I warn you that he’ll try to wheedle his way into an early start, now that we owe you so much.’

Annwynn smiled enigmatically. ‘You owe me nothing but my fee, Master Eddius. And you may tell Myrddion he may come at any time. These old bones ache more fiercely in the winter, so a pair of sharp young eyes and a strong back will be very welcome.’

In the way of fractured families, Olwyn had heard little of her daughter until she received a brief and rather curt message from a courier informing her that Branwyn’s husband had died of a fever and that he had been buried, as was his wish, where he could hear the sea. As his son was only five years old, Branwyn had called for her husband’s younger brother to take his place in the running of his estate.

As no further messages were received, Olwyn was forced to accept that Branwyn desired no help from her mother and had no interest in the safety and happiness of Myrddion. Had Olwyn known the truth, she would have been alarmed, rather than disappointed.

Gentle, well-intentioned Maelgwn had succumbed to a lung fever in a state of mind very similar to relief. Life with Branwyn was a turbulent sea of trouble, fear and threat. More than once, Maelgwn had woken in the dead of night to find Branwyn missing from the marital bed and crouched close to him like a predator stalking its prey. On one occasion, she had been hiding a large kitchen knife behind her back.

Branwyn had been given no choice other than to accept Maelgwr, Maelgwn’s brother, into her bed. The second son had none of his brother’s consideration, albeit he wasn’t unduly under his mother’s influence. The first time Branwyn attacked him, he beat her until her face and arms were black with bruises.

As for her feelings towards her eldest son, Branwyn’s animosity had not abated with the passage of time. All infants, regardless of their sex or relationship to her, were in danger from Branwyn. But as they grew, the troubled woman seemed able to accept them, and even play with them like the child she still was. But hatred eats away at the soul, so Branwyn could love nothing and no one, having retreated into a wholly egocentric obsession with old wrongs.

The day after his ninth birthday, Myrddion rose early in his small plastered room, dressed with great care after washing in cold water and brushed his long hair until it shone. Using a chewed twig and charcoal, he cleaned his teeth vigorously, for Olwyn followed the Roman concepts of cleanliness although in all other ways she was a true Deceangli. Once Myrddion had checked his reflection in a pail of water in the kitchen, he packed a hasty meal of bread, cheese, apples from the root cellar and several slices of cooked meat sliced off the bone, to take with him on the journey to Annwynn’s house.

Now that he was fluent in Latin, both written and spoken, and was able to turn the sounds of the common language into his own form of written translation, the boy filled his satchel with a smooth piece of slate that he often used to take notes, some coarse pieces of chalk, a precious piece of much-used hide that had been written upon and scraped clean so often that the leather was almost too thin for use, ink made of ground charcoal and gum and a stylus pen made from a sturdy quill. Like all budding scholars, he also carried a sharp knife to trim his quill and scrape away any errors, and a worn piece of sea sponge that would clean his slate.

Then, armed for a new, much anticipated experience, Myrddion grabbed two chunks of bread, slapped a piece of meat between them and quietly left the villa, eating his hasty breakfast as he went. The morning was an answer to a dream. He would start to learn the art of healing, and he would discover what life held in store for him.

Somehow, the rising sun was brighter and more beautiful than Myrddion remembered it. The villa was clean and white in the growing light, while the trees with their new, lime-green growth almost hurt his eyes with their brilliance. The sea caught the rising sun and turned the foam to lacy gold as if the attendants of Poseidon had dressed themselves in cerulean blue and pearl. Myrddion was so taken with this metaphor that he imagined how he would dress Poseidon, should the god be disposed to ask advice from a boy. Chuckling at his thoughts, he traversed the winding shoreline paths, kicking at clods of earth and tussocks of sea grass as he went.

Segontium was only beginning to stir when Myrddion hurried through its streets. Servants opened shop fronts and shook out mats to place on the thresholds, while others brought wicker baskets of fruit and vegetables or bundles of birch brooms and other wares to tempt the passers-by. Kitchen fires sent out plumes of grey smoke, and as he moved through the town the rising sun seemed to encourage the citizens to hang out washing on lines strung between trees, while the low hum of noise vibrated as villas, cottages and two-storey wooden and stone dwellings came to life. As his feet stirred a faint memory of frost on the grass, Myrddion’s heart lightened as he saw Annwynn’s cottage, its pond and its many outbuildings at the end of the dusty road.

Boudicca was already out, teasing the hens and frolicking in deep drifts of clover that were already buzzing with bees. The greying dog gave a bark of greeting and went back to her ecstatic rolling in the dark green weed. Annwynn was using a short paddle of wood to stir the steaming contents of a large copper cauldron that had been placed over an outside fireplace. As Myrddion watched, she wound a hot, wet mound of boiled rags around the paddle and heaved the sodden mass out of the huge pot and into a willow basket. A makeshift line that stretched between her apple trees was already festooned with cloth hung out to dry in the strengthening sunshine.

The healer looked up, wiped her sweating brow with her forearm and noticed her visitor.

‘Well met, young Myrddion. Welcome! The day is half done already, so we must hurry. Have you eaten, lad, or are you too shy to dine in a witch’s kitchen? Do you want a drink of cool water or one of my herb infusions? Are you warm enough, or can I find you an old cloak?’

Myrddion laughed self-consciously.

‘Do you plan to let me answer, Mistress Annwynn? I’ve already eaten, but I’d love some more food. Gran says that I’m growing, so I’m always hungry. I’d really enjoy one of your herb . . . er . . . whatever you called them, and I’m warm enough, thank you. I’d never call you a witch unless I had decided to name my grandmother as one. She’s a priestess of the goddess and she swears that one of her mother’s ancestors was kin to Ceridwen. Gran works with herbs and simples too, but she wouldn’t teach me, for she thought that if people knew I was learning about such things I’d be damned as evil because of my father. But I’m babbling on like a fool, mistress, so please forgive me. I’m nervous so I want to make a good impression on you.’

Annwynn narrowed her eyes against the sun’s rising glare and shaded her face with one forearm. The boy stood easily, with a tall lad’s natural grace that had no gawkiness in it. His hair was uncut and fell below his shoulders in a straight, glossy curtain. At his right brow, a few strands of pure white marred its blue-black glossiness and Annwynn felt a shiver of concern to see the thumbprint of prophesy marked on the boy.

In all other ways, Myrddion was a beautiful specimen of youthful masculinity. Although he was slender, Annwynn’s keen eyes picked out the long muscles that sheathed his arm and leg bones and promised strength and resilience. His brows turned up at the outer edges, giving his face a quizzical and slightly devilish cast, but his dark, almond-shaped eyes nullified any negative effects. The womanish lashes that accentuated the beauty of those eyes added to the softness and purity of his face, with a mouth that was delicately modelled and quick to smile. Even Myrddion’s teeth were perfect and Annwynn felt a moment’s resentment towards a child who was so bountifully blessed by nature. As a child, Annwynn had been plump, awkward and plain, so she had been judged as useless for any task other than the endless corrosion of hard, physical labour leading to an empty future.

Ah, Annwynn, you’re being unjust! The boy can’t help his good looks any more than you can change your plain features. It’s what’s inside that counts, and this lad is passionate to learn my craft. From me! And he speaks and acts like a young man rather than an immature boy.

Annwynn’s thoughts scurried back to her usual, sunny view of the universe. Dumping her basket of steaming rags onto a nearby tree stump, she ambled over to Myrddion and threw one heavy arm over the boy’s shoulder to usher him into her cottage.

Gazing around at the fascinating array of drying herbs, jars of mysterious objects and warm, colourful weavings, Myrddion realised that nothing in Annwynn’s cottage had changed since his last visit. The boy sighed happily.

‘Sit you down, Myrddion. Do you like mint? Yes? Then you shall try my mint tisane. But first I must explain your duties, for I will be your mistress and you must accord me the respect due to your teacher.’

As she spoke, she bustled around the fireplace until she found two beakers, spooned some odd, dried
something
into each one, and then poured hot water over the shrivelled, chopped leaves. The steam wreathed around her plump face, which had developed a network of new wrinkles around her twinkling eyes as she smiled.

‘I will obey you in all things, mistress,’ Myrddion replied earnestly. ‘I am grateful that you consider me fit to be your apprentice.’

‘And you are only . . . eight . . . nine, isn’t it? Your gran has taught you courtesy, but the gods alone know where you got your brain. You sound like a little man, Myrddion, but you don’t need to pretend with me.’

‘Mistress, I’m not pretending, truly I’m not.’ He sipped carefully from the beaker of mint tea while he tried to decide what to say. ‘People laugh at me behind their hands because they believe that Gran has trained me like a pet dog. Yet this is the way I am, for good or ill. I talk this way naturally.’ He looked down at the beaker in his clenching hands. ‘I wish I didn’t. I would like to be like every other boy . . . but I’m not, and I can’t change the way things are.’

The boy looked so forlorn that Annwynn changed the subject and began to explain his duties. Each day, he would arrive before dawn and collect herbs for drying, boil the rags used to bind wounds and clean the tools that Annwynn used as part of her trade. Then he would collect the eggs, milk the cow, sweep the cottage and weed the vegetable gardens. At midday he would eat. In the afternoon, if Annwynn had no patients, she would show him how to make the various poultices for sprains, breaks, cuts and boils.

As he became more able, he would help his teacher with patients and learn the more complex problems of internal diseases and their treatments. Annwynn welcomed note-taking, and if he wished to assemble a scroll on her medicine, then she had no objections.