For Camelot's Honor (24 page)

And why so surprised that such a one should have a wife?

But Geraint was holding his peace, and so Elen decided to hold hers. They were now the center of a flurry of activity. More boys came for the horses. Elen let Geraint help her dismount. The children led the animals to a trough where a stooped and wiry man stood ready to see to their care. A few old women scuttled into houses coming back with chairs that were set in the shade. Another man hobbled back toward the fields, hollering for all to come in and see to the comfort of my lord and my lady.

All their faces were stark white. All of them trembled whenever they glanced in Elen's direction. The wrongness of it all left a sour taste in Elen's mouth.

The old men all got to their feet. Bowing deeply, the bald one they had singled out, gestured to the chairs. “If you and your … lady would care to take your ease my lord. You will see how well we have tended the king's plenty. All is yours.”

“May I know how we may call our host?” Geraint asked.

That startled the man as badly as naming Elen his wife. “A … Adev, my lord.”

“Adev. Thank you.” Geraint inclined his head once. He took Elen's hand with so stately a courtesy it would have been flattering, had they not been surrounded by people wide-eyed with fear. He led her to one of the chairs, seeing that she was seated before he was. She took a minute to lash Calonnau's jesses to the chair's slats since she had no other perch for her. She was not letting the hawk away from her now. She needed the steadiness of her heart beside her, even with the hawk's anger pressing hard against it.

Women brought pitchers of small beer and wooden noggins, which they filled, and then they backed away, hastily bowing, trying to get out of sight as quickly as possible.

“What has been done to these people?” murmured Elen to Geraint. “We do not dare ask.”

Geraint shook his head. “We watch.”

So, watch they did as the folk came flooding in from the field. No person stopped to salute, much less speak to them. Mothers and granddames pulled their children into the rude houses. Men brought out trestles and boards for a table which they set in front of Geraint and Elen. Only Adev stayed at their side, and he kept his eyes fixed rigidly ahead. His brow was bright with sweat and his eye bright with fear.

People went into the long white houses and emerged with all manner of foodstuffs. These were clearly the stores, but Elen had never seen such a thing. Stores were for grains and preserving, not for bread, or cheese, or the fresh fruits.

Snatches of furtive conversation reached her.

“… the whole thing, here …” A father said to a child as that child brought out a round, ripe cheese.

“… bring the best …” called one woman to another as she hurried forward with an armload of cloths to spread on the table.

“… That's all …” said a man's quavering voice behind them.

“No matter, bring it,” answered another, deeper voice.

“But …”

“Hush! Would you tempt the wrath? They'll know if anything's held back!”

She wished for a way to reassure them, a way to understand what plagued this place where they were so clearly afraid for their lives. They were heaping the table in front of them with food — breads and cheeses and steaming bowls of stew, fresh fruits, and last year's apples. Her stomach churned with its hunger, but all the same she could not believe her eyes. Whole barrels of beer were being rolled out of the strange, white storehouses, and sacks of nuts were stacked beside them. Two people could not possibly eat so much, yet no chair was set at the board for any other to join them, let alone any long bench. What were they doing? Paying tribute or toll? Some hard tax?

She thought of the old pair by whom they had been distracted on their road. This was what that illusion had been taken from. This was the truth of that shadow play of fear. She thought of the man whose armor they had stolen, and of the twisted brand on his brow.

“Geraint,” she whispered. “Take off your helm.”

He understood at once. “It is a risk.”

It was, but it was a way to show who they were to those who would believe no less a sign. “It is better we should be open about who we are than that we should try to hide and fail.”

Rather than waste words of agreement, Geraint simply undid the strap under his chin and removed the banded helmet, running his hand through his black hair as he did.

Each and every one of the villagers froze in their tracks, and they stared at Geraint's open and unmarred face.

“He's not …” began a tangle-headed child. A woman grabbed her from behind and clapped a hard hand over her mouth.

Adev was also staring, his jaw slack, his brown eyes wide. “But … you carry the spear …” he stammered. He took one step backward. “She wears the grey … how is this …”

“I won this armor from one I defeated in battle,” said Geraint evenly. “So too the cloak and spear.”

“Defeated?”
The word chocked Adev, and he could say nothing else for a long moment. He swayed on his feet, torn by his different fears. Geraint waited, his patience seemed infinite. All around them the people murmured, their fear taking on a new, sharper pitch. Whatever danger they expected, this was not it. Was this worse? They were wondering. What did it mean?

“Who are you?” whispered Adev.

No names,
Elen mouthed to Geraint. There was too much magic in the ground of this place. They must hold off giving their names as long as possible.

Geraint saw her warning and answered Adev. “We are strangers to these lands.”

For a moment, Elen thought Adev was going to faint. A woman gasped. Had this not been so horrible, it would have been comic.

“A stranger, bearing the grey …” Adev wagged his beard back and forth. “No. No.” He gripped his head in both hands, shaking it hard, as if trying to dislodge some unbearable thought. Behind them, someone had begun to weep, the choking hiccoughs sounding unbearably lonely in the still air.

When Adev could look up again he croaked, “My lord, I beg you, leave this place. Leave us in peace. Please. He must not know you have been here.”

Geraint remained seated. “He? Who?”

“My lord, please!” Adev fell to his knees. “Leave us! Leave now! We have done nothing to you. Please! He must not know!”

Around them, others were looking to the fields and the track. There was no movement that way but the waving of the green wheat. Some husbands were shooing wives into the houses, but mostly young and old huddled closer together. They were afraid for their lives, afraid and helpless.

Unable to sit still any longer, Elen rose and walked forward. “It is your king you fear, Adev?” she asked, as mildly as she could.

Adev bowed his head, biting his lip. Elen thought of Urien, and how he sent fire and slaughter down on Pont Cymryd, all because his will was denied.

She knelt so she could take the man's hands, cursing the coldness in her own. She would share human warmth, that most clear and basic communication with this man who was almost mad with his terror. “What will he do when he finds we have been here?”

“He … he …” Adev licked his lips. “All is his. That we offered what is his to strangers …”

What overlord grudges his people hospitality?

Elen nodded, although she understood nothing of this place. She stood, raising the old man to his feet. “Then you must not give us what is his. Take away what you have brought. Instead, we will host you.”

Geraint was watching her, wondering what she was doing. The truth was, she was wondering the same. At home, she would not have even contemplated what she was about to do. It was a thing out of legend. But here, in this place, legend surrounded them and such power as should have belonged only to the gods simmered in the air of the fair summer evening. The prophecy her mother's ghost had laid upon her was everywhere written, and it came to Elen that to refuse to do this thing might be more dire than to attempt it.

Slowly, haltingly, Adev managed to look up. Weak hope sparked in his eyes. He looked to the crowd, the husbands and wives in their homespun tunics and dresses, dyed weak brown and uneven blue when they were dyed at all. They all had a worn and hollow-eyed look that made them appear so alike as to be of a single family. Not one was fat. Not even the babe bundled at his mother's hip. Not even Adev the headman. All were too thin.

“Take this away,” she said again, gesturing to the food on and around the cloth-covered table. “We would not bring trouble on you.”

They did not need more urging. As swift as the food had been laid out, it was now snatched away, hurried into the stores and some little into houses, to be hidden perhaps, perhaps to be eaten so it could not be taken away again. This was madness. This was a nightmare worse than any vision Elen had ever seen. What had done this? These were people of the soil. They should have been as tough as tree roots, and as hard to pull from their place. There was much an overlord could do to such people, and much they could not. The right of blood flowed both ways, and a chief who was too hard … there were torches in the night and a high house burned as well as any other. Elen had heard stories at the summer fair in Abergavenny of such revolts. Those who labored for their lords would stand only so much. Even if revolt did not happen, it was not unknown for entire villages to simply … disappear. Whole families, or indeed whole clans might take to the hills looking for a new life, and a new chieftain. Strong backs and skilled hands could find homes more often than not.

What then had driven these people mad with fear, but not driven them to rebellion?

When the board was empty, Elen said, “I saw a white piglet in the pen. Bring it to me. I swear it will not be harmed nor taken from you.”

Habits of obedience, it seemed, ran deep here, even over such a strange request, or maybe it was that hope had not been completely driven from them. She had promised to feed them, and they wanted to believe. A square, mud-stained man with gnarled hands stumped to the pen. He reached unafraid among the noisy swine and with an expert twitch grabbed the tail of the white piglet as it nosed his hands to see if he'd brought food. The animal squealed and kicked comically in mid-air, but no one laughed. They only drew back as the man came hesitantly forward.

All this time, Geraint kept his seat, and his false calm. She could feel the tension pouring from him. He did not know what she planned and he did not like this place. His keen eyes watched the road, looking for danger from that way even as the folk around them watched it, leaving her free to work.

Elen took the squirming, kicking, piglet, holding it tight in her arms as she had so many others in spring. It was not pure white, having faint brown dapples on its skin, but it was near enough.

She knelt, gathering her concentration, reaching back to that place where her mother's gifts lay. Her heart beat strong in Calonnau. Around her the air was heavy with portent and premonition. It reached into her blood and it made her strong. Weary in her fear and her loss, she accepted that strength and drew it into herself.

You will have three gifts,
her mother's ghost had told her.
Well, this shall be the second.

“Mother Don, Mother Rhiannon, look with favor on this thing.” The prayer steadied her, and she felt the touch of the other world on her shoulder. Certain now that she would be heard, she whispered into the swine's ear in the oldest tongue she knew. “Cousin mine, go you and tell your grandmother that Adara's brood is taken hard by hunger in the far country.”

The little pig was still in her arms for a moment. Then, it wriggled free, and she let it go. But it did not run back to its pen. Instead, it trotted up to the table, calm as a dog in his master's hall. It circled the table, once, twice, and once more, and touched its snout to the cloth.

What happened then happened between one eyeblink and the next. Where there had been a bare board, there was a bounty of food. Baskets of berries and apples. Rounds of nutty breads fresh and hot. Roasted quails and grouse steaming in their juices on wooden platters. Clay tureens full of stews of fish and vegetables. Pottages of pease and wheat, crocks of butter, honey and cream, pitchers of foaming beer. All the wealth of the land was spread on that board.

The piglet squealed high and sharp and bolted back to its sow. The strength left Elen's knees at the same moment and she collapsed. Geraint caught her before she hit the ground.

“Stand me up,” she whispered. “Make no sign.”

He did not like this, but he did as she asked, lifting her and steadying her on her feet.

Two,
said a woman's voice in Elen's mind.

Elen swallowed.
So be it,
she said in silent answer.

“Please,” she said, spreading cold hands to encompass the whole village. “Accept this gift.”

She found she could stand again. She squeezed Geraint's hands as she took them from around her waist. She said nothing. She did not want any of those who crowded around to see that aught was wrong.

They did stare, in wonder and in trepidation. They looked to each other. They looked to Adev. Their chests heaved at the sight of the bounty loaded upon their spare board, and warm, heady scents that rose into the evening air. Mothers clamped their hands on childrens' shoulders to keep them from scrambling forward.

“It is none of your lord's,” said Geraint. “It is freely given to you.”

A spasm very like pain crossed Adev's face, but gradually, his resistance melted away.

“Yes,” he whispered. “Yes, we do accept this gift.” He turned to his folk gathered there, reluctant to believe, fear delaying understanding. “We do accept this gift.”

One by one, parents holding back their children stepped forward. Older children edged ahead of younger ones. They came to the food with hesitant hands, plucking apart bread to dip into gravies or scoop into butter, picking up the fresh gooseberries one at a time to pop into mouths. But as the taste of the food, its scent, the reality of it spread, the fear ebbed, and they crowded round the table. Chairs, tables, benches and knives were fetched. Children sat under trees with split loaves heavy with butter and cream between them, their mouths now full, sticky and laughing. They all ate like they were starved, and for more than the food, but for the fellowship the feast provided. They smiled as if it were the first time in years. They came to laughter as they had come to the food, hesitant and fearful, but gradually accepting and grateful.