Gwenhwyfar (5 page)

As Gwen watched breathlessly, the two combatants rolled and thrashed, tearing up the ground and the underbrush in their struggle. And aside from the sounds of combat, it was a silent struggle; the bear roared no more challenges, and the snake did not utter a single hiss.

Suddenly there was a tremendous
crack;
Gwen jumped and screamed.

For a long moment, serpent and bear were frozen together into a knot of fur and scales and torn flesh and blood.

Then, slowly, the serpent’s coils fell away from the bear, dropping limply to the forest floor.

The bear had broken its spine.

But the bear had not escaped unscathed.

It stood there, swaying from side to side for a long, long moment, bleeding from a hundred wounds. Gwen gathered herself to try to creep out of the grove and escape, when the bear looked up and
looked
at her.

She froze. There was something in its eyes. Something . . . desperate. Something with a hint of recognition . . .

The bear held her with its gaze,
looking
at her, making her feel that it was trying, somehow, to tell her something.

Then it moaned once, its legs buckled, and it toppled clumsily to the ground.

There was a roaring in Gwen’s ears; little black specks danced before her eyes, then grew, then covered everything with blackness, a darkness that she fell into, and forgot bear and blood and serpent and all . . .

When she opened her eyes again, there was no sign of the bear, nor of the serpent. The forest floor was undamaged, the underbrush rustled undisturbed, and Holdhard snored on, as if nothing whatsoever had happened.

Gwen was silent all through the meal, even when her father petted and praised her for the treat she had brought him. She smiled up at him as Little Gwen seethed, but the smile was only on her lips; her mind was still on that terrible fight in the forest, trying to understand how it could have happened, and then—not happened. She had not been dreaming. She was very sure of that. She had not been asleep.

That meant it could only be one thing: a vision.

She didn’t want to tell her mother about it, somehow. She really didn’t want to tell
anyone
really, but she had to know what it meant, and if she could not tell her mother, there was only one person she could unburden herself to.

Provided that person would listen to her.

After the meal was over, and the women had gathered at the hearth as the men gathered at the mead benches, instead of sitting at her mother’s feet as she usually did, Gwen allowed Little Gwen to usurp her place without a murmur. Instead, she settled away from the warmth of the fire, just in the shadows, and fixed her gaze on the priestess, silently willing the woman to
look
at her. If it worked to will people not to look at her, the opposite should be true too, shouldn’t it?

For the longest time, the priestess seemed oblivious to Gwen’s gaze. The usual talk went on, of the luck of the hunt that day, of the feast to come on Samhain, of those who were expected to pledge to each other by leaping the fire that night. Of the thickness of the wool, the taste of the wind, speculation on how hard the winter to come might be.

But finally, slowly, the priestess turned her head and looked into Gwen’s eyes. Her solemn gaze met Gwen’s anxious one, and, finally, she nodded once, then indicated the door with a little inclination of her head.

Gwen got up and headed for the door, as if she were going to relieve herself at the privy. But she lingered beside the door, shivering in the cold with her cloak around her, waiting for the priestess.

She did not have long to wait. The priestess slipped through the door and shut it against the wind, then reached down and gripped Gwen’s shoulder.

“Your eyes were burning holes in my back, child,” she said, calmly. “What is your trouble? For surely you have one, if you gave up your place at the hearth and hardly smiled at your father’s thanks.”

“I—I saw something!” Gwen blurted. Then the words came tumbling out of her, like an avalanche of pebbles, as she described the battle of serpent and bear. When she was finished, she waited in silence.

“I do not know what this means,” the priestess said, after a long silence, in which the cold wind whipped their cloaks about them. “That it is a vision, and one portentous for you, I have no doubt. But I cannot tell what it means.”

“Oh,” Gwen said, in a small, and disappointed, voice.

“But I will meditate on this,” the priestess continued. “And if the Goddess sends me enlightenment, I will tell you.” The hand on Gwen’s shoulder relaxed, and the priestess gave her a little pat. “You did well to tell me, Gwenhwyfar. Such visions are rare; your mother has never had one. Should you have another such, do not fear to confide it to a priestess.”

“I won’t,” said Gwen, and that seemed all there was to say. Feeling vaguely cheated, she went back inside and spent the rest of the evening on the edge of the cluster of her sisters, shivering, until the queen sent them all to bed.

The morning of
Samhain dawned as perfect as anyone could have asked for. The sun was warm enough for pleasure but not so warm as to make the old people grumble about summer-out of-season and bad omens. A cloudless sky and not even a hint of wind meant that the fires would send their smoke straight up, not into anyone’s face. A hard frost three days ago had killed the flies, and the hunts had been outstanding; in short, everything was as perfect as one could want to celebrate the High King’s wedding, the harvest, and the rites of the Lady of the Fields and the Lord of the Wood.

Gwen and her sisters were rewarded for much hard work in the days before by being given a holiday today. They couldn’t stay abed though; the moment the sun was up, so were they, getting their hair braided, putting on their best gowns and shifts. The castle hall was full of people already; folk had been coming for days, and every little space where someone could lay his head had been taken up by someone. There were even tents pitched all about the castle and people sleeping in them.

When the girls left their room, the sleepers had already been cleared from the Great Hall, and trestle tables were set up along the wall, laden with bread and autumn fruit and honey for folk to break their fast on, and ale for drinking. For the girls, however, there was a tastier treat of sops-in-wine and watered wine with honey to sweeten it. All of them helped themselves to apples once they had cleaned their bowls, both figuratively and literally. It was only dawn and a long time to dinner.

Already there was activity everywhere, in the Hall and especially out on the green and about the village. Great cauldrons of soup were cooking, and ovens were fired up with the first baking of the day; the boar’s head, the baked meats, fish and fowl, the fruit pies, the cakes and baked vegetables that would be served at dinner. The second baking would be for meat pies for supper and more fish and fowl. There was a whole ox roasting at one fire and a whole wild boar at another. Samhain was not a religious festival, although tonight there would be the Great Working for the High King—it was the Equinox that was the significant date, when the Winter King slew his rival, the Summer King, as the Spring Equinox was when the Young Stag slew the Old. Samhain was the celebration of the end of harvest and the time when those animals who were to be killed for winter meat were culled out. Anything that could not be preserved must be eaten, so why not make a festival out of it? The butchered beasts were already rendered into quarters and in the pickling vats, the smokehouse, or the salt packs. Sausages were already made up and curing. The brewing was done, the ale and mead in their casks.

Still the women were hard at work, tending to the cooking. Innards and bones, hooves and vegetable scraps had gone into pies and soup, for nothing was wasted. The common folk would get their portion of the ox and the boar—everyone got at least a small share of meat—but mostly they would be eating their fill of the soup. It was the guests of the king who would feast on the choicer stuffs.

So this was mostly celebration for the menfolk. The hard work of farming was over, and the year was about to descend into the dark. Not a bad time of year to handfast, for the sharing of a bed now could mean a fine babe in the summer, and a bed was warmer with two in it. This would be the last time of abundance before the hoarding of winter.

Gwen’s father made a point to bring in all his warriors for the days of feasting, organizing contests and games. There were even musicians, and not just the ones from the village.

He was a surprisingly tenderhearted man as well where children were concerned; as this was the time of year when many a lamb grown into a sheep, gosling now big and gray and honking, or pink piglet grown fat went under the knife, he saw to it that there were plenty of things to occupy the children who had made these creatures into pets. So when the former pet became quarters, ham, and sausages hanging in the smokehouse, it was all done when the child was occupied with dancing or gaming or stuffing himself with unaccustomed treats.

As Gwen headed purposefully out with her pockets bulging with apples, she did not follow after her older sisters, who were making straight toward the field where some of the older boys were engaged in wrestling, archery and sling contests, and the hurling of woolsacks.

She also made sure to lose Little Gwen at the moment when her younger sister was distracted by a game of tag. Little Gwen could not bear to be left out of anything that promised attention, and once the child’s attention was fully occupied, Gwen took advantage of a couple of geese being chased to get away.

Gwen didn’t want to play tag or hoops, to run races for prizes or watch the older boys and men compete at feats of strength. She wasn’t interested in the quieter pursuits of playing with poppets or merrils, and she certainly wasn’t interested in the mock handfasting that was going on, nor the flirtations of her oldest sister.

She made her way with quiet determination to where the horses had been tethered.

She knew better than to approach them; handling the warhorses was strictly the work of those who were given that privilege—sometimes boys and rarely girls, but mostly fully grown men and the occasional woman. But feast days like these were the only time she ever got to see them do the sorts of things they had been trained to do.

At the moment, they were being readied for the chariot races. The Romans had introduced the chariot to the tribes, and once they had seen chariots in action, there was no stopping the tribes from adopting the vehicle. But unlike the Roman races, which were held in the coliseums on round or oval tracks, and were consequently hideously dangerous for driver and horses alike, these races, like the ridden ones that would come later, were held on the straight. From the line out to some distant spot, then a turn, and back to the start. Horses were too valuable to lose to accidents that could easily be prevented.

The chariots were light wicker affairs, never pulled by more than two horses. The wheels had iron rims and iron fittings, and the wicker cars themselves were open in front, with a curved wall behind. The chariot that their father used for important occasions had seats; these racing chariots did not. Nor did they have the scythes on the wheels that the war chariots had.

The war chariots were fearsome things, and Gwen had never (of course) seen them in use in battle. But these races would demonstrate some of the skill of the charioteers and the warriors who fought with them.

There were four in the first race, which was a very special challenge match; two of them were her father’s horses and were driven by his men. The other two belonged to two of his war chiefs. The king was well known to be a generous winner and a gracious loser; no one would hold back for fear of displeasing him. These would be excellent races.

Much as Gwen yearned after the horses like one gone lovesick, there was one pair and their driver that Gwen particularly wanted to watch, and they were not her father’s horses. They belonged to Hydd ap Kei, one of the king’s oldest friends, and the chariot driver was a woman.

Her name was Braith, and Gwen had watched her race a score of times. She was amazing in the races, and Gwen wondered what she would be like in battle. She seemed to be absolutely fearless, she was known for running out onto the pole, standing on the yoke to help balance for a fast turn, running back to the chariot again. Precious time could be lost in the turns, precious in a race, and, Gwen supposed, precious in a fight, too. Running the pole like that helped in a turn. Gwen had even, once, when the chariot had hit an unseen rock and shattered, seen Braith leap onto the horses’ backs and drive them with one foot on each horse, her hair coming loose from its braids and streaming behind her like the horses’ tails.

She’d been disqualified, for after all, in a chariot race it is expected that there be a
chariot
behind the horses, but people were still talking about the feat.