Shaman of Stonewylde (12 page)

Sylvie sighed. Maybe this hadn’t been such a good idea. Leveret had always been difficult with her; prickly and unwilling to establish any kind of channel between them. She really didn’t know where to start, as it wasn’t as if they’d had an argument that they could patch up.

‘Are you happy living up here?’

‘Well, obviously I am. Anything’s better than my life was before.’

She hadn’t changed that much after all, Sylvie decided; still rude and hostile.

‘I wondered if you’d be coming down to the Village soon to visit your mother?’

Leveret turned and glared at Sylvie, her angry eyes taking in every detail of the pale woman’s face. Sylvie wasn’t looking good these days, her eyes strained and weary, her mouth sad. Leveret felt an inkling of pity, despite herself. Sylvie had always been so perfect and beautiful, but somewhere along the line that had disappeared. Her serenity had been punctured, and with it her beauty. Leveret found her fierce dislike starting to dissolve and a reluctant sympathy seeping.

‘Has Mother asked you to invite me to visit?’ she asked, a little more harshly than she intended. ‘Was this her idea?’

Sylvie shook her head, her long silver hair rippling as she did so. She drooped like a wilting flower, thought Leveret, as if all her vitality and energy had been sapped.

‘No, Leveret, she hasn’t asked me to do anything. But I know that she misses you and—’

‘That’s not really the point, though. You can miss someone but still not want to see them.’

‘True,’ agreed Sylvie, thinking of Yul. ‘But I’m sure Maizie does want to see you.’

‘Well, I’m not sure!’ said Leveret bitterly, all the feelings that she’d kept at bay now flooding back. ‘And until I am, and she asks me directly herself, I won’t see her. And just for future reference, you needn’t take it on yourself to try and make things better between me and my mother, thank you Sylvie. It’s none of your business!’

‘Oh, Leveret!’ Sylvie stared at her in dismay. ‘There’s really no need to be so antagonistic towards me.’

‘I’m not antagonistic – I just don’t want you interfering. It really is nothing to do with you, despite the fact that you’re now so happy living in
my
home with
my
mother . . .’

Leveret’s voice tailed off and she felt alarmingly close to tears, which made her angry; she’d done with crying at Imbolc. But Sylvie’s cheeks had flushed.

‘Don’t be jealous, please!’ she snapped. ‘I’m not happy at all, believe me! I’m only living there because your brother has become such a brute and I have nowhere else to go. And besides, it works both ways, Leveret. How do you think
I
feel about
you
living so cosily with my father? That’s a privilege I’ve never had!’

They stared at each other, quite aghast at the lacerating emotion that had flared up seemingly out of nowhere. Green gaze met silver one and something strange happened as they looked, for the first time ever, deep into each other’s eyes. Empathy bloomed and both of them crumbled, their mouths quivering and tears welling. Leveret was suddenly overwhelmed with compassion. Rapidly crossing the flagstones of the roof, she reached up and put her arms around her sobbing sister-in-law. Sylvie grabbed hold of the smaller, younger girl and held on tightly, the sobs choking her.

‘I’m so sorry, Sylvie,’ said Leveret through her tears. Her throat ached with sadness for this poor woman who’d done no harm to anyone. ‘I’ve always disliked you and it’s so stupid. I really don’t know why, because you’re a lovely person and you’ve always been kind to me. I’m sorry!’

Sylvie couldn’t speak but gradually her sobs subsided, although she still clung to Leveret. She found it strangely comforting; there was something strong and vibrant within Leveret. Eventually her tears stopped altogether and Leveret gave her a final hug.

‘We’d better go back inside,’ she said gently. ‘Shall we get together soon and have a proper talk?’

Sylvie had nodded, blowing her nose and managing a shaky smile.

‘And Sylvie, I’m sorry how I’ve always behaved towards you. That’s over now, I promise.’

That had been earlier, and Clip, having watched Leveret and sensing some of her inner turmoil, insisted on them making a journey that evening.

‘I think you need to ask some questions, Leveret. It’s Beltane the day after tomorrow and, for that, we need to join in the celebrations and everything up at the Stone Circle and in the Village. So I’d like us to go up to the Dolmen this evening and journey from there. Remember I said to you we’d do that when the weather became warmer?’

Sitting together in the entrance to the ancient cave, a small fire now burning amongst the ring of stones and aromatic smoke filling their nostrils, Clip looked carefully at Leveret.

‘Things are happening, Leveret, and there are big changes on their way. I don’t know why, but I’m just not getting any answers, try as I might. Maybe that’s because you’re on the wax and I’m on the wane. Have you had any of your other visions lately?’

Leveret shook her head.

‘No, not really. I felt something the other day when Martin was watching me . . . but nothing that really helps. Right now I feel . . . confused. Sylvie and I had a talk earlier and it’s preying on my mind. I’m not sure how successful a journey I’ll have this evening.’

‘I’m sure you’ll be given the answers you need if the time is right,’ he said, stoking up the fire and passing her some water. ‘And I have something here, something I’ve made for you.’

Clip reached into the bag he always carried and pulled out a parcel wrapped in cloth. He solemnly handed it to Leveret with both hands and made a little bow.

‘I found her lying on the path when I visited Mother Heggy’s cottage recently, after our conversation,’ he said. ‘I’ve preserved this for you – tanned it all myself, so there’s a lot of my intent and energy in it. It’s for you to wear sometimes when you’re journeying. All the ancient shamans would’ve had something similar.’

Mystified, Leveret opened up the cloth and stared at the thing
in
her lap. It was – had been – a hare, and a large one at that. The head was intact, presumably stuffed, and the enormously long ears lay back flat. Golden glass eyes stared at her in the flickering firelight and Leveret shuddered as something fleeting touched her memory, something from long, long ago in a different era. The fur pelt was beautiful, a speckled golden brown, and fully opened up so that it stretched out in a great piece of material with four paws still attached, and a tuft of a tail at the bottom. There were long leather laces attached on either side, near the head. Leveret’s hand moved to touch it and she received a jolt that sizzled through her body. She cried out and turned to Clip in wonder, her eyes shining.

‘Clip, I . . . I—’

He smiled and patted her arm in understanding.

‘No need to say anything, it’s alright. I’m assuming she died of natural causes, as there wasn’t a mark on her, no wounds of any kind. She was lying right in my path, on the ground near Mother Heggy’s cottage and she was still warm – what could I do but cure her skin for you? I’ve long thought you should have a shaman’s headdress or magical costume of some kind. You may recall my cloak of black bird feathers? That will be yours when I leave Stonewylde, but I realised that you should also have your own totem garment. You must put the hare’s head here, over your forehead, so she looks out from your inner eye chakra and her ears lie back over your head and crown. Tie the laces here, under your chin . . .’

Leveret looked up at him and now it was Clip’s turn to shiver. The hare headdress was perfect. The hare’s sightless eyes gazed out from the girl’s forehead and the soft fur, with the fine leather inside so carefully tanned over the past two weeks, fell in a kind of heavy veil from it, reaching right down her back. Leveret’s wild dark curls and the hare’s front paws framed her pointed face, whilst the rest of the skin hung down over her shoulders with the hind paws level with her breasts. She had become hare-woman; even her green eyes had changed.

Clip picked up his large frame-drum and beater, and settled
more
comfortably on the cushion, a recent concession to comfort. Leveret, magical and bizarre in the hare headdress, pulled her warm cloak around herself and gazed into the flames of the fire. The soft April light outside the stone cave began to fade unnoticed as the deep-voiced shamanic drumbeats summoned, insistent and throbbing. The flames crackled brightly in the hearth, and outside a crow called across the landscape . . .

Raven drew her into the entrance; not her usual one, but a tree tunnel of sorts, long and stretching away beneath an arch of beech trees. Leveret recognised it as the Long Walk leading into the Stone Circle, although in this Middle World landscape everything was slightly different. The trees breathed, their green-lichened trunks expanding and contracting with each breath, and their delicate twigs and unfurling leaves trembled with life-force. They sparkled a brilliant lime-green, giving out light and energy. As usual, the way was lined with waist-high stones all carved and hewn into shape. And in the dreamscape, the stones themselves had life, each grain and molecule pulsating with being. The worms in the earth by the side of the pathway were visible, beautiful and perfectly designed for their role in the great web of life. The sky through the branches above was pure, forget-me-not blue and so limitless it made Leveret want to cry
.

Raven strutted alongside and turned its glossy head to fix her with a knowing eye
.

‘
Everything is connected, everything is true,’ it said, with the beak that never opened
.

The Long Walk stretched ahead and Leveret walked its length peacefully, sniffing the air and the scent of nature all around, like a perfume more subtle and sublime than any other. The bird song was a symphony greater than any that man had, or ever would, compose. Leveret felt perfectly, completely happy in such a place. Of Clip and his silver wolf, there was no sign
.

They reached at last the entrance to the Stone Circle, and over the two stones there was a woven archway of hawthorn boughs smothered in starry blossom. Inside the Circle it was different again, and at first Leveret thought the great arena was empty. Each megalith
was
painted as usual, but instead of the normal patterns and motifs, the stones were painted all over with leaves. If was like walking into a woodland grove rather than a stone henge. Real boughs of many different types of tree lay on the tops of the stones and stood propped between them, so that all was green and leafy
.

Then Leveret noticed a couple standing over by the Altar Stone. He was dressed as the Green Man – or maybe he
was
the Green Man – in a robe of leaves and a massive headdress of hawthorn blossom. His skin was green and his grey eyes bright in his face, and as Leveret stared at his mass of dark curls she realised it was Yul, but a very young Yul, not much older than she was now. By his side stood the May Queen, his Maiden of Beltane and of course it was Sylvie. She was a young, exquisite girl with skin like pearl and hair like silver corn-silk, dressed in the traditional white dress with a wreath of bluebells and white blossom on her head
.

The Green Man was merry and bright and he glowed with a strange green light that danced all over him. The May Queen glowed silver as if washed with moonbeams and sprinkled with stardust. Silver threads chased all over her pale limbs as if alive. As Leveret watched, the Green Man began a dance upon the earth floor and, as if by magic, the green energy began to awaken beneath his feet. She could see it clearly, like a great coiled snake under the ground slowly coming to life, moving as the boy’s dancing feet marked out the sacred pattern that quickened it. And the Maiden too began to dance, trailing silver moonbeams and magic as she moved, her light feet caressing the earth and the waiting serpent so it flexed with pleasure and delight
.

And her vision expanding suddenly, as it did in the dreamscape, Leveret saw this great serpent of Stonewylde, this life-force and magical being, curled beneath the land all around, stretching out along the ridgeway and beneath the riverbed and below the Village and around the Hall. It writhed below the Wildwood and the cliffs, the hills and the valleys, the wells and the springs. Everywhere the snake spread its coils and its length, and then, with her vision expanded even further, like a lens pulling back and back, Leveret saw that the serpent was simply one aspect of the great Goddess in the Landscape that was Stonewylde, her life force and her life energy
.

The boy and the girl in the Stone Circle, their dance now done, fell into each other’s arms. And Leveret saw such complete love, such absolute tenderness in their embrace and their kiss that she could not breathe for the tears that choked her throat. Such perfect harmony – the darkness and the light, the green and the silver, the male and the female. And Raven turned to her and spoke softly
.

‘
This is what has been lost and must be found
.’

‘
But how?’ asked Leveret
.

‘
The Circle must be free of taint,’ Raven replied
.

‘
But how?’ she asked again but there was no response, for the vision was fading and now they were somewhere else completely
.

They were at the entrance to a cave where boulders were heaped around the mouth. Carefully they picked their way through and into a long, dark passage. They walked slowly along, noting the carvings of snakes all over the walls and roof, until they were inside a great tomb. Leveret looked around in wonder at the rock-lined chamber. It was dry, the air strange with the scent of earth, herbs and incense. Tiny oil-lamps, little more than primitive finger-pots filled with oil and a burning wick, were dotted all around the edges of the stone-lined floor. A long stone table lay in the centre, and off the chamber were several dark portals leading into blackness. Leveret was scared of what might lie in them and looked to Raven for reassurance. Raven bobbed its head and said, ‘You are right not to look beyond this chamber. That is not for you to know just now
.’