The Horse Goddess (Celtic World of Morgan Llywelyn) (47 page)

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Authors: Morgan Llywelyn

BOOK: The Horse Goddess (Celtic World of Morgan Llywelyn)
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Otherworlds, where she might escape.
Otherworlds, where there were names she could call on and help she could seek.
In a swirling gray darkness she called to the spirits of her people. She reached out, summoning, aware of vast distances of time and space, frantically searching for the familiar.
And from far, far away, she at last heard a voice. A harsh metallic voice.
“Epona,” Kernunnos said.
She shuddered and surrendered the fight.
When she came to herself she was lying in another tent, and as she climbed upward from the drugged sleep she realized that her hands and feet were bound. One of her female “attendants” stood over her, smiling a false smile. “You are feeling better now, Kelt?” the woman asked.
“Where am I?”
“In safe place. Man without a name is searching for you, but he will not find you here. He will not see you again until the Taylga.”
The Taylga. This concerns you
, warned the spirit within. Epona wanted to close her eyes and sleep, just sleep … but the spirit within would not allow it.
“What happens at the Taylga?” it forced her to ask.
The other woman lowered her eyes. “Women do not attend sacrifice.”
“But surely you know …” Epona put flattery into her voice, smearing it like honey on bread. “You are obviously a favorite of the shamans.”
The woman smirked. “Is so. First slave of Tsaygas. Warm his bed, taste his food for poison.”
“Then you must know about the sacrifice. Women always know more than they admit.”
The smirk became a smile, as of a shared sisterhood. “Is
so. This Taylga will be most special, it is said. Last Taylga was just over when you came here; it was not big success. Sacrifice was not sufficiently fine. But this season we have two splendid horses: black one to placate evil spirits, white one to be sent as messenger to Tabiti, to insure that strength of prince is renewed for coming year.”
Kolaxais is alive then
, Epona thought with relief. Kazhak would be glad to hear that—if she could get to Kazhak and tell him. “The white horse will be sacrificed to ask strength for Kolaxais?” she inquired, to be sure.
“For ruler of tribe,” the woman answered guardedly. “Sacrifice of white horse is always to strengthen bonds between royal Tabiti and prince of Royal Scythians, representative of Papaeus. Tabiti is father in sky; han is father of tribe.”
Perhaps Kolaxais is already dead. Perhaps a new prince sits in his place, on his rugs, listening to the shrieking of the shamans.
Not Kazhak. It would not be Kazhak.
“Is another purpose for Taylga,” the woman said, putting one hand on her belly. “At Taylga, woman is offered to white horse before sacrifice. If horse accepts her, means tribe will be much more fertile in new season. Since Kazhak brought wolf-demon to threaten Kolaxais, not enough babies have been born to our people. This body”—her hand caressed her flat stomach—“should have swelled with child of shaman, but is empty. After Taylga, womb will hold new shaman. Tsaygas has promised.”
“What do you mean, a woman is offered to the white horse?”
“Is a white stallion,” the shaman’s woman replied, leering at the prospect of the promised spectacle. “Shamans give drug to horse, makes him very excited. So excited he will even mount human woman if she is held for him. Fertility of the horse is passed on to the person, enters the entire tribe.”
“What happens to the woman?” Epona asked, horrified, seeing in her mind the enormous penis of a stallion.
“Woman dies, but tribe will grow. Shamans have promised. Shamans have very special woman for sacrifice.”
You are the chosen sacrifice, Epona,
said the voiceless voice of the spirit within.
T
he women left her alone for a time, though securely bound and with a guard at the entrance to the tent. Epona lay sweating in horror. She could not keep herself from picturing the ceremony they had described; the shameful degradation of the beautiful animal, the insult she and he would be forced to offer to the earth mother. Twisted, evil! These were not white shamans, but black, according to the beliefs of their own people. And she was powerless against them.
No. Not powerless.
She clenched her teeth hard and closed her eyes, forcing herself to concentrate. Without sleeping, and by the force of her will alone, she summoned the gray mist and the swirling, the darkness that gave way to the light. She would not be afraid of what she found there this time.
Spirits of my people
, she called.
Be with me.
Epona,
said the voice.
I hear you.
But she saw nothing, only light and shadow. Nevertheless, she could sense something around her; disembodied life that
was more alive than flesh and blood; life that throbbed and burned and moved. Radiant, exultant. Life.
Weak tears of joy stole from beneath her closed eyelids.
Spirits of my people
, she whispered.
Help me. Help Kazhak, who is a good man.
You owe us
, came the reply.
Yes,
she said, acknowledging the debt at last.
I owe you for the gift of life.
Something brushed close to her in the swirling mist and she had one brief glimpse of a hairy distorted face, and two yellow eyes that were totally mad. She recoiled in shock, feeling the sudden strain this put on the tenuous thread connecting her with her recumbent body in the Scythian tent.
Her body leaped violently and her eyes opened. For a moment she did not know where she was; the transition was too abrupt, too painful. Then she heard the wind blowing, and the wailing of the shamans, and she knew.
The sound of a scuffle nearby caused her to try to lift up enough to see what was happening, but the bonds that held her were too tight. She whipped her head back and forth in frustration, fighting with every muscle to gain some precious slack in the ropes.
“Be still, Epona. Someone will hear.” Kazhak bent over her, with a Kelti knife in his hand.
Her eyes mirrored her relief and joy at seeing him. He bathed himself briefly in their warmth, then glanced over his shoulder toward the limp body of the guard that he had dragged inside the tent. “Is not much time,” he whispered. “Soon shamans will come, for you … for my horse.”
“
Your
horse?” Her voice was weak with disuse.
“Shamans mean to take Kazhak’s stallion for White Horse Sacrifice. Last year he was too dark, but gray horse gets white with age. This season …” He clamped his jaw on the words and did not finish. “Will not happen,” was all he said,
The knife had cut the bonds on her wrists and arms and Kazhak moved down to free her ankle.
“How did you find me?”
“Strange thing happen. You were gone; Kazhak asked
everywhere, no one knew. Or would say. Could not search every tent, men would not let me in. Where to go? Then Kazhak saw wolf, huge wolf, with torn face. Clear as Kazhak sees you now. Wolf looked right at me, then ran this way, into this tent. Kazhak followed. Guard tried to stop, but Kazhak had good knife, put in guard’s throat before he could cry out.”
She was free at last, and he helped her to her feet. The effects of the drug left her dizzy but she was fighting it off with every breath she drew. “Where is the wolf now?” she managed to ask. Kazhak glanced around the tent.
“Gone,” he said simply.
The noise level outside was increasing. Added to the ritual cries of the shamans and the omnipresent shrieking of the wind were the shouts of men, and the clatter of bones and rare, hoarded wood being dragged into a central place for the sacrificial fire. “Must go now,” Kazhak said urgently. “You ride away on my stallion,
now,
or shamans sacrifice you both.”
She dug her heels into the earth and resisted his tugging hands. “I will not leave you! I want to stay here to help you, Kazhak. You must not send me away now, when you need help most.”
“You can help most by leaving and taking stallion with you,” Kazhak told her. “Kazhak raised that horse from a colt. Taught him everything. Has been brother to me, that horse. Shamans know this. They know if they kill that horse, they will tear out Kazhak’s heart. If you are safe, stallion is safe, it will be easier for me.”
“But what will you do?”
“Try to convince my brothers not to listen to shamans. Try to see Kolaxais, if he is still alive.”
“They will kill you too, Kazhak. If I go, you must come with me, now. You must ride away with me so we both live.”
He smiled a bitter smile. “Kelti put much store by their honor, is it so? Would not be an honorable thing for Kazhak to leave now, while father may still be alive but helpless in grip of shamans. Kazhak must stay long enough to do what
he can for Kolaxais, or is not an honorable man. Is it so?”
Once more she was being pushed and shoved. She would get no chance to pit her powers against those of the shamans; she would flee the Scythian encampment like a thief, taking the gray stallion with her, and leaving a brave man behind to attempt to fulfill his own obligations to those who gave him life.
Tears burned in her eyes. She could cry now; she was a Kelt. “I cannot leave without you, Kazhak,” she said. “It would … tear out Epona’s heart.”
“Is not an order. But Kazhak asks.”
They met and locked eyes in a silence that had no room for anything other than their two spirits.
Epona was the first to lower her eyes. “Where will I go?” she asked in a voice so soft he could hardly hear it.
“West,” he told her. “As far as you like. Dasadas will go with you; he knows the way to get you back to the Blue Mountains, if that is what you want.”
“Dasadas?!” She could not believe her ears.
“He will not let anything happen to you,” Kazhak said with certainty. “You are safer with him than with any other man. Kazhak had rather you live, with Dasadas, than die to give glory to shamans.”
“But I am not afraid of dying, Kazhak.”
The bitter smile remained. “You always argue. There is no time for arguing. You are not afraid, Epona, but Kazhak is afraid for you. What if life does not go on forever, like you think? All this”—he lifted a strand of her hair and fingered it. Kelti gold—“all of this would be gone.
“Go with Dasadas, Epona. He is waiting with my horse. If we are very careful, may be we can get to them before anyone sees us.”
He caught her wrist and pulled her after him, out of the tent. As she stepped over the guard’s body she saw that he lay in a pool of blood, and she was glad.
The huge fire of sacrifice was being built in the center of the encampment, and the entire tribe seemed preoccupied with it. Every able pair of hands was engaged in collecting and
carrying anything that might burn, including the smashed wagons of men already dead by the shamans’ order.
Tsaygas and Mitkezh were determined to light at the next sunrise a blaze that would be seen from horizon to horizon, symbolizing the birth of a new power on the Sea of Grass.
They will be very disappointed
, Epona thought to herself, running behind Kazhak, bent over to be less visible in the gloom of a cloudy afternoon, dodging breathlessly between tents and wagons.
When their main sacrifices escape them, they will lose much status. The earth mother does not show pity to priests who abuse their privilege.
A few people saw the fleeing figures, but no one raised an outcry. It was not a good time to draw attention to oneself. Kazhak and Epona succeeded in reaching the edge of the encampment without anyone’s summoning the shamans.
Perhaps my brothers will stand with me after all,
Kazhak thought. But he did not have a good feeling about it. Men who have turned against you once are not to be trusted a second time. As he had promised, Dasadas was waiting. He rode his new bay stallion, a heavy pack of provisions fastened behind the saddle, and he held the reins of Kazhak’s gray. His eyes lit with relief as he saw the two approach. “Dasadas got to stallion before shamans came with drug,” he said. “You found Epona. Is good, Kazhak. Good. But is anyone following you?”
Kazhak glanced back. “No one follows, not yet. But soon. Is strange thing, but none of those who have become so friendly with shamans seem to have noticed us. Is like they were blind.”
Epona glanced back the way they had come. A mist, as of water vapor, seemed to have settled on the encampment. A very unseasonable fog, that shielded some sights from inimical eyes.
Uiska,
she thought.
The smoke of cooking fires hung unusually heavy in the air, clouding the vision, making eyes smart and burn. It was hard to see clearly in such an atmosphere, and the Scythians groped through their duties as if half-blinded.
Tena,
Epona said to herself.
Still, there was very little time. At any moment the shamans would return to the tent to check on the condition of their treasure; perhaps to give her additional potions to make her more docile, even as they meant to drug the horse. If they were to escape, they must do it now, while all the usually mounted Scythians were on foot, engaged in perparing the sacrificial bonfire.
Urged by Kazhak’s demanding hands, Epona had reluctantly mounted the gray stallion and taken the reins from Dasadas, but now she turned for one more look at Kazhak—and that was her undoing. His eyes met hers with a look of such loss and longing nothing else mattered: not the fire of sacrifice, not the stallion, not her own tribe. “Kazhak!” she cried, and threw the reins down on the horse’s neck, preparing to dismount.
“Run!” Kazhak thundered at the stallion, slamming his hand across its haunch with all the force he possessed. The whip of inarguable command was in his voice and the animal obeyed, leaping forward with such a bound that Epona was nearly thrown from the saddle. She instinctively grabbed the stallion’s mane, pulling herself back into balance, and at that moment she heard angry cries and saw a group of men running toward her, led by the furious shamans.
“Do not let them escape!” Tsaygas screamed, as his men scrambled for their horses.
“Come, Epona!” Dasadas yelled, grabbing the gray stallion’s headstall as he galloped beside her. There was always the chance she would turn and go back, to certain death. She tried to fight him off but he dodged her desperate fist. When she tried to leap from the saddle he urged the bay in so close to Kazhak’s gray that he was able to clutch the back of her clothing in his hand and hold her on the horse. “Is what Kazhak wants!” he yelled, and this time she heard him. Her struggles lessened and she sat upright in the saddle, allowing the flight to continue.
But she turned in the saddle and looked back in time to see the first of the Scythians reach his own hobbled mount,
unfasten it, and vault aboard. At that moment a figure—lean and lithe, like a giant dog—darted from between two tents and launched itself straight at the throat of the Scythian horse. The animal reared with a terrible scream, the rider fighting for control. The horse crashed to the earth, its rider with it, pinned beneath the heavy body. The silver wolf attacked the helpless man then, rather than the horse, slashing his throat open and then whirling on the next Scythian who approached to aid his comrade. The speed and fury of the wolf’s assault seemed to paralyze the man with fear. It hurled itself upon him, driving him to the earth, tearing him open. Even as he died the wolf left him for its next victim, and the next after that.
It seemed to be everywhere at once, snarling, slashing, its fangs savaging flesh as if with an insatiable thirst for human blood. In moments it had wrought havoc in the Scythian encampment and so panicked the hobbled saddle horses that even the best horseman could not calm one of them long enough to free it and mount.
Kazhak snatched his bow from his
gorytus
without thinking and fired a quick shot, but the arrow passed harmlessly by the wolf—or through it. That could not be; he blinked and rubbed his eyes, and in that moment the wolf turned once and looked at him, with such insane eyes that he was rooted where he stood. Yet the creature did not attack him; its primary interest seemed to be in scattering and slaughtering those who would pursue Epona. Already the area reeked with blood and rang with the cries of torn men, and the animal appeared to grow stronger with every man it killed.
No one was going to be pursuing Epona; not for quite a while.
But it was Kazhak’s people who were being slaughtered. Though they had been turned against him, the men who were dying had once called themselves his comrades. His brothers.
He drew his Kelti sword. If Epona was right, perhaps the wolf would back away from that weapon. He could do that much; he could stand with his people against this thing, and try to keep it from sending any more Scythians into the
wooden houses. Perhaps, when Epona was far enough away to be beyond all hope of catching her, the wolf would even let them alone.

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