The Silver Witch (24 page)

‘Not so fast! Ha,' he grunts, taking the cup from me. ‘I never saw a person so happy to drink something that wasn't ale.'

My breathing is easier now, my throat soothed. My eyes begin to find their sight once more.

‘Hywel? Is it you?'

‘Aye.' He climbs stiffly to his feet. ‘For my sins, Prince Brynach insisted he would put you in the care of no one else. Though heaven knows I make a poor nursemaid.'

I see now that I am in my own little house, and the realization brings me comfort. How I got here I do not know. The last I recall I was in the great hall, shifting from hare to woman, and on the point of death.

‘You brought me here?'

‘The prince did. I assisted him. He would not leave your side until he could be convinced you would live.' Hywel frowns down at me, his bushy brows and unkempt beard wriggling as if they have life of their own as his face expresses his displeasure. ‘And well you might not have, the wound you had. I gave you up for dead more than once, but the prince would not have it. Bid me try anything and everything. Even sent for Nesta and her herbs, but Princess Wenna would not let her come. That displeased him greatly, I can tell you. Man was fit to tear his own teeth out when he thought you'd die. Don't know why you didn't, truth be told. Still, here you remain.'

‘Yes,' I say, dragging myself a little more upright and pulling the woolen blanket around myself. ‘Here I remain.' For a while I watch Hywel tending the fire, content to allow him to go about his business while I try to order my thoughts. ‘How long?' I ask at last. ‘How long have I … slept?'

‘Five nights, if you count the one we found you. And I'm not likely to forget that this side of a harvest moon! Naked in the prince's bed! With half the village sleeping two strides away. Ha! How we took you from there without raising merry hell I shall never know. He wrapped you in a blanket and carried you himself, kicking me from my dreams on his way out. Says he knows not how you came to be there, nor who it was inflicted such harm upon you. Whoever it was, there is no doubt they supposed they left you dead. 'Tis a miracle you are not.'

‘A miracle or your tender nursing,' I find I have the strength to tease him, at least.

‘In me our prince found the person he could most trust with your safety. And I've dressed more wounds on the field of battle than any other living, I'd wager. And that'—he indicates my injury with a wooden spoon—‘well, you did not come by that falling from a tree or stumbling in a rabbit hole. Handle of some sort, most likely a sword hilt. Though how you came to be engaged so closely to one who wanted to kill you that he could not use the blade is another mystery.' He turns his attention to the stewpot suspended above the fire, stirring the contents with some effort, so thick and uneven are they.

I force myself to remember the events of that night. The snow. The riders. Their murderous intent. And the Afanc. Tears of gratitude come without warning. I know how she guards the secret of her existence, and yet she risked discovery for me. My sniffing brings an anxious glance from Hywel, so that I wipe my face with my blanket quickly, lest he think me a flimsy child. I become aware that beneath the blanket, save for a grubby tunic, I am naked. Has Hywel really tended me all these days and nights? He is a good man, but to have him be so intimate … But I am being foolish. His skills have saved my life as surely as the Afanc's appearance saved it earlier. ‘I am in your debt,' I tell him.

‘There is nothing I would not do for the prince. You, of all people, know what that means,' he replies without looking at me. He hands me a bowl of stew and a spoon.

‘Yet it was to my benefit. And I am grateful,' I say. ‘And thankful that Nesta did not put a hand on me!'

Hywel regards me closely now. ‘You do not trust her?'

‘Her loyalties lie with her mistress.'

‘As they should.'

‘So long as the princess's loyalties are also correctly placed.'

He ponders this statement for some time while I chew the gray meat that swims in the oatmeal broth in my bowl. An attempt has been made to disguise its flavor with the liberal use of garlic. I recall the lavender. ‘Tell me,' I ask him, ‘do you burn lavender on the fire?'

‘Burn it? No. I used an oil infused with the flowers and leaves. To speed the healing of your head wound.'

‘I am impressed.'

‘A soldier who can keep other soldiers alive is more likely to live to see old age himself,' he explains. I might have questioned him further on his remedies but the door opens and Prince Brynach steps inside. Hywel scrambles to his feet, but the prince barely notices him the moment he sees that I am awake. Even in the firelight I can see he is tired and troubled, but his face is transformed with a broad smile now.

‘You have decided to rejoin the living,' he says, coming to sit on the floor beside my bed.

‘Only for Hywel to try to kill me off with this terrible stew.'

Brynach laughs, but Hywel bridles. ‘I am expected to be cook as well as nurse and protector! Ha!' Muttering about, needing some air to breathe and snow to piss in, he goes outside.

‘It gladdens my heart to see you well,' the prince tells me, taking my hand in his. There was a time I would have pulled back, but such closeness with death has, perhaps, made me keener to savor life's sweeter moments, so I let him hold me, let him softly caress my hand with his fingers.

‘I wonder that you do not find yourself … repulsed … having seen me as I was,' I say, trying but failing to imagine his shock at seeing me shifting before his eyes.

‘I have always said you are like no other, have I not? Why, then, should I not accept all the strangeness that comprises you? I care only that you are returned to health. Despite Hywel's cooking.' He smiles.

‘He is a skilled healer.'

‘I have seen him bring back men from the brink of death. And I knew he would let no further harm come to you.' He hesitates, then goes on, ‘Seren, did you see who it was? Did you see who attacked you?'

‘They wore helmets with visors or crosspieces. And they did not speak. Nor did I recognize their horses. But … well, it was not the men who sought to stove my head who wished me dead. That is, not beyond doing the bidding of whoever sent them.'

‘But who would wish harm to you? Why?'

‘Answer the “why” and you will have the “who.” There are those who see me as an obstacle in their path to greatness. If they remove me, they have an easier route to you.'

‘Me?'

‘I warned you, there is a traitor among those you name loyal.'

‘You cannot believe Wenna had a hand in what was done to you!'

‘The princess came to me, a short while ago. She asked me to help her.'

‘Asked
you
?'

‘It was indeed a measure of her desperation. She … she wanted to know if she would ever give you an heir.' He draws back a little from me now, his face glum. ‘I sought answers to her question in a vision.'

‘And what did your seeing tell you?'

I hesitate, but I must speak plainly. ‘She will never bear you a child. That part was clear…'

He keeps his voice level, but I know this is a blow for him every bit as painful as the one I have endured. ‘And the other part? You suggest there was more.'

‘I saw men, an army; they were attacking the crannog. They were chasing you. They were relentless. They drove you into the lake…'

He lets go my hand at last. He is quiet for a long time before he asks, ‘This vision foretold my death?'

‘I cannot be sure. There are other ways to read what I saw.'

He gives a mirthless laugh, standing up and pacing around the room. ‘Soldiers hunt me to a watery grave? Such a vision speaks clearly to me.'

‘Which is why you have me to interpret such seeings for you.' I try to get up, but the pain in my head is so sharp it is as if I have been struck anew. I clutch at the wound. Brynach hurries to my side.

‘You are not yet healed. Do not trouble yourself with…'

‘With your safety?' I gasp as he lays me back on my bed. ‘It is my purpose, my prince.'

‘And one which I pray you live to fulfill for many years, but that will not be the case if you struggle from your sickbed too soon.' He attempts a smile. ‘Consider how grumpy that would make Hywel, after all his hard work.'

‘Very well. I would not inflict his temper on you without me to protect you. I will rest a little longer before we talk. But talk we must.' My efforts to cease his flapping around me like a mother hen are poor. Another thought occurs to me. ‘Have you been seen coming here? Hywel says you stayed with me. Were you not missed?'

‘Seren, when I thought you were … when I feared I would lose you forever, I vowed to any gods who cared to hear me, if you lived I would have us deny each other no longer. I would not keep from you, would not continue my life without you. No matter the gossips and whispers. No matter the disapproval. And I will discover who it was who wished you dead.'

Such a declaration moves me so that I must bite my lip to staunch tears I do not wish him to see. ‘Such behavior might provoke another attack,' I whisper.

‘You will not be unguarded.'

‘Am I to be bait, then?'

He takes my hand again. This time he lifts it and presses it to his lips. I feel the softness of his kiss and the heat of his breath against my skin. ‘My love. My love.
My love,
' is all he says.

The following days and weeks pass in a heady mix of pain, indolence, and delight. Every day my prince comes to my home and sends Hywel away. For a few hours he is mine. If it is daylight we sit by the fire in my house and talk. If it is nighttime we go out and walk beneath the stars. Slowly my head heals and my strength returns. He courts me as if we were carefree youngsters, and always he is respectful, gentle and proper. He kisses my hand, but no more than this.

This evening has a special beauty about it. The snow has gone and there is a smell of spring in the air. We walk under a full moon so bright it casts sharp-edged shadows. I lead Brynach to the lake and show him the perfect double of the moon that floats upon the water on such nights as this. We sit atop a smooth rock that juts out over the lake and peer down to study our own faces, side by side, slick and darkly mirrored on the silky surface.

‘No copy of you can be as wondrous as you truly are,' he tells me.

‘I think it is a flattering likeness,' I disagree. ‘The years have been kinder to me in the lake than out here. But it makes you look sorrowful, my prince.'

‘I am only so when I am away from you, my prophet.'

‘You have your princely duties,' I say, and neither of us will choose to name these.

‘Would that you could be my princess,' he says suddenly, a bitterness to his voice that I have not heard before. I put my hand on his.

‘Let us not waste our time together wishing for what can never be. I am content.'

‘I am not!' He throws a stone into the water and our faces are broken to pieces by the disturbance. He stands, still holding my hand, and leads me back from the shore into the cover of the woodland. An owl swoops by as we slip between the trees. Somewhere near a hedgehog snuffles, newly emerged from its winter sleep. Prince Brynach stops when he comes to the shelter of a mossy oak, pulling me to him in a swift movement, finding my mouth with his. His kisses are deep and taste of passion, of want, of longing. For a moment I do not respond, my mind forbidding me, years of trampling my own desire beneath the heavy tread of duty keeping me from expressing my own desire. But my body acts as if cut loose from my control. I feel my need for my prince's love burning hotter than a fire of oak, and such heat melts my resistance and my reserve.

‘My love!' he murmurs, shaking my hair free of its bonds and running his hand through it. ‘My living ghost, my silver goddess, my shining heart…' He kisses my eyes, my face, my throat, hungrily, eagerly, the waiting and wanting of years at last overcoming him.

My hands trace the muscles of his back as he presses me against the trunk of the great tree. So much strength turned to gentleness. So much power brought to sweetness for want of me.

‘Let me love you,' he whispers in my ear. ‘Be mine now. Forever. I cannot live otherwise. I swear it.'

I gasp, unnerved by the force of my own desire for him.

He undoes the brooch that holds my cape, and slips the tunic from my shoulders, exposing my bare flesh to the moonlight. He touches the drawings on my pale skin, following the dark curves of the ink patterns.

‘I would know all of you, in all your wonder,' he says, dropping to his knees to press his mouth to my quivering belly.

And I know I can deny him no longer. I know I can never again turn from him. Let the future judge us as it will, the present is ours, and it is glorious!

 

13

TILDA

They are both so shaken by the events at the dig that neither speaks on the journey back to the cottage. Lucas was in a state of understandable rage over the condition of the dig, the broken lights and the failed attempt to raise the remains. He didn't blame Tilda outright, after all, how could he? And yet a large part of his anger was directed at her. If he could not say exactly how she had been connected to the calamitous occurrences that had so completely wrecked the dig, he clearly knew she was, in some crucial way, involved. There had been so much confusion, so much panic when the lights had started exploding, with people scattering in all directions, that nobody save Dylan and Tilda had seen the last falling light halt halfway to the ground. Or if they had, they had not believed what they saw, and quickly allowed themselves to banish the image from their minds and address the more tangible, pressing issues to hand, such as clearing broken glass and checking mangled equipment in the half-light. When Lucas's language and demeanor became almost aggressive, Dylan was quick to defend Tilda, the two men nearly coming to blows until she simply turned and marched over to the Landrover.