Crimson Fire (27 page)

“What do you mean?”

Gytha took a deep breath, then said quietly and with dig- nity, “I mean that it will all come to nothing. You will defeat them, yes. But later you will be destroyed by what you
fi
nd there. You will be destroyed because you will not understand. You will not see the truth. Not until it is too late.”

Sledda jumped up and grabbed Gytha by her thin shoul- ders, hauling her to her feet, then spoke in a deadly quiet tone, “You are a dead woman, Gytha.”

Quietly, the old woman said, “I was dead the moment I took the cards. Did you really think I didn’t know that?”

Sledda turned desperately to Havgan. “This woman is a fake. I’m sure of it. Don’t pay any attention—”

Havgan raised his hand and Sledda fell silent. He stared at the cards laid out before him. Then, without even looking up, he said, “Kill her.”

Sledda smiled cruelly and pushed Gytha toward the door, calling for the guards. Just before she was hauled from the room, Gytha turned around one last time. Havgan did not look up, but the old woman was not looking at Havgan. Instead, she was looking directly at Gwydion and Rhiannon. Her eyes
fl
ickered to the card of The Moon, the card of deception, then

back to them again. She smiled.

Nardaeg, Sol 21—early afternoon

R
HIANNON STOOD WITH
Gwydion and Sigerric at the rail of the gently swaying ship, gazing at the eastern shore as it slowly
fl
oated by. The day was warm, with a hint of summer coming. Fields of growing wheat dotted the countryside. Occasionally they passed by tiny villages, nestled on the banks of the river.

They had embarked on this ship two days after the doomed Gytha had read the wyrd-galdra. If Sigerric knew anything about that night, he had given no sign. He stood now at the railing, his tanned face joyful in the warm sun.

They had been
fi
ve days now on the River Saefern, making

their way down to Mierce, one of the tributary countries of the Empire. The ship was over sixty feet long. The deck and the huge mast were made of pine, giving off a sharp aroma. The sail was rectangular, made of strips of red and white cloth. It
fi
lled now with the breeze, billowing out as the ship caught the wind, pushing them swiftly down the river.

“Where are we now?” Gwydion asked Sigerric as they passed a town on the bank. Gwydion was still pale and hol- low-eyed. The night after Gytha had been killed, he had woken up screaming from a nightmare, jabbering that the cards were soaked in blood.

“That’s Camlan,” Sigerric replied, “in the shire of Liodis, which is one of the three shires that make up the marc of Gill- ingas. Never been down this way, eh?”

Gwydion shook his head. “No, I’m afraid not.”

“You haven’t missed much. To tell the truth, it’s a good place to stay away from.”

“Why?” Rhiannon asked curiously.

“The folk of Gillingas never really took to the religion of Lytir. There are many, many Heiden in this marc. And you know what that means.”

“No,” Gwydion answered. “What?”

“Don’t you know what they do? Why, they take the babies of the True Believers, and they sacri
fi
ce them and drink their blood. They put the curse of Sceadu, the Great Shadow, on those they hate. They do unspeakable acts. Unspeakable.”

She heard footsteps behind them and turned quickly. Hav- gan and Sledda walked up to them. Havgan put his arms on the rail, while Sledda stood stif
fl
y next to him.

Down the river, far off but steadily drawing closer, a dark smudge on the bank caught her eye. She could not yet make out the details, but the patch of land was bare and black as though a great
fi
re had burned it, a
fi
re that had been so deadly that no living thing could grow in its wake.

“What’s that?” she asked, pointing south.

Sledda hissed between his teeth, and Sigerric answered qui- etly, “It is Ealh Galdra, the place where the Maeder-Godias, the High Priestesses of the Old Religion, used to live. Here, at the outskirts of Camlan.”

“Really? Why here?”

“Legend has it that it is the place where the Asbrubridge touches the earth. That is the bridge between Middle-Earth and the realm of the Old Gods. The ground there is—or was— sacred. It hasn’t been used now for hundreds of years.”

“Since the last Maeder-Godia of Coran died?” she asked. “Yes, though she did not die there. She was burned at the stake

in Athelin,” Sledda said, obvious satisfaction in his cold voice.

“Yes,” Havgan mused. “She did not die there. But she left us something to remember her by, just the same.”

“What was that?” Gwydion asked.

“A prophecy. As she was burning, she spoke of Ragnorak, the day of doom. And this is what she said:

“Brothers shall fight and fell each other, And sisters’ sons shall kinship stain;

Hard is it on earth, with mighty whoredom; Ax-time, sword-time, shields are sundered, Wind-time, wolf-time, ere the world falls; Nor ever shall men each other spare.

“The stars turn black, earth sinks in the sea, The hot stars down from heaven are whirled;

Fierce flows the steam and the life-feeding flame, Till fire leaps high about heaven itself.”

At his words a shiver ran down Rhiannon’s spine. A cloud passed over the sun, leaving them all in its cold shadow. Hav- gan’s hands gripped the rail tighter. When the shadow passed, bathing them in the sun once more, Havgan’s hands did not relax. He
fi
xed his gaze on the black shadow that rushed to- ward them.

They were close enough now to make out some of the de- tails. Crumbling pillars stood exposed to the blue sky. Black- ened stones were scattered about in the long grasses. Portions of the walls still stood here and there. A huge, blackened, T- shaped stone squatted malignantly on the bare ground. All around the stone were
fi
re-blackened urns. Runes were carved in the stone by the score.

“What is it?” she asked.

“It is Asbru Hlaew, the Rainbow Mound, where the Maeder- Godias were burned after they died. It is fashioned in the shape of Donar’s hammer. Their ashes were placed in the urns,” Siger- ric replied.

“But . . . but all the urns are still there! Surely someone must have tried to—”

“Yes, they did try,” Havgan broke in. “They did try to take them and destroy the place. But they could not.”

“The place is haunted,” Sigerric said, not taking his eyes from the stone as they sailed slowly by. “They couldn’t even set foot on the ground without being stricken by sickness. So the urns stay where they are.”

As they passed directly opposite the mute, blackened stone, Rhiannon reached out and gripped Gwydion’s hand. There was something about this place. She could feel it in every bone of her body. An anger. Heavy, oppressive, not yet honed to a killing force.

She glanced at Gwydion. His hand was cold, and he was surely feeling that anger, too. Sigerric apparently felt nothing, nor did Sledda. But Havgan did. He shuddered brie
fl
y and closed his amber eyes against the sight of the black stone.

As they sailed by, the color seemed to seep out of the day, like life’s blood from a mortal wound, leaving the afternoon dry and lifeless, as the harsh cry of an eagle sounded out overhead. But then the stone
fl
owed away from them as they rounded a bend in the river, shutting out the sight. The colors returned, and so did the warmth of the sun.

Havgan took a deep breath of pine-scented air and turned to Sigerric. “Come, my friend, how about a throw or two of the dice?”

Sigerric laughed. “I don’t know, Havgan. Your dice aren’t too lucky for others. That’s what the sailors say.”

“Oh, they’re just sore losers,” Havgan said, laughing in his turn. But the laughter seemed forced and his face was a little pale. Sigerric and Havgan went off, with Sledda trailing behind.

Rhiannon and Gwydion were alone at the rail. She spoke in a low tone. “Did you feel it?”

“Oh, yes,” he whispered. “It feels ready to explode.”

“It will. Soon, I think. I give it another twenty years or so.

Then . . .”

“Then what?”

“Ragnorak. The day of doom. The day when the gods return in anger and battle to their deaths.”

She said nothing for a time as they stood at the rail. She looked at Gwydion and did not like what she saw. She saw the face of a man who had poison eating at his vitals.

And the pity that she had refused to feel
fl
ooded into her.

What was she? What was she that she could for one moment have stood unmoved before such sorrow and pain as Gwydion’s? If she were a stunted, twisted, barren thing, that was something she had done to herself. That was her handiwork and none other. No one else had done that. Only she.

But if that were true, if she were responsible for what she had become, there was a certain freedom and power in that, wasn’t there? Enough power to turn herself around, perhaps. A struggle, yes. But wasn’t everything?

And what of what Gwydion had done for her, the time he had come to her cave and found her suffering? Why, he had fed her, washed her, stayed with her, enduring even her anger. And

what had she done for him in return? Nothing.

Was there really time to change? Could she do it? She didn’t know, but she could at least try.

So she reached over and gripped Gwydion’s hand on the rail, closing her own hand over his clenched one. And she be- gan to speak the words she should have said weeks ago.

“Gwydion, you must stop. You must stop doing this to yourself.”

Gwydion looked at her, then up at the towering mast, his eyes unfocused. “It’s ships like this that he’s building, isn’t it? That’s what you said.”

“Forget about what I said before! Listen to me now.” She reached out and turned his face to hers, her hands gently rest- ing on his hollow, sunken cheeks. “You did what you had to do. Maybe even what you were born to do. You saved his life.”

Gwydion winced and tried to turn away.

“No!” she said urgently, drawing his face back to hers. “Listen to me. I believe that you had to do it, that you were meant to do it. It’s one of the reasons we’re here in the
fi
rst place—maybe the only reason. You can’t see to the end. No one can. You don’t know that what you did was wrong. It may have been right.”

“Uthyr . . . so many others,” Gwydion rasped.

“Yes. But who is going to kill them? Not you. It is their fate for this turn of the Wheel. You did not begin this. And you can’t end it that easily. The death that is coming for them is not on your head.”

“It is,” he whispered.

“No and no and no.” Then, she had an inspiration. “You told me once that you had a dream, a dream of the Protectors,

of the Wild Hunt. And Cerridwen and Cerrunnos came to you. Remember?”

“I remember,” he said tonelessly.

“And in that dream they told you your tasks. Your task was to keep Arthur safe, to
fi
nd the sword of the High Kings. At no time did they say to you, ‘Oh, and by the way, kill the Golden Man.’ Isn’t that so?”

“Yes.” His tone was stronger, but still tentative.

“So, he wasn’t meant to die now, and you weren’t meant to let it happen.”

“But you have been angry at what I did. And you were right to be.”

“I was wrong,” she said evenly. “The invasion cannot be turned aside. I was wrong to blame you. I’m sorry.”

“You’re sorry?” he asked in baf
fl
ed astonishment. “I saved

the life of our most bitter enemy, and you’re sorry that you were angry? You had every right—”

“No,” she cut in. “I didn’t. It happened. And I think that was how it was meant to be. You just remember something, Gwydion. And I can assure you that if you forget, I’ll be right at your shoulder nagging you to remember.”

“Nagging?” Gwydion asked, with the ghost of a smile. “Yes, nagging. It’s what I do best, after all.”

“And what will you be nagging me to remember?”

“That it’s not your fault. It was not your task. There was nothing—is nothing—you can do to turn the dream aside. The dream is and cannot be unmade.”

“Rhiannon,” he said hoarsely, a gleam of hope in his tired eyes, “do you really believe that?”

She looked into his tortured face and answered
fi
rmly. “I

do. And you must. Kymru needs you. She needs you to come back to her and work to save her from her coming captivity. And you will.”

“You think so? Truly?” “I know so. Truly.”

He straightened up a little, his defeated posture gone. He gazed out at the countryside, his eyes
fi
rm with purpose again. And Rhiannon felt that at last, for once in her life, she had done the right thing. She had reached out and comforted a suffering soul, forgetting herself for a few moments. And who could say what might come of the effort? Who could say what rich, beau- tiful thing might grow from such a seed? Gwydion was back among the living again. Ready to do what he could to make the Golden Man’s coming victory short-lived and bitter.

And she was ready, too.