Guinevere drew in a deep breath. “Who are you?”
His hair was brown, thick, and badly cut. He had trouble keeping it out of his eyes, and more than once as they stared at each other, he reached up a hand to push it back from his face. Pointing to his own chest, he spoke in a soft, guttural voice. Guinevere shook her head. Hesitantly, the stranger tried again. “Llyr, son of Bran, leader of White Foot hunters of Snow Mountain.”
His accent was foreign, but this time, he spoke a dialect of Mountain Welsh, and she could just make out the words. Mountain Welsh was an old language, out of use now except among isolated folk. In Northgallis, people used it to communicate with that ancient race of men who still lived in the hills, men known to modern Britons as the Old Ones. Guinevere's eyes widened as she realized what this meant.
Tentatively, she let go of the horse's mane. “Llyr, son of Bran,” she repeated. He had the name of a god, and so had his father. But this was not surprising, for the Old Ones traced their lineage all the way back to the ancient days, when the world was new, pristine, divine. They considered themselves to be descended straight from gods.
“Snow Mountain? Do you mean Y Wyddfa?” This was the tallest peak in Gwynedd, whose upper slopes glittered with snow even in summer and where the gods themselves were still said to walk.
The young man's face lit in a delighted smile. “Y Wyddfa,” he agreed. “Home of gods.”
Guinevere let go of Peleth's reins and made Llyr a reverence as best she could in her tunic and leggings. “Guinevere, daughter of King Leodegrance of Northgallis.”
Llyr lowered his eyes. “Gwenhwyfar,” he said shyly. “She With Hair of Light. I am honored.” And he made her a deep and solemn bow.
She colored faintly. Strangers always gawked at the pale color of her hair, as if she had chosen it herself just to astonish them. “Never mind that. What do you do here, so far from home?” She glanced at his weapons stacked against the tree. “Not hunting—you're too far from Snow Mountain.”
He shook his head. “Not hunting.” He searched for the word and found it. “Guarding.”
“Guarding what?”
He laughed. “You.”
“Me? Whatever for?”
He gestured to the woods all around them. “From beasts in the forest. From wild men.”
“Wild men?” she breathed.
“You will be safe,” he said gravely. “There is no need to be afraid.”
She stiffened. “I've been riding out in the woods all my life, and I've never been afraid.”
Llyr looked pleased. “Long Eyes guard you well. And Red Ears.”
“Red Ears? Long Eyes? Who are they?”
He waved toward the eastern mountains. “The Red Ears live in the land of mountains. In the land of your father-king.”
Guinevere gasped. “In Northgallis?”
“Aye. Nort-gal-us.”
“Do you mean . . . ,” she said, her voice beginning to shake, “that I was guarded in Northgallis? When I was a child?”
Llyr nodded.
Guinevere laughed nervously. “That's enough of your tall tales. You'll have me believing in faeries next.”
Llyr pointed up into the heights above them. “I live with the Long Eyes now. In this place, the Long Eyes guard you.”
“You mean here in Gwynedd? In King Pellinore's kingdom?”
“Gwynedd,” Llyr said, pleased. “In the valley lives the king. In the hills live the Long Eyes.”
Guinevere gulped. “You must be jesting. You can't be telling me that the Old Ones have guarded me my whole life.”
“Old Ones,” Llyr repeated happily. “Aye. Old Ones. Earth's Beloved.”
She was shaking, and he gripped her arm to steady her. Together they sat down on the warm, flat rock. While Guinevere struggled to come to terms with the enormity of these revelations, Llyr began to talk. As he talked, his command of Mountain Welsh improved, and as she listened, so did hers. After a little while, she found she could follow his speech with ease.
Llyr was no longer with the White Foot, the people of his birth, but with the Long Eyes, who hunted in the high hills above Pellinore's castle. Mapon, the leader of the Long Eyes, had sent his own son to the White Foot in exchange. As far as Guinevere could determine, this was a common practice among the Old Ones, or Earth's Beloved, as they called themselves. She could see the wisdom of it. In this way, the people in different clans could keep abreast of changing customs, get news from different parts of the country, and intermarry so their lines did not diminish. Llyr had been with the Long Eyes for six months and would not return to his own people until he was twenty. He was now seventeen years old.
Guinevere looked at him in surprise when he told her this. She had thought him younger, perhaps because of his diminutive size, but the longer they sat together and talked, the clearer it became that he was a person to be reckoned with, a prince of standing among his own people. He was not like anyone she had met before. The meanness of his dress, the shaggy hair, the awkward speech, were offset by his natural gifts. His dark eyes were liquid as a deer's and large for his narrow face. His arms and legs, as slim as her own, were tanned and hard with muscle. He moved like a dancer and had a certain air about him, a direct meeting of the eye, that commanded respect.
He seemed very proud at having been selected to guard her today. Apparently, it was considered a great privilege among the Old Ones to be awarded guard duty over She With Hair of Light. According to Llyr, only the bravest men were assigned to the task. He had killed a boar last week to prove himself worthy.
Guinevere stared at him. “You killed a boar? By yourself?” When King Pellinore went boar hunting, he took a troop of well-armed men with him and ropes, too, sometimes. They were often gone for two or three days, returning home exhausted, scratched, and bruised and, when successful, with the carcass of a great beast stuck all over with spears. No one ever went boar hunting alone.
Llyr laughed at her suggestion. All the men in the clan had gone to hunt the boar, a great she-boar who lived in a mountain cave high above their camp. The search had taken one day, the chase another, and the final battle, beast against man, had lasted from noon to sunset on the third. He, Llyr, son of Bran, had thrown the spear that finally dropped her. Thus, he was given credit for the kill. At the celebration—where, he assured her, he had gotten gloriously drunk—Mapon had promised to grant him one request. Naturally, he had asked to be permitted to guard She With Hair of Light.
Guinevere said helplessly, “It is very flattering that your people consider it a privilege to guard me, but I honestly do not understand why you bother. I am not an important person anymore. I have no rank outside Northgallis, no land, no power, no value to anyone. In Gwynedd, I am only the queen's ward. It is a waste of your time to guard me.”
Llyr smiled. “You are jesting.”
“No, Llyr. I am not jesting.”
Llyr drew in his breath sharply as color drained from his face. “You . . . do not know why we guard you?”
“Of course I do not know. How would I?”
Llyr swallowed hard. “Did not your father-king tell you? Did not your people tell you? Everyone knows.” He turned to her a face still pale with shock and a gaze focused on something in the distance. “No one ever told me that you did not know.”
“Know what?” Guinevere narrowed her eyes. “Tell me this is not about old Griselda's prophecy.”
Relief flooded Llyr's face. “You do know.”
Guinevere buried her head in her hands. Even the Old Ones had heard the wretched prophecy! Then a thought struck her that startled her into speechlessness. Of course they had heard of it—it was their prophecy in the first place! The hill witch Griselda, who had visited her father on the night of her birth, had been one of the Old Ones herself. It must be so; it explained everything.
Breathing slowly to control the racing of her heart, she looked into Llyr's liquid eyes. “Llyr, listen to me. You must not believe such nonsense. No one can know the
future. A prophecy is not necessarily truth.”
Llyr smiled forgivingly. “Gods do not lie,” he said simply. “Gods speak truth. Always.”
Guinevere bowed her head. She could think of nothing to say to change his mind. Divine pronouncements, pagan or Christian, were universally believed. To doubt them was heresy.
“It is written in the stars,” Llyr explained. “You will save Earth 's Beloved one day, you and the great king who is coming.”
Guinevere stared at him. “What king? Your people do not have kings, you told me so yourself.”
Llyr stared back at her, enveloped in stillness. His voice, when he spoke, fell so low she had to strain to hear it. “One day, a great king will come. This is a promise to Earth's Beloved from the Goddess Herself. He will save us from oblivion. It is written so in the stars. His name in our tongue means ‘the One Unconquered.’ ”
Llyr paused, searching her face for comprehension. He saw only disbelief. He rose to his feet. “I have said too much, and it is time to be going. Lugh, son of Lugh Long-Arm, will be coming to take my place.” Llyr winked. “Although you will not see him.”
Bending down and scrabbling in the undergrowth, he collected handfuls of small rocks and pebbles. With deft fingers, he built a little cairn in the middle of the clearing. It was a small construction, deep in the grass and likely to go unnoticed unless looked for.
“If you need me at any time for any trouble, build a cairn, thus. I will come. This is a promise. Between you and me.” Llyr pressed his cheek against her own. “Fare well, Gwenhwyfar. Light with thee walk.” He stepped back and raised an arm in a formal salute.
The last she saw of him was the flash of his bright smile before he gathered up his weapons and faded into the forest, noiseless as a wraith.
CHAPTER SEVEN
Council of Elders
Deep in a cave high in the hills, a dozen men sat cross-legged around a low peat fire. They were short men, thick-bodied and tough, with shaggy hair and unclipped beards. Their faces bore the marks of the hard life they led, and their sharp black eyes missed nothing. They wore skins, well cured and oiled to a comfortable softness, and most of them wore some kind of ornament as well, of bone, horn, or shell. Each of them had a smudge of ash on his forehead.
The leader, indistinguishable from his fellows but for the carved staff he held and the gray in his hair and beard, led the others in a prayer to the ancestor spirits. Then he struck his staff against the stone floor of the cave and said, “Let them come.”
Llyr entered the cave behind Lugh, son of Lugh Long-Arm, and looked nervously about him. Only once in his life had he been brought before a Council of Elders, and that was during the ceremony that had marked his entrance into manhood. He had been with the White Foot then, and his own father had held the sacred staff. This was very different. He was bound to the leader, but only by a foster-bond, and he knew that he was still regarded as a foreigner by the others. Lugh had been born into this clan, and his father held a high place among the men. Today, Lugh Long-Arm was sitting next to the leader, Mapon.
Both young men stopped opposite Mapon at an open space in the circle and made the sign of submission. Mapon bound them with an oath to answer truthfully all the questions put to them or risk expulsion from the clan. Lugh, the accuser, was the first to speak. He told the gathered men he had seen Llyr in a clearing in the forest, sitting on a stone with She With Hair of Light, sitting right down next to her and actually speaking to her. Lugh had seen him clearly. Llyr had been sitting in the sunlight, closer to the woman than Lugh was to the Elders now. Not only had he sat beside her, he had touched her. He had pressed his cheek to hers.
The sitting men stirred, and their faces hardened. Llyr had broken the prohibition, Lugh continued. Llyr had shown no respect for the rules laid down by the Elders. The gods only knew what secrets he had revealed.
Llyr shot a sharp glance at his accuser. Lugh's color was high, and he spoke with anger. With a sinking heart, Llyr realized Lugh was taking his revenge. Before Llyr had come to live among the Long Eyes, Lugh had been promised to a very pretty girl who, once Llyr arrived, had transferred her affections to him. Llyr had never encouraged her. The girl was coy, flirtatious, and empty-headed, and he did not want her. But this had only infuriated Lugh, who considered Llyr's indifference an insult to his beloved. There seemed no way out of this dilemma except the girl's changing her wayward mind or Llyr's returning to Snow Mountain. This, obviously, Lugh was doing his best to accomplish.
Llyr looked at all the solemn faces around the circle and wondered how many of them knew this, and if those who knew it would take it into consideration. There was no way to tell. Like all of Earth's Beloved, they guarded their expressions. Those lined and weathered faces gave nothing away. Mapon himself might have been made of stone.
The sight of Mapon gave Llyr another sinking feeling. He loved the old man, although he had known him only six months. Mapon had done more than take him into the Long Eyes; he had taken him into his own home, treated him like a son, and dealt with him patiently and fairly. These accusations would pain Mapon every bit as much as Llyr himself. When it came his turn to speak, what could he say? He could not have acted any differently. He had been guided by something far beyond himself. Perhaps if he had turned and run away when he first saw her riding across the meadow on her horse, the rest would not have happened. But how could he leave his post, betray Mapon's trust, on his first day of guard duty? Besides, he was not certain he could have turned away. The girl was . . . a mystery, a wonder, a revelation. And he, like a summer moth greedy for light, had flown too near the flame.
Lugh had finally stopped speaking. Mapon signaled him to take his place in the circle, and Lugh sat down. Now Llyr was the only person in the cave still standing.
Mapon said, “Llyr, son of Bran, speak. We will hear you.”
Llyr took a deep breath. The air was full of peat smoke and shadowy light. He sensed the divine presence all around him. He would obey the god and tell them the truth, but he doubted they would believe him.
As the fire dwindled, Llyr recounted his adventure of that golden day: how the girl had come into the clearing with her gleaming horse, how the light had fallen from the spring sky and lit the air all around her, how his weapons had slid from his hands and stacked themselves against the tree, how his feet had moved forward without his willing it, how still the world had gone in that moment when she turned her bright head and saw him.
He had been powerless to prevent any of it. That was the point he stressed, again and again. Something else had been with them in that clearing, steering his body, commanding his thoughts, guiding him through the difficulties of speech in a seldom-used tongue, opening his eyes to the person behind the dazzle of her presence. She was patient and kind. She had the gift of warmth, of openness, of understanding. Talking to her had been astonishingly easy, like water sliding downhill.
As he spoke, he watched their faces for any sign of comprehension. He saw none. He glanced anxiously at Mapon but saw no change in that grave and weathered face. Behind Mapon, a curtain of stitched skins hung on the cavern wall. Llyr knew the curtain hid the entrance to a smaller cave where the clan's wise woman lived, the hag they called “the One Who Hears.” Llyr had been hoping she would not show herself at this gathering and was glad to find her chamber still in darkness. Only twice had he seen light behind that curtain, and on both occasions it had signaled the appearance of the hideous old woman, half blind, half mad, who could hear the voices of gods. He did not want to see her again.
Llyr came to the end of his tale and stopped. He had told the Elders about everything except the building of the cairn. Lugh had not mentioned that, so perhaps he had not seen.
Mapon nodded to the man on his right. One by one, each man in the circle had the opportunity to question Llyr, to praise or castigate him, and to express his own view of Llyr's behavior. In every council, each man was allowed his say. This time, without exception, they condemned h
im. He heard anger, horror, and outrage in their voices. They ridiculed his belief in a guiding power. They accused him of falling in love, of desiring her, of lacking the discipline and control required of a hunter, a leader, a man. Only Mapon added nothing to this chorus of disapproval.
When it was the leader's turn to speak, Mapon asked Llyr if he had anything else to say. Mapon's voice sounded sad and weary, and a lump rose in Llyr's throat. He held himself very straight and answered that everything had happened just as he had related. He had not revealed any forbidden secrets. The girl already knew about the prophecy, and she did not believe it. She knew nothing about the great king. She thought he was someone among Earth's Beloved.
The cave grew very still. No one moved; no one breathed. The coming of the great king was never spoken of aloud in any gathering. It was a promise of the gods to Earth's Beloved, a promise of salvation from the violence of the Others, a promise to save them from annihilation. Only seers and wise women spoke openly about events that determined the future of the race.
Mapon rose. His face was no longer unreadable. It was consumed with grief. “We have heard you. Leave us now, and wait for our decision.”
Outside, Llyr was surprised to find it was still a beautiful day. He sat down near the mouth of the cave in a pool of sun. He could see no one else about, but he knew they were there: lookouts in the trees, children foraging for wood and edible shoots or tubers, women squatting by the streambed washing wool or gathering reeds, young men checking their snares and following spoor. All of Earth's Beloved knew how to become invisible in the forest. It was their invisibility that kept them alive. It was their invisibility that he had violated.
The heat of the sun on his skin raised gooseflesh on his arms. It was a bad sign. Llyr shivered and tried to look on the bright side. Perhaps Mapon's grief sprang from worry about his wife and not from his foster son's behavior. Sula had given birth to a stillborn son weeks ago and then had fallen into a fever from which she had not yet recovered. Constant tending and the sacrifice of every lamb in the flock had kept her alive, but only just. Any day now, he expected the wailing to begin.
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