“You do not believe that!”
“No. But some do.”
“Is Kolaxais still alive?” Kazhak had to ask, fearing the answer.
“We think so, but no one has seen. When he dies, it is believed shamans will say he chose new han, telling only them. New han will not be strong prince; will be someone shamans can control.”
“All brothers know Kolaxais said, many times, Kazhak would succeed him as han. You have heard, Vladmir.”
“When people are afraid, they forget what they heard,” Vladmir told him. “They will not argue now. They were used to following orders of Kolaxais; now men say is not much different to follow orders of shamans. Is easier than dying.”
“Do they not want to be free?” Kazhak burst out, and Vladmir stared at him.
“Free of what, Kazhak? Man is always ruled by something, yes?”
Kazhak stumbled from his friend’s tent, fighting off the fumes of the hemp that could weaken a man and take the bone from his back.
He returned to Epona. “Shamans have been very busy,” he told her. She was shocked by his appearance; he had aged seasons in just one day. “They know all about silver wolf now, blame Kazhak. Turn brothers against Kazhak. Even Kolaxais …”
“Hai,” Epona said softly, opening her arms to him as a mother would invite a weary child.
He swayed toward her, but at the last moment he pulled back.
“No no. Kazhak very strong, no problem,” he assured her, forcing his voice to be hearty and confident. “Kazhak will not be driven away again by shamans and demons. Will stay, talk with brothers, win them back. You see. You watch, Epona.”
“What happens if the shamans are too strong? Will you just wait for them to kill you?”
Kazhak knotted his fists and pounded them against his thighs. “No! Kazhak is not ready to go into wooden house. Kazhak is a man of the horse; when there is no way at all to win battle, Kazhak rides away. Lives, to fight again. But this battle is not lost. Kazhak will stay; fight.”
“Why? Why do you have to stay, when you know they mean to destroy you?”
His voice was husky as he answered, “Among my people, father is sacred, is it so? Papaeus? Kazhak let shamans separate son from father. Was big mistake. Kazhak got mad, took brothers, rode away; did not stay to protect father. Kazhak dishonored father. Kolaxais is right to turn his face from me now. Kazhak can get name back only by fighting for Kolaxais, winning his forgiveness. Winning him away from shamans.” His shoulders slumped beneath the weight of the burden they had assumed and he turned away from Epona. He stumbled out into the night, seeking the gray stallion. He would sleep with his horse.
The power of the spirits, Epona thought sadly. It can be a basket brimming with bread and fruit, or it can be a sword to cut a strong man down.
She awoke to find that sword hanging over her own head. Two women she had never seen before were in the tent with her, and a man stood at the door. An armed man, with an Assyrian sword in his hand and a bronze Makedonian helmet, complete with noseguard, on his head. He was obviously well prepared for physical conflict, if it came to that.
In one hand he held Epona’s own knife, slipped from her belongings while she slept. When she saw Goibban’s iron in that hand, a little of the strength went out of her arms.
“Epona of the Kelti,” one of the women said, “we are your attendants.”
“I need no attendants.”
The man spoke. “Shamans say you are magic person, you are to be treated with great respect. Shamans offer you high honor, Kelti woman. Attendants are one mark of that honor.”
She was rigid with suspicion. “Where is Kazhak? Does he know of this?”
“Is not Kazhak’s business,” the Scythian replied.
The women crowded closer to Epona. One held a cup brimming with dark liquid. “Drink,” she urged, but Epona pulled away. In one long stride the man stood next to her, his hand behind her skull, holding her head still as the women forced the cup against her lips and pried open her jaw. She fought them, but the three together were stronger than she and some of the liquid got into her mouth and down her throat. She felt the flesh numbing where it touched.
The woman stood back and watched her, waiting for the drug to take effect.
Mitkezh entered the tent. A glance at Epona’s eyes told him she was fighting the potion, but he was confident of its power. Even a strong shaman could not fight off the effects of Scythian rue. Soon the woman’s spirit would have no strength of its own, and she would answer whatever questions he put to her. He would learn as much as she knew of the magic of her people: the powers, the rituals. From such a wealth of information there might be much that could be added to the shamans’ own usage.
And when she was wrung dry, as a sacrificial cloth was wrung dry of blood, there were other uses for her. Fitting uses for a woman who had foolishly laid claim to power in her own right, and challenged the strength of the shamans.
They were not afraid of her now. Their own grip on the tribe had tightened to such an extent that they did not need to cower before this person who could summon the wind. What was the wind? Not as frightening as the predators who slunk around the camp; not as terrifying as the giant wolf for which Kazhak was responsible.
But the Taylga would drive all these demons away. The Sacrifice of the White Horse, performed as it would be this time, in this season, with new and special power, would give incomparable strength to those who offered it.
Mitkezh smiled, watching Epona slowly lose the fight and become drowsy. “Send for Tsaygas now,” he ordered the guard. “Is time.”
She could hear their voices at a great distance. They called her by name; they asked questions. To her vast surprise she heard her own voice answering them like that of a sleepy child. She tried to close her mouth and bite off the words, but the commands of her spirit did not reach the hinges of her jaw.
The questioning went on and on. She was dimly aware that even in her helplessness they treated her with a certain care, a certain respect. A respect they had never accorded a woman before. That much, she had achieved.
At last they went away. Or perhaps they did not; perhaps it was only this world that went away, and Epona felt herself sinking downward with familiar swoop and slide into otherworlds.
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.
Chapter 29
The 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?”
The Horse Goddess (Celtic World of Morgan Llywelyn) Page 42