That urchin met them in the big dining nook, grinning and sassing and a little peeved that Meredydd didn’t notice his wit through her thoughtful, fretful haze. He served up and fell silent.
“Master,” said Meredydd at length, “Osraed Ealad-hach spoke of history repeating itself in me. What did he mean by that?”
“Ah,” said Bevol. He put on his pensive face and gazed at Skeet’s dark head. “The record of Halig-liath has it that many years ago—close to a century now—another girl studied at Halig-liath. She was Taminy. Taminy-a-Cuinn, daughter of the Cirke-Master—what was his name? Ah—Osraed Coluim—Coluim-a-Cuinn. According to the records, Taminy was a good student. As good a student as you are; as good as her male classmates and possessed of a natural talent in healing, especially. Legend has it that she sang a duan so perfectly, she rarely had recourse to herbs or waters or even crystals. And it was said that when she did use the crystals, she made them burn so fiercely that those looking on couldn’t watch for fear of being blinded. Legend also has it that she was pretty enough to turn the heads of Prentices and Aelders alike. Turn them so far that there was a great falling away among the boys. Some never went on Pilgrimage; some were withdrawn from Academy by their parents until Taminy should be removed; some decided they really weren’t suited to the contemplative life of scholarship or the rigors of service. A few committed acts that were...completely against every principle written down for us in the Corah.”
Meredydd’s brow crinkled in alarm. “And Taminy caused all of this?”
“That was what many people thought. And, in the end, the Osraed Body agreed with them and sent Taminy home in disgrace.”
“What happened to her?”
“Her father, the Osraed Coluim appealed the matter all the way to the Cyne’s Council, but the Chancellor, an Osraed of Tradist bent, persuaded the Cyne—Aelfrith, it was at that time—that it was a matter of religion, not a matter of state. Osraed Coluim did the only thing he could do, for his daughter’s sake; he took her on Pilgrimage against the strict wishes of the Osraed Body. He came back without her. He claimed she walked into the Western Sea and drowned herself. The Body said it was her punishment.”
Meredydd sat, stunned, horrified. “Will that be my fate, as well?”
“What—merely because it was hers? Superstition ill-befits an Osraed, Meredydd-a-Lagan. If you aspire to the station of Divine Counselor, you must leave superstition behind.”
“But—”
“Your Pilgrimage, if you recall, is being openly encouraged.”
“Yes, by Osraed Ealad-hach. Isn’t it superstition that causes him to despise me?”
Bevol pointed at her with a chunk of bread. “Fear you, Meredydd. He fears you. Because of this...faery tale. On account of Taminy, he fears you.”
“Why? What do I represent? What did she represent that he should fear it?”
“Change.” He waved the bread up and down. “Eh? You see? Forward movement. Upward movement. Advancement. He is an old man. Old men have trouble adapting to these things.”
“But he’s Osraed.”
“And are Osraed perfect, Meredydd?”
She swallowed a tiny sip of soup, her eyes on his face. “I...had thought so.”
“Well, they are not. Osraed are human, anwyl. No human is perfect. Of created beings, only the Meri is perfect, for She is a creature of a different order. She is Eibhilin, a Being of Light.”
Meredydd found her eyes drawn to the mark upon Bevol’s broad forehead. Between his brows it sat, an odd starburst pattern which proclaimed to all who saw it that he was Osraed, chosen by the Scion of the First Being and His Sign upon Earth. The Kiss of the Meri, it was called, and from Halig-liath and from other Holy Places beyond even Caraid-land (or so Osraed Bevol said, though it was not Doctrine) Pilgrims flowed to the Sea. They came by the score, but only a handful received that Divine Kiss.
Meredydd was still thinking of that Kiss an hour later, as she stared into the rippling rivulets that fled up the chimney of their cluttered parlor.
“Master, tell me again how the Meri came to you.”
“How she came to me? Would it not be more instructive to hear how I came to her?”
“I suppose that’s really what I meant.”
He chuckled and tugged lightly at her hair, plaited now, in preparation for sleep. “That journey begins at birth, anwyl. Perhaps even before.”
“Please?”
“Ah, well.”
She felt him settle back in his fleece-padded chair and wriggled her fire-warmed toes against the fender in anticipation.
“My Pilgrimage was a rather long one and contained four tasks. To find a rod of iron in a heap of grain, to find someone who needed healing but would not tell me so, to follow a riddle path to a dell where my Path to the Sea would be given me, and, once on that Path, to not deviate from it by a hair’s breadth for any reason under the sun. I passed the tests—”
“But cannot tell me how,” finished Meredydd. “May I guess?”
It was a ritual by now, this guessing game. He nodded and she went on as if she had heard that motion of old bone and muscle.
“You used a magnet, didn’t you—to find the rod? I said a bellows the last time, but that was wrong, I’m sure. It must have been a magnet. And the riddle—well, since you won’t tell me what it was, I can’t guess at that. But the person you healed must have been a mute, because, of course, they couldn’t tell you that they needed healing. And I think that in order not to stray from the path, you blindfolded yourself and had your Weard lead you.”
“Two of three,” he said. “Not bad.”
“What went missing?”
“The thread of my story. Now, I completed my tasks—although I was not sure I had or that I done them correctly—and I came out to the Sea where I had been led. I found my Pilgrim’s Post, my Weard took up his station behind me, and I sat in the sand and waited. My mind was only as calm as it could be, my heart was hungry with anticipation and quivering with dread. After all, more Prentices are shunned than embraced. The pull of sleep was strong, but I struggled to ignore it. I had intentionally seated myself in a tidal pool and an icy wash of water reached me at the times my drowsiness was at its worst.
“On the second night of sitting so, I saw a bright ripple beneath the waves, parting them like a gleaming knife, like a flame in the water. And out of this lambency, the Meri rose, radiant, beautiful, all of grace and Light. She gazed at me with great green eyes like emerald coins and I gazed back. Then, when I thought my breath had stopped in my lungs and I began to sway with delirium, She swam toward me and came up out of the water and met me eye to eye. Then She set her lips—if lips they were—to my forehead.
“I felt different, suddenly—transformed. I was calm, assured, joyous, but still full of wonder. I knew things I’d never even suspected before. I saw what holds the stars in their courses and makes the planets dance in their orbits, paying court to their Suns. I knew the names of lands I’d never visited. I knew what makes some men hate and fear and other men love. I knew that the best of all treasures was the love of God and that it was also the best of all gifts. I knew that the first thing a true man or woman must possess was a pure, kindly and radiant heart. I knew the will of the First Being for Caraid-land and for Nairne and I knew It’s will for me. I saw myself giving the Pilgrim’s Tell before the Cyne in Creiddylad. I saw Halig-liath with me in it. I saw bits and pieces of my future.”
He paused for a moment then said, “And there is something else I saw which I have never mentioned before. I saw a little girl in a burned out stead-yard, struggling in the mud to reach the dead body of her mother.”
Meredydd whirled about to face him, nearly thrusting her feet into the fire in her haste. “You saw me?”
He nodded, stroking her hair as if to calm her, his own hair and beard gold-slashed copper in the firelight, his face, ruddy.
“Why didn’t you ever tell me?”
“It did not seem...important.”
“Do you know how my Pilgrimage will end?”
“Does anyone’s Pilgrimage ever end?” he asked philosophically.
“Do you?” she persisted.
“I hope it ends with you giving the Pilgrim’s Tell before Cyne Colfre.” He read her expression, then said, “Anyone can see the beginning of a thing. Only God sees the end clearly.”
“Do you?”
“No, Meredydd.”
She searched his face, then turned back to the flames, content that he would never lie to her. They sat in silence for a moment, then Bevol said, “You will not go back to Halig-liath until the Solstice Festival at the end of the week. I will prepare you for Pilgrimage, myself.”
“But, your classes—”
“I will hand them over to my second. He can handle the academic testing.”
Meredydd nodded, her chin rocking on drawn up knees. One week. One week from now, she would be on her Path to the Western Sea.
Chapter 4
Bend and you will not break, for the bent can straighten.
The emptied can be filled, the torn mended.
Want can reward you, even as wealth can bewilder.
The wise man finds the Balance:
Without becoming inflamed, he is kindled;
without defending himself, he is defended;
without laying claim, he is acclaimed;
without competing, he finds competence.
How true is this: Bend and you will not break.
— The Corah
Book II, Verse 90
Cirke-dag dawned cool, breezy and with the threat of rain. Cloaked against that threat, the inhabitants of Gled Manor made the twenty minute walk to Nairne, arriving at the Sanctuary to mill in the Cirke-yard with their fellow worshippers. Meredydd kept her head high in spite of the glances she reaped from the parents of her classmates—most especially from those who were close to Moireach Arundel and her son.
There was nothing of the siren about her today, drabbed in a stole and a woven dress that, knee slit, fell nearly to the ankles of her leggings. Every scrap of skin was covered but for hands and face, her hair formed a chaste, shining coil about her head. She ignored the prying eyes, fixing her own on Halig-liath. Crowning the escarpment at the eastern end of town, it dominated Nairne like a dowager Cwen supreme astride her stony mount. Mist rose off the Halig-tyne, curling serenely at the foot of the cliffs, rising to wrap itself about the angles of wall and spire, softening the arrogant profile.
I might never set foot there again, she thought and felt a keen sense of loss. Ah, but at least there would be the Farewelling—the climax of the Solstice Festival when the Pilgrims were feted.
Skeet tugged at her tunic, now, telling her it was time to go in. She took her eyes from the Holy Fortress and turned to climb the wide Sanctuary stair. Aelder Prentice Wyth stood just above her on the steps, his hair flying in the spring breeze, his long, angular face stark and troubled. She blinked and turned aside before he could speak to her.
Though she fled into the Sanctuary, she found no solace within. Eyes still prodded her, accused her wrongly. Across the aisle from where she sat with Osraed Bevol and Skeet, Prentice Brys and his family glared at her. Brys’s neck was buried in scarves that were pungent with medicaments and herbs. She could smell the camphor strongly even from here. The corners of her mouth twitched impulsively and she raised her hand to cover it, bowing her head and praying earnestly for his speedy recovery.
The Cirke-Master, Osraed Saxan, gave a teaching on tolerance and understanding, but it fell into hard soil. Those who regarded Meredydd-a-Lagan, accused seductress and Wicke, with icy disdain continued to regard her that way. She could feel the eyes on her curious, judging, condemning. At the end of the Teaching, as the last note of the last lay rang off, Meredydd excused herself and left the Cirke.
She was halfway across the Cirke-yard when she heard someone calling to her. For all she wanted to bolt and run, she stopped and turned. A sigh of relief escaped her; it was Lealbhallain.
She waited for him to catch her up and smiled at him. “A friend! You are still my friend, aren’t you, Leal?”
He frowned, the freckles across the bridge of his nose mingling into a ruddy-gold blotch. “How can you ask that, Meredydd? I am always your friend. You were running away,” he accused her. “Aren’t we going for our Cirke-dag stop by the backstere’s?”
Meredydd looked down at the toes of her shoes. “Are you sure you wish to be seen with me?”
“Always.”
His loyalty made her feel willful and free. She nodded, raising her head. “Aye, then. Let’s have our pastries, by all means.”
They performed the ritual just as always, crossing the Cirke Bridge to the south side of Nairne and strolling all the ay to the quay to give the backstere a chance to get back from Cirke. Then they strolled back into town again past closed shops and opened tearooms and public houses. Business halted on Cirke-dag, but eating and socializing did not, hence shops that provided fuel for either of those pastimes shut down only during worship and opened immediately after to receive their throngs of customers, some of which were not seen in Nairne from one Cirke-dag to the next.
At the backstere’s they got creamcakes and resumed their walk, heading back again along the river, which dissected the little town into uneven halves. Meredydd’s eyes found new beauties in the streets of Nairne today—in the fresh-washed cobbles and white-washed storefronts with their gleaming windows and hand-painted signs. And the smells of Nairne were also beautiful—baked goods and Cirke-dag dinners from a myriad houses, spices and flowers and, from the river, the perfumes of tarred planking and wet earth and stone.
“What are you thinking, Meredydd?” asked Lealbhallain when she had been silent for a very long time.
She pecked at the half-finished creamcake. “I’m wondering what I’ll do after.”
“After?”
“I’m going on Pilgrimage at Solstice, Leal.”
“What? Why?”
“Osraed Ealad-hach...” She paused. No, she really shouldn’t lay this at his door—that would be backbiting. “Osraed Bevol thinks it would be a good way for me to prove myself at Halig-liath. To prove I’m not what people are saying I am.” She glanced at him sidelong. “You’ve heard the rumors.”
He nodded, watching the flagged walkway in front of them. “Aye. You must know I don’t believe it. By the Kiss, Meredydd, I know none of it’s true. You’re no Wicke. You’ve done naught to Wyth or Brys or anyone.”
She laughed. “Bristles!”
He glanced at her reproachfully. “I’m your friend, Meredydd. I’ll always defend you.”
Impulsively, she put her arm through his. “I’m fortunate in my friends,” she told him and he smiled brilliantly for her.
“Tell me, Leal. Have you ever been to Creiddylad?”
He blinked at the sudden change of subject. “Aye.”
“Is it really a jewel?”
He shrugged. “I suppose you could say it was. It’s a big town and fine and rich. Except the poor parts. It’s not like here, where there’s some a little rich and some a little poor, but most living goodly lives and making sure the poor stay only a little that way. In Creiddylad, there’s deep poor. Folks that can barely scrape by. They’ve no land, you see. They’re all crowded into little—” He waved his free hand with its bit of creamcake as if trying to prod a word loose from the air.
“Warrens,” he said finally. “Aye, they’re almost like that—like rabbit hutches. And all these folks crammed in there with no land of their own so they can’t farm up victuals for the family table.”
Meredydd was stunned. If the report had come from anyone else, she wouldn’t have believed it, but Leal would lie to her no more than he would abandon her. “But that’s awful. And how can it be, with Cyne Colfre living right there?”
“Well, father says there are reserves set aside from tariffs and the like that are supposed to help care for these folk and set up works
hare for them, but he says that hasn’t been working so well of late. Father says it’s greed—unscrupulous administrators turning the monies to their own use. Used to be that Creiddylad was like Nairne and the other villages, where the landed folk took care of the unlanded folk, at least that’s what Father says. He says it must change, of course, but who could change it?”
“I would think God could; the Meri could. Perhaps we should ask after it when we go on Pilgrimage, instead of worrying about our own estate.”
Leal nodded. “I think you must be right. But why do you ask about Creiddylad?”
“Like I said, I was thinking of what to do after. I don’t know if I could stay here, because if I fail, Nairne wouldn’t have me. They’ll believe the stories and I’ll have no life here.
I thought maybe I could go to Creiddylad. Maybe there’d be something for me to do there. It sounds like there’s a lot to be done there,” she added.
Lealbhallain scowled—actually scowled—at her. “Oh, you’ll go to Creiddylad, all right, Meredydd-a-Lagan. You’ll go there to give the Pilgrim’s Tell to Cyne Colfre. Mark it.”
They had reached the riverbend by now and wandered along the quay, watching the little boats bobbing on the quiet waters and the fishermen sitting so patiently on their piers. But when they sat on a stone balustrade in the shadow of the palisades, it was Halig-liath that drew Meredydd’s eyes—drew them up to the warm stone walls and the staunch parapets. She could see the outer wall of the concourse from here and the high gallery above the hidden courtyard. In one week, she would say good-bye, she prayed it was not forever.
She left Lealbhallain on the corner of his street, not wanting to cause him any trouble with his family, and left the streets and avenues of Nairne behind her. The rest of the day was hers and she knew exactly what she would do with it.
Ritualistically, she took the anniversary path—the one that left the Nairne Road and ran to the Bebhinn Wood. The one that led to a place where a younger Meredydd had squandered irreplaceable time. Every year to the day she had done this—retraced those childish steps—but never had that woodland pool seemed the least bit magical. It was a joyless place of sodden grass and sorrowing trees and never, since that day seven years before, had it held anything that should have made an eight year old girl stop, enchanted, to while away her mother and father’s last hours—hours that should have been her last, as well.
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