Page 201 of The Daughters of Avalon
I cannot stop myself. I yearn to hold him. Beauty beguiles me. I long for the scent of his warm baby skin beneath my nostrils and I lift him up from the blanket’s folds, careful notto wake the rufous-haired child.A druid!I marvel. A goddess-blessed druid, after so long. Emrys was the last, and before him… not since Taliesin. But this babe has something more than Emrys possessed… he has the soul of a Sylph shining from his eyes… pure and true. He will beguile when he speaks. He will command gods. He will…
“M’lady,” intrudes a young maid, and I am enraged. Holding the child near to my breast, I spin about, forgetting myglamourand raising a hand to strike her down.
And, then… I stop myself, realizing she could prove useful. I will not return here, I know, for a trick of this sort can only be played once, and yet I will have need of eyes inside this demesne. Restraining myself, I soften my glance… such a pretty thing, with pale flaxen hair, a pert little nose and eyes as blue as my Elspeth’s.
The young woman hesitates, clearly unsettled. Could it be she glimpsed my true self behind myglamour?
Or mayhap she simply despairs to see the look of fury on her mistresses’ face.
I smile.
“M-my m-mother sent me to help,” she says.
I crook a finger to summon her within. “Thank you, sweetling. Please, come in.”
It does not matter if she suspects me now because my charm weaves itsmagikbetween us. Even against her will, she glides toward me, and I can smell her fear as I place my hand upon her arm, sliding it up, along the path of her dainty shoulder, and finally placing a finger beneath her sweet chin. I dig my nail into her virgin’s flesh. “What is your name, my dear?”
“Ellyn.”
“Ellyn,” I whisper softly. “I weave the chains that hold you now, and to my will you shall bow.” I lift a finger to touch her upon the brow, and say softly, “I need—” Completely at a loss, Iwave a hand over the babe. “Whatever it is that babes must need. Fetch it down to the stables.”
Fear has left her now. “Yay, mistress. Will you take both bairns?”
“Bairns?” I say, amused by her dialect. “Nay, I think not. I need only one—this one,” I say. “What is his name?”
“Broc,” she says, and tilts her head to inquire, “Shall I join you, mistress?”
“Oh, no… not today,” I say. “I need you here, my pet.” I turn with the child in my arms. “But, please, fret not. I will summon you before long, and in the meantime, please see my horse is prepared to ride.”
“Yay, mistress,” she says, and hurries to do my bidding.
“Oh, Ellyn…” She turns. “Please, do not speak of this to your mother.”
“Yay, mistress, of course,” she says, and I smile, holding my prize closer as she leaves.
“When thy father went a-hunting,” I croon to the child. “A spear on his shoulder, a club in his hand, He called the nimble hounds, ‘Giff, Gaff; catch, catch, fetch, fetch!’” And I bounce the child, and laugh, and say again, “Giff, Gaff; catch, catch, fetch, fetch!”
Chapter
Twenty-Four
The woods were tangled with undergrowth. Brambles strangled young saplings, lifting shoots to seek more prey. Pale green and concealing claws, they snagged at the length of Wilhelm’s trews, nipped the hem of Seren’s gown. Bendy and willful, vines clawed at the legs of their mounts, and on occasion finding purchase and drawing nicks of blood.
Wilhelm had never seen it so wild—overgrown and cruel with the will to prevail.
With nary a word of complaint, Seren endured the aggravation. He knew she must be relieved to be nearing the end of their journey and a heartfelt reunion with her sister.
The coursers, on the other hand, continued to complain, snorting and huffing in protest over the assault on their flesh, prancing with legs too high and stumbling over uneven ground. It was as though the path before them would impede their travels, driving them back to the road.
“`Tis overgrown,” Wilhelm grumbled, moving ahead and slashing at thickening vines with his sword. “It must have rained aplenty since I left.” But that in itself would be nothing new. Even during the driest of months they had plenty of rain in the north. Never in all his days had he ever encountered a forest sogreedy and wild. It gave him a shiver at the back of his nape—not unlike that feeling he’d had on the morning he’d discovered Warkworth in ruins.
But, of course, it could simply be due the fact that he’d been so long traveling already—months if you counted the many weeks before discovering Seren in Dover. He’d been traveling so long, in truth, that at this point he hadn’t the first inkling what was going on in London, nor even at Warkworth, and for all he knew, his brother could be locked away in a tower for treason.Wasn’t that what happened to men who forswore contracts with the King?
He bloody well hoped Giles hadn’t followed his hot-headed advice. It would serve no one at all for him to speak his true heart. But if he did, he hoped to God that Rosalynde would be prepared for the consequences. As it was, Wilhelm half anticipated returning to discover the castle under siege. It was the order of the day, so it seemed. Stephen was ever besieging one castle or another in pursuit of Matilda.
At the moment it was sunny, but while Seren’s mood had vastly improved, Wilhelm’s had taken a turn for the worse—mostly, because he realized that the very instant she was reunited with Rose, he was bound to be forgotten. For that alone he was glad to be traveling slower.
Taking a moment to calculate the distance, he reckoned that from Dover to Neasham it was a good ninety leagues, or more. From London to Neasham about seventy. From Neasham to Warkworth perhaps no more than twenty—a good two days’ journey, little more, even with the overgrown brush. However, reluctance wasn’t the only reason for his decision to avoid the North Road. While it might have been easier traveling on the old Roman road, it was also well-traveled. To make matters worse—at least for their purposes—the entire thoroughfare, from London to Edinburgh, was cleared of trees for a good ten totwenty meters on either side of the road—a measure instituted by King Henry as a defense against brigands. It only made sense for the shires to keep it, though, at the instant, it would be safer for Seren if they remained hidden.
