Page 316 of The Daughters of Avalon
“You speak so fondly of your mother,” Rhiannon ventured. “And yet you’ve never spoken her name.”
“Isolde,” said the paladin after a moment.
“Isolde?”
“Aye.”
“The same?—”
“Indeed, she is one and the same,” Marcella said, and once again she heard rather than spied Marcella’s smile.
Goddess, alive, it didn’t seem there could be any more surprises, but here was yet another.
Isolde was the old woman who’d tended them for a while at court, whilst they were still very young. She was also the same woman who’d delivered Rhiannon and her sisters to Llanthony the year King Henry died. She was the one who’d roused them from their slumber in London, and spirited them away to the Vale of Ewyas, where she’d placed them in the care of those monks. Only then, she’d gone, and they never saw her again, and Rhiannon had only assumed she had abandoned them to their misfortunes. After all, who wanted to attach themselves to five penurious young maids.
Rhiannon didn’t know what to say.
“We parted ways after an argument over your mother,” said Marcella.
Rhiannon shook her head. “So, it seems, my mother is the cause for so much discontent. I’m so sorry to hear this, Marcella. Have you seen her since, or are you still estranged?”
She sensed Marcella’s gaze, even through the darkness. Her face became visible only in glimpses as moonlight pierced the foliage. “My mother is dead,” she said. “She died a few moons after Henry died. There was a bout of leprosy at Blackwood when I was young, and despite that she was healed, she was twisted and ravaged by her illness. After she left court and deposited the five of you at Llanthony, she wasted away and died. God forbidshe should ever humble herself enough to appeal to me—not in life. Though I do still see her now on occasion.”
Rhiannon blinked. “You still see her?”
Silence was her initial response, and then, Marcella asked, “’Tis odd how we can know something in our hearts, and still not know it experientially.”
“I don’t under?—”
“As you must know already, all things are one, living and dead. If the stars align, you might still connect with loved ones Beyond The Veil, but you must wholly believe it.”
Rhiannon considered that a moment, and then Marcella added, “If you look and listen, you’ll see signs of our departed in so many forms.”
Rhiannon wondered how Arwyn would appear—in a glorious explosion of flames, she decided with a smile. Her youngest sibling may have been gentle at heart, but she was dazzling in spirit. She found the thought comforting and tucked the knowledge away for further exploration.
“How much longer to Amdel? Do you know?”
Marcella peered up at a sliver of sky through the trees. “I would suppose by now we have passed into Darkwood, so perhaps another bell.”
Rhiannon stiffened.
“Never fear,” Marcella said, correctly reading her unease. “We are far north of the inn.”
Rhiannon shivered, although it had little to do with the evening’s damp or chill. “I have never been there, but I know enough from my sisters to know it is nowhere I wish to be.”
Marcella agreed. “No man, lest he have some death wish, ever rests at that inn.”
“My mother is the patron, did you know?”
“Of course,” said Marcella. “And I must confess I made good use of that knowledge.”
“Hunting?”
“Aye.”
Rhiannon arched a brow. “Dewinekind?”
“Nay,” said the paladin, sliding her a glance. “I know what you think, Lady Blackwood. Fortunately, ’tis been an age sincedewinefolkwere the sole concern of the Guard, or even the Church. Mind you, we’ve far worse enemies now, and the greatest being your mother.”
