She closed her eyes for a moment at the memory, and her shoulders stiffened. “I tried to fight him off, and then to close my womb to his seed, but whatever power I had was useless that night. Brutus…I don’t know, but there was something there that night that was so powerful that nothing could have stopped my father getting a child on me.
“And, oh, how tragic that was.”
“How so?”
Blangan told him of how, at that moment when she had felt her father’s seed spill into her womb, the Gormagog’s Og power had split in two, divided between the Gormagog himself and the son he had just conceived on his own daughter.
“This land depends on the combined power of Og and Mag, the union of the male and female, to remain in health. At that moment when the Gormagog’s power split in twain, Og’s power was virtually destroyed. This land might look rich and green to you, Brutus, coming as you do from an area less endowed, but it has been touched by blight.”
Brutus remembered what he’d seen earlier in the day, the patches within the forest where diseased trees had fallen.
“I understand,” he said. “With the union disrupted, the land dies?”
“It sickens, certainly. And I was, and shall always be, blamed for it. Og’s power had split, and even as my father lifted himself off my body, my mother the MagaLlan rushed into the chamber moaning and shrieking and tearing at her hair,” Blangan’s face twisted bitterly, “and shouting that I had cast a spell of darkcraft over both Og and this land. It was a disaster. There I was, weeping in pain and humiliation, there was my mother, shrieking that I’d laid a dark enchantment on the land, and there was my father, jiggling, naked, up and down beside the bed and wringing his hands and staring open- and dribble-mouthed at me as if I were darkness incarnate.”
Her voice softened into a whisper. “And all I was, Brutus, was a terrified thirteen-year-old girl, having just been raped by her father and with no more ability to weave darkcraft than I could command the tide to retreat. Someone had cast that darkcraft, but it was not me.”
“Who?” Brutus said, very softly.
“My mother, I think. No one else would have had the power.”
“Why?”
“I don’t know, Brutus. In the end, I can’t think why a MagaLlan, dedicated to the care of the land and to maintaining the union between Mag and Og so that the land would prosper, would do something so horrific.
“Whatever the who and the why, soon my name was being spoken with revulsion by every Llangarlian. My mother kept me close while my belly swelled, not even letting me outside her house during those long, long months; she was terrified I might do something to lose the child, and that she would not allow. When my time came to give birth…by Mag herself, Brutus, it was terrible. Worse than what Cornelia went through. No one helped me, but my mother, and my very youngest sister, Genvissa, stood there for all those long hours watching silently. I tore apart as I gave birth—because of that I have been unable to give Corineus children—”
Her voice broke on a sob, and she had to take some time to compose herself.
Brutus laid a hand on her shoulder, knowing that she would accept no more than that small gesture of sympathy.
“I tore apart with the birth, and as soon as my son was born, and I put him to my breast, my mother leaned down and took him without a word or a look to me. The next day, still bleeding, I was delivered to the merchant who wived and bedded me within the day, and who bore me from Llangarlia.”
“Oh, gods, Blangan—”
“Now that I am back,” Blangan continued as if Brutus had not spoken, “my name will be blacker than ever. I will be the evil Darkwitch who destroyed the land’s wellbeing, and who decimated Og’s power. At some point, I will be taken and killed. The MagaLlan cannot afford for me to have my say.”
“I will protect you.”
“I doubt very much if you will be able to protect me. Not here. Not in Llangarlia.”
“I will—”
“No, shush.” Blangan put her fingers on his mouth. “Make no promises you cannot keep. I am at peace with this. If I had wanted to escape death, Brutus, I would have not come with you.”
“Corineus…”
“Do not tell Corineus. There is no point. And do not tell Cornelia.”
Why not Cornelia? wondered Brutus. What has she to do with all this? And suddenly that nasty worm of suspicion flowered again within his belly. Corineus…widowed…and Cornelia. But then Blangan was speaking again, and Brutus tore his mind away from Cornelia and Corineus.
“There is more I must say, and if you have found the previous difficult to accept, then I fear that what I say now will make you angry. But say it I must.”
“Genvissa,” he said, his voice low.
“Aye. Genvissa. My younger sister and undoubtedly the MagaLlan by now. That day you first met me you described her to me, Brutus, and Cornelia tells me you have dreamed of a strange woman.”
Damn Cornelia, Brutus thought. Has she told you how thick my erect member is? How many times I prefer to move my bowels every week? How golden my stream of piss is in the morning as compared to the evening?
“Cornelia has needed a friend, Brutus. If she has told me that you have dreamed of this woman then do not begrudge her this.”
“She has dreamed of—”
“Not of her young lover whom you murdered, Brutus. Yes, she has told me of that as well…but are you aware that Genvissa has also appeared to her in dream? Cornelia does not yet know the identity of the woman who appeared to her, but she described her to me, and it was Genvissa.”
“What? When? She has not told me—”
“She would not think to have told you, Brutus, because she blames herself for what happened, not the woman—the goddess, Cornelia thinks her—who appeared to her…and told her in precise detail how to plan and organise the Dorian uprising in Mesopotama.”
Brutus was so shocked that he could only stare at Blangan, open-mouthed.
“Cornelia has also told me of the manner in which Mesopotama died, Brutus. She told me of the cracks that spread up the walls of buildings. Cracks, Brutus, that sound very much like those that appeared in Locrinia.”
“You can’t think—”
“I think, Brutus, that Genvissa’s hand is everywhere in your life for the past year. Cornelia may have been a thoughtless young girl, but not everything she has done has been on her initiative only.
“Genvissa has brought you here for a reason. I have no idea what that reason is, but I fear it is dangerous, both to you and to the Llangarlians.”
“I cannot think her that cruel. That manipulative.”
Blangan sat back, a cold hard smile on her face. “No, of course you can’t.”
And with that she despaired, for she could see in Brutus’ hesitation that Genvissa had already caught him within her darkcraft.
How I wish, she thought in a sudden rush of cold horror, that I had not told him as much as I have.
Poor Cornelia. She will never be a queen in this land. Genvissa will see to that.
It was very late at night when Brutus lay down beside a deeply asleep Cornelia. He was exhausted, but with all Blangan had told him, he did not think he would be able to sleep for hours, if at all.
Cornelia was curled up under her blanket, a bundled shape held tightly against her breast, and Brutus laid his head against her shoulders, thoughtful.
Had Genvissa manipulated all of them?
Was that terrible revolt, and all the subsequent death, Cornelia’s fault entirely, or should the fault be shared? He reached an arm over Cornelia, and touched his son.
Cornelia did not stir, and Brutus did not wake her. He left his arm lying across her body, his fingertips lightly touching his son, and despite thinking he would never sleep, slipped quickly into an exhausted slumber.
When he dreamed, it was not of Cornelia, but of the dark-haired woman with the streak of russet through her hair.
Genvissa.
She was standing
before him laughing, naked, her hands splayed over her round, pregnant belly. As he stood staring, lust stirring in him even though she was pregnant, her belly swelled, as if months passed instead of moments, then Genvissa dropped to the ground, moaning.
She writhed once or twice in agony, then lay on her back and spread and lifted her legs, and strained to give birth.
Brutus moved, looking between her thighs.
Genvissa screamed, arching her back, and something slithered from her birth canal and lay between her legs.
It was not a baby at all, but a city.
It was the city he had seen on the wall in Assaracus’ house. Beautiful, extraordinary, white-walled, many-turreted, gleaming in the sunlight. A city such as the world had never seen before.
Genvissa raised herself on her elbows, and looked over her now flaccid belly to what lay between her legs. She smiled, and Brutus thought her face lovelier even than the city.
“See what we have made between us, lover,” she said. “The greatest city the world will ever know.”
He dropped to his knees beside her shoulder, and leaned down, and kissed her deeply.
As he raised his face from hers, she said, “Other women may give you sons, Brutus, but only I can give you immortality.”
Only I can give you immortality…
When Brutus woke in the morning, it was to find that he’d rolled far away from Cornelia and Achates, and that, as he recalled what Blangan had said to him the previous night, it was to dismiss it as the addled meanderings of a woman grief-stricken and bitter at her inability to bear her husband children.
CHAPTER EIGHT
They rode through the forest, three men on low, sturdy, shaggy-haired dun horses. Under their light cloaks they wore finely woven woollen tunics, richly patterned and coloured, over similarly fine woollen leggings. Knives were slipped under their belts, and at their hips swung swords of elegant craftsmanship.
One man, of some thirty years, was set apart from the other two by the fine bronze and gold jewellery he wore in his ears and at his neck and wrists. He had very pale skin, dark hair and eyes, and a sensitive, thin and clean-shaven face with light grooves running from nose to mouth. When he chose, and that was often under normal circumstances, he also had a brilliant smile.
Atop his physical comeliness the man wore an air of moodiness about him, and a certain degree of mysticism, that, while complementing his sensitive face, seemed at odds with his warrior bearing and the hardness of his hands.
His name was Coel, a proud younger son of the House of Erith, and while he came here at the behest of the MagaLlan (and through her, the Gormagog), his true allegiance was to Loth, with whom he had played as a boy, watched over as a youth, and confided in as a man.
His mission was twofold: to escort the leader of this vast fleet north to the Veiled Hills, where he might meet with the MagaLlan and the Gormagog, but also to lead Loth’s mother, Blangan, to her death.
Unbeknown to the MagaLlan and the Gormagog, there was a third part to Coel’s mission, something Loth had confided in him, and something Coel did only for Loth.
There was a woman among these strangers, a woman as any other, but who Loth said intrigued him. Loth had told Coel of his vision of the great fleet that was sailing towards Llangarlia, and he had also told Coel that his vision was constantly pulled back to watch this woman—girl, really—giving birth.
“She intrigues me,” said Loth. “Coel, my friend, find out for me what she has about her.”
Coel had laughed, and made a ribald comment, but Loth had hardly even grinned.
“There is something strange about her, Loth. Find out for me what that is.”
Coel pulled his exhausted horse to a halt, stared for a long moment at the hill rising in the distance, then slid from the beast’s back, giving it a well-earned pat on its neck. He and his two companions—Jago, a young and smooth-cheeked man, and Bladud, a much weightier and grim-visaged warrior who had a scar neatly bisecting the beard on his chin—had taken a week to ride this far. They’d changed their horses twice, and sometimes three, times a day at villages along their route, invoking the Gormagog’s and the MagaLlan’s names as security against the horses’ eventual return.
Five days out they had begun to hear rumours, and then firm reports, of a massive fleet of black ships that had entered the Dart River far to the south.
Terror was spreading among the tiny villages of southern Llangarlia, and Coel did all he could to reassure the frightened people: these newcomers were no threat. The Gormagog and the MagaLlan knew of them, and knew how to control them.
At least, Coel fervently hoped so.
He thanked Og and Mag that there were no reports of fighting: these strange people had arrived, but were apparently content to hunt for food, and to establish a basic camp, and had not embarked on a rampage of terror through the forests surrounding the Dart.
This seventh day since their departure from the Veiled Hills had brought Coel and his two companions to the very edge of the Dart River. In front of him, although still some distance away, rose a high hill. Here, so Coel had heard from reports and now could hear with his own ears, the foreigners had established their camp.
He turned to Jago and Bladud, Jago’s face clearly showing his nervousness while Bladud’s remained inscrutable, and nodded that they should also dismount.
“We’ll walk from here,” he said. “These black ship people will have warriors in the woods surrounding their camp, and doubtless we will be intercepted before long. If we are on foot, then we will the more clearly be seen as emissaries rather than attackers.”
“I fear them,” said Jago.
“We all do,” Coel said, “but it weakens us to voice such fear.”
Jago’s cheeks reddened, but he bowed his head, accepting Coel’s rebuke.
“The Gormagog and the MagaLlan will direct them to our purpose,” Coel continued, now feeling a little sorry for Jago, “rather than allow them to work against us.”
Jago raised his head, about to say something, when all three men jerked to a halt, their horses shying, and stared at the five men who had appeared silently on the forest path before them. Like the Llangarlians, they were dressed in tunics that came to mid-thigh, but they wore no breeches or leggings, and the material of their tunics was of fine linen rather than wool.
They were well armed with both lances and swords—the like of which Coel had never seen before—and had hardened leather circular shields, a curious device in their centre, held on their left forearms by straps.
Their faces were strange, their skin swarthy, and their hair and eyes were very dark—a darkness Coel had only ever seen in one other family before.
Coel risked a single step forward, spreading his hands well away from his sides to show his peaceful intent.
“I have come to speak with your leader,” he said, hoping the warriors would understand his intent rather than his words. “I mean you no harm.”
The lead warrior grunted, as if he had understood what Coel had said, then nodded, and beckoned the three men forward. Seven other warriors stepped silently out of the woods—Coel had not even realised they were there—relieving the three Llangarlians of their swords and knives, and then the party set off, walking steadily towards the hill.
Coel, Jago and Bladud were escorted to a clearing on the edge of the Dart. Here they were stopped while several among their escort went forward into the largest mass of people Coel had ever seen.
They were everywhere, the dark-haired, exotic-featured people of the black ships; Coel had no means of estimating their numbers. The people swarmed over the open spaces and the gently sloping side of the hill, while scores of ships crowded at anchor in the calmer sections of the river. In the days since their arrival they had managed to set up a basic camp: wooden shelters covered with rushes or branches and hundreds of campfires over which pots bubbled and meat smoked. Women crouched at the water’s edge washing clothes and minding children, while herds of goats and
sheep—of breeds even more exotic to Coel’s eyes than the people themselves—were corralled at the edges of the woods.
He was still gaping when he realised that the warriors were returning, and with them walked a man who Coel instantly realised was not only this people’s leader, but a man who wielded god-power.
Coel stiffened a little, and he felt both Bladud and Jago shuffle in their discomfort.
The man continued to walk towards them, his face devoid of any expression. He moved with the strength and grace of a hardened warrior, and the gleaming bands of gold about his legs and arms gave him an almost supernatural glow; if nothing else, they told Coel that the man was a king of some standing. He had very long, curly black hair tied at the base of his neck, and wore a fine linen tunic of ivory with a belt of woven gold and silver threads about his waist.
He was unarmed, not wearing even a knife for his food.
The man came to a halt two paces away from Coel, regarding him with as much care and curiosity as Coel knew he studied him.
“You have a fine cloak to hang over your equally fine tunic,” said the man in quite reasonable if highly accentuated Llangarlian, and Coel jumped in surprise—he had expected to communicate with this stranger by means of hand signals and significant looks.
One among Coel’s escort of warriors handed Coel’s sword to this man, and he turned it over in his hands slowly as he examined it.
“And your sword,” the man continued, “is far better crafted than any I have ever wielded. Are you the Gormagog himself, come to greet me?”
He turned slightly, handing the sword back to one of his men.
Despite all his caution, Coel’s face dropped in shock. He knew of the Gormagog? Great Og, what else did he know?
Clearly amused at Coel’s reaction, the man raised a black eyebrow, waiting for a response.