By the time they reached the Watch Hill, darkness had fallen. Torches circled the gravesite; their light cast an illusory warmth across the features of the man who lay beside it, and glowed on the pale robes of the Druids and the priestesses in their blue. But Dierna was swathed in black, and though the firelight sparked and glittered like falling stars from the bits of gold sewn into her black veil, no light could penetrate its shadow, for tonight she was the Lady of Darkness.
“The sun has left us…,” the priestess said softly when the singing ceased. “This day it reigned supreme, but now the night has fallen. From this moment onward, the power of light will lessen, until the cold of midwinter overwhelms the world.” As she spoke, even the light of the torches seemed to weaken. The teachings of the Mysteries placed great importance on the cyclical movements of Nature; now she understood them in the depths of her soul.
“The spirit of this man has left us….” Her voice scarcely shook as she went on. “Like the sun he reigned in splendor, and like the sun has been cast down. Where does the sun go when it leaves us? We are told that it walks in the southern lands. Just so, this spirit journeys now to the Summerland. We mourn his loss. But we know that in the heart of midwinter’s darkness the light shall be reborn. And so we give this body back to the earth from which it was made, in hopes that his radiant spirit will once again take flesh and walk among us in the hour of Britannia’s need.”
As they laid the body in the grave and began to fill it in, Dierna could hear someone weeping, but her own eyes were dry. Her words had not given her hope—she was beyond that. But Carausius had not given up the battle when his fate turned against him, and she knew now that she would not do so either.
“Carausius has his victory. But it is in the world of the spirit. In this world, his murderer still lives and boasts of his deed. It is Allectus who has done this—Allectus, whom he loved—Allectus, who must pay for his treachery! At this moment, when the tides of power begin to turn toward disintegration and decline, I will set my curse upon him.”
Dierna took a deep breath and raised her arms to heaven. “Powers of Night, I call you by no mean magic but by the ancient laws of Necessity, to fall upon the murderer. May no day seem bright to him, no fire warm to him, no love true to him, until he has atoned for his crime!”
She turned, gesturing toward the lake that lapped below.
“Powers of the Sea, womb from which we are all born, mighty ocean on whose currents we are all carried, may all courses he may choose go awry! Rise up to engulf the murderer, O Sea, and drown him in your dark tides!”
She knelt beside the grave and buried her fingers in the loose soil.
“Powers of Earth, to whom we now release his body, may the man who killed him find no peace upon your surface! May he doubt every step he takes, and every man on whom he depends, and every woman he loves, until the chasm yawns beneath him and he falls.”
Dierna got to her feet again, smiling grimly at the shocked faces around her. “I am the Lady, and I set upon Allectus, son of Cerialis, the curse of Avalon. Thus I have spoken, and thus it shall be!”
The year-wheel rolled toward harvest, but though the weather held fair, a summer storm of rumor racked the land. The Emperor had disappeared. Some said he was dead, murdered by Allectus. But others denied it, for where was the body? He was in hiding from his foes, they believed. Still others whispered that he had fled over the sea to make submission to Rome. Certain it was that Allectus had proclaimed himself High King, and was sending his riders up and down Britannia to summon chieftains and commanders to a great oath-taking in Londinium.
The people of Londinium were cheering. Teleri flinched at the sound, and drew the leather curtains of the carriage closed. It was stuffy inside, but she could not bear the noise, or perhaps it was the pressure of so many eyes, so many minds, all focused on her. It had not been like this when she was here before, with Carausius. But by the time she joined him here, he had already been accepted as Emperor. The difference, she supposed, was that this time she was part of the ceremony. She ought to have been proud and excited. Why, she wondered, did she feel like a captive being paraded in the triumph of some Roman conqueror?
It was better once they reached the basilica, though here also there were too many people. Tables had been set up for feasting. The princes and magistrates who sat there eyed her with less curiosity and more calculation. Teleri tried to hold her head high, but she clung to her father’s arm.
“What are you afraid of?” asked the Prince. “You are an empress already. If I had guessed, when you were a gawky girl, that I was raising the Lady of Britannia, I would have bought you a Greek tutor.”
She gave him a quick look and saw the glint in his eye, and tried to smile.
A blaze of color at the end of the long aisle resolved itself into figures. She saw Allectus, arrayed in a purple mantle over a crimson tunic, dwarfed by the bigger men beside him. His eyes brightened as he saw her.
“Prince Eiddin Mynoc—be welcome,” he said formally. “You have brought your daughter. I ask now if you will give her to me as a wife.”
“Lord, it is for that we have come….”
Teleri looked from one man to the other. Was no one going to ask her? But perhaps, she told herself, her consent had been given that night in Durnovaria, and the rest—the killing of Carausius and all that had ensued—was only its sequel.
She stepped forward, and Allectus took her hand.
The feast that followed seemed endless. Teleri picked at the food, listening halfheartedly to the conversation. There was some discussion of the gift which Allectus had given to the soldiers upon his proclamation. It was traditional for an emperor at his accession, especially when he was a usurper, but Allectus’ contribution had been generous even by those standards. The merchants, on the other hand, seemed to be hoping for more favors. Only the chieftains of the old Celtic blood paid her any attention, and she realized that her father had been right, and it was partly because of her that they had come.
By the time bride and groom were put to bed, Allectus had drunk a great deal. Teleri, bracing herself as he staggered against her, realized that she had never seen him in less than full command of himself. Her first husband’s embrace had been something to endure. As she helped Allectus out of his clothes, she began to wonder if her second man would be able to do a husband’s duty at all.
Teleri got Allectus into the great bed and lay down beside him. Now that they were alone, there were things she must ask him—not least of them how Carausius had died. She had not been surprised to feel guilt when she learned of his murder; from the moment when she accepted Allectus’ love, she had understood, at some level, what he meant to do. She had not expected the pain.
But when she turned to him, he was already snoring. In the dark hours of the night Allectus woke, crying out that Constantius was coming with a great army of men with bloody spears. Sobbing, he clung to her, and Teleri soothed him as if he were a child. He had been happier when he still served Carausius. And she, if not happy, had at least retained her honor. On which of the three of them could she blame this tragedy? Perhaps it was Dierna she should blame, she thought bitterly.
After a time Allectus began to kiss her, his embrace becoming more frantic until he took her with a desperate urgency. Eventually he slept once more, but Teleri lay for a long time wakeful in the darkness. She, who had dreamed of freedom, had chosen this cage. But it was done now, and must be endured.
As Teleri at last fell into a fitful slumber, she found herself praying to the Goddess as she had not since she was a girl, dreaming of escape from her father’s hall.
In Avalon, Dierna endured as well. Her curse had gone out against Allectus; its fulfillment must be left to greater powers. But for a time, it seemed that those powers did not care. The anniversary of Carausius’ death went by, and the world rolled on unheeding. The priestess waited, but for what she could not say.
Another year passed. If Britannia was not happy with A
llectus’ rule, no one dared speak too loudly against him. But he continued his payments to the barbarians, and the Saxon shore stayed peaceful. As for Constantius, though his fleet had overcome that of Carausius, it had taken a beating, and as the latter himself had predicted, it would take time and money to build enough transports and the galleys to guard them to invade the island.
The moon rode high in the heavens. Though it was beginning to wane, it still was bright enough to dim the summer stars. The thatching on the House of Maidens glistened, and the pillars of the Processional Way glowed. Dierna took a deep breath of the cool night air. Around her all was silent. The restlessness that had kept her from sleep must be a thing of the spirit. Something was changing, and its reverberations resounded on the inner planes.
Another year had come and gone since Britannia rejected the lord that Avalon had chosen, and in that time the High Priestess had not left her isle, but from time to time rumors reached them. Constantius had launched his invasion at last. Some said he had landed near Londinium, and the High King’s forces were fighting him there. Other reports spoke of a force that had landed at Clausentum and was marching on Calleva. If Carausius had lived, she would have been using all the magic of Avalon to aid him. But never again would she interfere in the affairs of the outside world.
Dierna was about to return to her bed when she glimpsed someone running up the hill. It was Lina, who as a part of her training had been assigned to keep vigil beside the holy well. Frowning, the High Priestess hurried toward her.
“Hush, I am here.” She got an arm around the girl and guided her to one of the benches. “Take a deep breath, and another. You are safe now….” She held Lina until the girl’s sobs became shuddering gasps and her trembling stilled. “Tell me, daughter, what has frightened you?”
“The well.”’ Lina drew a shaky breath. “The moonlight was shining on the water, mirror-bright. I looked into it, and suddenly mist swirled around me and I saw men fighting with swords. It was horrible! So much blood! I was glad I could not hear their screams.”
“Was it the Romans? Did you see Allectus?”
“I think so—Roman soldiers were attacking a British camp. Tents were blazing. By the light of the moon and fire it was easy to see. The Romans were fully armed, but our people had been sleeping. Some of them had time to grab their shields, but most had no armor at all. The fiercest battle was around a thin, dark-haired man with a golden headband. He fought bravely, but not very well.”
Allectus! thought Dierna. At last my curse strikes home.
“One by one the men of his guard were killed. The Romans called on the King to surrender, but he would not, and so they speared him, again and again, until he finally went down.”
“He is dead, then,” Dierna said aloud, “and Carausius avenged. Be at rest, my dear one, and you, who betrayed him. In another lifetime, perhaps, we will meet again.”
That autumn, while Emperor Constantius basked in the adulation of the capital he had reconquered for Rome, rains lashed the land. In the Vale of Avalon, clouds swathed the Tor and lay low across the waters, as if the mists that protected it were blotting out the world. But despite the leaden skies, Dierna felt as if a great weight had been lifted from her, and her priestesses, taking heart from her mood, began to speak of building new walls around the sheep pen and replacing the tattered thatching of the meeting hall.
On a morning shortly after the equinox, the maiden in charge of the sheep came in weeping because one of the ewes had gotten through the temporary fencing and disappeared. And because, after a week of solid rain, the clouds had thinned to a misty drizzle that might even soon admit a few rays of sun, and after so many months of lassitude she found herself actually wanting exercise, Dierna volunteered to search for it.
It was not easy going. The waters had risen with all the rain, and some places that were usually dry had become marsh as well. Dierna chose her path carefully, wondering what the silly creature had been thinking of to leave the hill. But the soft ground made for easy tracking, and she followed the trail around the hill above the holy well and down through the orchards. Still it went on, back along the edge of the lake toward the low hill of Briga, whose shrine was circled by apple trees.
Dierna paused, frowning, for the hill, ordinarily on an isle by courtesy, had become in truth an island. Mist lay low across the water, as yet too thick for her to see the sky, though it glittered in the light of the sun. And yet it seemed to her that she could see something grey beneath the trees. She knew where the path must be, though she could not see it. Picking up a pole that had drifted onto the shore with which to probe the ground, she began to wade out into the water.
Mist swirled around her, at the first step a veil, but by the third a curtain that hid both the place from which she had come and her goal. An ancient panic stopped her, muddy water lapping her ankles. This is my own land! she told herself. I have known these paths since I could walk—I should be able to find my way blindfolded or in a dream! She took a deep breath, calling on disciplines she had practiced to induce calm for almost as many years as she had lived on Avalon.
And as the roaring in her ears faded, she heard a call.
“D’rna—help me!”
It was faint with distance or exhaustion, hard to tell which, for the mist deadened sound. But Dierna splashed forward.
“Someone, please…can anyone hear at all?”
Dierna gasped, her sight darkened by memory. “Becca!” Her voice cracked. “Keep calling! Becca, I’m coming for you!” She stumbled ahead, feeling out the way with her staff.
“Oh, Goddess, please—I’ve tried so hard to find my way….” The words faded to disjointed mumblings. Butthey were enough. Dierna turned and found herself in deeper water, reached out with senses beyond sight as she had when she searched for Carausius, and at last glimpsed the shape of a tree and, clinging to its roots, a woman’s form.
She saw draggled dark hair, limp as waterweed, and a thin, mud-smeared hand. The body she hauled onto the higher ground was as light as a child’s. But it was not a child. Dierna cradled the woman against her breast and gazed into Teleri’s eyes.
“I thought…” Her mind reeled in confusion. “I thought you were my sister….”
The wonder in Teleri’s face faded, and she closed her eyes. “I was lost in the mist,” she whispered. “Ever since you sent me away I think I have been lost. I was trying to come back to Avalon.”
Dierna stared down at her, wordless. When she heard of Teleri’s marriage to Allectus she had wanted to curse her too, but she had lacked the energy. It would appear that, even without her cursing, Teleri had been punished by the same powers that brought Carausius’ murderer down. But Teleri was still alive. Mist drifted around them like a clammy veil. In all the world, she could see nothing living but Teleri, and herself, and the apple tree.
“You came through the mists…” Dierna said slowly. “That can only be done by a priestess, or by passing through Faerie.”
Thought came slowly, as if from deep waters. Could she forgive this woman, for whose love Allectus had turned against his master? Could she forgive herself, for being so certain she knew the will of the Goddess that she had tangled them all in this doom? Dierna sighed, releasing a burden she had not known she bore.
“I am not the one you were looking for…. Forgive me…” Teleri whispered then.
“Are you not? I promise that I will treat every woman in this temple as my sister, my mother, and my daughter, as my own kin….” The voice of the priestess gathered strength as she repeated the oath of Avalon.
“Dierna…” Teleri gazed up at her, those dark eyes, still so lovely in her ravaged face, filling with tears. Dierna tried to smile, but now she was weeping herself, and could only hold the other woman close, rocking her like a child.
She did not know how much time had passed before calm returned. A cloud of white still surrounded them, and it was cold.
“We seem to be trapped here, until the fog goes awa
y,” she said with a cheerfulness that belied her words. “But we will not starve, for there are still apples on this tree.” Gently she settled Teleri against the trunk and stood up to pluck one. As she did so, she saw a stirring in the air beyond the island, and then, as if it had precipitated out of the mist, the shape of a woman poling a small flat craft of the kind the marsh folk used.
She stilled, squinting as she tried to see. The woman seemed familiar, and yet, as the priestess reviewed the people of the marsh villages, she could not remember her face or name. Despite the chill, the stranger was barefoot and clad only in a deerskin wrap, with a garland of bright berries on her brow.
“Hello.” She found her voice at last. “Can your craft carry two lost ones back to the Tor?”
“Lady of Avalon that is, and Lady of Avalon that will be, that is why I am here…” came the answer.
Dierna blinked, and then, understanding at last who had come for them, she bowed.
Swiftly, lest the Queen of Faerie disappear as she had arrived, Dierna lifted Teleri into the boat and clambered after her. In another moment the punt was sliding into the cloud. The mist was very thick here, and bright, the way it sometimes appeared when one passed through it to reach the outside world.
But the radiance that encompassed them as they emerged was the clear light of Avalon.
Dierna speaks:
Last night, when the moon first came full after the equinox of spring, Teleri ascended the seat of prophecy. It has been long since this way of Seeing was practiced, not since the time of the Lady Caillean, before the priestesses lived on Avalon, but the long memories of the Druids had preserved the ritual. The Sight comes to me rarely now, and our need was great, and worth the risk of the experiment.
Constantine, the son of Constantius, now rules the world, and the Christians, who for a time seemed about to be destroyed by their own quarrels, have been united by the persecutions of Diocletian, and now reign as the favorites of his successor. The gods of Rome were content to share in the devotion of the people of Britannia without supplanting them. But the god of the Christians is a jealous master.