The Forest House

  Eilan! he thought. How could it be? Had she lost the child? If she was really High Priestess, how was he ever to see her again? He waited with ill-concealed impatience for nightfall, and grew silent with the others as they saw the procession of white-robed maidens emerge from the timber gate of the Forest House and come towards them down the avenue. At their head walked a slender woman with a scarlet cloak over her white gown. Beneath the thin veil he could see the glint of golden hair. She came crowned with light and attended by harpsong. Eilan…his heart cried. Can you feel me near you, Eilan?

  “Out of the winter’s darkness I have come—” she said, and her voice was like music. Too much like music, thought Gaius; Eilan’s voice had been sweet to him, but it had not this resonance. He pressed closer, trying to see. This woman’s voice sounded as if she were a trained singer.

  “Light-bearer am I, and bearer of blessings. Now comes the springtide; new leaves shall spring soon from the branches, and the rainbow flowers. May your beasts bear in abundance; good fortune to your plowing. Take now the light, my children, and with it my favor.”

  The Priestess bent, and they lifted from her head the crown of candles. As they lowered it to the ground before her, Gaius saw her face for the first time in full light. It was the face he had dreamed of, and yet, even in a single moment of illumination, he knew it was not Eilan. He remembered, now, how beautifully Dieda had sung.

  He pulled away, shaking. Had the woman got it wrong or was Eilan the victim of some dreadful deception?

  “Hail to the Lady!” the people cried. “Hail to the Holy Bride!” Cheering, the young men touched their torches to the candle crown and began to form the procession that would carry the light to every hut and farm. It was certainly Dieda, and she must know where Eilan was. But he could not approach her now.

  He turned away and recognized another face in the crowd. At this moment, danger meant nothing.

  “Caillean,” he whispered harshly. “I must speak to you! In the name of mercy—where is Eilan?”

  In the half-light he felt sharp eyes on him; he heard a voice speaking in a whisper, “What are you saying?” A hard grip closed on his hand. “Come away from this crowd; we cannot speak here.”

  He went unresisting. It seemed to him that if death should descend on him, it would be no more than his due. But when they were beyond the crowd, he stopped in his tracks and turned to the priestess.

  His voice was low and hoarse. “Mistress Caillean, I know how Eilan loved you. In the name of any god you cherish, tell me—where is she now?”

  Caillean pointed to the dais where the white-veiled woman presided over the festivities.

  “Cry out and betray me if you will, but do not lie to me.” Gaius stared into her eyes. “Though every man here should swear that is Eilan, I know better. Tell me if she is alive and well!”

  Caillean stared back at him with widening eyes in which he read amazement, anger, and fear. Then she let out her breath in an explosive sigh and pulled him after her, further away from the circle of torchlight where Dieda was lifting her hands to bless the crowd. As he followed Caillean into the shadows, Gaius told himself that the catch in his throat was only from the smoke of the fires.

  “I should tell them who you are and let them kill you,” she said finally. “But I, too, love Eilan, and she has had enough pain.”

  “Is she alive?” Gaius’s voice cracked.

  “No thanks to you,” Caillean retorted. “Ardanos would have put her to death when he heard what you had done! But he was persuaded to spare her, and she told me everything. Why did you never come for her? Is it true that you have married someone else as we were told?”

  “My father sent me away—”

  “To Londinium,” she confirmed. “Then it was one of the Arch-Druids’s lies that you had been married off to some Roman girl?”

  “Not yet,” he said. “But I have been on service and was not free to come. If Eilan was not punished, why do I not see her here?”

  Caillean looked at him with contempt; and Gaius felt it withering him. At last she said, “Would you expect her to be out here dancing when she has just given birth to your son?”

  Gaius’s breath caught. “Is she alive? Is the child?” It was dark here, away from the fires, but it seemed to him that Caillean’s stern expression softened.

  “She is alive, but weak, for the birth was hard; I have been very frightened for her. You do not seem to me worth dying for, but seeing you might be the medicine she needs. The gods know I am no judge. I care nothing what Ardanos might say. Come with me.”

  Caillean was only a dark shadow in the night as she led him around the crowd and back along the road, away from the Forest House and the Hill of Maidens. When they could no longer see the light of the fires, Gaius asked, “Where are you taking me?”

  “Eilan is not in the Forest House now; she has dwelt in a little house in the deepest part of the woods since the child began to show.” After a moment Caillean added hesitantly, “I have been very troubled for her. Women are sometimes very sorrowful after they have had a child, and the gods know that Eilan has enough reason to be unhappy; perhaps when she sees that you have not abandoned her, she will recover more quickly.”

  “They told me that if I did not attempt to see her, she would not be mistreated—” he protested.

  Caillean laughed, a brief bitter sound. “Ardanos was furious, of course, the wretched old tyrant. He is convinced that only if you Romans think of our priestesses as Vestals will you protect them. But the choice of the Goddess had fallen on Eilan, and he could not deny it, when Lhiannon with almost her dying breath had proposed this deception.”

  Caillean did not speak again. After a time Gaius saw through the trees a small glimmer of light against a greater darkness.

  “There is the house.”

  Caillean’s voice came soft in his ear. “Wait in the shadows while I get rid of the old woman.” She opened the door.

  “The blessing of the Lady to you, Eilan; I’ve come to keep you company. Annis, I’ll care for her now. Why don’t you go out and enjoy the festival?”

  Presently he saw the old woman emerging, well-swaddled in shawls, and as she passed down the pathway he drew back beneath the trees. Caillean stood in the open doorway behind her, framed by the light. She gestured, and as he came forward, heart thumping like a charge of cavalry, said quietly into the golden glow behind her, “I have brought you a visitor, Eilan.” He heard her going out to keep watch behind him.

  For a moment Gaius’s eyes were dazzled by the light. When he could focus again, he saw Eilan lying on a narrow bed, at her side the bundle that he knew must be the child.

  Eilan forced her eyes to open. She supposed it was kind of Caillean to come to her, but why should she bring a visitor? She did not want to see anyone except Caillean, but she had been sure the older priestess would be busy with the festival. A dull curiosity stirring within her, she opened her eyes.

  A man’s shape was standing between her and the light. Her grip on the child tightened in instinctive alarm and the baby made a little squeaking sound of protest. At that, the man took a quick step forward, and as the light fell full upon his face, she knew him at last.

  “Gaius!” she exclaimed, and at once burst into tears. She saw him redden, shifting uncomfortably from foot to foot, unable to meet her eyes.

  “I was sent to Londinium; I had no choice,” he said. “I wanted to come to you.”

  “I’m sorry—” she said, though she was not really sure why she was apologizing, “I seem to weep very easily these days.”

  His gaze flicked swiftly to her, and then to the bundle.

  “Is this my son?”

  “No other,” she said, “or do you really think perhaps that because”—suddenly she was crying so hard she could hardly speak—“that because I gave myself to you, I would lie down for any other man who came along?”

  “Eilan!” From his face, she could see that the thought had never occurred to him,
and did not know whether to be flattered or indignant. His hands clenched and unclenched. “Please! Let me hold my son.”

  Eilan felt her tears ceasing as abruptly as they had come. She looked up at Gaius, for the first time really seeing him as he knelt beside her, and lifted the baby into his arms. He looked older and grimmer, fine drawn by hardship and with a shadow in his eyes as if he too had known pain; on his cheek was a new scar. But as he held the child she saw his face begin to change.

  “My son—” he whispered, gazing at the crumpled features, “my first-born son…” Even if he went through with his marriage to the Roman girl, thought Eilan, this moment was hers.

  As the baby’s pale blue, wandering eyes met those of his father and seemed to fix on him, Gaius’s arms tightened protectively around him. All the hardness had gone from his features now; his focus was entirely on the baby, as if he would do anything to safeguard this child who lay so trusting and helpless in his arms. It came to Eilan that even when Gaius had been making love to her she had never seen him look so radiant. She recognized the Father-face of the God.

  “What sort of world will this be for you, little one?” Gaius whispered, his voice cracking. “How can I protect you, give you a home that will be secure?” For a long moment he and the child seemed lost in mutual contemplation; then the baby burped suddenly and began to chew on his thumb.

  Gaius’s gaze returned to Eilan, and as he set the child once more within the curve of her arm she realized that, wan and exhausted though she might be, to him she was the Goddess as well.

  “So, how do you like him, my dear?” she said gently. “I have called him Gawen, the name that your mother gave you.”

  “I think he is beautiful, Eilan.” His voice was shaking. “How can I ever thank you for this great gift?”

  Run away with me! her heart cried. Carry us both away to some land where we can all live together and be free! But the lamplight glinted balefully on the signet ring he wore, and she knew that there was no such country, beyond the reach of Rome.

  “Make a world that will be safe for him.” She echoed his own words. She remembered her vision; in this child the blood of the Dragon and the Eagle had mingled with the old line of the Wise; the saviors of Britannia would come from his line. But for that to happen he must live to be a man.

  “Sometimes I wonder if that is possible.” His gaze went inward, and she saw the grim shadow once more in his eyes.

  “You have been in battle since I saw you,” she said gently. “You did not get that scar in Londinium…Tell me.”

  “Have you heard about the battle of Mons Graupius?” Gaius’s voice grew harsher. “Well, I was there.” As the story poured out of him in a succession of images, she flinched, feeling the horror, and the pity, and the fear.

  “I knew that something had happened,” she said in a low voice when he was done. “There was a night, a moon after Lughnasad, when I felt that you were in great danger. I spent the following day in terror, but the feeling passed off after nightfall. I thought then that perhaps you had been fighting, but though I could sense nothing more I was certain that you had survived! You are part of me, my beloved. Surely if you had died, I would know!”

  Gaius reached out blindly and took her hand. “It is true. I dreamed I was in your arms. No other woman will ever live in my heart as you do, Eilan. No other woman can give me my first-born son! But—” His voice cracked. “I cannot acknowledge him. I cannot marry you!”

  His face working, he looked down at the child. “When I could not find out what had happened to you, I kept telling myself that we should have fled together when we had the chance. I could have endured a life on the run if we were together—but what kind of a life would that have been for you, and what kind of life for him?” He reached out and touched the baby’s cheek.

  “He is so little, so soft,” he said wonderingly. “If anything tried to harm him, right now I think I could kill it with my bare hands!” Gaius’s gaze flicked from the child to Eilan and he grew red, as if embarrassed by his own emotion.

  “You said to make the world safe for him,” he went on in a low voice. “As things are now, I can think of only one way to do that. But you will need as much courage as some ancient Roman matron of the Republic.” At the moment neither thought it odd that despite their great Emperors, Romans always invoked the days of the Republic whenever they wished to call great virtue to mind.

  “You are trying to tell me that you are going to marry your Roman girl,” Eilan said harshly. She was crying once more.

  “I have to!” he exclaimed. “Don’t you see? Mons Graupius was the last stand of the tribes. The only hope of mercy for your people now is in rulers who are both Roman and British, like me, but my only hope of gaining power in the Roman world is through alliance to an important family. Don’t cry,” he begged raggedly. “I have never been able to endure your tears, my little one. Think of him.” He gestured toward the sleeping baby. “For his sake, surely we can bear whatever we must.”

  You will not have to bear what I do, she struggled against her tears, what I have already borne!

  “You won’t be alone for ever, I promise you that,” he said. “I’ll claim you as soon as I can. And,” he added disingenuously, “surely you know that among our people a marriage is not indissoluble.”

  “Yes, I have heard that,” Eilan said acidly, sure that if he was marrying into a noble family, that the union would be as tight as the girl’s kinfolk could make it. “But what is she like, this Roman girl? Is she beautiful?”

  He looked at her ruefully. “She has not half your beauty, my precious. She is a little thing,” he added, “but very determined. There are times when it seems that I have been thrown unarmed into the arena to face a war-elephant, or a savage wild animal unarmed, as I have heard is done with criminals in Rome.”

  Then she will never let go of him, thought Eilan, but she managed a smile. “Then you do not…really care about her?”

  “Darling,” he said, kneeling at her side, and the relief in his voice made her want to laugh, “if it were not that her father is the Procurator, I give you my word, I would never have looked twice at her. With his help I can become a senator, even a Governor of Britain one day. Think of all I could do for you and the baby then!”

  Gaius bent over the child and once more that fierce protectiveness flickered in his eyes. Then, sensing that Eilan was watching him, he looked up again.

  Eilan continued to stare until she saw him becoming uneasy again. Caillean was right, she thought with bitter resignation. He has fallen in love with a delusion and persuaded himself it is reality—like every other man! Well, that should make it easier to tell him what she had to say.

  “Gaius, you know that I love you,” she began, “but you must believe that even if you were free to offer me marriage I could not accept you.” She sighed, seeing confusion flicker in his eyes.

  “I am High Priestess of Vernemeton, the Voice of the Goddess, did not they tell you? What you hope to be among the Romans, Gaius, among my people I already am! I risked my life to prove myself worthy, and the ordeal was every bit as dangerous as your battle. I can no more give up that victory than you can throw away the honor you have won!”

  He frowned, trying to accept it, and Eilan realized that they were really far more alike than he knew. But it seemed to her that he was prompted by ambition, while she—if that were not also a delusion—was obeying the will of the gods.

  “Then, though no one else knows it, we will work together,” said Gaius finally, his gaze returning to the child. “And with a Governor and a High Priestess for parents, what might this little one not do? Who knows; perhaps he will be Emperor himself someday.”

  At that, the baby opened his eyes, considering them both impartially with his vague gaze. Gaius picked him up again, cradling him awkwardly. “Be still now, Lord of the World,” he whispered as the baby squirmed, “and let me hold you.”

  At that thought—that anything so small and pink
could ever grow up to be Emperor—his parents laughed.

  TWENTY

  Gaius returned to Londinium in a kind of bittersweet daze. He had found Eilan, and lost her. He had been forced to leave the child she had borne him, and yet, he had a son! At times, as the capital and Julia drew nearer, he wanted to turn his horse and gallop back to Eilan, but he could find no way they could stay together as a family. And he remembered how stern her face had grown when Eilan told him what being High Priestess meant to her. For a few moments she had not looked like his Eilan at all. It chilled him to think of the risk she had run to prove herself worthy, and how she had risked his son!

  And yet she had wept when they parted. So, to be truthful, had he. If Eilan thought he got any pleasure from the thought of being married to Julia Licinia, she was very much mistaken. As he breasted the last hill and saw the tile roofs of the city basking in the afternoon sun, he reminded himself that he was only doing this for her sake and for the sake of their child.

  It was twilight by the time he reached the house of Licinius. The Procurator had not yet returned from the tabularium, but Gaius found Julia in the women’s atrium. Her eyes lit up at the sight of him, making her prettier than he had ever seen her. Not, of course, as pretty as Eilan; but then no one could be as beautiful as Eilan had become. Still, Julia might become very handsome in time.

  She greeted him demurely. “So you are back from the West Country, Gaius.”

  “As I stand before you, what would you say if I told you I was still in the North?”

  She giggled. “Well, I have heard that the spirits of the slain sometimes appear to those they leave behind.” Suddenly she was frightened, and the mirth went out of her voice. “Gaius, tell me you are only teasing me and that I truly see you here, alive and well!” Abruptly he realized how young she was.

  “I am flesh and blood,” he said wearily. But since he had been here last he had seen death and dealt it; he had seen his future in the eyes of a newborn child. Before, he had been a boy. He was a man now, and had learned to think like one. No wonder if Julia was confused by the change.