Authors: L. M. Roth
There was no
longer any time for relaxing, for Cort knew he must make for home with all
haste. That the woman Brenus had taken to wife was evil was clearly evident to
him now. And whatever her purpose was in coming to Eirinia must be thwarted at
all costs to himself.
They arrived
in Eirinia in the second week of March, just when the birds were returning and
the first tender blades of grass were thrusting their emerald shoots up through
the ground. Cort breathed in the salty sea air. He did not realize how he had
missed it! His mother reveled in the mild climate and marveled at the glowing
green hills and the clear blue waters that surrounded them. She had never
pictured such a scene of pastoral perfection, having seen only a vista of trees
in Trekur Lende, where the vast forest stretched for miles in every direction.
The look on
Dag’s face when he saw Cort served to prove Siv right in her insistence that he
return. Dag had just come in from the field where he had begun the spring
plowing: Judoc was setting the table for the evening meal with the help of
Maelys and Nolwenn. Cort did not knock, but entered boldly into the house, and
was immediately the center of an ambush of hugs and kisses that left him winded
with the intensity of the attack. Just at that moment, Dag entered the hut and
stared at Cort with the expression of a man who has just awakened and wonders
if he is still dreaming. Then he rushed to him and embraced him long and
deeply, suppressed whimpers the only display of emotion that the great man
permitted to escape his usually impassive façade.
Neither of
them said a word, just simply held each other for a long moment, as Cort
stroked Dag’s hair comfortingly. Finally, Dag released him and Cort turned to
Siv and Brit.
“My intended,”
he said proudly as he drew Siv forth toward Dag and Judoc. “And my mother.”
Brit came
forward shyly, and Cort saw too late that Judoc suddenly had the look of one
stabbed unexpectedly through the heart. For had not she raised him from the
time he was eleven years old? Now she looked at him with disbelief through
tear-filled eyes. He tried to make amends.
“Mother,” he
addressed Brit, “this is my other mother, Judoc. I know you both will love each
other, so come, be friends.”
Judoc then
smiled and held out her hand to Brit, who warmly clasped it.
“Thank you,”
she said, raising Judoc’s hand to her own cheek, “thank you for taking care of
my boy.”
Tears coursed
down her face and Judoc suddenly pulled her into her arms and kissed her cheek.
“Let us be
friends, you and I,” she whispered. “We shall share him, for it is true that he
is as one of my own sons. And proud I am of him, for bringing back such a fine
maid to wed. Happy I am also, to see him reunited with his own mother.”
Brit shed a
look of gratitude on Judoc that warmed Cort’s heart. Yes, they would be
friends, and perhaps it would be easier to prevail upon Brit to make her home
with him and Siv. For he would return to his own hut and there would be room
for her to stay with them. It was decided that Siv would stay with Dag and
Judoc until she and Cort were married, while Cort and Brit shared his hut until
that time.
The family set
down to dinner with much joy and excitement animating the meal. His brothers
Brand and Dirk kept talking over each other in their eagerness to share with
Cort all that happened since last they saw him, and his sisters cast curious but
friendly glances at Siv. Cort was relieved to see that Maelys shed warmer beams
on Siv than she had ever bestowed on Melisande, a good omen for the future. Judoc
kept the conversation going while Dag sat at the head of the table and beamed
on all present. Now that his eldest son had returned, he was entirely content
with life, and certain that all would work out for the good.
The following
day Brenus came to call on the family. Cort braced himself for the encounter,
but the intervening months appeared to have tempered his brother’s anger. He
smiled sheepishly at Cort, and offered his hand. Cort took it, but his own
anger still burned hot against Melisande. He noted that she had not come to
greet him, and he now was impatient to speak to her at the earliest
opportunity. He did not have long to wait.
Two days after
their return, Brenus went to the forest to hunt. Cort had come in for lunch
from helping Dag and his brothers in the field and finished before the others.
He decided to take a few moments to check on Brit before returning to the
field. His hut was closer to the woods than the others and he stepped out the
back door to savor a few moments among the trees, breathing deeply of the
aromatic fragrance that never failed to calm his spirit.
Just as he was
about to leave and head back to the field, a shadow came between him and the
sunlight. He looked up and saw Melisande blocking his path. The smile on her
face was false, her green eyes as hard and cold as a blade of grass encased in
a January frost. She inclined her head toward him and spoke.
“Hello,
brother,” she snarled. “I am astonished that you had the gall to return and
face me after our last encounter. And you bring a bride! Is that to steel
yourself against temptation from me?”
“Do not
flatter yourself,” Cort sneered in disgust. “I am blessed to be wedding a
childhood friend whom I love deeply. But that is not your business, sister.
What about you; do you have any childhood friends? And what of your homeland?
You have never told any of us where that might be. Perhaps you would care to enlighten
me now?”
Melisande
tightened her lips and glared at him. He would not have been surprised if smoke
had escaped her nostrils like some dragon of legend. He decided it was time to
move in for the kill.
“But then,
perhaps I can tell you where your homeland is, Melisande. And I can enlighten
my father on your origins.”
Melisande now
paled and looked distinctly startled. Her anger dropped from her, to be
replaced with something that looked strangely like panic…
“What do you
mean, Cort? How could you know anything about me? You and I never met until
last autumn when I wed your brother, Brenus. You speak in riddles but do not
say what you mean. I believe you are making up tales to cause trouble for me.
For you are angry that you can not have me;
that
I know!”
Melisande
tossed her head and would have stomped away from Cort, but he grabbed her arm
and dragged her back, wrenching her around to face him. She attempted to pull
away, but he held her fast.
“On the
contrary, Melisande! I know all about your family: for I knew your mother quite
well. Indeed she was nearly my stepmother, a fate for which I thank Dominio
that I escaped from, I can assure you!”
Melisande now
appeared alarmed and made one last attempt to escape Cort. He would have none
of it and blurted out his disclosure.
“Your mother’s
name is Fanchon, is it not? And she sent you here to make trouble for Dag, the
man who rejected her when she could not rule his life!”
Melisande
burst into tears and shook her head pleadingly at Cort. For a moment he almost
felt sorry for her. But he remembered what had happened between them in these
very woods just last autumn, and his heart hardened against her.
“No, that is
not how it happened,” Melisande whimpered. “She is dead. She died when I was
three years old. And it was all Dag’s fault.”
Cort looked at
her in disbelief. What could Dag possibly have to do with Fanchon’s death? He
had not seen her since they left her in Gaudereaux more than twenty years ago!
“You lie!”
The words
burst out of him with all of the outrage that he felt at the thought of this
woman accusing the best man he ever knew of such a deed.
“No, I tell
you the truth! May I explain?”
Melisande
looked at him almost pleadingly, and Cort had to admit that she seemed sincere
in her anguish. Whatever had happened to Fanchon, it was clear that it had
affected her daughter deeply.
He nodded
briefly and Melisande proceeded.
“I was three
years old,” she began. “Just at that age when the world held a new adventure
for me every day, and there was no one better to share it with than my mother.
It was she who came to my room each morning and we played before we had even
broken our fast. She was so lovely, and loved to laugh and frolic about. She
taught me how to walk, and then how to dance. Yet at times she seemed touched
by sadness, and I would put my hands on her cheeks and ask, ‘Mama, what is
wrong?’ And she would say, ‘It is nothing, my little one.’ But I did not
believe her…
“And then one
morning it was my father who came to my room with eyes so red that I knew he
had been weeping for a long time. I was afraid to ask what was wrong, and
wondered why Mama did not come…
“He picked me
up and held me close and whimpered. It frightened me all the more and I begged
him to put me down. I ran to Mama’s room, but she was not there. He followed me
and sat down on a chair, where he took me up on his lap, and stroking my hair,
told me the worst thing I had ever been told in my life.
“She was gone,
gone into the sea: she would not be coming back. I did not understand. We had
bathed in the sea many times, why was she not coming back? The day went on and
she did not come. She never came, and was gone from my life forever.
“I did not
know the whole truth until I was thirteen years old. I was visiting my
grandmother Gaelle, and I asked her what had happened to Mama. By now I knew
she was dead, but I didn’t know why she had died, or what had happened. And she
told me a strange tale…
“Many years
ago, my mother met a man from the wild north country. He had come to Gaudereaux
with a small band of companions, and he and my mother fell in love. They
quickly became inseparable, and when it was time for the man and his companions
to leave, she went with them as his betrothed. They were gone for many months,
and when they returned there was a strain between them. It was not long before
the betrothal was broken and the man left. Do I need to tell you who that man
was?”
Cort shook his
head. He knew all too well, remembered all too well. And wondered why, as they
took their leave of her on the dock, he had thought he had heard the last of
Fanchon. What bitter irony that was now.
“His name was
Dag, and he traveled with a small boy whom he later adopted. You were that boy,
Cort. I thought it was Brenus; he is dark like Dag and you are fair, but it was
you. Gaelle told me that they broke their betrothal because he had been exiled
from his own people over the God whom he served. He had been rejected by his
tribe, and was under sentence of death if he ever returned to his homeland. My
mother was under that sentence as well.
“They
disagreed on how they would live, but that was nothing, Gaelle said. Many young
people do that and manage to work things out and come to an understanding. And
that would have happened in time with Dag and my mother, she felt. But it was
the choice that Dag laid before my mother that doomed their relationship, she
said.
“For Fanchon
asked Dag to renounce his God, Dominio, and live with her in Gaudereaux. And he
refused and left her there. And that was the last she ever saw of him.
“My mother
married my father, a decent man from a good family, and for a time they were
happy. But as the years went on my mother increasingly fell prey to strange
moods. There were times when she was sunk in melancholy, and none could break
it, not even with the songs and dance that she loved so much. What caused the
moods none could say, but at last one day my mother told Gaelle.
“It was Dag,
she said. There was never a man like him in her life, and never would be again.
She did not love my father: she had never loved my father. She simply married
him after Dag left her because it was what was expected of her. But she was not
happy with him and regretted her choice.
“My
grandmother tried to soothe her, told her that she and Dag may not have found
happiness either, but my mother would not be comforted. There was also the
matter of Dominio, she admitted. She had turned her back on Dominio after
pledging her life to him because she loved frivolity and good times, and she
feared she would never be forgiven for breaking her vow. And she could not ever
return to Dominio; of that she was certain.
“Gaelle told
me that Mama had shared all of this with her just the day before she died. And
when Father brought news of her death, she knew that she had walked into the
sea on purpose, because she could no longer bear life in this world.
“And for that
I blame Dag. And this God of his that he chose over my mother, Dominio. I blame
Dominio.”
Cort found
himself deeply moved by this recital. Who would have ever thought the
light-hearted Fanchon to have suffered so greatly that she took her own life?
Certainly not he. And Dag would be horrified if he were to hear of it. This then,
explained the look of hostility that he had surprised on Melisande’s face so
many times when she looked at her father-in-law.
But how was it
that she had come to Eirinia?
“Melisande,”
his voice was husky as he was surprised to find tears strangled in his throat.
“I am deeply sorry for all that Fanchon suffered. But it was her choice, hers
alone. It was
she
who asked Dag to renounce Dominio, and this he could
not do. He made a vow: so did she. He kept his, and she broke hers. I know now
that she suffered terribly, and so did you by her actions, but Dag had no
choice other than the one he made. He pledged himself to serve Dominio and had
to fulfill that pledge. It is a sacred trust.”
Melisande
pursed her lips as she fought her tears. For one moment of madness Cort felt
the urge to put an arm around her to comfort her. It would surely be the
brotherly thing to do. But Melisande did not exactly have sisterly feelings
toward him, and he resisted the impulse.
“Why did you
come to Eirinia?” he asked bluntly.
A furtive look
came into her eyes, and Melisande hesitated. She looked at Cort as if to
determine how to answer his question.
“After my
father died I felt I needed a change from Gaudereaux, where there was so much
pain everywhere I turned. I heard of Eirinia. This land is renowned for its
tales of magic and mystery. Although I have yet to see any proof that the tales
of it are true. It seems quite tame in my eyes!”
“Oh, they were
true enough in the old days! But it is Dag who put an end to all of the ‘magic
and mystery.’ He it was who tamed this land!”
And Cort
laughed and drew himself up in pride at his father.
“But there
must be some reason why you came here, Melisande. And why have you not told the
truth about your mother? Neither Brenus nor my parents have been able to get
one word out of you regarding your homeland and family. That alone is reason
enough for me to think ill of your intentions. Can you tell me that I am wrong
in that assumption?”
Melisande
tightened her lips once more and glared openly at Cort.
“You always
suspect me of evil, of ill will! Why can you not believe me, Cort?”
“I shall if
you could tell me that you knew nothing of my family before arriving here, and
the meeting with Brenus was purely accidental. But by your own admission you
knew everything about us before you ever set foot on these shores, yet hid all
knowledge from us. And that alone is reason enough for me to doubt you and the
sincerity of your affection for my brother.”
Melisande bore
this recital with a reddened face and such rigidity in her stance that it threatened
to take over her entire body. At last she spat at Cort, and whirled around and
stalked away from him with her fury written in every line of her body.