Shadow of Stone (The Pendragon Chronicles)
Read Shadow of Stone (The Pendragon Chronicles) Online
Authors: Ruth Nestvold
Praise for Ruth Nestvold
:
"... an excellent up-and-comer. "
-
Cory Doctorow at
Boing Boing
http://boingboing.net/2004?w=27
"The book is so rich that it is impossible to recount every nuance, every emotion transmitted, each of the author's choices to depart from tradition or adopt unfamiliar elements, while manipulating them in favor of the economy of the narration... It tells the story of war with rawness and realism, love with feeling and sensuality, magic with naturalness and enchantment... Ruth Nestvold truly has my gratitude and commendation for managing to rewrite and re-invent this story of love and war so masterfully, creating one of the most beautiful books I have ever read."
-
Review of the Italian translation of
Yseult
(Book One of
The Pendragon Chronicles
) by Valentina Coluccelli
http://www.diariodipensieripersi.com/2011/03/recensione-la-fiamma-e-larpa-di-ruth.html
* * * *
SHADOW OF STONE
Book Two of the Pendragon Chronicles
by
Ruth Nestvold
Copyright 2012 by Ruth Nestvold
Cover by Derek Murphy, Creativindie Covers
Map by Britta Mack & Ruth Nestvold
First Electronic Edition 2012
* * * *
SHADOW OF STONE
There was once a woman, fair as the moon, who lived most of her life beyond the realm of legend. As she stood beside the grave of her lover, the legend that ended with his death was far from her mind. Her soul felt as dark as the shadow cast by Drystan's standing stone, dark and barren. Love was over, but life was not; she would have to find a way to go on, for the sake of their son.
This is the story of how Yseult outlived the legend that had been her life.
Prologue
Dumnonia, southern Britain, late fifth century
Here, with my arms curled round the sacred cross
That in white warning stands above his bones,
I crouch, with hot limbs pressed against the stones,
And moan his name, and wail and weep his loss.
John Grosvenor Wilson, "Isolt at the Tomb of Tristram"
A cool breeze came from the sea, but the autumn sun shone mild on the party of mourners. Cador clenched his hands tight as a handful of Arthur's companions lowered the coffin into the earth with ropes.
It wasn't fair. They shouldn't be here. They should be celebrating victory, not burying Drystan!
His gaze drifted to the figure of Yseult, standing tall and still opposite him. Her small son Kustennin clutched her hand, imitating her brave stance. The standing stone erected in Drystan's honor cast a wide shadow, but Yseult stood in sunlight, her pale, bright hair catching the late afternoon light.
Cador tore his gaze away and glanced at the stone.
Drustans hic iacet Cunomori filius,
"Here lies Drystan, son of Cunomorus." Whoever had engraved the stone had not known his Latin letters well — the "D" was turned around. He had seen such mistakes more than once; it was not kings or monks or magistrates who carved gravestones, it was stonemasons. Cador could have wished this particular stonemason had gotten his cousin Drystan's name right, but even more than that, he wished any mention of Marcus Cunomorus could have been left off the memorial for the son he had murdered. Marcus, though married to Yseult, had never loved her, had agreed to a separation, but then he had killed Drystan in a fit of rage over their affair. Unfortunately, it was Drystan's parentage that indicated his status as a prince of Dumnonia, here in this place where he would have ruled in the natural order of things, and status was what gravestones commemorated.
A hawk circled above, occasionally emitting a long drawn-out mourning call:
kaiee, kaiee
. There was something pagan about this burial, far from town, church, or graveyard, alone on the crest of a wild Dumnonian hill with a view of the sea. Drystan would have approved of the location and smiled at the sweet cry of the hawk, but he would surely have insisted on a song to lift the spirits of those who stood next to the grave, weeping.
Cador cast another surreptitious glance at Drystan's great love — and Marcus's widow. Yseult still did not cry.
With a muffled thud, the heavy stone sarcophagus reached the bottom of the hole. Kurvenal and Gawain coiled the ropes they held, dropped them over the side, and stepped back, making room for Yseult and her son. Together, she and Kustennin leaned over, picked up handfuls of dirt, and threw them into the grave.
One by one, the rest of the mourners followed suit, sometimes adding a small memento like a wildflower or a piece of honeyed fruit to ease the prince's journey to the Afterlife or the Otherworld or whatever place the dead went when they left. Quite a crowd had taken the time to make their way here to pay their respects — warriors who had fought with Drystan against the Saxons, their wives and lovers, local farmers and villagers. As opposed to his father, Drystan had been popular among the people of Dumnonia.
As Cador stepped away from the grave, he had to wipe a steady stream of tears from his cheeks — he was not as brave as Yseult. Or perhaps she had no tears left; he had been there when she had collapsed on the tiled mosaic floor of Marcus's villa, had tried to comfort her while she sobbed in choking gasps.
He looked out at the bright blue of the ocean. If only Drystan had remained at Dyn Tagell; he would have been safe from his father there. Cador tasted salt on his lips. They would all have to learn to live without Drystan's laughter now, without his song and love of life.
A touch on his elbow and Arthur's deep voice. "Come, Cador. We must fill the grave."
Cador nodded and followed his cousin. Even though Arthur was Dux Bellorum of all Britain, he was not too high above them to shovel dirt on the coffin of a relative and companion. Drying his cheeks, Cador took up a shovel. Next to him, Drystan's man-at-arms and best friend Kurvenal sniffled, tears dripping from the end of his nose.
Once the turned earth was a brown mound beneath the standing stone, Cador leaned on his shovel, his gaze again seeking the figure of Yseult. She stood at the edge of the gathering, watching the proceedings, Kustennin's hand still in hers. She should have been Drystan's wife; instead, she'd been forced to marry his father Marcus Cunomorus.
Look where that had ended
.
With the otherworldly knowledge of the Old Race, Yseult turned and met his gaze, raising her hand in greeting. She regarded him as a friend, he knew that.
A friend. He wondered if she would ever love again.
She mounted her waiting gelding and took Kustennin up in front of her. Next to him, Gawain nudged his shoulder. "Let us load up the shovels and be off."
Cador nodded.
The sun was skirting the horizon as they pitched the tools onto the wagon. Drystan's stone caught the final rays, glowing bright yellow at the top of the incline.
"A well deserved warrior's monument," Gawain murmured. "Promise me you will do your best to see that I have such a one too when I die."
"What makes you think I will outlive you?"
Gawain chuckled softly. "Perhaps the fact that I am more than a handful of years older than you?"
Cador forced himself to smile. "True." He didn't want to think about any more graves or gravestones. There was peace in Britain now, thanks to Arthur, and with a little luck, most of his fighting companions in the wars against the Saxons would live to become old men.
Together they walked to where their mounts were tethered. Cador glanced over to the spot where he had last seen Yseult, but she and her son were out of sight.
Book I
Love Remembered
Chapter 1
Lindinis, Kingdom of Dortrig in eastern Dumnonia, ten years later
But the cities of our land are not populated even now as they once were; right up to the present they are deserted, in ruins and unkempt. External wars may have stopped, but not civil ones.
St. Gildas, "On the Ruin and Conquest of Britain" (sixth century)
Cador lifted his face to the sun, enjoying the first warm day of spring. Hands clasped behind his back, he strolled from the villa garden in the direction of the outbuildings in search of his steward, Alun. The roof tiles above the colonnade dividing the forecourt from the working part of the villa glinted a friendly, hopeful orange. Now that the weather was turning, the signs growing clearer every day that the long winter was coming to an end, there was much to be done to prepare the fields for planting. Added to that, the first horse fair of the season was in little over a month. Cador knew that the rest of Arthur's companions, the men he had once fought with against the Saxons, jokingly referred to him as the "farmer king," but he didn't care. He enjoyed villa life, finding far more satisfaction in growing things or assisting at the birth of a new foal than in warfare.
He inhaled the scent of the irises blooming beside the path, one of his mother's additions when they moved here. After the battle of Caer Baddon, once it had become obvious that the peace of Britain would hold, he had relocated his household from the hill-fort of Dyn Draithou to the Roman villa north of Lindinis, and had never regretted it. Cador had brought his second wife Terrwyn to this small paradise, enjoying five happy years with her — before burying her in the cemetery past the orchard after her death in childbed. Even peace was not without heartbreak.
Farmer king or not, Cador was still the military leader of his people, and he did a king's duty in regularly training with his soldiers, as well as maintaining a standing army and the defensive site of Dyn Draithou, one of the most important beacons in southern Britain. But he would never again be one of those men who looked forward to the exhilaration of battle. These days, his contribution to the British fighting forces was mostly in horses for Arthur's mounted men — not a small thing, since Arthur's military strength was based on cavalry.
He passed through the gate from the villa forecourt to the busy yard of the outbuildings, entering another world. This was where the business of the villa took place, and now, on the first fine day of spring, it was full of people and animals: a team of oxen being unharnessed from the plow; servants throwing slops to the pigs; farm workers leaning against a wall, mugs of watered ale in hand, recovering from the day's sowing.
As he turned a corner in the direction of Alun's offices, the smell of fresh bread wafted towards him from the bakehouse. He smiled, wondering what it was about the scent that induced such a feeling of contentment; as much as he loved roast boar or venison with cherry sauce, the scent of those dishes did no more than make his mouth water. But bread smelled like home.
Just as he was about to push open the door of the bakehouse and beg a bite of comfort, his mother Enid hurried out of the kitchens, wiping her hands on the apron she wore over her stola. "Cador! I was meaning to go in search of you!"
He smiled. "Yes, it has been
so
long since this morning when we broke our fast together. I miss you too, mother."
Enid chuckled. "You jest, but we really must discuss this evening's meal. Have you received any word whether we can expect Yseult tonight?"
He shook his head. "I doubt if it occurred to her to send a messenger ahead after she left Dyn Tagell. She is like family, after all."
"Yes, yes, but she must know what is involved in planning a meal, especially when the number of guests at the table changes."
Cador wasn't sure if that was the case at all, knowing Yseult and her priorities, which tended toward healing the sick and arbitrating between antagonistic regional lords in western Dumnonia. She left meal planning to others.