The Forest House (19 page)

"Eilan, what were you saying to that man? He walks like a Roman!”

"Oh, I don't think so,” he heard Eilan say slowly. "Wouldn't he have been in uniform? The rest of them all were.”

He slowed, amazed at her guile. It was at least partly her innocence that had at first attracted him.

Now where the devil had his centurion got to? He forced himself into motion again. Was the man likely to tell Macellius about this? And, more important, how would Gaius manage to see Eilan again? Now that he had found her once more, he could not simply let her go.

 

Behind him in the tent, Eilan clasped her hands over her pounding heart. It seemed almost impossible that the other priestesses could not hear it.

Lhiannon stirred, and murmured, "What happened? Was anyone hurt?”

"Some fool frightened the cattle and they stampeded,” Caillean answered.

"How…how did I get here?”

"A passer-by carried you. Huw fainted—the great halfwit,” Caillean said crisply. "No, your rescuer is gone; Eilan blessed him in your name.”

Eilan, hearing, thought it lucky Gaius had not been wearing Roman uniform and wondered why. She wondered what he would look like in the uniform of the Legions. Handsome, she imagined, but then, he was nice-looking anyhow. She shook her head, knowing that she should not be thinking of him that way, certainly not here. That part of her life was over.

"First make certain that Huw is all right, then bring him in here.” Lhiannon ordered. "If the cattle have stampeded, they probably cannot be rounded up at once, and we will be here for the rest of the day.”

Eilan went out into the sunlight. She found Huw sitting on the ground, barely conscious, shaking his head dizzily.

"Is the Holy Lady safe?”

"No thanks to you, if she is,” Eilan said crossly. "She fainted, and a passer-by carried her into the herb seller's booth.”

"Where's all the cattle?”

Eilan looked around her and realized that Lhiannon had been wrong. The square was busy with folk setting up fallen booths and chattering, but there was not a cow to be seen.

"Only the gods know that, and maybe their drovers; they stampeded.” The man who had been gored, she noticed, had been carried away by his friends. "That's why they gored that man; they were frightened,” she said crisply.

"It was the Romans frightened them,” Huw mumbled, getting painfully to his feet again. "Marching in all clanking and glittering that way. A murrain on them; why did they come here anyway? Did they think the blessing of the cattle was some kind of unlawful gathering?

"There'll be no blessing of the cattle this day,” he went on, shaking his head. "I'd best carry the Lady home. With Romans around there's more likely than not to be some kind of trouble,” he added in a grumbling undertone.

Not for the first time, Eilan wondered why Lhiannon tolerated this great oaf. He was little use to her as a bodyguard; Eilan could not see that he was any use at all. If she should be ever in the position of the Oracle priestess—little as she desired it—the first thing she would do would be to rid herself of the services of this great bobby.

 

About a month after Beltane, Eilan was summoned to Lhiannon, and found her with a man who reminded her oddly of Cynric, and a little girl of eight or ten years with light reddish hair sun-touched with gold.

Eilan smiled at the child, who returned her gaze bashfully. Lhiannon said, "Hadron is one of the Raven Brotherhood. Tell her your story yourself, Hadron.”

"It is soon told,” the man said. "I have a foster brother who has joined the Legions as an auxiliary, and he interceded for me or I would have been taken and sent to the lead mines. After his intercession, the penalty was removed and my life spared, and so I was given only ten years of exile from any Roman possession. I must now flee to the North, and I cannot take a girl child with me where I go.”

"So what is the problem?” Eilan knew Lhiannon had the authority simply to take the girl into the Forest House without consulting anyone. The fact that she had not already done so meant that there was some difficulty.

"She seems to me to be too young for a place among us,” Lhiannon said, frowning. "I do not know what to say to him.”

"If that is all,” Eilan replied, "I should be happy to care for her until she can be sent to fosterage elsewhere. Or is there a female relative to whom she might be consigned?”

"There is not,” said the man. "For my wife was Roman born, and I know very little of her near kinfolk.”

"So your child is partly Roman? Cannot you send her to her kin among them?” Lhiannon asked.

The man answered sullenly, "My wife quarreled with her kindred to marry me; she begged me with her dying breath to make certain her daughter never fell into their hands. I thought if I might leave her in the care of the priestesses…”

Lhiannon said sternly, "We are not a refuge for orphans. Although for one of the Brotherhood of the Ravens we might possibly make an exception.”

Eilan looked at the child and thought of her own little sister, dead at the hands of raiders three years ago now. If Senara were alive, who was looking after her? She had looked forward to tending Miellyn's baby as a kind of substitute for her lost sister, but the older woman had miscarried the Year-King's child.

"I would willingly care for her, Lhiannon.”

"That is why I called you. You are not yet committed to any very exacting duties here among us,” Lhiannon replied. "Although this goes beyond the usual requirements. Still, if you will have it so, I will put this little refugee in your charge.” She paused and asked Hadron, "What is her name?”

"My wife called her Valeria, My Lady.”

Lhiannon scowled. "That is a Roman name; she cannot be called by it here.”

"My wife had given up all her kin to marry me,” said Hadron. "The least I could do was allow her to give her family name to her child.”

"Even so, she must have a new name if she is to live here among us,” Lhiannon said firmly. "Eilan, will you give her one?”

Eilan looked at the child, who was gazing at her with frightened eyes. She had lost all else; now she was to lose her father and even her name. Eilan said gently, "By your leave, I will call her Senara.”

"That will do very well,” said Lhiannon. "Now go; find her a place to sleep and suitable clothing. When she is of a proper age she may take vows among us as a priestess, if she wishes.”

When Hadron had gone, Eilan looked once more at the little girl, who stood gazing raptly at the Lady.

"I am sorry to lay this upon you, Eilan. I have never had to deal with a child this age. What are we to do with her?” said Lhiannon.

"Perhaps she can run errands.” Eilan put her arm around the little girl and smiled.

Lhiannon nodded. "Since she is not under vows, perhaps she could carry messages beyond our walls.”

"She is a little young for that, but if you are truly uncertain about having her stay here, perhaps we should ask among the Romans,” Eilan suggested. "Despite what Hadron said, her mother's people might want her. We should at least make inquiries.”

"That is a good thought,” Lhiannon agreed a little vaguely, her attention already flitting away. "Look after it, Eilan, if you will.”

The little hand slipped trustingly into her own, and something in Eilan's heart that had been sore since she lost her sister at last began to ease. As they walked across the courtyard, she asked the child, "You are not unhappy to be called Senara? It was my sister's name.”

"Not at all,” the little girl answered. "Where is your sister? Is she dead?”

"Dead or carried off beyond the seas,” Eilan replied. "Alas that I do not know.” And then she wondered why she had not asked Caillean for some word of her sister's fate, and her mother's when the older woman was scrying. Was it perhaps that she preferred to think of Senara peacefully dead than living in slavery?

She looked at the child, seeking some sign of her Roman parentage, and thought of Gaius. As the Prefect's son, Gaius could find out if there was anything to be known. Before Valeria became Senara forever, she owed it to the child at least to try.

As Eilan showed her charge where she was to sleep and found a linen novice's gown that could be cut down for her to wear, she found herself thinking about Gaius as much as about the girl.

Where was he now? Was he thinking of her as eagerly as she was of him? Had he put some spell on her, that she could not only think of nothing else, but did not particularly want to? She sighed, remembering the strength of his voice, his handsome face and form; the slight accent with which he spoke her name, his lingering kiss at the Beltane fires.

I did not then realize fully what he wanted of me,
she thought.
I was too young to know—or care. But now I am older, and I am beginning to understand. What have I thrown away?
The thought came to her then:
For the rest of my life am I to dwell unloved—until I am as old and loveless as Lhiannon?

Who could she ask? Who could she tell? Dieda would understand, but separated from her own beloved, she would hardly sympathize. Caillean, mishandled and unloved so young, would be angry. And if Caillean would not understand, how could she expect it of anyone else here?

There was no one to whom she could describe the hungry need in her heart just to look on him once more, even if after that she should never set eyes on him again.

The next morning, as she was cutting bread and cheese for Senara, she asked, "Do you remember anything about your kin in the Roman town?”

"They are not in the town, Eilan. I think my mother's brother was some kind of Roman official; he wrote the letters for the Prefect of the camp, and other such things.”

"Indeed?” Eilan stared at her. Surely the gods were smiling, for this man must be the secretary to Gaius's own father.

She thought for a moment of taking the child into her confidence, but after a moment's reflection decided against it. If a priestess of the Forest House should be discovered in the company of a Roman, no matter how innocent her motives, it would mean trouble for anyone involved. And would it be all that innocent?

T
hat very day, Valerius, who was secretary to Gaius's father, had arrived out of breath and looking shaken. "I have just heard that my sister is dead,” he told Gaius.

"Tell me about it,” suggested Gaius as they walked across the parade ground towards his father's offices.

"It's a long story,” Valerius replied. "I lost contact with my sister when she married; I haven't seen her a dozen times in as many years.”

"Did she move far away?”

Valerius gave a short laugh. "Only so far as Deva, but she married a man of the tribes, and my father disowned her.”

Gaius nodded. It was bad enough for a Roman to marry a native woman of a princely house. He knew only too well how Roman society would view a daughter who ran off with a native lover.

"An old woman who used to be my sister's nurse and mine sent me the news of her death,” Valerius went on, "and I found out by asking some questions about the trouble her husband's in. I've seen him only a time or two, but he had a foster brother who's with the auxiliaries who told me that Hadron is one of the Ravens and has been proscribed. The thing is, she left a small daughter, and I don't know what's become of the child. Didn't you know a couple of the Ravens?”

"I knew some of them, yes,” said Gaius, thinking of Cynric. Considering the conditions of Cynric's birth, he did not wonder that he had joined a secret society dedicated to revenge. In similar circumstances, he thought, he might have felt much the same…

"Somehow or other I must find my sister's child. Hadron's foster brother is one of the auxiliaries, as I said, and he has no wife to whom he could consign a female child, which leaves me the girl's nearest relative. Can you think of me as the guardian of a little girl? I have not seen the child since she was in swaddling clothes; I suppose she must be eight or thereabouts.”

"First you have to find her…” said Gaius slowly. Cynric might know where Hadron had gone with his child. And in the process Cynric, who knew what it was to be separated from his beloved, might be able to help him see Eilan.

"Can you really help me?” Valerius slowed. They were almost at the Prefect's offices now, and the secretary was well aware of Macellius's disapproval of any contact between his son and his mother's people.

"Perhaps…” Gaius said cautiously. "I might know someone who could inquire for you.”

He had heard that Cynric had been summoned south to ride with the legionaries who had been despatched to punish the raiders who had burned the house of Bendeigid. It had amazed him at the time, but revenge made strange bedfellows. The word was that Cynric was now working with the auxiliaries as a guide and interpreter. Gaius wondered if he had changed his mind or if he still belonged to the Ravens.

If he tried to contact Cynric through army channels, his father would hear, but he was bound to see the young Briton sooner or later, hanging around the taverns that served the fortress.

"May Bona Dea bless you!” Valerius reached out to clasp Gaius's hand. Then the door opened, and both men stiffened to military attention.

 

Only a few days later Gaius, making his way through Deva's crowded marketplace, saw Cynric standing head and shoulders above the crowd. His curls had darkened somewhat, and his face now bore the beginnings of a beard. Gaius shouted, saw Cynric frown, decide this young officer was no one he knew, and prepare to move on.

Gaius swore and thrust through the crowd to face him. "Wait, man—don't you know me?” He stopped, tensing as the blue gaze descended and darkened. Surely the lad wouldn't hold his own deception against him now, when he too was serving Rome! "I think I still owe you a drink for hauling me out of that boar pit,” he said companionably. "There's a wine shop here; let's try its wares.”

Gaius drew a breath of relief as Cynric's frown changed to a rueful grin. "I remember you now,” he said, adding, "but I don't suppose your name is Gawen. What do I call you, Tribune?”

"As a matter of fact,” Gaius said, "my mother named me Gawen and called me so until the day she died. I told you the truth as far as I dared. But in the Roman town I bear my father's name: Gaius Macellius Severus. My mother was a woman of the Silures; I bear the cognomen Siluricus after her.”

"If I had known this at the time I would have killed you,” admitted Cynric. "But a lot has happened since then. I'll drink with you, Roman, or whatever you may be.”

In the dusty darkness of the wine shop, Gaius said, "I was sorry when I heard of the burning of your house; I could hardly have been more distressed if my own kin had been killed by those Hibernian bastards. I am glad that your father was not hurt, and more sorry than I can say that your mother died.”

"She was my foster mother,” Cynric remarked, "but for her sake I thank you. We have a saying in the North that blood binds for three generations, but fosterage for seven. And indeed my foster father's wife was as good to me as if I had been born to her.”

"She was a gracious lady indeed,” Gaius agreed. "And for your sake I grieve for her.” If he had married Eilan he would have welcomed this man as a brother. And yet, by accident of birth, he and Cynric had been on opposite sides of this struggle until now. At least others than Romans commit outrages, he thought. "I saw the ashes of your home, but my father sent me north immediately thereafter. Perhaps I struck a blow or two on her behalf against those Caledonians. I was glad to hear that the Hibernian raiders were punished.”

"At least I, too, got to strike a blow for them. That was the first time in my life I was not ashamed of the Roman blood in my veins.” Cynric went on. "I think that Beltane when you guested with us was the last time we were all happy together. All who survived are scattered now.”

"I was at the Hill of the Maidens this last Beltane,” Gaius said carefully. "I saw Dieda, and Eilan your foster sister, there. I was glad to know she had survived.”

"Aye,” Cynric said shortly. "She is in the Forest House, a priestess of the Great Goddess. As for Dieda, she is Eilan's kin, but none to me. Nor likely to be, if she stays there!”

"I have a friend in the Legions—” Gaius said then.

Cynric laughed. "Well, I am not surprised at that—”

Gaius shook his head. "His sister married a Briton, and was cast off by her kin. They had a daughter, but the sister's dead now, and they say her husband is on the run. My friend wants to find the little girl.”

"On the run…” Cynric said thoughtfully. "Why are you asking me?”

"Because they say he was one of those who fly at midnight—”

"Many birds fly at midnight.” Cynric gazed into his wine. "What was the man's name?”

"Hadron,” said Gaius. "His wife was called Valeria.”

"I know little of birds,” said Cynric, "but I can ask around.”

"Could they have taken the child to the Forest House? Would your kinswomen know?”

"I could ask,” answered Cynric.

I would rather ask her myself,
thought Gaius, but he did not know how to say so. And how did he know that Eilan even wanted to see him again? If she was happy in the Forest House, would he be only breaking her peace to try and see her there? He had done his duty to Valerius. Should he make some excuse and disappear again?

He realized that he had been silent too long when Cynric refilled his cup from the jug of wine and shoved it back at him.

"There's more to this than a lost child,” said the Briton. "What did you really want to say?”

"I must see Eilan again,” Gaius burst out suddenly. "I swear I mean her no harm. I only want to know she is happy there.”

For a moment Cynric stared at him, then threw back his head with a roar of laughter that turned heads all over the room. "You're in love!” he laughed again. "I should have recognized the symptoms. Isn't my own girl locked away behind those very walls?”

"But you're a kinsman,” said Gaius seriously. "They'll let you talk to her. Can you arrange something for me?”

"Why not?” Cynric grinned. "I've never seen any reason to keep the priestesses all penned up. That's like something you Romans would do. Dieda won't see or speak to me since she went in there, but my foster sister is not a prisoner. I will see what I can arrange for you.” He drained his wine cup. "Be at the edge of the path leading to the Forest House three days from now, an hour after noon.”

 

As Eilan waited in the woods near the Sacred Grove in the unusual brightness of the early summer sunlight, she was surprised to find that she was trembling. At first, when Cynric had spoken to her of a meeting with Gaius, it had seemed like the answer to an unusually fervent prayer. But she soon realized that the most dangerous thing in the world is an answered prayer. Her chances of keeping the meeting a secret were slim indeed. And no one would believe her if they were discovered.

In the end she had gone to Caillean for advice.

"There is nothing that you can do, since you have bidden him here, but to meet him as has been arranged,” Caillean had replied. "But I am going to be within earshot every moment; so that if I am later asked I can swear that the two of you have exchanged no word that could not be spoken in the presence of the parents of either of you. Do you accept that?”

Eilan had bowed her head, then turned to go. In truth, she was even a little relieved. If she must speak to him in the presence of the priestess, there would then be no question of his asking of her anything…dangerous.

"Wait,” Caillean had said. "Why did you bring this to me? Surely you could not imagine that I would approve!”

"I am doing nothing that betrays my vows.” Eilan faced the other woman directly. "But I know how idle tongues can embroider a tale. I believe that you would advise me as you thought right, whatever you might feel!” And then she had turned once more, and gone. But she remembered with some satisfaction the flush of color that had stained the other woman's cheeks.

And so she waited, knowing that with the implacable watcher she had nothing to fear. If she had earlier been asked whether she was afraid of Gaius she would have unhesitatingly answered no; but as the shadows shortened, she became frightened, then terrified.

"Oh, Caillean.” She turned to the other woman, who sat upon a stone at the edge of the clearing, working on a piece of embroidery. "What am I going to say to him?”

"Why should you ask me? I am hardly the person to advise a maiden on her dealings with a man,” Caillean replied with a sardonic smile.

Eilan sighed. As time passed she realized that it would take a while for him to come all the way from Deva. But as she waited, she found her hand stealing into Caillean's.

Was she meddling in an affair which was, after all, none of her concern? No, she told herself firmly. It was clearly her duty to find out all she could about the child's surviving relatives. Thus fortified, she waited; and her heart began to pound when at last she saw his shadow upon the path.

It was the first time she had seen Gaius in the uniform and helmet of the Roman Legion; she was struck by how well it became him. He seemed taller under the crimson crested helmet, and the color set off his dark eyes. He came into the clearing and stopped short. If he was surprised to see two women instead of one, it showed only in the momentary flicker of his eyes. Saluting them, he lifted the helmet from his head and tucked it under one arm.

Eilan found herself staring. She had never before had more than a momentary look at a Roman officer in full uniform; and it emphasized the differences between them.
And yet,
she thought,
by their laws we are all Romans.
It was like a revelation to her.

He looked at her and smiled, and suddenly all the things she had meant to say to him vanished from her mind.

Gaius shifted his gaze from Eilan to the older priestess, wondering what on earth he should say. He had never once envisioned that their meeting would be attended by a third party. He had not chanced angering his father and risking the wrath of hers, to exchange a few guarded remarks in the presence of a veritable dragon.

But as he met Caillean's amused glance his anger cooled. If Eilan was a Vestal Virgin or the nearest thing to one to be found within the British Isles, he could hardly blame her for wanting a witness who could attest to her unbroken vows. He wondered how he could make it clear, she was as sacrosanct to him as a Virgin in the temple of Vesta. He remembered how overwhelmed he had been by her trust when she sat beside him at the Beltane fire, how touched by her innocence.

Caillean, of course, was another matter; he could tell at once that the older woman would not have trusted him—or both of them—out of her sight, and for Eilan's sake he was indignant. But he guessed that the priestess had been brought up on tales of Roman outrages. To the women of the Forest House the very fact that he was a Roman and a man was enough.

And the truth was that if Caillean had not been there, he might have kissed Eilan; she looked very enticing in the pale linen dress that set off the gold of her hair. He thought the garb must be some kind of standard dress among the priestesses, for Caillean was wearing the same kind of draperies, though hers were dark blue and unbecoming. Both had little curved daggers hanging from their girdles.