Conn was ready to depart for Samriak well before the end of winter. He felt superfluous in Caledonia because Shona knew exactly what needed to be done, and basically wanted him out of the way so she could get it done. They liked him much better as an absentee landlord. Likewise, just as he had in Hama, he felt confident that leaving the demesne under her and Peig’s guardianship, and Sir Rab’s protection, was the best decision he could make. Conn left Sir Rab a company of Sagittari with instructions to recruit and train another.
It was a tearful farewell. Both Sir Eggar and Sir Njil had returned to pick up the extra wiga, women and children to take them to Sytha or Rila to wait for Conn and the cows. Most of the thousand plus wiga no longer necessary in Samria had also been taken to Rila by Sir Eggar the previous autumn, and he returned with news
‘Lile is now in Sytha as you requested. I took her there myself. Your two daughters are well. Rila is safe – everything you have asked to be done has been completed. It awaits your arrival.’
‘Have they been attacked?’
‘Several times, but everyone stays behind the walls as you instructed. The port is now excellent.’
‘And the Healdend of Sytha?’
‘Annoyed – Tredian doesn’t seem to like things not going as planned.’
Derryth spluttered in his beer. He was enjoying fresh supplies from Sytha; where good beer was being manufactured with hops from Meshech. They looked at him as he regained his composure, and then as he laughed.
‘He doesn’t like to see things not going as planned! He is not rowing alone in that boat.’
Conn handed him another jug. ‘Have more beer. You are not being helpful.’
Eggar continued, smiling. ‘As I was saying, he is a little annoyed that you continually fail to turn up. Doesn’t understand why you decided to stay – and has no understanding at all why you will not be arriving for another four months!’
Derryth nodded. ‘I don’t understand either. But it seems that it is a very long way on horseback – and herding cows take four times longer!’
‘He is happy about the cows though’, Njil offered. ‘At least that is something.’
After the Solstice cerebrations, Sir Brys led the four hundred cavalry and almost another six hundred horses across the river into Sumy, and from there northern plains of Sumy where they would wait for Conn and the cattle to arrive.
Given his need to visit before departing, potentially for ever, Conn had Njil drop him off in Samriak on his way to Sytha; it was a lot shorter journey than the one by road – eight compared to over 30. They arrived late in the afternoon, and they checked into the “Boar’s Head Inn and Stables” on the waterfront. Renovation complete, it was the finest Inn in Samria. The next morning they headed for the donjon after a tour of the docks; now filled with stores selling merchandise manufactured in Meshech. Business was brisk, and the tax collectors extracted duty on all arrivals. Although Meshechian, most of the vessels were now owned by merchants that used to work for him.
Efilda was waiting for them in the donjon, and she sat beside a woman draped in brown. Another pregnant girl sat at her side –Ysha. She smiled at him deviously. Obviously he hadn’t been as careful as he had thought in their assignations. One small girl sat on the warm rugs that Conn had arranged to be delivered from Meshech. The other suckled happily of a buxom nursemaid. His daughters seemed to be doing well.
The woman in brown was obviously a Folgere, and as soon as Conn saw her, and she him, his head filled with Astarte. He shut her out immediately so as not to surprise the Folgere.
Conn bowed respectfully.
Efilda did the introductions. ‘Marquis of Rila, this is Osrysa il Astarte, she was the first to be called, and she now wears the necklace that Astarte gave me to give her.’
Osrysa greeted Conn warmly – as all Folgere did. She walked up to him and kissed him on both cheeks and then his mouth, her body much too close, and the kiss lasting far too long for polite company. She almost quivered. Conn was glad to see that he hadn’t lost his touch.
She stepped back. ‘My Gyden is indebted to you, Feorhhyrde, and she has sent me to ask that you visit the cirice. I would be
very
grateful if we too can have a private conversation when you visit. If you know what I mean.’ She smiled mischievously, as her hand ran down Conn’s shoulder and on to his hand, where is stopped momentarily as if resistant to moving. She then turned and after kissing both Efilda and Ysha on the lips, she bowed and left.
Conn watched her leave. ‘I gather that you both have been having private conversations with her as well.’
Efilda almost blushed. ‘A lot of them. She is very willing, skilled and enthusiastic. She has only been here for two weeks – she came from a mountain village near the border in Sumal. Her family has been there for a long while, and it seems that she is a descendant of the Folgere who died soon after we arrived. I have discovered that the Folgere died giving birth. Anyway, we are now very close.’ Efilda suddenly looked at him sternly, and pointed to Ysha. ‘I understand that this is your doing?’
‘They say that only a wise man knows who his father is, but if Ysha says so, then yes. Is it a problem?’ The birth would also prove the case – if the child had blue eyes, it was his.
The Wealdend shook her head. ‘No – but I would like to know if there are any other surprises out there. Anyone else expecting a sibling to the future Wealdend of Samria? No mead maid about to surprise us all with a blue eyed baby? I hear that there were lots of tears and gnashing of teeth after you left your Inn last autumn.’
Conn assured her that there were no others. He was positive that the two girls who worked in his inn weren’t pregnant. He was scientifically positive you couldn’t get pregnant that way.
He then spent the morning with Efilda and told her that a troop of Valkeri wiga would be arriving soon to provide some additional protection for the girls. Once she knew what and who they were she was grateful as she didn’t know fully who to trust yet. Resentment in some quarters was still high – though her cousin was not behind any plot to have her removed. Sumy had nothing to gain by rebelling, and after Conn’s late night chat with him, an awful lot to lose.
After they had eaten lunch, Conn headed for the Cirice. As he got closer, he opened his mind to the Gyden. She was startled to find that he could feel her presence.
‘I thought that you shut me out before by accident, but that is not true. How very annoying. It is true that you are a very strange man, Feorhhyrde. My sisters did warn me of such but they didn’t say that I didn’t have to communicate via my Folgere.’
‘Information sharing is not a strong point in the sisterhood, it seems.’ Conn conceded.
‘They did say you were impertinent.’
Conn walked up the steps into the Cirice and found a dozen young girls in brown robes – sitting in meditation with Osrysa. The Folgere looked at him with amazement – she had been party to the conversation with Astarte. The girls were all young – perhaps fourteen or fifteen, but it was a starting point for the Gyden here in Samria. In Meshech and apparently Sytha as well, only virgins were called by the Gyden except in cases of trauma, which meant that it would be time before Samria had a fully functioned Cirice.
Conn could feel the Gyden flittering in and out of their minds and he tried hard not to be noticed by the girls by shutting Astarte out again. Osrysa sent the children away soon after Conn arrive, and escorted him to an enclave where he was presented with cakes and mead as he looked at the idol.
‘Thank you for coming, Marquis. I now understand that Astarte doesn’t need me to assist in communication with her. When you have finished please come to my room over there’, she pointed. ‘I will be waiting for you.’ She bowed and left the room.
Conn opened his mind to Astarte again.
‘That is very annoying. Anyway, Feorhhyrde… Feorhhyrde is such a strange name for you. Anyway, I sense that you wear a band – the Torc of the one called Casere?’
Conn showed the idol as if she had eyes. ‘That is true. Can you tell me who created it?’
‘No, I cannot. It is not for me to say. It is something that waits to be discovered.’
All questions, no answers. ‘Anyway, you wanted to see me?’
‘You go into Larsa?’
‘Yes, I do.’
‘The people there were once the children of my sister. She misses them.’
‘And in exchange?’
‘In exchange?’
Astarte was startled at the request.
‘I have not asked for anything – I am but a messenger.’
‘My mistake.’ Conn knew it was a request and it was the first time that they had been so bold. Normally the wind just blew him places he didn’t want to go.
‘Do you have a request?’
‘I do – but everything I want to ask, you won’t tell me.’
‘That is surely not true.’
So Conn asked a dozen questions – and she was unable to answer any of them, as he expected.
‘Some even I do not know and some I cannot say – even if I wanted. I am sorry that I cannot answer. If there is nothing else, please visit my Folgere. She awaits you with great need. She has yet to make her first devotion to me with a male.’
‘I best not keep her waiting then.’ Conn stood, he was also in a hurry now. Being around a Gyden has an effect on your libido. ‘Or to disappoint either of you…’
Conn walked to the small building and was about to knock on the door. ‘Come straight in, Feorhhyrde.’
Inside the room it was dark and it took some time for his eyes to adjust. When they did, he saw a very naked Osrysa. She smiled.
‘I have taken the liberty of removing all my clothes. Would you care to do the same?’
‘I can find no reason not to…’
~oo0oo~
It was several hours later when he escaped her clutches. The presence of the Gyden in the fornications meant that his virility was tenfold, and he could almost have died of a heart attack from exertion. In this case, she was the one who called time, and Conn took the opportunity to leave and arrived back at the inn just in time to join Derryth at dinner.
‘You could have waited…’
Derryth looked up.
‘Gyden, you look like you’ve been wrestling with a bear. I hope those scratches don’t get infected. Anyway I was thirsty. So what did the Gyden want?’
‘It seems we have to restore a people to the Gyden – or something similar. It was a bit ambiguous.’
Derryth laughed. He picked up his mug and toasted Conn’s. ‘And all along I thought we were just going to be herding cows. And the Folgere; was she also ambiguous?’
Conn shook his head after he had downed a tankard of beer. ‘Nope, she knew exactly what she wanted.’
~oo0oo~
Conn and Derryth left Samriak at daybreak. They had almost a three week ride to the waiting herds of cattle. Finally reunited, and everyone readied to depart, Conn sat looking at a mountain range that lay in front of them. This time it was him that asked the silly question of the head drover.
‘So, we are to steer six thousand head of cows over that. This looks like it’s going to be fun.’
‘Yes, lots.’ Derryth added dryly. ‘Really looking forward to it…’
The drover was holding a map and twisting it around as to try and work out which way was up.
‘The path that our ancestors used is written on these old charts – we are just not experienced in using them yet. We have been trying to decipher them for some time – without success.’
‘Not the best time to tell us that – with six thousand cattle marching up behind us.’ Derryth commented, looking behind him. The cavalry waited, and the horses were getting skittish.
Conn requested the map when he stopped and handed it back.
‘I don’t need a map. I have a horse.’ He patted the Elfina. ‘Balios, apparently there is a pathway through that mountain range that we could use to take these cattle through. Would you care to show us?’
Balios stomped his foot and snickered.
‘I’ll take that as a yes.’
Conn told the drovers to follow their lead, and he then lead the four hundred cavalry into the mountains. It wasn’t long before the path revealed itself; heavily overgrown with small shrubs and bushes, it would be a clear pathway after six thousand cattle had stomped over the foliage. As they forged ahead they could hear the mellow mooing hum of the herd behind them, and in the forest, it resonated throughout into a shallow roar.
‘Do you think we will surprise them when we arrive or will they know we are coming? Derryth asked.
‘I thought sarcasm was below a Twacuman. But jokes aside, we need to get a long way ahead, or they will surprise us.’
‘Do we have any idea what “they” are?’
‘None whatsoever. That is why it will be a surprise.’
By evening the herd was through the mountain; and the historic path was more than up to the task as more and more cattle stomped and widened it. At the highest pint a gap between the mountains allowed them easy access to Lars. Their first night was on the mountain; and they divided the herd into small groups to bed them for the night. Conn’s wiga maintained a vast perimeter of protection in shifts. There was no sign yet of the locals, and indeed no sign of habitation anywhere nearby.