The Phantom Queen Awakes (9 page)

And her own.

No! Let other old women prattle about omens.
Yes, I have seen her and I will die, but it does not have to be
today. She would not have spoken if there was no chance. I saw my
clothes in her hands, Laoghaire’s clothes...not those of the
others. She spoke of a choice. There might still be time to run
home, to fetch the babe ― to save him from the axes and swords of
the Northmen. I cannot save them all. The raiders are too close to
flee. But if I can save just one―

She leapt to her feet and raced up the hill,
running towards home as fast as her legs could carry her, tears
streaming down her weathered, wrinkled features.

She crested the top of the hill, feet pounding
along the beaten dirt path that led from the village down to the
stream. She could see the boats nearing the shore, less than a mile
away, where the ocean’s waves beat against the rocks. Her heart
slammed against the inside of her ribs like a blacksmith’s hammer
against an anvil, and her mouth had gone as dry as hanging herbs on
the last day of August. The bell in the church built by the priests
of Christ had not yet begun to ring; the men were out in the
fields, leaving the women and children undefended.

Her lungs wheezed like a bellows in her thin
chest as she ran, the pounding of her heart like the beat of a
bodhran at a céilidh, and even as she neared the village, she had
time for a prayer of thanks, glad she had not taken the Christian
baptism, glad she had stuck to the ways of her gods, no matter how
Aoibheann glared or how her son pleaded. If I had...would the Great
Queen have come to bring me warning?

She thought not, snatching a quick glance at
the shore as she moved around the rear of the family’s hut. The
first of the boats was being dragged onto the sand, but the shaggy,
filthy warriors had not yet charged toward the village. She could
see her people running, panicking, the women trying to gather their
children and lead them to safety, the few men not in the fields
racing toward their cabins to fetch their swords.

Treasa ducked into the cabin and forced her
withered limbs to carry her back to where Laoghaire slept fitfully,
bundled into his cradle. She grabbed up a blanket, spare changing
rags, and then the babe himself before hurrying for the door. We
may die of starvation in the woods; my dugs have been dry of milk
for many a year now, and I dare not stop to try to leash and drag
one of the goats along. But a chance at life was better than none
at all. She paused only long enough to grab up a waterskin and a
half-full basket of oats before ducking out of the cabin and
dashing for the woods.

Treasa tried not to cringe as she ran. Her
thin, papery skin was stretched taut across her shoulders,
expecting to feel the impact of an axe with every step. The air
burned in her lungs, the cold bit at her face, and as the branches
of the trees gathered her in to the safety of the forest’s shelter,
she stifled a sob of relief.

Behind her, in the village, she could hear the
first screams begin.

****

Afterword

A lot is made of the martial aspects of the
Morrigan; her status as a goddess of war and death can hardly be
overlooked. I’ve read stories in the past about her appearing to
warriors and kings, and swooping over the field of battle as a
raven. But she is also a goddess of prophecy, and aside from the
passage in the
Táin Bó Cúailnge
where she appears before
Cuchulainn as an old woman, washing his garments in a stream on the
night before he dies in battle, I’ve never read any fiction
portraying that aspect of her. What better protagonist for such a
story than an old woman, already near death and seeking to find a
way to escape it? This was the side of the Morrigan I wanted to
share with readers, and I hope you all enjoy it.

****

Biography

Ye olde author likes the weird and the
strange, which explains most of her friends. Married, with two
daughters, she has earned a B.A. in Literature and a B.S. in
Criminal Justice. Her interests include gardening, herbalism,
mythology and fairy tales, theology, everything Celtic,
role-playing games, horror movies, and the martial arts. She lives
with her husband, her younger daughter, five cats, a dog, and a
houseful of gargoyles somewhere near Chicago.

****

Sharon Kae
Reamer

The Raven's Curse

Lys ab Gysell felt she had sat on a bumpy
horse her entire life. After three weeks of riding along dry paths,
she felt cloaked with the dust of high summer. It invaded every
orifice and her hair and clothes were layered in grit. As some of
her entourage and all the slaves traveled by foot, they had been
forced to ride at a slow pace. They followed the trail north along
the coast before turning inland to the estuary near the walled
settlement that belonged to her husband-to-be and his people. The
briny sea air assaulted her nostrils as they approached a small
bay. She spied standing stones in the distance.

“What is that place?” she asked her escort.
The individual dialects varied widely, but their respective tongues
had enough in common that they could communicate.

“The
ar-men-hir
of Karnag,” he
answered. “The spirits of ancient heroes buried under the stones
guard the
mor-bihan
― the bay ― against
invaders.”

As they made the turn inland, she heard them
before seeing them. On the hilltop in front of her, naked, painted
men danced and brandished their iron-tipped spears. They welcomed
her with loud blasts from long horns in the shape of pig snouts.
Various sized dogs ran to and fro, barking wildly. She laughed with
joy to see the men with their limed hair sticking up like
frost-rimed sedges. She imagined that to an enemy, their demeanor
would be altogether different and a frightening sight. In this
case, it was a regal greeting. Fit for a queen.

Even before they entered the village, people
lined the way on either side of her, eager to have a glimpse of
her. She let her entourage lead her horse to where a tall man in a
richly patterned tunic waited, surrounded by other noblemen. She
knew instinctively it was her future husband. Unable to keep her
eyes from him as one of his men helped her from her horse, she felt
a smile form.

The rumors traded by the older women in her
tribe were now confirmed. Iaun Reith was a handsome man, indeed.
His loosely belted tunic did not hide a trim and muscular body that
contrasted nicely with his thick mane of dark hair and a well cared
for bushy mustache. He wore an astonishingly beautiful gold torc
around his neck. Her folk had received hints of Veneti wealth ―
acquired through battle gains and shrewd trading ― but Lys was in
awe at the abundance of gold on the noblemen who surrounded their
leader.

She could have done much worse, she thought,
and hoped she would please him as well. She approached and knelt
before him. His golden brown eyes sparkled like topaz as he held
out his hands to her, and she rose to stand next to him. His
answering smile as the throng of people cheered in front of them
told her all she needed to know.

****

The joining of hands had been timed to
coincide with the summer solstice. Two days before the fête, Iaun
led her to the hut near the forest where the holy women of his
tribe dwelled. Holy women were known to Lys, but her own people had
none, so she was anxious about meeting them. Iaun explained that
their approval of the match was a formality, but a necessary
one.

“Why do I have to spend the night here?” she
asked as they approached the two young women waiting patiently near
the entrance to the woods.

“It’s a necessary ritual. To make sure that we
are fruitful,” he said. “The holy women’s blessing will fortify my
seed.”

His gaze as he said that had been rather easy
to decipher. She knew he would not have waited to bed her under
ordinary circumstances, but their handfasting symbolized a union
between her tribe and his. Iaun knew the tradition required of a
leader and was bound to honor it. Lys understood the hope this
union meant to her own people. The Condrusi stood to gain more from
it than the Veneti: protection, something her people desperately
needed. They had already faced the Roman wolf at the
door.

Iaun left, and the two women guided her
through the wood to a willow bower they had already prepared. They
sang softly to her while they bathed her with a fragrant mistletoe
wash as she stood before them.

“How long have you been in training?” Lys
asked.

One woman, not much more than a girl, Lys
thought, shook her hair forward as she spoke. “We have just been
adopted.”

“It is an honor for our family,” the other one
said.

“Have you no holy men here?” Lys continued as
they dressed her in a long tunic of white linen.

They smiled at each other before answering.
“No. Not here.”

Before she entered her bower, another woman
approached her. The portions of gray in hair that hung in a thick
cloud around her face, and ended in a long braid down her back,
were in stark contrast to the dark hair of the other
women.

“I am Uxía.” She took Lys by the upper arms
and then tilted her chin up, staring deeply into her eyes. “You
have the eyes of a seer.”

Lys started. “How can you know
that?”

Uxía nodded. “Experience. I have enough of the
Gift to recognize it in others.”

Lys resisted the urge to look away and fought
to keep her breathing normal. “I don’t have any scrying
talents.”

“Seeing is not only scrying,” she said. “Maybe
I should have said that you have the Sight.”

Lys looked away to hide her dismay. Only the
most addled of old women in her tribe were attributed with the
second Sight. “Those women are shunned among my people.”

Uxía laughed at her reaction. “Do not fear.
The Veneti revere their women, holy or not.” She let go of Lys’
arms and stood before her. “Do others of your tribe have eyes such
a deep blue that the sea would grow jealous?”

Lys relaxed somewhat at Uxía’s compliment.
“No. My father has blue eyes, but of a normal shade. That is the
reason why my people chose me to be the gift of our people. Blue is
a color of good fortune.”

“Your father is one of your tribe’s holy
ones?”

“No, but he is one of the village elders, one
of the most respected among them.”

Uxía nodded her approval. “In that case, the
goddess will be pleased as well. She may visit you tonight. If she
does, it is a sign of great favor.”

The women had prepared a warm drink for her.
It had a bitter, unpleasant taste, and she drank it all as they
watched. It made her feel relaxed but oddly alert. She suspected
they had laced it with the fly mushrooms her tribe’s holy men used
to prepare men for battle. Lys sat alert within her nest of soft
grasses, her only company small snuffling creatures in the woods
around her. She had not slept alone or outside since she was a
young girl. Even the days of celebrating Bel saw her safely in her
family’s hut after dark. Her father had not wanted to risk the
chance of her deflowering from one of the youths in her village.
She was too great a prize to be lost.

A bright cusp of light appeared and danced in
front of the bower. It settled in front of her, just above her
forehead, and she looked into it for a time before she felt herself
falling, being pulled into the light.

After a time that could have been five minutes
or a year, the sky brightened. Only it was not the sky, but a small
area around where she sat. She was naked and her long hair fell
loose about her, providing her a scant but welcome covering. She
felt neither cold nor heat. She could not see any trees through the
light, only a dense white fog that pulsed forward and backward. It
made her dizzy to watch it, so she looked instead at the
ground.

“You are not known to us.”

Lys raised her head at the sound of the voice.
She gasped at the creature in front of her. It seemed to shift in
and out of dense pockets of shadow that had formed within the fog.
First one face appeared and merged before changing into another.
One minute a proud young girl with a warrior’s grimace and fierce
eyes watched her, the next a motherly face stared out at her, less
fierce but no less proud. Finally, a dark-haired woman with black
brows and full lips looked her over.

“Tell us your name,” she said.

“Lys ab Gysell.”

Was this the goddess the women had spoken of?
Curiosity warred with a feathery feeling in her stomach. Was she a
tree spirit? Or a guardian of the sea? Lys had yet to meet such a
being in human form. “May I know your name?”

A hand reached out to lift Lys’ chin, much as
Uxía had done, and the woman barked out a short laugh. “Well met,
Lys ab Gysell. What would you call me?”

Lys tried to think. Her people paid homage to
many deities who transcended tribal borders. “Are you one of the
Valkyrie that the northern folk speak of?”