Druids (13 page)

I haven’t changed, I’m just Ainvar! I wanted to shout after him. But I did not.

After a long time I wandered miserably back into the lodge. “Menua, is it difficult to be both a man and a druid?”

He pondered the question. “Impossible,” he said at last.

Would I ever be able to learn all I needed to know? Twenty years of study was considered the minimum necessary for a chief druid. I could be initiated info the Order long before then, because the time of initiation was determined by omen and circumstance. But those twenty years of learning were a feature of the druidical schools from Bibracte in Gaul to the distant and storied island of the Britons.

And everything must be committed to memory.

“Tell me again about Rome and the Province,” Menua would command for the thirtieth time, leaning at his ease against the trunk of a tree and chewing on a blade of grass. “And don’t change a word of it, mind you.”

“The Romans are a tribe from the land of Latium,” I began dutifully. “Once they were but one of many tribes, and they occupied a straggle of huts on a cluster of hills and fought with their neighbors. But they were more ambitious than then’ neighbors. In time they built up an army capable of exterminating the Etruscans on their north and taking over the rich valley of the Po River.

DRUIDS 77

“Next they destroyed their commercial rivals, Corinth and Carthage, so they could take over their trade routes. While defeating Carthage they also undertook the conquest of Iberia. The Romans ground into dust anyone who opposed them and established a virtual monopoly of trade, sending a constant stream of wealth flowing back to their stronghold, the city of their tribe.”

Menua nodded. I observed that the whites of his eyes were turning yellow with age, and there were freckles on the backs of his wrinkled hands. “Now tell me what the Province is, Ainvar.”

“The southernmost part of Gaul. Once the Celtic tribes there were as free as the rest of us. But that was before Rome overran the region, before I was born. They renamed it Narbonese Gaui, after the capital city of Narbo which they built there. Usually, however, it is simply referred to as the Province, for it is Rome’s chief province outside Latium.”

Menua sighed. “The Romans overran it. Brought in warriors and left them there, to marry, sire children, claim the land as their own. Romanized.” He shook his head. “And to whom was the city of Narbo dedicated, Ainvar?”

“To Martins, a Roman deity.”

The chief druid blew his nose in the air in an expression of contempt. “Martius. Spirit of war. Not the spirit of some living thing, a tree or a river, but of war.” His disgust was palpable. “They have no instinct for naming.”-

“No,” I agreed. “Naming is of principal importance. Everything has its own, innate name, which must be discovered.”

The chief druid almost smiled. My answer had pleased him.

“What do we know of the lives lived by Celts within the Province?”

“The southern Gaulish tribes,” I recited, “cannot do any business without the authority and partnership of a Roman citizen. No coin changes hands or debt is contracted without being written on the scrolls of the Romans.”

“Written,” Menua echoed in disgust. “A man’s debts written down to survive his death and torment his descendants.”

He stood up and began to pace, back and forth, with his arms folded behind him. ‘ ‘I know too much and not enough, Ainvar. We hear things, I catch a scent of something on the wind. … I cannot sleep for thinking of the power of Rome. I fee! it growing like a living thing, a vine to strangle the oak.

“But I am not sure of the danger, neither its degree nor its source. If it were possible I would go into Roman territory myself and observe what is happening there. Some claim the Gauls live

78 Morgan Llywelyn

better than we do here; others say they are wretched and enslaved. I need to know the truth, but I am the chief druid and these are dangerous times, I dare not leave the grove for long enough to visit the Province.”

Suddenly he turned and fixed his eyes on me. “But you are young and strong. You could make the journey for me. You could be my eyes and ears in the Province and report back to me on all that you find.”

My heart leaped in me. The thrilling promise of adventure was like a drink of strong wine.

Menua sat down again and leaned against the tree. His eyes gazed up at me but I do not think he was seeing me.

“Ainvar,” he mused. “One who travels far.”

I held my breath.

He said nothing more.

I waited.

The chief druid retreated into his head, leaving me to study the clouds in the sky and the pinkish-yellow stones emerging from

the soft brown soil. Our little river, the Autura, sang to herself below the ridge of the grove.

“You are still young.” Menua’s voice startled me out of some reverie involving Sulis. “You need more training. Before you can be initiated into the Order you must have studied in the groves of other tribes. I myself spent much time at Bibracte, where my head was greatly enriched by the druids of the Aedui.

“We could send you southward to visit the druids between here and the Province … then you couid cross the mountains that separate us from Roman territory and continue your learning on the other side. A different sort of learning, eh?”

“As your eyes and ears?”

“As my eyes and ears. Are you willing?”

I tried to reply with decorum, but eagerness betrayed me. “Yes!” I shouted.

Menua’s eyes twinkled. “You needn’t think it will be easy. The way is long and travel is always hazardous.”

“I don’t mind! I’m very strong and I can take care of myself!”

“Mmmm. To be sure. But we’ll give you an escort anyway, someone a little more seasoned than yourself to guard your back.” Menua stretched, scratched himself in both armpits, and got to his feet. He moved with unfailing grace in spite of his bulk, but I heard his bones creak the song of their years.

Together we performed the sunset ritual that thanked the sun for having given us the day. Then we returned to the fort, our

DRUIDS 79

faces suitably sober. But once Menua was asleep, I slipped out of the lodge and out of the fort, to stand alone and free under the night sky and give a mighty yell of sheer exuberance.

Menua informed the other druids of his plan. His choice of me for such an undertaking stressed, more man actual words, his faith in me; his desire that I be his successor someday. When that day came the chief druid would be elected by the Order, of course, but Menua’s preference would carry great weight. They knew it and I knew it.

Keeper of the Grove.

Shortly after the announcement, Sulis sought me out. “Perhaps we should work some sex magic together to assure you of a safe journey?” she suggested.

Her hair was soft against my lips and the magic came strong and sure.

The route Menua chose for me would take me through the lands of the Bituriges, the Boii, the Arvemi, and the Gabali. “Leam something of value in each tribe’s sacred grove,” Menua told me,

“but remember that your ultimate goal is the Province. Once you get there, don*t call attention to yourself. I have heard that the Romans regard druids with suspicion. Be a simple traveler, perhaps someone in search of new trading connections. Trade is the language the Romans like best,”

I would take with me one bodyguard and a porter. At my request, Tarvos would be my bodyguard. To identify myself as one entitled to instruction in the groves, Menua had the Goban Saor make a gold druidic amulet, called a triskele, for me to wear. It was in the form of a large wheel with three curved spokes dividing me circle into the trinity of Earth and Man and Otherworid.

“Before you go,” said Menua, “there is one final thing we must do for you. If you aspire to the Order of the Wise, you must be prepared to show the world a fearless face. So you will meet with us in the grove three dawns from now.

‘ Tor your deathteaching.”

THEY WERE HIDDEN in their hoods. Even Menua was concealed; I recognized him by his shape. In the same way, and with a stab of pleasure, I recognized Suits.

And beyond her, Aberth the sacrificer.

Deathteaching. He had to be present, as opener of the gate into the Otherworid.

We were one moon past Imbolc, festival of the lactation of the sheep. The days were growing longer, anticipating Beltaine two moons hence. Above our heads mat sunrise, larks were spilling song into a clear sky.

I had come to the grove to leam about death.

The druids surrounded me in a large circle, with a measured space separating me from them. Whatever happened, I would in the most essential sense be alone.

Menua spoke. “Death,” he intoned from his position sunwise of me, “is the reverse of birth. It is the same process happening backward. If we escape death by injury or illness, we grow old, feeble, helpless, infantile. We become as the unborn in preparation for returning to the unborn state.

“Think, Ainvar. Does the idea of being unborn, not-yet-bom, frighten you? Look back beyond your earliest memory.”

I concentrated. “No,“I said at last. “ltdoesnotfrightenme.”

‘ ‘Good. Then you must have no fear of death, for it is the same state. Death is a way of washing your memory clean of burdens loo painful to carry. Death rests and refreshes you, so you are ready to begin a new life in a new body spun from the strands of creation.”

Menua raised his pointing finger on his heart hand and rotated

it in the air. At once, a number of druids stepped out of the circle and laid firm hands on me. There were more than enough of them

80

DRUIDS 81

to hold me even if I struggled. Deathteaching drew every member of the Order within a day’s walk.

Before dawn the chief druid had weighted me down with the wealth that had once ornamented my father and brothers. Finger rings of massy gold, arm and leg rings of copper and bronze, brooches set with amber and coral and chunks of crystal. None of these were of Mediterranean workmanship; they were of the old, true Celtic style, massive but beautifully crafted with so much intricate detail you could study one piece for half a day without seeing all of it.

Now at the chief druid’s command the otfiers began stripping me jewelry from me. As each piece was removed, Menua said, “Life is loss.”

Strangely, I found myself feeling progressively lighter and more free. The riches that had been the pride of my warrior kin were taken from my sight, but I did not yearn after them; they had been a weight and a discomfort, I realized. I had grown too accustomed to the druid habit of being unencumbered.

When I stood in only my tunic and the skin that held my bones in a package, Menua told me, “What you have lost was an accre-tion. What you have left is your self. And when you lose even the flesh you wear, you will still have your self.”

The chanting began, softly, under his voice.

Sulis came forward to tie a bandage across my eyes. It was fragrant with clove-scented gillyflower and other, more subtle scents, one a sour tang that made me wrinkle my nose. Without sight my other senses intensified. My ears detected the first faint crackling of a fire being built some distance away. Then my nose reported the smell of burning cinnamon, an imported spice so costly it was used only for the most important of rituals, or in the meat cooked for a king.

“We cannot know what will come to you,” I heard Menua say. “The pattern dictates differently for each of us. Be open; accept.”

The druids suddenly spun me around like a wheel until I did not know if I faced night or morning. Fingers pried open my mouth and a noxious paste was forced onto the back of my tongue. I gagged violently, but they held me so I could not clear the stuff from my mouth. They did not release me until I inadvertentiy swallowed some.

The vomiting was explosive. I thought my guts were being torn loose. Staggering, I clutched blindly at the air as the supporting hands abandoned me. My fingers closed on empty space. The druids had gone back to the circle, leaving me alone. I cradled

82 Morgan Llywelyn

my heaving belly and doubled over, fighting for breath in a body gone out of control. Life was gushing out of me on waves of bile. My knees gave way. The last clear thought in my head was a question: Why had the druids poisoned me?

I tay in a knot on the ground with my knees drawn up to my chin. I was no longer even retching, everything in me had been vomited out. The chanting had never stopped. Gradually I realized it seemed to be coming from the earth beneath me also, from the soil and the stones, flowing into me, reverberating with a rhythm that matched the tides of my blood. I was desperately tired. I only wanted to sink into the chanting earth and be part of its song, thought-less, pain-less… .

I was drifting free with the familiar sensation that comes in the last moments before sleep. A thudding of the earth near my head told me that feet were treading around me, and a deeper instinct born of both bodily and spiritual senses informed me that the druids were dancing a pattern around me, spiraling in toward me and then out again, leading… .

I was gliding away from my body, lured by a beckoning dream beyond the rim of awareness. Warm light. Voices calling. I thought I reached out. I thought I cried a glad reply… .

There was a sound in my ear like the dry slithering of a snake across a stone. Aberth whispered, “Death is but a breath away.”

The edge of his knife drew a ribbon of flame across my throat.

Shocked back from the dream, I fought mindlessly, flinging myself as far as I could from the sacrifice!-, clawing at the bandage over my eyes, kicking out, trying to scramble to my feet so I could face whatever threatened me like a man. But I was terribly dizzy. It seemed to take me forever to stand up and tear off my blind-fold… .

To find myself in a place of lurid red light, teetering on a nar-row knife-edge between two abysses. Deep in one was a misty meadowland, dimly seen, peopled by vague forms that seemed to be gesturing toward me.

When I looked into the other I saw Aberth below me, grinning up at me, holding his knife.