The Forest House (29 page)

Then Caillean stood, and as her gaze focused on the ornaments Eilan was wearing, her eyes widened. Then she smiled.

“Lady of Vernemeton, I salute you in the name of the Mother of all!”

Ardanos, coming into the room behind Dieda, bent over the dead and then stood back again. “She is gone,” he said in a strange, flat voice. He turned, and something flickered in his eyes as he, too, saw the golden ornaments that Eilan wore.

The other priestesses were crowding around them, but it was old Latis the herb mistress who pushed forward and bowed, saying with a strange deference that terrified her, “I pray you, Voice of the Goddess, tell us everything the Holy Lady said with her last breath to you.”

 

“Lhiannon, may the Goddess rest her, chose an uncommonly awkward season for her dying,” Ardanos said sharply. “For we must have a priestess of the Oracle at the rites at Lughnasad, and obviously we cannot use Eilan!” He surveyed the two women before him grimly.

The three days of ritual mourning were past, and Lhiannon laid in her grave; Ardanos was surprised at how much it still hurt when he looked around this chamber where he had always met with her and remembered she was gone. He supposed he would continue to miss her for a long time, but he could not afford to show his grief now. Caillean sat frowning, but Eilan stared at him with wide, unreadable eyes. He glared back at her.

“You know as well as I do that it is superstition to believe that only a virgin can serve the shrine, but for Eilan to bear the power of the Goddess right now would be dangerous both for her and her child,” agreed Caillean.

Sexual abstinence was necessary during performance of the great magics—a magic such as the complete surrender of body and spirit necessary for the Goddess to speak through a mortal.

For the power to flow freely, the spirit must be detached from the senses. Thus it was forbidden to do those things that would increase their attraction and clog the pathways, such as eating the flesh of some animals, drinking mead or other liquors, or lying with a man.

“Lhiannon should have thought of that when she chose her,” the Arch-Druid replied. “It will not do, you know. It's bad enough that she is still here. But a
pregnant
High Priestess? Impossible!”

“I could take her place in the ritual—” Caillean began.

“And how would we explain
that
to the people? We could have justified a temporary substitution on the grounds that Lhiannon was ill, but they know that she is dead. Transitions are always delicate. People are wondering if the new High Priestess will survive her ordeal, whether the Goddess will still come to them now that Lhiannon is gone.”

He rubbed his forehead. None of them had had enough sleep for far too long. Caillean's eyes looked dark and haunted, and despite the bloom of pregnancy, Eilan seemed anxious and strained. And well she might be, it occurred to him then. Lhiannon had put them all in a quandary when she chose the girl.

“I tell you this—whatever madness came on Lhiannon at her ending, I will not allow it to destroy all that we have labored so hard to build!” He sighed. “There is no help for it. We shall have to choose again. There is a precedent; old Helve tried to pass her power to—what was her name?—that poor mad girl who died. And then the Council chose Lhiannon.”

“You would like that, wouldn't you!” Caillean began, but Eilan, who had been silent for so long the Arch-Druid had almost forgotten she was there, got to her feet suddenly.

“Not until after the ordeal!” she said loudly. Spots of color flamed in her cheeks as the other two stared at her. “They named a new High Priestess after the chosen one failed to carry the power of the Goddess in the ritual, didn't they? What kind of talk do you think there will be if I do not even attempt it? Everyone in Vernemeton knows that Lhiannon chose me.”

“But the danger!” exclaimed Caillean.

“Do you think the Goddess will strike me dead? If what I did was such a sin, then She is welcome to do so!” Eilan exclaimed. “But if I survive, you will know that She has chosen me indeed!”

“And what do you propose that we should do with you if you live?” he said acidly. “Your condition will be showing soon, and the Romans will have a good laugh when they see our High Priestess wallowing around with a belly like a pregnant cow!”

“Lhiannon thought of a way,” said Eilan. “It was the last thing she said to me. Once the ritual is over, Dieda must take my place and you must pretend that it is she who had to be sent away. You yourself cannot tell us apart, Grandfather, and you have known us both since we were babies!”

Ardanos eyed her narrowly, calculation spinning in his brain. The wretched child might indeed have solved their problem. If the ritual killed her, as was most likely, they would have every right to choose her successor, and if Eilan died in childbirth, Dieda would already be in place, ready to take over with no one the wiser. They would do well enough, he told himself, with either girl, for neither would ever think herself quite secure in her office. If the High Priestess needed the support of the priesthood, she would do what she was told.

“But will Dieda agree?” he asked.

“Leave her to me,” Caillean replied.

 

Still wondering at the summons, Dieda faced Caillean in the chamber that had for so long been Lhiannon's.

“Ardanos has agreed to let you substitute for Eilan after the ordeal of the Oracle. Dieda—you must help us now,” said Caillean.

Dieda shook her head. “Why should I care what Ardanos wants when he has never cared about me? Eilan has brought her troubles on her own head. I will not consent to this deception, and you may tell my father so!”

“Fine words, indeed, but if you are always determined to do exactly the reverse of what Ardanos decrees, then his will still rules you. I suppose if I had told you he opposes this you would have agreed?” Caillean replied.

Dieda stared at the older priestess, her mind whirling.

“He doesn't at all like it, you know,” Caillean added, watching her intently. “He would rather reject Eilan now and make you High Priestess in her place. I think he agreed to suggest the substitution only because he thought you would react in just this way…”

“High Priestess?” Dieda exclaimed. “I would never escape from this place then!”

“It would only be temporary, after all,” Caillean reflected. “As soon as Eilan's babe is born she would return to take up her duties, and then, in any case, you would have to go away—”

“Would you let me go north to be with Cynric?” Dieda asked suspiciously.

“If that is what you desire. But we had thought of sending you to Eriu for advanced training in the skills of a bard…”

“You know perfectly well it is what I have always wanted most!” Dieda exclaimed.

Caillean looked at her steadily. “Then it seems there is something I still can promise or deny you. If you do this for Eilan—and for me—I will see that you are allowed to learn from the greatest poets and harpers in Eriu. If you do not, Ardanos will surely make you Priestess, and I will make sure that you rot within these walls.”

“You would not,” Dieda said. But she felt a chill of fear.

“You shall see,” Caillean responded calmly. “There is no alternative. It was Lhiannon's wish, and I will do her will as we all have always done.”

Dieda sighed. She did not want to see anything evil happen to Eilan. She had loved her once, but after the past few years she found it hard to love anyone. It seemed to her that the other girl had been a great fool. She had had the kind of love Dieda had been denied and thrown it away. Nor could she see why Caillean should care. Still, she would not cross her. Caillean could be a good friend or a dangerous enemy—both to her and possibly to Cynric as well. Dieda had dwelt in the Forest House long enough to know just how much influence the Irishwoman wielded in her quiet way.

“So be it,” she said. “I pledge to stand substitute for Eilan until she is delivered if afterward you will be responsible for giving me my desire.”

“I will,” Caillean lifted one hand. “And may the Goddess bear witness. And no one alive can say I have ever broken an oath.”

 

Half a moon had passed since Lhiannon's passing, and they were come to the Feast of Lughnasad. Eilan waited with Caillean in the separate dwelling where the High Priestess had so often prepared for the rituals. Hearing sharpened by anxiety alerted her to the scuff of sandaled feet outside the door. Then it swung open, and she saw the hooded figure, seeming impossibly tall in the half-light, standing there. She could just make out the shapes of the other Druids behind him.

“Eilan, daughter of Rheis, the Voice of the Goddess has chosen you. Are you prepared to give yourself to Her completely?” Ardanos's voice tolled like a great bell, and Eilan felt her belly tighten with fear.

Now all the tales she had heard in the House of Maidens rose up to sweep her careful reasoning away. It hardly mattered whether the Goddess really cared about what she had done with Gaius, Eilan thought despairingly. To survive the ritual without damage would require a miracle.
I meant only to challenge the Druids, but I have challenged Her, daring Her wrath this way. Surely the Goddess will strike me down! And what will this do to my child?
Eilan wondered. But if the Goddess would punish an unborn baby for what the mother had done, She was not the loving Presence Eilan had sworn to serve.

Ardanos was waiting for her answer—they were all waiting, watching with hope or judgment in their eyes—and slowly she calmed.
If the Lady does not want me as I am, I do not wish to live.
She took a deep breath, fighting her way back to the decision to which in the sleepless nights since Lhiannon's death she had come.

“I am ready.” Her voice trembled only a little. At least her own father was in the North somewhere with Cynric. She was glad. She did not think she could have met his eyes.

“And do you declare yourself a fit vessel for Her power?”

Eilan swallowed. Was she? The night before she had doubted it, and wept on Caillean's shoulder like a terrified child.

“Fit? Who is, if you put it like that?”
Caillean had asked.
“We are all only mortal; but it is you who have been chosen. Why else have you been preparing for so many years?”

The Arch-Druid was watching her like a hawk waiting for some betraying rustle in the grass, waiting for her to perjure herself so that she would be in his power. She realized dimly that he was enjoying this.

Lhiannon thought I was fit,
she told herself then. Only by going through with this could she justify Lhiannon's dying choice, and the choice she herself had made when she gave herself to Gaius beneath the trees. It had seemed to her then that she was affirming a more ancient law of the Goddess than the one pledging her to chastity. To refuse this test was to admit that act of love had been a sin. She lifted her chin proudly. “I am a fit and holy vessel. Let the earth rise up and cover me, let the sky fall down and crush me, and let the gods by whom I swear forsake me if I lie!”

“The candidate has been questioned, and she has sworn—” Ardanos said to the Druids who attended him. He turned to the priestesses. “Let her now be purified and prepared for the ritual—”

For a moment he looked at her, and pity, exasperation, and satisfaction seemed to war in his gaze. Then he turned on his heel and led the men from the room.

 

“Eilan, you must not tremble so,” Caillean said softly. “Don't let that old buzzard scare you, there is nothing to fear. The Goddess is merciful. She is our mother, Eilan, and the Mother of all women, the maker of all things mortal. Do not forget it.”

Eilan nodded, knowing that even if this moment had come to her in the ordinary course of events she would still have been afraid. If she must die, it should be at the hands of the Goddess, there was no need to perish of fear beforehand.

The curtain stirred again and four of the youngest priestesses, among them Senara and Eilidh, came into the room carrying pails of water from the sacred spring. They stopped just inside the door, looking at her in awe.
The hand of the Goddess has descended on me,
she thought, and it seemed that she saw in their faces something of that same wonder with which she herself had always looked on Lhiannon. They were all young; not one of them, except Eilidh, even as old as she was herself…

She wanted to cry out, “Nothing has changed; I am still Eilan—” but in fact everything had changed. Yet when they stripped off her gown and she looked down, she was startled that her body still looked so little altered.

But these were virgins. So it was not surprising that they should not see the slight changes her pregnancy had made. As Eilan had done so often for Lhiannon, the girls helped her to bathe. She stood shivering in the chilly room, feeling the icy touch of the clear water on her body as, curiously, a purification; as if somehow it were dissolving away not only the last traces of her contact with Gaius, but the whole of her previous life.