The Greener Shore (6 page)

If only I could go to the Great Grove of the Carnutes; if only I could once again be alone in the sacred silence with That Which Watches! By drawing on the wisdom of the oaks my head would become wise again. Sadly, all that remained of the Great Grove were charred stumps. The affliction called Caesar had burned the ancient trees and sown the earth with salt.

The Romans, who are unwilling, or unable, to understand any society other than their own, described the druids as ignorant savages who worshipped trees. A Roman simplification for simple minds.

Trees are a visible representation of the sacred forces of wind and water and sun. Their shapes conform to the wind that swirls around them; their roots drink from the breast of Mother Earth; their arms are lifted in supplication to the Great Fire of Life. Therefore we worship
among
trees and
with
trees. Our reverence, like that of the trees themselves, is directed toward the Source of All Being.

The Source has many faces, each a living embodiment of its power. Sun and moon and fire and water are sacred to us as aspects of the Source. When we offer appropriate sacrifices to them the Source sees. And knows.

That Which Watches.

The Romans, on the other hand, adore statues. It is not the marble they worship, however, but human images hacked out of the stone. They bow down before gods and goddesses they have made for themselves—and can unmake just as easily.

Slumping down in the boat, I pulled up my hood and retired to the world inside my head. My imagination created a tree-covered island set like a jewel in the sea. A place where no one ever grew weary in his spirit. Druid magic, as strong as it ever had been, lay like stardust across the hills.

Time passed while I drowsed and dreamed. The sea heaved around us but I was secure on my island. There are times when the contents of our heads are all we have.

“Ainvar!” cried Briga from some great distance. “
Do
open your eyes and look!”

She sounded exasperated. I must have been asleep for a long time. Rubbing my eyes, I sat up and followed her pointing finger.

A band of richest green lay on the horizon. Never in my life had I seen such an intense color. I thought it was part of my dream until Goulvan said, “There it is, that’s Hibernia.”

In the language of Latium, my head reminded me,
hibernus
meant “wintry.” Suddenly I was wide-awake. “The Romans named this place,” I cried, “so they’ve been here after all! Cormiac, acquaint this man with your blade again and make him tell us the truth.”

Druids may not always recognize lies, but they know the truth when they hear it.

Cold iron is persuasive. With the edge of Cormiac’s sword pressing against his throat, Goulvan revised his story. “The Romans may have known about this land for, ah, quite some time. They purchase native goldwork and pay high prices for certain giant hounds that are bred here, the largest dogs in the world.”

“Go on,” I ordered through clenched teeth. “There’s more to this than trade. How did the island come by its name?”

“A Roman expeditionary party came here a few years ago seeking a site for a garrison. They sailed from Albion in late autumn, or so I was told, and made landfall in terrible weather. Howling gales and icy rain. The Romans hated the island on sight. Albion was cold and wet; they weren’t looking for more of the same.”

“Cold and wet,” I repeated. “Yet you described Albion to us as a paradise.”

Goulvan rolled his eyes. “You have to expect a trader to exaggerate a little! Anyway, the small party of Romans ran into a large tribe of belligerent natives who called themselves the Iverni. To Roman ears this sounded like ‘Hiberni.’ The coincidence suited the scouts perfectly. They hurried back to Albion to report that the island to the west was called ‘Hibernia’ because winter lasted all year. They claimed the island would not support a garrison.

“The Roman commander, whose supply lines were stretched to the utmost already, was willing to take their word for it. So this island was spared invasion. There are no Romans here, Ainvar. I swear it.”

Perhaps not. But we Gauls were.

Unlike the Roman expeditionary party, we reached Hibernia in late spring on a day of dazzling sunshine. As we drew near the shore, my eyes informed me that even Gaul had nothing to surpass the verdant luxuriance of the land the Romans had rejected. A warm, fragrant breeze blew toward us. It smelled…green.

I made my way rather gingerly to the prow of the boat and raised my arms in thanksgiving to That Which Watches.

“The Source
is,
” I chanted. “We
are.
” And my people chanted after me, “The Source
is.
We
are.
”

We made landfall on a beach as white as salt. There was no sign of life apart from the seabirds who still hovered around us, hoping for scraps of the fish we had caught earlier in the day.

Yet our crew was visibly nervous.

As head of my clan I was the first out of the boat. With some trepidation I stepped into thigh-deep water, and felt the foam of the surf curl around my legs. A few steps took me to dry land.

I was the first of the Carnutes to set foot on Hibernia.

The moment my foot touched down something inexplicable happened. It felt as if I had come home.

Treason! cried my head. Free Gaul is home. This is only a place of exile.

I stopped and looked back at Briga, who was leaning over the edge of the boat. “What are you waiting for, Ainvar? Go on!” she urged. She vaulted over the side as sprightly as a young girl and came splashing after me.

Both boats were drawn onto the sand above the tide level. The children began to race up and down the beach. Freedom went to their heads like wine. Hibernia rang with their happy voices and I remembered something I had almost forgotten. Once, we were a people who sang.

I nodded to Cormiac Ru, indicating that he—and his sword—were to stand close by me while I further interrogated Goulvan. “Tell me more about these natives you mentioned. You say they call themselves the Iverni?”

“Some of them do.”

“Are there other tribes, then?”

Goulvan dug into the sand with his toe. “Other tribes with other names,” he admitted reluctantly. Beneath his perpetual windburn he had grown very pale.

I know a frightened man when I see one. He had described the Iverni as well armed; were they also hostile?

“Are the Iverni members of the Celtic race?” I inquired.

“They must be,” said Goulvan. “They had rather fight than eat. They’re all like that on this island. They attack one another day after day, year after year, for any reason or none. These people are quite mad.”

I, who had been born into the warrior aristocracy, was amused. “Men who fight for pleasure terrify you, do they?”

The contempt in my voice stiffened his spine. “Of course not. I just don’t like this place. I find the natives too difficult to deal with. They can turn against you between one breath and the next and you never know why. Honor means more to these people than life. They’re not afraid to die but they’re terrified of being humiliated. One other odd thing about them: Any foreigner who lies to them is slain without hesitation.”

I smiled to myself. No wonder Goulvan disliked Hibernia. A trader who dare not lie would be at a serious disadvantage. “Slain how?”

“Decapitated. They mount his head on top of a pole.”

“The Celts have taken heads since before the before,” I commented. “Of course, the heads didn’t belong to liars. They were trophies of war taken from the most valiant as an expression of admiration. In the lifetime of my father’s father we abandoned the practice, however.”

Goulvan looked over his shoulder apprehensively. “I’m afraid that change of custom hasn’t reached here.”

Following his glance, my eyes reported nothing more ominous than a fox far down the beach. The animal emerged from a clump of salt grass, saw us, and vanished again.

I was surprised to be able to see such a small creature so far away. While we were in the boats the constant wind and the fierce glare off the water had strained my eyes. They itched and burned so badly I had to keep them closed most of the time. I had even begun to fear my vision was permanently impaired.

The light in Hibernia was singularly limpid. Soft and luminous yet amazingly clear, it bathed a landscape dominated by the color green. An omnipresence of green, a hundred different shades of green that soothed my scalded eyes.

They feasted on the vista before us.

The salt grass was the silvery hem of a mantle of meadowland thickly embroidered with wildflowers. In places the verdant expanse was interrupted by masses of golden-blossomed furze and billows of purple heather. Beyond the meadow a succession of low hills rolled in waves toward a wall of forest.

Trees! my spirit exulted.

A land with such broad meadows and vast forests would richly support a great number of people. So why would the natives need to fight? Upon reflection, my head concluded that the Armoricans, like the Romans, did not understand foreign customs. What they mistook for warfare was likely to be a form of sport. Celtic sports could be exceedingly rough, as befits a warrior race.

Goulvan might be reluctant to leave the beach, but I must. And I wanted Dian Cet with me; his snowy beard would assure respect if the natives really were Celtic. I told him, “We have to come to an amicable arrangement with the Hibernians, because we’re in no position to fight them. You and I are going to take Cormiac Ru as an escort and go in search of the nearest local chieftain. We’ll try to bargain with him for enough land to settle on.”

“Bargain with what, Ainvar? You gave the last gold we had to those thieves.” Dian Cet, who was old enough to have dispensed with diplomacy, indicated the Armoricans with a gesture of his thumb, the finger of insult.

Tapping my head with my forefinger, I reminded Dian Cet, “Our greatest treasure is here. We have four members of the Order of the Wise, with abilities worth more than gold.”

Once my words would have been true. But no longer; at least not about myself. Not since Alesia.

Among the possessions we had carried with us to that fateful siege was a bodiless stone head as high as a man’s thigh. The image—a representation of the Two-Faced One—consisted of two huge faces looking in opposite directions. One set of features was placid, icily remote. The other was sly and cruel. The avatar, which was mounted on a wheeled platform for ease of transport, had been carved by the Goban Saor. His talent had found within the stone a fearsome quiddity. To gaze upon it was to feel the cold breath of the Otherworld.

Fear is a tool of magic.

After Vercingetorix was captured I had made a desperate effort to save a remnant of my people. Placing my hand on the surface of the stone image, I had concentrated all the formidable force of an exceptionally gifted chief druid.

No mortal can make the unliving live. Yet I did, at Alesia.

An incredible heat had exploded within me, raced down my arm, and poured from my fingertips. I made myself stand firm. Long ago, Menua had taught me the defining tenet of true druidry:
You will enter the fire but never feel the flame.

I stood transfixed in a bubble of scalding light. I did not dare look at the carved figure, though it was changing beneath my hand. Even as Caesar’s Germanic allies were bearing down on us, intent on slaughtering every Gaul in their path, I felt mottled gray stone turn to scabrous flesh. Fevered, pulsating; loathsome to the touch.

As soon as they got a good look at the Two-Faced One, panic seized the Germans. They fled in all directions, trampling one another in their desperation to escape. I had never heard such howls as they uttered. Their mad screaming surely tore their throats apart.

The Germans sped away.

And I collapsed. Fortunately the Goban Saor caught me as I fell. Over his shoulder I had one glimpse of the horror I had brought to life.

Squatting on its wooden platform, the figure loomed as large as a man. Four baleful eyes rolled wildly; two sets of nostrils snorted fire; two pairs of lips writhed over gnashing teeth while a guttural gibbering polluted the air. The monstrosity belonged in no sane world. Yet for a brief time it was blazingly, undeniably
alive.
Even death will not extinguish that memory. I fear I shall revisit it in nightmare through many lives to come.

Later we buried the awful figure in a deep hole and raised a cairn of boulders over it. By that time the image of the Two-Faced One was merely stone again. Perhaps. I thought, briefly, of saying a prayer of thanksgiving beside the cairn and rejected the idea. The terror the thing engendered had enabled a few of my clan to escape, but at a terrible cost.

My druidic gift had been spent in its entirety.

Not the least of my wounds was the one to my pride. I, chief druid of the Carnutes, had been able to materially alter the form and function of objects through a deliberate act of will. That ability had set me apart from all my people.

Its loss left me a sadly diminished man.

I had said nothing about my personal tragedy to anyone. Yet Briga knew. The first time she touched me after Alesia, she realized the power that once flowed through me was gone. Like the force used by a fragile shoot to escape the hard acorn, such power is only given once. I could never summon it again. But Briga, my wise and loving Briga, had touched me anyway. She mercifully reawakened my sexual desire so I could lose myself in her flesh long enough to forget.

As her reward I had brought her to the end of the world.

Goulvan’s fears I could discount, but had Briga been apprehensive I would have ordered my people back into the boats immediately. Instead, my senior wife stripped off her sandals so she could run barefoot with the children.

Briga, my Briga. Whatever else we may find in Hibernia, we have brought life with us.

When I told her what I intended to do next, she approved. “It’s much more sensible to bargain for land than to try to seize any, Ainvar. We’re not Romans after all. We’ll wait for you right here, and spend the time looking for food and firewood.”