Going into the cottage was like entering another garden, only one that was upside down and dead. Bundles of dried flowers and herbs hung from the ceiling, well above the woman’s head but low enough to hit Caelym full in the face. He ducked down, made his way past shelves lined with neat rows of jugs and pots and wooden boxes, and passed through a second door that opened into the main room of the cottage.
It was a square room with a cupboard and counter against one wall, a bed and small square table against another. The bed was covered by a plaid blanket that was laid out so that its lines were perfectly straight, both up and down and side to side. The only other furniture was another, slightly larger, square table with two matching chairs. The chairs were exactly opposite each other and exactly aligned. There was a round stone hearth in the center of the room. A polished black kettle hung over the center of the hearth, and Caelym did not need to look inside it to know that the simmering water would be bubbling with well-disciplined bubbles, each one waiting its turn and rising to the surface in orderly succession—not in the confused, churning disarray with which most kettles boil.
The woman, who had gone to the counter and started unpacking her basket, looked over her shoulder and nodded at the table.
Caelym took this as an invitation to sit down, so he did— carefully, and at an angle, to keep the arrow from hitting the back of the chair. Resting his arms on the table to steady himself, he did his best to convey no more than polite attentiveness while the woman cleaned the last specks of dust off the food, took a knife out of the cupboard, checked its edge for sharpness, and cut meticulously measured slices of the bread, cheese, and sausage, grumbling all the while about uninvited guests who expected to be waited on hand and foot. She spread butter on the bread and put the bread in the center of a round wooden platter, arranged alternating slices of cheese and sausage around the bread, and added a sprig of parsley for garnish. With the plate prepared, she took a jug out of the cupboard and poured what he guessed from the color was elderberry wine into a cup. Then, finally, she brought the plate and cup to the table and put them down directly in front of him.
Exercising a restraint acquired through years of intense training, Caelym waited for her to take her hand away before he started to eat. Even so, it took him less time to clean the plate and drain the cup than it had taken her to fill them.
Sincerely grateful for the first substantial meal he’d had in weeks, he rose from his chair to praise the woman’s generosity to a stranger, only to be stopped by a dismissive wave of her hand. It was a gesture he would know anywhere—the exact same gesture that Feywn made when he came into her bedchamber uninvited. He opened his mouth, closed it, and sat back down. It was a full moment before he found his voice again.
“You are Annwr?”
“And if I am?”
“I’ve come with a message for Annwr from her sister and need to know that it is Annwr I am giving it to.”
“Fifteen years is a long time to wait to bring this message.”
Spoken in an imperious voice—as if Feywn’s voice were coming from the old woman’s lips—her words settled the last of Caelym’s doubts. Still, it was not fair that he should have to answer for Ossiam’s failure to have his vision sooner, and he recovered himself enough to say so.
“I began searching from one end of the land to the other, climbing snow-covered mountains and descending into desolate valleys, swimming across raging rivers, and wading through perilous swamps, with little food and no rest, the very moment it was revealed that Ossiam, Grand Oracle and Master of Divination, had seen in his dreams that . . . that . . .”
Caelym faltered. The vision that Ossiam had seen was of a beautiful girl held captive in a king’s palace, not a bad-tempered old woman living comfortably in a common cottage that was too clean but otherwise quite pleasant. He finished awkwardly, “That you were still alive.”
The realization of just how far off the mark their Grand Oracle and Master of Divination had been shook Caelym to his core, leaving him speechless.
Annwr broke the silence. “Ossiam couldn’t divine his way to the latrine in broad daylight and downwind of it!” She fixed Caelym in a direct glare. “So now you are finally here, suppose you say what it is you have come to say.”
Challenged to get to the point, he did. “To my sister, Annwr— greetings. In your absence, much has come to pass. It is imperative that you come without delay. Caelym, son of Caelendra, who bears this message, will be your guide. All will be revealed at the equinox.”
“Spring or fall?”
Her words hit hard—harder, maybe, than she intended. Refusing to acknowledge Annwr’s unwelcome reminder that he’d spent over two months searching for her and still had a long road ahead of him, Caelym spoke in his most imposing and masterful voice—a voice befitting an emissary of the Great Mother Goddess—as he changed the subject.
“Of course, you must be overcome with eagerness to hear of all that has come to pass in your long, sad years of separation. If there were but time and if only I had my golden harp at hand, what stories I could tell you, what songs I could sing. For now, let it suffice to say that Cyri, brave and beautiful, conceived in the Sacred Summer Solstice Ceremony and born of your exalted loins, stands at Feywn’s right side, ever yearning for your return.”
He paused there, waiting for the importance of what he’d said to sink in, before adding, “Now I have found you, you need fear neither Saxon warrior nor wild beast in the forest, for I will protect you and keep you safe on our journey.”
With this oath, at least, as good as fulfilled, he folded his arms on the table, put his head down, and fell asleep, the arrow in his back vibrating rhythmically with his snores.
She said his name sharply, causing him to startle.
“I remember you now! You always were a gabby little pest! I suppose that besides expecting me to feed you, you want me to pull the arrow out from between your ribs, and then go traipsing back with you so you can boast about what a brave hero you are.”
While it was true that Caelym was looking forward to hearing the gasps and cheers as he recounted his adventures before the high council, it was also true that he’d suffered genuine hardship on Annwr’s account, so he sulked in silence for several minutes before conceding that he would be grateful to have her help in pulling the arrow out of his back, “and pleased beyond the ability of my poor words to express for your bestowing upon me the exalted honor of escorting you out of these accursed lands to the place where your dearest kin reach out their arms wide in joyous welcome.”
It was a gallant response, well phrased and flawlessly delivered, but it earned him nothing more than a cranky grumble from Annwr: “I haven’t said I’m going anywhere with you.”
Instead of arguing, Caelym put his head back down on his arms.
He must have dozed off again, because suddenly Annwr was next to him and helping him over to the bed. She cut the stiff, blood-soaked cloth away from the base of the arrow and eased his cloak, tunic, and shirt off around it. Then she brought him another cup of wine and a leather strap to bite on. He braced himself, gripping the checkered blanket in his fists as she took hold of the arrow, biting the strap nearly in two when she wrenched it out.
Holding a cloth to Caelym’s back to stop the fresh flow of blood, Annwr led him back over to the chair by the fire. She put a basin of hot water on the floor in front of him, helped him shed the rest of his clothes, and kept a hand on his shoulder to steady him as he leaned over to wash. When he had done what he could on his own, she poured soapy water through his hair and scrubbed his back, cleaning carefully around the still-oozing wound. She had been quiet before, but somehow seemed quieter now.
Caelym guessed what she was thinking. “It would be likely to fester and bring fever, I suppose.”
“And you would be some physician to be knowing about festering and fevers?”
“That I am, for six years and more.”
“You never are. There’d be nobody trusting you with any healing!”
“My patients may not be trusting me with their healing, but I’m doing it whether they are trusting, or they are not.”
“Well then, you are physician and I am a midwife, so I suppose we may both be thinking it could fester and bring fever, but you are young and strong and likely enough to live through it.”
“Still, if it does fester, I won’t be moving so well for a while, so I will get my clothes and think of where I will go next while I can still be up and about.”
“And how am I to know where to find you, if I should decide to go on this trip of yours?”
“You are coming with me, then?”
“I haven’t made up my mind, so you might as well be getting back into the bed, as it will be a week or more before you are going anywhere.”
Caelym was not about to let the matter rest before he had an answer to his question. “A week is a long time to keep a man in your bed if you haven’t decided what you’re going to be doing with him.”
Annwr was not about to be pushed into an answer before she was ready to give it. “I am an old woman,” she snapped, “and it’s been more than a week since anybody has worried about whether there was a man in my bed. Anyway, your clothes are soaking in the wash and my geese would laugh themselves egg-bound to see you walking out the door wearing nothing.”
Too tired to think of a satisfactory retort, he allowed her to lead him back to the bed, but there he stood his ground, refusing to lie down, until he had repeated his pledge to save her from the Saxons. Even as the room spun around him, he spoke with a Druid’s persuasive powers, choosing his words skillfully to hide his disappointment that she was no longer beautiful.