Chapter 83: Cyri’s Worries

“How long will they be gone?”

Herrwn had just finished explaining the outcome of the High Council to Cyri. Her eyes glittered with tears.

His answer—“It’s hard to say exactly; infants learn to speak in two or three years, so I should think it should be no more than that”—was meant to be reassuring, but clearly it was not, as the tears spilled over and ran in streams down her cheeks.

Chiding himself for forgetting that time, which passes so quickly when you are sixty, stretches out forever when you are sixteen, Herrwn tried a different tack. “But Master Ossiam assures us that his visions show them happy with their foster kin, and, although you were too young when this happened to remember, Arianna was also fostered when she was little, and she returned to us quite safe and sound, and speaking English as easily as Celt.”

Knowing how close Cyri and the other young priestesses were, Herrwn expected the reference to Arianna to be comforting. He was surprised that, instead of being cheered, Cyri bit down on her lip and looked away. When she looked back it was with an expression he rarely saw on her face—an expression that almost always meant a pupil was hiding some wrongdoing.

“Cyri, is there something else that troubles you?”

“I—I …” she stammered. “She … We … I— I didn’t practice my recitation like I should have. I don’t remember how it begins.”

Herrwn had a feeling from the “she” and the “we” that what Cyri started out to say wasn’t about her failure to memorize the day’s lesson but rather some strife with her cousin. Recalling how his well-intentioned attempts to mediate Lothwen’s quarrels with her older sister had entangled him in emotional turmoil beyond his understanding, he didn’t press further, but instead said soothingly, “Well, I can understand that, with your worries about Arddwn and Lliem, it is hard to keep your mind on your lessons, so instead of your reciting for me, I will recite a story for you.”

Later, Herrwn would remember the troubled look on Cyri’s face as she forced a smile—pressing her lips together as if she were afraid of their betraying her—and he would wonder whether he might somehow have prevented the end of their world if only he had asked the right question and found out what was weighing on her mind. But at the time, he had just assumed that Cyri and Arianna had quarreled over some minor thing and, like all their squabbles, it would be made up and things would be as before. After all, the relationship between the two girls had begun with a misunderstanding, and that had been resolved without undue difficulty.

Born a half year before Cyri, Arianna had been sent out to be fostered when Cyri was barely three months old, so the two had essentially met for the first time at the celebration of Arianna’s return.

The burst of cheers that had erupted as Rhedwyn threw back his cloak, revealing their “most beautiful jewel,” had been the start of an exuberant procession through the shrine’s gates and on to the main grove, where priests and priestesses crowded around to welcome the child they already thought of as their future chief priestess. The next day they gathered again, this time having had a chance to put on their best clothes and pick out presents for the occasion. In the center of the jubilant crowd, Feywn and Rhedwyn stood together with Arianna in front of them, the girl glowing with delight at the noise and excitement around her and receiving each new gift with a heart-melting smile.

Annwr and Cyri were on the sidelines. Cyri, a cautious child, was clinging to her mother’s skirts and clutching her little plaid blanket. When it was time for her to be formally introduced, Annwr brought her forward and, kneeling down next to her, urged her to give her “dear cousin, Arianna, a hug and kiss.”

By then Arianna had given and received hugs and kisses from a long line of previously unknown relatives and had received a present from each in turn. She threw her arms around Cyri in an adorable gesture, kissed her cousin, to the applause of the gathered grown-ups—and left the embrace with the plaid blanket in her hand.

Cyri had stood still, her mouth open in shock, for a long moment before turning to her mother and crying out, “Lovie! She took Lovie!”

Watching from his side of the circle, Herrwn could see Annwr didn’t want to hurt Arianna’s feelings by taking back what the little girl obviously thought was a gift, and he understood that was the reason she took off her ceremonial shawl—the iridescent silk cloth embroidered with shimmering blue and green interlacing waves that she’d received on being ordained a full-fledged midwife—and gave it to Cyri, saying she was a good girl for giving her blanket to her dear cousin and she could have this instead.

The act of giving that priceless keepsake to a child not yet three years old momentarily silenced the crowd of onlookers. In that sudden stillness, the two girls stood facing each other—Arianna staring at the beautiful shawl in Cyri’s hand while Cyri’s eyes were fixed on the blanket in Arianna’s.

With a beguiling smile on her lips and her head cocked to the side, Arianna put out her free hand toward the shawl.

Lowering her eyebrows and sucking in her lower lip, Cyri held it out but kept a tight grip until Arianna in turn held out the blanket.

Cautiously, each took hold of the thing she wanted—then, at some signal invisible to the adults around them, Arianna let go of the blanket and Cyri let go of the shawl.

A titter of laughter ran through the crowd and the adult celebration went on, but Herrwn kept his eye on the little girls, and he noticed that, as they settled into playing with Gwenydd and the twins, Arianna wrapped the shawl around her shoulders like a royal cloak, its meticulously embroidered corners dragging on the ground, while Cyri kept her blanket tucked tightly under her arm.

Recalling that early scene, Herrwn felt sure that having successfully resolved their first conflict—and having done so when they were hardly out of infancy—the two would certainly make peace with each other now. And to be fair, just a few days later, on the day of the Welcoming of the First Lamb, he saw Cyri whispering the lines of the sacred songs to her cousin, and while that was not something he could condone, he did feel justified in taking that to mean the two were friends again.