Chapter 86: After the Storm

The season’s first storm was, as both Llwdd and Ossiam predicted, a drenching downpour. Driven by howling winds and lasting five days, it turned the valley’s streams into torrents and its lower fields into marshlands. Then, as abruptly as the tempest had begun, the rain stopped, the winds fell, and the sun returned.

The weather for the remainder of the fall was, if anything, milder than usual. Even so, the year’s winter illnesses arrived early. While none of those in their highest circle suffered more than annoying coughs and catarrh, it hit the lower ranks of their order, most of whom were elderly and frail, with devastating harshness.

By the autumn equinox, they’d already made three trips up the cliffside path to the sacred catacombs, taking Inendredd, Maeddan, and Roddrwn to lie alongside the shrouded remains of their ancestors, and over the next two months they carried up another four of their number—Frengwld, Haeddrenn, Haerviu, and Bevwyn—leaving only Feywn, Rhonnon, Aolfe, Lunedd, and the five young priestesses on the women’s side of the shrine and only Herrwn, Ossiam, Caelym, Moelwyn, Iddwran, and Ogdwen on the men’s.

The servants suffered as well. While none of them died, Iddwrna, the cook who had reigned in the kitchen since Herrwn was a boy, was left so weak and debilitated that she turned her duties over to her granddaughter and told Rhonnon that she wished to spend her remaining days with a sister who’d married out of the valley years earlier.

“But how will she be able to make such an arduous trip, being so feeble and with her painful toe?” Herrwn was genuinely concerned when Rhonnon told him Iddwrna was leaving—and was also heartsick at the thought of losing one more link with his past.

“I have spoken with Nimrrwn,” Rhonnon sighed and added, “Iddwrna’s grandson,” as if she did not expect Herrwn to know the family relations of his own chief servant. “I have told him that at the next break in the weather he is to take a horse and cart and adequate provisions, and accompany his grandmother to her sister’s village—with your permission, of course.”

This last bit was clearly a polite formality, and Herrwn gave the obligatory response.

“Of course, and he must stay with her as long as she needs him. I have no doubt we will be able to manage quite well while he is gone.”

Rhonnon sighed again. “I’m sure you will do your best. In any case, I’ve made arrangements for young Fonddell, who has been a sub-servant in the kitchen, to tend to your hearth, bring your wash water, and see to your laundry.”

Nimrrwn left things well-ordered, and with the hearth tended, hot water for bathing, and clean robes, Herrwn took some pride in feeling that he and Caelym were proving themselves quite self-sufficient—and said so aloud when he was sitting at the classroom table on the afternoon of the winter solstice with both his and Olyrrwd’s cups of wine.

“Well, who taught Caelie to look after himself?” he imagined his cousin saying with a snort.

“You did!” Herrwn replied out loud. “And we’ve still got a room full of camping provisions to prove it.”

While Olyrrwd was alive he’d refused to have so much as a single fishhook taken out of the room where he’d made his preparations for Caelym’s spirit quest, always insisting that he’d get to it later. Since his cousin’s death, Herrwn had found himself saying the same thing, first to Benyon and then to Nimrrwn. But when he had finally gone into the room, meaning to clear it out, he’d found that each waterskin and spear point held a memory of Olyrrwd too precious to part with, and that for him “the workroom” had become a shrine where he could feel the presence of his cousin’s spirit.

Now, however, it needed to be made ready for Arddwn’s return, so Herrwn set down his cup and went into the room, determined to do just that.

He was still in the room when he heard Caelym call, “Master, it’s getting late!” and realized that what he’d thought were only a few moments spent reminiscing among the piles of leftover provisions and paraphernalia had in fact been hours.

Caelym, already in his ceremonial robes, was holding Herrwn’s staff. After swiftly changing into his own ritual garments, Herrwn took the staff, drew a breath to compose himself, and put everything except for the all-important winter solstice rites out of his mind.