Chapter 38: Bidding Farewell

Ever since he’d first been allowed to join the fall equinox ritual, Herrwn had strained to hear the actual words in The Hall’s voices. That day, he was nearly certain that he could hear his mother calling his name, his father reciting the words of an ode he could almost make out, and the faint sound of his brother’s singing. As he strained to hear—not just with his ears but with every fiber of his body—he felt a draft of warm air on his cheek where Lothwen had always stroked it in their most intimate moments and felt a tug on his robes as though Lillywen was there, wanting to be picked up.

All too soon there came a soft tread of feet and swishing of robes. As the priestesses came out of the burial chamber, there was a nervous sort of murmur between the exiting women, and, listening as intently as he was, Herrwn heard Aolfe ask Rhonnon, “Is Feywn coming out?”

Herrwn understood why she might not. He, too, would have remained where he was if Olyrrwd hadn’t taken hold of his arm and whispered, “They’ll still be here when your time comes.”

Rhonnon, who’d turned and gone back into the grave chamber, may have said much the same thing to Feywn, because the two emerged from the tunnel together and Feywn took her place at the front of the line to lead the way back out.

Herrwn’s sense of peace and acceptance—wrapped around his shoulders like a warm woolen cloak—stayed with him all the way up through the tunnel and back down the trail to the Sacred Grove, where it was traditional to close the funeral rites for their highest members with a final proclamation from the chief priestess.

Herrwn knew what Caelendra would have said, and since the Goddess was the Goddess regardless of who She inhabited, he half-expected to hear Caelendra’s older and wiser voice bidding a final farewell to the departing spirits and reminding the living that they must put their grief behind them and carry on. But when Feywn spoke, it wasn’t in any voice Herrwn had ever heard before—not her own and not Caelendra’s but an ageless, sexless voice you would hear if a stone statue were to speak.

“Those who were his death, beware! He will be avenged!”

There was a long moment of silence when it seemed that not even the leaves of the sacred oaks dared rustle.

Although her voice was human again when she went on to swear by Rhedwyn’s death wounds that she would be faithful to him until the end of time itself, never loving or dancing with any other man, it was just as eerie to hear those words spoken in the sensuous tones Feywn had used when she named him to be her consort.

Herrwn and the other priests remained frozen in place as Feywn stepped down from the altar and walked away, the priestesses falling into line behind her.

Olyrrwd was the first to unfreeze. He nudged Herrwn and muttered, “Maybe you should say something about bidding farewell to the departing spirits, putting our grief behind us, and carrying on.”