Taminy Read online

  Gwynet was stunned. “I did? I ...? But, mistress, I don’t know any-any spells—any inyx, I mean. And I don’t know any of the runesongs—the duans. How could I Weave when I don’t sing and I don’t know the words?”

  “You said your dewdrops never did anything like that. What did they do?”

  Gwynet studied the other’s fire-lit face and tried to remember. Remembering was hard sometimes. It was all bound up in pain and feeling like a rabbit in a hunter’s snare, but she remembered going to the rill in the early morning to bathe and she remembered the dewdrops.

  “They ... they made me feel all wonderful. Like I were happy. Sometimes I might wish that the sun’d shine all day and Ruhf’d not be like to lay hands on me.” She lowered her head and blushed. “Sometimes I let myself fancy it worked. That he were lookin’ askew at me and might will to touch me, but couldn’a. I’d pretend my wishing done it.”

  “Perhaps it did.”

  Gwynet puzzled that. “But how?”

  Taminy stood, her face fading back into the shadows of the dusky room. “Ah, Gwynet, some people are born singing duans. They breathe them in from the ether and breathe them out into the world.”

  “Meredydd was like tha’, weren’t she?”

  “Yes, she was.”

  “And you. Are you like tha’?”

  Taminy was already moving toward the door, receding completely from Gwynet’s fire-lit patch.

  “I was once,” she said, and was gone.

  oOo

  Osraed Bevol arrived home a bit late that evening, his mind still picking its way through the signs and portents of his last meditation. Gwynet was engaged in the sage pursuit of practicing her alphabet, while Skeet, upon seeing him, commented reproachfully on his tardiness and began scurrying to put the meal on the table.

  “Where is Taminy?” he asked the boy, watching him ferry pots of hot food into the large dining chamber.

  “Upstairs.” He cocked his head, flicking his eyes upward. “She did come down today, though. Roamed about the house a bit.... Spoke to the Little One about crystals.”

  “Did she?” Bevol nodded. “That’s encouraging.”

  Skeet’s eyes dropped to the bowl of vegetables in his hands. “Aye, I do suppose. What must it be like, Maister Bevol? What must it be like to be dumped back upon the earth after living in the Sea? What must it be like to have to walk where before ye’ve darted like a silkie?”

  Bevol shook his head. “That, Skeet, is something you and I will never know. Nor is it something Taminy could describe to us even if she would.” His gaze went to the ceiling of the dining room as if he could see through it into the chambers above. “But, we will do all we can to help her adjust, for she must do more than walk, Skeet. She must run. She must fly.” He sighed volubly. “I sometimes wonder if Mam Lufu might not be better suited to this.”

  Skeet cocked his head pertly. “Mam Lufu weren’t the one summoned.”

  Bevol pointed at the tip of the boy’s nose. “Get on with the supper, Impertinence.”

  He left Skeet’s grin unanswered and went up to see Taminy. She was in her chambers—chambers that had so recently been Meredydd’s—gazing out over the fields at the front of the house. She turned from the window as he entered the open door and sat facing him on the window seat.

  “How was the day?” he asked.

  “It was a cool day for Eightmonth,” she said and toyed with the fabric of her skirt. “Gwynet drew fire this afternoon. Through that blue crystal I gave her. She has a natural Gift.”

  Bevol nodded. “I suspected as much. And did you instruct her in its use?”

  “I?” She laughed self-deprecatingly. “I’ve not been able to croak so much as a Sleepweave. You know that. I simply explained to her how the crystal worked. She found it hard to believe the talent that drove it was her own. I told her you would show her the use of it and not to ‘picture’ in it until then.”

  “Picture in it?”

  The girl’s porcelain pale face lit in a tender smile. “She paints a picture in her mind, focuses it in the crystal and makes it real. Just like that. She’s been weaving with dewdrops ... to keep from being beaten and to make herself not mind the abuse.” Taminy shook herself visibly. “She’ll be expecting you to speak to her about the crystals. Perhaps after supper-”

  “After supper would be a good time for you to speak to her about them, yes.”

  The girl glanced up sharply. “But Osraed, I cannot.”

  “Have you forgotten your history? Your culling standards? Your technical knowledge?”

  “No. You know I haven’t. I remember everything about the Art, except how to use it. I can’t Weave. My duans are just unfocused ditties. I’m an empty vessel, Osraed. I poured myself out into the Sea and the Meri took all of me. I don’t begrudge Her that,” she added. “I don’t.”

  “No, child, of course not. But don’t discount yourself so harshly. You had a native Gift. That will return, if slowly. Those who have gone before you are proof of it.”

  Her eyes held such a roil of frustration and hope, of doubt and faith, that Bevol was moved to go to her and gather her into his arms, awfully aware of what he held there. A unique being was Taminy-a-Cuinn. A singular meld of young woman and aged saint, of earthly frailty and divine virtue. She was a dust mote with the properties of a star, a drop of the finite that had been breathed upon by the Infinite. What did a man, even an Osraed, say to that?

  “You are Taminy-a-Cuinn,” he said. “You were chosen by the Meri to be Her Vessel. Trust that She will not allow you to remain empty for long.”

  “I will trust, Osraed Bevol,” she murmured against his shoulder. “And I will try to instruct Gwynet, if you desire it.”

  “I do. I do desire it. As I desire that you eat a good, healthy meal this evening. At table with the rest of the family.”

  She leaned back from him and smiled. “I do like the sound of that word, dear Osraed—’family.’ You make a duan of it.”

  oOo

  “So, Gwynet, you’ve learned the use of a crystal this evening.” Osraed Bevol broke bread into his stew and passed Taminy a secret wink.

  “Oh, no sir!” the child came back immediately. “I did something by accident complete. I was only picturing and ...”

  She glanced at Taminy for assistance.

  The older girl smiled. “You summoned fire.”

  “Oh, no, mistress!”

  “A natural,” said Bevol, nodding. He speared Gwynet with sharp eyes. “But you’ll have to learn control. Discipline. Taminy will teach you that. You’ll show that old Tynedale a trick or two before you’re a Pilgrim.”

  Gwynet bowed her head, acquiescently. “Yes, Maister,” she murmured, and didn’t quite hide her secret smile.

  Skeet set out a bowl of greens and slid into his seat, eyes jet-bright. “I did the bartering in town today, Maister, as ever. I’ve wonderful cream scones for breakfast.”

  “And wonderful gossip for supper, I’ve no doubt.” Bevol’s expression was wry. “What’s today’s portion?”

  The boy served up Gwynet’s greens, then heaped up his own plate. “Nairne’s agog over Meredydd, still.”

  “Of course. And likely will be till I’m in my grave and they can safely say I was mad.”

  Skeet passed the bowl to Taminy. “Ah, well, the Backstere has it you’re poor in the head—torn by the talons of grief. Popular tale is she was magicked into a sea snake or some’at. That’s the Backstere’s go at it. Lealbhallain the Loyal heard none of that. He believes you, Maister, bow and bind. ‘She’s transformed,’ he says, ‘made over out of Light.’ Brys-a-Lach, now, he says it’s all heresy, either way: snake or silkie. Said she deserved to drown, he did.” He scowled with sudden fierceness. “Called her a heretic ... and worse. Said the Moireach Arundel was right about her seducing her boy, Wyth. Said she tried to seduce him too.” He paused and glanced at Gwynet. “I’d’ve liked to cast a Wartweave on him.”

  “I’ve no doubt,” said Bev
ol mildly. “Don’t let it upset you. When it’s old news it will be supplanted by the new.”

  “Aye!” Skeet brightened, waving his fork in the air. “Has been. ‘Speaking of heresy,’ says the Backstere, ‘have you heard the rumors from the capitol?’ ‘Which ones, says,’ Arly Odern, and the Backstere gives the tell of his uncle from Creiddylad and some strangeness with the Cyne.”

  “This isn’t about those murals again.”

  “Ah, no. This is that tell you bid me keep my ears up for. Though, to all earfuls, those murals are an eyeful.”

  Bevol shot the boy a warning glance. “You were giving a tell ...?”

  “Backstere’s uncle goes to the Castle Cirke in Creiddylad once a moon. And at last Waningfeast, the Cyne just up and does this ceremonial.”

  Taminy looked up from her plate, eyes watchful. “What did he do?”

  “He up in the midst of the recitation of the Covenant and sips the Holy Water right out of the Cup. Tells everyone the Meri moved him to it.”

  “That’s all he said?” asked Bevol.

  “Well, that’s all the Backstere said, anyway. Might’ve said more but for Marnie-o-Loom. It’ll be all over the village by morn, like as not. Once the Backstere’s got it-” He shrugged eloquently.

  “Aye,” Bevol agreed wryly. “Gossips nearly as well as he bakes.”

  “You’ll want to hear about Marnie,” said Skeet. “She was abroad the night we came home from Meredydd’s Pilgrim Walk.”

  Bevol was all attention—for his supper. “Was she?” He glanced at Taminy, a sop of stew-dripping bread in one hand. “And what did she see on this night of nights?”

  “Cat smug, that one,” opined Skeet. “Looks me over grand as a Moireach and says, loud, so the whole shop hears, that she thought Meredydd had come home with us. ‘Two girls I saw,’ she says. ‘Bevol, and that boy and two girls—one little, one big.’”

  “Ah,” Bevol nodded. “So now I’m hiding a humiliated Prentice under my roof, is that her tell? I thought they’d all settled that Meredydd was dead or inyxed into a myth.”

  “Marnie’d have none of that. Here she’d been, chewing on this tidbit for weeks and just biding till she might uncork it. All a-sudden, Backstere’s got this tasty bit about the Cyne—Marnie’d have to best that.”

  Bevol shook his head, chuckling. “Well, now. I wonder how long it will take for Marnie to get her sly chatter up to Halig-liath?” He sighed, set aside his napkin and eyed Gwynet’s near empty plate. “Sop that up child, and you and Taminy will begin a study of rune crystals.”

  CHAPTER 2

  What is seen in Nature in a flash of lightning—That is Wonder.

  That comes to the soul in a flash of vision. Its name is Tighearnan, which means “Lord;” and Halig, which means “Holy;” and Caoim-hin, which means “the lovable, the gentle.”

  As Tighearnan, That should have obedience.

  As Halig, That should have reverence.

  As Caoim-hin, That should have adoration.

  All beings will love the lover of such a Lord.

  — The Corah

  Book II, Verses 51,52

  “I’m not made happy by this, Lealbhallain. If I’d my will in this, no son of mine would go into such a den of ambiguity.”

  “But it isn’t your will I serve, father. I serve the Meri’s will.”

  Giolla Mercer could not help but find his boy a constant source of amazement. If anyone had told him his timid, chuckle-headed child would return from his Pilgrimage a diminutive but solemn adult—an Osraed, by the grace of God—he would have pronounced that person daft. Leal’s new aura of quiet confidence seemed to extend even to the tips of his unruly hair.

  Now, under the intense paternal gaze, the boy blushed right to the roots of that hair, red on red, but continued to fold clothing into the hidebound case that was his family’s farewell gift.

  Giolla Mercer sighed volubly and glanced about his son’s attic room. It would be empty soon. “I know you’re right, boy. And I couldn’t be prouder of you, or more sure of your path, but I can’t help but worry when I hear such things from Creiddylad as are being whispered through Nairne these days.”

  Leal’s green eyes glinted. “Oh, I wouldn’t say they were whispered, da.”

  “Should have been. The tale of the Cyne’s artistic pursuits doesn’t bear repeating.” He hesitated a moment then added, “Nor, I’d say, does Marnie-o-Loom’s tell of seeing Meredydd-a-Lagan home from Pilgrimage.” He watched his son’s usually expressive face and felt a sense of loss in its new opacity. Not even out the door, his boy, but no longer at home. “You don’t believe it, Leal?”

  “That Meredydd’s here and hides? No, da. She wouldn’t hide from me. The Osraed Bevol wouldn’t let her hide. I believe the Osraed’s tell. But I don’t pretend to understand what it means.”

  Giolla Mercer nodded and did not betray his own beliefs. If Osraed Bevol was mad, it would come to light in God’s own time. “So,” he asked, managing a conversational tone, “have you heard when you are to give the Pilgrim’s Tell? Will you go before the Cyne?”

  Leal shook his head. “I’ve heard we may give the Tell at Halig-liath this year. The Cyne’s a busy man, according to the Osraed at Court. He wasn’t at Farewelling.” He didn’t say “again,” thinking it too critical. “Though there was a letter from his Durweard, bidding us good journey.”

  Giolla frowned. “Last Season he sent up a man, at least, to say that he was ill. There was no excuse given for that letter. Merely ‘urgent business at court.’ What can things be coming to in Creiddylad that our Cyne can’t even be bothered to meet his new Osraed face to face? Over six hundred years the Cyne’s been hearing the Tell at Castle Mertuile. An age of tradition and Colfre sneezes it away in two years time.”

  Leal grinned. “Well, there, you see? That must be why the Meri assigns me to the capitol. I’m to keep an eye upon the Cyne for Her. Yes, I can see clearly that Creiddylad needs Osraed Lealbhallain-mac-Mercer desperately.”

  Absurdly pleased to see the impish glint in his son’s eye, Giolla Mercer laughed aloud and tried not to think how much he would miss the boy when he was gone.

  oOo

  Taminy saw the Osraed Bevol and his small would-be Prentice off to Halig-liath after breakfast, then retired to the garden behind Gled Manor. The sun shone on the heights above Nairne, warming the centuries-old stones of the Academy and dusting the eons-old rock beneath it with a blush of rose. She could just make it out through the garden’s clustered trees—the rounded walls of the central rotunda, a bit of slate gray roof, a glisten of aged pines.

  Memory. Odd, how it could evade you when you reached for it and overtake you when you glanced aside. She could hear Halig-liath in mind’s ear; the scuff and clatter of dutiful feet—fewer now in the summer months when only the first year students attended; the chatter and laughter of young voices; the atonal song of the morning bells calling assembly. She could see, too, the upturned faces, a myriad eyes raised to the Osraed Gallery, waiting to hear invocation from the lips of the Apex of the Triumvirate, Convener of the Divine Council.

  Osraed Kinsel had been at Apex in her time at Halig-liath, a position Osraed Bevol now held. She had never been able to please Osraed Kinsel—or so she’d thought. Yet, when others had decried her as Wicke, he had been the only one to reserve judgment. The only one to suggest that the Meri should condemn or absolve her of the charge.

  She listened to the drowsing silence. Yes, she could hear them now, the bells; like the shimmer of sun on water, translated to sound. In a moment, the small aspirants to Prenticeship would gather for prayer and morning song.

  Lift up, lift up heads, hands and hearts.

  The Meri wills the day to start.

  Raise up, raise up heads, hearts and hands.

  The Meri wills us understand—

  Toward the Light we ever turn.

  Her Knowledge is the lamp we burn.

  She found herself humming the pretty little melody and brok
e off, smiling, but rueful. Oh, the things one remembered ...and oh, the things one forgot.

  She rose and crossed to where a climbing white rose twist itself about a thick oak. Dew sparkled in its petals—gems for the dawn, her mother had always called them. A heart-thorn of pain pricked her. Mother and father were gone now—their bodies returning to the earth, their spirits loosed in Realms she could no longer reach. They had been so near not that long ago, but in shaking the Sea from her flesh, it seemed she had shaken their souls from her embrace.

  Blinking back tears, she turned her eyes from the roses and sought the Sun in the green of Bevol’s garden. It was there, lying amid a veritable platter of jewels—emeralds most of them—scattered in the grass. The lawns blurred to velvety splendor for a second, but a blink made it be grass again. No, self pity was unforgivable in a place of such beauty and peace. Doubly or triply so for one who knew what Taminy knew, had been where she had been.

  She returned her gaze to the rose bush, reached out a hand and broke off a new bud. Carrying it to a gilded patch of green, she sat there, heedless of the effect of dew on skirts, and focused her all on the flower. The bloom became her world. She narrowed her gaze to one folded petal. The petal became her universe. She narrowed her gaze to a dewdrop on that petal. The dewdrop became a Cosmos. She let it fill her completely.

  Think you are but a pitiful form when entire universes are wrapped within you? That passage from the Corah had once comforted her. Now it seemed only to mock.

  Yes, I am pitiful! A lake severed from its river; an errant ray of light shuttered from its Sun.

  Entire universes ... and she had seen them, each and every one, ablaze with Light.

  Perhaps I am not shuttered, but only temporarily blinded. Anyone who looks into the Sun spends a moment in darkness.

  Here was a cosmos in a dewdrop ... on the petal of a rosebud ... in a hand that quivered with half-forgotten power. Taminy felt the swelling of her heart and soul, the quickening of her blood, the sudden acuity of her senses. She heard the distant Halig-tyne passing regally between her banks with lady-skirt rustle as the children atop the cliffs sang their morning songs and a falcon cried somewhere far above and the Sun chimed softly in the dewy grass, riffling among its jewels for the fairest and finding it on Taminy’s rose.