Chapter 46 Non
Non
I was grateful to see High Healer Sioned for once.
The Cyngor Blaen had requested her presence, as we had very little time between the end of the trial and the beginning of the ritual.
She was able to heal my head along with Dylan's shoulder and leg. Everyone else only suffered minor injuries. Except Alaw.
In her decision to be a martyr, she'd ripped open her barely healed stitches and collapsed with her dad only metres from the Cyngor Blaen. Had she made it a few feet further, she would have been the winner.
Neither Aeron nor Granny spoke a word to me as we all congregated around the summoning circle.
Dylan had also been oddly quiet. When I'd asked why, he just said he was exhausted.
He certainly looked exhausted, but a gnawing feeling in my gut told me it was probably the very public declaration of love I had just made.
Foolishly, I thought he would return the sentiment with his own I love you, too. I hadn't prepared for the possibility of rejection. My idiocy had won me the Anoethau but had likely cost me Dylan.
While Aeron and the rest of the Cyngor prepared for our departure, Dylan, Seren, and I all stood around awkwardly. Avoiding eye contact. Dylan had mumbled something about Osian not making it; Seren had chuckled at the same time and shot me a terrifying wink.
My grandmother broke from the huddled group of leaders and made her way towards us. I shuffled to one side so she could get to Seren. To my surprise, she stopped in front of me.
“A moment, please, Non.”
Instinctively, I looked to Dylan. He was deep in conversation with Zenn and hadn't noticed my grandmother's approach.
Without waiting for my confirmation, Granny gestured to a quieter spot away from the crowd gathered around the summoning circle.
Granny perched on a fallen tree as she folded her hands in her lap. “It seems congratulations are in order.”
I didn't dare sit down. This might have seemed like an innocent chat between a grandchild and grandmother, but nothing my grandmother did was without intent.
“Thank you.”
Silence stretched between us for so long that I was about to walk back to the crowd. “Has anyone explained to you what happens next?”
“Briefly.” They hadn't, not really. Aside from the conversation Dylan and I had about Witchfire, the process of being chosen as a vassal was a mystery.
Granny nodded, eyeing the daggers strapped to my chest. “It wasn't me, you know. I assume your friends in the West are under the impression I was the one who'd been drugging you over the years. I wanted you to know that isn't true.”
Did she think I was born yesterday?
“You really expect me to take your word for it?”
The voices from the crowd beyond grew louder. People started gathering around the circle, readying for departure.
“No, I don't, but I thought you should know so you stay vigilant. Blaming me, making me the scapegoat, is easy. The perpetrator might still be at large.”
I shrugged off her warning. With very little time left before we were required at the circle, I blurted out the burning question that had hung over my head like a raincloud.
“How long have you known my power came from Llyr and not D?n?”
Granny stood, pushing past me towards the others. “Some time.”
There wasn't much time to think about her admission before Aeron announced that it was time to depart. The Cyngor Blaen would step through the circle first, then each of us would follow in our order of results. As I fiddled with the ends of my hair, Dylan stepped to my side.
“You good?” He nodded towards my grandmother.
His question surprised me. “Oh, sure. She was just congratulating me on my win.”
Dylan lifted a questioning brow, but I ignored it, changing the subject.
“As a seasoned competitor who's made it this far twice before, any advice for this ritual?”
Dylan's jaw worked as he considered his answer.
“Not really. This is the easy part. Lie on an altar while Aeron calls to the gods and douses you in Witchfire. Apparently, the god that has chosen you will speak to you directly and claim you as a vassal. Zenn said the part where their power travels through realms and into you feels weird. Then, hey, presto, you are a vassal.”
His casualness about being chosen by a god made the ball of nerves ease in my chest.
“How does the being chosen part feel?
“I got as far as the doused in Witchfire part, and then it was radio silence.”
Dylan's off mood meant I didn't keep pressing about his experience, although I desperately wanted to know more. Had he ever wondered why he wasn't chosen?
Aeron clapped his hands and gestured for everyone to huddle around the circle a little closer.
“The Cyngor Blaen wishes you the best of luck.” And with that, he stepped through the circle.
It didn't take long for the Cyngor Blaen to make their way to the ritual.
All I needed to do was step over the line like I had a hundred times before, so why was I so nervous?
Truthfully, I had given very little thought to the becoming a vassal part of the whole thing.
Not dying had been such a priority that I hadn't even considered getting this far.
The rest of the Covens had gone ahead and would be spectators at the ritual, eager to find out who would be chosen by what god. The thought of standing in front of a large crowd made me grateful that we'd not been able to see them during any of our trials.
I took one final look at the others, lingering on Dylan's face. He broke our eye contact quickly and just mumbled a good luck.
All summoning circles were unpleasant to say the least, but the sensation of falling in every direction over and over was usually over quickly. This one went on for an eternity.
When I landed, I felt nauseous beyond belief and looked up to see the circle had dropped me right in the middle of a raised stone platform in front of the crowd.
Some began clapping, a cheer or two could be heard coming from the back, but these people were less than enthusiastic that I had placed first in the Anoethau.
To my right, someone whispered for me to move, and I turned to see Jazz beckoning me over to stand next to them. They stood to one side of the platform with Addae. The Cyngor was lined up at the centre of the makeshift stage.
“Where is this place?” I whispered to Jazz as I looked beyond the crowd.
We were on an island, a rather small one as it was only just big enough for the thousands of Coven members to congregate on. Beyond the land, a storm raged, grey skies looming over us, and the waves crashed against the rocky border of the island.
“Ynys Gwales, our sacred land. That's why we couldn't bring any weapons,” Jazz whispered back.
Patting my body, it seemed Jazz was right. My daggers had vanished while I was travelling through the circle.
“They're safe, don't worry. The circle would have delivered them safely to our room.”
I hadn't had my daggers long, but the absence of them at my sides felt like I was missing a limb.
When I kept looking at the landscape around us with confusion, Jazz leaned in to clarify. “This is the site where the gates to Annwn once stood before they were closed. Although there isn't much left anymore, there's still a faint trace of the same magic left in the stones.”
Jazz pointed to the stone altar that sat on top of a small hill behind the platform. The altar was flanked by ten monoliths, each carved with a different person.
“And they are?” I eyed the carvings.
“Five stones to represent the five children of D?n, five for the five children of Llyr.”
“Why are Llyr's children here if these were the gates to Annwn? Wouldn't they be placed where the gates to Annwfyn once stood?”
Jazz seemed to shift uncomfortably at my question. “The location where the gates to Annwfyn once stood isn’t know. That's why the Witches of Llyr come here to be chosen; this is all that remains of either realm.”
I wanted to ask more, but the flash of red light from the summoning circle distracted me as Dylan folded from nothing.
As he landed, the crowd roared, most of the noise being made by those wearing black habits who had congregated on one side of the platform.
He moved to stand next to Caerwyn, seeing as he served a dual role in the ritual as Ail to a Coven and a competitor.
The others came through one by one. The crowd had a decent reaction to Seren and Lleucu, but the biggest cheers by far were for Mared.
I supposed being the daughter of the leader of all the leaders made her well-liked.
I'd had very little interaction with her during my time here, but she seemed decent.
Compared to others I'd come across from the Central Coven, like Brychan, Mared was a ray of sunshine.
She beamed as she waved to the crowd. I looked at Aeron, expecting to see the face of a proud father, but if anything, he looked bored.
It hadn’t occurred to me that Aeron was married until I stumbled upon his wife. And the more I thought about the timid woman I’d seen during the last trial, the stranger it seemed that she was his wife at all.
Aeron stepped forward, a cold look of indifference on his face as usual.
“Before we begin, I want to take a moment to honour those we've lost in our quest to prove ourselves to the gods. Many of you have lost loved ones during this Anoethau, as others have before you. The gifts we receive from the gods are great, and the trials you have faced are but a small way to show your worth. These trials are a tradition ingrained deep within our history, but year after year, fewer are chosen to serve as vassals. I wish to remind you all that reaching this point does not guarantee the gods will find you worthy.”
He gave a pointed look at Dylan.
Aeron moved towards a set of crooked stone steps that jutted out from the face of the hill and made his way up them.
Jazz nudged me forward. “You're supposed to follow him.”