6. Turning of Winter, Warnings of Spring
Turning of Winter, Warnings of Spring
Dimness wrapped the world as the sun slept, too tired to rise more than two hands over the southern hills.
The true cold of winter had yet to come, but the low sun and short days made men shiver and dream of summer's days and of good fires even so.
Restless, Tuathal walked around and around the base of the hill, words tumbling in his mind as water tumbled over rocks in a stream.
It was not the road that called him, no, but the stones, the old stones that carried secrets.
The old ones had raised them, used them, taught the very rocks to dance under the light of stars and moon, or in the thickest mists and fogs of the winter.
Songs he knew, songs so old none now living knew the meanings in full, songs that moved the stones to dance.
They were not for common singing or entertainment, yet they had to be sung, kept alive.
Why that was so Múntiad Allav Aineran had not said when he taught them to Tuathal, Glanmor, and Bedwyr.
Now Tuathal walked, chanting the songs in the silence of his own head, reciting the tales of the old ones' power and doings.
He needed to go out, to sing the songs. He returned to the hall and gathered cloak and clarsach, then turned his steps east, toward the valley behind the hills. Fiachta had given his bards leave to come and go as they chose or needed, and so Tuathal went.
A little mist hovered over the pastures, fading as the day grew lighter, softening the distant land.
Gray covered the sky, gray with scattered bits of blue, tattered like torn cloth or snagged wool on a thorn.
Cloaked crows croaked, and a wren answered from the hedge.
He touched the rowan in the pouch on his belt.
Should a raven appear ... He'd give full respect to the bird, lest he find to his sorrow that more than a bird looked out from the wise black eyes.
Once around the bend of the road, he turned along the foot of the hills, staying clear of pasture and farm.
Today and tonight were not so uncanny as the dying of the year, true, but the veil hiding the worlds thinned.
Given what he sought, avoiding man and man's beasts would be wise.
A faint trail led along the edge of the rise, just above the damp places and springs at the foot where the land grew flatter.
He skirted hard gray stones, grass-bare and cold.
Snow whitened the higher hills to the north.
A few trees, left for shade and beast shelter, dotted the flanks of the rough green and stony gray slope.
There. Ahead, down in the flats, he beheld a row and cluster of stones, tall and splotched with age.
The double row led to a mound, stone-flanked on one side, grassy and gently sloped on the other.
One of Fiachta's sire's farmers had dug into the mound, thinking to find treasure and to level it for plowing, to use the stones for fences and byres.
He'd died, crushed by one of the tall, squared stones as he tried to remove it.
Of the treasure from the mound no trace had been found by the man's family, nor by Fiachta.
The priests of the god of the land had held rituals, slaughtered a sheep, and buried fine bronze and iron to lift the curse from the land.
Grazing aye, but naught else might be done in the field.
Tuathal nodded. The old ones' secrets remained theirs to keep, unless a man found something in the open, under sun and stars, rain washed.
The low southern sun bloomed under the clouds, sending long dark shadows north from the stones.
Dark fingers pointed to the mound. Tuathal found a dry place for the clarsach's case and removed the instrument, then tuned it and perched on a sturdy bit of stone wall.
He listened to the wind in the scattered trees, the faint calls of crows and other birds, the soft whispering hiss of wind ruffling the long grass around the stones, ungrazed for the past days.
He took a long breath, touched fingers to strings, and began to play.
Old, old notes came from the wires, ancient when Múinti Aineran had been young, older still when the white-haired master taught them to Tuathal.
Words half understood came with the notes, words of the making and unmaking of stone rings and patterns, of pictures of bulls and horses and other beasts on the stones, of gods half beast and wild.
Power answered, flowing as the wind through the great valley.
Out of the corners of half-closed eyes Tuathal saw movement, the stones swaying with the notes as the old songs took life once more.
A lament followed, the song of a bard without his people, standing among their works but seeing none of his kin and blood.
Did stones weep? A happier tune, one of a war of words and trees, of stone and fur and feather, swirled in the air.
Again the tall, roughly squared stones moved, back and forth as a double row of dancers, turning then returning to their places.
The magic was not his, but of the stones.
The bards' songs only woke what slept there, adding nothing. That Aineran had made oh, so clear.
Two more songs, and Tuathal fell silent. No, these were not for court and hearth, not for his people or even his mother's kindred. They belonged to the stones, the old ones, the ones before the Brytheen and Dunalaid and the wall builders of the south.
Memory refreshed, songs sung, Tuathal loosened the wires on the clarsach and returned it to the case.
As he did, he heard a sound, a quiet throat clearing.
He turned toward the stones. A tall figure in green and brown, cloak hemmed in brilliant blue, inclined a hooded head toward him.
Wary, Tuathal bowed low. When he straightened, only a stone stood where man had been, green and brown spotted, with hints of bluer stone visible on the edges in the low winter light.
He shivered and wasted no time returning to the path, then to the great hill and his brother's hall.
The red and gold of the fire welcomed him and beer and bread eased the last of the day's chill from his spirit.
Had he truly seen ... ? He sipped the sharp, rich beer.
Things moved at the moving of the sun and year, things not his to question.
He cherished Meren's company that night in his bed, soft and warm, only a man and a woman together.
Eight days later, he joined Fiachta, Aisling, and Tiernan as they took bronze and iron, cloth and bread, down the hill and north, to the great pool in the marsh.
A trackway led from the dry land out into the deep, open waters, black and sour, waters that froze only in the coldest of years.
"Our thanks for the waters, for land and the fruits of the land," Fiachta called, tossing a fire-twisted iron sword, rings of gleaming bronze, a torc of gold, and cloak pins into the depths.
"Our thanks for grass and grain, hay and wheat, meat and wool," Aisling chanted before giving the cloth and bread to the waters. She and her man retreated half-way up the trackway, mindful of slickness of the wet wood across the mire.
Tiernan poured beer and mead onto the dark surface. "For the fruits and grain, for honey and sun, for water of life and wisdom, we give thanks."
Tuathal closed his eyes for a moment, reaching inside for words.
Words and awan answered. "Great presence in the land, Braha of the waters, dark lady of the depths, Braha of the lake, thanks for all that is given.
Honor to she who stirs the waters sweet and bitter, clear and clouded, cold and warm.
Light of day on your waters, light of moon on your waters, our thanks float on your waters, oh Braha of the flowing stream.
Accept our gifts, Dark Haired one, graceful Lady of the Waters.
" He bowed and released the words. They seemed to float, then settle like water birds alighting at the end of day.
He bowed once more, backed, then turned and followed the others along the half-floating wood.
Once all had returned to dry land, and walked back to the great hill, Aisling beckoned. Tuathal hurried forward. "My lady?"
"It is said that some no longer give gifts of metal and goods to the land and waters?"
He thought. "The farmers of the south dig into a corner of the field and pour milk and grain into the land, then cover the place.
They have not much metal. The men of the east leave gifts at fords still, and a few in marshes.
I have heard a trader say that on the eastern lands, far from here, they give only lives save after battle.
Then they give the weapons and gear of those who were defeated, along with their bones and some heads.
The merchant sounded uncertain, and said that he had not seen such, but he had not sought out the places of offering, either. "
"He was wise," Aisling said after some thought. "We will honor the land in the proper ways, as has brought help and life in the seasons past."
Tuathal inclined his head. "Change only for having something new does not always bring good things."
That afternoon, as he listened to some of the arms men recounting their fights and hunts as they tended their weapons, a flash of gold caught Tuathal's eye.
He turned his head to see better. A trio of servant women washed and gently dried bronze mirrors, combs, and lamps.
The metal gleamed like dark gold in the weak winter sun, cloud and distance dimmed.
The sight stirred a memory of a place without bronze.