His boat, of course, was gone.
The narrow strip of beach at the foot of the cliffs had afforded little in terms of protective places to secure it, and though he had done his best, anchoring it to a jagged boulder in a hollow as far up the sand as he could, Geraint had not anticipated leaving it there for a fortnight. One or two days and it might have held, but the small craft and insufficient mooring was no match for the dozens of high tides that must have transpired in his absence — not to speak of more tremors that may have happened in the meantime. He stared at the empty sand, bereft of so much as a splinter of his transport, and silently cursed the gwyllion, the earthquakes, and the...no.
Not the sea.
He sighed, and turned his feet to the south.
The island seemed much bigger, traveling by land. He set his mind on Eilwen's declaration that it was a two-day journey, though he had his doubts; after all none of the island's inhabitants had need to measure a distance they were forbidden to travel, but if anyone knew, it would be the Daughters who ruled it. Nevertheless, if he marched always south, he was sure to come out somewhere near his intended destination sooner or later - hopefully the former, since he was out of food, and hopefully in enough time for his information to be of some use, if it were at all. He could not be quite sure, nor did he know whether Angharad would approve of the bargain he had struck. It had seemed, at the time, perfectly reasonable; brilliant, even, in the breadth of solution it offered. Now he thought upon it and wondered at his own confidence at something that sounded so fantastic, so beyond the pale; perhaps it had been a trick of the fae, the ulterior motive of the gwyllion all along, and he had doomed the island to an enchantment and entanglement that might only make matters worse. But it was no use fretting about it now. He had the answers, or at least some of them; what the enchantresses of Llyr did with them was their own decision.
And so he walked determinedly, swiftly, glancing and then staring hard, at times, at his surroundings, with a growing sense of bewilderment. Things looked...or felt...different, in a way difficult to pinpoint. Occasionally a boulder seemed to loom into his peripheral vision at an odd angle, but lay ordinary and innocuous when he turned his startled eyes toward it. A patch of moss or a tuft of brush that caught his attention, the way a window in a wall draws the eye, on further investigation bore no apparent difference from those surrounding it, yet it pricked at his consciousness, made him look again, and again, never quite satisfying him, as though its very ordinariness was a thin veneer over something strange and eldritch.
The perception dawned on him so slowly that he could not be sure it was real, and even as it continued, he questioned his senses, tried to push it from his mind. Nothing, it was nothing...but there it was again, an itch at the edge of his sight, a glimmering in places that had no business doing so. He began to glare rather irritably at such anomalies, suspecting that he was once again the target of some fairy prank. Hadn't they had their fill of sporting with him yet? If they were going to call his attention to various bits of landscape they might alert him of something useful, at the very least, like a patch of edible mushrooms. He sustained himself upon handfuls of green blackberries that grew in profusion, comforted by the notion that if they were enchanted they'd be riper and taste better, and steadfastly ignored the strangeness.
By midday he noted in relief that the phenomena dwindled in frequency as the hills began to flatten, and gradually as the land sloped into gentle and grazed fields the oddities became very rare indeed. By early afternoon they had ceased altogether, a cessation he suspected coincided with his leaving the forbidden quarter and its unseen inhabitants well behind, though there had been no obvious boundary.
He walked until darkness fell, and was cheered by the sight of lights on the horizon; too far-off to be dwellings where he might beg a night's lodging but signs of habitation at least. He slept in the lee of a boulder in the summer warmth, and was up before dawn the next morning, keeping the pale light at his left hand. Passing within sight of the odd cluster of cottages or sprawling farmhouse, he kept to himself, though tempted to beg a day's bread; if he stopped anywhere in such remote locations where travelers were no doubt novelties, he would be obliged to tarry and explain himself. Better to tighten his belt and keep marching; his cottage held food stores, and Angharad was waiting for him.
Angharad. It could not be said that his step quickened automatically every time he thought of her, for she never left his mind, but when he pictured her there in the cove, waiting at his hut, his heart skipped a beat and his feet seemed to chase after it, for a moment, until he reminded himself sternly that the odds of her being present when he arrived there were very low. Still, he would see her soon. Soon. Had she really gone every day to look for him, as she had said? How it must be worrying her, his being gone so much longer than they had all anticipated. Suppose it had been even longer than a fortnight; he had only guessed by the moon, after all; suppose it had been a month, or a whole year, or...or a hundred years, as in the story, while he stood trapped in the netherworld of Pentre Gwyllion. He paled at the thought, feeling suddenly nauseous, stopped stock still and shook himself. No, it could not have been so long; for one thing, here he was, ill-groomed but apparently not significantly older than he had been when he'd gone in. And besides, the gwyllion would never have let him go on a bargain they knew could not be filled. And no matter how long it had been, there was nothing to do but go on.
He thought, as he marched, of what he had learned, the tapestry that had been woven for him; he shook it and spread it out within his mind, marveling at the story it told, fumbling for words to match its colors. It had felt like a living thing as the gwyllion had woven it, a creation that breathed and grew of its own accord, and he felt, with a pang, that it would be somehow paler upon his lips, and that he was an unworthy messenger of so much magic. But it played in his mind, a story worth the telling, a riddle worth the answer, and he wondered what they would do with it.
Evening fell, and a velvet night, and he walked on under the stars until the ground became rough, wishing he had a Pelydryn of his own to light the way. Exhausted, he slept on the flat turf and dreamed of the sea, a blue eternity, stretching from one end of the earth to the other, and a white ship upon it, shining like a pearl, with a dark-haired captain at its helm, a star bound to his brow.
He awoke to a grey mist that promised rain, and trotted southward as quickly as he could, waylaying a shepherd boy over the next hill to inquire how far he was from Abernant. The lad gaped in astonishment, but motioned south, stuttering something in the range of "two hours or so" once he came to the coast and followed it. Geraint thanked him and went on with renewed vigor. He was rewarded by the sky breaking upon him the moment he came in sight of the thin blue line of sea over the edge of land, and realized that before he found any shelter he would be as wet as he could possibly get anyway, so he might as well keep walking. Grumbling, he turned and followed the coastline, wishing he had the power to dry himself with a word. Or do anything magical at all, for that matter.
Dangerous thoughts lay in that direction, thoughts he had suppressed for days, but whether from hunger or weariness or cold rain or some combination of all of it he did not have the strength to resist them now, and they settled like a dark thundercloud over his spirit. He wondered, tortuously, about the faceless men who might, even now, be gathering at Caer Colur, vying for Angharad's hand. What great powers would they display, what mysterious wonders, what arts that made them eligible to stand beside her, officially sanctioned by law and tradition? And once she had been forced to choose one of them, sworn an oath, duty-bound, to another man...where did that leave him?
How long could he stay here, only to be with her in stolen moments, both of them living a lie, possibly a dangerous one - cuckolding an enchanter was undoubtedly risky despite Angharad's protection, and it was an abhorrent idea in any case, an insult against his every notion of honesty and honor. The last few weeks with her had been madness, an ecstatic delirium, but it was all fire and fury; it was no foundation to build a life upon. She had said it herself, that night of the storm: there was no future here for the two of them.
Yet what future was bearable without her?
He grit his teeth to keep from groaning aloud, as the memory of her farewell to him pressed itself into his mind; her charge to him; his fervent vow to return to her, the tears she had wept and the arms that had held him fast. If staying was unthinkable, leaving her was more unthinkable still. And so he would be held here, bound by a spell stronger than magic, where he might see her from a distance but never touch her, meet her in public as a stranger and a subject while his heart consumed itself for want of her, watch her bear another's children while his own remaining years stretched out, alone and barren and unfulfilled.
If the island could be saved, that is. Suppose it were not - suppose his journey and his quest came to nothing, that the information he carried was useless, and that the Daughters' best efforts failed to defend their land against Arawn. If Llyr itself were lost, the island, its people, and its House - crumbled into the sea, wouldn't that set her free from all obligation, if only she survived it —
He stopped himself in horror that he could entertain, even for an instant, the thought of such loss for his own gain, and wrested his mind from the dark spaces it had begun to slide into. He quickened his pace, trotting through the rain, as though perhaps he could outdistance his own baser instincts, leave behind all memory of such capability, afraid to examine its implications in full. But the shame of it drove him forward, and when the thatched roofs of Abernant came into view he abandoned his original intention to stop there, skirting them with a sharp stab of lingering guilt, and marched on toward the cove.
The familiar cliffs rose into view and he sighed with relief, suddenly crushingly weary. For all that he was used to travel and exposure, and enjoyed a starry roof over a couch of green-smelling turf, there was nothing quite like a real bed and shelter - especially in such weather. The downpour that had begun that morning had slowed to a cold and relentless drizzle, and he thought longingly of the cosiness of his tiny hut, his supply of food...and the anticipation of company.
There it was; his own cottage, he was home. Geraint paused, at the mouth of the downward path into the cove, to examine the phrase in some surprise. He had never had his own dwelling, not since he had set his foot out of his father's house and not looked back; he had wandered a vagabond ever since, and the excitement and adventure of it had pleased him, but never had it given him such an odd little thrill of pride and comfort as did the sight of the thatched roof in the cleft below. Yes, despite his misgivings and doubts, he had come to call it home, in his heart if not in words, and the knowledge twisted at his heart. His home? Yes, for all intents...but not hers.
Imagine if she were waiting there for him, beside a warm hearth, to welcome him as he had seen his mother welcome his father home after a journey, to spend an evening in the joy of reunion, in laughter and love and the light of her smile...
But no smoke rose from his chimney, and the windows were shuttered. He trudged down the path heavily. Heart thudding, he pushed his door open, and the wan light of the wet afternoon pushed feebly into the chill darkness of the interior.
Setting his pack on the floor, he crossed to the hearth and busied himself with flint and tinder, shivering while he tended the sparks until a respectable flame licked its way through kindling, caught and blazed with a promising crackle. Only once the dried turf burned reliably did he rise and strip off his wet clothes, wring them out and hang them on nails protruding from the rafters. He danced before the small flames to dry himself, and crossed to the shelf in the corner where he kept his meager stash of spare garments.
And paused there in confusion, blinking at the space in the dim light. His spare clothing was gone.
He looked about the room, bewildered, and realized, for the first time, that his hut was, in various small ways, not as he had left it. He had little in the way of furnishings, but what he had were not in their places. Various of his tools that were normally propped in the corner, or hanging from the rafters, were missing.
He stood in the middle of the room, hair prickling eerily. Someone had been here, presumably not Angharad nor the other women in her confidence - what need would they have of his clothing or tools? Why would they have disturbed them? But why would anyone else come at all? A thief, he supposed, with a surge of indignation - a thief, in his home, helping himself to his hard-earned belongings; let the culprit return and he'd get more than he bargained for! Yet what an odd assortment of things had been taken. His bedding had been left behind, thank goodness; Geraint wrapped himself in his woolen blanket and threw more turf on the fire, willing his garments to dry faster.
The thief had evidently not been hungry enough to search for food; his store of salted fish, dried mushrooms, turnips and other provision was untouched, in the tiny root cellar he had dug in the corner near the door. He cooked, and ate, wondering all the while, feeling as though the last several days - or weeks? - of his life had been an exceedingly strange dream. Indeed he would have been tempted to believe it really was a dream, but for the silver pendant that still dangled from his neck, and the white scar on his breast beneath it.
The drum of the rain, a long-empty belly finally filled, and the long journey had predictable effects; long before the grey day had worn away into darkness, he had dropped to his pallet, and knew nothing more until the morning.
A shout from outdoors woke him, and he sat up in confusion; it was not Angharad's voice but a man's...no, a woman's...several voices, in fact, that he knew at once, and he scrambled up, snatching his clothes from their hooks over the hearth and hurriedly wrestling them on, shouting that he'd be out in a moment. There was a scuffling at his door, boys' voices laughing, a muffled cry of "Storyteller! Are you awake?", and Nia Tanner's scolding.
"Boys! Get you away from his door! Poor man has a right not to have his own house invaded by hooligans. He'll open it in his own good time."
Geraint threw the door open with an astonished laugh, and Marlen and Maddox tumbled in like puppies, shouting greetings. Behind them, Mawrth and Nia were approaching, looking mildly exasperated, but glad to see him. "A good morning to you, I hope, Geraint of Gellau," the tanner called out.
Geraint untangled himself from the clinging boys and strode forward, clasping them both by the hands in turn. "And to you! Well met, my friends - a surprise, indeed."
Nia grinned, reached up and chucked his unshaven chin. "Look at you. As wild as a highland Alban. That's what comes of living alone. When were you going to come visit again?"
He laughed, self-deprecating. "I should have, long since...but what brings you out so early?"
"It's on our way," said Mawrth, his blue eyes crinkling warmly in his lined face. He reached into a pack slung from his shoulder, and drew out a bundle. "Wanted to bring these to you, since we were passing."
Geraint took the bundle and unrolled it to reveal two tanned rabbit skins, golden-brown fur and supple-suede hide, as butter-soft as anything one might wish to wrap around a newborn infant. His heart stopped for an instant, and he opened his mouth to thank them, and found he could not speak around the choking tightness in his throat. He stood, almost frozen, staring at the skins, until he was pummeled from behind by one of the boys.
"Maddox Tanner, you ruffian!" Nia pounced on her sons and yanked them away for a dressing-down, and Geraint, broken from his trance, caught Mawrth's curious and concerned glance, coughed, and stammered out his thanks.
"'Twas nothing." The tanner waved a brown hand. "All the boys' work. Sorry for the roughhousing. We're on the way to the castle for the betrothal, and they're as frantic as netted fish."
Geraint felt his scalp crinkle. Dread settled in his spirit, a stone to drag him to earth. "Betrothal?"
"Aye, for the Princess Angharad." Mawrth slung his pack back over his shoulder. "She's to be wed in a few days, and everyone's invited as can manage the trip. Better than a festival. Come with us, if you like. You've been living here all summer but never seen Caer Colur, have you?"
"I..." Geraint searched for words, but they fled from him, and abruptly he stepped around Mawrth and toward the beach, staring out upon the blue expanse of water, his ears filled with a roaring that had nothing to do with the thunder of the surf. He heard his own voice stammer over the pounding of his heart. "I thought...that is, I had heard rumor that she...she would marry at the end of the summer."
Mawrth grunted. "Pushed up, for some reason; maybe she's settled on someone sooner than expected. That's part of the spectacle, you know, there'll be a ceremony tomorrow for her suitors to present themselves; all enchanters of one sort or another, so it'll be a good show, they say." Geraint saw him shrug from the corner of his eye. "Anyway, Nia insisted we go. Likes a day off, now and then, and the chance doesn't come often."
Geraint clutched the rabbit skins in his hands until his knuckles went white, trying to think of something that might sound like an ordinary response. Nothing came to him; his mind tumbled over itself in a confused and tormented snarl of tangled thoughts.
Mawrth was a concerned shadow at his elbow. "Here, now. Something frets you, lad?"
Geraint looked at him, and opened his mouth, closed it again. Mawrth's puzzled frown scanned his face, and dropped to the crescent moon that still dangled over his breastbone, plainly displayed between the strings of the neckline he had not thought to tie.
Geraint moved instinctively to hide it, too late. The tanner stared, from the pendant to his face and back again, with an expression of the kind of bafflement born less of confusion than the inability to believe the truth.
"Is that...," Mawrth mumbled faintly.
Geraint thought, briefly, of lying - claiming he had found the pendant, or stolen it - but knew at the same moment it would sound even more ludicrous than the truth. No mere man could steal a thing from Angharad of Llyr, even if he wanted to, and no one knew that more than the people of this island.
He dropped his concealing hands in surrender. "Yes," he whispered, "it is."
He offered nothing by way of explanation or excuse. Mawrth's sea-blue eyes searched his face keenly, and then looked beyond him, out to the water. "Well," the older man said, in a bewildered tone, and then, again, "well. Hm."
Maddox and Marlen were running along the waterline, tossing pebbles into the small breakers, while Nia trailed behind them, her skirts kilted up, tucking washed-up kelp into a knapsack. Geraint watched them, wondering, against his own will, what it would look like, how it would be, if the children were his own, if the woman were—
"By the tides, lad," Mawrth blurted out, in a low and fervent mutter. "When Nia kept after you to take up with an island girl, she didn't mean aiming straight for the throne. What have you been about?"
"I didn't plan it," Geraint stammered, and fumbled with the chain at his neck, unclasping it and clutching the pendant in his fist. "Neither of us did. It all began innocently enough. We met by accident when she came here to gather things for their rituals and...and..." he shrugged helplessly, dropped to the boulder where she always sat, and ran a hand through his hair in agitation. "She liked my stories." His voice broke. "She loves my stories, Mawrth."
"Hunh," Mawrth grunted, looking at him with mingled awe and skepticism, that changed, over a few silent seconds, into pity. "So much that she gave you that treasure, there? Must be some stories."
"There have been many," Geraint murmured, "but there is one I still must tell her." His fist clenched around the crescent until the horns bit into his fingers. "The most important one of all."
Mawrth shook his head. "You'll never get an audience. No one sees a Daughter the week of her wedding except those in the ceremonies themselves. The Hall will be full of courtiers for the presentation; we'll be lucky to get a spot in the courtyard." He rubbed his chin, looking wry. "I suppose you're determined to tell her before she's married."
Geraint flinched at the thought. "Only because I think I am unlikely to see her again, after that." He turned the pendant over in his hand, watched the sunlight tease sparks from the gem. "I must return this to her. It was no gift for my possession, but a charge and a token."
"But how did you not know about the betrothal?" Mawrth pressed. "Surely she told you."
"I have been away since before full moon," Geraint answered, "on a mission for her. When I left, there was no such plan. Not until summer's end."
Another silence fell, punctuated by a vague grunt from Mawrth. Geraint could not help wishing the man was gone, that they were all gone, that he could be alone for one blessed hour and give full vent to the storm brewing in his breast. But there was no time - not for lament, not for rage, not for grief - only for how he might fulfill the charge Angharad had laid upon him.
The shouts of the boys fell upon his ears again and he looked at them, young and beautiful in their exultation; Nia, laughing at their exuberance, her figure straight and strong and her hair fluttering in the wind off the water. He turned away, in despair, from the vision of that which could never be, and filled his eyes with the one before him. This family; this, and so many others - all lived on an island whose uncertain future rested upon the edge of knowledge only he currently possessed.
Painfully he wrestled down his grief. Angharad was as good as lost to him, and there would be time enough to mourn her; all the rest of his life, and every life after, perhaps. But now...
Geraint stood up, and turned to Mawrth. "I will come," he said quietly, "but say nothing of any of this to Nia. I would that my real purpose stays hidden, and the fewer are aware of it, the less trouble it may be for all."
Mawrth nodded. "You're welcome with us, no matter your purpose. But good Llyr, lad, what do you think you'll be able to do?"
"I'm not sure," Geraint admitted, "but I won't find a way to do it by staying here."
He returned to his hut, gathered up his pack, and filled it with provisions from his food stores, mechanically packing while his mind raced. Angharad's words played in his memory; her white face and blazing, commanding eyes. You must not come to the castle.
He had acquiesced. But that was before. She would not come here again, and he had no way of knowing if Eilwen or Arianrhod would visit in her stead. If he were to fulfill his quest, he must break his word to her, go to the place she had forbidden. There was no other way, and yet even there, how was he to reach her? A traveling bard might beg hospitality at any castle gate, but he was no such thing, no matter his talents, no matter what festivities were at hand.
Festivities. A betrothal. What had Mawrth said? There'll be a ceremony tomorrow, for her suitors to present themselves.
Geraint paused, breathless. For her suitors to present themselves. Part of the spectacle. All enchanters. It'll be a good show.
A spark of hope flared in his heart, trembling, and he wrapped the jeweled pendant and tucked it into his tunic, secure, resolved.
Yes. It would be a good show. The greatest performance of his life. And, quite possibly, the last.