Lady Of The Lake
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The water moved as it always did, with strange currents skating from bank to bank. Swells rose midlake and ran off to flood the fens. Whirlpools churned, then abruptly ceased, and the black water went as flat as a griddle. There were none alive who could divine the portends of the lake. In ages past, the princesses of Leam could interpret each omen they witnessed. But Tala couldn’t.
The only power that had come down to her generation was the ability to find water in dry earth. The chain of knowledge had been broken with the coming of the monks.
But it was an unheard-of catastrophe for no rain to fall between Beltane and Lughnasa. The three most fertile months of the growing season had so far passed without a drop of rain to replenish the rivers and streams.
And that tragedy had opened the ancestral mind of the people of Leam. They remembered the old rituals and sacrifices that had saved their land long years ago.
Like Tala, Venn and Mother Wren, every remaining soul born of Leam knew that if no rain fell between today and August 1, the only thing that would save them was the blood sacrifice of the atheling of Leam. The feast of the first fruits—Lughnasa—was Leam’s last chance to redeem the gods’ favor.
If they ignored the dire predictions of the past, in less than a generation they would all be dead.
In the fat years recently past, the ritual had dwindled to sacrificing the first grains and fruits gleaned from the fields, as a symbolic offering to guarantee the harvest. In years of dire tribulation such as this, only the sacrifice of the first blood—the son of the king or the king himself— could appease the angry gods.
Venn was the atheling of Leam. Only he could end the drought. Only his blood and body offered in sacrifice could guarantee Leam’s survival past this year. That fact may as well be written in stone. Everyone knew it as truth. Venn’s only salvation was rain. Plentiful rain falling in the days left in July was the only means to avert Venn’s early and untimely death.
Tala had no more faith in the old ways than she had trust in the new. She didn’t believe her only brother’s death would bring on the rain. She didn’t believe the old druid Tegwin had the power to work such magic. In her heart she believed that Venn’s sacrifice would change nothing. He would give his life and the drought would continue, unabated by divine intervention.
Tala knew even less about the new god, this Christ that her guardian, King Alfred, revered. But she knew he must be powerful if King Guthrum was willing to put his people to death if they did not accept the talisman of the cross.
If only there was someone wise and knowing she could talk to who could explain all of this to her. But she had no one. She had only this ancient lake of her ancestors, the silent spirits hidden in its depths and the confusion of her thoughts.
She prayed hard, pouring out her troubles to the Lady of the Lake. Tala sought insight and clarity, hope and solace. To make certain her desperate petition was heard, she removed her gold torque from her throat. Prayers without a sacrificial offering were an abomination to the gods.
“Lady, I beseech you. Give me a sign. Show me what I must do to save my brother’s life. He is just a boy, a puny man-child of no value to you. Venn cannot bring the rain, make the seeds sprout in your earth or hold the mighty Vikings behind your river Avon. His thin body will not feed your fish for more than a day. So why must he be taken from me? I need him. I love him. Take this torque and forget my little brother. You’ll be much happier with the gold.”
Tala extended her torque over the water. She held her breath, waiting for the Lady of the Lake to rise up from the water and accept her offering.
The dark water at her feet moved, then churned as if gathering power. A shadowy form broke the surface at Tala’s feet, throwing silvery drops onto her bare legs and breaking up the reflection of her golden torque. Her eyes followed the dark wake that bisected the still waters and her heart hammered in her throat. This was what she sought—a sign.
The fluid tension of the surface erupted in a blinding, foamy arc of silvery water beads. Tala threw her golden torque at the breaking wave. The ring of gold spun far, far out over the black water.
A pale limb shot up from a bank of waterweeds. It snatched the gold torque in midair and splashed below the surface.
Ripples washed quickly back to the pier where Tala stood. The lake undulated softly, then stilled once more. And Tala ap Griffin burst into tears.
The precious golden torque that had declared her a princess to all of her people—that she was willing to sacrifice for the life of her brother—had been snapped out of the air not by the Lady of the Lake, but by a fish.
The granary was first on Edon’s scheduled tour with Embla Silver Throat the next morning. He found the dusty building well stocked and dry. All provisions stored in barrels and well-constructed crates were in good shape. Ample seed was put aside for next year’s planting. Edon was a stickler for such details and always insisted upon holding back more than necessary.
Best of all, the granary was clean and rat free. Varmints were kept at bay by having numerous good mousers where they were most needed.
The deep well sunk in the center of the stockade and the one inside the keep were rank and fetid. Water for all purposes had to be carried from the Avon River, outside the gates of the fortress. The river itself had dropped five feet below the lip of the gate built to flood the moat surrounding the fortress on the deliberately raised motte of Warwick.
The absence of water in the deep moat to put out an assaulting enemy’s fire made Embla Silver Throat’s wooden stockade even more ridiculous, especially with so much ready stone about. Edon couldn’t see how she could be so dense. And in her greed to acquire more and more land, she allowed her freemen to continue to slash and burn the woods, when the land was dry tinder!