Book II of The Years of Bone and Ash

And what is a word? When we utter it, if it is known to us, it imparts meaning. That meaning expresses the purpose we intended when we chose that particular word.
So is this what a word is? Its meaning? Or is it the purpose behind its use? Truly, does a word even require utterance to be a word? If not, where does its meaning come from? To what purpose is an unspoken word given? What then, if it can be found in silence, is a word?

– Dael ap Owain: A Druid’s Training

A Power of Words

Dael jumped back nimbly and circled to his opponent’s left, holding his buckler high and close to his shoulder. He wove his shortsword rhythmically in tight circles to his front. His gray eyes stared into Rhodri Dda’s, determined not to be tricked again into committing himself against the old master-of-arms’ feints. The man had more tricks than a snow hare. “Watch the eyes,” he silently chanted. “Watch the bleedin’, shifty, tricky eyes.”

With a roar and fresh shower of foamy slobber, Rhodri swung his great axe high and brought it down in a backhanded swipe across Dael’s buckler. Sparks flew as the axe glanced off the small shield’s battered iron boss. Letting the momentum of the blow pull him to the left, Rhodri brought his sword up in a short arc, aimed for the boy’s ribs. But Dael used his quickness to slip out of range and continue his circling, still to Rhodri Dda’s left.

All righty there lad, the weapons master grinned, rely on ya quick wee feet all ye want. I’ll be a ‘avin’ ye jumpin’ into me steel quick as ye please. Again he attacked with a high backhanded swing of his axe, only this time he aimed carefully so that the heavy iron axe crashed into the buckler’s near side just where the boss attached. The impact sent sparks flying. More than the boy’s strength could withstand, it drove him to his knees where the old man’s bright blade was waiting once again.

“Lad, lad,” Rhodri shook his head, stepping back and casually clouting the side of Dael’s head with the flat of his sword. “Don’t always be expectin’ a clever and fancy attack. Sometimes . . . most times, it’s brute force ye’ll be a facin’. Smash and slash. Ye ‘ave to be as ready and as quick against that as ya do again’ a clever and tricky-like enemy.”

Seeing the frustration and anger cloud his young novice’s face, Rhodri Dda grinned, his few remaining teeth stained and broken as they were, affecting more of a crooked grimace despite his effort. “Ye were a thinkin’ hard ta catch old Rhodri in some fancy move there now, weren’t ya? Twas written all over yer face, lad. Yer eyes were all but a dancin’ with yer wee little plots ta trick old Rhodri Dda they were. Ye got ta be rememberin’ boyo, watch yer opponent’s eyes, but don’t be a tellin’ wi’ yer own peepers, huh! Be sneakier, more cunnin’ a the other bloody bastard and ye’ll live ta see a new day.

“All right then, lad, that be Bedwyr a walkin’ this way. Time fer yer druid’s lessons I be guessin’. We’ll be a seein’ ta ya on the morrow then. Off ye go. An’ be a checkin’ ya buckler good t’night. That last hit felt a wee soft, it did.”

Watching the boy trot down the hillside to meet Bedwyr, Rhodri Dda scratched his jaw through the unruly tangle of his beard, a perplexed frown shadowing his bloodshot green eyes. The lad ‘as a heart o’ a man twice ‘is size. And no a word o’ complaint ‘as ‘e ever so much as whispered. Ha! Almost no word, gods be told. “E be a quiet one, Bran bless ‘im. So why does old Bedwyr ‘ave me a trainin’ the boy so ‘ard? And so young? And what be a druid doin’ trainin’ wi’ a bloody sword ta boot? “Mayhap I’ll be a ‘avin’ a wee talk wi’ Nest soon,” he growled and shook his bald head, unwrapping the leather straps that held the shortened war axe to his stump and arm.

~

“From the look of you, you’ll soon have rain blowing out your ears and lightning out your arse,” Bedwyr observed, speaking to the air in a carefully neutral voice.

Dael shrugged but held his peace.

Soon enough they reached the bottom of the hill’s steep slope and Bedwyr led them south into the deeper reaches of the forest. Thick and ancient, its caliginous depths blanketed the valleys and lower heights all the way south to Caerleon and Nidum on the Severn Sea. Towering oaks and elms swallowed the druid and his apprentice in their deep shadows. Bedwyr followed a faint trail, suited more for rabbits or the solitary hart than the booted feet of men. They wound their way through great outcroppings of ageless rock, so covered in moss and ferns they looked as if a luxuriantly virid mantle had been draped over their cold hardness. Across dancing streams of clear, cool water the silent pair skipped from rock to slippery rock, climbing the far banks only to plunge again into the ever thickening wall of the endless wood.

Once, when they skirted the massive girth of a hoary old oak, its bark covered in delicate strands of moss like a fine coat of emerald fur, Bedwyr reached up and pulled a handful away, bringing it up to his nose and inhaling a deep breath of the musky, wet stuff. “Here.” He handed it to Dael. “Squeeze the water out of it and place it over that ear. You get anymore blood on your gorget, Nest’ll have you scrubbing it half the night, along with anything else she deems needs a good cleaning.”

Dael accepted the spongy clump without a word and after squeezing and shaking it several times, pressed it against his bright red and swollen left ear. At first he only felt the cool dampness against his burning ear. But after a few steps, he almost stumbled as a fierce stinging overtook first his ear, then the whole of the left side of his head and even down into his neck. Tears sprang from his now wide open eyes, running freely down his fiery cheeks. By the time he’d stumbled – for now he was – another twenty paces his entire head felt as if it had caught fire. A fierce, raging furnace of a fire. Bedwyr’s stocky back was lost in a febrile shimmer of blindness. Dael felt the thrill of panic surge through his bowels thinking the druid had gone on and left him to stagger blindly around until his very face melted away. He finally thought to pull his hand away from his ear and let go the moss. Unable to see clearly, he felt sure his head must be steaming, if not actually smoking and in flames.

“I must have forgotten to say ‘squeeze it once only, and that lightly’,” Bedwyr’s rueful voice broke through the bubbling hiss of Dael’s ears. “It tends to burn a wee bit if it’s over-handled.”

The boy almost laughed with relief at hearing the voice. He still shook, wracked with near-crippling waves of convulsive heat, but with each breath they seemed to lessen. Soon the pain receded until to his great amazement, he stopped shivering and found he could make out the vague outlines of his surroundings. And unless his fingers lied, his face – no, his entire head – wasn’t a charred, blistered, and smoldering ruin, but retained all the familiar features he considered uniquely his own. And finally, as full sight returned, the dull throbbing ache of his wounded ear seemed to have left him.

“I . . . I feel . . . good? Great in fact.” Dael drew in great lungfuls of fresh, humid air.

“Oak’s beard is a mite hard to find,” Bedwyr said on seeing the boy recover his senses, “but if you’ve an ailment or injury when you do find some, by all means, apply it to the hurt. But carefully, mind you,” he added with a grave shake of his head. “Carefully. Its potency is released by crushing when freshly harvested.”

Retrieving a small leather pouch from one of many pockets secreted amongst the folds of his voluminous brown cloak, Bedwyr dropped it in Dael’s lap. “Here. While we’re resting, go back and carefully fill this with oak’s beard. Only pull the darkest, greenest clumps. And do try not to crush the delicate hairs.” A slight grin broke the druid’s wide face. “Once you’ve dried it properly, it will make a fine tea for most ailments, and does well when added to a poultice.” Leaning on his staff, he peered down into the boy’s eyes, clear and gray once again with all the earlier anger melted away. “Off with you, lad. We’ve still a ways to go and you’ve much to learn this day.

* * * * *

“Dael! Dael! Come now lad,” Nest’s voice rang out. “Gather your things. We’re going now. Hurry up!”

Dael glanced up briefly, a harried look on his face. Kneeling alongside his raised pallet, he surveyed the full extent of his worldly possessions. Two small piles were collecting; one at the foot of the thick, wool-spun blanket and the other next to a down-filled bag he used for a pillow. Mostly though, his things lay scattered between the two. Where had he gotten all this, he mused as he picked up a small wooden carving and placed it on the left-hand pile. The right-hand held his sword, his buckler, numerous pouches of dried herbs, an old greased gray cape of Roman origin good for foul weather, and a spare set of thick woolen breeches and tunic. These he would take with him. Finally, he shook his head in exasperation and scraped everything else into the left-hand pile.

When he stood he carried his weapons and a worn leather pack slung over his shoulder. Hurrying out of his small sleeping cubicle he grabbed his prized possessions: an oddly carved short bow and a full quiver of gray fletched arrows made from ash wood. The bow, as well as the cape, had been a gift from that wandering old druid, Myrddin. He’d said the bow had come from the lands on the far side of the Roman Empire. Some place called Scy . . . Scythac or Scythia. There, if the man was to be believed, great hordes of fierce nomads rode to war on the backs of sure footed ponies, able to overwhelm their enemies with the power of their bows and unsurpassed archery skills. Myrddin told stories of these eastern warriors which captured Dael’s imagination even if they were all but unbelievable. But then, the bow’s undeniable power was something Dael had experienced, so, mayhap the stories were true also, at least in part.

By the time he hurried out of the compound, Nest, Bedwyr, and their brood of children, young and grown, were well down the road headed south. They made for the slopes of Arwystli and the bonfires of Beltine that would light the night’s sky on the eve of summer’s first day. As he settled into a long-strided walk that would catch him up within the next mile, he thought back to his conversation with Bedwyr not three days ago.

“Well, boy, that’s about all I can teach you,” his foster father had said as the two lashed the ninth and last bundle of wood – hazel, rowan and yew – onto the pony’s back. The Feast of Fire and Light required that only certain ‘sacred’ woods be burnt. “Come Beltine, we journey to the heights of Arwystli to celebrate the coming of summer. There you’ll find Myrddin waiting for you.”

“Waiting for me?” Dael grunted as he gave the bundle’s rope a final tug. “Waiting for me, why?”

Turning to look his foster son and apprentice squarely in the eye, Bedwyr answered, “You’ll be going with Myrddin to continue your studies.” Seeing the surprise and then dismay cloud the boy’s brow and tighten his lips into a thin scowl, he added, “It’s been what, boy, eight summers since you came to me, little more than a wee little thing of four winters. You’ve a good mind about you. You’ve learned about all there is that I can show you.”

Dael dropped his eyes to stare at his feet. He balled his roughened and calloused hands at his side but made no reply. Finally, he lifted his hurt and angry gaze to Bedwyr’s and said, “There’s much more that I could learn from you. But if I’ve become a burden on you and Nest, I’ll – ”

“Burden? Hell, boy, I’ll sore miss you and it broke Nest’s heart when I told her.”

“Then why?” Dael’s throat felt too tight for words.

“Because,” Bedwyr resisted the desire to lay his hand on the boy’s shoulder, “because what you need to learn now isn’t what I’m best suited to teach you. Myrddin is the one for that.”

Sighing deeply, he shrugged and reached out and grabbed Dael’s tensed shoulders in his big hands and squeezed. “Dael, boy, you’re all but a young man now. You’ve a destiny to fulfill. A powerful prophesy calls you the First Druid – a War Druid, lad. Such a thing has never existed in all of our people’s history. This is what you must learn from one such as Myrddin. All of my teaching has been to prepare you for this. And prepared you are, boy. Ready you are. So come the fires of Beltine, it’s with Myrddin you must go and learn the arts you’ll need to become the First Druid, sorcerer and warrior.”

So now he left what had been his home these past eight summers, his pitiful few truly needful possessions carried across his back or strapped to his waist. Yet Dael well understood that his true and invaluable possessions weren’t the powerful and foreign bow, or the fine Roman blade he wore on his slender hip. No indeed. But priceless was the knowledge he carried inside his head, and the discipline it had required to gain it: the lore and history of his people, the Celtae of Cymru, their gods and mysteries, who they were, where they came from, and a grim prophesy of dire foreboding that hinted at what was to become of them.

“Ah, there you are.” Nest smiled, swinging her youngest granddaughter to her other ample hip as Dael came up and gave her a quick hug of his arm. “See if any of the wee ones need a ride, will you?”

The family’s trek followed the Severn’s course as it neared its headwaters deep within the fastness of the rugged mountains running nearly the full length of western Cymru, from the kingdom of Gwynedd in the north to Dyfed and Glower in the south. They weren’t alone. Other families traveled along the well used way, mostly individually, but in groups also. No one hurried. Children ran and played under the trees with their fresh crowns of new green. The weather was clear and warm, promising a pleasant two days journey through the valleys and passes that led to the high slopes of Arwystli.

Bedwyr ranged ahead and behind. Often he could be found walking in deep conversation with three or four men. With the last of the Roman legions departed now some eighteen years, much of their talk concerned the increasing depredations of the Irish pirates to the west and their Scot cousins to the north. Already they had settled a number of colonies in the south, along the coastlines of Dyfed and Glower. Their control pushed ever inland with each passing winter. Prince Maelgwn, the Island Dragon, great grandson of the legendary Cunedda and now king of Ynys Môn and Gwynedd held firm in the north. It was his military successes that most likely forced the damned Scots and their sleek longships to seek other shores in the south to plunder and settle.

And always the Saxons and their ships harassed the island’s eastern and southern shores. The Saxon shores they were now called. The tyrant Vortigern had his hands full. Many blamed him for the Saxon inroads. He it was who had accepted the Saxon mercenaries, or what the Romans had called feoderati, to settle in Britannia in exchange for raising their war axes against their fellow Saxons as well as any others who followed. More like letting the fox guard the henhouse many now grumbled.

To all these tidings Bedwyr gave ear, occasionally offering his own thoughts. But mostly he listened and let the pieces fall into place against what he knew. And he pondered with increasing certainty and concern the darkness he feared was building, soon to find release, engulfing all the druid loved and held dear. It was at times like this he angrily wished his old friend had kept his inimical prophesies to himself. No, not really. But they cast a pall over the future that was more a burden than a boon. Just possibly, ignorance would have been bliss. Even if only for a time.

He caught up to his family as the shadows lengthened and a blue gloaming set in amongst the forest’s shadows. They had stopped and were making their night’s camp in a small clearing a short ways from the track. Two other families shared the site, their children running and playing from one camp to the other in waves of laughing, giggling voices that flowed around and through every obstacle in their way. A large fire crackled brightly in the center of the three camps. A dressed and spitted buck waited for the flames to calm before it was braced over the coals to cook.

“Well, we’ll eat fine and good tonight,” Bedwyr said as he settled down beside his wife. “Dael put that bow of his to good use.”

Nest nodded and smiled, finishing the last stitch of a repaired tunic. The last casualty of the day’s rough and tumble games. “He did indeed, bless his sweet heart. He was waiting for us and had this lovely spot picked out as we came up the path.” She folded her middle son’s tunic and carefully packed it away. With a quick look to her husband, she unbent her legs, stretching them out in front of her while she leaned back against her braced arms. “Ah-h . . . that’s better. There was a time my bones ached much less.”

Bedwyr let out a soft snort. “There was a time when nothing ached. Now, given a full day, I’m reminded of all my parts.”

Nest leaned over and bumped him with her shoulder, then leaned her head on his while they shared a quiet moment watching the shadows thicken and the fire’s flame dance.

“I’ll miss the boy,” Bedwyr said, his throat tight.

“Sweet Branwen’s tears,” Nest sighed, “won’t we all. Especially the wee ones.” She rocked her head on her husband’s shoulder, breathing deeply of his sweaty scent then added, “When Myrddin first came to us, I felt this was the right thing, the necessary thing, to do. I swear though, I had no idea what a hold our Dael would gain over my heart. I . . . I feel as if we’re feeding one of our own to old Beli Mawr himself. Or worse.”

“Aye,” Bedwyr turned his head and spoke softly into her hair. It smelled of mint, as always. “I can speak to him of his destiny and the great and mighty prophesies, but after all is said and done, I feel like I’m somehow betraying the boy to be some sort of, of sacrifice for us all.” He kissed the top of Nest’s head and rested his own against hers. After a moment he whispered, “I truly dread telling the children. Especially Arawn. He worships him like an older brother.”

“Oh, he already has.” Nest smiled proudly. ‘He wouldn’t be who he is and let you do his work for him.”

“No, of course not, bless him.”

“He took Arawn with him to hunt that buck. When they returned he had spoken to him. Then he gathered the others around and got them busy helping dress the meat while he told them. Fia got so mad at first,” Nest chuckled, “I thought she’d dress him with her knife. I didn’t hear what he said to her, but soon enough they were best friends again. He has a way with others’ anger, he does. Gets right to the pain and fear behind it. He’s promised them all a tale tonight. Before they sleep.”

“Ah, we’ve been found,” Bedwyr said as their youngest, Urien, came rushing towards them, big tears flying from his outraged eyes.

The smell of roasted venison still mingled with the sharp tang of wood smoke long after the meat itself had been consumed by the combined appetites of the three families sharing the snug glade for the night. The soft murmur of adult conversation was occasionally broken by the high chimes of a child’s laughter as they played finger games or wove elaborate webs of twine between their hands.

Dael sat on a rough log with his foster brother, Arawn, as the two steadily re-fletched several of his arrows by the soft glow of the dying fire’s embers. The two were the same age, twelve, yet Dael gave every impression of being the older. Slender to Arawn’s stockiness, he chose to wear his hair short, in the Roman style. He found it gave a helmet a better fit. His wide shoulders spoke of his father’s, gained as a woodcutter. His quiet, gray eyes were his mother’s although their depth and keenness seemed more a reflection of his tutelage under his druid foster father’s firm care. It was mostly in his gaze that the years beyond his age shown. That, and the attentive way in which he listened to those around him. And in the care with which he chose his words.

“Psst. Psst.”

Dael glanced over to Arawn, his eyebrows raised in question.

For answer, his foster brother darted his eyes towards a silent, brooding presence gathered across the coals from where the two worked. This brought a sly grin to Dael’s mouth as he returned to his arrow with only the slightest of nods in acknowledgement.

Holding the shaft out at arm’s length, he sighted down it, frowning in his effort to focus on the repaired fletchings. Slowly rolling the arrow between his fingers, he checked each row of goose quills, finally sighting the last over the glowing coals. The shimmering heat distorted, but did not in any way hide, the anxiously impatient, young faces so steadily peering at him from across the fire.

“Well,” Dael lowered the arrow and turned to Arawn, “something’s not quite right about this one. I’ll have to strip it down and start over.”

A tiny gasp, no louder than a mouse’s roar, drew his gaze across the orange haze of the coals. Huddled in an agony of muffled impatience, Fia, Gwern, Urien, and Little Llewelyn, as well as all the children from the other families, returned his gaze with desperate hope in each eye, their pleadings held tightly behind trembling lips.

“But enough for now,” Dael smiled. “Didn’t I promise someone a tale tonight?”

Like a half-score of blazing stars, the children’s faces lit up with smiles as they leapt to their feet and scrambled around the fire’s circle to throw themselves down against Dael’s feet. Urien settled into his lap while Fia and Gwern captured the ground closest to his feet – almost on his feet – with a familiar possessiveness. Llewelyn climbed up to nestle in Arawn’s arms while the others ranged themselves around, faces bright with eagerness. On hearing the muted commotion, several of the grownups turned and gave their attention to the young lad with the quiet, serious eyes and steady bow.

“So-o-o, what shall we hear tonight?” Dael frowned in thought. “The story of Bran, son of Llyr, and how he gained his magical cauldron? Or mayhap the tale of Dylan Eil Ton, Son of the Wave? No,” he shook his head slowly, “too sad was his doom for such a night as this. Ah-h, the tale of Blodeuwedd? Of flowers was she made. But no,” Dael’s easy gaze went from shining face to shining face, “of treachery and such woe we’ll have none this night.”

Dael shut his eyes, tilting his head as if he listened for a whisper on the wind. When he opened his eyes again, his audience wiggled and squirmed so with suppressed excitement there wasn’t a still bottom amongst them.

“No, tonight let us hear of courage and love, of a devotion that goes beyond life itself. It was thus for a prince of Gwynedd, Llewelyn, whose favorite hound was named Gêlert for he was a brown colored beast, huge and ferocious.”

A sigh, more felt than heard, went out from his rapt young audience as they sank into the familiar trance of a druid’s tale.

“Now when Gêlert gave cry in the hunt, all feared him for he was as brave and magnificent as a lion, but when he lay in front of the blazing hearth at his master’s feet, he was meek and gentle as the lamb.

The flower of all his race
So true, so brave – a lamb at home,
A lion in the chase.
‘Twas only at Llewellyn’s board the faithful Gelêrt fed;
He watched, he served, he cheered his lord
And sentinelled his bed.
In sooth he was a peerless hound.

“He was so tame and gentle; the prince would often entrust the hound with the care of his young wife and their small son.

“It happened one day that the prince desired to go hunting. His wife was gone visiting her sick mother and the child had fallen asleep as was his want, so Prince Llewelyn gathered his comrades and sounded his hunting horn to draw his hounds together.

The spearmen heard the bugle sound,
And cheerly smiled the morn;
And many a brach, and many a hound,
Obeyed Llewelyn’s horn.

And still he blew a louder blast,
And gave a lustier cheer;
“Come Gelêrt, come, wer’t never last
Llewelyn’s horn to hear.

“Oh where does faithful Gelêrt roam,
The flower of all his race;
So true, so brave, a lamb at home,
A lion in the chase?”

Now all the hounds answered except for the prince’s favorite, Gêlert. Dissatisfied with the delay, the prince set off with his party to hunt, without the swiftest and most tenacious of his hounds.

“The sport that day went poorly for Prince Llewelyn. In a cloud of anger, he led his companions back to his castle and what do you think was the first thing he saw? Why, Gêlert, his hound, bounding merrily to meet his master. As the hound neared Prince Llewelyn, the prince saw that the dog’s muzzle was covered in fresh blood. His brown coat was rusted with splattered blood and gore.

Unpleas’d Llewelyn homeward hied.
When near the portal seat,
His truant Gelêrt he espied,
Bounding his Lord to greet.

But when he gain’d his castle door,
Aghast the chieftain stood;
The hound all o’er was smear’d with gore,
His lips, his fangs, ran blood.

Llewelyn gaz’d with fierce surprise;
Unus’d such looks to meet,
His fav’rite check’d his joyful guise,
And crouch’d and lick’d his feet.

“Oh, but a terrible thought flew into Llewelyn’s mind, for Gêlert was used to playing with his young son and his bloody footprints did come from that part of the castle that held the nursery.

“With a cry, Prince Llewelyn ran to his young son’s chambers. As he ran, he saw the red trail, thick upon the smooth stones. Into the nursery he rushed, crying for servants and armsmen.

“There, in the corner’s shadows, was the child’s cradle, overturned with the covers and floor all covered in blood.

“No anguish could match Prince Llewelyn’s despair. He and his servants searched everywhere, but nowhere was there any sign of the tiny child. It became clear to the Prince that the hound, Gêlert, had devoured his son and heir.

“Oh, what a burning rage there was as he returned to the courtyard where Gêlert waited patiently, wagging his tail as if puzzled by his master’s behavior.

“‘Hell-hound! My child by thee devour’d!”’
The frantic father cried;
And to the hilt his vengeful sword
He plung’d in Gelêrt’s side.

His suppliant looks, as prone he fell,
No pity could impart;
But still his Gelêrt’s dying yell
Pass’d heavy o’er his heart.

“Without another word, he drew his great sword and struck the hound, thrusting the point into the animal’s side.

“Gêlert gave an agonized cry, gazed for a moment into his master’s eyes, and fell dead.

“In that moment, as Gêlert loosened his dying howl, the prince and all those present heard a little child’s answering cry.

Arous’d by Gelêrt’s dying yell,
Some slumberer wakened nigh:
What words the parent’s joy could tell
To hear his infant’s cry!

Conceal’d beneath a tumbled heap
His harried search had miss’d,
All glowing from his rosy sleep,
The cherub boy he kiss’d.

Nor scath had he, nor harm, nor dread,
But, the same couch beneath,
Lay a gaunt wolf, all torn and dead,
Tremendous still in death.

“Prince Llewelyn ran back into the nursery where the cry had come from. There, underneath the upturned cradle, where he had been asleep all along, was the Prince’s son. No one had thought to look under the upturned cot and bloody covers. Moreover, beside the child, who was entirely unhurt, there lay the carcass of a great, gaunt gray wolf. And the wolf was covered with blood and its throat torn out.

“Now the truth of what happened became clear to all.

“A wolf had entered the castle without notice, but Gêlert had sniffed out the beast and stayed to protect his master’s son. He had fought the great beast and slain it before it could give harm to the little prince.

Ah, what was then Llewelyn’s pain!
For now the truth was clear:
His gallant hound the wolf had slain
To save Llewelyn’s heir.

Vain, vain, was all Llewelyn’s woe”
‘Best of thy kind, adieu!
The frantic blow that laid thee low,
This heart shall ever rue.’

“Now Prince Llewelyn was filled with grief and remorse. He had murdered his faithful hound, betrayed his trust when honor and love should have been his rewards. Now Prince Llewelyn realized the true meaning of the old proverb: ‘The nut cannot be judged by the husk.’

“So sadder and wiser, Prince Llewelyn carried his honest hound to the slopes of Yr Wyddfa and buried him. Over his grave he raised a high cairn. So this is why the place is called Beth Gêlert, or the Grave of Gêlert. It is said that the phantom of Gêlert still hunts across the mountainside and you may hear its lonely howl on a cold winter’s night. It is the howl of a trusting, loyal soul betrayed.

“Therefore, on certain days, and especially after dark, beware as you wander across the slopes, beware of a leaping phantom hound. But only if your loyalties be fickle and your heart be weak.”

Bending down low to gaze directly into his audience’s transfixed stares, Dael slowly dragged his eyes from child to child. “Now remember well the tale of Beth Gêlert. Betray not those to whom you’ve pledged your honor and word, lest the hound, Gêlert . . . hunt you out.”

Not a child moved so much as a hair. Like little owlets they stared wide-eyed until with a crash, the last of the fire collapsed, sending coils of sparks like swirling faery into the night sky. Every child, and more than one adult, jumped at the sudden explosion.

“It’s to sleep now and sweet dreams.” Dael smiled, careful to cradle the sleeping child in his arms as he slowly stood. “Arawn,” he glanced down to his foster brother who had just set Llewelyn on his feet, “could you gather the arrows while I put young Urien here to bed?”

While Dael carried Urien to his blankets, one of the fathers, a tall lanky man of near forty winters with keen dark eyes, approached Nest and Bedwyr where they sat side by side on an open woolen blanket. “I’ll thank you for your son’s fine story,” he said in a quiet voice. “I’ve not heard a finer telling in years. Not since the bard Taliesin journeyed through our hamlet in fact. And him the bard to the young Island Dragon now, or so I hear.”

“Aye,” Bedwyr said, coming to his feet to accept the man’s compliment, “Maelgwn has succeeded his father, old Cadwallon Llaw Hir. And indeed, I hear his court boasts the finest bards in all Cymru, though I had not heard Taliesin was there. I thought him at Prince Gawr’s court here in Powys.”

“It still could be,” the man nodded and shrugged. “Much news is old news, or wrong by the time it reaches us hereabouts. I’m sure we’ll hear the right of it once we reach the slopes of Arwystili and all the folk gathered there. Well,” he dipped his graying head. “I’ll say a good eve to you good folk. I just wanted to praise your son’s telling. Fine, very fine indeed.” With a smile to Nest he turned and walked back to his family’s camp site.

As Bedwyr settled himself next to Nest again, she reached out to give his arm a squeeze. “You’ve done a true and good thing with your training. He speaks well for your efforts.”

Covering her hand with his own, Bedwyr sighed and said, “There was nothing but the best to work with, truth be told. But if we’re being truthful,” he added with a wry grin, “I hope he gives Myrddin, that old wizard, every bit as stubborn a time of it as he gave us. Good Bran, but that boy can be hard headed when he’s a mind to.”

“Well,” Nest grinned back, her teeth catching the last of the coal’s light, “just look who he’s learned from!”

“Who he’s lear –”

“Aye, who he’s learned from,” she laughed and came to her feet. “Now you get our pallet ready while I see to the children. And I don’t want to sleep on a pile of lumpy . . . whatever, like last year. You hear me.”

* * * * *

“So, boyo, I hear you make a fine telling of Beth Gêlert.”

Dael looked up from where he scrambled over the rough ground. The wind blew as it had for nigh on the past five days and nights, cold and stinging. For all of those five days and five nights he’d been cold. And hungry and tired which only seemed to make him feel the cold all the more keenly. But then, he’d been just as hungry, weary, and cold long before they had set out from Caer Swys on the banks of the Severn. “Hell,” he grumbled to himself, “winter’s the time for staying by the fire. Summer’s when you go tramping all over Rhiannon knows where. But not us. Oh no. We live outside all bloody year round. Like a pair of wild things we are.” Beth Gêlert?

“I don’t know if I make such a fine thing of it,” he grunted through cracked lips, “but it’s a tale I admire.”

“Your foster kin seemed to like your telling. Fia and Gwern especially.”

Why in all the frozen underworlds is the old druid going on about that? It only made him think back to the last time he’d seen all of them, at Beltine, just as the fine warmth of summer settled over the land like a virid breeze – warm, fresh, and full of new life and promise. And here I am, stumbling along in the bloody snow and wind trying to keep up with this old goat. Up, up, up the bloody side of this bloody mountain.

“Did you know,” Myrddin’s voice blew back to him, a high rattle amongst the wind’s moaning wail, “that it was here, on the slopes of Yr Wyddfa, that Gêlert’s cairn lies?”

“Is that why we’re here?” Dael yelled at the druid’s blurry back. “To visit the grave of some long dead if valiant hound?”

There was no answer. The wind grabbed at their cloaks, whipping them first this way then the other. Peering through the slanting snow as he hauled himself up and over an ice capped slab of rough stone, Dael could just make out the old druid’s vague shape, his gray cloak almost invisible in the windswept gloom of snow, sleet, and cloud that savaged the mountain’s heights. Only when the gusting currents tore at Myrddin’s cloak, sending it swirling about his head like some great bird’s wings, could Dael truly separate the man from the cold rock of their trail. “Trail! Some trail,” he snarled. “Barely a goat’s path.”

Finally rounding a sharp corner with a sheer drop into a black void on the left hand and a vertical mass of smooth stone and ice on the right, Dael spied what looked like a dark opening just ahead. Of the druid there was no sign, but the cave’s depths were all that could be gained from this spot on the trail. Unless he could fly. Still, Dael glanced up and around, half expecting to see the old goat scrambling up into the further heights.

“Well? Come on, boyo,” a disembodied voice called from the dark. “Unless you plan on spending the night out there in the fine air.”

Covering the last few paces along the narrow path, Dael’s foot came down on a patch of ice and flew out over the empty air. For a moment his balance failed, leaving him flailing his arms in an attempt to fall back against the wall’s face. His right hand struck the rock’s flat surface, scrabbling downwards until his fingers found the tentative purchase of a shallow crack and held tightly. Carefully he managed to settle both feet under him.

“And watch for a bit of ice on the last step or two,” the voice added, growing fainter as it receded further into the darkened depths.

“And watch for a bit of fucking ice,” Dael hissed through gritted teeth while he slipped through the black curtain of the cave’s entrance.

Feeling along the rough wall to his left, he cautiously worked his way deeper into the darkness, following the faint sounds of Myrddin’s activities. Suddenly a weak flare of orange light flickered in the gelid air ahead. Quickly it dimmed, but within several heartbeats a bright little flame burst forth, sending a thick yellow stream of acrid smoke up to find its way along the low ceiling until it disappeared into the dark line of a crack.

By the time Dael had eased his pack off and settled it and his bow against the cave’s wall, Myrddin had several pieces of kindling stacked over the small fire. The flames licked hungrily along the dry and cracked wood, and soon he added thicker pieces to the welcome conflagration.

“No, that’s not why we’re here.” Myrddin sat back against his discarded pack and looked up at Dael under his gray eyebrows. There was ice in his wild-blown hair. Clumps of it actually, just beginning to melt. His beard carried the same adornment in even greater amounts where his breath had added to the freezing, wind-blown moisture. All and all, Dael concluded, in the dancing light of the fire he looked more like some frenzied apparition come to life out of the overwrought imagination of a bard than the very respected – and even feared – druid and sorcerer he was. Only his blazing eyes, like pools of hot, emerald green, told of the power and authority he wielded in the realms of men, and a few others as well. It was those eyes that now bore down on his newly acquired novice. “Although, if you’d like, we can scour the mountainside in search of the hound’s final hearth.

“I thought not.” Myrddin continued to hold the disgruntled boy with his own hard gaze. “So, enough of this petulant complaining about things neither of us has control over. Today the sky is cold and harsh. So be it. Rest assured, my young boyo, there will be many, many more such days to come. Countless such, in fact.

“What we do here, though,” he continued in a level if slightly warmer voice, “is to travel the land of Cymru – the Land of Comrades – so that in time we will know it as well as we do ourselves. A druid must know this land, its people, its history, its secrets – dark and evil though they can be – its spirit, and the heart that beats just under its surface: a steady pulse that sings of powers ancient when the stars first shown in our night sky. Few ever come to this knowledge. But we will. We will learn the song. Learn its words, its melodies, its endless variations. And here, we start.”

Dael stood speechless. Never had Bedwyr spoken thus to him. Oh he had been sharp with him when necessary. And hard in his discipline if Dael’s efforts flagged. But the scope of what Myrddin now declared was so much more all-encompassing than anything Dael had ever considered. True, there was always the prophesy with its dire purposes and portends somehow calling to him. But for a young boy, even one as firmly planted as he showed himself to be, such things belonged to the future, the very tenebrous and intangible future. A lad of twelve summers lived a bit in the past, but mostly in the present and rarely if ever dwelt upon the vague shadows of the tomorrow. Apparently, everything we’ve done through this summer has little to do with this greater purpose, Dael’s stomach felt queasy, like being tickled from the inside by flies.

As if reading his mind, Myrddin’s face cracked into a tight smile. “This summer was a gentle time of easy living, easy lessons, and completing what Bedwyr began. Now,” and again his emerald gaze bore down on the boy, “now we enter a time of hard living, hard lessons, and completing what you can become. Do you know what that is?”

Dael shook his head numbly. He’d expected to become a druid, like Bedwyr, in time. And by then, see to whatever this ‘prophetic destiny’ was that seemed to lurk on his horizon. Somehow, more by his tone than by his words, Myrddin’s question seemed to ask a far more complex question than what Dael’s simple notions could encompass, requiring a very different answer altogether.

“When you know the answer to that, my boyo, then you’ll be well on your way to fulfilling your destiny. The one that only you can seek. And please note that I said ‘can become’ and not ‘will become.’ There be no easy sureties in the task set before us.

“Now, what do you know of the power of the word? Of air? Water? Fire? These are what we will learn of now.” Myrddin’s eyes burned like green fire as he threw the questions at the boy who had squatted down, the fire now burning brightly between them.

“Ours is an oral tradition,” Dael offered, his voice sounding subdued against the druid’s sudden passion. “Our history and faith is never to be written down, committed to the physical plane of stone, wood, or paper. Only in verse, as recited by a druid, be he bard, sorcerer, prophet, or physician can the ancient power be released.” Dael’s voice steadied as he iterated the lessons he had learned since he was six summers old.

“Ah-h,” Myrddin leaned forward, “and what is this ‘ancient power’ that these druids do release?”

“Well, it’s power . . . the umm, the power to . . . well, the power that comes from . . .”

“If you don’t know the answer to a question, boyo, just say so,” the druid snapped. “It does you no good to sit there and sound ignorant. Just admit it and be done with it. That, at least, sounds intelligent in comparison! And it saves time.”

“I . . . I don’t know.” Dael shrugged, his face starting to burn along with his eyes. “And I don’t know where it comes from either, for that matter. And . . . and I’m surprised that I don’t.” Dael crossed his arms and slumped in defeat. “It makes me wonder just what I have been learning all these years. Or what I thought I was learning.” He shook his head and fell silent, staring into the crackling flames. “I mean, it’s a perfectly valid question. ‘What’s behind the words we learn?’ Behind their meaning and . . . and their purpose. And apparently,” he dragged his eyes to meet the druid’s, “I’ve never given it much thought. Not until just now, when you asked. Great Gwydian, even I can see which is important, the words or their true meaning.” His flushed face shown only with frustration and disappointment. The anger was gone.

“That’s why you and I are together now,” Myrddin’s voice and gaze softened at the boy’s honest admission. Nest was right. This lad has the courage and heart to learn anything. “Before you can search for something, you must understand that you need it, and that you don’t have it. Now you know, boyo. And now we can begin your search.

“We’ll start with a lesson in the power of the word,” Myrddin said, falling into a rhythmic pattern of speech that bound Dael’s attention to each word. “And what is a word? When we utter it, if it is known to us, it imparts meaning. That meaning expresses the purpose we intended when we chose that particular word.

“So is this what a word is? Its meaning? Or is it the purpose behind its use? Truly, does a word even require utterance to be a word? If not, where does its meaning come from? To what purpose is an unspoken word given? What then, if it can be found in silence, is a word?”

Myrddin’s voice was quickly lost, the power of his words capturing Dael’s mind in a seemingly endless stream of provocative questions and the myriad new ideas and concepts they spawned. The fire had burned low, reduced to flickering coals when the druid’s voice fell silent.

“So what is a word?” He threw the question into the smoky space between them.

“Energy. Expressed energy.”

“What is meaning?”

“Energy. Defined energy.”

“What is purpose?”

“Directed energy.”

“And power?”

“Energy,” Dael sighed. “The pure potential of energy.”

“So, if you had to guess,” Myrddin asked, “what do you think the elements are? Water, air, fire and earth?”

“Energy.” Dael nodded with the faint shadow of a smile sealing his lips.

“And time?”

“Time?”

“Yes, what is time?”

After the briefest of pauses, Dael smiled openly. “Time? I don’t have any idea. Can it be a thing?” he laughed.

“That, we’ll come to see . . . in time.” Myrddin smiled back. “But that is . . . a much more intelligent answer, boyo. Much more intelligent indeed!”