Keeper of the Dream (45 page)

“Raine!”

Arianna jerked upright. There was the taste of a scream in her mouth, and the echoes of it in her ears.

She was lying on the bed, on top of the coverlet, still wearing her vair robe. But the cresset lamps had been doused, only the night candle burned. “Edith?” she whispered, though she knew the room was empty. There was a smell in the air, a hot, sweet smell. A familiar smell, though she couldn’t place it.

She got out of bed, fighting down dizziness and nausea. Something gleamed on the chest beside the window. The golden mazer.

It all came back to her then, with such a rush it was like a punch in the chest, and she doubled over as if from pain. Raine, fighting in a forest in France, the killing and the blood and the screams, then quiet … She had turned, no
he
had turned, and Hugh had been there, lifting the bow, and she had left it until too late. Falling, falling, falling into a soft white light …

“No!” Arianna cried.

She stood in the middle of the room, battling down a paralyzing fear. His name was like a drumbeat in her mind,
Raine, Raine, Raine
… She had to warn him. She prayed she had been given a glimpse of the future and not the past.

She dressed for hard traveling, arming herself with a quillon dagger. She bumped her protruding stomach against the jamb on the way out the door and a slightly hysterical laugh burst out her throat. She kept forgetting there was more of her than there used to be.

A thought pushed into her mind of what hard traveling
might do to her and her unborn babe, but she pushed it out again. Peasant women harrowed a cornfield in the morning, stopped to birth their babies in the afternoon, and were carding wool before the fire that evening. If they were that strong, then she was stronger. The blood of Cymry warriors pumped through her veins. Tough as old bacon were the princes of Gwynedd, how often had she heard her father say that. Tough to bring down, tough to kill …

With all the carousing still going on in the hall, it was easy to slip out unnoticed. But once in the bailey she pulled her fur-trimmed
chaperon
over her face and kept to the shadows. The ground felt encrusted in a mail coat, cold and hard. But there was no snowfall as yet this winter, and the sky above was clear as ice, sparkling with stars.

Rushlights burned outside the stable doors, though at the moment there was no one about. She ducked inside and began quickly to saddle her palfrey.

“Goddess spare me! I knew this would happen sooner or later. One must watch you every second, else you rashly set off on some foolish escapade.”

Arianna whirled, her hand at her throat where her breath had caught.

“Taliesin!” Her first thought was that Raine had returned, and her heart swelled with the joy of it. Then slowly collapsed again when she realized that the guard would have announced the lord’s arrival with a blast of trumpets to rouse the entire castle. “What are you doing here? Where is my husband?”

“My lord is in France. My lady, may I ask why you are again saddling a horse in the middle of the night?”

The squire’s golden helmet pulsed and glowed. A blue light surrounded him, shimmering, like a flame disturbed by a draft. And his eyes … his eyes were two shining stars floating in a black sea. I
am not imagining this,
she told herself. I
cannot be.
“I—I am going to France.”

Outside, a strong wind had come up. The stable walls groaned beneath the force of it; a door banged somewhere. It had grown suddenly cold. Her breath left her mouth in vapory white clouds.

He stepped toward her and she backed away. The wind whistled through the cracks in the walls, stirring up little whirlpools of dust and straw. She pulled her mantle tighter against her throat to close out the creeping cold.

“My lady, you cannot be such a fool,” he said. “You are heavy with child and ’tis not as simple a matter as riding to town. The south coast is leagues away and then you must take a boat to cross the channel waters. And if through the grace of the goddess you did manage to make it safely to France, do you know where you are going once you get there?”

Arianna shook her head, mesmerized by the glimmering light in his eyes.

“I thought not,” he went on. His mouth took on a smug curl that was all boy. But he was no boy, she knew that now. The wind screamed and something that sounded like gravel pelted the walls. “And, besides,” he said, “it’s kicking up a blizzard out there.”

“You lie, boy. The sky was as clear as spring water a moment ago.” But it had grown so cold, and the wind …

She ran to the front of the stable and flung open the door.

And looked into a blinding, undulating maelstrom of whirling white. Ice crystals whipped past her face, and the wind slashed and cut like a knife, so cold it flayed her cheeks and made her eyes water.

He’s doing this. He’s making it snow, just like once before he made it storm with lightning and thunder and so much rain the river flooded and the bridge washed away.

Suddenly he was standing in front of her again, though she had not seen him move. His helmet blazed, bright as a summer sun. The blue lambent sheen that surrounded
him, throbbed, grew brighter. “You are
magi,”
she said.
“Llyfrawr.”

The squire erupted into a fit of boyish giggles. “Would that I were a wizard, milady. I’d change Sir Stephen into a toad. He beat me this afternoon for not cleaning Lord Raine’s hauberk properly when it wasn’t his place to do so. My lord never beats me, though he does growl a lot and—”

“If you were being beaten in France this afternoon, how come you to be here in this stable tonight?”

God’s death, even I am no longer making sense.
I must be dreaming this, she thought. Yet it felt so real. She could hear the horses shuffling in their stalls, smell the pungent odor of straw and dung. She could feel the tickle of her fur
chaperon
against her cheek. She had seen … she had held the magic mazer in her hands, felt its heat, its power.

She grabbed his arm, and a jolt of fire coursed through her, as if she’d just touched the golden mazer. “Taliesin, I don’t know how you come to be here, but you must go back to Lord Raine, you must warn him that his brother will try to kill him—”

“He is safe, my lady. It is not his destiny to die in France. You must believe me,” And the word echoed back at her,
believe, believe, believe….

His eyes glimmered, star-filled, possessed of the wisdom of the ages. Time is a circle, she thought, and those eyes see it all. All that was, all that is, all that is yet to be. A white light blazed from his eyes, filling her mind. She embraced the light to ask of it the only question that really mattered to her.

Is it Raine’s destiny to love me?

She saw his lips move and knew that he answered her. But she couldn’t hear. The white light was a scream in her mind, drowning out his voice and the wail and whistle of the wind, drowning out her fears. For one single joyous moment she thought she understood it all. But then the
white light shattered, exploding into thousands of glittering crystals that floated and melted away, like snow-flakes.

“Milady, are you awake?”

Arianna opened her eyes onto Edith’s round, berry-colored face. The maidservant had a steaming cup that smelled of mint in her hand and she held it up to Arianna’s lips. “You were sleeping so late, we had begun to worry.”

Arianna pushed the cup aside without drinking. She got up, and pulling on her robe, went to the window. A pale, watery winter sun hung low in a washed-out sky. There wasn’t even a dusting of snow on the ground.

She turned away from the window. Edith bustled about the bed, straightening the covers. “Did you hear the blizzard last night?” Arianna asked the maidservant. “There was snow and wind and it was cold, so cold.”

Edith covered her mouth with her palm to catch a giggle. “Oh, no, milady. Mayhap you dreamed it.”

Arianna crossed the room to stand in front of the brazier. She held her shaking hands out over the burning coals. “Have you seen the boy Taliesin this morning?” she asked, oh so very casually.

Edith’s forehead crinkled. “Taliesin? Why, he is in France, squiring your lord husband.” She came up to Arianna, concern on her normally placid face. “Milady, you do look pale. Mayhap you ought to spend the day abed after all.”

Arianna allowed the girl to lead her back to the bed. “Edith? Last night, did we look to see the sex of the babe, using holy water from St. Winifred’s well?”

“Aye, milady.”

“What … happened?”

“Why, at first we couldn’t tell. The drop of blood seemed to sink, but then it floated up to the top again. So we did it again and … and … ” The girl stopped. Her
eyes went blank a moment and her mouth fell open. Then she blinked and went on. “It sank that time, my lady. Aye, that was what happened. Twill be a boy.”

Arianna got back into the bed. She didn’t protest as Edith pulled the covers up, tucking her in like a child. She was sure the maidservant had not remembered one way or the other what had happened last night. Edith had imbibed so much Christmas ale doubtless it was all a hazy, drunken blur.

I could have dreamed it, Arianna thought. Dreamed the vision, dreamed Taliesin in the stables, dreamed the blizzard. What did it matter anyway, dream or real, she could change nothing. In the light of the day, she knew she could not go to France, not six months pregnant, with no idea where Raine even was at this moment.

It had been autumn in her dream-vision, the trees dressed in orange and yellow and crimson. The wind would have stripped the branches naked by now, the ground would be hard and crusted with ice and snow. Whatever she had seen had happened already. If he were dead …

If he were dead, she would know it. There would be an empty hole in her heart that nothing could fill.

The coral-tinted sea smacked against the bow as the ship jibed, turning up the wide mouth of the river Clwyd. A flock of gulls led the way, and a westerly breeze filled the square leather sails, carrying him home.

Home.

Raine stood at the pointed prow of the ship, heedless of the salty spray that wet his face. He narrowed his eyes against the setting sun. A soft haze hung over the shore where, silhouetted on a hill, a man gripped the handles of a plow, while a woman walked ahead, wielding a goad to drive the oxen. The colter cut deep into the black earth, leaving a fresh furrow across the land. His land.

It had been September when he had left and the crops
had just been harvested. It was the end of April now, the plowing and sowing season. Yet it was not the land he had missed, or the safe walls and comfort of his castle, or even the dreams and ambitions he had left behind. It was her.

Arianna … his wife.

He would see her soon. He would drown in those sea-foam eyes and taste the sweetness of her lips. He would hold her softness in his arms.

“The tide’s in, my lord,” Taliesin said, coming up behind him. “We’ll be able to tack right up to the quay this time.”

Raine acknowledged his squire with a nod. The bloodred walls of Rhuddlan Castle appeared suddenly around the bend. On the spring wind he heard the clamor of bells. The sonorous toll of the village church bell clashed with the tinny peals from the castle chapel until they filled the sky with a glorious noise.

“They’ve spotted our sails,” Taliesin said. “They’re welcoming you home.”

They moored the warship among the fishing scows, near the tidal wheel of the stone mill house. A man who was fat as a muffin emerged from the open door of the mill house, wiping his hands on a flour-smeared apron.

“Why do the bells ring, miller?” Raine called out to the man who looked up at him from the wharf, squinting against the glare of the setting sun.

“They be ringing to induce the saints to ease the Lady Arianna’s pain. She be in labor with …” Recognition dawned on the man’s face, as he finally made out the features of the man he spoke to. He bowed low, scraping the weathered boards with his cap. “With your son, please God, milor’.”

Fear slammed into Raine’s chest like a fist. “Taliesin, fetch me a horse.”

The boy jumped onto the dock, rocking the boards. “Oh, there’s no need to rush, sire. First babes are always a long time in coming. It could be hours yet—”

“Taliesin, if you don’t shut your mouth and find me a bloody horse before my next breath, I will hang you up by your thumbs until you rot!”

In the end he didn’t wait for a horse, he ran up the road to the castle on foot. It was a sight they were to speak about for years to come—the Lord of Rhuddlan arriving home from the wars in France, pelting up the road as if all the devils of hell were after him, to be home in time for the birthing of his first child.

By the time Raine crossed the drawbridge into the bailey, his heart seemed to be squeezed up into an area just below his throat, so he couldn’t breathe. The yard seemed unusually empty of life for just past sunset. Even the mews and the kennels were silent.

The door to his chamber opened halfway before it was blocked by the formidable bulk of Dame Beatrix, the midwife. “My lord! You are not supposed to be in here. It isn’t allowed.”

“I make up the laws in my own castle,” Raine snarled, then drew in a deep breath. He knew that men were strictly barred from the birthing chamber and in principle he applauded the sentiment.

In reality, he was damn well going to see his wife. “I only want to see her, then I’ll leave,” he said, and he used one of those rare smiles that had captivated women’s hearts from Jerusalem to Paris.

Dame Beatrix’s hooked nose quivered as she glowered at Raine. But in the end she was no more immune to that smile than any other female. “Oh, very well,” she said in a voice tart as vinegar. “But only for a moment, mark you.”

She stepped aside to let Raine enter. So many torches blazed within that it was like stepping into the belly of a forge. The chamber had been prepared for the lying-in, with fresh rushes spread on the floor and sweet herbs burning in brass bowls on every available surface.

Arianna emerged from behind an osier-reed screen,
supported by Edith. The thin chainse she wore was so drenched with sweat, it clung to her body. Her hair hung in damp, matted tangles down her back. The torchlight glazed a face that was the waxy white of an old candle, and shadows lay like old bruises under her eyes. But his gaze was filled mostly with the sight of her belly, heavy and swollen, monstrous with his child.