The Dawn Stag: Book Two of the Dalriada Trilogy (54 page)

Samana’s thin, elegant brows arched high. ‘Your prince never got any information from me, either, Rhiann. And he tried more persuasive means.’ The small, pointed tip of her tongue slid out of her upper lip.

Rhiann dug her fingers into her palms, out of sight in her lap. ‘If you repent of your treachery, we will keep you alive and safe until this war is resolved one way or the other. If you won’t, I have no choice but to send you far away.’ She leaned forward. ‘Far from jewels and furs and warmth and ease, far from news and tales and music and every diversion you prize so much.’

‘You have no right!’ Samana struggled to her feet, her hands still bound behind. ‘I am a queen of a powerful tribe. You break every kin law there is. My people will seek vengeance—’

‘Really? Will your people seek vengeance from us when they know who betrayed their own king? When they discover how you really sold them to the Romans? When they realize that their queen became a Roman whore?’

Samana’s mouth twisted with bitterness, marring her beauty. ‘This was always about you and me, Rhiann, no matter what you say! You were always jealous of me, even on the Sacred Isle, and now you hate that Eremon wants
me
in his bed and by his side, and not you! You want to banish me, not because of your ideals but because you’re
jealous
, because I’m more queen and priestess and wife than you’ll ever be!’

That last barb pierced Rhiann to her core, because the dark part of her believed it herself. And Samana’s priestess senses were not dulled beyond all recall; she saw the angry flinch, sprang after it like a hound on the hunt.

‘That’s right, isn’t it, Rhiann?’ She stumbled forward a step, and out of the corner of her eye Rhiann glimpsed Nectan moving closer. ‘You’re only half a woman, Rhiann, a broken half ! A man like Eremon needs a real woman, and this you’ll never be!’

The shame that rose in Rhiann at these words turned instantly to rage – rage at herself, and at Samana, who taunted her with a twisted tangle of everything she did and did not want to be. Samana’s body exuded all that was lush, womanly, sexual, fertile. She had no memories of a dark king to douse her fire, or dull her passion. Yet the corruption that lay inside Samana made a mockery of all that her body promised, and even Rhiann’s growing fury did not cloud that sudden understanding.

‘And what are you, Samana?’ she cried at last. ‘A woman who uses sex as power? A woman who uses sex to abuse people and break them and make them betray themselves and others? Is
this
a real woman?’ She flicked her fingers at Samana’s torn and muddy dress, her wild hair.

‘A real woman,’ Samana spat, ‘loves her man with passion, but you have no passion! You are nothing but dry,
barren
and
used up
.’

Each word was a lash, laying open Rhiann’s heart, and she forgot who looked on, flooded by all the fury and grief she had so carefully suppressed for moons. ‘Dry I may be, but I love Eremon in a way you never could, because you are consumed, Samana, with your own lust for power and selfish desires! Where is the space for love in that? How could
you
– a woman who does not know the meaning of respect, or honour, or truth – love anyone? You cannot
give
, Samana, you only take, take and take until there’s nothing left, and,’ Rhiann’s voice broke, ‘Eremon deserves more than you could begin to give. I may not be complete, but I
am
real. I have a heart, and I have given it to him!’

Somewhere Rhiann was appalled at her loss of control, but the words sprang from a true place, and they found their target in Samana. The Votadini queen reared back as if she had been physically struck, and then screamed with frustration, her bound arms shaking as if to wrench themselves free. ‘A weakling like you is no match for such a man! Power
is
all there is, power is everything, and if you can’t see that, you little fool, then you’re stupid as well!’ Samana stamped her foot, her eyes feverish with madness. ‘
I
lead Agricola around by his balls – the leader of all Britannia, the commander of forty thousand men! – and he does
anything
I want him to!
I
control the men and so
I
am the power in this land! Who
else
could have thought of raiding the Isle? Who
else
had the power to make Agricola do it, besides me!’ She was screaming now. ‘I control him! He listens to me, and me only!’

…
raiding the Isle …

‘You?’ Rhiann stammered. ‘
You?
’

A shadow fell over the walls, and Rhiann turned to see Fola walking slowly forwards, dazed, her eyes wide and fixed on Samana. The horror in her soft face was so raw it made Rhiann flinch. Yet it was Nectan who reacted, taking two strides to Samana’s side and striking her full across the face. Samana crumpled to the ground, pressing her jaw into her shoulder, as Nectan – calm, steady Nectan – stood there trembling violently, tears glittering on his cheeks.

For a moment all of them were frozen. Rhiann’s mind reeled; she could not absorb what Samana had just confessed. Yet as the moment drew out, it was Samana who spoke first, panting as she smiled up at Rhiann. ‘Yes!’ she hissed. ‘I ordered the Romans to spill the blood of the Sisters, it was all
me!
So kill me for it, Rhiann, and be done with it! I no longer wish to look on your face.’

Nectan raised his hand again, but Rhiann stepped forward and caught his wrist. ‘Peace,’ she stammered, her voice shaking. Tension quivered in Nectan’s arm, until he dropped it and turned away to the door, hiding his face.

Samana was backed up against the hearth now, and she levered herself to her feet once more. ‘So what will it be, cousin? The sword? The dagger? I welcome both of them, if they will send me to the gods, to live among heroes who possess real courage, power and might.’

Still Rhiann could only stare at Samana as if she had never seen her like before, as if she were some vile, unnatural animal that had been banished from the world in ages past.

She killed the Sisters. She, a sworn priestess
.

Rhiann could not comprehend such a betrayal. Samana had broken sacred bread with the priestesses. She had sworn her undying oath to them as the Stones looked on. But more than that, they had given her love and understanding and refuge.

Rhiann’s eyes closed, and behind her eyelids she saw the bright sun glittering on Roman spears, the descending sword, Nerida’s face.
Samana killed them. She killed them
. And those words, repeated over and over with the bloody pictures, at last penetrated Rhiann’s shock. Dark rage began to beat on her temples – all the rage of all the moons past. All the rage of years. The need to strike out reared in her; the need to hurt as she had been hurt. Her eyes jerked open.

Samana saw her clenched fingers, and smiled. ‘Yes, Rhiann, give in to it and strike me down! Do it! I don’t care!’

Rhiann stared at that wild cloud of dark hair, the honey skin, the sloe eyes that showed nothing but twisted triumph. If she had a blade in her hand, would she stab it into Samana’s breast, as Samana had pierced her own with grief ? She thought she would, as the red fog clouded her mind. She
knew
she would.

Yet her training was strong, and instead she struggled to breathe first, to calm herself, because Nerida and Setana had taught her that.
Breathe
, she thought, as the room tilted around her. Goddess, breathe. The elder sisters were always calm, always gentle and wise. They would never strike or kill anyone. She had to be strong for them.

It was then that the voice came, slipping softly into Rhiann’s heart.

Sister … Daughter
… The voice was no more than a stirring of the currents in Rhiann’s soul. Yet with its sudden, haunting cry, so the fog of her rage was arrested.

Daughter. Goddess daughter
.

‘No …’ Rhiann moaned.
I hurt, I hurt and I must do something to release it…

Abruptly, a wave of warmth swept Rhiann, smoothing the jagged edges of her anger. It surged and ebbed and surged again, growing greater each time, wrapping Rhiann’s body in a cocoon of vibration too low to be heard. Over her shoulder she heard Fola gasp, but it was not a gasp of pain or shock, and then Rhiann knew that Fola felt it, too.

Suddenly dizzy, Rhiann closed her eyes, groping for the edge of the bench. And that was when the scene came back to her with true clarity, which her grief had veiled. Nerida stepping towards the soldier, her hands outstretched, smiling, as the blade rose above her. And Rhiann heard the words Nerida had spoken, even though she had not been close enough to hear that day.
Come, I forgive you
.

‘Come,’ Rhiann found herself whispering, as it caught in her throat. ‘I forgive you. I forgive you …’ And with the words came the feeling that Rhiann knew, right then, had flooded Nerida’s heart when she gazed upon that soldier’s sword, a sweet release, that was like nothing in Thisworld at all.

Slowly, Rhiann groped for Fola’s arm and drew her forward to stand by her side. Fola’s face was transfigured, shining beneath the tears, and for an endless moment they stood wreathed together in that light.

At long last, Rhiann blinked as if waking, the air warm and hazy around her, not knowing how much time had passed. Yet when she looked at Samana, and saw the glittering smile of triumph there, she knew it had been no real time at all.

‘Sister,’ she said – and Samana’s smile faltered for the first time.

Yet Rhiann’s soul had cleared, as if a veil of heavy clouds were drawn back by a breeze, and in that grace she pitied her cousin rather than hated her, for Samana had abused power, and for that she would never have love.

‘We will not give you death,’ Rhiann told Samana softly, simply. ‘It is for you to make peace with the Mother when you meet her in the Otherworld. As for us …’ She drew a deep breath. ‘We forgive you, Sister.’

Samana screeched in wordless fury as Rhiann held up her palm. ‘Yet there must be consequences from the choices you have made. First, you are hereby banished from the Sisterhood, and stripped of your status as one of the Goddess Daughters. Second, you are hereby named an outcast among the free tribes of Alba. The word will be sent out of your banishment from society.’

‘You cannot do this!’ Samana screamed, shaking her tangled hair. ‘You have no right to do this!’

Fola put her hand in Rhiann’s other palm. ‘We are what is left of the Sisterhood. Rhiann is the last Ban Cré. We have spoken.’

‘But … but… ‘Samana spluttered,’ you cannot make me outcast, you have no right!’

Rhiann raised one finger, reciting the lore. ‘A person can be declared outcast by the elders of a tribe, a council of chieftains, a conclave of the druid brethren, or a conclave of the priestess sisters.’ She pointed at Nectan, standing expressionless by the door. ‘We are the Sisters, and we have here also a chieftain of the Caereni, who stands witness, and a chieftain of the Decantae to endorse the same. You will find no refuge the length of Alba, Samana, not even among your own people, when our message reaches them. Every person will turn their face from you, from the smallest child to the oldest servant. You have remained powerful here only because your own people do not know the full extent of your betrayal, yet they will now. You will be nothing in your own people’s eyes from this moment on, and for as long as your life lasts. We have spoken.’

No one moved, except Samana, whose whole body was trembling, her black eyes wide and stricken. To be made outcast was a fate far worse than death. It meant the loss not only of status and recognition and power, but of home, food and shelter. It meant that no one would even recognize her as a
human
. She would be a wraith, even when she stood before those who had formerly hailed her as queen. Ignored, uncounted, unsung.

‘You cannot …’ she whispered again, yet Rhiann merely nodded at Nectan, and he cut Samana’s bonds with his dagger, and then all three of them turned their backs and left the lodge without another glance.

For some time there was the sound of things crashing to the floor, as Samana vented her rage on the benches and stools in the guest lodge. But eventually, as the long, sunseason twilight descended, Samana was forced to emerge.

The news had travelled through the entire dun already, and the yard outside the lodge was crowded with men, women and children. The Sisters were there too, standing together. Yet when Samana appeared, walking tall as if to salvage some dignity, with a rustling of clothes and feet, every single person there turned their backs on her.

Her heart pounding, Rhiann stared into the shadows gathering between the houses, and listened to Samana’s soft steps pausing behind her. ‘He will still die; this I promise you,’ came the hiss, and Samana spat on the ground at Rhiann’s feet.

Then she walked out of the open gates into the northern wilderness, far from her home, far from the Roman lines. No one marked her passing or which way she went, for she was as invisible to Alba now as if she had never lived.

For a long time Rhiann stood without moving, like a slim, fair statue, as the people gradually dispersed back to their homes. Fola was the only one who remained, beckoning to the few Sisters left to shepherd their younger charges into the other guest lodge.

‘Burn oil to sweeten the air,’ Fola said softly, ‘and make an offering to Ceridwen, goddess of birth and death. Then sing for the souls of our elder Sisters, for they have come close to us this night.’

She turned back to Rhiann, who still had not moved, gazing out of the gate where the mists of dusk were rising from the line of hazels and oaks that ran down into the valley. Yet when the damp evening wind blew up the path, Fola saw one long shiver run the length of Rhiann’s spine, as if she was waking, and it was then that she took Rhiann’s arm and silently led her back into the empty guest lodge.

The hearth was surrounded by the destruction of Samana’s wrath – overturned benches, scattered ashes, spilled mead cups. But it was there that Fola led Rhiann, and when she turned to face her, Fola saw that to let the forgiveness come, all Rhiann’s barriers had indeed melted.