You look at her like

she is the sea

at the end of a cliff,

You look at her like

the leap into her depths

will either kill you,

drown you,

or set you free.

~Nikita Gill


Chapter 3

Geraint returned to his preparations warily, hanging the net of clean shells over the flames, placing a chipped clay pot of stream water on the embers beneath. "I wonder," he mused out loud, "what brings the Princess of Llyr to such a lonely shore, so far from...wherever it is she came from."

Angharad shot him an amused glance. "I come here when I wish to be alone - though lately, not as often as I have wished. It isn't far, really – less than an hour's ride, a bit more if you walk. Have you seen nothing more of the island?"

He told her of his visit to the nearby village and she nodded. "Llanisfair. I live in the other direction - though Caer Colur is generally reached via the main road from the harbour. Perhaps you'd care to visit it next."

"If I would be welcome."

She stared at him levelly and did not respond to this, noticing instead that he was no longer employed in preparing food. "You may sit. I mean," she sighed, and shook her head as though weary. "Please be at your ease."

He felt her gaze on him as he crouched on his heels and poked at the fire; it was disquieting; he had never known any young woman to watch a man so openly. Even those who did stare pretended not to, for modesty's sake. He might have enjoyed it more if he'd felt she was staring in admiration, but her look and manner still denoted little more than curiosity and amusement.

The embers sparked and crackled and he thought of that sudden blaze. "Hm. Might I be...impertinent enough to ask," he began, "what that bit of—," He wiggled his fingers toward the fire.

Angharad looked wry. "That bit of very poor self-control? I'm sorry about that. It had to come out somewhere." She spread her hands out and looked at them thoughtfully. "Surely all those stories don't leave out what we are."

"No," Geraint said, "but I confess, I did not anticipate such an...incendiary demonstration."

She laughed at this, a real, surprised peal of laughter. "Who are you, Geraint son of Durhaim? You speak like a nobleman, perform like a bard, and scrub mussels like a scullery maid. Who is your family?" The laugh was still on her lips, but her voice was becoming earnest, eager, gathering that ferocious intensity he was beginning to recognize. "What is it like in Gellau? How long have you wandered? Who have you met in your travels? Where-"

Geraint held up a hand with a grin and she stopped, with obvious effort. "There are stories enough there for many days, Princess."

"Start with the first, then," she commanded, her eyes challenging him as she sat back, obviously expecting obedience.

He laughed. "Very well. My father Durhaim was scribe to King Cadoc of Gellau - a man of letters. He would have liked to take the bardic trials himself, but he suffered long illness that prevented him from the rigors of that life. So you see I grew up among the king's family, and I absorbed their manners, I suppose. When my father died…"

"Not yet," she interrupted. "Who was your mother?"

"Oh." Of course she would want to know that. "Her name was Heledd. Daughter of Cerwen. She loved to sing. In fact she used to say she was a descendant of Menwy himself, but I don't know the truth of that. She died when I was quite young."

"I'm sorry," Angharad said quietly. "Go on."

"When I lost my father I was fourteen. The king offered to give me his place. It was kind of him, and I could have done it, I suppose, but…" Geraint shook his head, with a rueful grimace. "There were…complications. I fancied myself quite in love with a nobleman's daughter at the time." He glanced at Angharad; she was grinning and he blushed. "It was nothing - the foolishness of a boy in the first flush of youth. But her brother found out…intercepted letters we had written to one another. He let me know in no uncertain terms that my birth and rank left me unfit to…clean up after her horse." He snorted. "Not that those were his exact words."

Geraint glanced at her again; she no longer laughed, but neither did she look as indignant as he might hope, at the details. "I realized at that point that no matter how long I lived in the king's service, I would never be accepted into his society." He shrugged. "Perhaps it shouldn't matter, but it vexed me, even while I-quite sensibly-told myself I didn't want to be a part of it, if that was the way it was. Beyond that, I was tired of being told what I could and couldn't do. So I left."

She blinked into the silence. "You left. Just like that?"

"Just like that."

"But where did you go?"

"Well." Geraint smiled, shaking the mussels over the steam. They were beginning to pop open. "First, by sheer luck, I happened upon a Rover camp, and they took me on in exchange for another pair of working hands. As fate would have it, my first job was exactly the one that proud brother of my first love had declared me too low for." He heard Angharad giggle and disguise it as a polite cough. "I can tell you right off; nobody's too low for that. But I was clever enough to make myself useful to everyone in the camp, and gradually I learned many skills - including those I survive on, now." He shook the net again. "Meanwhile I discovered I loved traveling, loved the freedom of their lives. I saw much of the land with them."

"But you aren't with them now," she observed. "Why did you leave them?"

"They had certain rounds," he said. "A pattern from which they rarely deviated. And I wanted to see more. Also, though they are generous and accepting, I never felt quite…one of them. I was never permitted to take the lead in any of their trades, though in a few years I was as capable in several as any of their own. I realized I would never be truly free until I set out on my own. So I did. That was…three years ago? No, four. It's a bit hard to keep track. I'm not even sure how old I am anymore. The Rovers pay no attention to birthdays. Twenty-some-odd."

The mussels were done; Geraint took the net off the fire and laid it on a boulder swept clean of debris, and then looked around a little doubtfully, as though platters might magically appear. "I'm afraid I am unprepared to entertain a lady in formal fashion," he confessed, holding up a flat, broad bit of slate. "I've been using this as a plate."

Angharad laughed again; it was a delicious sound, open and careless; she suddenly seemed completely at ease, the formality of her bearing and speech melting away. "I'm starving," she said. "I'll eat them right off this rock. Do you have a spare knife? I left mine with my boots over on the beach. Stupid of me."

Geraint handed her the small knife he used for cooking, contenting himself with the larger dagger he'd used to harvest the mussels. She snatched a steaming shell, burned her fingers, and dropped it again with a squeak. He laughed before he could stop himself, she shot him a look of amused outrage, and he offered her an open mussel as restitution. "You've never cooked for yourself, have you?"

Angharad looked as wry as it is possible to do while eating mussels. "No," she said frankly. "I brought food, you know, provisions of the traveling sort, but it's up there." She waved her hand toward the clifftops. "My horse's saddlebags. I'll leave it with you to make up for what I take. You can't have too much, out here on your own." She looked thoughtful. "I should like to know how to cook. I always thought it looked rather like magic. Mix the right ingredients and you've got something new. Oh! Drat," she said suddenly. "I'm supposed to be collecting kelp and ormer. You made me forget what I came for."

That laugh again. Geraint took a breath, and let it out slowly to steady himself. "I saw plenty, out among the mussels. Why do you want it?"

"We use it in spells," she said, cracking another shell, and added, "and in jewelry," in a tone that suggested something amused her.

"I can get it for you," he offered, anxious to do something else to please her.

Her eyes danced at him over the edge of the shell. "I'd like to see that again. Shall I hold your clothes for you?"

Geraint choked on the bite he'd just taken, and stumbled to his feet as he tried to cough. Angharad sprang up and delivered a surprisingly strong blow to his back; the lump in his throat popped free and he swallowed it down, conscious that his face was blazing.

"Good thing they're slippery," she remarked, handing him a water flask from her belt. "Sorry. That was mean of me." She was red-faced herself, but, he suspected, more from suppressed laughter than at any embarrassment at discomfiting him. "It's kind of you, but no - I have to do it myself. There's a proper way to go about it if they're to be of any use to us."

"I see," he gasped out, as soon as he could speak again. "I'm sorry. That caught me off guard."

Angharad grinned. "You can come with me, though, if you like. I can arrange for you not to need such…precautions."

Curiosity made him acquiesce. "Very well. Any way I can be of service."

"Yes. But later." She sat again. "I'm still hungry, and you've only had that one bite. Not a very satisfying one, either."

He had no concept of time passing, nor even of eating, though he must have done so, for the mussels eventually disappeared and there were as many empty shells on the ground around him as there were at her feet. She plied him with more questions about his past, about life among the Rovers, about what he had seen in his travels across Prydain. He told her of the verdant south, the green and rolling farmland; the spectacle of towering cliff and sea that ringed the southwest coast, the lonely starkness of the marshlands that separated them. He told her of the purple-heathered, grey-veined hills of his own land, the blue lakes set like gems, hidden away in the hollows beneath the Giant's Throne. When he spoke of the mountains in the north, the pinnacles and needles of stone capping their summits, her eyes dilated and face flushed in a way that made him forget what he was saying. He trailed off into silence, but she seemed not to notice.

"I should so like to see real mountains again," she breathed. "I saw the Eagle once, when I visited Caer Dathyl, years ago. It was magnificent."

"You haven't been off this island much, I take it," he said.

"I've been to Mona many times." She nodded toward their larger neighbor to the southwest. "To the mainland, only once."

"But the House of Llyr is allied with the House of Don," Geraint mused. "Or so it is said. Isn't it odd that there should be so few visits? For diplomacy's sake, if nothing else?"

"Yes, we are," Angharad said shortly. "There is kinship between the houses if you go back ages. The daughters of Llyr are also descended from a daughter of Don.…it's where this hair comes from." She ran her hands through her fiery mane, pulling it away from her face with a grin. "Didn't see this anywhere in Llanisfair, did you? I'm a throwback, a reminder that we owe as much to Belin as Llyr. Not everyone likes to be reminded."

The careless tug and tangle of her fingers through her hair made him catch his breath again, and Geraint looked away, trying to distract himself. What had she just said? Anywhere in Llanisfair…no, come to think of it; though that vivid golden-red crown of hers would have been notable anywhere, there was a distinct lack of anything but dark heads in the village. No wonder the ladies had exclaimed over his own crop of pale-gold curls.

"Prince Gwydion has visited Caer Colur several times," Angharad went on, drawing him back to himself. "I have….an open invitation, more or less, to return such visits, but….the queen doesn't encourage it. And I have too many duties here to leave for long." She looked mildly uncomfortable, her face reddening, and Geraint felt stricken with a sudden, irrational dislike of the crown prince.

"Speaking of duty," she continued, rising, "I must collect what I came for. I promised to be back before dark."

Geraint scrambled to his feet as she turned, noting for the first time that the sun was growing low. He followed her down to the cluster of standing rocks where she had left her boots and other items, watched while she shouldered a leather pouch. "Stay next to me," she instructed, and waded into the surf.

Once again he watched in wonder as the waves parted before her, and hurried to place himself in the same vicinity of calm water, in the shadow-trail she left before the breakers rejoined. Around them the sea grew higher, but the waves continued to divide, flowing gently past, effortless. "Does it just…do that for you?" Geraint asked, incredulous. "Or do you have to make it happen?"

"It's a warding spell," Angharad said carelessly. "So it requires a little something from me. But not much."

She waved a hand over the surface of the water, then dipped into it as one might dip a cupped hand to drink. But the hand she brought up did not rise wet and streaming; it cupped instead a rounded bead of water, like a drop of dew on the surface of a velvet-leafed herb, only many times larger.

"Great Belin," Geraint breathed. Angharad's sea-green eyes glittered at him across the bead.

"No," she said, amused. "He has nothing to do with this."

He laughed, realizing his mistake. "Of course. Llyr, isn't it?" He poked at the shimmering bead; it quivered and held its shape, even as his fingers breached the surface and came out dripping, as they might from any puddle. "What else can you do with it?"

"Oh, just.…" She slid the bead from one hand to another, twisted her fingers in the air. Before his eyes it elongated, shimmering, fluidly divided itself until it took on the shape of a five-pointed star…another twist, and it flowed into the form of a scallop shell, transparent as glass. "Anything I can think of, I suppose. It's just a game, really. This is how we play as children." She let the bead slide from her hand and back to the surface; it landed with a plop like a giant raindrop and was gone.

They had reached the rocks where he'd seen the ormers, tightly clustered around the bases and in the clefts of stone. Other small attached creatures - tentacled, soft-bodied, multi-colored - waved gently in the current, a small underwater forest. Angharad dropped to her knees to reach the shells; the water rose to her chest, and her brilliant hair spread like rays of light across the surface, rippling with the slight movement of every wave that crested harmlessly past them - a sight that captured his attention so fully that Geraint did not see what she was doing until she handed him the leather pouch she carried, already heavy with ormers.

"How'd you…? That was fast," he exclaimed, peering inside at the mass of shells, undulating softly in their death throes. While he was looking she dropped in two more. "You don't even have a knife."

"No," she chuckled. "They come off because I ask them to."

"Of course they do," he retorted. "Next you'll tell me they willingly sacrifice themselves."

"Weellll." She looked rueful. "In a manner of speaking. But they don't really feel it, you know, not in the way we would. And we eat them, too - it's not just vanity and magic. Nothing gets wasted."

She rose to her feet and motioned for him to follow; he did so like a man in a dream, trying rather unsuccessfully not to notice how her wet hair and garments clung to the lines of her figure, until they were on dry land again.

"Now then," she said, and followed it up with a string of words he did not understand. Only after she had stared at him expectantly for several seconds did he realize, with a wordless exclamation, that they were both perfectly dry.

Angharad sat on the rock and pulled her boots back on. "How long will you stay here?" she asked abruptly, breaking his surprised silence.

"I…" Geraint bit back reckless words that he might stay where he could see her forever, and shoved the thought down as the madness it was. What good would staying do; what on earth could he hope for? "I haven't decided. It is pleasant here, and I have nowhere to go and no way to get there, until I repair my boat." He shrugged, trying to appear nonchalant. "I thought I might stay the summer."

She stared at him, inscrutable; he could not tell whether she was pleased or not. "I mean," he stammered, remembering their respective positions, "if it is permissible. I am here on your good graces, after all, a guest of the island."

"An uninvited one," she remarked, with a teasing twitch of her mouth. "But I shall be lenient. Wouldn't you rather stay somewhere else? There are guest quarters in Caer Colur; you'd be much more comfortable."

The thought of staying near her plucked at him with an almost overwhelming temptation. But… "No," he answered. "I thank you, princess. But I am in no position to be a guest of the royal house. Here I am free to be who I am, without apology, as I could not be in your home."

"Hm," she said, staring at him, thoughtful. A little of the goddess returned, as though in response to the impudent idea that they could be on equal footing, anywhere, and she said with sudden severity, "Are you aware that on this island, Geraint of Gellau, it is not permissible for any common man to look a Daughter of Llyr in the eye?"

Geraint opened his mouth and then closed it again, stunned. Confusion enveloped him as he dragged his gaze from her eyes, only to have it bounce frantically about other bits of her that seemed far less appropriate. Finally he fixed it somewhere vaguely to her right. "I…I was not, milady, or at least…that is one of the rumors, but…forgive me, I…"

"No," she interrupted. "I knew you did not know. I am glad of it. Look at me."

Her emerald gaze shot through him again, burned into his heart. "I told you so that you would not be in ignorance if you ever come to court," she explained, and then for the first time her own eyes faltered, danced away as if she were unsure of herself. "My mother is not so lenient. But I…find it…pleasant. Out here, where there is no one to see, to condemn you - please always face me as you do now."

Her face was flushed, glowing in the golden light of the lowering sun. Geraint bit his lip, swallowed hard, and coughed before speaking, for he did not trust his voice. "Does that mean you'll come back?"

Angharad glanced back at him quickly and then away. "I told you," she said, a small smile playing at her mouth, "I come here often."


Again, my thanks to all you who read and reviewed. I hope this continues not to disappoint - you have time to savor, now - I'll be gone for the next three weeks. Updates will continue in mid-June!