A/N: All right, this is my first time attempting an 'Avalon' fic. I'm looking forward to it, but before I continue I am just going to make it clear that the main character, Eleina, is of my own creation. I don't want to play around much with the plot line of the 'Avalon' series, because it's just too amazing as it is for me to do so. This shall be a back story of one of the priestesses, set around the time of the book 'The Lady of Avalon,' when Lady Dierna is High Priestess, and maybe spilling over into when Lady Ana becomes so. Not sure yet. I'm planning on focusing this more on the political and religious side of the Avalon series, what with the Romans and the Saxtons and Paganism and Christianity, more then the characters of the actual books and their lives. I hope you enjoy! (Note: I do not own 'The Mists of Avalon' or any other book in the 'Avalon' series, these are all owned by Marion Zimmer Bradley who is an astonishing writer and an inspiration to many aspiring writers.) Also note that I did take the beginning style from the 'Avalon' series. Enjoy!

Update: All of the chapters are going through some edits, just to fix some grammar I noticed or spelling mistakes. If you're a regular, I suggest you reread the chapters.

---.:.Meandering Muse.:.

Eleina speaks:

It has been so long ago since that day… the fateful day in which my world was split in two. You could almost say my life was reborn from the ashes of my old—like the beautiful phoenix that finds its harbor in the bosom of the Old stories. The phoenix is an elegant, beautiful bird of fire with such a heavenly song and an untold power within its veins. This is how she appeared to my innocent eyes when first the Lady of Avalon emerged on my doorstep. She was the women about whom the elders gossip with hushed voices and the nervous laughter of fear.

The Lady of the Holy Isle was unlike any woman I had ever seen in the mere fifteen years of my existence and would ever meet again in my long life. She was a regal beauty, ageless and flawless even to the most experienced in such things. Maybe it was the air of power that surrounded her like a heavy winter cloak, or how the subtle blue dye of her Priestess robes made all in the house shrink and become even less important then the mice that scurried across our piss-stained floors. The Goddess herself was living in that woman, (or so the humble folk of my village murmured out of the earshot of the ever-growing community of Christians. They could talk ones ears off with words of salvation and sin.) I, being the child I was, was awe-struck by the figurehead. I remember thinking 'Is Avalon really as beautiful and as grand as this woman before me?' I was tempted to bow before her splendor, kiss the hem of her robes, and pronounce her Goddess before all. It wasn't until later that I found out that Lady Dierna was quite an old woman, and it was years until I finally saw the age come into her face and the youth flash out of her eyes to be replaced by weariness. She held the weariness of the world within her, and the politics of which the Lady of Avalon must partake heavily on her shoulders. Oh, how I pitied her, but ah… how gracefully she contained her pain. How flawlessly she hid her feelings and her fatigue. If I did not know better, I still would call her Goddess.

To begin my story, however, I must start at the beginning with no gaps or thoughts left untold. Only then will you understand what I have to tell of Avalon and the mysteries that lie within. It is doubtful that any will travel the Holy Isle again, friend or foe. It is hidden now… hidden from even the likes of me, who only yearns to once again tread along the warm sands of its banks with the cool sea water lapping at my toes. I hunger for one more chance to bask in the glow of the sun under a wide branched tree, listening to the distant sound of church bells from across the mist. If only just to listen to the singing of the Priestesses one last time before I fade from this world, if only that, then I would be made a happy woman for the rest of my days. My soul would finally be at rest. But, these are only dreams now… just as is Avalon, who vanished just as dreams do themselves into the mists of time.