Taran shook her gently awake at first light— it was a bleak morning, chilly and overcast, as though spring were having second thoughts, and glancing back wistfully to winter. "We'd better get on," he said regretfully. "It feels like rain."
"Oh, drat." Eilonwy sat up and drew her cloak about her, wrinkling her nose at the sky. "What a shame, after such a day yesterday! Like getting a worm on your last bite of an apple." Remembering the previous night's squabble, she cast Taran a questioning look, gauging his mood; he made no response to her comment, but then he was never very talkative in the morning.
The Rovers were already up and about, tending to morning chores. Eilonwy waved several farewells as voices called out to wish them safe journey and wind at their backs until their next meeting. She gazed back in admiration of the bright wagons as they saddled the horses and mounted up, set the pale smudge of sunrise to their left, and headed toward Caer Dallben. Gurgi trotted alongside, investigating every bush and clump of grass. Kaw had disappeared.
The horses needed no guidance, sensing their destination, and Eilonwy let Lluagor amble along, her thoughts intensely occupied with all she had seen and heard. Not a quarter-hour into their journey, a cold droplet of water hit her cheek, and then another; the horses snorted and steamed from their noses as the pattering sound of light rain rose from the rocks around them. Taran muttered under his breath as they pulled their hoods over their heads. Presently Gurgi came galloping toward them, having made investigations from the crest of a nearby ridge.
"Gurgi smells rainings and drainings!" he announced. "Oh, many cold streamings coming from the hills. Master and wise princess must make haste to get home, or be drenched with great soakings!"
Taran clucked to Melynlas, propelling the stallion into a trot. "We're aren't too far out. We'll be all right."
Eilonwy urged Lluagor to speed up, grumbling to herself. The wind was indeed increasing, cold and wet, catching at strands of her hair and lashing her in the face with them, despite her hood. She pulled her hands into the folds of her cloak, but the jogging of the horse kept shaking the cloth free. In minutes her fingers were clenched upon the reins, white with cold. Though she had taken the time to put on her sandals, she had not thought to don leggings; her toes were going numb, and her legs prickled where the raindrops found bare skin between wind-whipped folds of cloak and tattered skirt.
Gurgi's nose was a reliable prophet; before they'd covered half their distance, the sky opened and sent forth a deluge. Wind blasted them with gusts of freezing rain, and now they were leaving what little shelter the hills provided, as the swells of land and rocky outcroppings melted into gentle rolling fields. Eilonwy, miserable and shivering but determined not to complain, huddled into her cloak, as Taran reined up and hesitated at the base of the last series of ridges.
"I think perhaps we should wait out the rest of this," he called to her, his breath puffing white before being carried off by the wind. "I thought we could make it back before it got so bad, but there'll be no shelter at all the rest of the way, and Caer Dallben is a league off, still."
"But wait it out where?" She looked around them, seeing nothing that offered anything better than a windbreak, if that. "Shouldn't we just gallop home quick as we can, and warm up once we get there?"
He shook his head. "It's not good for the horses, galloping in this for too long. Especially Lluagor; if she takes colic she could lose her foal. It's bad enough she's out in this at all. Come, follow me — even a few trees would be better than nothing."
He turned Melynlas downhill to the west, heading for a dip in the landscape, and Eilonwy followed, turning their backs to the wind. Gurgi tore ahead of them, rounding a bend where a pile of rock jutted from the landscape like the foot of some great beast. Presently he came loping back. "Haste, make haste!" he urged. "Clever Gurgi finds hollow places within mighty stones! Not as dry as a cozy cottage, no, but out of the flowings and blowings of the wind!"
He scrambled back, beckoning them earnestly, and they trotted the horses around the outcropping. The change of angle revealed heaps of great stones, tumbled about and leaning against one another, as though a giant had been building a wall and then knocked it over in a rage. But if so, it had happened so long ago that the rock bases had overgrown with turf and moss. Their craggy tops had caught enough earth to support the growth of a few small and very bold trees, which clung tenaciously here and there, overhanging the narrow spaces between the stones.
"Well done, Gurgi!" Taran exclaimed, and the creature wriggled all over, joyful at being praised. Wearily, they dismounted, and led the horses into the hollows; the space was cramped, but a blessed relief from the elements. Only a misting of the rain managed to reach them here; the wind occasionally flung a cold arrow between cracks, but otherwise it was an impotent fury, shrieking overhead in rage at their escape.
"It's like a maze," Eilonwy remarked, as they twisted and turned their way through the monoliths, seeking a spot where they could all fit comfortably. Taran halted at last, and squeezed his way past Melynlas, back to where Eilonwy led Lluagor by the bridle.
"Let her go," he advised. "There's a wider spot up here that's as good as we'll find, I think, at least for the horses. I don't want to lead them somewhere so tight we can't turn around. Come."
She followed him forward, past the horses and into a vaguely semi-circular space against a low cliff, its upper edge overshadowed by the grim stones and a few of the stubborn trees. Slightly more rain found its way in here, but the horses seemed content, huddling against each other for warmth. Taran dug into the saddlebags and found the blanket Eilonwy had used as a bedroll. "Here," he said, handing it to her. "Take this and find a dry spot, if you can."
Beneath the overhanging cliff there was a shallow recess; Eilonwy backed into it, shivering, wishing she had something to burn. There were scattered dead twigs fallen from the trees above, but nothing that would make a fire of any lasting heat. Taran, after filling nosebags for the horses, shook the rain off his cloak and joined her, folding his long limbs up tight. It was a small space, and it made her feel odd…jumbled-up and fluttery, for him to be so close. She scowled at her own confusion. For goodness' sake, she had often ridden horseback behind him, arms tight around his torso, with no thought except staying seated…and now the mere possibility of brushing shoulders with him made her nerves fray like old cords, made her reluctant to offer him the shared warmth of the blanket. She forced down her foolishness and held out its edge. He wrapped it around his shoulders, the press of the cloth pulling her closer; his solid warmth soaked into her side.
"Coll said to be home within an hour of sunrise," she said, to fill the silence, and deny the quiver in her breath.
She felt him shrug. "Even Coll can't predict the weather. He'd be more upset if any of us were ill. We'll just wait for the worst of it to pass."
They watched the horses switch their tails, draw their heads together and nicker quietly to one another. "I suppose the Rovers are all huddled in their wagons, back there," Eilonwy mused. "It must get cramped when the weather's foul."
"They're used to it, I should think," Taran said. "Perhaps they find it cozy. But they've got their own troubles. They were telling me yesterday how bad the bandits in the southern hills have been, the last few years. That's why it's been so long since any camps came this way."
"I never even thought of that," Eilonwy confessed. "What a target for thieves they must be, with all the goods they're carrying! And so many children and families to protect. I wonder how they manage it."
"They've got their ways," he said. "All the women and children travel and sleep in the center of camp or in wagons. The men and older boys stay in stations 'round the edge. Did you not notice, last night? I suppose you were too distracted with your dancing." She swept him a sidelong, warning glance, but his expression was mild, his tone neutral; if he meant to annoy her she could not tell. "And they're all fighters when they need to be. The lads showed me hidden compartments all over the wagons, where they store weapons. They've quite a lot of protection spells and luck charms hung about. Who knows if they really do anything, but they seem to think so."
"They may be right. I met at least one who knew something of magic." The day before, she had acquired her new dagger from a sturdy, matronly woman who had been very interested in her bundles of herbs—one who, upon noticing her pendant, had sweetened the bargain, adding in the scarlet sash to bind the blade to her waist. The woman had ended the transaction with a little head bow, curling her hand into a crescent shape and touching it to her breastbone— a gesture that had felt startlingly familiar, and spawned an instinctive impulse to return it. Eilonwy had done so automatically, and instantly a smooth, sweet sensation had rippled through her, like the rings on the surface of a pond when you tossed a pebble in. It was the signature of magic she encountered but rarely, a birthright Achren had denied her: water, the cool, heavy, balancing counterpart to the swift fire element that came to her so readily. Always it left her trembling and yearning, though for what, she could not say…beyond, simply, more of it.
And that single gesture had drawn it as easy as breath. Cautiously she performed it again, now, touching her curled hand to her heart, but the sensation did not repeat itself. Perhaps it was only meant to be something communicative, then; a salutation of sorts. She would ask Dallben when they got home.
Assuming he would tell her anything. Maddeningly, Dallben seemed indifferent as to whether she ever accessed her magic or not —certainly his reaction to seeing her newfound abilities after the quest for the Black Crochan had been ambivalent, at best. Concerned, at her confession of how she had allowed herself too much liberty; relieved, that she seemed to realize it. But never encouraging her to do more, never directly teaching her much of anything that did not come to her on its own.
Gurgi came scampering up and shimmied off a dirty spray of rain, before crawling next to them and curling up at the foot of the rock face. Eilonwy watched him somewhat enviously. If only it were so easy to get dry! Surely there was magic she ought to be able to use that could accomplish the same. But control over water eluded her. A few brushes with it in times of desperate need, that was all—reins that were placed in her hands and then ripped away the moment she thought she held them fast.
But there was no use grousing about it now. Her current situation was tolerable enough. For all that Taran's closeness made her feel like she'd swallowed moths, the sensation was strangely compelling; he felt…safe. Protective. At her other side Gurgi lay curled like a hound at a hearth. The little hollow beneath the stones was a secret space, outside which the wind and rain howled but could not reach them. If the interior of the Rover wagons were anything like this, they might well be called cozy. "I wonder if they usually go the same route," she said. "Was this clan the same as the one you'd seen before?"
"More or less," he said, "but they change often. I recognized some of the adults, and saw a few whose names I remembered. But when I asked about another fellow I'd met before, they said his family had joined a different camp. Sometimes branches break off and start their own caravans, or folks marry into different clans and take their kin with them."
"It must be hard for them to start over like that," she said. "Being always on the move, never getting attached to any one place, I should think they'd be all the more attached to one another. But I suppose it's interesting to travel about and see how people and places have changed since the last time you were there."
Taran hemmed agreeably, and she continued on. "Only think, by the time we see them again, Niamh and Oisin may have children of their own. Can you imagine? They're no older than…"
She trailed off, and Taran coughed self-consciously, the prelude to an awkward silence. The memory of the young couple absorbed in their amorous embrace was burning her mind like a brand, the heat of it pulsing into her face. Was he thinking of it as well? —blast it, what made her wonder such things?
Suddenly she was oppressively hot. Taran's presence radiated like an oven. She threw the blanket from her shoulders with a huff, and from the corner of her eye saw him glance at her in surprise. "Warm enough?"
"Mmmph." She wasn't; she missed the comforting sense of his nearness immediately, despite being so flustered by it moments before. Belin and Llyr! Why did nothing about her own feelings make sense where he was concerned? He was like the wild piece in the strategic battle-game Coll had taught them to pass the time on winter evenings: that one red-painted knave that upended all the rules when it was brought onto the board. He had not always been so. She could not stop resenting the change long enough to decide whether it might be welcome.
Silence stretched again, thick and uncomfortable, and then Taran spoke again, lightly. "This reminds me of when we were stuck on top of the mountain pass in the rain with Fflewddur. You remember, just after we left Medwyn?"
"And we all sang to brave the storm," she exclaimed, in relief at the safe change of topic. "Better shelter this time, though. I wish Fflewddur were here! Who knows when we'll see him again."
"Odd, isn't it," Taran said, "that we should make such a friend of someone we've only seen during a crisis of some kind or other."
"You could say that about nearly everyone we know. When has Gwydion ever just popped in to Caer Dallben for a chat? Or Doli? We're so far away from everything. Perhaps that's why a Rover visit has always been so exciting for you."
"That's true," he admitted. "But their visits are so brief, there's never a chance to make true friends among them. You've got to do things together, I think, for someone to become dear to you. Things that matter. So you'll always be close to those you've traveled and labored with, even if that's the only time you've spent with them."
"Maybe." Eilonwy squinted thoughtfully. "But you've still got to like them. We traveled and labored with Ellidyr, and that didn't make him any friendlier. I think you could likely make as dear a friend of someone just by talking with them, even if you didn't do much of anything."
"That would still take time, though."
"Yes, of course. But think of all our moments of being with Fflewddur…which stand out as the best? The battles and dangers? Or just sitting 'round the fire, telling stories? Do you know what one of my favorite memories of him is? That one evening, coming back from Caer Dathyl, when he and Doli got into a quarrel about rabbits."
A brief silence —then Taran broke into a chuckle. "I forgot all about that. How did it begin?"
"That old chestnut about carrying a rabbit's foot for luck. Fflewddur swore by it, but Doli told him the Fair Folk made it up to make fools of humans. Fflewddur didn't believe him, or pretended not to. And they went back and forth until I couldn't breathe for laughing." She was laughing, now, at the memory of her friends: the bard descending into more and more outrageous anecdotes of lifesaving fortune by rabbit appendages, each of them ruthlessly shot down by the dwarf, whose dry irascibility increased in proportion to Fflewddur's silliness. They threw so many insults at one another, any strangers watching might have thought they would be at one another's throats any moment, but their twinkling eyes had given the game away to all those who knew them.
"I think my favorite," Taran said, "is the time you and I couldn't stop laughing at his snoring, that night in Medwyn's byre."
This memory of inexplicable, uncontrollable hilarity threatened instantly to repeat itself. "Oh, Llyr," she gasped, after an explosive giggle, "I remember how loud he was! It was like boulders crashing."
Taran was laughing, too, his face rosy with it, the blanket falling from his shaking shoulders. It didn't matter; they were both warm, now, flushed with shared memory and mirth. Oh, if he would always be just like this, just himself, an easy and affectionate companion! Laughter, she thought suddenly. Laughter does it, too…makes friends out of strangers, and family out of friends.
But the laugh subsided, and nothing took its place; she glanced up to find him looking at her…looking at her in that intense way that made her break her gaze at once, eyes darting to find a safe place to land— anywhere but upon him! Her cheeks burned; she cleared her throat, and noticed that the wind no longer shrieked overhead. "Storm's quieted down," she observed.
He said her name at almost the same moment she spoke, in a murmur she pretended not to hear as she scrambled from beneath the hollow. "We should get on," she said briskly, "don't you think? The wind's stopped, and without that, a bit of rain doesn't hurt. I hate to worry Coll and Dallben."
She thought she heard him sigh, but when he appeared in his turn he only looked up at the clouds appraisingly, and nodded. "Yes, you're right. Best to get back, and properly warmed up. Come, Gurgi."
As they gathered the horses Eilonwy gazed about curiously at the stones that hemmed them in. "Funny" she said aloud, "this spot. It looks almost on purpose, how these were arranged, doesn't it?" She pointed to various tumbled slabs. "If you imagine that one and that one standing up straight, and those over there moved just a bit over, we'd be in a sort of half-ring, with lintels across."
Taran paused to follow her gaze. "Now you mention it…yes, it does. Almost like columns 'round a doorway."
They both stared at the cliff wall that backed the masses of stones, as though a door might materialize there. Eilonwy felt her the back of her neck prickle. Stone rings were always places of power, according to everything she had ever heard or read, and not always safe ones; they were ancient, built by beings older than men, and the old magic lingered on long after understanding of it had faded, even after the stones themselves had succumbed to time. "I think we'd better go," she whispered.
Taran nodded uneasily, and they wasted no time guiding the horses back out. The wind had stopped, the rain slowed to a chilly misting. A brisk trot warmed them all as they left the hills behind.
In less than an hour they were cantering into the barnyard, and she was pushing open the door of the cottage while Taran and Gurgi took the horses off to the stables. It was warm inside, the hearth fire fresh-kindled, the iron kettle hovering over it, ready for the morning's grain. Bread and honey were laid upon the table. Eilonwy sighed happily as she crossed to the fire and hung her wet cloak from the mantle. Coll must be out doing chores; Dallben was likely still asleep; for now, this cozy space was hers alone, the only sounds the rain upon the shutters, the crackle of the flames, and the boiling of the kettle. By the time Coll and Taran and Gurgi came in, she'd have breakfast ready.
How sweet and lovely it was, to have a home to come to! She did not, after all, envy the Rovers.
Puttering about, setting the room in her preferred order, she did not hear Dallben enter…but then she never did hear him, and had become used to turning around and seeing him sitting in a chair that had been empty a moment before.
"Morning," she said happily, planting an impulsive kiss upon his wrinkled cheek as she passed.
His shaggy eyebrows twitched in surprise. "Well, then. Brought the sunshine in, since it's blocked without, eh? You enjoyed your time at the camp, I see."
Eilonwy plunked upon the table side-bench, beaming. "It was marvelous. Did Coll tell you what all we found?"
He waved a hand lazily. "I have seen the fruits of your labor, of course. But I think your current mood is based on more than linen and thread —both of which, I suspect, you will despise before the day is out. Come, what did you make of the people?"
"They were lovely," she sighed. "I never had such fun. And Dallben," she continued eagerly, "they knew something of my parents."
A spark of real surprise crossed his watery gaze at this, an occurrence so unusual that she marked it. Quickly she related what she had learned from the smith and old Moira, and was gratified when he asked several pertinent questions. "And another thing," she added, after a pause for breath. "The woman who bartered for my herbs did this." She cupped her hand to her breast and bowed a little, as the Rover woman had. "I did it back to her before I thought, and I felt something happen. Not to anything around me, just…there was magic in it. Do you know what it means?"
Dallben's brows shot up like startled caterpillars, then settled into his somber, thoughtful gaze. He maintained this silently for a few moments before speaking. "That was the mark of reverence," he said, "from one devotee of Rhiannon to another. A salute your own people brought to Prydain."
Rhiannon…queen of the moon, mother of Llyr. Of course, the hand made the crescent; she ought to have guessed. "Then that woman was my kin?"
"No, I think not. The Rovers adopt what customs they choose from all with whom they have business. Most likely she was a midwife; Rhiannon is their matron, and she would have recognized your lineage." He nodded at her pendant. "She may not have been aware of any magic, though midwives do tend to be dabblers. But you felt it, did you?" He grunted…a sound she had learned to interpret as mildly ominous, as it often preceded a tiresome new edict.
"But I've done it since, and felt nothing," she added, by way of reassurance that no more rules were necessary.
"Not surprising," he said. "It is a mode of communion from one woman to another. An empty gesture, otherwise."
Before she had time to digest this, there was a tromping of boots and a scratching of claws at the door, and then the little room was full again, with rain shaken from hoods, with jokes and affection, and all sitting down to breakfast. Pottage and weak ale were passed around, as tales were retold of what they had seen and done —with certain bits, she noted, carefully omitted from Taran's narrative, as they were from hers.
"You did well to take shelter," Coll assured them. "I did worry, when that wind picked up, and wished I'd had you come home last night, but all's well that ends by a warm fire. Weather's a fickle companion, whatever," he added, with a rueful glance to the window, where a steady rain still beat against the shutter, "and there'll be no plowing today. But take heart!" He winked. "A rainy day is perfect for sewing, and I've already pieced out both your new clothes."
He laid his chuckle over their groans: a homely, familiar chorus.