The Dark Swan/Part I
I was only a boy, rescued from the tyranny of slave work. The sisters of Bride found me laying among the thorns at the village crossroads. My brow was damp and my legs bloody where the undergrowth had sliced my skin.
“Lift 'im up, 'elp us carry 'im Mayra.”
I could hear the women fussing over me but I did not have the strength to open my eyes. I was weak with hunger and thirst. The one they called Mayra fretted about me, feeling my limbs and chest, repeating again and again the name of her Goddess.
“Bride, oh my Goddess, oh my Sweet Bride...What has happened?” And she rocked me and listened for my breath.
“'e might be dead,” she uttered in a whisper.
“'e ain't dead.” another sister spoke gruffly “look, 'is eyes be fluttering.”
At sunset three days previous, I fled my Master. The journey had been long and every part of my body ached but I knew that there was more to life than hardship and the stinging pain of the whip.
Bride's disciples gathered my body in their graceful arms. They brought me to their sanctuary in the forest and threw me in the bath. When my body was clean, they rested me on a bed of straw and dirt. The sister's called me Patricius, a name which means noble man. I felt that I had been deemed as Bride's knight, himself! I joyed as they raised me inside sacred walls.
I became the charge of three adherents, Mayra, Ailsa, and Lynn. Mayra was constantly vexed by my condition, mothering me as though I had never been weened from the tit.
“Drink up boy,” she clucked, handing me a glass of the warmest ewe's milk.
I drank deeply and felt my heart quicken with hunger from the first taste of drink. I shoved a piece of corn bread into my mouth from the loaf Mayra pressed upon me.
Lynn was not so kind. She cursed under her breath and touched my wounds roughly. But she carried the water of Bride, and I felt the pain ebb as she massaged the healing balm over my legs.
“'e'll be better soon,” She said to Mayra “and 'e can't stay here. 'e'll be a man, after several harvests I expect and Bride's sanctuary cannot be open to 'im then.”
Mayra said nothing. I think she was plotting a way to disguise me in women's clothes and keep me always for her own.
Ailsa was very young and was not of great assistance but she kept a brilliant fire aflame on the hearth and when Mayra gave us a moment of peace she told me the stories of Bride. I did not speak, Mayra had decided from too much torture, but in truth I knew little language then. I had grown to work, not to sing praises.
Still, I enjoyed what I understood of Ailsa's stories.
“She means well,” Ailsa whispered to me of Mayra as she sat beside her fire and gazed at my stillness. “She can keen almost as much as Bride, that first time.”
I looked at her confused.
“Ruadan was the son of Bride by Bres, a God in his own right. He was defeated in Magh Tuireadh. That is why we have been pushed to the edges of the forests, Bride's name is cursed beyond these parts. The Goddess walked barefoot through the carnage. She knelt beside her son's ashen body and she moaned to fill the valley with her screams. It was the first time,” Ailsa muttered quietly, “that a Goddess had mourned like that. Even when Bres left her for the roots of Yggdrasil she did not cry. But the death of Ruadan was past her endurance. Bride is filled with emotion. She is filled with love for us because we are all her children. One day, she will deliver us to a land of promise and bounty. One day, she will find proper worship.”
I fell into a deep slumber, nursed by Mayra and calmed by Ailsa's voice.
Though I was a boy, I grew a disciple of Bride. I never spoke in the company of the sisters but in dreams I saw my Goddess. She came to me full of light and I was her consort, her shepherd and servant.
I was not allowed to tend to her sacred well as Lynn and the elders did, nor would I light Bride's eternal flame. But I helped Mayra in the kitchen, ever silent, and I was happy.
Each night Bride spoke to me, appearing vividly in elegance and beauty and I understood her. I told her my stories, how I had been taken from my mother and into slavery, how I had lived in anguish until I came to her sanctuary among the oaks. She keened for me. She wrapped me in her arms, hot like fire.
“I love you,” she whispered. “I love you as I did not know I could ever love again.”
With her watery voice, her flaming breasts, the Goddess Bride took me in. She taught me to make love to her and I knew she was a part of me. She wrapped my heart in light and cooled my tears.
But just as Lynn had said that I would, I grew into a man and I heard Lynn's stubborn voice berating Mayra.
“'e 'as to leave! Times are urgent for Bride. A cloister of ladies won't be payed no mind by Giobhniu's men. But a man! They'd soon have 'im for a soldier and 'e knows our secrets. 'e must swear in Bride's name to keep her sacred and then 'e must go!”
“But is there nothing 'e can do? Nowhere 'e can go? We've 'id 'im this long!” Mayra clung to Lynn's robes
“Giobhniu's men be closin' in on us, Mayra! They gather closer every day! Bride 'as little power without her mantle.”
My ears perked up at the mention of Bride's mantle. I had never heard mention of the item before. But I knew that the strength of my love, my goddess, grew fainter each day. I yearned for Bride to live in sacred worship once more. I was her most loyal disciple. I would die for her, if that is what she asked.
I hurried from out of my hiding place, listening to Mayra weeping in the halls. I found Ailsa in front of the hearth, as she often was, listening for the voice of her Goddess, praying to Bride to keep her sisters' flame glowing and their passion strong.
I stared at her, my voice still trapped in my throat.
“Patricius,” she cooed. “What is it brother? Do you continue to be lost for language?”
I hurried towards her, a look of desperation and hope flooding my eyes. In the ashes by the hearth I drew the shape of a mantle and she looked at the image curiously.
“You want to know, what happened to Bride's mantle?” she asked. “You cannot get it for her. You will die.”
My lips quaked as light quivered over them beside the glowing flames of the hearth.
“But I have seen the way you look into the face of her idols, Patricius. She owns you completely.”
I admit that I was scared. Over and over I heard Bride's keening in my head. Dare I loose my life in her honor as Bres had done, as Ruadan had fallen?
“Bres wears Bride's mantle. It 'is 'ow she buried 'im, deep in the roots of Yggdrasil. 'E loved her too. But 'e was only half a God. They lived beautifully for a time together until he grew old and did not wake. Bride did not know than that Giobhniu would rise and defeat her. She did not know that she would be relegated to these small sanctuaries, worshiped by our meagre numbers. She only wanted to give her lover a proper burial. She called to her the creatures of the earth and she carried Bres' body herself, to the roots of Yggdrasil. She covered Bres in her mantle and rose again to the high branches of the world tree. Bres is buried where the shamrocks carry four leaves instead of one. Three for Brighid and one for her love.”
My face became like stone. I was determined to bring my lady back her mantle. Ailsa took a piece of flint from beside the fire. With careful fingers and long rod instruments she burned the flint to a scalding ember.
“Hold out your arm, Patricius.”
I did as I was told.
Ailsa placed the burning flint on the inside of my forearm. My skin seared with pain and my legs twitched but I did not move. Ailsa stood and went to the window of the sanctuary. She took a tiny bowl of Bride's water that had been resting there and she poured it on my arm where the flint had burned me. Bride's healing water cooled the wound and spread the most pleasurable sensation all over my body. I could feel Bride's love.
Where the Bride's water had trickled a scar was formed, spiraling towards my wrist like a snake. It was the symbol of Bride. All who saw the sign would know that I worshiped her and would reveal her secrets under no amount of torture. Ailsa too, had the same scar and all of Bride's disciples.
Ailsa whispered to me again, urgently.
“Leave while the others are sleeping. The place where Bres is buried is ruled by Giobhniu. You will not come by it easily. Bring Bride back her mantle if you can. If you cannot, you will die in her service, like the rest of us.”
Ailsa lit a torch for me from the hearth fire.
“This fire will always burn in Bride's domain. Beyond this small parcel of land, you must find your own light”
She kissed me on the cheek and I left the room, silence enveloping me once more.
I did not sleep. I posted the torch above my bed. I knew in my heart that Bride would hold me back, if she knew about my quest. Already she had lost a lover and a son. Already she was almost dying herself. But Bride had passion and an immortal love, with only her small population of disciples to tend to her well and flame, she lived on.
I imagined her cries as I threw a cloak over my shoulders and left Bride's sanctuary beneath the glowing moon. I ran my fingers over Bride's symbol on my arm and continued onwards. I imagined my lover keening for me.
“Do not die for me. Please...do not die for me. Do not leave me.”
Still I walked forward. And die for her I would, if that is what was asked of me.
Comments
Post a Comment