The Tower and the Emerald Read online

  She frowned. Behind words lay always other words . . . And these were the ones one should strive to hear.

  What if those who had imprisoned him had reason for what they did?

  ‘Ask yourself . . .’ His voice was soft again – silence within silence. ‘Ask yourself who would be the innocent and who the guilty. He who lies here denied what rightfully belongs to every living being . . . or they who deny it?’

  It seemed to her she saw the circle of tall stones standing erect, each transmitting the energy of sky to earth and earth to sky. Between them the force flowed from one to other, completing the ring. Within this ring, four priests and one priestess in cloaks of wolfskin and eagle feather, with golden torques about their arms and around their necks, stepped slowly and deliberately to the rhythm of the fatal chant-spell, gradually, inexorably, closing the spiral. Each face was masked: the mask of Judgement: set and hard and impersonal: but through the eyeholes the eyes glittered: some with triumph: some with fear: all with hate.

  In the centre lay a man with both legs ritually broken: his handsome face the face of an angel . . . pleading with them for mercy . . . protesting innocence with words so persuasive that surely no one with a heart could remain unmoved. How many times had the powerful and the corrupt destroyed those who threatened them, she thought.

  She started to move again, resolved to unwind the spiral, finding the strange words she had spoken before now coming easily to her mind. But this time there were changes in the sequence. She was trembling, almost dizzy with the turning. But now she was determined to make haste.

  Stumbling, she finally completed the last steps and fell panting on to the grass. She was drained – exhausted – but well pleased with what she had done.

  A cloud must have passed over the sun, for a sudden chill made her shiver. As she looked up, the icy cold that a moment before had touched her flesh now reached her heart. In shock she clambered to her feet. There was no cloud – but a dark and shapeless miasma over the land. The buttercups at her feet seemed dead . . . the grass scorched as though a fire had passed swiftly over it. The sky was clear and black as night – but without moon or stars!

  Horrified she stared around her, her hands up to cover her mouth . . .

  What had she done? Oh God! What had she done?

  Then she heard a cruel and mocking laugh. She spun round, but the circle was empty . . . truly empty now. She knew that she had broken the ancient spell, and the prisoner was set free.

  Suddenly she remembered.

  She knew that she had not always been Viviane, daughter of Garwys, betrothed of Caradawc – but once was Fiann, priestess, and lover of Idoc, a priest turned sorcerer.

  How sweet her adolescent love had been . . . the touch of him . . . his eyes . . . the turn of his head . . . Everything about him had made her heart beat faster. There had been a time when the whole of her life hung on a word, a glance, from him. She had even entered the priesthood to be near him.

  When Idoc first lay with her the ecstasy had shut out all other thoughts, all other dreams. As his flesh entered hers, her experience of him had been total. But those early years had passed, and the handsome young man changed, becoming ever more remote and secretive, lying with her only rarely, and each time more selfishly and violently than the last, until her love and her body were so bruised and shamed that she swore never to let him touch her again.

  Yet his colleagues honoured him increasingly as he passed with brilliance each trial and test devised for him. At last he stood so high among the adepts that he was named as successor to the High Priest.

  She could see him now standing in the Holy Place, bowing his head as each ceremonial robe was placed over him: the white, the blue, the purple; and with each robe an ancient mighty Name, each Name a Power. She saw the marking as each Name was given: on the soles of the feet, on the palms of the hands, and finally on the forehead. She saw his eyes as the crystal and the rod of silver were placed in his hands, the circlet of silver and hawk feather on his brow. How many times had she run her fingers through that long, thick black hair, kissed that severe but handsome face, traced those winged eyebrows to the strong, straight nose? Ah, but he was handsome – magnificent in his robes. Surely now that he had so much, he would not demand more? Surely now that the long and gruelling training and initiation were over, he would relax and be as loving with her as he used to be?

  But this was not to be. His very first act was to rid himself of the three priests who had not been wholehearted in his choosing. Two died suddenly, mysteriously and horribly, and the third fled for his life. They all realized, too late, that they had given power to someone who was either a madman or a demon. From that time on no one was safe – nothing was sacred. The High Priest found himself no more than a figurehead, powerless to interfere. The ancient laws were now twisted round to suit Idoc’s whim. Anyone who dared to cross him was cruelly destroyed.

  At last, in desperation, realizing that his genius for destruction was not limited to their own community, but that his ambitions reached out across the whole country, the priesthood secretly planned to use a binding spell, the last resort of the desperate, a spell so fearful that whoever pronounced it risked his own life.

  The spell was cast. With their last act of knowledge the priests pulled down the Stones upon themselves and closed the circle forever. She could hear the sound of their falling now, the roar, the rushing wind, the thud that struck her heart into darkness.

  And then . . . the long silence.

  Now, standing in another life, in another body, Viviane – who had been Fiann – remembered the look in Idoc’s eyes when he realized that she had betrayed him.

  She began to shake. ‘O God,’ she sobbed. ‘O God . . . O God . . .’ Should she call on the Christ? On the Holy Spirit? Or on the ancient gods of her people?

  Stumbling, she fled . . . fell and rose and ran . . . and fell again . . . Where should she go? Where was there to hide? She could not believe that she had been foolish enough to fall victim to his cunning and his charm once again.

  Viviane crouched by the stream in the valley, weeping, fingering her knife . . . wondering if she should kill herself . . . but she knew that the death of the body would be no escape . . .

  And then she heard a sound, faint at first, but steadily increasing. Puzzled, she held her breath and listened. She was so distraught with fear that at first she did not recognize it. It was the distant sound of a hunting horn, the calling note of a party searching in the forest.

  She leapt up, frantic with fear that they might pass her by, and began to run towards the forest, calling their names.

  ‘Caradawc!’ she screamed as she ran. ‘Caradawc!’

  The dark shadow had lifted from the land, the forest was in leaf again, the grass springy beneath her feet. Over­head a lark sang in the clear air. Tears streamed down her cheeks, her breath coming short with the effort of running. Surely she had imagined the whole thing?

  The horn blew loud and clear, and when its notes died away she could hear voices shouting her name amid the thunder of hooves.

  Suddenly the party broke out of the cover of the forest. Caradawc waved and galloped ahead to meet her, full tilt down the slope of the hill. How beautiful he looked! How she loved him! She could see the relief on his face, the white flash of his smile . . . Then suddenly his horse lost its footing on the uneven ground and Caradawc was sent flying over his head. The others laughed. The young prince’s horsemanship was unquestioned, and spirits were high now that they had found her.

  But then a strange thing happened. Caradawc’s chestnut reared up on its hind legs, whinnying with fear, and then galloped off towards the west. Caradawc himself lay still, his body buckled awkwardly in the grass. Viviane reached his side at the same moment as his great friend, Gerin. Together they turned him over and straightened him out.

  ‘He must have hit his head on that stone,’ Gerin said, allowing her to cradle her lover in her arms. Caradawc was very pale and still, an
d there was a thin trickle of blood from beside his temple.

  Viviane looked anxiously into Gerin’s eyes.

  ‘He’ll be all right,’ he said soothingly. ‘He’s taken worse falls than this in battle.’

  The others were now dismounting and crowding round them, but Cuall, Caradawc’s dog, howled disconsolately and backed away from his master as though he did not recognize him.

  Gerin arranged for Caradawc to be lifted up on to his steed in front of him, while his friend Rheged galloped off to bring back the prince’s horse. Cai, another close friend, rode on ahead to warn Goreu of his son’s accident.

  Gerin had said that Caradawc would be all right, but would he? He looked so pale . . . so dead. Seeing him slumped against Gerin, his legs flopping against the flanks of the horse, Viviane found it difficult to imagine him conscious again. She shuddered. Could Caradawc’s fall have anything to do with what had occurred in the ancient circle? Impatiently she dismissed the idea. ‘That way madness lies,’ she thought, and she stroked her mare’s silky mane as she rode, taking comfort from the animal’s companionship.

  * * * * *

  Goreu’s dogs came streaming through the gates and over the fields to meet them, barking with excitement. The sun had set while they were still in the forest, and the long twilight had almost faded. Some of Goreu’s people with torches were standing anxiously in the quarter-light, peering at the party of dark shapes picking its way carefully down the last hill slope. The hunting dogs joined in the din, excited as they were to smell home at last, and the horn blower, carried away by the occasion, blew continually on his horn. Every man, woman and child who lived around Castle Goreu – serving its master, sheltering under his protection – was out, milling about them, asking what had happened. The cries of alarm when Caradawc was lowered down gently in the arms of his friends brought the huge bulk of Goreu himself into the courtyard, growling like a bear. But when he saw the young prince he was shocked into silence, and as the flickering torch flames lit up his face, Viviane saw no trace of the contempt he usually showed towards his son.

  They carried Caradawc to his room and laid him on his bed, Goreu calling for Kicva, the healing woman, part Druid trained, whom he trusted more than the Christian priest with his cedar box of herbs and ointments.

  Viviane washed the prince herself, stripping off his dusty clothes one by one.

  Goreu strode about the room, glowering and grumbling, more irritated now than worried, complaining that they had returned without meat from a forest teeming with deer and boar, sneering at his son for not being able to stay on his horse . . .

  Kicva came at last and pushed Viviane aside with her bony hands.

  ‘My lord,’ the young woman turned, outraged, to Goreu. ‘Surely the priest has been called? You are not trusting your eldest son to this . . . this . . .’

  Words failed her as she stared at the evil-smelling crone. The great age of the Druids was long past . . . the Romans had seen to that . . . but still the Celtic people clung to threads of the old knowledge, ragged as they were, often meaningless and dangerous for being misunderstood. Viviane, whose own father still held to the old religion, knew something of the Druid faith, and looked on Kicva as a sorry representative of the ancient line of bard-masters and shaman-priests that lay behind her.

  At Viviane’s words Kicva turned on her a look of such malevolence that the young woman shrank away from her – but then, remembering Caradawc’s plight, she stood her ground, meeting the woman’s eyes stare for stare.

  ‘The Christian will be called,’ Goreu said. ‘There will be time enough for his mumblings. But first Kicva will tend him, for she nursed me as a child and saw my father through all his battle wounds. Stand back, girl! Give her room,’ he commanded.

  Viviane moved out of the woman’s way but still kept close to Caradawc, taking his limp hand in hers.

  ‘I can’t work with all these people here,’ the old hag snarled, looking at Goreu. ‘Send them away.’

  ‘You heard her,’ he snapped. ‘Everyone leave the room!’

  ‘I will not!’ Viviane said defiantly, as the others moved to leave. Gerin paused at the door, anxiously meeting her eyes, asking her silently if she wanted him to stay. She shook her head and he reluctantly left. She settled down upon the edge of Caradawc’s bed, clutching his hand as though she believed no force on earth could prise her fingers from his.

  Goreu took her roughly by the arm and jerked her away. If she had not let go her lover’s hand, he would have been hauled off the bed with her.

  ‘Go to your room, girl,’ he snapped. ‘I am in no mood for this!’ And he pushed her angrily towards the door. She looked back, her arm bruised from his rough handling . . . Already the old woman was stooping over the young prince, Goreu standing beside him, holding up the lamp. It was as though she were already forgotten: a stranger who had briefly intruded and then passed on. There was something disturbing in the scene: something sinister in the flickering light that held the three figures together against the surrounding darkness.

  But she was too tired to worry about it. She found that she could barely drag herself to her own chamber. She hardly felt the servant undress her and bathe her face. Dimly she knew that she pushed her hands away when she started the combing . . . and then she sank into the merciful oblivion of a dreamless sleep . . .

  * * * * *

  Caradawc remained unconscious for three days. The life of the castle was subdued as its young prince, heir to his father’s kingdom, lay silent, locked in a shell of darkness that no one could penetrate.

  For some reason Goreu and Kicva would not allow the Christian priest near Caradawc. Viviane brought him to the door several times, but Kicva had locked herself in with her charge and would let no one enter. In vain Viviane alternately pleaded with Goreu and railed against him, furious that she also was barred from the chamber. But Goreu was morose and sulky and unmoved by anything she could say. He had put his faith in Kicva and was determined to follow her instructions minutely.

  ‘The Christian can pray in his chapel,’ he said gruffly. ‘Kicva knows what she is doing.’

  ‘What does she say? How does she explain it?’ Viviane begged to know.

  ‘His soul is on a journey. It will return,’ Goreu said briefly.

  ‘If it is his soul that is affected, surely the Christian . . .’

  ‘The Christian knows nothing about the soul,’ he growled.

  Viviane bit her lip. There were many things she would have liked to say to him – but how could she speak to such a stubborn old man, holding like a dog to an old bone?

  She turned away and sought the comfort of Hunydd in the stables. ‘If only I’d listened to you,’ she sighed, stroking the soft muzzle, ‘none of this would have happened.’ But she knew that we can never unravel Time and what has been, is, and always will be.

  * * * * *

  During that night, the third of Caradawc’s ‘journey’, Goreu came to her chamber.

  She did not at first know that he was there. Deep in sleep she began to dream that Caradawc’s fingers were exploring her body. She stirred and groaned with the pleasure of it . . . and then a sound woke her and she found it was not the prince but his gross father who floundered in her bed, heaving himself upon her, his hand where she had dreamed her lover’s was. She pulled away in horror, crying out and beating her fists on his grey head. He clasped her tightly and forced his face into her breasts. What had seemed so delicate and beautiful a moment before was now an outrage.

  ‘Viviane, girl . . .’ the old man ground out in a hoarse whisper as he wrestled with her. ‘Don’t fight me. I’ll show you what a real man feels like . . . not a boy. My son is no use to you. He’ll never wake up. You need me just as I need you!’

  ‘I’ll never need you!’ she screamed, fighting like a wildcat for her freedom, spitting and biting and tearing with her nails. ‘Get out of here!’

  As she frantically turned her face to escape his kiss she saw a figure at the d
oor.

  ‘Help me!’ she screamed. But the figure did not move.

  Then Goreu lunged his bearded face at hers again. She bit his nose and as he screamed and momentarily withdrew she saw the figure again.

  It was Caradawc. He was standing quite still watching them, a small terracotta Roman lamp held high in his hand, its flame lighting the whole shameful scene with extraordinary brilliance while their monstrous shadows played across the wall.

  She called his name, and Goreu loosened his grip and looked round, shocked.

  She wrenched herself away from the man and he fell off the bed, landing heavily on the flagstones, swearing and muttering. She staggered upright, naked before the prince, scratched and bleeding, her long red-gold hair floating around her like fire in the lamplight.

  Suddenly he moved, and it seemed to her the scene remained totally static except for that movement. Afterwards she could not remember if it all happened between one breath and the next, or whether it took longer. At any rate she watched as though in a dream as he crossed the room, picked up the dagger from her little wooden table, and plunged it between the shoulders of his crouching father. She had never seen him move more decisively. Goreu had been partly right when he had accused his son of being ‘a boy’ – but he had changed. It was no boy who strode across the room.

  She heard the gasp of her own breath, part horrified, part exultant. Her hate for the old man was so bitter at this moment that she felt no pity as he slumped and lolled, blood spurting from the wound.

  ‘Caradawc,’ she whispered and reached out her arms to him, thinking that he would need comfort when he realized what he had just done. When he would begin to feel remorse.

  But he ignored her and stood looking down on his handiwork for what seemed a long time. Her arms dropped to her sides. He did not need her.

  Then, without looking at her, he strode towards the door. When he reached it he turned. The lamp, which he had put down when he seized the dagger, shone on his face. For the first time he looked into her eyes. For the first time she saw clearly into his. They were not the eyes of Caradawc – but of Idoc.