SEREN
I wait inside my house. The fire is lit but I keep it burning low to avoid too much smoke in the small space. Today I have fed the short flames with rosemary stalks to aid my memory of the vision, and to lift my dulled senses. I am always weary after a quest. The causes of this lie in some measure with the poisonous nature of the fairy toadstool. Its effects linger in the body a day or more sometimes. But there are other origins to my low spirits and lethargy. Journeying in my other guise tires me upon my return, for my limbs and sinews have been used in unfamiliar and unpracticed ways, so that now my body aches. More, I am downcast by the clear meaning of the vision. Wenna will not bear a child. That much is plain. I do not care for the woman, but I pity her. As a princess her position is now all but untenable in these politically unstable times. As a woman, she will face a barren future, and I would not wish that upon anyone. There is more at stake here, however, than Wenna’s happiness, for the vision foretold the possible death of Prince Brynach. To those uninitiated in the ways of reading a seeing, it might appear that all is lost. A hundred or more charging horses bearing soldiers sharp with weapons seen driving him into the lake … that must surely foretell nothing less than his enemies’ triumph, his own defeat, his very death. But it need not be so. Had he fallen to a sword, or an arrow, or an axe, then yes, I would have read the vision no other way. But he went into the water. He was taken by the lake. In this way he entered that liminal realm where two worlds meet, and from which it is possible to return. So, I pray the seeing shows not his ultimate demise, but a battle lost from which he may, may, recover.
I have sent a shepherd boy with a message for Nesta. If the princess wishes to hear my words herself she can choose to come, but I think she will not. It is important for her to keep her fears and her desires to herself, and whilst a visit from Nesta would go unremarked, anyone seeing Princess Wenna calling upon me would be suspicious of her motives. And when people are suspicious they want to find the truth, even if it means gouging out someone else’s secrets. Or perhaps, making up truths of their own. Either way, Wenna will not want tongues wagging on account of her business. Nesta will come to me as one wise woman to another, under guise of exchanging remedies, perhaps. She will listen to what I have to say and if her mistress trusts her to repeat my words faithfully, then so must I.
Soon I feel her heavy footsteps thudding through the ground, and moments later she knocks on my door. I bid her enter and she comes to settle herself close to the fire. She is a little out of breath, her short legs having worked hard to carry her stout body over the frostbitten ground at some speed, it seems. I give her a moment to arrange her skirts and remove the hood of her gray woolen cloak. I notice she is wearing a silver broach, pinning her kirtle. It is a pretty thing, a ring of oak leaves and acorns finely worked. A present from the princess I should imagine, and worn today to remind me of the esteem Nesta is held in. Of her position on the crannog. I need no such reminder. I know which one of us is trusted to wash Princess Wenna’s small clothes and which one of us is trusted with seeing her future.
‘You are well, Seren Arianaidd?’ Nesta asks. The sound of my formal name spoken in her voice is unfamiliar to us both. It amuses me. I imagine it pains her.
I merely nod, not wishing to encourage an unnecessary exchange of pleasantries. My head is too sore, my belly too hot, my limbs too cramped, to be bothered with such things. Nesta should know this, if she calls herself healer and follower of the old religion. She should understand. But, in truth, she is an altogether different manner of witch from me. It is true, her remedies have helped those with small ailments and base longings. She does not, however, tread the path of true magic, nor would she dare to seek a vision. There are better hedge witches a day’s ride from here, I’d wager. She does the name no service, for though her skills are passable, her heart is greedy. This is not the way of a true witch. Her lack of talent has driven her to follow a dangerous path, a road where dark magic is used for personal gain, each successful spell a stain upon her own soul and that of whoever it is pays for her services. She is seen as a vain and silly woman, I think, but people do not fear her. Their judgment is off. She is more dangerous than they could imagine.
At least she has no more patience for formalities than I, so that her next question takes us to business.
‘You sent for me; have you done what Princess Wenna asked of you?’
‘I sought a vision on her behalf, yes.’
She leans forward, her deep-set eyes brightened by the firelight. ‘What did you see?’
‘I can speak plainly to you, Nesta Meredith?’
The Silver Witch
Paula Brackston's books
- Alanna The First Adventure
- Alone The Girl in the Box
- Asgoleth the Warrior
- Awakening the Fire
- Between the Lives
- Black Feathers
- Bless The Beauty
- By the Sword
- In the Arms of Stone Angels
- Knights The Eye of Divinity
- Knights The Hand of Tharnin
- Knights The Heart of Shadows
- Mind the Gap
- Omega The Girl in the Box
- On the Edge of Humanity
- The Alchemist in the Shadows
- Possessing the Grimstone
- The Steel Remains
- The 13th Horseman
- The Age Atomic
- The Alchemaster's Apprentice
- The Alchemy of Stone
- The Ambassador's Mission
- The Anvil of the World
- The Apothecary
- The Art of Seducing a Naked Werewolf
- The Bible Repairman and Other Stories
- The Black Lung Captain
- The Black Prism
- The Blue Door
- The Bone House
- The Book of Doom
- The Breaking
- The Cadet of Tildor
- The Cavalier
- The Circle (Hammer)
- The Claws of Evil
- The Concrete Grove
- The Conduit The Gryphon Series
- The Cry of the Icemark
- The Dark
- The Dark Rider
- The Dark Thorn
- The Dead of Winter
- The Devil's Kiss
- The Devil's Looking-Glass
- The Devil's Pay (Dogs of War)
- The Door to Lost Pages
- The Dress
- The Emperor of All Things
- The Emperors Knife
- The End of the World
- The Eternal War
- The Executioness
- The Exiled Blade (The Assassini)
- The Fate of the Dwarves
- The Fate of the Muse
- The Frozen Moon
- The Garden of Stones
- The Gate Thief
- The Gates
- The Ghoul Next Door
- The Gilded Age
- The Godling Chronicles The Shadow of God
- The Guest & The Change
- The Guidance
- The High-Wizard's Hunt
- The Holders
- The Honey Witch
- The House of Yeel
- The Lies of Locke Lamora
- The Living Curse
- The Living End
- The Magic Shop
- The Magicians of Night
- The Magnolia League
- The Marenon Chronicles Collection
- The Marquis (The 13th Floor)
- The Mermaid's Mirror
- The Merman and the Moon Forgotten
- The Original Sin
- The Pearl of the Soul of the World
- The People's Will
- The Prophecy (The Guardians)
- The Reaping
- The Rebel Prince
- The Reunited
- The Rithmatist
- The_River_Kings_Road
- The Rush (The Siren Series)
- The Savage Blue
- The Scar-Crow Men
- The Science of Discworld IV Judgement Da
- The Scourge (A.G. Henley)
- The Sentinel Mage
- The Serpent in the Stone
- The Serpent Sea
- The Shadow Cats
- The Slither Sisters
- The Song of Andiene