The Dark Chronicles Ch. 06

"Was I so small, that these hands held me all?" She looked up at Morgayne. "Mother, was I so tiny the Maerlyn's hands held me, like I hold a bird?"

"Yes, Lilith, a tiny thing, squirming like my heart." Morgayne looked at me quick as she said it, and I membered how I could have grasped it, her heart.

I looked at the girl, and membered too how she was all covered in her birthing shroud as I pulled her from the womb, how Emmelyne washed it quick away, hush hush. I looked at Lilith, and wondered when her prophecy would fall, when her tell would come.

"These children then, Lord Maerlyn, these the ones we never saw? And their mother too, the king's sister, we never saw her; not her fierce love, anyway."

I turned slowly, hearing a voice I'd not heard for years. Count them, too many. Count them, too long. Even Morgayne, with her preternatural stillness, was stone.

Only Lilith spoke, too young to ever know, but instinctive and quick. "Are you a Sister, Lady, who comes from out of the mist?"

"Yes child, I am a Sister, long sleeping in the Isle of Glas. I was a little daughter too, like you, many years ago. I'm older now."

She laid a formal kiss on Lilith's brow and I wondered if she saw the echo of the caul around the girl, or whether Morgayne's blood hid it from her sight. "I greet you, child. I Nym Nymue be, come to see the king make a queen on his throne."

"Why don't you greet me?" Mordant asked, petulant and jealous of his sister. "I'm a royal prince. I'm important, too."

Nymue gazed down at the boy, as if remembering something from a long time ago. "Yeay, you're a destiny, a prophecy. A prince who returns. But you are ordained, I cannot change you. Yet your sister, she is unknown to me, and I greet her mystery, for I must know it like I know the circles and rocks and the stars above."

"And I, Nym Nymue, am I your mystery too, that you never saw? What does that make me?" Morgayne broke her still silence, a small faint tremor in her voice. The rarest thing, the Lady uncertain?

Nymue turned to face Morgayne, and the two women contemplated each other, still as ice; one little and fine, her hair all white and her gown all white, the other taller and thin, scarlet clad, her blood all red. I took one step back, a rare wisdom for me. I confess it, I'm a genius... two steps further back, and if I was any smarter, I'd run. Or trip over my feet. So I stayed.

"Morgayne, the king's sister; you stayed well hid, I did not see." Nym Nymue was honest with the younger woman; she did not see. Of course, I can't see one foot in front of the other at the best of times, and trip over them both.

Morgayne laughed, and my ankle beat and her old dark malice was there. "In plain sight, Nymue, I hid where all could see. If they would but look." Morgayne straightened her back, and was tall above the white priestess. "What use you to the Goddess, Nymue, if you cannot see?"

She went on, her voice low and calm and full of cruel intent, the Red Morgayne. "Yet you say my boy is ordained, a puppet, a thing with no will of his own? What see you on the boy? The Goddess's will, that will act through him all darkness done?"

"I do not know it fully, Sister, he is not clear." But Nymue stood her place, and Morgayne took one step back. "But he cannot be put aside, your Mordant. His is destiny. I know that, at least."

Morgayne held Mordant by his shoulder. "See, my son, you are important. If only we knew how."

She turned to Lilith, and looked at her for a long, long time. "Yet you confound them, and are hid, my daughter. Like your mother then, hidden for all the world to see."

Lilith looked up at her mother, the Red Morgayne, her blue eyes wide. "Mother, what does it mean, that I am hidden from the priestess Nym Nymue, who greeted me with a kiss?"

"Nymue does not see you, Lilith, she cannot see your future, and so cannot steer it. That not knowing and not guiding is a torment to her. Mother Nymue's rocks and circles stand still on the land, yet our hearts beat, so who is most alive here?"

"You are right, Morgayne. Your child lives an unseen life. I see her before my eyes, but no shadows stretch away from her. She turn a corner, and she is gone from my sight. A rare thing, your Lilith."

"It sounds to me that you will make your own destiny, Lilith, pleasing no-one but yourself." Morgayne spoke to her daughter, and could have been speaking for herself.

I too looked at the girl, and wondered who she would bind to her will, when she was older and knew what to do with it. A girl child born from a brother and sister's sin, shrouded on the day of her birth, and Morgayne her mother? A powerful thing, and oh so pretty. Oh my word, some man's delight and doom, no doubt about that.

"Oh, look who comes, my father the king." Lilith ran to Artur who picked her up and spun her around, the love in his eyes clear to see. I looked to the Sisters, as they gazed upon the girl and her king, and saw their eyes. Oh look, my boots need mending. A needle, a thread, a seamstress I'll be. I shall talk to Emmy, I think, and let her know our secret is moving close.

Lilith danced with her father, oblivious of the watching eyes. He kissed her on the lips.

Morgayne came up to one side of me, and her slow fingers trailed down my sleeve. Nymue came to the other side of me, and her hand touched upon my arm.

"Maerlyn..."

"Heart..."

Oh dear, has it just got complicated?

* * * *

The ceremony itself was simple.

Artur commanded and Artur was obeyed, and even his sister the Lady Morgayne let the girl Miryamme have her day, to be throned beside her king.

Emmelyne braided Miryamme's golden hair in twelve plaited loops, and the princess's head was circled in ancient twists, the wyrm's head eating its tail, curled around and about itself. Emmy braided the little doll too.

Nym Nymue visited the girl, and clad her in an embroidered gown. The importance of the young queen's promise to the land was shown by the shape of a great wave on Miryamme's gown and the dragen rampant and thick. Nymue told the girl her own story of the five great waves and her mortal swim, so Miryamme knew she was chosen, chosen special for the land.

Miryamme walked beside Nym Nymue, the High Priestess of the Goddess, down the long centre of Artur's grand hall, to where the king sat on a carven throne. I, the Maer Maerlyn, stood behind Artur the king and played my part, and the king played his. A court was all made and assembled, and legiances given to the king, and they all played peaceful and their parts too.

Of Miryamme I was no longer sure. I saw that she leaned on Nymue beside her as they walked, and as the princess came closer to the dais I could see that her eyes were part closed as if she might be sleeping.

"Tonight, tonight," I heard her whisper. "I fear it, I fear it. I don't want to. I don't like it."

I looked to Artur as Miryamme came closer, and saw a huge sadness in his eyes as his bride stopped before him, swaying slightly; and I think he knew she was mad, but too late.

But Artur did as he always did. He stood tall, and shook his head the once, no matter. He took the hands of the girl before him, and leaned down to whisper something in her ear, so quiet that only she could hear it. She lifted up her head, and opened her crystal green eyes so wide and smiled up at him her little smile. Artur turned towards her, placed both his hands on her tiny waist, and steadied her with his own strength, before kneeling before her.

"Miryamme, on this my knee I vow myself to thee. To honour and protect thee, all thy days." He took a breath. "My queen."

Artur stood, and led her to her own throne, there on the dais beside his, and Miryamme sat beside him, and her doll sat beside her too. Nym Nymue stood behind the girl, and placed a simple garland on her head. She too leaned to the girl's ear and whispered something I could not hear. Miryamme looked at the priestess with her big wide eyes, and nodded her head and smiled her little smile. She put her finger to her lips, sshhh. Nymue placed a little garland on the doll's head.

I was there.

The day a crown was placed on a young queen's head and she sat beside the king, I was there.

My doll is pretty, and she has no eyes, but still she sees too much.

© electricblue66 2018