The White Mare: The Dalraida Trilogy, Book One Read online

  Copyright

  First published in the United States in 2005 by

  The Overlook Press, Peter Mayer Publishers, Inc.

  Woodstock & New York

  WOODSTOCK:

  One Overlook Drive

  Woodstock, NY 12498

  www.overlookpress.com

  [for individual orders, bulk and special sales, contact our Woodstock office]

  NEWYORK:

  141 Wooster Street

  New York, NY 10012

  Copyright © 2004 by Jules Watson

  All Rights Reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopy, recording, or any information storage and retrieval system now known or to be invented without permission in writing from the publisher, except by a reviewer who wishes to quote brief passages in connection with a review written for inclusion in a magazine, newspaper, or broadcast.

  ISBN 978-1-46830-131-1

  For Alistair, for Eremon’s eyes, and more

  Contents

  Copyright

  Acknowledgements

  Prologue: LINNET

  Chapter 1: LEAF FALL, AD 79

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18: LONG DARK, AD 79

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22: LEAF-BUD AD 80

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  Chapter 38

  Chapter 39

  Chapter 40

  Chapter 41

  Chapter 42

  Chapter 43

  Chapter 44

  Chapter 45: SUNSEASON, AD 80

  Chapter 46

  Chapter 47

  Chapter 48

  Chapter 49

  Chapter 50

  Chapter 51

  Chapter 52

  Chapter 53

  Chapter 54

  Chapter 55: LEAF-FALL AD 80

  Chapter 56: LONG DARK AD 80

  Chapter 57

  Chapter 58

  Chapter 59

  Chapter 60

  Chapter 61

  Chapter 62: LEAF-BUD AD 81

  Chapter 63

  Chapter 64

  Chapter 65

  Chapter 66

  Chapter 67

  Chapter 68

  Chapter 69

  Chapter 70

  Chapter 71

  Chapter 72

  Chapter 73

  Chapter 74

  Chapter 75

  Chapter 76

  Chapter 77

  Chapter 78

  Chapter 79

  Chapter 80

  Chapter 81

  Epilogue

  Historical Note

  Acknowledgements

  No one can complete such an undertaking alone, and I’d like to thank all my friends and family for their love and support, particularly for not minding that I was only half-there for the last few years, since my other half was off in first-century Scotland.

  To the friends who gave invaluable and encouraging editorial feedback, and helped me answer the breeches/trouser question: Amber Trewenack, Tessa Evans, Helen Jamieson, Kathryn Tenger, Claire Hotchin, Lisa Holland-McNair, and Jo Ferrie.

  To Amber, who cried in all the right parts and thereby gave me hope. To my big brother Mark Thompson, for beaming with pride and unconditional love at all the right times. To my wonderful agent Maggie Noach, for believing in me so staunchly. To my editor Yvette Goulden, for understanding what I was trying to do, and all those at Orion, for treating my ‘baby’ with such respect.

  Patricia Crooke helped me with some ideas for gaelic terms. David Adams McGilp of the Kilmartin House Museum kindly broke away from an audio-visual crisis to talk to me, and in return I promised to tell everyone about his brilliant museum in Kilmartin, Scotland, a stone’s throw from Dunadd.

  Great thanks go to Dorothy Watson, who generously gave me a temporary home in Australia. To Claire, Graeme and Cassie Swinney, who took me into their home during the last fraught months of editing: for barbecues, essential gin and tonics, and overwhelming generosity and love when I needed it most.

  My biggest thanks come last. To Claire, who sowed the seed, believed in me with unwavering ferocity, and held my hand through absolutely every drop of blood, sweat, and tears.

  And to my beautiful husband Alistair: for cooking up the best plot details over many a pint in many a pub, for reading it umpteen times and still getting emotional, for coping with my meltdowns, and above all, for unstinting love and belief. I couldn’t have done this without you.

  Prologue

  LINNET

  She was the child of my heart, though not of my body.

  I remember her as a girl, running up the mountain path towards me with amber hair flying, face twisted with weeping.

  I worried about her then, and how the jealous taunts of the other children could draw such tears. I feared she was weak, and would not survive what was coming. For it was both my gift and my curse to see some of her future.

  Blood spattering wet sand.

  A green-eyed man in the prow of a boat.

  The sea closing over her head.

  And last, the cries of women on a battlefield, picking their way among the dead.

  I knew she had a greater destiny to fulfil, but how would it unfold? That I did not know. As priestesses, we trumpet our powers of sight, but the truth is that it comes rarely, and never clearly.

  I watched the girl closely from the day my elder sister birthed her and died. I remember her grasping my finger, milky eyes seeking my face, the tuft of red-gold hair still damp from the womb … ah, but these are a mother’s musings.

  What I did realize that day, was that she was one of the Many-born, who come back to live again and again. And that because of this, her gifts would be as great as her pains.

  For this reason I could not help her. She had to grow into her strength. And so she did. Like the fierce salmon, she fought against the currents of people’s jealousy, ambition, and awe. As her legs lengthened, so her face came into its form, losing the softness that had troubled me once. I saw also that she no longer cried – and in my priestess heart I felt relief.

  But in my mother’s heart, I wept for her.

  I could not speak about her future – the blood, the man in the boat, the battle. My role was not to guide her course, but to build her courage and insight so that she could steer her own way through what would come.

  For while we are caught like threads in the Mother’s loom, we still have choice. I loved her more than my life – and so I wanted her to choose her path. Perhaps I would have done differently if I had known how it would hurt.

  One thing only I clung to: although my sight hinted that many dark years were coming for the people of Alba, somehow, I knew she was a link to our freedom.

  History can turn on many things.

  O
n a word.

  On a sword blade.

  On a girl, running up a mountain path, amber hair flying in the wind.

  Chapter 1

  LEAF FALL, AD 79

  The babe fell into Rhiann’s hands in a gush of blood.

  The mother let loose one final scream of triumph and agony, and slid down the roof-post against which she squatted. Rhiann, leaning in on her knees, wriggled to get a better grip on the slippery body. Fire from the hearth glowed on waxy skin and smeared blood, and under the wisps of dark hair, tiny bones throbbed against her fingers.

  ‘To the Mother’s arms you sink. The kin bids you welcome, the tribe bids you welcome, the world bids you welcome. Come in safety.’ Rhiann murmured the ritual words breathlessly; the woman’s heel was digging into her ribs.

  Still holding the child, she nodded to the old aunt, who eased the mother to a pallet of bracken by the hut’s fire. Now mercifully upright, Rhiann brushed her hair back with one shoulder, her hands still full of the squalling baby.

  The mother pushed herself up on her elbows, panting. ‘What is it?’

  ‘A boy.’

  ‘Goddess be thanked.’ She sank back down.

  When the cord stopped pulsing Rhiann rested the baby on the pallet, taking her priestess knife from her waist-pouch. ‘Great Mother, as the child has fed from this body, now let him feed from You. Let his blood be Your blood. Let his breath be Your breath. So shall it be.’ She cut the cord and deftly tied it off with flax, then wrapped a scrap of linen around the tiny shoulders to turn the baby’s face to the fire.

  ‘Oh, lady, what do you see?’

  All new mothers asked this of priestesses. And what were they to reply? This boy is not of the warrior class, so at least he will not die by the sword.

  ‘What will he be?’ the old aunt wheezed.

  Rhiann turned back, smiling. ‘I see him hauling in nets full of fat fish with his da, for many years to come.’ She nestled the baby on his mother’s breast, leaving a last caress on his soft head.

  ‘You’ll have one of your own soon,’ the aunt croaked, handing her a rag. ‘They won’t be picky over your suitor, our man says. Not with the King so ill.’

  ‘Hush!’ the other woman hissed from her pallet.

  Rhiann forced a tight smile, wiping her fingers. ‘Now,’ she said to the new mother, ‘brew up the woodruff twice a day, as I told you, and it will bring in your milk.’

  ‘Thank you, lady.’

  ‘I must go. Blessings be on you and the babe.’

  The woman drew her child closer. ‘And you, lady.’

  Outside, the tiny hut’s reek of fish and dung smoke was washed away by the dawn air. Taking a deep breath of it, Rhiann forced the old aunt’s words away too, draping herself over the cow-pen to stretch her back. The bony cow lowed and scraped its flank against her fingers, and she smiled.

  Many nobles at Dunadd would look down their noses at this steading: the turf roof, the driftwood fence, and crusted fishing nets. To Rhiann, though, it seemed content in its little bracken glen. The scent of brine and lilt of fisher songs drifted over the bay. The rhythm of the day was well begun for everyone, and it would be much the same as any other day. She thought about how fine a future that would be. Calm. Uneventful. Predictable.

  Then a tiny figure came hurtling around the side of the house and barrelled into her legs. ‘Ah!’ she cried, and bent to swing the little boy into the air. ‘Who is this great, fierce boar trying to run me down?’

  The child could hardly be seen for dirt; she didn’t know where his ragged fringe ended and his face began. He battered grubby feet on Rhiann’s thighs, and she held fast and tickled until he squealed.

  Then the boy’s sister was there, clucking in embarrassment as she took him from Rhiann’s arms and set him down. ‘Ronan, you scamp! Oh, forgive us, lady … your robe …’

  ‘Eithne,’ Rhiann glanced down at her stained dress, ‘I was hardly clean – your new brother saw to that. Goddess knows what I look like!’

  ‘A brother!’ Eithne hid a shy smile with one hand. ‘Da will be pleased. And you look as fine as you always do, lady,’ she added, remembering her manners.

  ‘Pretty,’ the boy piped. ‘She says you’re pretty.’

  Eithne looked at her feet, giving his hand a sharp tug. She was dark like her brother, with black eyes and bird-like bones. The two of them were strong in the blood of the Old Ones; the people who lived in Alba before Rhiann’s tall, red-haired ancestors arrived. Common blood, as it was known.

  Right now, Rhiann ached to be small and dark and common. Life would be much simpler for her then.

  ‘Thank you for bringing the babe safe, lady. And for coming so far.’ Eithne dared a quick glance at Rhiann. ‘Especially with the King so sick and all.’

  Rhiann’s belly turned over at this, but again, she forced it away. ‘When your mother knew she was bearing, I promised to come, Eithne. And I left my uncle in good hands. My aunt attends him.’

  ‘Pray to the Goddess he gets well!’ Eithne pulled something from the recesses of her patched dress and proffered it to Rhiann: a crude and dented stag-head brooch. ‘Da asked me to give you this. It’s good copper – he found it on the beach.’

  Rhiann touched the brooch to her forehead and stowed it away reluctantly. It was tradition to pay for the services of a priestess, no matter how poor the family. Yet, by the Goddess, she had enough brooches.

  There was a loud nicker from a horse tethered to the end of the fence, a light-boned mare the colour of winter mist. Rhiann smiled at Eithne. ‘Ah! My Liath calls. Give my blessings to your father, and thank him for the fine brooch.’

  She drew on her sheepskin cloak, pulling the fleece close about her neck. Then she squared her shoulders and took up her pack. It was time to seek her own home.

  The path inland was wreathed with mist that crept over the water meadows, choking the River Add in its bed, clinging to Rhiann’s face and throat. Liath’s hooves were muffled on fallen alder leaves, and all was silent and dripping.

  Such a fog hid many doorways to the Otherworld. Perhaps fey spirits were floating beside her right now, just beyond her fingertips. Perhaps they would draw her through, and she would leave the dankness of Thisworld behind. Rhiann spread her hand, hoping that the air between her fingers would conjure the spirits she sought, to take her away …

  But she caught a branch instead, and icy dew spattered down her neck. She rubbed it away, sighing. Doorways and spirits! Here, there were just rotting leaves, mist and damp, and long nights to come.

  The track wound up on to a spur, and when she emerged into milky daylight she reined in. Stretching away before her, the blanket of mist hid a wide marsh, which lapped at the flanks of a lone rock crag. And rearing from the crag into the light was Dunadd – the dun, the fort, on the Add. On its crest, the King’s Hall, where her sick uncle lay, squatted against the sun, and the pillars of the druid shrine clawed the sky with black fingers. She shivered and nudged Liath along.

  Dunadd’s nobles lived high on the rock above the sprawling village at its feet, surrounded by an oak palisade. As Rhiann reached the village gate, the guard came down from his tower to loosen the cross-bars, blowing on his hands, and then helped her dismount with a wary nod.

  They were all looking at her warily now.

  The village was just stirring, the first dog barks and curses and children’s cries drifting out from under hide doorcovers. Rhiann led Liath through the jumble of thatched roundhouses, sheds and granaries to the stables. There, she threw the reins to a yawning horse-boy and hurried up the path to the Moon Gate, the entrance to the crag, leaving the village and the mist behind.

  ‘My lady! My lady!’

  It was Brica, Rhiann’s maid. In the weak sun, the carvings of the moon goddess on the gate shadowed her lean, sharp face. She flew forward to take Rhiann’s cloak, chittering at the mud that had splashed up from Liath’s hooves. ‘I’ve heard nothing about the King, mistress – the Lady Linnet was not back
when I left. Are you well? Are you feared? You look pale …’

  ‘I’m fine!’ Rhiann brushed off the invasive prods of those black eyes.

  Brica was of the Old Blood, too, and grew up on the Sacred Isle out in the Western Sea, where Rhiann had trained to become a priestess. When Rhiann had stormed from the island the previous year after her initiation into the Sisterhood, the eldest priestess pressed Brica’s services upon her. Rhiann didn’t know why, for she and the little maid had never taken to each other.

  ‘I need to wash properly.’ Rhiann spread her hands. ‘Is there water?’

  ‘Ah! Your aunt emptied the water-pot with her draughts for the King. I’ll go to the well right now!’ Brica handed Rhiann’s cloak back and darted away, lifting her skirts from the churned mud beneath the gate.

  Rhiann slowed as she passed the houses of the King’s kin. Here, the air of waiting was pungent, broken only by the steady drip of dew from carved doorposts. Servants crept to dairy and well on soft feet, their eyes cast down. Somewhere, a baby wailed and was hushed.

  Rhiann’s heart began to thump against her ribs.

  And then the great arc of the Horse Gate was looming over her, leading to the crest of the dun. Peering between the carved stallion’s legs, Rhiann could glimpse a curl of blue smoke rising from the small druid shrine, on the edge of the cliff. Between gate and shrine sat the King’s Hall, a sprawling roundhouse topped by a thatch roof that swept to the ground. No one moved there.

  From the roof-peak hung the royal emblem of her tribe, the Epidii – the People of the Horse. It was embroidered with the divine White Mare of the horse goddess Rhiannon on a sea of crimson.

  This morning, though, the breeze was as weak as the pale sun, and the pennant stirred forlornly on its post like a bloody rag.

  Rhiann lived on the edge of the crag, her door facing out to the marsh. When the wind was in the south, the only sounds that carried to her were lonely bird-cries, and the beat of wings. Sometimes she could pretend she was Linnet, her aunt, who lived on a mountain with only goats and one loyal servant for company.

  As Rhiann lifted her doorcover, a finger of sun outlined Linnet herself, seated on a stool before the hearth-fire. Her aunt was changed. Normally so tall and regal, now she was slumped in weariness. Her russet hair, untouched by grey, looked somehow faded, straggling from its braids, and when she raised her face, the pale, tranquil oval was lined with furrows of worry. The women of Rhiann’s line bore strong bones and long, fine noses. But in pain this fineness became pinched, and Linnet looked so now. ‘It is not good, child.’