“A battlefield marriage,Fen?”he said faintly, rubbing the strong fingers between hisown.
“Many such have been made.And, if it fails to suit, it’s only for…”
“Only a year and a day.Iknow.”Butit will suit.That’s what makes me afraid.I will be here on myknees, asking for its renewal, every year and a day for the rest ofmy bloody life.“Aren’t we already closer than brothers?”
It wasn’t the right question.Themoon-clouds won out over the fire.A sorrow whose depths Cai nowknew he had barely comprehended darkened Fen’s gaze.“Please.Lether make us so.”
Cai raised their joined hands.Hehoped there was nothing for him to say as part of the rite.Histhroat was closed, an aching pressure of tears building up behindhis eyes.And Danan, after examining both of them with a solemnanxiety Cai had never before seen her display, bound the ribbononce around Fen’s wrist.
“Solstice to solstice, handto hand, from blood-mother earth to the heart of man…”
Cai closed his eyes.He tried tolet his doubts go, to lay them on the warm night wind that wasstirring his hair, pushing the wool of his cassock against him inall the places where he longed to be touched.If Fen wanted this,then whatcouldbe better?The ritual words, older by far than monasterystones or even the hillfort’s walls, rolled out around him.Bud into bloom,bloom to decay, round the great track for a year and a day…Danan’s voicealtered, losing its rasp of age and smoke.It gave Cai a vision ofoak saplings springing up, each on its own side of a stream.Winterpassed, suns and moons, and in the heat of summer each tree leanedacross the stream and enmeshed its young foliage with the crown ofits brother.More summers, more winters, more suns and moons, andthe two had grown together, their great trunks fused, the streamparting now to flow round them.Hand to hand and pledge to pledge, fromhome and hearth to the bright world’s edge…
Danan stopped.When Cai opened hiseyes, he half-expected to find a priestess of the Druids beforehim.They had not all been slaughtered or driven back to theirmountains by the Romans, and she had sounded so young.But therewas only an old woman, looking scorched now after all.She sat downsuddenly on the sand.“No.”
She hadn’t completed the loop of theribbon around Cai’s wrist.She let it go, and it drifted from Fen’slike a trace of blood in the water.Fen picked it up and offered itto her.“Go on, old woman.”
“No.”
“No what?Go on.It isn’tfinished.”
“It can’t be.The timeisn’t right.”
Fen chuckled.He made as if tofasten the ribbon himself.“Time?I may be a faithlessvikingrpirate, but even Ican promise a year and a day.”
“No, Fenrisulfr.You can’t.Not even that.”
Shuddering, Cai unfastened the silkbinding.He took it from Fen’s wrist too, fingers clumsy on theintricate weave Danan had made.“Leave it,” hewhispered.
“No!I want us to be morethan brothers.”
“We are.”
“And how does she know myfull name?”
“She knows Addy.Just leaveit.Come on.”
“How did Addy know it?”Fenturned to face him, eyes wide, suddenly full of angry fear.“Whydid he say I would get my wish of vengeance, knee-deep in water andblood?I don’t wish that anymore.I want to stay withyou.”
Danan staggered to her feet.Hermovement released a tang of singed fabric onto the air.“I mustgo,” she rasped, and broke into a fit of coughing.
“Stay.Finish therite.”
“Fen, let her be.”Cai heldout the handfasting ribbon to her, and she took it, pushing itfrantically into her clothes.Cai would have helped her, but shewhipped away from him into the shadows, too swift for him tofollow.He took a few steps in the strange tracks she had left.There on the sand were her apple and her ear of barley corn.Hepicked them up.The apple was hard and green, the corn riddled withdark pods of fungus.“Danan!”he called, hardly expecting to beheard.“Is it true?Does the land die without you?”
A weird rush of laughter rippled backto him.“Of course not, stupid boy.”
Cai bowed his head.There went anothermiracle.
“But check your orchardsand your barns.You’ll find the wind has changed.”
It did, in a buffet of air so strongit almost knocked Cai down.He stumbled, and Fen caught him hardfrom behind.There was a wash of freshly broken comfrey stalks, andthen of ozone, and then the breeze was blowing sweetly from the seaonce more.
“What was that?”
Cai turned in his arms.Fen wasshivering, staring into the darkness Danan had left behind her.“Nothing,” Cai told him fervently.“Nothing.Everything’s allright.”
“It isn’t.Why wouldn’t shebind us?Why did she say—?”
