(eng) Marion Zimmer Bradley - Avalon 03 by Lady of Avalon

Author:Lady of Avalon [Avalon, Lady of]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 0101-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter Thirteen

High and clear, the whistle of the watcher came floating over the marshes. At the foot of the Tor it was heard, and a trilling cry carried the message upward. “One comes. Call the mists and send out the barge that will bring him to Avalon!”

Dierna draped her long veil over her head and shoulders. Her heart had begun to beat with unaccustomed excitement; she paused a moment, surprised it should be so, then took a deep breath and stepped out from the shadows of her house into the brightness of the summer’s day. She cast a critical eye over the priestesses who awaited her.

Crida, seeing the look, tossed her head. “Are you afraid we will not do you credit? Why are you so careful? It is only a Roman.”

“Not entirely,” answered the High Priestess. “He is a tribesman from a people not so different from our own, forced, like so many of our young men, into a Roman mold. And he is a man marked by the gods…”

Silenced, Crida covered her own face with her veil. Dierna nodded and led the way down the winding path. As they neared the shore, Ceridachos came out to meet her, dressed in all the Arch-Druid’s regalia, attended by Lewal, who had met their visitor before.

She wondered how the Tor would appear to the Admiral’s eyes. Over the years the first whitewashed wattle buildings had been replaced by stone, but they nestled against the side of the hill. Only the great Processional Way, with its paired pillars, had a majesty as mighty as the works of Rome, if different in kind. And the standing stones that crowned the Tor had been ancient when Rome was only a scattering of huts upon the seven hills.

The great barge of Avalon lay drawn up on the shore below the apple trees. It had been built in her mother’s time, large enough to carry horses as well as men, and it was paddled-not poled, like the smaller craft in which the marsh dwellers slipped through the reeds. Dierna stepped in and took her place in the prow, and at her word the boatmen pushed off and the barge slid silently across the mere. Before them, a bright haze glimmered on the water, veiling the far hills with gold. When they reached the middle of the lake, Dierna got to her feet, balancing with the ease of long practice, though indeed today the water was as smooth as a dancing floor.

She took a deep breath and lifted her hands, her fingers twitching as if she were spinning an invisible thread. The boatmen raised their paddles and the barge floated, waiting, on the threshold between the worlds. The spell that called the mists was woven in the mind, but it manifested in the outer world, linking one to the other by such movements as these. Her breath gathered power; she could feel the muscles of her throat begin to vibrate, though there was still no sound. Dierna closed her eyes, calling upon the Goddess within and gathering all her forces into one mighty act of will.

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