Ashes of the Elements

Chapter Seventeen

When Josse next woke, the Abbess no longer lay in front of him. The sun was shining brightly down into the grove, and, a few paces away, a figure in a nun’s habit knelt in prayer.

She was, he thought, watching her, probably saying the Office. Prime, would it be? Or Tierce? It depended on how long they’d been asleep.

She was wearing wimple, headdress and veil. The garments sat a little awkwardly over the bandage round her brow, but she looked herself again. The laughing, curly-haired woman with whom he had shared his forest bed had gone.

With a faint sigh, he bade her a fond farewell.

While the Abbess was praying, he got up, folded the blankets and stowed them back into his pack, trying to move quietly so as not to disturb her. The fire was still glowing, but, now that the sun’s heat was reaching down to warm up the forest, there was no more need of it. He stamped out the last of the red embers, and then took out his knife and cut neat turves from the thinly growing grass on the outer fringes of the undergrowth, with which he covered the burned scar in the ground.

He hoped his actions would be pleasing to the Domina.

Then, with nothing else to do, he sat down and waited until the Abbess had finished.

* * *

As she walked towards him, he noticed that, for a moment, she could not meet his eyes. Remembering the night, remembering how he had not only removed quite a lot of her habit but had also lain with her, body close up against hers, he understood.

We have to put that behind us, he thought. Just as if it had never happened.

He stood up. With a bow, he said, ‘Abbess Helewise. I wish you good day. We should, I think, make our way back to the Abbey, as soon as you feel able to travel.’

She shot him a look in which relief and gratitude were mixed. Then she said quietly, ‘Yes, Sir Josse. I am able to travel straight away.’

He shouldered his pack and stepped out on to the path beside her. Together they turned towards the track that led to Hawkenlye.

And saw, standing silently some ten paces off, the robed figure of the Domina.

For a long moment, she stared at them, unmoving, deep-set eyes fixed first on the Abbess, then on him. He felt he should speak — felt, indeed, that he should apologise, although he was not entirely sure what for — but somehow her intent gaze kept him dumb.

Eventually she said, ‘The woman is well?’

The Abbess said quietly, ‘I am well.’

The other woman nodded. ‘It is a long journey you have, for one who has been injured.’

‘I can manage,’ the Abbess said.

The Domina stepped closer. When she stood right in front of the Abbess, she raised a hand and touched the dressing on Helewise’s head, leaning briefly forward and apparently sniffing at the place where the cut was. ‘Clean,’ she observed. ‘The man has done well.’ She glanced at Josse.

He bowed his head.

The Domina was reaching into a leather pouch that hung at her waist, half-concealed by the cloak she now wore over her white robe. Taking out a small glass phial, she removed its stopper and held it out to the Abbess. ‘Drink,’ she ordered.

Josse watched the Abbess. He could sense she was reluctant — which was more than understandable, bearing in mind how they had both suffered from the smoke they had inhaled last night — but at the same time she was also, he thought, hesitant to offend someone who was genuinely trying to help her.

As if she read all of that, the Domina gave a brief laugh. ‘This will not make you see the dance of the creatures of the night,’ she said. ‘It will not make you feel you can fly, nor create the wild pictures inside your head. It is to help your pain.’

‘I have no-’ the Abbess began.

The Domina gave a short tch! of annoyance. ‘Do not deny it,’ she said. ‘I can feel it.’

The Abbess’s mouth dropped open slightly. Then, as if making up her mind, she took the phial and drank its contents.

‘Good, good,’ said the Domina.

The three of them stood, not moving, not speaking; Josse felt, as probably the Abbess did too, that, here in the Domina’s realm, they must take their cue from her. And she seemed to be waiting for something.

After a while, the Abbess suddenly smiled. Looking both happy and surprised, she exclaimed, ‘The pain has gone!’

And the Domina said, ‘Of course.’

Then she turned to Josse. ‘I sense your impatience, man,’ she said. ‘You wish to take the woman back to her own place.’

She appeared to be waiting for an answer, so he said, ‘Aye. I do.’

‘All in good time,’ the Domina said. ‘Before you depart from my domain, I will address you.’ She held out her hands towards Josse and the Abbess, and, as if pushing aside the branches of a tree, she moved them out of her way. Then, beckoning them to follow, she led them along a path which Josse had not previously noticed, one which wound away into the deep forest on the far side of the clearing with the fallen trees.

Why, he wondered, did I not notice it before? He shook his head in puzzlement, for, now that the Domina was leading them to it, the track seemed all too obvious.

The Domina glanced at him over her shoulder, gave him a strange smile, then turned back to face the way she was going. And, quite clearly inside Josse’s head, he heard the words, ‘You did not see this secret way before because I did not want you to.’

Not for the first time, Josse had the alarming sensation that he was in the presence of something — someone — far beyond his experience or comprehension.

As they left the clearing, the Domina said, waving a hand towards the dead trees, ‘This is the work of Outworlders. It is an abomination.’

And Josse thought he heard the Abbess mutter, ‘I knew it!’

* * *

She did not take them far. After perhaps a quarter of a mile of negotiating the narrow path, it opened out into an open space, through which a small stream ran. Above the stream, on a bank which rose up above it, was what appeared to be a dwelling. Made of branches, bent and woven into a framework, it was roofed with leaves and turves. Inside was a stone hearth, on which a pot bubbled quietly.

The Domina indicated that they should sit down on the bank above the rippling water.

As they settled, Josse thought fleetingly how bewitching was the combination of the sounds — the stream rushing along its stony bed, the softly simmering pot — and the smells … some strong herbal scent, from the steam coming from the pot, the sweet smell of flowers and green grass, a sort of peatyness from the stream.

Ah, but it was powerful, this atmosphere!

The Domina did not sit down, but remained standing above them.

After a moment, as if she had been waiting until she had their full, undivided attention, she began to speak.

‘Outworlders,’ she said, ‘are not welcome here.’ She looked down at Josse, then at the Abbess. ‘Outworlders do not understand our ways. They destroy and desecrate what we hold to be holy. Outworlders killed the sacred oak.’

Josse nodded slowly. ‘In the grove where the old temple ruins are,’ he said. ‘They set traps for game, and disturbed buried coins.’

‘They burrowed beneath the oldest tree,’ the Domina said. ‘He had fallen of his own volition, for he was tired and no longer wished to live. Outworlders took what was not theirs to take, and, not content with what came readily out of the earth, they killed a second tree.’ Her face working, she said harshly, ‘He was young, with centuries of life ahead of him! Yet Outworlders hacked with their blunt weapons, hacked at him until he bled, until he wept, and they brought him to the ground!’

‘They did a grave wrong,’ Josse said quietly.

‘Outworlders trespass against us,’ the Domina said, more controlled now. ‘And we do not forgive.’

‘The man — the Outworlder — died,’ Josse said. ‘The spear was skilfully thrown, and he died cleanly.’

The Domina nodded. ‘It is our way. We do not deliberately inflict pain.’

‘Did he die because he had killed your oak?’ Josse went on tentatively.

The Domina gazed down at him for some moments. ‘The trees in the sacred grove bear the golden bough and the silver berry,’ she said. ‘Fruit of the sun and fruit of the moon, pure white seed of the god.’

‘Mistletoe,’ Josse murmured. No wonder the Forest People had taken the felling so seriously; mistletoe growing on oak was a rarity indeed, and now, in a very short time, they had lost two of those special trees. One had died, but the other had been deliberately felled. Purely to serve man’s greed.

‘There is something else,’ the Domina said. She turned away from the stream bank, paced a circle between the water and the dwelling, and then, as if having collected her thoughts, returned to address them once more.

‘You saw our most secret ceremony,’ she stated. ‘It is not for Outworlders.’

‘We had no malicious intent,’ the Abbess said. ‘We came into the forest because I was concerned for two of my — for two young women who are my responsibility. We came across your — your activities in the grove by pure mischance.’

The Domina stared at her. ‘No malicious intent,’ she repeated. ‘But yet you were witnesses to what it is forbidden for Outworlders to see.’

‘We did not-’ Josse began.

But the Abbess and the Domina were still locked in each other’s gaze; Josse, watching closely, had the sudden sensation that there was an invisible thread between them, a thread which, against all odds, meant that they understood one another. The Abbess said softly, ‘Domina, what was it for?’

And, with an almost imperceptible nod of acceptance, the Domina said, ‘Listen, and I will tell you.’

She drew herself up, arms by her sides, and stared out over the rushing water to the dark forest beyond. Then she began to speak.

‘We are few, we who live with and within the Great Forest,’ she said. ‘We move from place to place, here for a season, there for the next, always the same pattern down through the years. We take what the forest freely gives, but we do not abuse her bounty. We limit our numbers, so that the Great Mother is not overstretched in supporting us.’

She paused. Then the calm voice went on: ‘Under the bright night skies of summer, every two hundred moons, we assemble in the most ancient of the silver fruit groves for our sacred procreation ritual. A ripe virgin is chosen, who is the recipient of the seed of the tribe. If the Mother so decrees, the seed of the elders is successfully sown in the womb of the young woman, and, in time, the new child of the tribe is born.’ Briefly she closed her eyes, murmuring some soft invocation; it was as if the matters of which she spoke were so potent, so deeply ritualistic, that to describe them was both dangerous and exhausting.

But, gathering herself, the Domina went on.

‘If the procreation ritual results in a live birth and the child is male, he in turn is schooled in the mysteries, and, in time, takes his place as an elder of the tribe, to engender new life as he was himself engendered. If the child is female, she is sequestered from the tribe until, in her sixteenth year, she is led forth to be fertilised with the seed of the tribe.’

Josse, shaking his head in disbelief, could scarcely believe that here in this forest — its fringes only yards from Hawkenlye Abbey, only a few miles from roads, towns, villages — here in this forest, an ancient people still lived who worshipped the old goddesses and gods, whose lives were ruled by the moon and the sun. Who had not, it seemed, been touched by the least fingertip of late twelfth-century civilisation.

It was all but incredible.

He realised that the Abbess was speaking. Reverently, in the attitude of a supplicant, she was asking the Domina for permission to pose a question.

‘Ask,’ the Domina said.

‘The girl, last night,’ Abbess Helewise said. ‘She — Domina, she looked exactly like one of the girls in my care. One of the girls, indeed, about whom I have been so concerned.’ She smiled briefly. ‘Sufficiently concerned to trespass into your forest.’

The Domina, eyes still on the Abbess’s, gave a curt nod of understanding. Then she said, ‘Selene. The girl you saw in the grove is called Selene. She was born sixteen years ago, in the silver fruit glade, but in bringing her into the world, her mother left it.’ The echo of an old sorrow crossed the Domina’s face, darkening her countenance; the deep, far-seeing eyes were narrowed to ominous slits, and the full mouth became a stern, hard line. For an instant, Josse saw the dread power of the woman.

Then, staring once more at the Abbess, the Domina said, ‘The mother died because the birth was so hard. And the birth was so hard because she bore in her belly not one but two offspring. Two daughters, the one an exact copy of the other.’

Twins, Josse thought. Some poor woman of these primitive forest folk had carried twins. Multiple births, God knew, were difficult enough at the best of times. But out here, on the forest floor, no comforts, no warmth, not even a village midwife to help, what must the wretched woman have suffered?

He realised that the Domina was watching him. She said, ‘The mother had care, Outworlder. The best care. Do not imagine that she would have fared better out there in your world, some man’s chattel in one of your great houses.’

He dropped his head. ‘I apologise.’ Fool! he berated himself. First, for forgetting about this Domina’s skills with herbs and potions, which must surely far surpass those of some peasant midwife. And second, for overlooking her clear ability to read his thoughts.

‘Only one child was needed by the tribe,’ the Domina continued. ‘By our laws, if such an event occurs, the choice must be the elder child. Selene remained with us, Caliste was given away.’

‘Caliste!’ The Abbess breathed. ‘That is what she calls herself!’

The Domina looked mildly surprised. ‘Of course.’

‘But-’ Josse knew what the Abbess was thinking. Sure enough, she went on: ‘But how did she know? She was but a babe when she was lain on Alison Hurst’s doorstep! And they — Alison and Matt — named her Peg!’

‘Peg,’ the Domina repeated tonelessly.

‘I know, it’s not a very lovely name,’ the Abbess agreed, ‘especially when compared with the child’s real name. But they didn’t know the real name! And I cannot understand how the child did, either.’

‘She wore her name around her neck,’ the Domina said.

‘But-’ The Abbess frowned, then her brow cleared. ‘The piece of wood!’ she exclaimed. ‘Yes, I remember Alison Hurst showed it to me when Caliste wanted to come and join us.’ She turned to Josse. ‘The baby wore a leather thong round her neck, on which hung a pendant made of wood, carved with strange marks.’ Wonderingly she turned back to the Domina. ‘Was it some sort of code, which only Caliste understood?’ she asked softly.

‘It was our script,’ the Domina said.

‘How could she interpret it?’ Josse demanded. ‘She was only an infant when you left her with the Hursts, so where did she find the key to the code?’

The Domina was eyeing the Abbess. ‘You have manuscripts in your Abbey?’

‘Yes. We do.’

‘Tomes on natural lore?’

‘I — Yes!’ Excitedly, she went on, ‘I remember now! Peg — she was still called Peg, when she first came to us — particularly liked the tree lore manuscript!’ She turned her eyes up to the Domina. ‘And it was after she had discovered it that she asked to be known as Caliste.’

The Domina nodded, unsurprised. ‘She found the key to the script,’ she remarked, in a tone that seemed to say, naturally!

‘What did it look like?’ Josse asked. ‘The script?’ He had been thinking hard.

‘It was a series of notches, cut into the sides of the pendant,’ the Abbess told him.

‘Aye.’ He glanced up at the Domina. ‘The ogham alphabet.’

She shrugged. ‘Call it what you will. It is our way of recording the sounds of things.’

‘She always loved to spend her time out of doors,’ the Abbess said. ‘Alison Hurst told me how, even when Peg was tiny, she made her own little garden.’ She looked at the Domina. ‘It’s hardly surprising, is it? Given whose child she really was.’

The Domina shrugged again. ‘All of my people understand their brothers and sisters in nature. They are all the Great Mother’s children.’

The Abbess was nodding. ‘Human people, too,’ she said eagerly. ‘Caliste has the healing touch, Domina. Recently I have put her to nursing duties, and, in her care of the sick, she shows a true natural ability.’

For the first time, the Domina gave a faint smile. She said, ‘Caliste is her mother’s daughter.’

Josse had been aware of a steadily growing irritation in himself. All very well and good to speak of Caliste and her abilities so proudly, but had this Domina any right to pride? Look what she subjected Caliste’s twin to, only last night!

Again remembering, too late, the Domina’s telepathic skill, he tried to make his mind turn to some other subject. Something innocuous — the flowers, perhaps, the trees …

But she had overheard his thoughts, picked up his anger. In a cold voice, she said, ‘You criticise our ways, Outworlder? You, who have not the least knowledge or understanding of forest life?’

He stood up, suddenly humiliated by sitting obediently at her feet like some schoolboy. ‘I do criticise,’ he said baldly. ‘You took a young woman into that clearing last night, you held her down naked on a log and stood there watching while five men raped her! Would not anybody criticise that?’

The Domina’s face changed. The deep, dark eyes seemed to light up with a bright flame, and, as her lips drew back from her strong, even teeth, she hissed like an angry snake. Josse, standing his ground, felt briefly as if flame were scorching up and down his body; a stab of primeval terror pierced him, and it was all that he could do not to fall, screaming in fear, begging for mercy, at her feet.

But, as quickly as it had come, her attack eased off.

And, in a voice that sounded quite gentle, she said, ‘There was no rape. Selene went willingly to the ritual, knowing full well what would happen. She has long been aware that she would be the chosen one. And I myself administered the potion that would both arouse her and moisten her — did she not look eager, Outworlder? Did the ritual not end in a more glorious climax for her than for any of the males? And besides’ — the harsh lines of the face softened — ‘why should I wish to harm her?’

She paused, looking from Josse to the Abbess and then back again.

‘Why, indeed, should I inflict pain or harm,’ she repeated, ‘on the child of my own daughter?’