The Guinevere's Tale Trilogy

Chapter 3-1

Chapter Three

Autumn—Winter 493

Two years came and went in the ceaseless rhythm of sacred festivals and lunar cycles. In the House of Nine, change began to unleash its unsettling force as bodies began to blossom. The Goddess saw fit to give Morgan ample curves, while I had little more than budding breasts and barely perceptible hips beneath my gown. But my moon time came first, and with that sacred milestone, I was finally able to trade my white robes for the forest green of a second-degree initiate.

Were I still at home with my mother, a different kind of ceremony would have marked my entrance into womanhood, one which had been passed down from mother to daughter for countless generations among the Votadini. I imagined my mother at her mortar and pestle, crushing leaves of woad, adding them to a tiny steaming cauldron of water, copper, and other substances which she would not divulge until I had a daughter of my own to mark, then carefully straining the liquid to produce a dark blue ink. I imagined myself lying facedown in her chamber at the new moon as a cluster of thin, sharp bones like teeth slowly pricked the symbol of our tribe, a horse whose body formed an endless knot, into the flesh of my left shoulder blade. She would lovingly bandage the tender flesh and embrace me, now officially a woman of our tribe, though I lived far from our ancestral home.

But those were the memories of a person I had chosen not to become. My life was here, in Avalon, among the ranks of the acolytes struggling to understand our new roles in ritual and study. We were learned, but not yet masters, and stood as assistants to those who trod the path of the Goddess before us. Gone were the carefree days of childhood; we now had to adjust to the growing demands of adulthood and increasingly complex temporal and spiritual studies.

A sharp autumn breeze shook the tips of the fiery oaks and rustled our gowns. We were supposed to be concentrating on the circular boards in front of us, carefully set with gleaming crystals in a purposeful formation, but my mind kept drifting to my friends back in Northgallis. We were all nearing marriageable age now, and they would be preparing to leave their childhood homes for the beds of powerful men they barely knew. At one time, I would have envied them, but now I was grateful to be here, learning about one of Avalon’s most sacred forms of divination.

As Argante had explained it, Holy Stones originated with the Druids who had ruled our tribes long before the Roman eagle made her nest on our shores. Comprised of two sets of twenty-one stones aligned in a triangle formation facing off across an empty field, it was primarily used to predict the outcome of battle and advise clan leaders of strategy. Stones with different properties were used to represent troops—footmen, archers, or cavalry—protecting the two most important pieces: the king and the queen. The battle or situation in question was simulated using these stones, performed over and over as the seer received strategic advice from the gods. Once the best strategy with the most positive outcome was determined, the Druid would advise his or her leader.

Although capturing the king was the point of the exercise and the only way victory could be claimed, the queen—a red stone symbolizing the Goddess, lifeblood, and the power behind the throne—was the most important piece. Known by names such as the Sovereignty Stone or Lady Fortuna, the queen was the only piece that could move anywhere on the playing field. The queen also had the ability to sacrifice herself to save the king or “heal” captured troops and return them to the board, but no more than three times in any game. The only piece that could actively capture a queen was the opposing queen.

Outside of Avalon and the Druids’ isle, Holy Stones was primarily a game of strategy for the wealthy and well-educated, and few knew its true power or purpose. Some of my earliest memories were of playing this game with my father. He often played it as a way to clear his mind when he needed to think. The tenderness and patience with which he’d taught his “little warrior” how to protect the queen on an oak board with polished gemstones was as clear to me now as when it happened.

Today, however, it was more than a game. We were learning how to use this seemingly secular cover to reach out to the world beyond the lake and its marshes to gather information useful in advising those in power. We had each been given a different situation and were now asked to play it out and relay what strategy would most benefit our ruler.

I was paired with Morgan. She sat across a long wooden table on which rested five sets of boards. In our scenario, High King Uther faced a challenger to his supremacy—one of his own lords from the Midlands who had recently allied with the Saxons.

Morgan and I faced off just as they would have but played out our moves and counterattacks with stones instead of lives. We had taken about an equal number of each other’s troops, and I was waiting for her to make her next move. To my right, Grainne and Mona were moving their pieces at astonishing speed—forward, back, off the board, and on again as each of their queens asserted her healing power—eyes unseeing, concentrating on the visions that directed their every move.

“Are you going to make a decision before the sun goes down?” I asked Morgan.

“Be quiet and let me concentrate. I can’t help divination doesn’t come as easily to me as it does to you,” she sneered, fingers vacillating between two groups of stones.

I was about to retort that the sight often passed from mother to daughter—an admittedly cheap dig at her unidentified maternity—when Argante drifted in our direction, checking on each pair’s progress.

“Remember, ladies, true power, true skill is not about doing one better than one’s sister. All things thrive in balance, and for that to be maintained, each must focus on what she is best at and on her own destiny, not that of her sister.”

She was speaking to the whole group, but her chiding glance was clearly meant for me.

Argante noticed Morgan’s hesitation and paused behind her, placing a gnarled hand on top of the one Morgan held in mid-air. “Stop for a moment, Morgan. Do not try, just be. What you see before you is not a wooden plate and scattered stones, but two armies on the field of battle. You are the war goddess Morrigan, directing battle through the eyes of her ravens perched in the treetops and awaiting the final outcome. You know the strong and the weak. You call some to glory and others to death. Breathe deep, and tell me what you see.”

Morgan’s eyes became distant, but I did not need to hear her words to know what images flashed before her, for I saw them too. On both sides, the soldiers were badly wounded and tiring fast. Blood streamed from gaping holes in chests and abdomens or congealed into dark patches around slashes to faces and limbs. Some collapsed from their injuries while others fought on without an eye, an ear, and even a hand. Beneath the soldiers’ feet, the ground was thick with bodies.

I suddenly understood this was the turning point. The next few decisions would determine the outcome, whether the troops returned victorious to their wives, died in battle, or ended their days as slaves to foreign masters.

Morgan’s hand shot out, and she advanced an archer, putting him in firing range of my foot soldiers but also leaving him unprotected.

It was a decoy. The move was meant to draw my attention to the obvious kill and away from her increasingly vulnerable king. If I wanted a prolonged siege, I could have stayed back, picking her men off one by one, but I saw an opening. Her right flank was weak, and I surged forward, ignoring her archer. In this state of heightened awareness, I knew it was better to sacrifice a few troops to protect the many.

The unexpected onslaught threw Morgan, who struggled to keep pace. She eventually faltered, leaving me free to replace her queen with mine and, in the next move, capture her king.

We both sat back, breathing heavily. The visions had cleared, but my head buzzed with the exertion. Around us, the afternoon was advancing, the declining sun making the crystals scattered about our boards gleam merrily in the last gasp of day.

“Very good,” Argante lauded us. “You have both done well. Remember, when we practice this way, one of you must always lose. But when you use this method of divination in real situations, be sure to control your sight so that you may see both your best advantage and your enemy’s every weakness. It is the only way to assure victory for your side.”

Morgan threw her an acerbic glare, clearly displeased about losing, but fortunately for her, Argante had already turned her back.

“Guinevere, I would like to speak with you in private.” She guided me to the shade of a nearby oak, leaving Morgan to sulk at the table. “I did not make this known, but each of the scenarios I set before you was a real battle, one I could use to measure your skills because I know the tactics that were used, as well as the outcome.”

Argante leaned heavily on her cane. “The battle you and Morgan just completed was the one exception. We received word last night that King Uther was contemplating just such a move against an insurgent and wished to see the possible outcomes before advising him. So we set our two strongest seers in opposition—you and Morgan—and you have given us the key to the battle. Because of the number of casualties you anticipate, I will warn him to avoid any confrontation whatsoever. If he is foolish enough to defy my advice, at least I can tell him how to come out alive. Congratulations, Guinevere. You have just saved the life of your king and many of his men.” She patted my shoulder and hobbled back to the table, leaving me to contemplate her words in stunned silence.

Morgan towered head and shoulders over me now, having shot up like a weed over the last lunar year, and she took no small pleasure in being able to literally look down on me. Mona too had grown, though she was still considerably smaller than Morgan, while it appeared I was destined to mirror my mother in petite stature. Even Grainne, so child-like in appearance, was slightly taller than me. Though I felt like a dwarf compared to them, I was glad to share the Neophyte Hall with those women. The rest of our sisters from the House of Nine had already left us, bound for marriage or ministry in the outside world, a world I scarcely remembered though I had called it home less than three years before.

A year and a day—that was all that remained before our period of study ended. After that, the Goddess could summon us at any time to the mysterious ceremony that preceded our final vows. We all intended to remain on the isle and serve the Lady here, but that was not entirely in our control. If our families wished to have us back, they could call for us, or if Argante became aware of a need for our skills, we could be sent anywhere in all of Britain. As an uncertain future loomed before us, we made the most of our time together, taunting and teasing, fighting and laughing as though we were related by flesh and blood.

Late one winter morning, Argante was summoned to High King Uther’s court in Carlisle by a rare personal invitation. Although she rejoiced at the king’s choice to consult the keepers of ancient wisdom in such turbulent times, the chill weather had taken a toll on her health, so she appointed Viviane as emissary in her stead. Late season snows still clogged the passes and trails of the Mendips, which led north out of Avalon, so Viviane sent word that it would be several weeks before she could safely undertake the journey.