The Hanged Man: Part 3: Samhain
Post #10: In which a shapeshifter learns to retain his soul ...
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Part 3: Samhain
(SAH-win or SOW-in) Halloween; begins the dark half of the year and is the midpoint between autumn equinox and winter solstice. Fire festival; third of three harvest points in the cycle. Self-assessment and reflection, a time to let go of that which no longer serves. Ushers in a period of peace and rest.
The Card: The Devil
Seduction by the material world and power, authentic experience
CHAPTER 5
MORFRAN
“Now breathe, Morfran. Think of your breath as becoming sky and wind. Push it out from your center down your arms and legs. With each breath push it farther out your fingers and toes. Surround yourself with it. As you breathe, imagine black feathers stirring in wind. Imagine a light-boned wing. Imagine far-seeing eyes and a strong beak. Imagine scent of old blood and rotting flesh. You, my son, stay at the center of your breath. The shape of your soul remains unchanged, but clothed in a different form. Now breathe! Breathe and fly!”
He flew, but clumsily, six feet off the ground. One flap of wings, two, and the crow fell, a sprawl of dark wings and outstretched neck that flickered into a boy.
“Oh, well done!” said Ceridwen. She sat cross legged in the grass. Morfran grinned at her, triumphant, and untangled himself. He’d fallen awkwardly on his twisted hip.
A low hill above Bala Lake served as their classroom. From where they sat Morfran could see farm, orchard and Ceridwen’s garden. Bald Tegid, easily visible because of his giant size, worked on a stone wall and Morfran could just see the golden floss of his sister Creirwy’s hair shining in the sun.
Morfran was in his tenth year and for weeks Ceridwen had been teaching him the art of shape-shifting. They’d begun in the garden as beetles, bees and snakes. In each shape Morfran entered into new layers of experience and understanding. Today’s lesson was the hardest yet—mastering the shape of a black crow.
“My name means ‘black crow,’” he said now, “so this shape is really like a second real shape. Does my soul fly on black wings?”
“I don’t know,” said Ceridwen, smiling. “Souls are mysterious and changeable. You’ll discover for yourself the shapes of yours. What’s important is that you never shape shift without knowing who you are when you do it. You must always stay tethered to yourself so you can come home.”
After that lesson he practiced constantly, and soon he learned how to shift by himself. Ceridwen, at work cutting reeds on the lakeshore, would see him vanish on a nearby hillside and a black crow, his favorite and most effortless shape, fly up, crying harshly and triumphantly, circling above her, and then folding its wings and plummeting into thick reeds fringing the water. Seconds later a blue dragonfly would alight on her bundle of reeds and then fly up near her face, the whirr of its wings against her cheek making her smile.
Once Morfran mastered the art of shape shifting, Bald Tegid taught him how to fish. Both children had learned to swim as soon as they were old enough to walk to the lake unaided. The deep water was cold away from the shallow, reedy edges that warmed in summer sun. Morfran liked to row a mile or two into the center of the lake and then shift into fish or otter or duck.
One autumn evening when Noola was full, he rowed along a silver path of moonlight. When his arms began to ache, he let the oars rest and sat quietly, floating on the lake’s silver skin. Looking down, he saw shapes of turrets and towers in the water where he’d never seen them before, thick walls and battlements and lighted windows.
He thought of a fish, silver as moonlight, and dove into the lake. He swam down and discovered a great castle standing on the lake bottom. An open door led him into scullery and kitchen. Stone steps climbed up a tower and he swam up and found a room, furnishings rotted and decayed. He swam out the open window and, room by room, explored the castle from top to bottom. Once it had been a fine place. Although many lights shone, as if for a gathering or feast, not a living soul could be seen, but he found many human bones, especially in the lower rooms. He inspected a vast hall with long tables and chairs pulled up to them. Elaborate candelabra festooned with floating ribbons of water weed and reeds from the world above hung from the ceiling. One large room led off another with fireplaces like toothless dark mouths. In the back regions near the open door, he swam through kitchens and here, too, many people had perished in the cold lake water. A feeling of magic and evil brooded everywhere. The lights only underlined the feeling of shadow.
Disturbed and fascinated, he swam up into silvery moonlight, glad to be in clean, cold water away from the castle walls. He thought of his dark, twisted shape, his adolescent body, leapt out of the water into the boat, took up the oars and returned home.
He found his family gathered before the fire. When he appeared, breathless with what he’d seen, Bald Tegid gave him a keen look out of eyes shadowed by the fire. “You’re cold, my son,” he said. Creirwy rose from her place at her father’s side and put more fuel on the fire, smiling at her brother. He smiled back. Ceridwen sat sewing herbs into sachets near a lamp with a high flame. She too smiled at Morfran, but her face looked troubled.
“So, you’ve seen the castle,” said Bald Tegid in his deep, rough voice. “The autumn full moon has revealed it to you. Now, my children, it’s time for a new tale.”
“In a time long past and coming again soon, a fertile valley lay among these hills. In the valley stood a castle and from the castle ruled a king who oppressed the people of this region without mercy. For many long years he reigned with none to stop his cruelties, and his arrogance grew along with his power and wealth. His unfortunate wife was a stranger, with no friend or family to support her, and in due course a son was born.
This is an old country and pockets of magic and mystery are to be found everywhere if you know how to look. Somehow word passed from one to another of the miserable plight of the people under this king, eventually reaching my ears. I lived in a solitary rocky place in the high mountains. It happened I’d lately found the companion of my soul and heart, your mother, and thought of settling in some green place with her to raise a family. I thought I’d take a walk and see for myself how it was with this region and its king.
In the meantime, the king ordered a feast to celebrate the birth of his son. He invited the most powerful men in the land, and wagon after wagon of fine provisions arrived. He pressed musicians into service and ordered local people to assist in preparations. They didn’t dare disobey, in spite of their hatred and fear of the king.
I arrived in the midst of this bustle. I looked here and listened there and watched everywhere. I realized the king would destroy himself and the fine land and flocks under his rule. Indeed, not a soul within reach of his power enjoyed safety. Something certainly needed to be done.
I returned home and consulted with your mother. We sent for a silver-haired harper, who’d learned his art from the Fair Folk themselves, and he brought with him a friend who was a piper. Together we made a plan.
On the night of the feast the castle filled with the finest group of villains you could hope to find. Each was greedier and more arrogant and power hungry than the last. They ate and drank and roistered, smashed dishes and glasses, brutally used any woman who caught their fancy, cursed and shouted, spit and fought. The king’s poor wife, still white and frail from childbed, held her baby son to her in terror and hid behind the locked door of her chamber.
As she listened to the riot below in the castle, she caught a thread of beautiful music. It cut through her fear like a shaft of sunlight and beckoned to her. She wrapped the babe securely and unlocked her door, making her way quickly down a flight of stairs the servants used and into the kitchen.
Here she found an old man with long white hair and beard playing the harp, and beside him a piper. Many gathered around, for the music sounded clean and sweet and healing on that night of evil and fear.
The two musicians made their way out of the kitchen and scullery and into the quiet evening. Behind them followed the queen and her babe, servants, cooks, grooms, pot boys and all manner of other simple people who wanted only to work the land, tend their flocks and love their families in peace. They stole away from the castle, following the music under a starry sky. Soon they found themselves climbing a low hill, leaving the castle lit and noisy behind them. None hindered their going because none saw them leave.
They breasted the hill in the dark and slowly the line of following people broke up as each slid away in the direction of his field and fold and barn. Eventually, none were left with the musicians but the queen and her child. The harp and pipe played the others all the way home. When everyone was safe behind bolted doors, the music died away into peaceful darkness.
The next morning the people gathered on the crest of a low hill above the castle. Spread out below they found a wide lake, nearly five miles long. Calm and deep, it lay under morning sun. On the lakeshore, I began building a house out of blocks of stone, your mother beside me. I looked to the top of the hill and raised a hand in salute and people clapped and cheered. Ever since then we’ve made our place here and served the people as best we might, and the lake has covered over the castle and its evil.
Creirwy, nestled beside Bald Tegid, stirred and sighed. “Did you make the lake, Dada?” she asked.
“Yes, my heart,” said Bald Tegid, dropping a kiss on her head. “He was an evil man and it was best to cleanse the valley of him altogether, but no need for the innocent to be punished along with him. The castle is nothing but a ruin now. The lake keeps it safe and perhaps with time the castle will sink into the lake floor so even Morfran’s keen eyes no longer see it!” He smiled across at the youth and rose, lifting Creirwy in his arms. “Off to bed with you, now,” he said, and left the room.
Morfran did not speak. Firelight moved in the room. Ceridwen kept her eyes on the work in her hands, not meeting Morfran’s gaze.
“What happened to the queen and her child?” he asked.
Ceridwen’s hands stilled but she didn’t raise her eyes. “The queen died,” she said at last. “The fear and brutality she lived with weakened her. I wanted to know her story but there wasn’t time.” She at last looked up. “I did everything I could to save her but she was too injured.”
“And the child?” Morfran asked.
She looked away.
“Mother?”
“Morfran,” she said, “What your father said, that I’m the companion of his soul and heart, he is that for me also, as a man and a woman might come together in such strength and love. But you, my son, my dear one, you are this to me as well, a child of my heart and a child of my soul, though I didn’t give birth to you.”
“You aren’t my mother. You and Bald Tegid aren’t my parents?”
“I am and we are,” replied Ceridwen, her voice shaking, “but not by birth.”
In the following days Morfran thought a great deal about Bald Tegid’s story of Bala Lake and his own beginnings. How did the queen—his mother—his other mother--come to be married to such a man? Where were her people and her home? He hungered to learn about her and his family. He turned away from thoughts of his father. He felt ashamed to be the son of such a man, king or not, but his mother’s spirit called to him from beyond death and he made up his mind to learn her story.
A few days later, Ceridwen and Morfran harvested the last of the herbs and put the garden to bed for the winter with deep blankets of compost from lake, barn and household. As they worked in the crisp, sunny air, Ceridwen told him about the Cauldron of the Deep.
“When I was a young woman, I drank from it. It’s the source of wisdom and magic. In due course, I became the Cauldron’s keeper. I’m going to make a brew of Inspiration and Knowledge in it now for you. The first three drops of the brew will bestow mastery of magical arts and the gift of seership on whoever takes them.”
She looked anxiously into his face. They knelt amongst the sage and thyme, and the sharp scents came to his nose.
“Mother…” he began.
“You’re worthy of this,” she said quickly. “There’s great power in you, Morfran. I’ve always known it.”
“But Creirwy,” he said weakly, seeking a gentle way to refuse so she wouldn’t be hurt.
“Creirwy’s gift is her light. I never knew such an unshadowed nature. But you know she has no interest or aptitude for magic.”
Morfran did know. Creirwy demonstrated no curiosity in the power of alchemy and enchantment. Hers was an uncomplicated nature. She welcomed whatever came with a smile and trusted everyone. Creirwy would not care about anything that came out of the Cauldron of the Deep.
Morfran assented reluctantly. Ceridwen’s face relaxed and she gave him a smile of such love he felt uncomfortable, though he didn’t try again to dissuade her.
The recipe for the brew of Inspiration and Knowledge was complex. Ceridwen marked thirteen moons from Morfran’s thirteenth year as the time for him to drink from the cauldron. She spent days and nights poring over old tomes until she’d learned under which moon and planets to gather herbs, flowers, fungi and roots, and under which stars to steep them.
At last, the ingredients were ready. Morfran watched her swing the Cauldron of the Deep over the fire and drop the ingredients into it.
The brew needed a year and a day to simmer. In order to help tend the fire and watch over the brew, Ceridwen found a young peasant boy called Gwion. The boy was hungry and cringing when he came, but Morfran’s family opened their arms to him and all that year Gwion took his turn in feeding the fire and stirring the simmering cauldron with a heavy wooden spoon.
Morfran understood Ceridwen’s love and concern for him, but he felt content with his life and not the least worried by his twisted, lurching gait or his future. A feeling of growing power sustained him, and he knew one day he’d leave Bala Lake and his family. He was determined to go into the world and find his mother’s people. As Ceridwen became absorbed in brewing the draft of Inspiration and Knowledge for him, he missed her companionship. He would rather enjoy their old easy days together tending orchard and garden, roaming mountainside and lakeshore, than have anything she could prepare in the Cauldron of the Deep. He already possessed the gift shapeshifting, and wisdom would come with years.
Morfran took his turn stirring the cauldron and watching over the fire, but disinterestedly. He wouldn’t hurt Ceridwen, but to pretend gratitude became a heavy burden. He necessarily grew even more solitary, as she could rarely be persuaded to leave the cauldron, and spent long days on his own.
He envied Bald Tegid and Creirwy. They were the least affected by the brewing.
Bald Tegid had always been the center of Creirwy’s world. In her childhood, he told her tales and taught her giant lore as they fished, built stone walls, and tramped across hills to visit remote farms and crofts together. His deep gravelly voice and her fluting sweet one became familiar to the people in the region, and the homely giant and his bright sunbeam of a daughter were welcomed with affection wherever they appeared.
During the year of brewing, Ceridwen rarely left Bala Lake, her one concern the proper preparation of the brew of Inspiration and Knowledge. Morfran noticed Bald Tegid went abroad more often by himself, leaving Creirwy to gradually take over their previously shared role of traveling to market. Morfran’s clear eyes discerned the physical shape of a woman emerging from the child’s body, but her manner continued as unspoiled and childishly happy as ever. Morfran realized, with a stirring of disquiet, that Creirwy thought of no shadow or harm in the world. Her trusting and loving nature provided no self-protection. He didn’t want to dim her innocence, but she’d no sense of self-preservation, having never conceived of danger. The idea that one day his little sister would grow up gave him a protective, tender feeling.
(This post was published with this essay.)
