The Tower: Part 6: Ostara
Post #62: In which a choice ...
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CHATTAN
Chattan followed the knot of excited men surrounding Seren to David’s house. They jostled through the door, David in the lead, and stood in an angry and, Chattan thought, frightened clot as David lit lamps and produced mead and several wooden cups.
Seren was pale. He repeatedly lifted his hand to his throat, his eyes wide and staring. David pushed a cup into his hand and Seren took a gulp of mead. A tinge of color returned to his face, but his eyes glittered.
“Speak to us, my friend,” David pleaded. “Calm down, gather yourself together and speak! You can do it!”
Seren’s throat and face tensed with effort. He opened his mouth, but no sound came out.
“It’s witchcraft!” said one of the men. “Rowan Tree is damned!”
“That little bitch,” said another. “You should never have gone near her, boy. Plenty of others, more willing and more beautiful. Let this be a lesson to you!”
“Who did this to you?” demanded Mingan. “Was it the work of the wizard, the girl’s father? Or was it the witch Maria and the old woman Heks?”
“Does it matter?” snarled David. “Wizard or witch, there’s evil abroad, powerful evil that can silence the most golden voice under heaven. We must face it and destroy it! We must return our community to law and order. We must put our faith in a wise and God-fearing man instead of that witchy woman and her crones. We must regain our rightful place as masters and teach the women to serve!”
“What can we do against such power?” asked one of the men fearfully.
“Yes, what can we do?” asked Chattan, arranging his own face in an anxious frown. “Tonight the girl Clarissa sleeps under the protection of Heks, and Maria and Ginger are together.” He hoped the reminder that none of the four women was unprotected and alone would forestall any sudden nighttime violence.
“Rose Red released the feathers,” said David. “I’ve known from the beginning she’s as unnatural as the rest of them. She and that Artemis, who hunts like a man and calls herself the keeper of the forest. That giantess is a friend of Rose Red’s, and they tried to bring her here! I’ve heard rumors she gave herself to a fox! Perhaps she’s the leader of them all. I’ve never seen a knife like that. It’s obviously an instrument of dark magic.”
Chattan, watching Mingan, noted a dark flush on his cheeks under narrowed eyes.
“I will speak to Rose Red,” Chattan said. “I’ll make her see reason.”
One of the men sniggered. “You persuade her,” he suggested. “Let me know if you need any help!”
Mingan glared at him.
“Make her see she should leave,” said David. “She’s not needed or wanted here. She and Artemis should go away, along with the giantess they’ve hidden somewhere in the woods. Maybe we can convince them to go on their own.”
“And if they won’t?” asked one of the men.
“We’re bigger, stronger, and have more right to lead than they do,” said David. “I’m a man of means and education. Nobody wants witches and women in control. We’ll stand together and cast them out, use violence if necessary. When word gets out about what they’ve done to Seren, they’ll be hunted down and killed like animals anyway. We don’t want to be seen sheltering such evil.”
Seren sat down abruptly on a nearby chair and put his head in his hands.
“You need your bed,” said David. “After a good night’s sleep, you’ll find your voice and this will be a bad dream. Be off, the rest of you. Give the man some peace. Chattan, you come and tell me how it goes with Rose Red in the morning.” He shooed them out and Chattan heard the door shut solidly, followed by the sound of a bolt being drawn.
The night was wild with gusting wind, warm and smelling of damp earth and water. Chattan glanced down the slope to the fire pit and saw no flame or spark. Kunik and the others had doused it thoroughly. He hoped the women were safely home and would stay there. He suspected they were not in danger as long as they stayed together. None of these men would dare approach them unless they were alone and vulnerable.
The men dispersed, muttering and talking in low tones. Chattan paused under a tall beech tree. From this vantage point he could see the river, the fire pit, David’s house, the community building and several small homes. Mingan made his way up the hill.
“Where’s he going?” Heks appeared beside him, silent as a shadow.
“He’s going to Rose Red,” said Chattan grimly. “Don’t sneak up on me like that! You shouldn’t leave Clarissa.”
“Clarissa’s sound asleep. I gave her something. She’ll sleep until morning. I don’t intend to be seen. No one will know I’m not with her.”
“I want to get there before him. I’ll let you follow at your own pace. Be careful.”
Chattan stepped into deeper shadow, closed his eyes and reached within himself for the shape of his soul. He raised his nose into the wind, breathing deeply of the boisterous night and catching Heks’s scent, though she already followed Mingan, keeping to the shadows. His pupils dilated to make the most of the low light and he sprang, thrusting with powerful hindquarters, and bounded lightly up the slope on his wide paws, making no sound and invisible in the night.
He moved past Rose Red’s oak tree and circled back from behind. The wind blew in his face, and he could smell Mingan clearly and Heks less clearly. Light burned from Rose Red’s window. She was still awake. He knew Artemis was with Gwelda.
The hour had come. Rose Red was alone. It was the moment he’d waited for, he and Mingan both, circling warily around one another, neither able to act definitively until Rose Red made a choice. It all depended on her courage and strength. Artemis was sure of her. She had told Chattan Rose Red herself remained unaware of her power and Mingan’s underestimation of her and Chattan would be his downfall. Mingan’s arrogance and hatred were fatal weaknesses.
Chattan knew what Mingan was, but he didn’t think Mingan knew what he was. He’d been very careful. Until tonight, the scent of this form had never been closer to Rowan Tree than the forest beyond Rose Red’s house. Mingan knew a lynx had been near, but he didn’t know Chattan was the lynx.
On this night, he, Mingan and Heks stood with Rose Red on a crossroad and watched her choose the future.
“Whatever happens, you must not influence her,” Artemis had cautioned him. “She must make a free choice, and she must accept the consequences of her choice. She has everything she needs. She is everything she needs. She’s not a fit consort for you unless she trusts herself absolutely and knows she doesn’t need you.”
“I understand,” he’d said, and he did. He would not interfere, but he would watch, and if Mingan lived this night Chattan would not rest until he had hunted him down and torn him apart, as Mingan had torn apart Jan and, undoubtedly, others.
“Rose Red? It’s me, Mingan. Will you let me in?”
Chattan pricked his ears.
“Just a minute,” he heard Rose Red say.
The door opened, letting out a glow of light. “I was going to take a walk,” said Rose Red, cloaked and with a lantern in her hand.
Chattan drew his lips back in a smile that looked like a snarl. She didn’t want to be alone inside with Mingan. Good girl!
“I want to talk to you privately,” Mingan began, clearly reluctant.
Rose Red set off on the path to Rowan Gate and Eurydice’s house. “Nobody to hear but the trees,” she said.
Mingan fell into step beside her.
“Bit of bother tonight at the bonfire,” said Mingan.
“Did you think so? I enjoyed the stew. And the story.”
“There’s some bad feeling about what happened after the story.”
“Oh?”
“Are you happy here, Rose Red?”
“This is where I belong. I’m happy here.”
“It might be time to consider leaving.”
“Oh, no. There’s no question of that.”
Mingan took her by the elbow and turned her, forcing her to stop and face him.
“You might not have a choice. The witch Maria and her sidekick with the red hair, Ginger, will be forced out, and Heks will likely be killed, along with that girl, Clarissa, who’s cursed Seren, her or her father has, anyway. Rowan Tree won’t stand for it. You were part of it, with your magic knife. You’ll be outcast, along with the rest. They don’t want you here, any of you. When word gets out about what you’ve done to Seren, they’ll come for you.”
“You mean David doesn’t want us here. David and a few others.” Rose Red’s voice sounded cold and Chattan exulted. She wasn’t going to be cowed easily.
“David has power,” said Mingan.
“David’s a coward,” Rose Red shot back, and pulled free from Mingan’s grasp. “He’s threatened by powerful women.”
“You’re in danger!” Mingan raised his voice. “You don’t appreciate how much danger you’re in! I’m trying to protect you!”
“I know you are. Thank you.” Rose Red’s voice softened.
Mingan took full advantage of the opening. His voice became intimate and infused with affection. “I’ll always protect you. You’re so beautiful and so precious, like some shy woodland thing. I never met anyone like you before.”
Rose Red began walking again, head bowed.
“Thank you,” she said again. “I appreciate your concern, but I’m quite self-sufficient, and I like being alone.”
“You can’t mean that. You’re made for loving. A woman like you needs someone to look after her.”
Some of the warmth left her voice and her shoulders stiffened. “I assure you I don’t need anyone to look after me.”
“But I have looked after you for weeks now, and you never knew. Rose Red, I don’t want you to be frightened, but something is watching you at night.”
She paused and faced him again. “I know. What is it?”
“It’s some kind of a monstrous cat. I’ve seen the footprints.”
“So have I. And also prints of something like a large wolf.”
“Rose Red, those are my prints. I’m your secret protector, watching over you through the night, keeping you from harm. I’ve seen cats like that before. They’re vicious and bloodthirsty. They fall upon small, unprotected communities like this and slaughter the people, one by one. I’ll bet this one killed Jan and followed Gwelda here. It will never stop hunting you unless I kill it. It’s watched and waited, getting closer every night, but I’ve held it off. It knows I’m here, and it fears me and my kind. As long as I’m here, it won’t come too close.
“We’re fated to be together, you and I. It’s time you recognize me and my power. I’ll tear out the cat’s throat and lay its body at your feet. Behold the bodark!”
He whirled away from her and thrust a knife into a nearby beech tree. The blade gleamed like copper in the lantern light. Rose Red set down the lantern she carried, carefully and deliberately. Her face was set.
Mingan began speaking what sounded like some kind of an incantation in a guttural language. Chattan wondered if Heks watched and listened. Mingan’s form quivered as he chanted, bulging and oozing in a shimmer of dark orange and rusty red, then becoming the dull black of a cinder. His body shortened and lengthened. Ears pricked above a head with eyes like burning embers and a long canine snout, lips wrinkled back to show powerful teeth.
The wolf stood higher than a man’s hip, its brushy tail held straight out from its body. The size of its paws made the black legs look slim and fragile. It stood facing Rose Red, not actively threatening, but its snarling face, intent ears and aggressive stance expressing demand rather than invitation.
Rose Red did not gasp or cry out. Her attention moved from the wolf to the knife thrust into the tree and Chattan saw a flash of understanding in her eyes, as though she suddenly solved a puzzle. He and Artemis had agreed to say nothing about the slashes in the tree near where Jan had been killed, and their suspicion they had been made in exactly this way. He suspected Rose Red recognized the copper-bladed knife for what it was, the mate to the copper blade Brigid had forged for her during Imbolc. She normally wore it sheathed at her waist under her tunic, its blade coated with deadly poison.
He hoped it was sheathed at her waist now.
It was time. He stepped out from between the trees and sat at the edge of the lantern’s glow, fully in view but not too close to either the bodark or Rose Red. He swiveled his black-tufted ears forward and fixed his gaze on Rose Red. Their eyes locked. She appeared unable to look away. She showed no fear, only an intense, searching interest.
The bodark noticed her attention turn to something behind him and turned, stiff-legged and hackles rising along his spine. He snarled at Chattan, growling in his throat, saliva dripping from his jaws. Chattan lifted his lip just enough to show the gleam of teeth and met the bodark’s red eyes, allowing his contempt and disgust for the foul creature to show. He continued sitting on his powerful haunches, dismissed the bodark and looked back at Rose Red.
Her eyes traveled again to the knife in the tree, then to the bodark, then to Chattan. The bodark turned back to her, dropped its head and whined in its throat. Its tail twitched in a tentative wag. It took a couple of steps closer to Rose Red. But for the burning, watchful eyes, it looked like a large dog seeking kindness.
Rose Red allowed it to approach, standing with feet apart and knees slightly bent, her right hand close to her right hip. For the first time, Chattan appreciated the courage Artemis had spoken of. Rose Red was not getting ready to run. She was prepared to face them both, lynx and wolf. She was ready to fight. He burned with pride. Once again, she met his amber gaze, as though searching for an answer to a question she hadn’t yet asked.
Chattan made no sign.
The wolf, directly before Rose Red now, reached to lick her hand with its long slavering tongue.
She looked down at it, her eyes cold, withdrawing her hand.
“No.”
The bodark growled and stiffened. Its head came up. The dull hair along its spine stirred again.
Chattan tensed but made no move.
Now the bodark held Rose Red’s gaze, the rumbling growl growing in volume. It drew back its lips and pinned its ears. Rose Red’s right hand flashed under the hem of her tunic and reappeared with the copper-bladed knife. She sank deeper into a crouch, bending her left arm defensively in front of her. She held the knife in a reverse grip with the edge facing away and without hesitation, screaming in what sounded to Chattan like rage rather than fear, she slashed forward and down across her body, right in the bodark’s face.
As Rose Red had drawn the knife, the bodark sprang but overreached, not expecting her to move even closer. Its teeth raked her defensive arm and it fell back awkwardly, snarling and growling. As she wielded the deadly knife, it cut the bodark across lips and tongue and in a moment the creature lay, gasping, slobbering, with bloodied jaws. It shrieked, half growl, half bark; shuddered, and died.
Rose Red stood over it, crouched, knife in hand, glaring down at the body, ungainly and angular in death. She breathed heavily. Blood dripped from her arm.
Chattan stood and approached the dead bodark soundlessly on his wide feet.
“Wait.” Rose Red halted him with a gesture. She knelt and wiped the knife carefully on the ground, first one side and then the other, before sheathing it again. “It’s poisoned,” she explained briefly.
At her nod, Chattan once again approached. He sniffed the bodark and drew his lips back in distaste at the stench of blood and the unholy mingling of unnatural wolf and dangerous man. The creature was unquestionably dead.
Chattan began purring. Rose Red, still kneeling, reached for him. Her hands trembled and tears fell down her cheeks.
He approached her, his body vibrating with his purrs, and she put her arms around him, sinking her hands into his thick salt-and-pepper coat. She laid her cheek against his shoulder and wept.
He changed into his man shape and took her in his arms, rocking and murmuring reassurance. She hardly appeared to notice.
When she drew away, she said, “I knew it was you. I recognized your eyes.”
“You recognized the knife,” he said.
“Yes. Then I understood why Brigid made me mine.”
“Artemis and I found knife marks like the one he made in the beech near where Jan was killed.”
“You mean it was him?”
“Him or others like him; men who choose to become werewolves.”
“Why has he been watching me?”
“Because men like Mingan want power and control. They fear anything more powerful than they are. They hate anyone who is different than themselves. That’s why he killed Jan. Jan and Gwelda’s happiness together, their care for the forest, offended him. When he arrived here and found someone like David, weak and convinced of his superiority, the opportunity to cause trouble was too good to resist.”
“Did Gabriel know?”
“I’m not sure. I think he suspected. He didn’t trust Mingan. That’s why he offered him hospitality. He wanted to keep an eye on him.”
“He always seemed to be there when Mingan tried to get me alone.”
“Your friends have been concerned for you.”
“And you?”
“I am Cerunmos, Sacred Consort, come to take the place of the White Stag.”
“For Artemis?”
“No, Rose. For you. Artemis starts a new chapter now. I come for you. I will fulfill the role of Sacred Consort until it is time for me to go. If you choose, part of that role will be our union and partnership, but only if you choose freely and from your full power. I do not come to you because you need me or I need you. I come with an invitation to join our power together.”
Rose Red shivered. Her eyes made black pools in her white face in the lantern light.
“You must get inside and take care of your arm. You’re shocked. Will I walk you home, or do you want to see Maria for your wounds?”
“I will go home. I’ll see Maria in the morning. Please walk with me.”
He picked up the lantern.
“What shall we do about – that?” she asked, indicating the bodark’s sprawled body.
“Leave it. We’ll deal with it in the morning.”
Rose Red clambered to her feet, weary but steady. They walked, side by side, back to Rose Red’s oak tree.