Gwenhwyfar_ The White Spirit - Mercedes Lackey [64]
“What?” gasped Gynath.
Gwen could only sit there, half frozen, as memories she didn’t think she was supposed to have came flooding back. Of the Merlin’s questions. Of what he had mumbled.
“There were not, thank the good Goddess, many of them,” she continued. “But . . .” She shook her head again. “The way he said it, made me think it must be true. And so cold-blooded—”
“Perhaps . . .” Gynath began, in a whisper, her face gone pale.
“Perhaps it was meant as . . . a sacrifice.”
They all three exchanged sober glances. Even as young as she was, Gwen knew that there were sacrifices. From time to time one of her father’s treasured white horses went off and never came back.
There were sacrifices at all the Great Rites. Mostly fruit and flowers and grain, of course; among other things, you didn’t waste the life of an animal that could breed more of its kind unless you needed something really badly from the gods. But animals were sacrificed and—sometimes people as well.
That was mostly in the hands of the Druids. Mostly. Though sometimes there had to be a Year King . . . only in dark times though.
But the Merlin was the Chief Druid. And he was the one who had advised Arthur to do this terrible thing. Was he playing the Substitute King with the High King’s new twins, sacrificing other boy children like them so that they would be spared? If he was, well, that was just wrong. Even Gwen knew it didn’t work like that. The Year King had to go to the sacrifice willingly, had to know what he was doing, and do it for the Land and the people, and how could a baby do that?
But if they were sacrifices, what were the sacrifices for?
It was baffling, and somehow, that made it even more horrifying.
“This is something I thought you should know,” Bronwyn concluded. “And it will go no further than the three of us. But you, Gynath, may well be queen here one day. And you, Gwen, will likely serve her as you would have served your brother, had he lived. And you must both know about things like this and keep a sharp watch on the High King’s doings.” She bit her lip, and the flickering flame from their rushlight made her look even older and more drawn. “It may be he has done this for the Land and the Folk. Unless the Ladies bring the word to us, we cannot know. But on the face of it, these are dark doings, and the High King is besmirched by their foulness. If these are dark doings, there is one thing you may be sure of.”
“What’s that, Bronwyn?” asked Gynath in a whisper.
“That they will come back at him when he least expects and be his ruin,” the old woman said, grimly. “Blood will have blood, and innocent blood calls more strongly than any other.”
The messenger went on his way. The season turned, summer to harvest, and the rites and the festival. Poor Gynath was at her wits end trying to arrange all, even with the help of Bronwyn and all the women, but out of respect for the king, few guests replied that they would come, and only the king’s closest friends arrived. For the villagers, it was no different from any other Harvest festival. There was food and music, dancing and gaming, drinking and more drinking, coupling and handfasting, and all the usual doings in their season. And if the gathering at the king’s hearth was a subdued one, if there were no races this year, well, at least there was, at last, a gathering at the king’s hearth, and when the guests were gone again, there was no more going out to another hearth and leaving the king to mourn alone over the ashes. In part that was just plain sense, for there was no other place big enough to hold them all when the winter winds began to blow, but in part it was because the king was taking an interest in life again.
A few women made attempts to draw him out, but by Midwinter it was clear that