‘Has been Genvissa’s willing tool for too many years to change now.” He paused. “Genvissa told me there was nothing I could do, that there was no weapon left. Bitch ! What if she is right, Loth? What if she is right?”
‘Loth, listen to me. I need to speak to you of Cornelia.”
‘What of her? She had little—”
‘Loth, listen .” Coel summarized what he knew of her: Cornelia’s strange attraction to the land; her unexplained knowledge of the Stone Dances; the feel of Mag within her womb that was so strong when Coel had entered her in the rock pool; her uninvited appearance at Mag’s Dance and her intimate knowledge of Mag’s Nuptial Dance.
‘Moreover, Loth,” Coel continued, “she remembered all that had happened. Neither the drugged wine she’d drunk in Ecub’s house nor the frenzy wine she’d imbibed in Mag’s Dance hid the memory.”
‘But later,” Loth said, “when Siangan was dead, there was no power left in her. I, too, had thought there was something , but…”
‘She’d fainted, Loth. Might that not explain it?”
‘I don’t know…”
‘There’s something else you need to know, Loth. Genvissa told Brutus to ask Cornelia how Siangan had died.”
Loth went very still, and the mist rushed in close about them.
‘Brutus was furious that she had kept this secret from him. He threatened her, with his voice and his fists.”
Loth lifted his lips in a silent snarl, and the mist trembled.
‘Yet even so threatened, Cornelia only told him of you, and of the manner in which you killed your mother.”
‘She did not mention Ecub, or what happened in Mag’s Dance before I arrived? She did not mention you?”
‘No.”
‘She did not mention the Nuptial Dance that she had made with Blangan?”
‘No.”
Loth frowned. Cornelia had no reason to protect Mag (or, indeed, anyone who had been within Mag’s Dance). None. Unless…
Loth finally looked at Coel from out of his hideously deformed face. “This woman is very enigmatic,”
he said. “Very much so. Not only that she has protected so much when Brutus, as you say, threatened to beat it from her… but that Genvissa was so careful to set Brutus against her. Why would Genvissa feel threatened by Cornelia?”
‘Because she is Brutus’ wife, when Genvissa wants him in her bed, as she surely does?”
Loth shook his head. “A wife here or there would not bother Genvissa. A wife would just be something to be ignored. No, she is somehow disturbed by Cornelia, and that makes me more than curious to discover why.”
He considered, looking away into the mist as if he could find hope there.
When he finally looked back to Coel, his friend thought that maybe he had.
‘I think that you are going to find Cornelia’s company a compelling thing over the next few weeks,” he said. “I think you are going to become a very great friend to her.”
Coel smiled, very gently, very warmly. “And ,’ think that your suggestion will not be a hard thing, Loth. ,’ think that I will not find it an arduous task at all.”
CbAPGGR SIX coRnelia speaksOMETIMES I FIND MYSELF WISHING I COULD BITE
my tongue, and take back unthinking words, and sometimes I find myself wondering why it is that I have remained silent.
Why did I not tell Brutus in the first instance about the manner of Blangan’s death and then, in the
second instance, hold back so much when I was forced to tell him?
That night spent in Mag’s Dance remains with me so clearly. The dense mystery of the yellow mist, the sensuality of Blangan’s dance, the power of Ecub and her frenzy wine… that monstrous man, and the touch of his fingers on my breast and belly.
How could I tell Brutus that, and expect him to understand the beauty of it?
Yet holding back that part that was not beautiful—Blangan’s death—destroyed that which was growing between myself and Brutus. We had existed so long in mutual hatred that the slow and desperately fragile growing together after Achates’ birth had been the sweeter for what had preceded it.
Then that single omission, that simple silence, and Brutus’ angry face and the hilt of his dagger thrust into my face.
Aethylla, of course, made things no easier for me. She chided me for my stupidity, for my naivety, and my unthinkingness . Worse, she scolded me while nursing my son, ensuring I had to endure the double burden of my stupidity as a woman and my failure as a mother.
And all this she did while Brutus stood and watched.
I could have wept. I did weep, once Brutus, Corineus (shooting me a half-sympathetic, half-accusatory glance), and Hicetaon wandered off somewhere to discuss whatever Brutus had been told that morning, and I was left to my own devices.
Left to consider my failings.
And so I did, for Brutus’ departing face left no doubt in my mind that he considered me less than the dustiest, flea-ridden cur. I spent the first part of the morning sitting inside that round, stumpy stone house, alternatively weeping and cursing myself silently as I rocked a sleeping Achates (Aethylla having generously allowed me to hold him) to and fro in my arms.
Later, when I managed to calm a little, and Aethylla had fed Achates once more, I noticed that it was a wonderfully clear morning. I ventured outside, Achates in my arms, wondering if the Llangarlian guards beyond the door would allow me to walk about the town.
The only guard, as such, was Coel, leaning against the outer wall of the house, idly chewing a twig, and looking for all the world as if he had been waiting for me to appear.
‘Cornelia,” he said, spitting away the twig and standing straight. “I would like to make amends for creating this distance between us. Can we talk?”
Tears sprang unbidden to my already red and swollen eyes. I was so desperate for a moment’s kindness, a kindness from anyone, that I didn’t even consider that it was Coel who had begged me to remain silent in the first instance.
‘I thought,” he continued, “that I might be your escort for the day. What say you? Would you like to see some of this land and its people?”
And then he lifted his hand, and with the gentlest of fingers, wiped away one of the tears that had escaped down my cheek.
He nearly undid me, as he had undone me in that rock pool. No one, save Blangan or Corineus, had ever been this kind to me, or treated me as a respected equal.
I opened my mouth, unsure what to do (what if Brutus discovered it?), but before I made any sound I heard Aethylla calling my name, and her voice was hard, and spoke of further judgment. “Yes,” I said in a rush. “Thank you.”
He nodded, his eyes twinkling at my obvious desire to escape Aethylla. We walked away down a street toward what Coel said was the market area of the town. “Many of the local hamlets and farmsteads are herding their cattle and sheep to the pens here for the autumn sale,” he said. “It is one of the busiest times of the year for Llanbank.”
I could not have cared less about any market, but thought it impolite to say so. I nodded, and tried to look interested.
Coel laughed. “What am I doing?” he said. “Marketing is a man’s world and of no interest to you.
Besides, the ground grows muddier toward the market,
and your shoes are too fine to ruin. If we go this way, along this path toward the fen lands, we will come to some pleasant meadows, where we can sit and talk.”
Reluctantly (I truly did not want to spend a morning talking with Coel in some wild grassland when it might provide Brutus with yet more fodder for cruelty) I followed him along the path. The houses soon fell back, allowing sweet meadowlands to take their place. Coel led me to a spot underneath a stand of young ash trees, and we sat among the periwinkles and columbines that grew there.
‘This is a very beautiful land,” I said, made uncomfortable not only by the silence, but by the warmth and gentleness of this man beside me.
‘For a stranger,” Coel said, “you have a deep regard for Llangarlia, don’t you? A bond, almost.”
‘It is very beautiful,” I said again, briefly closing my eyes in agonized disbelief that I could be so incapable of a coherent conversation.
Coel drew up one knee, resting his extended arm on it. He looked out at the meadowlands, and the glint of the Llan lying just beyond.
‘Brutus has been cruel to you,” he said.
Oh, Hera, if he continued on with this then I was going to cry again!
‘Yet you did not tell him about Ecub, nor of Mag’s Nuptial Dance, nor of anything else save Siangan’s death. That was so well done, Cornelia.”