But the girls were soaked by the time they came into the central hall of the priestesses. Eilan felt Miellyn had welcomed the opportunity to run.
“Get yourselves dry now, lasses, or you’ll catch a rheum and I’ll be using up all my medicines nursing you!” Latis, who was so old now she could no longer go into the forest to gather the herbs, cackled with laughter and shooed them towards the door. “But mind you come back then to lay out the herbs you’ve brought me, or they’ll mildew and both the plants and your labor will be wasted!”
Skin still glowing from brisk rubbing, Miellyn and Eilan returned to the still-room. Built on behind the kitchen where heat from the ovens kept the air warm and dry, the rafters were festooned with bunches of hanging herbs. Woven trays upon which roots or leaves were spread to dry hung beneath them, turning lazily. Shelves with earthenware crocks stood along one wall, and bags and baskets of prepared herbs were stored along another, neatly labeled with the sigils of the herbalists’ craft. The air was pungent.
“You’re Eilan, are you not?” Latis peered at her. She looked rather like a dried root herself, thought Eilan, seamed and wrinkled with age. “Goddess help us, they get younger every year!”
“Who does, Mother?” asked Miellyn, hiding her grin.
“The girls they send to serve the Priestess of the Oracle.”
“I told her she would be sent for training to the Lady soon,” Miellyn said. “Well, Eilan, do you believe me now?”
“Oh, I believed you,” Eilan said, “but I thought surely it would take someone older and with more skills than me.”
“Caillean would say that they do not want anyone too learned near Lhiannon for fear she would ask too many questions. If the Priestess were forced to think about what she was doing, the Oracles she gives might not always serve the Druids’ policies so conveniently.”
“Miellyn, hush,” Latis exclaimed. “You know you must not say such things — not even in a whisper!”
“I will speak the truth and if the priests object, I will ask them by what right they ask me to lie.” But Miellyn lowered her voice. “Eilan, be careful; you are holding that basket aslant. We took enough trouble to gather these leaves, I do not want them dirtied by a fall to the floor.”
Eilan readjusted the angle of the basket she was holding.
“There are some truths which should never be spoken aloud, not even in a whisper,” Latis went on soberly.
“Yes,” Miellyn said, “so I am told; and usually they are the truths that should be proclaimed from the rooftops.”
“In the sight of the gods this may very well be true,” replied the other. “But you know very well we are not in the presence of the gods, but of men.”
“Well, if the truth cannot be spoken in a house built by the Druids,” Miellyn replied stoutly, “where in the name of the gods can it be?”
“The gods alone know!” said Latis. “I have survived so long by sticking to my herbs, and you would do well to do the same. They, at least, speak true.”
“Eilan doesn’t have that choice,” said Miellyn. “She’ll be tied to the High Priestess for the next six moons.”
“Remain true to yourself, child.” Old Latis touched her chin so that Eilan could not look away. “If you know your own heart, you will always have one friend who does not lie.”
The priestess had spoken the truth. With the coming of the next moon, Eilan was brought to Lhiannon and taught the ceremonious etiquette for attending upon the High Priestess in public, which, in effect, meant every time that Lhiannon went out of her own dwelling in the Forest House. She learned the rituals of robing Lhiannon for the ceremonies, which was more complicated than it looked; for from the beginning of the ritual, not even with a fingertip’s weight could any human being touch the Priestess. She shared with Lhiannon the long ritual seclusion with which the Priestess prepared for the rites, and helped her through the physical collapse that followed.