Stephen Lawhead - Taliesin

And yet… it was changed. There had been a subtle yet profound shift. Like a shift in the wind that indicates the long dry spell is broken and the rains will come, like the step that takes a traveler over the unseen boundary into another land, Charis knew the anticipation that comes when something unknown is expected.

After, the ceremony, when the bones of the ox were nothing more than scattered ashes and its blood a thickening river seeping among the ancient altar stones, the celebrants walked down the hill by torchlight. Charis moved as one in a dream, her feet drifting, every movement languid and slow. She floated, rising as if from icy, turgid depths through numbing fathoms, surfacing to breathe fresh air for the first time. She felt as if she had lived her life thus far asleep and now was about to awaken. With every airy step she felt the past receding, becoming more remote, falling away from her like worm-eaten clothing, a burial gown grown wispy and rotten with age.

Her heart beat in her chest and her pulse drummed in her ears. Every object that met her gaze appeared needle-bright and surrounded with a halo of cold, shimmering light. Her mind was opened to vistas unimagined, as if the wisdom of the ages had been breathed into her soul. She knew things she had never learned, and this knowledge swirled around inside her like a giddy whirlpool.

Charis walked down the hill to the city acutely aware of everything around her and yet oblivious to all. She drifted, feeling the wash of Oceanus’ restless tide as its waves tugged at her; she breathed the sharp salt air deep into her lungs, and it was like breathing a rare and subtle ether.

Words formed in her mind as if written in flame: I am the Mother of Nations; I am the Womb of Knowledge… I am Atlantis.

It was very late, but Avallach and Briseis shared a quiet moment before going to bed. The lamps burned low, and the moon shone full through the open door to the balcony. They spoke in low tones as Briseis cradled her husband, her arms around him as Avallach stroked her neck and shoulders.

There came a soft knock on the door and Avallach rose reluctantly.

The king opened the door, and the light fell on Annubi’s face. The seer apologized at once. “Forgive me, Sire. I would not disturb you but…”

“What is it?”

“It is about the bull girl-earlier today.”

Avallach shook his head. “I do not understand.”

“I asked him to bring me word,” explained Briseis as she joined him. “What of the girl?”

“I am sorry, my queen.”

“Dead?”

The seer nodded. “The wound was deep, and she was overweak from loss of blood. There was nothing to be done.”

“Did she suffer?”

“She resisted to the end. There was pain, yes, but I think she preferred it that way.”

The queen nodded absently. “Thank you, Annubi.”

With a nod to the king, the seer turned and disappeared. Briseis closed the door after him and turned to the king. “Such a waste, when you think about it.” Briseis put her head against her husband’s chest. They held each other for a long moment.

“It has been a long and eventful day,” said Avallach at last. “I am tired.”

“Go along to bed. I will just blow out the lamps.” The king kissed her and moved off to the bedchamber. Briseis made her way around the room, extinguishing the lamps. As she passed the balcony, she paused: a soft melody floated up from the garden Below. Someone was singing. The queen stepped to the balustrade.

On the moon-drenched lawn Below stood Charis, wearing only a thin nightdress, turning slowly around and around, arms raised to the sky and eyes to the moon, the strange song on her lips and a look of pure rapture on her upturned face.

Briseis opened her mouth to call out, but thought better of speaking and listened instead. It was a long moment before she could make out the words. What she heard made her breath catch in her throat.

“Mother of Nations, Womb of Knowledge, I am Atlantis… Atlantis… Atlantis… I am Atlantis.”

Hafgan stood wrapped in his cloak of midnight blue, oaken staff clutched in his right hand. He studied the night sky for a long moment and then began pacing once more, in sunwise circles around the heel stone in the center of the stone circle, pausing only to eat a few hazelnuts of knowledge from a leather pouch at his Belt.

He paced his slow circles and listened to the wind as it fingered the winter-dry grass, and to the cry of a hunting owl in a distant tree. The moon shone down fair and full as it moved through its measured course, and Hafgan noted the quality of its light as it passed overhead. Listening, weighing, judging, the druid passed the hours of the night.

When the moon stood directly over the heel stone, the druid began his chant of prophecy, humming the secret syllables to himself, slowly, deliberately, feeling their power quicken within him. The heavy curtain that normally veiled his senses began to wear thin, becoming transparent, allowing him to peer into the Otherworld, where his eyes could see, his ears hear, and his mind perceive those things ordinarily denied mortal men.

His chant became a song and he lifted his voice, releasing it to travel the unseen pathways of the air. He sang:

“Earth Mother, behold your son!

Sky Mother, recognize me,

your devoted servant.

Father of Wisdom, speak to me,

that I may hear your voice,

Keeper of the Gates of Knowledge, open wide

that I may enter your realm.

Great Goddess, Queen of Life,

diffusing silver light, bull-homed,

and wandering through

gloom of sacred Night,

with silvery rays you shine;

Now full-orbed, now dwindling in decline,

show by your passing,

the secret sign;

Reveal to me the vision of your sight.”

At this last, he stopped pacing and threw his arms wide. His cloak slipped from his shoulders as he raised his staff high, gripping it with both hands over his head.

A shimmer lit the sky as a star streaked to earth. A moment later another plummeted earthward, and another and then the sky was alive with falling stars, all glittering, hot points of sparks, the burning wake of a firebrand plunging through the night.

When it was over, Hafgan lowered his staff and reached into his pouch for a handful of hazelnuts. He sat on a nearby stone and chewed thoughtfully while he contemplated what he had seen. He sat there, thinking, until the moon began sinking toward morning. Then, taking up his cloak, he left the stone circle and walked slowly back toJjis hut outside the caer.

Early the next morning, the people of Caer Dyvi gathered outside the druid’s hut. Many had seen the strange starfall in the night and feared that some dire misfortune was even now speeding towards them.

They called to him, saying, “Wake up, druid! Tell us what calamity is forecast. Hafgan! Why are you still abed when danger lurks near? Wake up!”

Receiving no response, they raised a great outcry until Gwyddno Garanhir himself came forward and demanded, “Kinsmen, why this shouting so early in the morning? What is happening here?”

“Are you the only one who does not know?” asked one distraught woman. “Has no one told you?”

“The starfall last night,” said another. “Terrible it was! Surely, disaster must soon overtake us.”

“If it is as you say,” answered Gwyddno, pulling on his mustache, “then Hafgan will tell us what to do.”

“But there is the trouble,” answered one of the men gathered there. “Our derwydd will not awake and talk to us.”

Gwyddno nodded to Cuall, who pushed aside the oxhide hung in the doorway to keep out the wind and entered the druid’s hut. He emerged only a moment later. “He has gone,” said Cuall. “But the ashes of his hearthfire are still warm.”