Stephen Lawhead - Taliesin

Taliesin ducked back inside the hut, found Cormach’s staff where the body had been, retrieved it, and joined Blaise and the other druids, who had begun covering the body with fir boughs. When the body was covered-except for the head, which Hafgan still held between his hands-the druids, one at each corner of the bier, raised the green-mounded platform. It rose from the ground as lightly as wool drifting on the wind.

“Take the staff, Taliesin,” Hafgan told him. “Raise it before the hut.”

Holding the staff in both hands, Taliesin raised it as high as he could. Hafgan spoke a phrase in the secret tongue, paused, and repeated it twice again. In a few moments wisps of smoke began ascending from the smoke hole in the roof and out from under the deerskin in the doorway. Taliesin held the staff between his hands and watched bright orange flames creep up the outside of the wattle hut. The fire drew the fain who observed with silent curiosity as flames engulfed the hut and the thatch roof collapsed inward.

The druids turned the bier then and, began walking back through Dolgellau, Taliesin going before them with Cormach’s staff in his hands. They crossed the stream at the ford and then took the path leading from the woods and into the hills. A good many of the clansmen followed them, making a fair-sized procession.

They walked without hurry, but the distance shrank so that they reached Garth Greggyn in almost no time at all. It seemed to Taliesin that they merely walked out of the forest, over a hill and were there, in the valley of the spring Below the sacred grove. The druids ascended the hill to the grove where the rest of the Brotherhood had gathered. The clansmen followed but timidly and at a distance.

The bier was carried into the center of the grove and placed on two upright stones. The druids closed around, each with a branch or bough from a tree. Hafgan raised his hands shoulder high, palms out, and began speaking in the secret tongue. Then, lowering his hands, he said, “Brothers, our Chief has begun his journey to the Otherworld. What will you send with him?”

The first druid stepped forth, raised his branch and said, “I bring alder, Foremost in Lineage, for assurance.” With that he placed his branch against the bough-covered bier and stepped back.

“I bring dogwood,” said the next, “Powerful Companion, for compassion.”

“I bring birch, Lofty Dreamer, for high-mindedness,” said the next, placing his branch against the bier.

“I bring hazel, Seed of Wisdom,” said another, “for understanding.”

“I bring elm, Great Giver, for generosity.” And another placed his branch against the bier.

“I bring chestnut, Proud Prince, for regal bearing.”

“I bring ash, Stout-Hearted, for honesty.”

“I bring rowan, Mountain Lord, for fairness in judgment,” said another.

“I bring thorny plum, Invincible Warrior, for keenness of discernment.”

“I bring apple, Gift of Gwydyon, for reverence.”

“I bring oak, Mighty Monarch, for benevolence.”

Around the circle they went, each druid naming his gift and then placing it against the bier. Taliesin watched, entranced, listening to the words, wishing he had a gift. He glanced around the grove and saw a rose thicket with a few late-blooming flowers persisting among its barbed canes. Laying down the staff, he went to the thicket and took hold of a cane near the root where the barbs were not so close, pulled and pulled again. There was a snap down in the earth and the cane came up.

He carried it to the bier where the last brother was bestowing his gift. Hafgan drew a breath and opened his mouth, but before he could speak Taliesin stepped forward with his cane and said, “I bring rose, Enchanter of the Wood, for honor.” And he placed his cane with the other boughs, which now formed a leafy enclosure around the bier.

Hafgan smiled and said, “Brothers, let us release the body of our friend from its duty.”

Each druid bent, took hold of the bough he had oifered, raised it in one hand, and with the other took hold of the bier, and together they carried the body out through the grove to the cromlech which stood on a mounded hill Below the grove.

The cromlech was a small circle of standing stones surrounding a dolmen, which consisted of three upright stones topped by a flat stone slab. Cormach’s hawthorn bier was set on the slab and the boughs were placed all around, once again forming a dense enclosure over the body. Hafgan raised his hands, uttered something in the secret tongue, and then said, “Farewell, friend of our brother, you are free to go your way.” He knelt and put his palms against the dirt. “Great Mother, we give you back your son. Treat him not unkindly, for he has served his master well.”

So saying, he rose, turned his back and left the dolmen, passing through the ring of stones. The other druids followed, each passing between different stones in the circle and moving off in their various directions into the hills and woods beyond.

Later the three sat near a fire in the wood, darkness like thick wool wrapped close around them. They ate some of the food which had been given to them by the people of Dolgellau and talked. When they had finished eating, Blaise yawned and rolled himself in his cloak and went to sleep. Taliesin was far from sleepy; brain brimming with images, he stared into the dancing flames and pondered all he had seen that day. Hafgan watched him for a long while, waiting for the questions he knew were swimming in that golden head.

Finally Taliesin raised his face from the softly crackling flames and asked, “What will happen to the body now?”

Hafgan picked up an apple from the small pile on the ground beside him and passed it to the boy. He selected one for himself and bit into it, chewed thoughtfully and said, “What do you think will happen?”

“The flesh will corrupt, leaving the bones behind.”

“Precisely.” He took another bite. “Why ask the question when you already know the answer?”

“I mean,” said Taliesin, gnawing his apple, “what will happen when the flesh has dissolved?”

“The bones will be gathered and taken to a vault in the earth where they will be laid to rest with the bones of our brothers who have gone before.”

“But the birds and animals will disturb the body.”

Hafgan shook his head lightly. “No, lad, they will not come within the sacred ring. And anyway, flesh is flesh; if it feeds a fellow traveler on his way, it has performed one purpose for which it was made.”

Taliesin accepted this, took another bite of his apple and tossed the core into the fire. “The bier floated, Hafgan, when you spoke in the secret tongue-was it an enchantment?”

Again the druid shook his head. “I merely called on the Ancient Ones to bear witness to our brother’s deeds and grant him safe passage along the way. The body was light”-his palm floated upward as he spoke”because there was no longer anything to bind it to the earth or weigh it down.”

The boy contemplated the fire, eyes sparkling. “Will we see him again?”

“Not in this world. In the Otherworld perhaps. A soul lives forever-before birth and after death it is alive. This world is only a brief sojourn, Taliesin, and it is doubtful if men remember it when we pass on-just as we forget the life before this one.”

“I will remember,” declared Taliesin.

“Perhaps,” said Hafgan evenly, gray eyes keen in the firelight as he watched Taliesin. In the shimmering light the boy’s face seemed to take on a different aspect. It was no longer the face of a child but a timeless face, neither old nor young, the face of a youthful god, an immortal beyond the reach of age or time.

Hugging his knees, Taliesin began rocking back and forth. He stared into the flames and said, “I was in many shapes before I was born: I was sunlight on a leaf; I was star’s beam; I was a lantern of light on a shepherd’s pole.