Jack Whyte: The Sorcer part 2: Metamorphosis

"The fair Salina! Merlyn, I watched the dissolution of this man, this dauntless warrior, from the moment he first set eyes on the woman who is now his wife."

"Salina? That is a Roman name. Is she—?"

"No, she's a Pict, from the mainland of your Caledonia," Connor answered.

"In truth, she's not." Brander had been gazing around, clearly looking for his new wife, but he now turned back to me. "She is of the Painted People, as they call them, but not from the mainland. She comes from the farthest islands to the north, beyond the mainland, a place called Orcenay. Ah, there she is, among the other women. I'll bring her over."

When he returned, he was accompanied by two women, the younger tall and radiantly beautiful even from afar, and the other older, richly dressed, walking slightly behind them, head downcast as she looked at something she held in her hands.

"She's glorious," Donuil breathed. "And so young."

Connor snorted. "Young? That's her niece, Morag. Think you your brother's an old goat? Salina walks behind her."

As they drew closer to us, the woman Salina raised her head and quickened her step to walk beside her husband, and I watched the way Brander took her hand and brought her forward, slightly ahead of him, to present her to us. Perhaps because of the youthfulness of her companion, some part of me was surprised that this new wife should be so mature, "old" being a word that no man with blood in his veins would ever have thought of applying to a woman such as her. She was a woman in her prime, beautiful, with high cheekbones and a full, sensuous mouth beneath deep-set eyes of blue so bright that even the whites surrounding them looked blue. She wore a hood of some kind, covering her hair, and she moved with great self assurance and dignity. I watched her closely and with intense curiosity as she greeted her good-brother Donuil, taking his hands in both of hers and smiling radiantly into his eyes. It was clear she had heard much about Donuil, and equally clear, from the flush that suffused his cheeks, that Donuil was abashed by the unexpected warmth of her greeting, so that he sounded flustered making excuses for the absence of his wife, who had ridden off into the hills just after dawn to commune with her own gods on the anniversary of her birth.

Then the younger woman, Morag, moved forward and was presented to Donuil, and I lost awareness of her aunt. I felt Salina's eyes fasten on me, but I was too smitten by the beauty of her niece to look back at her. I was amazed at how Morag had changed in the two score paces she had taken since I saw her first. In that first glimpse, she had appeared a glorious young woman of eighteen years; now she was a beautiful child, tall and slim and delightfully formed with high, proud breasts. But breasts and face were startlingly at variance, for while the former denoted a woman grown, the latter shone with the utter innocence of youth. It was a truly lovely face, with wide, grey eyes and a laughing mouth set between silken, dimpled cheeks. I gauged her age now, on seeing her this close, as being less than Arthur's; newly thirteen, I thought.

And then it was my turn to meet Salina, but as I turned to greet her I saw Tress approaching, tucking her hair hurriedly into place and looking flustered. Her first thought on hearing we had guests had been that our guest quarters were all unprepared, and she had rushed off to rectify that. I smiled towards Salina, holding up one hand in a mute plea for her indulgence while I turned very slightly away, extending my other hand to take Tress's as she arrived.

"Lady," I said then, returning my full attention to my new guests and bowing slightly from the waist before looking fully into Salina's eyes for the first time. "You and yours are welcome here in Mediobogdum. Our home is yours, and everything we possess, crude though it is, is yours to command. Your arrival fills me with pleasure, the more intense for its gladdening suddenness. I have heard many wondrous things about your husband, but none of them mentioned his eye for beauty." I looked from her to Brander. "I wish you well in your new marriage and will pray for many years of happiness ahead for both of you." I urged Tress forward, holding her tense fingers tightly in my own. "May I present my own lady, my Tress? We are to be wed soon, too." I smiled now at Tress, who was wide eyed with trepidation. 'Tress, you've heard much about the celebrated Brander, Admiral of the Northern Seas and brother to Donuil and Connor. This is he, and his new wife, the Lady Salina."

As Tress exchanged greetings with the newcomers, I glanced across at young Morag, with the intention of including her in my welcome, but she was standing, wide eyed and oblivious, staring at something behind me. Curious, I turned my head and saw Arthur, gazing back at her transfixed.

I might have said something to Arthur at that moment, had I the time, although I doubt if anything could have influenced the outcome of what had already happened there. I know I thought of introducing him to young Morag, but even as I raised my arm to sign to him, I saw the thunderstruck expression in his eyes and knew I might as well be miles away. At precisely the same instant, I saw swift movement from the corner of my eye as Connor surged forward to sweep Tressa off her feet in a great hug, and then the civilized pause we had enjoyed gave way to a swirl of movement and the noisy exchange of greetings among friends.

Connor had more gifts to present, including a supple and intricately worked, fleece lined leather coat of ring mail for Arthur and an array of weapons, equipment and clothing for the other boys. Tress was dumbfounded by the gift he gave to her, and it was plain to me he could not possibly have pleased her better. It was a carved, wooden chest of ancient, blackened oak, filled to the lid with hundreds of brightly coloured balls of yarn and thread—yellows and reds and blues and greens and blacks and white and greys— all dyed, Connor maintained, in the mountainous northern mainland close by the islands where he and his father's people now lived. Unable to respond adequately with words, Tress merely smiled at him through tears and then caressed his cheek before removing her treasure, with the willing assistance of several hands, to a private place where she could pore over it in solitude.

As we ushered Connor, Brander and their immediate party through the throng to the quarters they would occupy for the duration of their stay, I learned that Brander's visit was, on the surface at least, simply a temporary and belated visit to his brother Donuil, predicated upon opportunity. Without a war to demand all of his time, Brander had found himself uniquely able to spend time with his new wife, and as a wedding gift to her, he had decided to accompany her southward to visit her sister, who was wife to the Pictish king of the peninsula called Gallowa in Caledonia, a mere two days' sailing time to the north of Ravenglass. Morag's mother had been unable to attend her sister's nuptials, so Morag had attended in her place, and the bridal couple was now escorting the bridesmaid home to Gallowa. Naturally, since chance would bring Brander thus close to Donuil, whom he had not seen in twenty years, he had decided to combine one pleasure with another and to meet, at last, not only Donuil and his wife, but also Merlyn Britannicus, whom he had missed by mere hours years earlier, at the outbreak of the Eirish war, arriving from the northern isles with his father's fleet just after we had left to sail eastward to return to Camulod. It struck me immediately that the political ramifications of a visit from the admiral of the upstart Island Scots to a Pictish mainland king, when both of them had wives who were sisters, were too obvious to be remarked upon there, during a casual stroll. I resolved to find out more about it later, when the timing would be more appropriate.