Ragnelle: A Hag's Tale

The Break

Leodegrance stayed for nearly three weeks.

For nearly three weeks, he made sure that he was never alone with me.

For nearly three weeks, I pretended not to notice.

I did not want Leodegrance to seek me out. What could we possibly have in common? The leagues between a grown man of two-and-forty summers and a girl of thirteen could not be surmounted, even by the rules of etiquette.

But others noticed. They followed his lead.

By the time it came for Rhys to depart, I had not uttered a single word to any of our guests, beyond a distant greeting.

The young blonde warrior, the cause of all my trouble, dropped his eyes to the ground when I walked past.

But I was the Lady of Dwyfor, a child of Modron. I would not show I cared. They whispered and flinched but I walked past them with my head held high.

Rhys, on the other hand, was beloved.

Leodegrance was at pains to welcome my brother into his household. In the three weeks he stayed with us, he included Rhys in every training session,  invited him to join in every discussion on politics or the law. Never matter that Rhys had more interest in picking worms from the ground than he did in the squabbles of one Princeling over another or refinements on the division of hacksilver in a sheep-farmer's will. He was the future Lord of Dwyfor. While my presence was required for the rituals and for show, he was the hope of our declining world against the might of Pendragon and his Roman cohorts.

Rhys was gracious. He had been trained to be no less. Only I could hear the sneers and mockery he cast on Leodegrance in the darkness of his own head. Only I was there to hear his fears as he tossed and turned in his chamber when another day was done.

He was thirteen years old, nearly a man. But the gulf between being and nearly being was as wide as an ocean. Neither of us had gone beyond the borders of Dwyfor or strayed from our own familiar valleys and beloved hills and forests. Now Rhys was to leave Dwyfor - leave all of us - to spend years away in the company of strangers, men and women who did not know him.

People who did not know how easily he felt the cold in winter or that he loved sweet honey cakes baked with dried apples. People who had no understanding of his need for solitude, or the fierce affection that bubbled under his rough ways and chilling green eyes.

The days slipped away, like clouds passing through our fingers.

Before we could catch hold of them again, it was summer's end. Our childhood was broken.

"I won't go!"

It was a sign of his desperation that Rhys spoke aloud. This past summer, more than ever, he had taken to speaking only with his mind, hiding his words away from those around us.