sense beyond hearing, a sense belonging to my untrammeled soul.
I ran to tell Menua. Words shaped for only five senses were inadequate, but he understood.
‘ ‘Now it begins for you, Ainvar. You can find the pattern anywhere. Hear it, see it, feel it. Where would you like to begin?”
I knew at once. “Can I have a man with a spear?” I asked.
Menua nodded. He did not even ask me to explain.
Taking a warrior called Tarvos with me to watch for the wolves I still remembered with a shudder, I left the fort to spend the night in the forest. Among the trees, without the barriers of walls and roof.
I went to seek the magic in the night with my newly awakened senses of the spirit.
I found a snug place for myself in the lee of a hillock and sent my bodyguard to stand a distance away, where he could hear me if I needed him but would not distract me. His expression told
42 Morgan Llywelyn
me he thought I was mad, but I was the chief druid’s apprentice. It was not given to warriors to question my actions.
After singing the song for the setting sun, I wrapped myself in my cloak and lay down to wait.
I had a long wait. Nothing happened. By sunrise I was stiff and hungry, yet determined to persevere.
Every night for eight nights I slept in the forest, with barrel—
chested, bandy-legged Tarvos poking his spear into every clump of shrubbery and muttering to himself. During the days I continued my studies with Menua, who was currently teaching me me motions of the stars.
On my ninth attempt I heard the music of the night.
Sometime after the moon disappeared a wind arose. The trees became its instruments. It played them with undulating volume, with sweeping susurrations of sound, with a great plumy movement billowing through, sighing away. Each tree had a voice. Oaks creaked, beeches moaned, pines hummed, alders whispered, poplars chattered.
I lay absolutely still, drowning m sound.
Then everything came together.
I was caught up in the rhythm of a dance, ecstatic and sublime, that had been going on long before there was any such being as Ainvar. I was dissolving into wind and moss and leaves, into a rabbit huddled in its burrow, into an owl swimming through the night on silent wings.
Disturbed by the rushing wind, cattle lowed in a distant meadow. Every cow had a distinctive voice their herder would have recognized among hundreds; each voice filled a particular space belonging to it alone in the larger pattern of sound, a pattern that included my own breathing and the scattering of insects in the leafmold and the pattern of raindrops striking the leaves.
Water rolled down my cheeks. Perhaps rain. Perhaps tears summoned by beauty.
The night sang. The earth smelled of rotting wood and tender shoots unfolding in darkness, feeding on decomposition, death and birth together in the pattern, one springing from the other.
Both in me. Both of me. I of them. I was the earth and the night and the rain, suspended at the apex of being. There was no time, no sound, no sight, no need of them.
I was.
Rapture.
DRUIDS 43
“Ainvar? Ainvar!”
I opened my eyes to find Tarvos crouched over me. His face was twisted with worry. His hair held the shape of the wind. “Ainvar, are you all right? If anything has happened to you the chief druid will hang me in a cage!”
Dawnlight filtered through the leaves above us. The air seemed gray and grainy. I sat up, surprised to find myself dizzy. My clothes were sodden. “I’m not dead,” 1 assured the warrior. “I’ve had the most wonderful experience. …”
“Mad,” said Tarvos with conviction. “All you druids are mad.” He extended a hand to help pull me to my feet.
I liked Tarvos. His jaw was too broad and there were gaps between his teeth—and he had called me a druid. I tried to smile at him, but my legs were shaking under me. My wet clothes clung like ice and I began shivering.
“You look terrible,” Tarvos informed me. ‘“Like an owl in an ivy bush, all staring
I ran to tell Menua. Words shaped for only five senses were inadequate, but he understood.
‘ ‘Now it begins for you, Ainvar. You can find the pattern anywhere. Hear it, see it, feel it. Where would you like to begin?”
I knew at once. “Can I have a man with a spear?” I asked.
Menua nodded. He did not even ask me to explain.
Taking a warrior called Tarvos with me to watch for the wolves I still remembered with a shudder, I left the fort to spend the night in the forest. Among the trees, without the barriers of walls and roof.
I went to seek the magic in the night with my newly awakened senses of the spirit.
I found a snug place for myself in the lee of a hillock and sent my bodyguard to stand a distance away, where he could hear me if I needed him but would not distract me. His expression told
42 Morgan Llywelyn
me he thought I was mad, but I was the chief druid’s apprentice. It was not given to warriors to question my actions.
After singing the song for the setting sun, I wrapped myself in my cloak and lay down to wait.
I had a long wait. Nothing happened. By sunrise I was stiff and hungry, yet determined to persevere.
Every night for eight nights I slept in the forest, with barrel—
chested, bandy-legged Tarvos poking his spear into every clump of shrubbery and muttering to himself. During the days I continued my studies with Menua, who was currently teaching me me motions of the stars.
On my ninth attempt I heard the music of the night.
Sometime after the moon disappeared a wind arose. The trees became its instruments. It played them with undulating volume, with sweeping susurrations of sound, with a great plumy movement billowing through, sighing away. Each tree had a voice. Oaks creaked, beeches moaned, pines hummed, alders whispered, poplars chattered.
I lay absolutely still, drowning m sound.
Then everything came together.
I was caught up in the rhythm of a dance, ecstatic and sublime, that had been going on long before there was any such being as Ainvar. I was dissolving into wind and moss and leaves, into a rabbit huddled in its burrow, into an owl swimming through the night on silent wings.
Disturbed by the rushing wind, cattle lowed in a distant meadow. Every cow had a distinctive voice their herder would have recognized among hundreds; each voice filled a particular space belonging to it alone in the larger pattern of sound, a pattern that included my own breathing and the scattering of insects in the leafmold and the pattern of raindrops striking the leaves.
Water rolled down my cheeks. Perhaps rain. Perhaps tears summoned by beauty.
The night sang. The earth smelled of rotting wood and tender shoots unfolding in darkness, feeding on decomposition, death and birth together in the pattern, one springing from the other.
Both in me. Both of me. I of them. I was the earth and the night and the rain, suspended at the apex of being. There was no time, no sound, no sight, no need of them.
I was.
Rapture.
DRUIDS 43
“Ainvar? Ainvar!”
I opened my eyes to find Tarvos crouched over me. His face was twisted with worry. His hair held the shape of the wind. “Ainvar, are you all right? If anything has happened to you the chief druid will hang me in a cage!”
Dawnlight filtered through the leaves above us. The air seemed gray and grainy. I sat up, surprised to find myself dizzy. My clothes were sodden. “I’m not dead,” 1 assured the warrior. “I’ve had the most wonderful experience. …”
“Mad,” said Tarvos with conviction. “All you druids are mad.” He extended a hand to help pull me to my feet.
I liked Tarvos. His jaw was too broad and there were gaps between his teeth—and he had called me a druid. I tried to smile at him, but my legs were shaking under me. My wet clothes clung like ice and I began shivering.
“You look terrible,” Tarvos informed me. ‘“Like an owl in an ivy bush, all staring
Similar Books
