Page 92 of The Faerie Handmaid

She clicked her tongue. “Now, none of that, fine sir. You know as well as anyone I am no priestess.” As she talked she sponged at the places on his long wound that had begun to bleed again. “But you’re right. Not quite nothing, but almost. A bit more yarrow paste to stanch the bleeding.”

“No need to stick me again, then?”

She dimpled at him. “I regret that I will not have the opportunity. Nothing here needs to be sewn together.”

“I want to get up. Give orders to get that body out of the boatman’s cottage and set a guard to ensure there will be no other intrusions.”

From the doorway, Mordred spoke. “Already done, sir. Lie still and let Braithe minister to you.”

Lancelin started to sit up at the sound of his sovereign’s voice, but Braithe put a firm hand on his chest, and he subsided once again. No one spoke for the next few minutes as she spread a thin layer of the yarrow paste over the torn areas of his wound, then covered him with the fresh sheet Loria was holding out. Mordred came into the chamber when this was done and pulled a chair up next to the bed. He gazed at Braithe with a faint smile. “And now, not-priestess—”

“My lord, I only said priestess because I needed aid without delay!”

Mordred’s dark eyes were bright with humor. “We understood that. When the lad came crying into the keep, calling for a sword to protect Priestess Braithe, anyone who heard him leaped into action as swiftly as they could.”

“And I,” Lancelin said, his narrow mouth curling at the corners, “am the swiftest of all.”

“Indeed,” Mordred said, leaning back in his chair, extending his legs in a pose of pure relaxation. “As you so often remind us, Sir Lancelin.” Lancelin chuckled, and Mordred turned his attention back to Braithe. “Now tell me, please. Who was that man, and why was he threatening you?”

Braithe settled more comfortably in her own chair and accepted a cup of cider from Loria. When she had drunk some of it, she began the entire story of Faolin, and with it, the situation in the White City and the Royal Council. She left out any mention of Gwen.

She also left out her own use of magic, both in her escape from Faolin’s house and in today’s success, blocking him until help could arrive. She wondered what these men would think if they knew that she, merely Morgana’s handmaid, had acquired a level of magic many priestesses could only dream of. She needed time to understand how the Lady might wish her to use this gift.

The one thing she already knew was that she could not waste it on the Isle of Apples, where it was not needed. That meant that everything about her life would change.

She touched her stomach with her palm, thinking to find relief at last from the nagging thrill of premonition that had plagued her since her return to Camulod. To her alarm it was still there, quivering beneath her breastbone. She tried to breathe it away, but it persisted with a stubbornness that frightened her. She still could not guess at what it meant.

Morgana spent her first days back on the Isle alternating between seeing supplicants in the anteroom and fussing over the Blackbird. His weakness made her uneasy. She brought him tinctures to increase his appetite and to help him sleep. She persuaded Dafne to replace his bedding with the softest sheets and blankets and the plumpest pillows the Temple had to offer. She went to him at the end of every day, coaxing him out for a gentle walk in the gardens or a visit to the lakeshore, where they sat and listened to the awakening of the night birds and the splash of fish leaping for their evening feed.

They didn’t talk. Morgana had given up trying to engage the Blackbird in conversation, even of the most quotidian nature. He wasn’t rude about it, and she wasn’t offended by his silence. He had never been voluble. Now it appeared he had nothing left to say.

There were things she wished she could ask him, but since they had returned to the Isle, she understood that her questions would not be welcome. Her mentor’s thoughts had turned inward. He had no inclination to share them.

It could be, on the other hand, that his thoughts had turned forward. He could be contemplating his future, but she had no part in that. She would be left behind. She often touched her sigil and prayed for the courage to face that moment.

After a day spent in the anteroom, a day when she missed Braithe’s assistance very much, she emerged from the dimness into the light of the sanctuary and found the elder priestess waiting for her. Niamh stood before the stone that cradled the sword of power, her head bowed in contemplation, her hands tucked into the sleeves of her robe. She looked up when she heard Morgana’s step. “Ah. Free at last.”

“Yes,” Morgana said as she crossed the sanctuary. “Do you seek inspiration from the stone?”

Niamh considered the question. “No. It’s rather that I’m seeking memories. It helps me to recall the day when the true king drew the sword with the assistance of a young acolyte and the Black Mage.”

“It seems long ago now.”

“Indeed.” Niamh pulled herself up a little, wriggling her tired shoulders. “We must speak, Morgana.”

Morgana had to quell a spurt of alarm. “Is all well, Priestess?”

“Well enough. Come, let us go into the residence and drink a cup of cider together.”

To Morgana’s surprise, Niamh led her into her own bedchamber. It was larger than any of the others, appropriately, but its austerity matched Morgana’s own. The only notable difference was a row of little clay pots in the window, each nurturing a seedling or a cutting of some kind. Niamh caught Morgana’s curious glance at them. “Herbs, mostly,” she said, with a wave of her perpetually dirt-stained hand. “Some of them are hard to grow, and I worry we won’t have enough when we want them.”

Morgana crossed to the windowsill to inspect them. “I do not recognize these.”

“You might when they’re bigger,” Niamh said. “It’s a bit of a passion with me, to try to grow unusual plants—despite their reluctance!” She gave a dry chuckle. “Now, Dafne will be here in a moment with some cider, and a bit of bread and cheese. Please sit.”

Morgana took a seat at the small table that was set near the window, evidently so the elder priestess could look out over the Temple grounds to the garden, where her true interests lay. Niamh sat across from her and followed her gaze. “Sometimes,” she said, “I look out over all this and I feel ready to pass the mantle of responsibility to someone else.”

“I understand,” Morgana said, and she meant it. She hoped never to be elder priestess, but she was the mainstay of the Temple’s service to the petitioners who came from all over Lloegyr. Every time she returned from an absence she was reminded that it was herself they came to see. The other priestesses, little by little, had grown accustomed to the preference. She hoped they had gotten over their resentment. Perhaps they even understood how burdensome such a reputation could be.