The frustration unravels fairly easily as well. While her progress has been swift, she still struggles with once inconsequential tasks. Lacing her boots is finally becoming easier, but it's still a bit of a chore. The determination is also reasonably easy to extract from the tangled skein of emotions. She’s made promises to her people, to Dian and Gwladus, and to the Goddess, which she intends to keep. The thread of hope pulls out of the knot fairly easily, too.
Hope that she fits in here, hope that she can do well, hope that these new people will take some of the sting of all she’s lost. Fear is tied closely to hope, so most of it pulls free as well, and when she looks at her fears closely, they’re unfounded. When she starts trying to unravel the anger, she finds it tied closely to guilt and grief, and the more that she tries to pick them apart, the more they seem to blend into each other.
Walking through the garden, Gethin spots her sitting on a bench, staring into space, and sighs. He decides that the budget meeting for the New Year’s celebration can wait a bit, so he alters his direction. Sitting down quietly next to her and waiting for her to notice him.
When she doesn’t right away, he speaks. “Wyt ti'n iawn?” (Are you well?)
With a glance at him out of the corner of her eye, she replies, “Dydw i ddim yn gwybod eto.” (I don’t know yet.) and shrugs eloquently, slipping into her native language, “How do you sort out how you feel? I’m angry, sad, and guilty all at once, and I can’t seem to unravel them.”
Gethin scoots closer and puts an arm around her shoulders, “Sad, I can understand. The sadness will abate with time. You are still too close to all those events. Angry… That I can also understand. When people die, we often have a period we go through where we are angry at them for leaving us, for going where we cannot follow. Angry with ourselves over any perceived shortcomings that might have prevented the loss. Angry with anyone we deem responsible. The anger will need to be released before it turns inward upon you and devours you. That is something we can work on. Guilty, though, I do not understand. Even Lugh and our people told you that this wasn’t true. Will you deny the great Judge his due? Tell me why you feel guilty.”
“I should have known that asshat would try something if I had warned them,” Emlyn growls.
Gethin waves her into silence, “Are you an oracle now? Predicting the actions of gods and men? ‘If I had’ and ‘I should have’ are two of the most horrible phrases in almost any language. They are fraught with self-blame and recrimination, and you just used both of them in the space of a single breath. Let's examine each link in your chain. Even if you had warned them, would they have believed you? Ignoring what you know to be true now, wouldn’t it have seemed a bit…insane at the time?”
Gethin waits until she nods before he goes on, “If they didn’t believe you, then they wouldn’t have prepared. With that settled, we take up the next link in your chain of guilt. Let us assume that they did believe you. What preparation could they possibly have made to withstand an assault by a god? How did your action or inaction change the outcome? It did not. Nothing you could have said or done would have altered it in the slightest. The asshat, as you call him, was out to reap the Cymry like wheat and devour the souls for more power. How many had he already devoured? How much had his power already grown? How was your family to stand against that? Do you know why Lugh absolved you? Why the Cymry absolved you of any guilt?”
“Not really,” Emlyn shrugs.
“They see what you do not,” Gethin says with a squeeze, “You had no more control of the asshat’s harvesting than the wheat does when the reaper’s scythe starts to swing. At least you and your friends managed to stop the reaper before the wheat was all ground to flour, baked into bread, and eaten. Would you not think it remarkable if four of the stalks of wheat in the field were to attack the reaper and win, saving all the rest of the wheat in the field from utter destruction? Would you place the blame on the one stalk that survived because the others did not? Once the flour is ground, there is no planting another crop with that wheat. The field may have been mown, but because the reaper was stopped, the seeds are there for a new crop to be planted. What that new crop will look like, I cannot say, but there is at least the possibility for a new crop. That possibility only exists because of you and your companions. I know what a price all of you paid for that slim chance. What price are you still paying, dear girl? I know that much was taken from you, but much is also being offered, if you will only accept it.”
Emlyn’s face screws up for a moment as she tries not to weep in a public place. “I will... I do… It’s just hard sometimes,” Emlyn gives him a wan smile. “There is something I’ve been meaning to do since I’ve got a few moments of your time. My grandfather wants to speak with you. I told him you were here. If you come with me, I’ll get the blade, and you can talk to him. Do you have time?”
“Yes, they can plan the budget for the New Year celebration without me,” Gethin chuckles, “I admit to being quite curious about your blades, and those meetings are always boring.”
“I know that everything is hard for you right now,” Gethin sighs, “You were so badly injured, so your body not behaving as you have come to expect it to is bound to be frustrating. I know that you must have some trepidation about taking oaths to another god. I know any one of the things you’re grappling with right now is difficult and painful. I can’t imagine how hard it must be to handle all of them at the same time. I cannot tell you how immensely proud I am of you just for getting out of bed each day. I have seen too many others who just turned their face to the wall and waited to die.”
“Do you know my House’s motto?” Emlyn inquires.
“It’s been years since I’ve tried to recall it,” Gethin shrugs, “Something about a heart, I think.”
“Let the light show us the path or show us where to carve a path,” Emlyn replies, “I feel like I’m making a path, and cutting a new path is always hard work. I promised Dian and Gwladus that I would live. I’ve made the same promise to my people because they tell me that as long as I live, they have hope. I cannot turn my face to the wall. I know things will get better. I will get stronger. My strength and my skill will return. My broken heart will mend itself in time. I think I will always miss them, but maybe it won’t always be so sharp or cut so deep.”
The two of them walk along in companionable silence for a bit until Emlyn reaches her room. Propping the door open to maintain her sense of propriety, she takes the blade of her grandfather and is careful not to touch the hilt. With a wry smile at Gethin, she says, “I don’t want a lecture about self-pity right at this moment. I’m not prepared to face him just now, but if you’ll wrap your hand around the hilt, you two can have a nice chat.”
Curiosity overwhelms him, and Gethin sits in the chair at her desk. Setting his cane aside, he takes the blade from her and does as she directs. He can feel another presence in his mind as soon as his hand closes on the hilt. “Gethin, is that you, old friend?” Melfyn chuckles, “How are you? I suspect that all of this has been a bit much for you, too. I know Emlyn’s struggling with it. I sensed it when she called us to her because she thought they were about to be ambushed, but that wasn’t the time or place to delve into any of that.”
“It hasn’t been easy,” Gethin replies, “to know that what I used to think of as home isn’t there anymore. I think, at some point, I’ll need to see it for myself. Right now, I think I’m needed here more than I need to stand witness to the destruction. So much of my life has been here in Harito for so long that I think it’s easier for me. Everything she’s ever known is gone, almost as if it never was. She’s determined to remain on this side of the veil, and that’s a good thing. Her induction ceremony is tomorrow. She’ll be sitting her vigil in the chapel tonight. I’ll go and sit with her for a time. I’m sorry that I let Sian come between us. I couldn’t bear seeing the two of you together, but I should have made more of an effort to spend time with you.”
“Nonsense,” Melfyn shoots back, “You’re exactly where my granddaughter needed you to be. She needs to have someone around who understands our language, our culture. You were always canny, Gethin, and one of the few people I’d trust to protect her.”
“You should hear her,” Gethin replies wryly, “I thought she was going to proposition me to become the founding sire of a new house.”
“I’m well aware,” Melfyn chuckles, “We talked about her inability to find even a shred of another of the Great Houses still standing. You might be one of the last, old friend. It was the first thing she said when the Goddess returned us to her—told me and Terwyn that we’d have to fill in for her mama. I told her to set that aside and focus on regaining her strength. Once she’s back in condition, we’ll start worrying about the rest of it. Until then, that’s the primary focus. She’s got to be able to defend herself if they try to come for her. Founding a new house is all a moot point, unless Midir survived somehow, since Midir would be the last of any of the Great Houses.”
“I think Emlyn means to try to resurrect Dian or Gwladus or maybe even both of them,” Gethin says, “She begged the Goddess for a favor – to find them and offer them sanctuary. The Goddess found them, and they accepted. We haven’t told Emlyn as yet, but the Goddess thinks they’ve found Midir, Neit, and Cian. Apparently, the asshat trapped them in soul stones. A necromancer found them and was using them to power his enchantments. We haven’t said anything to Emlyn yet because the whole thing is just so uncertain. We’re not certain that it is them. We’re not certain that they’ll be able to regenerate. We’re not certain that the regeneration, even if it succeeds, won’t alter them from the people she knew and loved. She’s still processing all the things that have happened in the last few months. We thought it would be cruel to give her hope that might be false hope. We’ll tell her once we’re more certain of who’s in those stones and how things are progressing.”
This story has been stolen from Royal Road. If you read it on Amazon, please report it
“That settles the issue of Midir, then,” Melfyn sighs, “but Dian and Gwladus were with her when she fought the asshat. If their remains could be retrieved from that place, it might be possible. If I had to choose between those two for her to found a new House with, I’d choose Gwladus, but, in truth, both of them would be suitable. It’s a shame about Midir. Midir was the one who really loved her. He followed her into service to stay close to her. I hadn’t told her, but his family had already come to see me to see if we would be agreeable to a match between them. The others loved her, but not in that way. They all grew up together, and they were fast friends long before she blossomed. Midir and Cian noticed her in the way boys notice girls, but the others just stayed her friends. I half expected, when the message came with the Ban Gwyr offer, that it would be from all of them. It would have let them all remain together, but it wasn’t. It was a different group of boys.”
“She called them a bunch of miscreants,” Gethin chuckles, “but never said who they were, exactly.”
“Boys from rival houses,” Melfyn laughs, “Suren, Gothan, Cregoria, and Stilba. They thought that we’d sell our crown jewel of this generation cheaply. She was right to call them miscreants. They wanted to use her to try to establish a new Great House. The king hated the idea and was quite pleased when she rejected them. Not pleased enough to let her marry into the Royal House, though. More’s the pity. She’d have made an amazing queen.”
“I’m surprised that the king didn’t adopt her and then marry her off as part of a trade deal,” Gethin shrugs, “I’d have married her off to one of the neighboring kingdoms and let her take it over. At least then there would have been an allied power on one border.”
“The princes would have been furious,” Melfyn laughs, “Maybe even angry enough to revolt against their father. At least three of them and maybe as many as all five wanted her for themselves.”
“She could always have married one of them later,” Gethin grins, “I’m sure Nerys schooled her well on what to do in the event of a kidnapping. That’s part of a mother’s duty, and I can’t imagine Nerys shirking. Those same techniques work on boorish or inconvenient husbands just as well.”
“Perhaps so,” Melfyn says, “but the king would never have agreed to it. No kingdom marries off its leading general outside its own borders. No kingdom with any sense would have taken that kind of a risk, either. Despite not having the official title, that’s what she was. She didn’t just make it to Second Awst, Gethin. She held that position against more challenges than I can count. Even if the king had agreed to it, someone would also have had to get Emlyn to go along with anything like that. I wouldn’t place bets on her agreeing to it. She was out to make us second only to the Royal House, just so she and her younger sisters would have better choices than Briallen did. Bri’s husband was nice enough, and Bri was happy with him, but Emlyn hated him for the way he talked about Bri. He regarded Bri as not much more than a broodmare, and that alone was enough to make Emlyn despise him. Emlyn wasn’t having that for herself or Arwydd or Myfanwy. That’s why she battled her way up to Second Awst. She’d have been First Awst, but she liked the old coot, Bedo, so she cut a deal with him. Their deal was that she wouldn’t challenge him as long as he promised to name her as his replacement the following year when he retired. Bedo agreed, so she stayed as Second Awst, but the Geward Awst knew about their agreement, and if he knew, so did the king.”
“Wasn’t that hard for her? Commanding men twice her age at least?” Gethin asks, “It seems like she probably had some issues.”
“Nothing she couldn’t sort out,” Melfyn smirks, “If they gave her guff, she’d put them in their place. Even if she couldn’t trounce them outright, she let them know that they’d been in a ring with her. Plenty were happy to follow her, though. She was careful and considerate of her troops. If they needed something, they got it. If they did something spectacular, they got rewarded and recognized. She did her best to ensure that they were prepared and equipped for whatever task was at hand. If there was going to be bloodletting, she did her best to ensure that most of the blood wasn’t Cymry, and they all appreciated that. There were plenty who tried to push her aside and failed miserably. Some of her biggest supporters started as her biggest skeptics. It took her a while to win them over, but she did it.”
“What did the Geward Awst make of her?” Gethin asks.
“I know that Elgan, the Geward Awst, was keeping a close eye on her. Once she made it to First Awst, she’d have been allowed to challenge him,” Melfyn chuckles, “Elgan wasn’t sure he’d win either. He had been spending that year she gave Bedo drilling his troops into the dirt. Emlyn planned to take First Awst and wait another year before challenging him. That would give her a chance to consolidate her new position and start working with the new batch of troops who weren’t familiar with her methods. It would also mean a second year of Elgan drilling his troops into the dirt. At that point, they’d be tired and ready to revolt. Elgan didn’t see it coming, but she’d have been Geward Awst well before she was marriageable.”
“What did the king think of all that? Surely, he was at least concerned,” Gethin inquires. “I think the king had some idea, though, because he was always overly friendly with Emlyn,” Melfyn’s grin plain in his voice, “Had the king known what was really going on, things might have been different. What even the king didn’t realize is that she was busy behind the scenes, turning Arwydd into a younger copy of herself. Emlyn had already started training Lefi, Gwern, and Myfanwy, too, even though Myfanwy had another hand of winters before she’d ever make her first bout. If everything hadn’t happened, the king would have had his hands full - not just with Emlyn, but all her younger siblings in the bargain. They were all intensely loyal to each other, too. Lefi’s rankings were already rising under her tutelage, so he worshiped Emlyn. Arwydd had only been competing for a couple of years, but was showing great promise, again part of Emlyn’s training. Gwern was getting ready to start, but Emlyn had been working with him too. The boys knew that they had to rank well to support their sisters. She instilled that idea in them. Since Lefi and Gwern didn’t want to let their sisters down, they trained hard. They were doing well, remarkably well. Lefi and Arwydd were both in the top five for their age groups. What Emlyn taught the girls was that since they were female, they’d have to battle twice as hard, train twice as hard, but that they could rise too and be more than just walking wombs like Bri.”
“No wonder she’s taken their loss so hard,” Gethin grimaces, “She was pouring her heart and soul into those little ones.”
“And they reciprocated,” Melfyn confirms, “They thought she hung the sun, moons, and all the stars. Now you see why I say she’s probably the most remarkable Cymry woman in generations.”
“What about her older siblings?” Gethin asks, “What did they think of Emlyn?”
Melfyn heaves a huge sigh. “Delwyn was too proud to listen to Emlyn. He was the oldest and thought he should have been training the younger ones, even though he’d almost never ranked as well as Emlyn. He had a year or two, here and there, and that made him think he was her equal. Madoc was the second son, and he was always close to Emlyn, but not as close as her younger siblings. He knew that as the second son, he’d have to do well and work for his spot in the House, so he had a bit of a different attitude than Delwyn. He still didn’t listen to Emlyn about how to rank in the tournaments as much as he should have, though. I suppose it’s hard to respect someone when you’ve changed their nappy. Niefon was just a year older than Bri and never saw anything wrong with having the girls be little more than breeding stock for some other house. In his mind, Briallen marrying without much of a dowry was just what girls should do. He didn’t understand why Emlyn would go to all the effort. It baffled him, and so those two weren’t close at all. When Emlyn was younger, she looked up to Bri, but that changed when they got older. Mostly, Emlyn pitied Bri because Emlyn saw what everyone else missed. Bri could have been Emlyn years sooner, but Bri just gave up. Between Terwyn, Delwyn, Madoc, and Niefon, Bri got no support. She’d get stuck with their hand-me-down weapons and armor. That made it harder for her because their gear was ill-suited to her, so she didn’t rank nearly as well as she could have. When Bri would try to get her own gear, Delwyn, Madoc, and Niefon saw it as cutting into the budget for their gear and would loudly campaign against it. I tried to tell Terwyn, but he wasn’t listening to me, either. When Emlyn started having the same problems, I didn’t bother saying a thing to Terwyn. I just went and got her some gear and charged it to the House. If Bri had ranked as well as she could have, we might have gotten bride-price offers for her, too. Emlyn knew that, and it’s part of the reason she wasn’t close with Delwyn or Niefon. Madoc wasn’t as bad about it, so she was closer to him. The real rancor from Delwyn and Niefon was that when Emlyn started ranking well and started blooming, they had to escort her everywhere she went just to deter any kidnapping attempts. They felt it was beneath them to attend to their sister’s welfare, and I’m sure they let Emlyn know about it. I think my son and those three short-sighted louts are why Emlyn taught Lefi and Gwern that they had to support their sisters.”
“If I’m going to sit with her to start her vigil, I should probably go,” Gethin says reluctantly, “You’ve certainly helped explain a lot. I know that she misses them all terribly. It is good that she has you and Terwyn.”
“Hrmph,” Melfyn snorts, “It's good she has me. Terwyn is still bitter because she’s the one who survived, not Delwyn, Madoc, or even Lefi. He’ll mellow out eventually, but if you can find a way to limit his contact with her for a while, then you should do that until Terwyn comes around. He will, in time, just not right now. He was there when it all happened, so I think he blames her for it. She doesn’t need that right now. Part of it was her running around with those boys, even though he admits that nothing happened. Says that her reputation is ruined. I know she thinks she should have warned them. Hells, even if she had tried to tell him what was coming, he wouldn’t have believed her. There was a message that came in over the drums, which was cut off, and he didn’t believe it either. Since he can’t own his own part in it, he’s got to put it somewhere, so to him, it’s on her.”
“She doesn’t need that right now,” Gethin agrees, “That might be enough to send her over the edge.”
“If you can think of anything,” Melfyn shrugs, “tell her you want to talk to me. I’ll tell you anything I can think of that might help her or might help you help her.”
With a big sigh, Gethin lays the blade on the desk and looks around to find Emlyn sitting on the bed watching him closely. Her knees are drawn up, and her chin is resting on them. “You two certainly had a lot of catching up to do,” Emlyn says tentatively.
“It’s been a long time since I talked to your grandfather,” Gethin says, “He was telling me about why you became Second Awst, about your deal with Bedo, and your plans to displace Elgan as Gedwar Awst.”