Arising out of a subtle drift of mixed colours and shapes, the last of the three arrived. She was young, wonderfully beautiful, and hugely round in the belly: fully pregnant, apparently ready to drop a child any day, from the look of her. The woman let a serene sort of smile cross her face, she tilted her head and blinked her blue-stained eyes. “Now, is this a way to greet a goddess? You were rude to my sisters, but must you be impolite with me too? Uncouth.”
“Some goddesses you lot are. Murdering old men. Stealing the bodies of bakers. Sneaking about in the twilight like… like… I don’t know what. A magical ferret.” She scowled.
“Most postulants to the maze would abase themselves before a manifestation of just one of we three sisters. Most supplicants would count themselves blessed to hear my children laughing and playing, even just the once… a sound to haunt dreams and keep treasured and precious in the beating of the heart, for ever and ever. It would warm your old years, in your toothless, wrinkled agedness, if you would but let the laughter into you… Acknowledge it. Accept it. Be joyful of it.”
“No. I’ve had quite enough of old spirits of the earth worming a way into my mind.”
“I suppose that is true enough. I can taste that which was once inside your blood and sinew. Perhaps he left you frozen inside? Perhaps there is nothing warm and loving left in you to welcome in the laughter of children?” She tilted her head, curious. “Perhaps.”
“H’m. I’m warmer and more alive than you, I suspect. You can call yourself a goddess if you like. As for myself, I don’t know if there is much difference between you and a forest-imp, besides aggrandised names and ranks.” She waved a hand. “And whatnot.”
“Dangerous words,” whispered the goddess. But she laughed the moment after she said it, clear and pretty. As she did, she laid her hands gently on her belly, the way pregnant woman will sometimes do. Lowering her gaze, she said then, “It’s a brave mouse that snarls at a she-fox. A brave moth that flutters in the face of the nightjar.”
“Brave, or just plain tired of games. Sometimes a person isn’t brave. Sometimes a person is simply utterly worn out with fear and worry. Eventually, even a mouse gets sick of paws landing, this way and that.” She looked around. Quinnya was paying no attention to her. “Can’t they see you?”
“They cannot. Although, magicians often talk to unseen voices. It won’t seem strange to any of them. Weird things beset weird people.”
“That so?”
“That is so.”
“And your children?” She looked around. Now that she knew what to look for, she could just see the stirrings upon the grass, whisking over it, in little trailing lines. Small disturbances that betrayed a passing of something light-footed and airy. “Here now…” A frowning sensation passed over her lips. “Children require fathering.”
“What an impertinent point to raise. My sisters are right. You are delightful.” She tilted her head the other way, as if appraising goods. “But you also chafe. You are prone to be irritating. That will not do.”
“And yet you are refusing to leave me be.” Her fists clenched and re-opened. Hot and cold tinglings ran down her skin. “What is your purpose?”
“Ah. And that is another impertinent question, but, it is a question that follows old laws and rules. The winter demon that was in your heart must have left some lore there. That question was well phrased, and it cannot easily be turned aside. Our purpose? Let me see. Our purpose is the keeping of the peacefulness of the tor, the moot, the accord. This hill–this was where the two great goddesses called truce, spoke each to the other in conciliatory whispers, made peace and made love. Did you know that?”
“What? Wait. What was that last thing you said?”
“Troves must be sealed. With blood. Or with death. Or with procreative acts. Or with love. Even if that love is loose-woven and ill-at-ease, symbolic only. The two goddesses could not truly love one another. There was too much pain and blood, loss, grieving and betrayal for that. And thus the pact was sealed in ritual only. Oaths made lightly are like mayflies dancing on a deep, dark pond. They do not last long. And yet, and yet, and yet… we three were left to keep the peacefulness of the tor and the accord. And that is our purpose. That is my purpose.”
“So, you are keepers of the peace? Between the two factions? Sun and moon. Day and night.”
“In some measure, more or less. Yes.”
“And your interest in me is what exactly? I cannot think that’d I’d be much help stopping a war. Oh,” she said. “But that was why I came here. It was my whole reason for coming here. I made a promise to speak at the moot, and try and get everyone to see some sense. Your interest as always going to fall on me. As soon as I promised to speak against a war…”
“We three heard your oath echo from a long way off. It is good that you work to keep it.”
“Or else?”
“You would be punished.” A momentary smile. “After all, you placed yourself within our sphere of interest, willingly and without lien or duress. We have a right over you. But… and yet, and yet, Cessation spoke first with you, and found you would not do her biding. Provenance spoke then with you, and found you obstinate. Inception speaks last with you, and finds you unpleasing to her thoughts, and an irritation to her mind. Whether you will do her bidding, she does not know for Inception does not bid others. She but allows them to act on her behalf.” There was that small knowing smile again. “But, we three agree that we three have our purpose, and so too do you. You are disobedient in the face of great power. That is both the good and the ill of you. Only time will tell if the good and the ill will go well with you.” Her smile was now a minnow-flash in sunlight. “We have spoken enough. Goodbye to you for now, Caewen of Drossel. The three have looked upon you, and found you wanting for their immediate uses. You will have other uses, we suspect… in the longer scheme of things… and we will talk upon that, ourselves, one among three, among one, among many. Before this moot is done we will have come to a final decision concerning you.”
“I see. Best be off with you then.” She frowned as she said it, almost to a scowl. “I certainly don’t need you adding to the mess of things.” She waved a hand. “Go, then.”
She laughed, pitching her tone upwards, into the grey limned sky. Already fading, she said, “You are an impertinent farmyard donkey, and imprudent.” With an almost hungering look on her face, she added, ghostly, “We three watch. We three wait. I take my leave of you, Caewen of Drossel, farm-ass and lumpish fool. Impertinent one. Disobedient one. Unwilling one. You’ve a keen talent for abrasiveness. I hope it doesn’t lead you into too deep a patch of briar-rose and thorn.”
And then she was gone.
Caewen was alone. She experienced a feeling something like coming up from deep underwater. A light pressure that had been on her ears, and which she had barely been aware of, released, and there was a sensation of being able to breath again, even though she had been breathing perfectly well the whole time she had been in conversation.
As she gathered her breath back within herself, she heard her name being called. Caewen turned. It was Quinnya, her storm-grey eyes lit with irritation. “Caewen of Drossel! I will not call again, well? If you do not enter the maze this moment, then your moment will be past. A seven year wait, then. You want that, well?”
“Sorry,” muttered Caewen, as she walked over, more than a little sheepishly. “I didn’t hear you. I was distracted.”