Angharad of Llyr is heir to a matriarchy: a line of enchantress-queens that has ruled her island for centuries. Her destiny from birth: to rule as sole authority and ensure that her powerful bloodline endures for another generation. Devoted to her p...
Oops! This image does not follow our content guidelines. To continue publishing, please remove it or upload a different image.
The sky was gold and crimson in the west, a luminous mirror of her ardent spirit, when Angharad arrived in the grove that evening with her load of driftwood. She slid from Tan's back to unload, humming to herself happily.
Eilwen, hurrying down from ministering at the altar, embraced her in the customary way and then pushed her back at arm's length to study her. Her green eyes glinted knowingly. "Well, you're positively glowing. Must've been a good day."
"The weather was lovely," Angharad retorted, deliberately evasive, but unable to repress a smile, or the warmth that flooded her face. Eilwen chuckled.
"You'll have to tell me all about it. Come, I'm done for the day and I'm starved. Anything in those saddlebags of yours besides sand and shells?"
"No, sorry. I've left everything at the cove."
Eilwen was already peeking into the bag, and shut the flap with a disgruntled sigh. "You certainly have, haven't you," she muttered low, out of the hearing of the girls who were milling around, cooing over Tan and stroking her glossy sides. "I suppose his appetite is quite equal to all you bring him," she added, with a suggestive quirk of her eloquent brows.
"Oh, honestly," Angharad grunted, and her sister laughed, tucked her arm into the crook of her elbow, and pulled her away, leaving Tan content under the adoring ministrations of the acolytes. Eilwen steered them both toward the storehouse that held the food offerings for use of the priestesses, disappeared inside, and came out laden with a basket full of bread, cheese, honey, strawberries, and mead.
"I'd kill for a lamb roast," she grumbled. "Nobody's brought meat in weeks."
"Wrong time of year," Angharad reminded her, amused. "Better for you anyway to avoid it, the healers say."
"Half the healers are old crones with no appetites left of any kind," Eilwen sniffed disdainfully, as they strolled across the lawn. "Ask them what they were eating when they were our age. You'll never hear Branwen or the other midwives telling a young mother not to eat meat."
"Different then, though, isn't it? And she's apt to tell them to have more fish than anything," Angharad pointed out, snatching a strawberry. The sweet fruit crushed between her teeth and she realized with some surprise that she was ravenously hungry. "Llyr, I'm famished. You should have gotten more."
Eilwen sank to a grassy embankment with a saucy grin. "Forgive me; I thought you'd had your fill already. Go ahead, have whatever you want. I can always go back." She pulled the bread into sections and ate, studying her sister sidelong. "You're a sight, by the way; looks like you've been through a tempest. I hope you've got nothing ceremonial coming up tonight. Your hair's going to take hours."
Angharad raised a hand ruefully to her head, crunching its salty locks in her grasp. "Just needs washing is all."
Eilwen bent toward her and sniffed. "Oh! You went seabathing. It's about time," she snorted, her grin widening. "Did he enjoy it?"
