For a moment that grey gaze held my own. "And what did you think I was?"

"An army man," I answered, for thus, in vision I had seen him.

"Until a few months ago that was so." His face darkened. "I was born at an army post in Dacia. It is all I know, all I ever wanted to be."

"Are you so eager for battle?" I asked curiously. He did not seem bloodthirsty, but how could I know?

"Say rather, that I want what battle can win," he corrected. "Justice. Order. Safety for the folk beyond the frontier so that peace can grow..." He fell silent, his ruddy skin reddening further, and I judged he was not a man who often let his feelings show.

"Your fortunes will turn," I a.s.sured him. For a moment he eyed me uncertainly, and I reinforced the illusion that disguised me. "But now we should sleep," I went on. "Tomorrow's journey will be difficult after such a storm." But in truth, it was not the riding that had exhausted me, but the effort to conceal my essence when what I really wanted was to offer him my body and my soul.

The rain had stopped by morning, but as I had antic.i.p.ated, as the day grew warmer, the saturated ground gave up its excess moisture in wisps of fog. As we rode it grew thicker, until tree and meadow disappeared and the only thing visible was the path.

"Domina," said Constantius, "we must halt, before we wander from the road and end up sinking in some bog."

"Do not be afraid. I know the way," I answered him, and indeed, I could feel the power of Avalon drawing me forwards. We had come around by the higher ground to the north and east, where a narrow neck of land ran out to the isle.

"I am not afraid, but I am not a fool, either!" he snapped back at me. "We will go back to the shelter and wait for the weather to clear." He reached out to take my bridle rein.

I kicked the pony forwards and reined it sharply around. "Flavius Constantius Chlorus, look at me!" I let the illusion of ugliness fade and called up the power of the priestess to take its place. I could tell I was succeeding when his face changed.

"Lady-" he breathed, "now I see you as I did before..."

I wondered what he meant, as this was the first time I had used the glamour, but the power was continuing to build around me.

"I have been sent to bring you to the holy isle of Avalon. Will you come with me freely and of your own will?"

"What will I find there?" He was still staring at me.

"Your destiny..." And Aelia, I thought then. For a moment I wanted to cry out to him to turn, to flee.

"And will I return to the human world?"

"It is there that your fate will be fulfiled." Ten years of discipline spoke through me now.

"And will you go with me? Swear!"

"I will. I swear it by my eternal soul." Later, I told myself that I had believed he was asking if I would go with him to Avalon, but I think now that a deeper wisdom made that vow.

"Then I will come with you now."

I turned, lifting my arms to draw down the power, and as I spoke the spell, the world changed around us, and with the next step the mist was rolling away to either side and we entered Avalon.

Since dawn the drums had throbbed through the earth of the holy isle, the heartbeat of Avalon, filled with the excitement of the festival. White hawthorn weighted the hedges, and creamy primroses and bluebells flourished beneath the trees. It was Beltane eve, and all the world trembled with expectation. All but Aelia, who was trembling with fear.

"Why has the G.o.ddess laid this upon me?" she whispered, curled upon the bed that had been hers while we awaited initiation. There were currently no priestesses in training, and they had given the house to us to prepare the Beltane Bride for the festival.

"I do not know," I answered her. "But we have been taught that often Her reasons for setting our feet upon a path are not apparent until we reach its ending..." I spoke for my own sake as much as for hers.

In the three days since I had brought Constantius to the isle I had not seen him, but he haunted my dreams.

Aelia shook her head. "I never intended to go to the Beltane fires. I would happily have lived a virgin until my life's end!"

I put my arms around her and rocked her gently. Our unbound hair mingled on the pillow, dark gold and light. "Constantius will not hurt you, darling. I rode with him for two days-he is a gentleman..."

"He is a man!"

"Why did you not tell them of your fear when they chose you?" I stroked her hair. And why, I asked myself, had the lot not fallen on me?

"We swore obedience to the Council at our initiation. I thought they must know best..."

I sighed, understanding how it must have been. Of us all, Aelia had always been the most biddable. For the first time I wondered it the lot had fallen upon her entirely by chance.

"They said the G.o.ddess would give me the strength to do it, but I am afraid... Help me, Eilan! Help me to escape this, or I will drown myself in the sacred pool!"

I stilled, understanding in a single instant how I might fulfil both her desire and my own. Or perhaps I had already planned it in some secret part of my soul, and only now, like some moulting insect hidden in the soil, had the idea emerged into the light of day. Justifications came easily-Aelia was the choice not of the G.o.ddess, but of Ganeda. All that was required was a virgin priestess.

It did not matter who she was, so long as she came willingly to the fire. And the subst.i.tution would be so easy. Though she was paler in colouring than I, and thinner as well, Aelia and I were enough alike for newcomers to mistake us. The younger girls nicknamed us the sun and the moon.

The one reason I did not give myself was the true one-that Constantius Chlorus wasmine , and it would be like death to see him lead another woman to the bridal bower.

"Ssh... be easy..." I kissed Aelia's soft hair. "Both the Bride and her attendants go veiled to the ceremony. We will exchange clothing and I will take your place in the ritual."

Aelia sat up, gazing at me wide-eyed. "But if you disobey, Ganeda will punish you!"

"It doesn't matter..." I answered.Not once I have spent the night in Constantius' arms !

The firelight, seen through the sheer linen of my veil and the screen of branches, filled the circle with a golden haze. Or perhaps it was the aura of power that the dancers were raising, for with each circuit around the bonfire it grew stronger. All the folk of Avalon were here in the meadow at the foot of the Tor, and most of the people from the Lake village as well. My whole body vibrated as the earth shook to their footfalls, or perhaps it was the beating of my heart. I could feel the dancing building to its crescendo.

Soon... I thought, licking dry lips. It would be soon...

The other maidens shifted restlessly on the bench beside me, Heron and Aelia and Wren, all of us clad alike in green gowns and veils and garlands of spring flowers. But only I bore the hawthorn crown. My skin still tingled from the water of the sacred pool, for we had all helped to bathe Aelia, and in the process been cleansed ourselves. I had shared her fast and her vigil; all the ritual requirements had been completed. This subst.i.tution might be disobedience, but at least it would not be sacrilege.

"The Roman has been bathed and prepared as well," said Ganeda, who waited with us. "When he arrives, you will be brought out to him. Together, you will partake of the sacred food, and together you will enter the bower on the far side of the dancing floor. You are a virgin field, in which he will sow the seed that will engender the Child of the Prophecy."

"And what will I give to him?" I whispered.

"In the outer world, the female is pa.s.sive while the male initiates action. But on the inner planes, it is otherwise. I have spoken with this young man, and at present fortune does not smile upon him. It is for you to awaken his spirit, to arouse and activate the higher soul within him, that he may fulfil his own destiny and become the Restorer of the Light for Britannia."

I dared not ask more, lest my voice be recognized, and then I heard a change in the drumming and my throat began to ache so with tension that I could not have spoken if I had tried.

The Druids were coming in, their white robes washed with gold by the firelight, wreaths of oak leaves upon their hair. But as I watched I caught a glimpse of brighter gold among them. The people were cheering; the air throbbed with wave upon wave of sound. Dizzied, I shut my eyes, and when I opened them again I blinked, dazzled by the golden figure who stood before the fire.

As my sight adjusted I saw that it was only a saffron tunic to which the light had added a deeper gold, but the wreath that crowned Constantius was fashioned of the true metal, like that of an emperor. I realized that when I had last seen him, splashed with mud and worn out by our battle with the storm, Constantius had not been at his best either. Now, his skin glowed against the tunic, and his fair hair was as bright as the wreath of gold.

"He is Lugos come among us," breathed Heron.

"And Apollo," whispered Aelia.

"And Mithras of the Soldiers," added Wren.

He stood like the sun G.o.d in the midst of the Druid oaks. If I had not loved him already, in that moment I would have adored him, for the body of the man had become a clear vessel through which shone the light of the G.o.d within.

If I had watched for much longer, I think I might have pa.s.sed into an ecstasy that precluded movement, but now the drumming was giving way to the music of bells and harpstrings. The maidens beside me a.s.sisted me to my feet as the screen of branches was lifted away. The noise of the crowd became a hush of awe, and there was only the music.

Constantius turned as we came forward, and his exalted expression focused suddenly, as if he could see past the veil to the woman, or the G.o.ddess within. Wren scattered flowers before me, Aelia and Heron walked to either side, and then they too fell back and I went on alone. Constantius and I faced one another, priest to priestess, across a little table that bore a loaf of bread, a dish of salt, and a cup and flagon filled with water from the sacred spring.

"My lord, the gifts of the earth I offer you. Eat, and be strengthened." I broke off a piece of bread, dipped it in the salt and offered it to him.

"You are the fertile earth. I accept your bounty," Constantius replied. He ate the piece of bread, tore off another and held it out to me. "And I shall spend my strength to care for the sacred soil."

When I had eaten, he picked up the flagon, poured some of the water into the cup and held it out to me.

"I am poured out for you like water. Drink, and be renewed."

"You are the rain that falls from heaven. I receive your blessing." I sipped from the cup, then offered it back to him. "But all waters are at last reborn from the sea."

He took the cup from my hand and drank.

The drum began to beat once more. I took a step backwards, beckoning, and he followed me. The music moved faster, and I began to dance.

My feet no longer seemed to belong to me; my body had become an instrument to express the music as I bent and swayed in the sinuous spirals of the sacred dance. My garment, of a linen almost as fine as the veils that hid my face, clung and flared as I whirled. But always as I circled, Constantius was my centre, to whom I turned as a flower to the sun.

First he swayed, and then, as the music broke through the last of his Roman conditioning, he began to move, a stamping, vigorous kind of dance, as if he marched to music. Closer and closer we came, mirroring each other's movements, until he caught me in his arms. For a moment we stood breast to breast. I could feel his heart beating as if it were my own.

Then he lifted me, as easily as if I had weighed no more than Heron, and bore me away to the bower.

It was a round hut in the ancient fashion, made from branches loosely woven together. Flowers had been twined among them, and firelight gleamed through the gaps, dappling the rich cloth that covered the bed, and the walls, and our bodies, with golden light. Constantius set me on my feet again and we faced each other, silent, until the golden leaves of his wreath no longer quivered with the swiftness of his breathing.

"I am all that is, has been, and will be," I said softly, "and no man has ever lifted my veil. Make pure your heart, oh you who would look upon the Mystery."

"I have been purified according to the Law," he answered me. Then he added, "I have eaten from the drum; I have drunk from the cymbal. I have seen the light that shines in the darkness. I will lift your veil."

These words were not the ones the priests had taught him. Clearly, he was not only an initiate of the Soldiers' G.o.d, but of the Mother and the Daughter as they are known in the southern lands. He reached out, and with steady hands lifted the hawthron wreath from my brow, and then drew off my veil. For a moment he simply stared at my face. Then he knelt before me.

"It is you! Even in the storm I knew you. You are the G.o.ddess indeed! Did you show yourself to me first in the guise of a hag to test me, and is this my reward?"

I swallowed, gazing down at his bent head, and then, bending, took off his golden crown and laid it beside my wreath of flowers.

"With this crown or without it, you are the G.o.d to me..." I managed to say. "It was I indeed, and even then, I loved you."

He looked up at me, his eyes still wide and unfocused, set his hands upon my hips and drew me forwards until his bent head rested at the joining of my thighs. I felt a sweet fire began to build between them, and suddenly, my knees would no longer bear me, and I slid down, down, between his hands until we knelt together, breast to breast and brow to brow.

Constantius gave a little sigh then, and his lips found mine. And as if that had completed a circuit of power, suddenly the fire was everywhere. I clutched at his shoulders, and his arms came tight around me, and together we fell to the bed that had been prepared for us.

Our clothing had been made so that at the removal of a few pins it would fall away, and soon there was no impediment between us. His body was hard with muscle, but his skin was smooth, sliding across mine, and his strong hands tender as he taught me ecstasies that had never been mentioned in my training. And then we came together. I set my arms about him as the power of the G.o.d came down, shaking him until he cried out in his extremity. And as he gave his soul into my keeping, the power of the G.o.ddess bore my own away to meet him and there was only light.

When time had come back from eternity once more and we lay quiet, clasped in each other's arms, I realized that outside the hut, people were cheering. Constantius stilled, listening.

"Are they cheering for us?"

"They have lit the bonfire atop the Tor," I said softly. "On this night, there is no separation between your world and Avalon. The priests will huddle in their cells for fear of the powers of darkness, but the fire that is lit here will be visible all over the Vale. On other hills, folk are waiting to see it. They will kindle their own fires then, and so, from hill to hill, the light will spread across Britannia."

"And what aboutthis fire?" he touched me once more and I gasped as flame rippled upwards.

"Ah, my beloved, I think the fire we have kindled between us will light the whole world!"

CHAPTER SIX.

AD 270.

When I woke, the pale light of early morning was filtering through the leaves of the bower. The air was moist and cool on my bare skin. I burrowed back under the covers, and the man beside me grunted, turned, and flung out a possessive arm to draw me close against his side. For a moment I stiffened in confusion, then my awakening senses flooded me with memory. I turned, fitting myself more closely against him, astonished, despite the unaccustomed soreness in my body, by howright it felt to lie this way.

I could hear no human sounds, but the birds were singing a triumphant welcome to the new day. I raised myself on one elbow, gazing down at the sleeping face of my-lover? That seemed too light a word for our union, and yet what had pa.s.sed between us had surely been more personal than the transcendent joining of priest and priestess as they manifest the power of the Divine into the world.

Though that, certainly, had been part of it. A reminiscent tremor of energy quivered in the area of my solar plexus as I remembered. When we came together, the awakening earth had been filled by the radiant power of the sun. If I extended my senses groundward I could feel the aftermath of that conjunction, like ripples spreading through the stillness of a pool.

And what else had the ritual accomplished? I focused on my own body, lips swollen with kissing, b.r.e.a.s.t.s awakened to an exquisite sensitivity, the muscles of my inner thighs sore with unaccustomed stretching, and the secret place between them beginning to throb once more as memory stimulated new desire. I forced awareness deeper, into the womb that had received Constantius's seed. Was I pregnant? Even my priestess-trained senses could not tell. I realized that I was smiling. If last night's love-making had not planted a child in my belly, we would have to try again...

Relaxed in sleep, Constantius had a serenity I would not have suspected. His body, where the sun did not touch it, was like ivory. I gazed upon his face with growing delight, memorizing the strong lines of cheek and jaw, the high-bridged nose, the n.o.ble sweep of his brow. In the pale light the brand of Mithras was barely visible to the eye, but to my inner senses it glowed, focusing the radiance of the soul within.

As if that awareness had been a physical touch, he began to waken, first with a sigh, and then with a flutter of the eyelids, and then the muscles of the face tightening into their accustomed lines as he opened his eyes. He was, it would seem, one of those fortunate people who pa.s.s in one instant from unconsciousness to full awareness. The grey eyes that gazed up at me were wide, not with sleep, but wonder.

"Sanctissima Dea..." he whispered.

I smiled and shook my head, unsure whether that had been a t.i.tle or an exclamation. "Not now," I answered. "Morning has come, and I am only Helena."

"Yes-now," he corrected. "And when you came to me last night, and when you sat as a hag beside my fire, and when you summoned me to Avalon. The Greeks say that Anchises trembled in fear because he lay with a G.o.ddess all unknowing. But I knew-" He reached up, and very gently brushed the hanging lock of hair back from my brow. "And if the G.o.ds had blasted me for my presumption, I would have counted the price well paid."

The G.o.ds had not blasted us, though there had been moments when we might well have been overcome by ecstasy. It was Ganeda, I thought suddenly, who was going to blast me when she realized I had taken Aelia's place in the ritual.

"What is it?" he asked. "What is the matter?"

"Nothing-nothing you have done," I said quickly, and bent to kiss him. Clearly reverence did not unman him, for his response was instant. He pulled me down beside him, and in the flood of sensation as he made love to me all thought was for a time submerged.

When I became capable of coherent thought once more, the light that was filtering through the leaves of the bower was bright and golden, and I could hear the murmur of voices from outside.

"We should dress," I murmured against his cheek. "The priestesses will be coming soon."

His grip tightened suddenly. "Will I see you again?"

"I... do not know..." Yesterday, I had not really thought beyond the ritual. I had known I wanted Constantius, but I had not considered how difficult it would be, once I had lain with him, to let him go.