Dreams to Return Home By…

[King Adam Aberdeen I]

Adam had spent the better part of eight days at sea, and another five days upon the land coordinating, bargaining, and allying men, clans, and countries to Skye’s cause. The days were filled with speeches, promises, and politics… but his nights were dream ridden. Dreams that would be soon explained… hopefully by Lady Eirian… It was the last two nights that convinced Adam to return home…

Dreams had always been a way that Bess and Adam would communicate issues of severity to one another. It was always unintentional, unexpected, and uncontrolled. All the same, they now knew and understood that should a dream occur, they would return to one another post-haste… and eventually work the reasons for the dreams out together…

Again it was the Englishmen in a mirror that spoke to Adam… “Young Duke… awaken from yer sleep… forsake those that depend upon you now… for your wife and those in the Castle depends upon you most…” Seeing himself in the mirror, yet the image was one of him… but not him… he responded… “And wot dae yae mean good knight? Why should I return to mae wife… she bae well dun yae knaew…” The man in the image smirked… “Is she not with child? Doth she nay require her husband to bring them into the world you both have made… Is this not your first together? Should yu let her die in childbirth without yu there? Should yu allow those in the castle to die at the hands of an oppressor?”

Adam sat up abruptly and looked around as if he had seen a ghost… Standing, he rouses the Gold Talons from sleep… “Arise mae knights… we make faer Turas Lan… time we waste naet…” As the men awoke quickly, and some began preparing to leave, while two or three stood by the Duke querying what was the matter. “Die…?” he thought of the dream… “Nay matter… we leave as soon as the men are ready…” Adam silently pondered upon the dream as he saddled the white stallion.

Cinching the belly strap of the saddle, his knee upon the horses chest… his mind pondered the dream… Was Turas Lan under siege? Was Bess and bairin in danger? The dream and his mental questions hastened his actions…

“Move it men… make haste… nae time tae spare…” as he sat upon the destrier; the clear advantage was on the Duke.

[Queen Beathag Aberdeen]

Dreams to Return Home By...

- Mother and Daughter Across Space -

"Ah think the face of the child will suprise ye most of all." An elder woman sat beside the younger, but both of them had a face that seemed ageless, eternal. One of golden hair lay her head on the lap as auburn tresses from the other fell across her cheeks. "It will be beautiful. You, n' all of your siblings were beautiful children."

"Why has it come sae late, m'mother. Is a woman to bare child this late in life?"

"She may bare it longer than she thinks if it is wot the heart wishes, Changelin'. Promise me tha' ye will have more of them if your heart wishes it and the body wills it."

"Ah would give Adam as many as he wished. It was arranged tha' way nay?"

"By Destiny more than by the hands of parents. Be careful." She rises, cupping her daughter's face. Both appear to be maidens. Both appear to be nothing at all. She presses her face to her child's face, now to become a mother of a new generation. "Be careful. Take care, more than ye already dae. Heed them more. Ye will have happiness but make sure it comes at no price."

"I wish to pay nothin' more.."


She awoke with a start, shaking away the last touch of her mother's hands with the knowledge that in a room in the castle Murieall's hands were folded over her chest. They were stark; pale and cold where the ones in the mind were the fluid, graceful things that memory made them to be. Beathag had never been one for dreams, until her mind grew from youth's odd logics and forsook elder reason impressed on her by trial. It had begun when her life took on meaning: Aodhan's birth produced so many dreams of how he would be, what he would be. The journeys they would embark on, the way the wind would change. Adam spoke to the slumbering part of her soul and ignited it with colors ferocious and lovely.

She surrendered her place by the Solarium window slowly. Tiredness had not taken her until a pair of days ago. Her stride, still long, ached and it felt as if the child were making ready for what was said to still be a further day. Or was it the realm burdening her? Pains for the people - giving birth to peace, instead of a child? The gardens were not far off and somehow the scent of grass rose up over the snow in the dry, crisp fields of Fieldren. Looking out across it she held her belly in her hands before calling out to one of the women nearby. "Find the Artisan. Ah must ask somethin' of her."

Supersticion fostered a belief in the power of dreams, the symbolism in them. Her mother once said some things were the mind making sense of the world, but others a woman should never ignore. If one woman had them and another was given a boon that made sense of them? It was good to employ it. Many women had the senses, but the Artisan had the rare gift of powerful foresight.

[Lady Eirian Gwenyth Apollius]

Calling a Seer

Eirian was being sought after or she made herself able to be found. Her name was on the lips of people again. A drawing of a family to take to the fields, another of a body being laid to rest in the churchyard were beginning to dry out her hands for the length of time they were exposed to the cold, cold air. Now, out in the fields of guards, encampments, and people the Fieldren fields had burst to life. If the city could not take them then people were finding refuge near it. Some refused to go in, for fear they'd never get out again. Everyone, still, was growing hungry or tired. She lent her time to these people and as if she had never had known privelege she bent down next to them in a hunt for shoots under the snow and roots to boil for broths and peasent medicines. Before she gave birth to Hope, she had been in these fields when the color was high. Anulia had helped her find the stuff of color. Now, they dredged up lumpy, fat objects covered in mud. Cleaning it off on the edge of her dress, she'd toss it on a satchel at her hip. Hope was swaddled in blankets, slumbering against her back when her cries at the sounds of yelling made her fuss. The Lady's handmaiden looked up, noticing two men on foot coming towards them. A guardsmen from a distance was a threat until he closed in. All around them women were gasping, men were holding close to weapon until the wind unfurled the Griffin. Now, the mighty sign was being pelted by fat, hard drops of rain. As the baby was being brought around to be shielded, others held one another as the party advanced towards the dark haired woman. In drab colors with dirty hands, she looked nothing like an Artisan who had sat at a great loom, canvases, or cared only for the pretty things in the world.

"Artisan, the Ducal family requests your presence. The Duchess has need of you." He would not have recognized her, were it not for the pair of eyes. Everyone had some feature among the court: hair, eyes, an expression or stance. The blue eyes that looked at him now could peer through him, and he knew this. It disturbed him, and for all intents the most pious of women at court could have been little more than a witch. Throwing her cloak forward, she concealed the baby beneath an oil cloth that made the water slide off and away from her while Tabitha went to fetch their horses. No carriage had been brought, nor was it sensible to take a wagon when it could haul people or suprises. The guardsmen shared Tabitha's expression as the rain grew hard but Eirian remained still. It was nothing new to her now.