I.
Much later, when Robin holds all the threads in her hands, she can trace the knotted pattern that has neither beginning nor end, but if she had to choose she would say that it began with Ari. So much seemed to begin with Ari ~ Ari who should have died beneath the waters of Tethy's sea as Rathannan's three moons rose over Mawn. It is of Rathannan's moons that Robin dreams.
The dream is always the same. Three moons: silver & bronze & gold. They weigh down the sky where bright stars cling like lint & the cold is sharp & clear. She dreams a cantlos wind snapping & snarling down frosted valleys & between the standing stones on the plains. The stones cast a net of shadows across the weirdway & the grass, brittle as ice, sharp as thorns. There is the sharp smell of coming snow on the air, of peat smoke & old stone.
Robin stands on the weirdway amongst the dancing shadows, & begins the long walk along the spiral under the fall of moons as old & dinted as battered coins. In her dream she wears her jeans & one of her brother Ben's thick trawling jerseys, thicker & warmer than her own, & because it is a dream & all things are possible, she is snugly wrapped in Lal's second best cloak ~ the blue one that is like a summer sky & pinned with Ari's battered swans head pin, which is made of tin & worthless. Her fingers pluck at the broken threads where the pin has caught & for a moment Robin falters, sensing the flaying threads fretting beyond the darkness. They are Lal's boots she wears too, the warm fur turned in, laced tightly up her calves & the soles much too thin. She can feel every leaf, every twig, each pebble turn under her feet but they carry her across the wold to the very door of the brae.
Robin ducks her head under the lintel, steps down into smokey dimness reeking of tallow & peat, unwashed wool, bare stone, earth... There is a hollow emptiness to the brae. Of course there is. There is no~one there. There has been no~one there for a very long time. They are away over the hills plucking an obdurate Ari out of the sea.
Robin knows she must reach the harp where it hangs on the wall; if she can reach the harp all will be well.
A life for a life, Ari is to say ~ & Robin jerks awake to steamy rain & the steady whirr of the overhead fan ~ but even in her dreams Robin is tenacious. She begins again, dreaming three moons, an inky sky, a cantlos wind while across the hall Nan's querulous voice calls out, persistently, in gaelic Lal! Lal. Och, moi croi...moi croi.... Robin stiffens. Even in her dream a jealous tendril sprouts for surly Lal is hers & though she remembers everything about him she does not dream of Lal. Lal was never hers & his harp is forever out of reach.
The dream is always the same. Three moons: silver & bronze & gold. They weigh down the sky where bright stars cling like lint & the cold is sharp & clear. She dreams a cantlos wind snapping & snarling down frosted valleys & between the standing stones on the plains. The stones cast a net of shadows across the weirdway & the grass, brittle as ice, sharp as thorns. There is the sharp smell of coming snow on the air, of peat smoke & old stone.
Robin stands on the weirdway amongst the dancing shadows, & begins the long walk along the spiral under the fall of moons as old & dinted as battered coins. In her dream she wears her jeans & one of her brother Ben's thick trawling jerseys, thicker & warmer than her own, & because it is a dream & all things are possible, she is snugly wrapped in Lal's second best cloak ~ the blue one that is like a summer sky & pinned with Ari's battered swans head pin, which is made of tin & worthless. Her fingers pluck at the broken threads where the pin has caught & for a moment Robin falters, sensing the flaying threads fretting beyond the darkness. They are Lal's boots she wears too, the warm fur turned in, laced tightly up her calves & the soles much too thin. She can feel every leaf, every twig, each pebble turn under her feet but they carry her across the wold to the very door of the brae.
Robin ducks her head under the lintel, steps down into smokey dimness reeking of tallow & peat, unwashed wool, bare stone, earth... There is a hollow emptiness to the brae. Of course there is. There is no~one there. There has been no~one there for a very long time. They are away over the hills plucking an obdurate Ari out of the sea.
Robin knows she must reach the harp where it hangs on the wall; if she can reach the harp all will be well.
A life for a life, Ari is to say ~ & Robin jerks awake to steamy rain & the steady whirr of the overhead fan ~ but even in her dreams Robin is tenacious. She begins again, dreaming three moons, an inky sky, a cantlos wind while across the hall Nan's querulous voice calls out, persistently, in gaelic Lal! Lal. Och, moi croi...moi croi.... Robin stiffens. Even in her dream a jealous tendril sprouts for surly Lal is hers & though she remembers everything about him she does not dream of Lal. Lal was never hers & his harp is forever out of reach.
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