Part Five
Ynys Avallach
Merlin and Aurelia
“It was the plague.” I say, stating the obvious.
“Aye, it was. Maybe. It may have been something else. Who knows?” Aurelia’s head drops at the dreadful memory. “I was laid low. I clearly recall . . . I recall rising early to relieve myself then returning to see how Aridius had fared through the night. I opened the door to his sickroom and thought it stuffy and rank. Ari was sunk deep in sleep, so still. I went to fetch his jar to fill it with fresh water. . . .”
She gives a little shudder at the memory.
“And then?” I ask, urging her gently back across the years.
When she speaks again, it is from that far-off place. “I am told I was found in the corridor amidst the shards of a broken jar, or in the cook house—or was it somewhere else? My next memory was waking up in a bed drenched in sweat with a raging thirst. Setonius was standing over me and so was my faithful servant and friend Tatiana.
“Then Theo appeared. It was my impression that the priest had been summoned to anoint me with holy oil, or pray, or something. But I don’t know. I awoke much confused and with clear no understanding of where I was or what was happening.”
“Did you learn how long you were abed?”
“Five or six days, I think,” she sighs, “and little memory of it even now. Oh, little snatches of this and that came back to me over time—starting up out of sleep in the middle of the night to see a candle burning at my bedside and someone, I don’t know who, slumped in a chair, asleep beside me . . . being offered a drink of water and almost choking on it . . . the deep, dull ache in my belly and my bones . . . of feeling that I had not the strength to draw another breath . . . things like that. Nothing of any real consequence.”
She draws a deep breath and then faces once more the pain she carries deep in her soul. “It was not until the next day—the day my fever broke, or maybe the day after—that I was considered well enough to receive the news that Ari had died.”
Silence falls between us again. Aware that I am treading on a sort of sacred ground, I allow this revelation the respect it deserves. In a moment, she nods and continues, “Everything changed after that. Everything.”
“I can well imagine,” I agree, thinking how the death of a beloved alters not only life for those they leave behind, but sometimes the very world they inhabit.
“My poor husband had died alone in the night—the self-same night I awoke with fever and went in to him,” she says. “So Tatiana told me and I so I believe—indeed, I think the moment of his passing is what roused me from my bed that night.” She bends her head and closes her eyes on the everlasting grief of that moment. “I did not see him again—not even in death could I hold his hand and tell him my love.”
“No?”
“He had been buried by then, you see,” she replies softly. “Just another corpse in the burial pit he had himself ordered to be dug.” She offers a grim smile. “A small justice that—the man who commanded such a grave for others becomes just another occupant.”
I let this assertion settle, then say, “I am sorry to hear it but, in truth, I don’t suppose it could have been otherwise.”
“No,” she replies slowly, “and I do not think I would have done anything different in any case—not that I could have. But it would have been nice to at least write a few words for Theo to speak over the bodies at the funeral. There were nine others buried with Aridius that day—six men and three women.” She shrugs lightly. “That is what Theo told me. As soon as I could rise and leave the villa, Tatiana and I went to the grave.”
Aurelia lowers he head and sighs. “There was little enough to see—a simple wooden marker carved with a cross and the names of those buried beneath. He was gone. The only man I had ever loved was gone.
We sit for a time. Each of us turning over in our heads the tragic events of that cruel season. Aurelia weeps for the misery and waste she witnessed and the dreadful aftermath as the world moved on and she, along with everyone still alive, moved with it.
After a time, she dabs her eyes and glances out across the far southern hills. Something prompts me to ask, “There is someone you have not mentioned,” I say. “Someone I worry about.”
Aurelia comes out of her reverie. “Who is that?”
“Ursa!”
With a shake of her head and a smile, she replies, “Ah, yes. Ursa—my faithful protector, companion, and friend.” Aurelia turns a wondering gaze on me. “Do you believe in guardian angels, Merlin?”
“I do,” I affirm. How could I not? I had met at least one that I could call by name, and likely more that I never recognized.
“I believe in them, too,” Aurelia says, and laughs, “I just never thought mine would be a dog!”
I give her a wondering look. “Truly?”
She nods her assurance. “When Uther was born, Ursa lay by my side through the birth—I’ll not pretend that it was an easy delivery, it wasn’t. But, when the travail had passed and the baby was swaddled and safe in my arms, Ursa came padding back into the room. She looked at me and at the infant, and then came to the bed and rested her head on my arm. I stroked her for a moment and thanked her for her watch care. Then she licked my hand and left the room, pausing look back one last time.” Aurelia regards me with a little half-smile. “I never saw her again after that.”
“No?”
“I did not know it then, but I believe she had come to bid me farewell,” replies Aurelia. “That is how it is with guardian angels, you see? They only stay as long as they are needed.”