Meri by Maya Kaathryn Bohnhoff

the ground between his booted feet. “I
lied to you about my dream. The horse never took me to Lin-liath. It took me to
Gled Manor. To your house.”
    Meredydd flushed with embarrassment and glanced about,
seeking an avenue of escape.
    “You have seduced me,
Meredydd, although unwittingly. No matter where I send my thoughts, they return
always to you. In class, I know, I act as if I had the wisdom and authority of
an Osraed. I don’t have anything like that wisdom. And I shouldn’t have the
authority I’ve been given—not over you. Not when I only abuse it.”
    He took a sudden step over the graves, meeting her face to
face and startling her into a tiny retreat. He caught her hands to keep her
from fleeing further.
    “You should teach me ,
Meredydd. I should be your Prentice.”
    She disentangled her hands and took another step away. “Don’t
say this! You’re misguided, Aelder Wyth. You squander your attentions on me—”
    “No, not squander. Listen to me, Meredydd. I have a fine
estate. I’m an Eiric already, at eighteen. But Arundel is too big, by far, for
my mother and sisters and myself. It will be mine alone when the sisters marry.
When I come back from Pilgrimage, Meredydd, if the Meri has me, if you will—”
    Meredydd’s heart clenched into a tiny, terrified knot. “No,
Wyth!”
    “Why not?”
    “I’m only fifteen.”
    He laughed. “Nearly sixteen, you told me.”
    “And what of my own Pilgrimage? If the Meri has me, I’ll
have so much to do. So much work. And She might bid me go out of Caraid-land to
do that work.”
    “You don’t have to go.”
    “Disobey the Meri?”
    “I mean, you don’t have to go on Pilgrimage. You could marry
me at Solstice, instead.”
    “I will go on
Pilgrimage, Wyth Arundel.”
    “Yes, yes. Aye. All right.” He waved her anger back with
placating hands. “If you wish so much to go, then go, of course. And when you
return, I will let you continue your studies.”
    “ Let me! You could have
no choice!”
    “Of course, I could have a
choice. A husband—”
    “I have no husband. I’ll not have you as one.”
    His distress was evident. “Why not?”
    “Good God, Wyth! How could I marry someone who would stand
there and speak of permitting me to do the
Meri’s will?”
    “I take it back. All that I said. I’m wrong. Of course, the
will of the Meri is paramount.”
    “Wyth, I don’t love you!
I don’t know what love is, yet. My parents had it. Osraed Bevol and Aelwyn
Meara had it, may God bless her soul. But I’ve too small a vessel for so deep a
thing as that. And what I do have is full of the Meri. She fills my cup, Wyth.
There’s no room in it for you.”
    “But She’s a spirit. I’m a man. The filling is different.”
    A man at eighteen. So serious—gangly, over-tall body drawn
severely upright, deep set eyes so somber, lips so tight. A man.
    Meredydd laughed. “Oh, Aelder Wyth, I hope when we’ve both
visited the Sea we’ll understand what a man is—or a woman, for that matter.
Now, take your sheep along home, please. They’re eating my roses.” She started
to turn away.
    “My roses, you mean.”
    She swung back. “What?”
    “ My roses. Lagan is mine
now. Has been this last five years—part of Arundel.”
    She gaped at him. “By what right—?”
    “By mart forfeit. After...after the fire, you’d gone with
Osraed Bevol. He never claimed the land as your guardian—”
    “So your family did? But five
years—”
    “Mother said it was needed. Our pasturage had got so worn we
needed extra for the increased herds. And if we held Lagan the hands could take
them through direct on the Tyne Road to the market in Creiddylad—not have to
take the long way around to catch the road above the palisades. Father had
started the claim but... well, mother did it on his behest, or mine, I suppose.
You weren’t of an age to lay claim yourself.”
    “But so soon . They’d
just been buried.”
    “Aye. But Osraed Bevol could have contested our