Free To Love Again by Bertrice Small Page A

us. New bread is always best eaten warm. We are cousins, are we not? My father is Eppilus, Ceara’s youngest son. I am only the first of your relations that you will meet. Your mother had ten brothers, all of whom are alive, and most have children, and in some cases grandchildren, of their own. You will not be lonely here.”
    Cailin looked to Brenna. She was pale, but her breathing was steady and even. The girl turned away and followed the young man back to where Ceara was busy preparing the morning meal. The big woman ladled cooked barley cereal into two fresh trenchers of bread, and handed them to the couple.
    “There are spoons on the table, if you are dainty,” Corio told her. “Come and sit down.” He wolfed down a bite of his bread and cereal.
    They sat, and Ceara plunked two goblets down before them. “Watered wine,” she said, and then, there being no one else in the hall, she joined them. “You remind me of your mother, and yet you do not look quite as she looked at your age. Was she happy with your father?”
    “Oh, yes!” Cailin said. “We were a happy family!” Abruptly, the enormity of the tragedy engulfed her. Only yesterday Kyna, her father, and her brothers were alive. There had been no warning at all of their demise—not that it would have been any easier to bear if there had been, but to have survived the murderous slaughter of her family only by chance was more than she could bear. Why should she live when they were all gone?
    It was the very first Beltane festival that she had been allowed to stay at unchaperoned. Brenna had given Cailin her head that night, and once on her own, Cailin had begun to see things in a new light. All the young men had wanted to dance with her, and she danced about the leaping fires until almost dawn. She had not been ready to slip away into the darkness with any man yet, but drank her first cupful of honeyed mead and felt wonderful afterward. Cailin thought to return home with her brothers, but they had gone off much earlier, into thedarkness with two maidens. She had not seen them again. Only when the false dawn began to lighten the skies, and the music finally stopped, did she wend her way back to the villa, to discover that death had been there before her.
    Now, Cailin grew pale and shoved the trencher away from her. The very thought of food was nauseating.
    Ceara divined the trouble immediately. “It is the will of the gods,” she said quietly. “Sometimes they are kind, and sometimes they are cruel, and sometimes in being kind, unkind. You and Brenna are alive this day because your journey in this world is not yet done. Would you dare to question the wisdom of the gods, Cailin Drusus?”
    “
Yes!
” Cailin cried. “Why should I live when my family does not? What could my brothers have possibly accomplished in this life that rendered their existence no longer necessary in this world? They were just seventeen!”
    “I cannot answer you, child,” Ceara said honestly. “All I can tell you is that everything happens when it is supposed to happen. What is death? It is but the doorway between this life and the next. We need not fear it. When your time comes, Cailin, those you love who have gone before you will be waiting on the Isles of the Blest for you. Until then it is your duty to the gods who created you to live out your destiny as they have planned you to live it out. You can, of course, whine, and despair about the unfairness of it all, but why would you so futilely waste the precious time allotted to you?”
    “Am I not allowed to mourn then?” Cailin asked bitterly.
    “Mourn the manner in which they met their ends,” Ceara said, “but do not mourn them. They have gone on to a far better place. Now eat your breakfast, Cailin Drusus. You need your strength if you are to care for Brenna.”
    “Do not treat me as if I were a mindless child, lady,” Cailin said.
    “Then do not behave like a child,” Ceara replied with a small smile, rising from