The Widow of Caer Mawnog

Dame Armaelle Jullou - mounted, field-armored - galloped into the glade, holding a swaddled infant close against her breastplate. Battle-worn and bloodied, she reined to slow the animal, steadied, then stiffly rolled her hip to dismount. Stricken with pain, Armaelle stumbled when her legs met the ground, and, glancing fearfully behind her, cradled the child’s head and trudged on.

Armaelle limped into Caer Mawnog under the haunting glow of a full moon. The cemetery rested in a boscage of brooding willow trees with gnarled, reaching limbs that grasped for the moonlit sky. The night air, thickened with an ethereal mist, weaved like ghostly, drifting tendrils about crumbled tombstones, gothic statues, and stone markers.

Shambling through a sea of moss-covered headstones, Armaelle whispered desperate prayers of favor. Climbing a hill, she passed grime-coated statues of winged angels whose blank, stone eyes peered heavenward; kneeling children, their heads bowed in sorrowful prayer; ominous faceless creatures wielding tall, menacing scythes; widows, draped in mourning cowls, their grief-stricken eyes buried in their hands.

Fatigued and winded, Armaelle fell to her good knee and prayed.

“Blessed Maiden,” Armaelle implored the moon, ripping away her helm so her eyes might better comb the cemetery. “A hiding place! Quick! To save my sovereign!”

The baby girl burbled and cooed while, in the distance, Armaelle heard the pounding rhythm of approaching horses.

Armaelle clutched the child, frantically turning herself about to scan the cemetery for crevasses. “I beg you, please!”

Splinters, cracks, pops - the sounds of grinding stone - preceded the attention of a grieving widow, her bitter voice as the coldest winter wind. “I will barter.”

“Protect the child!” Armaelle gasped, addressing the animated statue.

The widow’s stone face gazed dispassionately at Armaelle and said, “Yes, in exchange for your unseeded vessel.”

Shocked, Armaelle placed her palm against her abdomen, then looked uneasily at the forest trail.

“A fair price,” the widow persuaded. “One life for another. A fertile womb from which to be reborn.”

“Agreed,” Armaelle breathed. “Steady, sweet princess.”

Tears welling, she lifted the swaddle from around her shoulders, and, as the statue accepted, the baby’s flesh petrified to marble in the widow’s arms.

Armaelle’s heart sank.

What had she done?

Suddenly, Armaelle keeled, her gut seized by torturous pain, and she began to bleed.

Terror-stricken, sobbing, and uncertain about the child’s fate and her role in it, Armaelle shuffled down the hill. Stepping into the stirrup, she groaned, stiffly throwing her injured leg over the saddle. Spurring on her mount, they burst into a gallop to disappear into the dark, misty forest.

Minutes later, six rogues on horseback came thundering into Caer Mawnog. Their lead, throwing himself from his saddle, crouched to inch his way along the earth; distrusting his sight, his fingers caressed the mud, feeling for tracks and warmth. He snapped to arrest his riders’ attention, then waved them onto the adjacent trail. So commanded, they dashed into the forest to give chase, leaving him.

Cautious, the leader withdrew a steel dagger to creep silently among the graves. He wore enemy leathers, a hood, and a soiled wool scarf that masked his face, exposing only squinty, weathered eyes. He made his way furtively, placing a careful hand on the gravestones he passed, prepared for an ambush, listening intently for a baby’s cry.

Moonlight spilled over the cemetery to bathe its headstones in pale silvery light trailed by long shadows.

Tracking her footfalls, the assassin approached where Armaelle took her knee. Finding her helmet, he lifted it to his face and sniffed. He inhaled the air around him and bent to the ground before following a scent up the leg of a statue. He found the figures of praying angels, sobbing children, a mother cradling an infant, and looming reapers; witnesses, all, yet motionless, silent, yielding him nothing.

Disgusted, he stood and tossed the helm aside to retrace his steps, investigating every possible cranny and nook, until - glowering - the rogue led his horse into the forest to search for what he’d missed.

Stillness descended, and the widow and child remained that way until a crone visited Caer Mawnog precisely one year later; another full moon hung listless in the midnight sky.

Lame, the old woman wandered the cemetery leaning on a crooked wooden staff and glanced earnestly at every tombstone and memorial she passed. Eventually, she encountered the grieving widow cradling a swaddled babe.

Kneeling, the hag removed a ceremonial knife from her robes to lay it before her, and - in taking a charcoal pencil - drew a one-inch square on her inner forearm. She prepared her ritual, muttering ancient rites to border the shape with four runes. Without hesitation, she dropped her pencil and snatched up the knife to stab her arm. She drew the blade along the perimeter, and as it cut, she did not flinch nor bleed; it sliced clean, and red, fibrous muscle was exposed underneath.

Balancing the once-inch square on her knife’s tip, she gingerly set it on the baby’s forehead. And as moist beads of blood ran down the baby’s cherubic nose, stone became flesh. Her eyes opened; she winced; she yawned.

Eagerly plucking the child from the widow’s grasp, the hag immediately brought her charcoal to line the statue’s eyes; she colored in the irises; gave definition to its lashes; penciled its nostrils; drew a crease along its lips, and traced the cartilage in her ears. Muttering old, forgotten words, the crone pressed her forearm against the widow’s peak to impress a bloodied square. Then bandaging her wound with spare cloth torn from her sleeve, the old woman lovingly embraced the child and departed into the forest.

Later, alone, sensing - alive, yet of stone - reborn, the widow strained to place her feet on the ground. Standing, she wobbled and teetered, bracing herself against headstones to stay upright. Once familiarized with walking, she lumbered headlong down the hill and into the forest, where the widow left Caer Mawnog, eager to flee its gloom.