Eldr
I must tell you that most of what you know of me is a lie.
True, some of this fabrication is of my own doing, my blood and sweat bringing together the threads that were woven into the tapestry of my life. Nevertheless, I have allowed my deeds and choices to become narrative and evolve into lore.
It is the natural progression of any story.
However, I object to how my tale has been usurped by the men who appeared in it. I suppose it is a woman’s lot to be first a father’s daughter, then her husband’s wife, and finally, possibly, her son’s mother. In the world into which I had been born, a woman was most easily characterised by the men who owned her. I am sure that the kingdoms of Moray and Alba, those territories that would later be known as Scotland, were not alone in their predisposition to mistake being indentured for having an identity.
The world that created me was a broken one, composed of scarred territories and bitter men playing at kings. Moray, my home, had laid in dominion to Alba for generations, taxed heavily and used as the first line of defence against marauding Norsemen and other mysterious enemies that spilled forth from the northern sea. Mac Bethad tried, as did we all, to bring Moray the freedom and the peace it deserved. It has been said in the years since that the road to hell is paved with the best of intentions. The dead that haunt me still have assured me that my eventual passage toward the eternal shall be one bathed in the shadows of old blood.
It is a fate I have long since accepted, and though my death may not be restful, I can only hope that it will bring me once more to the sides of those I have loved and lost. For yes, even I, history’s most fiendish queen, have loved and been loved in return. And like many women before me, love was an insufficient shield against the full rage of a world thrown off its delicate balance.
Here am I sure that I have lost some of you. I hear your angry words, your bitter protest. You were a queen, I hear you say. You were first a lord’s wife and then a king’s. What could you possibly know of hardship? Of toil?
I have known the back of a husband’s hand, have been subject to his drunken whims, and have toiled to bring forth his heir. There is no woman, no matter how common or how highly born, who has not been in some way subject to the desires and ordinances of a man.
I will, however, grant one concession.
I was never a victim.
I was always exactly what I needed to be.
Those who knew me called me murderess, witch, hag, and crone. Others called me My Lady and Your Majesty.
One called me Mother.
One called me mo lasair—my fire.
I carry all of these names with me. I have collected them and made from them an armour that no arrow nor sword can pierce. This armour is made of the strongest metal and forged in the heat of my lust and anger. I know every chink in its mail and its every weakness.
Leave the tapestries to my sisters.
Bring me my sword.
* * *
Her first husband’s name was Gille Coemgáin mac Maíl Brigti, and their earliest meeting took place when Gruoch was fifteen years old.
When the ravages of time had left her an old woman, and she found herself turning in her bed in the deep quiet of the night, unable to sleep, Gruoch would sometimes allow herself to think back upon that first meeting.
Gille had been tall and thin and walked with a particular hunch, leaning much like a tree will when subjected too long to harsh winds. Or like one that has learned to bend to save from snapping at the trunk or lifting at the root.
There had been a flurry of excitement when he had entered the fortress and into Gruoch’s life. He and a handful of his men had ridden past the gates and into the main yard, their black and bay horses slick with sweat, mouths foaming around their filthy bits. Gille had been at the head, calling out in a loud voice for the King’s son to show himself. Gruoch had been worried at first upon hearing the harshness of his tone but had felt considerably better as she heard her father’s hearty laugh respond to the stranger’s call.
“Gille, have you lost your way on my mountain? Or have you finally taken me up on my offer of hospitality?”
Bodhe’s head appeared, following shortly after the sound of his voice as it boomed through the hall’s main doors. The heavy wood creaked as he made his way through, his powerful hands pushing them open as though they weighed nothing. Gruoch knew that each door carried a considerable heft since they were a practical defence against both the cold winter winds and any marauding tribes or soldiers.
Though her father was shorter than Gille by at least two hands, his broad shoulders and ruddy face made for an imposing figure. If Gille was the bending birch tree, Bodhe was a stout pine, made to outlive and outlast its gentler, deciduous cousin. The sturdy logs of such pines had built their fortress and the walls that surrounded it, and Bodhe loved to recount how he and his men had felled those trees and built their home themselves.
Crinan, the mysterious great-grandfather Gruoch had never met, had been blessed with an abundance of heirs. This blessing had meant an assurance of the line and guaranteed the younger children a liberty not afforded to their elder siblings. Some had been presented with an escape from the tediousness and constraints of court, and when Bodhe, a languishing middle son, had asked for this freedom, it had been gladly granted. Crinan had been pleased that his son would want to live so far north, further still than Inverness, the closest settlement of its size nearby. As Bodhe was fond of reminding his daughter, it was important that a leader lived out among his people and that he was seen often and everywhere. A man who could not live among his men was not a leader, and one who hid himself away in a castle could never hope to be the kind of man who inspired true love and confidence.
Her father had claimed these things, and as she did with most everything Bodhe told her, Gruoch held the advice close to her heart.
Gille’s smile was genial as he held out a waiting hand at Bodhe’s approach. Bodhe clasped it soundly and grinned, taking a step back as Gille slid down from his mount. He held out the reins without looking, and a young boy, who received a swift swat from his father as motivation, quickly grabbed for them.
Gruoch looked on at the travelling party and counted eight astride and twelve more on foot. Their stables were solid and well built and would probably house the additional horses along with Bodhe’s own, but it would be a tight fit should the twelve men a-ground be expecting to share the stable tonight.
Bodhe’s voice did not carry as he spoke to his friend. After a moment, the tall man clapped his host’s back and guided him toward the other riders, who were quickly dismounting. The men were dressed against the April chill, and Gruoch noticed that a few wore mantles of fur over their belted tunics, whose ornately trimmed sleeve cuffs and necklines denounced them as nobility. One of these, a man whose dark, coppery brown hair fell about his eyes, caught the girl’s stare as he pushed back the stray strands. He grinned openly at her and nudged a man to his right while he nodded in her direction. His companion, a black-haired man with an impressive beard, snorted in response and shoved his friend away from their horses and towards the main hall.
“And what do you think you’ll spy, little eldr? A king?”
Gruoch felt Hertha’s hand clamp onto her shoulder. The pinch of strong fingers and a rough whisper sent a fright through her body. A gasp flew from her mouth, and Gruoch clasped a hand to it as she was spun around, coming face to face with her guardian.
“A king, Hertha?” Gruoch’s voice was muffled by the fingers that still hid her grin. “Do you think so?”
“Hardly a king, little flame. A man pretending at kingship is more like.” Her tone was gruff, curt. Hertha looked past Gruoch and toward Gille who was making his way into the hall, its heavy door held open by one of Bodhe’s men.
“I knew he was not a king,” came Gruoch’s tart reply. “He is not wearing a crown, and his tunic is made of too coarse a wool.
Hertha swatted at her charge’s head. Though she attempted to duck quickly, Gruoch’s movements were too slow to escape Hertha’s deft palms. While Gruoch felt a hand smack at the back of her head, the touch was gentle and failed to live up to the ferocious airs Hertha allowed her voice to adopt when she spoke to her charge.
It amused Gruoch that this voice was never so daring when it was addressed to her father.
The Norse woman had once travelled with the North Men who had sailed across the narrow seas from their pagan countries in swift longboats, armed with cruel axes and crueller intentions. Hertha sometimes told stories of her country, with its rocky shores and flat lands. She said it was a land that had existed before time and that her gods were even older than the Christian God and the Christ, his son, an idea that scandalised Gruoch while also filling her with a secret thrill. Hertha had been a healer in her home country as well as a warrior, and it was her skill with medicine that had kept her alive when Bodhe and his father had beaten the heathen northerners back to their ships and into the sea.
She claimed to have been shaped by the wind and toughened against the rocks. Whenever Gruoch took in Hertha’s pale blue eyes and ashen blonde hair, she found such a story easy to believe. There were deep-set lines at the corners of Hertha’s mouth and eyes, as though the years of scowling had etched them there permanently. She boasted that her knowledge of plants and ability to read the skies had come from the gods themselves, given over the centuries to humans who knew how to listen to them. Her knowledge of herb lore and healing was astounding, and her reputation had spread across her master’s territories.
She had been lady’s maid and protector to Gruoch since the death of Bodhe’s wife during his daughter’s sixth winter.
And Gruoch loved her.
“Aye, you’re a wise one yet, eldr,” Hertha said, grabbing at a red braid and tugging it gently.
Gruoch pushed the hand away, smoothing the ginger plait back and away from her shoulder, letting it fall against her back. Such auburn locks were a trait in her family and in many of the families who lived across Moray. When she had still been a small child, enraptured with the wild woman’s magical potential, Gruoch had been told that she was eldr, which meant flame in the tongue of the Norsemen. Hertha had sworn that if the fire in Gruoch’s heart could but one day match the fire in her hair, she would be unstoppable.
Hertha had regaled Gruoch with stories of women in her native country who fought like demons alongside their men, riding their horses and carrying shields and blades. Gruoch didn’t much care for the idea of having to ride into battle and had told her guardian as much, reminding Hertha that Bodhe had been a more cunning warrior than she and her family of marauders. Under her father’s protection, the people of Moray could build their homes and raise their families, knowing that their lord would keep them safe whenever the heathen would-be conquerors chose to cross the bitter sea.
“Leave at my hair, Hertha,” Gruoch said, trying to sound cross and authoritative. “I’m not a child.”
“No, in this, you are right, little flame. I know this, you know this, and I suspect your father may have recently remembered it as well.”
Gruoch narrowed her green eyes as she drew her shoulders back, trying and failing to appear imposing. “What do you know, Hertha?”
“I know nothing, girl,” Hertha replied, turning away suddenly.”But I know enough to know the things of which I know nothing about.” Then, she paused and looked back at Gruoch, smiling as the girl worked to decipher what she had heard.
The moment of levity was short-lived, and Hertha motioned impatiently to Gruoch that she should follow. Gruoch turned to cast one quick look back at the visitors. She caught a glimpse of the black-bearded man making his way into the hall, closely followed by the man with the rich brown hair, the one who had smiled at her. She felt a girlish flutter in her chest, though she resigned herself to tear her gaze away and follow Hertha away from the hall and towards the main house.
“Does my father mean for me to marry?” Gruoch called her question ahead to Hertha, whose brisk pace kept her a few feet away. Oh please, God, Gruoch thought to herself as she felt her cheeks burn. Let it be the one with the hair in his eyes, the one who smiled at me. I think I should die to love so handsome a husband.
Hertha snorted derisively. The sound irritated Gruoch and shattered her hopeful mood. The girl bristled as she picked her way carefully through the yard. Hertha had never married, never borne children, and would ever be a slave in Bodhe’s house. Even though in her secret heart, Gruoch loved her foster mother dearly, Hertha’s response to her question had set Gruoch’s blood afire and quickened her temper. She forced herself to breathe, knowing that Hertha would take satisfaction from riling her.
“Oh yes, marriage. What else in this world could you hope for or expect, girl? If you’re so anxious to wed, why not ask him directly? Do you have a suitor in mind? Could it be the rider I caught you staring at like a lovesick farmer’s daughter?”
“I am a farmer’s daughter,” Gruoch shot back.
“You are a lord’s daughter, a prince’s daughter, and you ken it well.” Though the tone remained casual, Gruoch understood that Hertha had no intention of humouring any girlish fantasies. “Your father might own these lands, might ride through them and may have the final say in what lives or dies here, but don’t make the mistake of thinking he is of the land and for the land in the way his tenants are.” Hertha walked up to the front door of their home and turned, waiting for Gruoch to catch up to her. “You aren’t one of them, eldr. You mustn’t ever forget that. They won’t.”
“And you mustn’t forget yourself, Hertha,” Gruoch told her as she walked past and through the open door. “I am the lady of this house, and you will speak to me thus.”
This time Hertha’s slap was true, and as Gruoch stepped through the threshold, she did so rubbing the back of her tousled head.
