FicWad

Chapter One


Dow was the youngest son of his parents, Draga and Edain. He had three older brothers: Seamus, Gwyn and Drostan; and an elder sister, Vyvyan; and two younger sisters as well, who were called Gwendol and Meghan. But Dow was a special boy, despite-or perhaps because of-his place as the youngest boy.

Dow had been blessed with being born on Bealtaine, the Half-Year, after his mother had asked the aid of Ysuelt.

So it was quite a spectacle, the house of Draga, on the Bealtaine of Dow's thirteenth birthing. All the village was quite a bustle with joy and pride of the young Dow, who had dwelt long and quietly over this strange and wondrous ascension into manhood.

Dow was a quiet boy, with dark looks and eyes, and fair skin. The girls of the village giggled about him, despite his young age, and his brothers had often joked that he would be far more lucky with any woman than perhaps any one of the heroes they had grown up knowing.

But he didn't want to hear that or know it. The girls made him mindlessly uncomfortable, with their long hair in loose, flowing braids; and their big, pretty eyes; and flirtatious lips flapping with praise for his attractive face. No, Dow wanted nothing with to do with the young women of the village.

There was one, though, that always managed to catch his eyes. But that was a foolish thing.

His Coming of Age was quiet, standing before Draga in the nude, a little flushed as he answered the questions pressed upon him.

He completed a silent, effortless task set upon him just as dawn struck over them and his mother and sisters returned. Draga smiled down on him, gently kissing his brow with reverence.

"Blessings be on you from the Old Ones, brother Dow. May you never be of hunger or thirst."

And, with that, he was a man. It was a marvelously surprising thing, much simpler than he had thought.

The village woke with the sun, and he wandered with a purse heavy on his hip, and looked about, trying to see the festives with new eyes.

But all he saw was what he had seen. Except, perhaps, that he now saw the girls smiling more at him, and older boys grinning a bit more madly at him. It was the latter that unsettled his stomach, made him flush and look away a bit, laughing as they spoke around him like he belonged.

At thirteen, he did not belong much of anywhere.

The forest was blessedly silent and pensive, despite the day. He trailed his fingers gently over low hanging branches dressed in thick moss, and smiled. This was where he belonged: not in the village, surrounded and suffocated by peers who treated him like he was something new and marvelous; but here, where the Old Ones were everything that you saw and breathed and smelt.

He wandered about, until he came upon a tiny clearing, occupied by a single soul, sprawled all in grace, a sword cast over his belly idly, his glowing skin all nude to the sun's face.

"Oh!" he gasped, turning his head away. "I didn't know anyone was here . . ."

"It's alright," the other boy murmured, lifting his head a little, and smiling gently. He sat up, crossing his legs and sticking the sword between his ankles and his waist, leaning against the heft with folded hands. "You're Dow. Or . . . are you something new now? It was your birthing, wasn't it?"

"It is," he whispered, still not looking right at the other boy. He scuffed his foot against the ground idly, worrying his lip idly. "I still am, though I don't think Draga proud of me for that. I couldn't find anything else to name myself."

"There is time."

The boy wasn't much older than him, but he looked and acted so much more than the fifteen he was, with that sword; that smile; and the golden red hair all long and waving around his face in comely waves. His smile became a grin, and he removed the sword, casting himself out again.

"Lie with me a while, Dow, son of Draga. Come watch the sun with me. He is so much more pleasant than those who call themselves Sons and Daughters in the village."

Dow idled a moment, wondering if he should strip off his clothing as well. He did not, but strode to the other boy's side, casting himself down beside him. They lie in silence for what felt like ages, only the sound of birds and the distant laughter and music of the village impeding the wandering of their souls and minds.

He reached a hand across his chest, and turned his head to look at Dow.

"They've called me Llewellyn since my Coming. It's good to finally meet you, Dow." Dow took the boy's hand, and smiled a little, gripping it surely. Llewellyn's smile was a grin again, and he stole his hand away to cast it above his head idly, sighing gently. "It's a fair day, think you not? I wish all the year were like this."

"It rained last year," Dow offered. "I love the rain."

"You're an odd creature." But he was laughing softly, turning his head a little, grinning like some fiend. "This is your first Bealtaine as a man. And you come to the forest? I'm not impeding a meeting with some lovely maiden, am I?"

Dow blushed brilliantly, and closed his eyes, sighing. Llewellyn sat up, a soft chuckle just a breath on his lips; to which Dow turned his head, escaping the somehow knowing blue eyes of the older boy. But he just leaned after him, until Dow was all but trapped between Llewellyn's arms, their hips close to touching, and Dow could do nothing else but stare at those bright eyes and blush darkly.

"Were you off to meet someone?"

"No," Dow whispered. Llewellyn nodded a little, and flopped back on the soft ground with a grunt, sighing gently and scratching his chest. Dow watched him out of the corner of his eye, trying to understand that.

But Llewellyn started to talk softly. "I don't think the girls are much, either. But then, they don't think much of me, so I suppose it works out well."

"Why wouldn't they think much of you? You're quite handsome."

Llewellyn was looking at him with a slight smirk and cocked brow before Dow realized just what exactly he had said. He covered his mouth helplessly, murmuring his apologies quickly and vehemently, turning his face away as he flushed brilliantly.

The ginger chuckled softly, shaking his head behind Dow's back, and placing a hand gently on the boy's spine, burrowing his nose into Dow's nape gently, his chuckle becoming a wondrously playful laugh.

"It's alright, Dow," he murmured through his mirth, shaking his head against the younger boy's back. "There's nothing wrong with thinking that."

"Yes there is."

"You're young. We both are. There's nothing wrong." He rolled Dow onto his back, meeting his eyes; and, just to prove his point, he gently kissed the other boy, a quick and chaste press of thin lips to thin lips. To that, he grinned. "See? And the world does not erupt with the wrath of the Old Ones."

Dow stared at Llewellyn, at the space he had been at when the ginger fell away with raucous laughter, rolling about on the ground and holding his stomach. He turned a heady glare to the older boy, who was smiling through laughter and tears, his face flushed a little; that flush chasing itself down his chest.

And Dow had to remind himself what a sight that would be, to be caught staring at the older boy.

Llewellyn chucked his chin gently, and pressed that fleeting kiss to his lips again.

"Besides," he uttered with a grin and his lips just a breath from Dow's, "this is Bealtaine. What does it matter what happens here, with only the lusty nymphs and the ladies of the Forest to see our secrets?"

Dow looked away, toward Llewellyn's discarded sword. He looked about discreetly for the other boy's clothing, and shivered a little to see that there were none. Llewellyn chuckled very softly in his ear, nuzzling it very gently, making Dow squirm.

"Stop."

"Why? What are you worrying over, little Dow?" Dow took a slight offense to the words, shoving Llewellyn as best he could.

But the older boy grabbed him by the elbows, and tumbled him back over his head. They wrestled for a while, squirming in the dirt and grass, pulling hair and letting nails bite into skin and feel the muscle underneath as they laughed, growing breathless. Llewellyn finally pinned Dow, grinning down at him fiendishly, lifting a hand for a moment to dart long bangs out of his face.

He sat heavily on Dow's hips, and held his shoulders down, leaning in close, making the young boy flush darkly.

"Now that I've caught you," he murmured, breath ghosting over parted lips, "what is it that I should do to you, little Dow?"

"Let me up!"

"Ah-ah." He stole a third kiss, lingering now, his hair shifting around them and shutting away the world. Dow stared at him when he pulled back, his eyes showing his mild confusion.

He gasped when Llewellyn shifted his hips slightly against his. But Llewellyn laughed, bright and bubbly as the river that rushed past their village. His grin was feral, flashing his sharp little teeth.

"No wonder you've not a care for girls. Or am I an exception to the rule of not caring for anyone?"

"Let me up!"

Llewellyn did then, standing there and blocking the sun, the light splaying around him like a great glory. Dow stared at him, gaping a bit; perhaps this was not a boy, but the hero of legend, who had not been so heroic in all things.

But then his eyes ghosted unknowingly south, and it was Llewellyn's turn to flush slightly and turn away. He grabbed his sword as Dow sat up, watching him, and kept his back careful to the younger boy.

After a good while, he chuckled, and grabbed a discarded pack that Dow had not seen, pulling from it his sparse clothing, which he swiftly and eagerly wriggled into. He shouldered the pack, and hung the sword at his belt, casting a dark, quartered look back at the younger boy.

Dow sprung to his feet as Llewellyn began to leave the clearing, rushing him and tackling him perilously to the forest floor, out of sight of that damnable sun, where the older boy looked every inch an Old One.

"That's unfair, doing that. Doing those things and leaving as though nothing at all happened."

"I thought you didn't like it," Llewellyn pointed out, wriggling against the surprisingly firm pin Dow had him in.

"I thought you were playing about," Dow whispered back, his breath now the one ghosting over suspiciously parted lips.

He did not bestow a kiss, but jumped up, and snatched Llewellyn's sword from his belt, rushing off, back to the village, where he could still here the music being played, and the laughter of young couples, and older ones as well.

Llewellyn did not pursue him.It came to pass, nearly a fortnight later, that Draga came upon Dow in the square, sitting with the sword planted between his ankles and his waist, leaning on the heft and staring into the middle distance. He sat beside his youngest son, and stared in that direction as well, before leaning over after a moment.

He gently asked, "What, exactly, are we waiting for?"

Dow professed, "I stole this sword from a boy on Bealtaine. He hasn't come for it. I'm waiting to see if he will."

"Perhaps he wished for you to have it?" Dow slowly shook his head, unsticking the blade and flopping back against the hard-packed dirt of the square. Draga did the same, and they stared at the moon, high over head; it was a few days from going dark.

"I don't feel like much of a man, father," Dow whispered at random. Draga chuckled slightly, and lifted his arms to cradle his head; Dow looked over at him.

"Few of us do. Some days, even I do not. And I have borne seven child, Dow. Seven. You'd think I'd be a man." His smile was gentle, half-hidden by his beard. He tapped his nose, and winked conspiritually; "Your mother, however, is thoroughly convinced. Don't let her on.

"Now. Tell me how it is you came by this sword, and who exactly we're waiting for."

So Dow quietly retold Draga of how he had spent the early pitches of Bealtaine; of the boy named Llewellyn whom had lain in the clearing in but his flesh; and how they had shared kisses, and wrestled; and then, he told of how odd it had been, to see Llewellyn, and to know things he shouldn't have. He told of tackling the other boy; of his near mockery; and then, he was to the sword.

He lifted it slowly for his father to see. It was of a fine make, almost too heavy for Dow to lift with his thin arms. Draga inspected it with half an eye, his attention mostly on his young son, who would not meet his gaze.

"What do you worry over? That I might strike you for spending your Bealtaine with another man?"

"I don't know," Dow admitted softly. Draga hummed softly, and handed the sword back.

He set Dow to straights, facing him now, and tapped his nose gently. Quietly, he uttered, "When I was little older than you, there was a boy in this village. He was called Sion, and I cared for him dearly as we grew into ourselves, but it started out something like your own: we met by chance, he the reckless and I the sheltered."

"What happened?"

"Sion and I went into battle with the Woads. We came back, different men than we had been. I met your mother, Edain-she was from another family, outside the village-and . . . and I couldn't say what became of Sion. And for that, I'm sorry."

Dow stared at his father, wide-eyed and skeptical. How could this be true? His father had borne seven children with his mother, had never once looked at another woman since he had dedicated himself in their handfasting.

And perhaps that was it. Draga had known the love of a man, and had married a woman to keep himself from that slippery way.

But Dow doubted his childish logic.

There was a sudden rolling mirth on the other side of the square, and Dow turned his head slowly. Llewellyn's long ginger hair caught lights from around the village, and he shook his head a little, stepping toward them.

Dow stood unsurely, and stumbled when Draga pushed him toward the other boy. His eyes were a little rueful, his voice soft as he whispered, "Don't make my mistakes."