I discovered the circle of stones, far from the ramparts, standing as it always had in the high grass, imperishable emblems of the dancers who had once gathered there.
The great shock came, however, when I entered the cathedral and, dipping my hand into the water fount, looked up to see the stained-glass window of St. Ashlar.
There was the very image of myself in the glass, clothed in a priest’s robes, with long flowing hair such as I had worn in those days, and peering down at my own true self with dark eyes so like my own they frightened me. Stunned, I read the prayer inscribed in Latin.
St. Ashlar Beloved of Christ
And the Holy Virgin Mary
Who will come again
Heal the sick
Comfort the afflicted
Ease the pangs
Of those who must die
Save us
From everlasting darkness
Drive out the demons from the valley.
Be our guide
Into the Light.
For a long time I was overcome with tears. I could not understand how this could have happened. Remembering to play the cripple still, I went to the high altar to say my prayers, and then to the tavern.
There I paid the bard to play all the old songs he knew, and none of them were familiar to me. The Pict language had died out. No one knew the writing on the crosses in the churchyard.
But this saint, what could the man tell me about him, I asked.
Was I truly Scots, the bard asked.
Had I never heard of the great pagan King Ashlar of the Picts, who had converted this entire valley to Christianity?
Had I never heard of the magic spring through which he worked his miracles? I had only to go down the hill to see it.
Ashlar the Great had built the first Christian church on this spot, in the year 586, and then set out for Rome on his first pilgrimage, being murdered by brigands before he had even left the valley.
Within the shrine his holy relics lay, the remnants of his bloody cloak, his leather belt, his crucifix, and a letter to the saint himself from none other than St. Columba. In the scriptorium I might see a psalter which Ashlar himself had written in the style of the great monastery at Iona.
“Ah, I understand it all,” I said. “But what is the meaning of this strange prayer, and the words ‘who will come again’?”
“Ah, that, well now, that’s a story. Go to Mass tomorrow morning and look well at the priest who celebrates. You will see a young man of immense height, almost as tall as yourself, and such men are not so uncommon here. But this one is Ashlar come again, they say, and they tell the most fantastic story of his birth, how he came from his mother speaking and singing, and ready to serve God, seeing visions of the Great Saint and the Holy Battle of Donnelaith and the pagan witch Janet burnt up in the fire as the town converted in spite of her.”
“This is true?” I asked, in quiet awe.
How could it be? A wild Taltos, born to humans who had no idea they carried the seed in their blood? No. It could not have been. What humans could make the Taltos together? It must have been a hybrid, sired by some mysterious giant who had come in the night and coupled with a woman cursed with the witches’ gifts, leaving her with his monster offspring.
“It has happened three times before in our history,” said the bard. “Sometimes the mother does not even know she’s with child, other times she is in her third or her fourth month. No one knows when the creature inside her shall start to grow and become the image of the saint, come again to his people.”
“And who were the fathers of these children?”
“Upstanding men of the Clan of Donnelaith, that’s who they were, for St. Ashlar was the founder of their family. But you know there are so many strange tales in these woods. Each clan has its secrets. We’re not to speak of it here, but now and then such a giant child is born who knows nothing of the Saint. I have seen one of these with my own eyes, standing a head taller than his father moments after he left his mother to die at the hearthside. A frantic thing, crying in fear, and possessed of no visions from God, but wailing for the pagan circle of stones! Poor soul. They called it a witch, a monster. And do you know