"If that is your choice, I will not prevent you," she told him. Moving to the mouth of the cave, she paused and beckoned him. "Tonight, however, you will come with me. I have something to show you."

With that, she turned on her heel and went out into the night. She waited for a moment, and when he did not come, she called him again.

Reluctantly, and with much bitter complaining, Bran emerged from the cave. It was dark, and the pathways she walked could not be seen; yet somehow her feet unerringly found the way. Bran soon stopped grumbling and concentrated instead on keeping up with the old woman and avoiding the branches that reached out and slapped at him.

They walked for some time, and as Bran began to tire, much of the anger dissipated. "Where are we going?" he asked at last, sweating now, slightly winded. "Is it much farther? If it is, I need to rest."

"No," she told him, "just over the top of the next rise."

Sighing heavily, he moved on-trudging along, head down, hands loose, feet dragging. They mounted the long, rising incline of a ridge, at the crest of which the trees thinned around them. Once over the ridgetop, the ground sloped away sharply, and Bran found himself standing at the edge of the forest, looking down into a shallow, bowlshaped valley barely discernible in the light of a pale half-moon just clearing the treetops to the southeast.

"So this is what you dragged me out here to see?" he asked. His eyes caught a gleam of light below, and then another.

As he looked down into the valley, he began seeing more lights tiny flecks, glints and shards of light, moving slowly over the surface of the ground in a weird, slow dance.

"What-," he began, stopped, and gaped again. "In the name of Saint Dafyd, what is that?"

"It is happening all over Elfael," Angharad said, indicating the night-dark land with a wide sweep of her arm. "It is the May Dance."

"The May Dance," repeated Bran without understanding.

"Your people are ploughing their fields."

"Ploughing! By night?" he said, turning toward her. "Why? And why so late in the season?"

"They are made to labour for Count de Braose all day," the old woman explained. "Night is the only time they have to put in the crops. So they toil by lantern light, planting the fields."

"But it is too late," Bran pointed out. "The crops will never mature to harvest before winter."

"That is likely," Angharad agreed, "but starvation is assured if they do nothing." She turned once more to the slowly swinging lights glimmering across the valley. "They dance with death," she said. "What else can they do?"

Bran stiffened at the words. He gazed at the moving lights and felt his anger rising.

"Why did you show me this?" he shouted suddenly.

"So that you will know."

"And what am I supposed to do about it?" he said. "Tell me that. What am I supposed to do?"

"Help them," Angharad said softly.

"No! Not me! I can do nothing!" he insisted. Turning away abruptly, he strode off, retreating back into the forest. "I am leaving tomorrow," he shouted over his shoulder, "and nothing you say can stop me!"

Angharad watched him for a moment; then, turning her face to the sky, she murmured, "You see? You see how it is with him? Everything is a fight. A wild boar would be less headstrong-and more charming." She paused, as if listening to an unheard voice, then sighed. "Your servant obeys."

Retracing her steps, she made her way back to the cave.

Determined to make good his vow, Bran rose at dawn to bid Angharad farewell. A night's sleep had softened his mood, if not his resolve. He regretted shouting at her and sought to make amends. He said kindly, "I will be forever grateful to you for saving my life. I will never forget you."

"Nor I you, Master Bran."

He smiled at her use of the disdained name. Unable to put words to the volatile mix of emotions churning in his heart, he stood silent for a moment lest he say something he would regret, then turned to collect his bow and arrows. "Well, I will go now."

"If that is your choice."

Glancing around quickly, he said, "You know that I do not wish to leave this way."

"Oh, I believe you do," the old woman replied. "This is your way, and you are ever used to having your way in all things. Why should this leaving be different from any other?"

Her reproach annoyed him afresh, but he had promised himself that nothing she could say would change his mind or alter his course. "Why do you torment me this way?" he said in a tone heavy with resignation. "What do you want from me?"

"What do I want?" she threw back at him. "Only this-I want you to be the man you were born to be."

"How do you know what I was born to be?"

"You were born to be a king," Angharad replied simply. "You were born to lead your people. Beyond that, God only knows."

"King!" raged Bran, lashing out with a fury that surprised even himself. "My father was the king. He was a heavy-handed tyrant who thought only of himself and how the world had wronged him. You want me to be like him?"

"Not like him," Angharad countered. "Better." She held the young man with her uncompromising gaze. "Hear me now, Bran ap Brychan. You are not your father. You could be twice the king he was-and ten times the man-if you so desired."

"And you hear me, Angharad!" said Bran, his voice rising with his temper. "I do not want to be king!"

The old woman's eyes searched his face. "What did he do to you, Master Bran, that you fear it so?"

"I am not afraid," he insisted. "It is just…" His voice faltered. How could he express a lifetime of hurt and humiliation, of need and neglect, in mere words?

"I don't want it. I never wanted it," he said, turning away from the old woman at last. "Find someone else."

"There is no one else, Master Bran," she said. "Without a king, the people will die. Elfael will die."

Bran uttered an inarticulate growl of frustration and, turning away again, strode quickly to the cave entrance. "Farewell, Angharad. I will remember you."

"Go your way, Master Bran. But if you think about me at all, remember only this: a raven you are, and a raven you will remainuntil you fulfil your vow."

Bran stopped in the cave entrance and gave a bitter laugh. "I made no vow, Angharad," he said, her name a slur in his mouth. "Just you remember that."

With swift strides, his long legs carried him from the cave. Angry and determined to put as much distance as possible between himself and Angharad's unreasonable expectations, he walked far into the forest before it occurred to him that he had not the slightest idea where he was going. As many times as he had been out gathering materials to make arrows, he had paid little heed to directions and pathways; and last night when Angharad led him to the valley overlook-from which he would certainly be able to find his way it had been dark and the pathway unseen.

Already tired, he stopped walking and sat down on a fallen log to rest and think the matter through. The simplest solution, of course, would be to return to the cave and demand that Angharad lead him to the valley. That smacked too much of humiliation, and he rejected the idea outright. He would exhaust all other possibilities before confronting that disagreeable old hag again.

After trying to work out a direction from the sun, he rose from his perch and set off once more. This time, he walked more slowly and tried to spy out any familiar features that might guide him. Although he found no end of pathways-runs used by deer and wild pigs, and even an old charcoal burners' trackway-the trails were so intertwined and tangled, crossing over one another, circling back, and crossing again, that he only succeeded in disorienting himself further.

He moved with more deliberate care now, reading direction from the moss on the trees. Certainly, he thought, if he kept moving north, he would eventually reach the high, open heathlands, and beyond them the mountains. All he had to do was get clear of the trees.