Chapter 17

CHAPTER 17

THE CEREMONY

Lilly sat on a carved wooden stool while Gurta worked on her hair. The morning had been wonderfully normal compared to the last few day’s, mornfood in the courtyard with Morii, a wonderful hot bath and now Gurta fussing around Lilly like she was the most important of people.

‘There ye be Lady Lilly, all done’ Gurta exclaimed, standing back from Lilly to examine her handiwork. She had a beautiful smile on her face and stood clasping her hands together in front of her.

‘Gurta, it looks amazing,’ Lilly told the old woman as she turned her head slowly from side to side trying to get a better look. Gurta had woven many small braids at each side of Lilly’s head, these were then looped under Lilly’s ears and caught up on top of her head in silver and dirrand stone dragonfly clips. On the ends of the braids were tiny silver beads, which jingled slightly as Lilly moved. The main bulk of her hair at the back had been braided with silver ribbon threaded through and ten small white flowers inserted at intervals all the way to the bottom. Lilly had never seen anything so intricate in hairstyles before, the overall effect was that of dragonflies flying amongst flowers.

‘If my lady would like to come to the clothing room’ Gurta said, still beaming. Lilly stood up and followed Gurta down the hall. After another half hour of Gurta’s attention, Lilly was ready. Gurta had disappeared and now, alone for a few moments, she stood looking at herself in the long mirror in her room, dressed in the white ceremonial robe of softest shimmering gauzy material, with her hair prepared and soft white leather slippers, Lilly thought she looked like some kind of beautiful ghost or fairy creature and could not begin to imagine what the atmosphere of this very special occasion would be like. She felt positively tingly with excitement.

A noise behind her broke Lilly’s trance, she turned to see Gurta holding Pel. Pel had been washed and brushed and had a collar of silver and dirrand stone beads around his small neck. Gurta was robed in a shimmering gauzy white robe with a fine embroidered veil over her silvery white hair.  ‘Oh Pel! Oh Gurta!’ Lilly exclaimed, ‘ye both look so beautiful.’ Pel smiled and told Lilly that she looked more than beautiful.

Together they left Lilly’s rooms and went down to the main courtyard.

Lilly was amazed to see everyone dressed in white and silver, but with subtle differences, either the embroidered designs were different or the shape of the robe was slightly fuller. There was a hushed and excited air about the place as the people of the Kort greeted each other and got into small groups of ten or twelve. Just as Lilly was wondering what she should do next, everyone went quiet and looked toward the main hall entrance. Two of the court workers, dressed in the ceremonial white, opened the double doors and bowed low over their shoes. A tinkling of bells began, followed by slow, very soft drum beat. Gurta got hold of Lilly’s hand and escorted her towards the doors, everyone else in the courtyard fell into place behind them.

As Lilly watched, King Litan and Queen Lewold appeared through the doors, followed by Morii and Leekan the Gamray with Sardor and all of Gamray’s aides. They stopped for a moment and Morii held out his arm to Lilly. What a sight this party was, all of the Hah-rold were dressed in the most exquisite white, shimmering gauze robes, embroidered in golden thread with flowers or animals or insects. Leekan was being carried by his aides on a pure white litter with silver bells attached to each corner. Sardor was walking in front of Leekan or Gamray carrying a small white drum from which dangled more strings of tinkling silver bells. He beat a soft, compelling rhythm which just made Lilly want to walk in time to it.

Lilly went to Morii’s side and put her hand, palm facing upward onto Morii’s forearm as she had been directed to do by Gurta earlier that morn. She then held out her other hand and turned that palm upwards too. This was how they walked, very slowly and carefully to Sardor’s drum beat all the way into the city square. A chain of gliding, white clad folk, palms facing skyward resting on each others arms. Not a sound other than the jingling of small bells and that one continuous drum beat could be heard, their feet made no noise as they were all wearing the soft leather slippers and even their clothes, gossamer fine, made no rustling as they walked.

Lilly had no idea what time of day it was, Gamray’s daughter seemed fairly low in the sky, so she assumed it must be late afternoon. As they approached the main square, Lilly was surprised that no other Norsonians were around, the city was totally empty. The entire place had been decorated with bunches of white flowers, which were attached to anything that would hold them. There were white paper lanterns strung around the trees and buildings and bunches of lightin bush were in wrought iron holders, staked into the ground all around the green. At the far end of the green, a stage had been erected, this was covered in white flowers. Tables swathed in more white gauzy material littered every inch of the streets. It looked like a gigantic street party which nobody was attending.

At the foot of the steps leading up to the city meeting hall the procession came to a halt. The drum beat stopped. King Litan and Queen Lewold parted and stood either side of the steps as did Morii and Lilly and then everyone else, men and boys on one side, women and girls on the other. Sardor struck up the beat once more and Gamray was carried into the meeting hall.

Merging together again everyone followed quietly behind. Inside the meeting hall, Lilly could smell the slightly sweet smell of burning lightin bush, as her eyes adjusted to the light she realised why no one was outside. There were many thousands of Norsonians in here, and somehow the far wall now seemed to be about a mile away. (Lilly would discover later that the meeting hall had been opened up at the back to make it twice the size of the huge hall she had been in before), Slowly they progressed toward the end of the hall, passing hundreds of folk all dressed in white, each with their own embroidered handiwork that had taken some a lifetime to complete.

As they neared the raised platform at the far end of the hall, Lilly could see a white painted longboat with a carved dragonfly at the front. Laying on the boat was the body of old Gamray, wrapped in a silver cloak and adorned with red lilies, this was the only splash of colour in the entire place.

Sardor walked up onto the platform and positioned himself behind old Gamray’s longboat. Leekan was set down to one side of old Gamray, surrounded by his aides and Lilly, Morii, King Litan and Queen Lewold stood at the other side of the longboat.

Sardor had begun the drum beat again and now quickened the pace until it was almost impossible to distinguish the separate beats. Then, silence. Everybody stood and Leekan levitated himself up and over old Gamray, until he hovered about a metre above the old Gamray’s head. Leekan’s wonderful blue aura began to spread around him as he opened his eyes and seemed to gaze around taking in every Norsonian face within the great hall.

Suddenly Sardor began speaking, it was an old Norsonian chant in a language that Lilly had never heard and could not understand, but she guessed it was the story of old Gamray’s life, as Gurta had told her would take place. It was a saga and Lilly could hardly believe she was hearing this for herself. Although she could not understand the language, the sound was soft and beautiful and all the time Leekan gazed out over the crowd. At the end of the saga, Sardor bowed and everyone turned up their palms sky bound and said as one, ‘our love go with ye Gamray.’

Leekan then rose another couple of metres above old Gamray and his blue aura light began to funnel down toward the longboat. Just as it reached old Gamray’s lifeless body it was joined by a stream of bright red light coming up from the red lilies surrounding old Gamray, the two streams of light entwined with each other and seemed to dance and flicker, shooting out tiny fingers of purple as they mixed in the air. The colours now appearing were of such intensity that Lilly could not take her eyes off them. Then the beautiful singing started, quietly at first and built up to a tremendously loud, all surrounding sound that seemed to invade every part of Lilly’s head and body. It was like standing under a freezing cold shower and sunbathing in the warmest sun all at the same time. Lilly could feel electricity all around her, the mix of colours and the music was so intensely beautiful that she almost wanted it to stop, it was almost unbearable, but not quite.

Lilly was also most certain that she was not breathing air, but seeming to absorb oxygen through every pore of her skin, she was powerless to do anything while Gamray’s music of love filled her ears and the colours of the aura filled her eyes.

Quite suddenly the music stopped and Lilly felt her lungs suck in a giant breath, like she’d been under water for just too long. All around her she could hear others doing the same thing. Lilly looked around, some of the lightin bushes were snuffing out. Now there was a soft glow and she could just make out Morii’s features as he smiled at her.

Sardor’s voice boomed out,

‘ People and creatures of speech of Norsonia, our old Gamray has passed and will shortly make his final journey. Ye have a new Gamray who shall love and protect ye all. He has instilled in yer hearts his love. He has given yer minds his peace. Ye bathe in the light of his goodness and ye sleep in the safety of his power. Yay good Norsonians ye may sing yer praises of our new and beloved Gamray.’

With that said, every Norsonian started singing as Gamray closed his eyes and began to raise up old Gamray’s longboat.

The tune was simple and chant like, the words were;

‘Gamray giver of peace and love

Shine on us from up above

Sing to us of loving ways

Be amongst us all our days.’

As the longboat glided down the middle of the meeting hall, about two metres off the ground, followed by the floating Gamray and the Hah-rold party, the Norsonians began to sing their chant as a round. Firstly the children, then the women and finally the men joined in, it sounded very sweet with a wonderful harmony. As the boat passed, more and more people filed out of their rows and in behind the royal party and followed them and the two Gamray’s outside. The huge procession moved slowly down to the shore of the great lake where Gamray, by sheer mind power, manoeuvred and lowered the white longboat onto the still water. Slowly the shore line filled with Norsonians holding lightin bush torches, their gauzy robes billowing slightly from the soft breeze in the twilight. Finally the song ended with the men finishing the last line alone.

Sardor stepped forward as the new Gamray floated down beside him. Sardor held up his torch to the night sky and pointed to the eastern horizon. Everyone held up their torches as Sardor called out,

 ‘Go Gamray, go to yer son who rises in the East, go to Valhalla and in the morning of yer wakening ye will greet yer daughter and all of ye will be as one.’

With these words spoken he threw his lighting bush torch onto the longboat. The new Gamray raised his arms and dozens more lighting bush torches rose into the air out of peoples hands and threw themselves at the longboat. The boat started to blaze and when Gamray blew gently in it’s direction the white longboat moved slowly eastwards towards the centre of the lake.

Lilly and the others stood and watched as the boat flared up and burned under the newly risen moon of Gamray’s son.

Morii got hold of Lilly’s hand and gave it a gentle squeeze. ‘What did ye think of our taking and making ceremony Lilly?’ he asked in a low voice. Lilly took a moment to think of how to answer. ‘It was the most amazing and utterly fantastic thing I have ever seen,’ was her reply, she had tears in her eyes and a lump in her throat. She felt as happy and as sad as she had ever felt, all at the same time.

Morii put an arm around her shoulders and hugged her tight. ‘Poor Lilly, ye have had much to learn and to see and to do. I do believe ye are in need of comfort and refreshment, so let us not delay further, but come ye into the square and we shall have a jolly time.’ With that Morii pulled Lilly back toward the city square, where everyone else was now heading and Lilly gladly went.