This world had been her own conception for the most part, which was why she had remained responsible for watching over its fate. While it was being created, she had devised a special, magical valley that reminded her of her own Timeless Lake. In this world it took the form of a steep-sided bowl in the midst of the great forest. In the centre was a tranquil lake with an island of dark stone that almost seemed to float upon the surface of the water. And on the island was a tower that took the form of a gigantic tree, the twin of the Cailleach’s home in the Timeless Lake.
This secret vale was sacred and steeped in magic. It was the living heart of the world she had created with her brothers and sisters. It would never change significantly down all the long ages because, no matter what should befall it, this place would always find a way to return to the original pattern: the tree-lined bowl, the lake, the isle, the tower. In this era, the Cailleach had given the tower the form of her own beloved Tree at the Heart of the World, but she knew from her Seeings that in the future, it was destined to rise and fall; to be destroyed and rebuilt a number of times and in a variety of designs - and yet, in its fundamental essence, it would always remain the Tower.
The Cailleach was snatched out of her reflections by a warning tingle that passed right through her body. Someone had entered the Vale. Furthermore, she was certain to the very core of her being that it was someone who would play a significant part in the crisis the world was facing. Was it one of the three unknown women? Had fate brought her to the Lady’s very doorstep?
On the table stood a silver bowl of crystal-clear water from the lake, and the Cailleach stooped over it eagerly, willing an image of the intruder to form. To her disappointment she could see very little detaiclass="underline" rocks, a few sparse and broken trees, and a still, dark figure lying on its face beside a large boulder. Alive? Dead? It was impossible to tell. Stifling a curse, she threw her thick cloak of black feathers, cowled and fringed with white, around her shoulders and stepped out onto the high platform at the top of the external staircase that curled around the trunk of the tower’s treelike walls. Taking a deep breath, she lifted her arms - and the shape of a woman shimmered into the form of a great eagle. She soared upwards from the ledge, revelling in the uplift as she spurned the ground; enjoying the rush of wintry air through her feathers. With her raptor’s keen vision she scanned the landscape, circling the vale until she had found the place she sought. The area was easy to recognise. A landslide had wiped the trees from a section of the valley wall, leaving a long scar of rough and stony ground in its place.
Close to the bottom of the slide, the accumulation of tumbled boulders was piled together with the splintered remnants of the trees that had been lost in the disaster. At the foot of the snowy mound, the Cailleach saw the dark blot that she sought. Landing quickly, she shimmered back into her human shape and ran towards the still form that lay sprawled in the lee of the boulder. She turned the body over carefully, and her spirits fell in disappointment. This was not one of the women she had been seeking. It was a young man, and one of the wretched slave race of humans, at that. He appeared to be on the very brink of death. How could he affect anything in the future? And yet the urgent feeling that the poor wretch would be important to her plans would not go away. Though she had no idea why, it was vital that she save his life. Casting her cloak about him, she took him up in her arms and apported him back to her tower.
The Cailleach was moved to a depth of feeling unusual for her at the sight of the pale, thin form that lay so still on the comfortable bed she had created with a careless wave of her hand. As a rule she remained aloof from the individual creatures who inhabited the world she had created, for what would be the point of involving herself with lives that sparked so briefly down the long ages? She had never bothered to study the slave race before - there had been no need - but now she decided it was time she started. When the coming upheavals took place, it looked as though the influence of the humans on the world’s future could be far greater than any of the Guardians could possibly have expected.
Furthermore, she still couldn’t shake the feeling that this particular human would be important. What she had not counted on, however, were the emotions he engendered. In the changeless Otherworld of the Timeless Lake, she had little need of such feelings, which interfered with the stillness of her meditations, so the strong sense of sympathy and concern that came over her at the sight of this pitiful, injured, helpless creature took her by surprise. So preoccupied was she with the slave, it failed to occur to her that her sojourn in this world was affecting her emotions, making them increase in strength.
Having rescued the human from the brink of death and brought him home with her to her tower, it was but a short step to convince herself that healing the pathetic creature did not really count as interfering in the events of the mundane world. If she didn’t intervene, he would perish from his injuries, and having gone to all the trouble of rescuing him, she decided that it would be ridiculous to let him die.
When it came to taking care of this new responsibility, the Cailleach, with her powers of Gramarye, had considerable advantages over a worldly rescuer, whatever their race. While he remained unconscious, she used her powers to cleanse his filthy, lice-ridden body, thinking, as she did so, that her recently acquired sense of smell was not necessarily a good thing in this case. It took her quite some time and effort to heal all his injuries: the broken bones, wrenched muscles and the skin covered in bruises and abrasions, but finally, with a sense of tremendous satisfaction, she could declare herself content with her work, and clothe her patient in a clean, white robe.
Only when these basic needs had been attended to did she start to wonder how she would manage when he awoke. No one must ever learn that a Guardian had crossed the invisible boundary into this reality, as her presence could interfere with all sorts of imponderable factors connected with the fate, self-determinism and philosophies of the indigenous races - not to mention bringing down the wrath of the other Guardians on her head. For everyone’s sake, she must persuade this young man whose life she had saved that she belonged to his world.
The Cailleach decided to present herself as a Wizard, for that would give her the widest opportunities to use her powers. To maintain the disguise, however, she would have to make some very sweeping alterations. Her tower, like her home in her Tree at the Heart of the World, consisted of one spacious, circular chamber set high above the ground. She had needed no lamps or fire, for warmth and light emanated from the very walls, and there were no furnishings save a table, a chair and a bed. So far, she had obtained all her worldly needs such as food and clothing through magic. The tower was singularly uncluttered, for whatever she needed she could simply materialise out of thin air. That would have to change.
Leaving her wanderer to the long, profound sleep of healing, the Cailleach bent all her energies to the task before her. Standing in the midst of the great, circular chamber, she pictured in her mind the changes she wished to make. There could be two sleeping chambers up here, with a general living area and a study in which she could work and meditate on the floor below. Finally, she would divide the ground floor into a large, cosy kitchen and a smaller store room for foodstuffs and other supplies, which she would have to apport in by magic before her stray awoke. The stairs should be inside, rather than around the exterior of the tower, and she would need an additional entrance at ground level. On the snowy island outside her tower, she created a garden which, though dormant at present beneath its cold, white covering, would one day have fruit trees and beehives, rows of thriving vegetables and curving beds filled with many-hued flowers. Oh, and the shape of the tower itself should change. She envisioned a tapering, elegant form, instead of the tree shape to which she was accustomed . . .