Legacy: Arthurian Saga (109 page)

"I had not heard that. Then there'll
be fighting before winter?"

He nodded. "Before the month is out.
That's why I am here, Maelgon stays on the Irish Shore, but the
danger is not on the west; not yet. The attack will come from east
and north."

"Ah." I smiled. "Then certain things
will be made clear very soon, I think."

He had been watching me intently. Now
his mouth relaxed, and he nodded again. "You see it? Of course you
do. Yes, one good thing may come out of this clash -- Lot must
declare himself. If, as rumor has it, he has been making advances
to the Saxons, then he will have to declare for Colgrim. If he
wants Morgian, and the High Kingdom along with her, he'll have to
fight for Uther." He laughed with genuine amusement. "It's Octa's
death that has brought Colgrim raging straight across the German
Sea, and forced Lot's hand. If he'd waited for the spring, Lot
would have had Morgian, and could have received Colgrim too, and
used the Saxons to set himself up as High King, like Vortigern
before him. As it is, we shall see."

"Where is the King?" I
asked.

"On his way north. He should be at
Luguvallium within the week."

"He'll lead the field
himself?"

"He intends to, though as you know
he's a sick man. It seems that Colgrim may have forced Uther's
hand, too. I think he will send for Arthur now. I think he will
have to."

"Whether he sends or not," I said,
"Arthur will be there." I saw the excitement spring to Cador's face
again, and asked him: "Will you give him escort, Duke?"

"Willingly, by God! You'll come with
him?"

I said: "After this, where he is, I
am."

"And you'll be needed," he said
meaningly. "Pray God Uther has not left it too late. Even with
proof of Arthur's parentage, and the King's own sword fast in his
hand, it won't be easy to persuade the nobles to declare for an
untried boy...And Lot's faction will fight back every foot of the
way. Better to take them by surprise, like this. The boy will need
all you can throw into the scale for him."

I smiled. "He can throw in quite a lot
himself. He's to be reckoned with, Cador, make no mistake. He's no
kingmaker's toy."

He grinned. "You don't need to tell me
that. Did you know he was more like you than ever like the
King?"

I spoke with my eyes on the glittering
surface of the lake. "I think it is my sword, not Uther's, which
will carry him to the kingship."

He sat up sharply. "Yes. That sword.
Where in middle-earth did he find that sword?"

"On Caer Bannog."

His eyes widened. "He went there?
Then, by God, he's welcome to it and all it brings him! I'd not
have dared! What took him there?"

"He went to save the hound. It had
been given him by his friend. You might call it chance that took
him there."

"Oh, aye. The same kind of chance that
brought me along the lakeside today, to find a poor hermit, and a
boy called Ambrosius, who holds a sword which might well befit a
king?"

"Or an emperor," I said. "It's the
sword of Macsen Wledig,"

"So?" He drew in his breath. I saw the
same look in his eyes as there had been in the Cornish troopers'
when I spoke of the enchanted island. "This was the claim you were
speaking of? You found that sword for him? You cast your net wide,
Merlin."

"I cast no net. I go with the
time."

"Yes. I see." He drew another long
breath, and looked about him as if he saw the day for the first
time, with all its sunlight and moving breezes and the island
floating on the water. "And now for you, and for him and all of us,
the time is come?"

"I think so. He found the sword where
I had laid it, and you came, hard on its finding. All the year the
King has been urged to make proclamation and he has done nothing.
So instead, we will do it. You lie tonight at Galava?"

"Yes." He sat up, pushing the dagger
home in its sheath with a rap. "You'll join us there? We ride at
sun-up."

"I shall be there tonight," I said,
"and Arthur with me. Today he stays with me in the forest. We have
things to say to one another."

He looked at me curiously. "He knows
nothing yet?"

"Nothing," I said. "I promised the
King."

"Then until the King speaks publicly,
I'll see he learns nothing. Some of my men may suspect, but they
are all loyal. You needn't fear them."

I got to my feet, and he followed
suit. He raised a hand to his watching officer in the distance. I
heard the words of command, and the sounds of the troop mounting.
They rode towards us along the lakeside.

"You have a horse?" asked Cador. "Or
shall I leave one with you now?"

"Thank you, no. I have one. I'll walk
back to the chapel when I'm ready. There's something I have to do
first."

He looked again at the sunlit forest,
the still lake, the dreaming hills, as if power or magic must be
ready to fall on me from their light. "Something still to do?
Here?"

"Indeed." I picked up the fishing rod.
"I still have to catch my dinner, and for two now, instead of one.
And see, this day of days has even produced a breeze for me. If
Arthur can lift the sword of Maximus from the lake, surely I shall
be granted at least two decent fish?"

9

Ralf met me at the edge of the
clearing, but we could not have much talk, because Arthur was
nearby, sitting in the sun on the chapel steps, with Cabal at his
feet. I told Ralf quickly what he must do. He was to ride down now
to the castle and tell Drusilla what had happened, that Arthur was
safe with me, and that we would join Duke Cador on the ride north
tomorrow. A message was to go ahead to Count Ector, and one to the
King. Meanwhile Ralf was to ask the Countess to arrange with Abbot
Martin to have the shrine tended during my absence.

"And are you going to tell him now?"
asked Ralf.

"No. It's for Uther to tell
him."

"Don't you think he may guess already,
after what happened down yonder? He's been silent ever since, but
with a look to him as if he'd been given more than a sword. What is
that sword, Merlin?"

"It's said that Weland Smith himself
made it, long ago. What is sure is that the Emperor Maximus used
it, and that his men brought it home for the King of
Britain."

"That one? And he tells me he found it
on Caer Bannog...I begin to see...And now you take him to the King.
Are you trying to force Uther's hand? Do you think the King will
accept him?"

"I am sure of it. Uther must claim him
now. I think we may find that he has sent for him already. You'd
better go, Ralf. There'll be time to talk later. You'll ride with
us, of course."

"You think I'd let you leave me
behind?" He spoke gaily, but I could see that he was torn between
relief and regret; on the one hand the knowledge that the long
watch was over, on the other, that Arthur would now be taken from
his care and committed to mine and the King's. But there was
happiness, too, that he would soon be back in the press of affairs
in an open position of trust, and able to wield his sword against
the kingdom's enemies. He saluted me, smiling, then turned and rode
off down the tracks towards Galava.

The hoofbeats faded down through the
forest. Sunlight poured into the clearing. The last of the
waterdrops had vanished from the pines, and the smell of resin
filled the air. A thrush was singing somewhere. Late harebells were
thick among the grass, and small blue butterflies moved over the
white flowers of the blackberry. There was a hive of wild bees
under the roof of the chapel; their humming filled the air, the
sound of summer's end. Through a man's life there are milestones,
things he remembers even into the hour of his death. God knows that
I have had more than a man's share of rich memories; the lives and
deaths of kings, the coming and going of gods, the founding and
destroying of kingdoms. But it is not always these great events
that stick in the mind: here, now, in this final darkness, it is
the small times that come back to me most vividly, the quiet human
moments which I should like to live again, rather than the flaming
times of power. I can still see, how clearly, the golden sunlight
of that quiet afternoon. There is the sound of the spring, and the
falling liquid of the thrush's song, the humming of the wild bees,
the sudden flurry of the white hound scratching for fleas, and the
sizzling sound of cooking where Arthur knelt over the wood fire,
turning the trout on a spit of hazel, his face solemn, exalted,
calm, lighted from within by whatever it is that sets such men
alight. It was his beginning, and he knew it.

He did not ask me much, though a
thousand questions must have been knocking at his lips. I think he
knew, without knowing how, that we were on the threshold of events
too great for talk. There are some things that one hesitates to
bring down into words. Words change an idea by definitions too
precise, meanings too hung about with the references of every
day.We ate in silence. I was wondering how to tell him, without
breaking my promise to Uther, that I proposed to take him with me
to the King. I thought that Ralf was wrong; the boy did not begin
to guess the truth; but he must be wondering about the events of
the day, not only the sword, but what there was between myself and
Cador, and why Ralf had been so handled. But he said nothing, not
even asking why Ralf had gone away and left him here alone with me.
He seemed content with the moment. The angry little skirmish down
by the lake might never have been.

We ate in the open air, and when we
had finished, Arthur, without a word, removed the dishes and
brought water in a bowl for me to wash with. Then he settled beside
me on the chapel steps, lacing the fingers of his hands round one
knee. The thrush still sang. Blue and shadowed, and misty with
presence, the hills brooded, chin on knees, round the valley. I
felt myself crowded already by the forces that waited
there.

"The sword," he said. "You knew it was
there, of course."

"Yes, I knew."

"He said...He called you an
enchanter?" There was the faintest of queries in his voice. He
wasn't looking at me. He sat on the step below me, head bent,
looking down at the fingers laced round his knee. "You knew that.
You have seen me use magic."

"Yes. The first time I came here, when
you showed me the sword in the stone altar, and I thought it was
real..." He stopped abruptly, and his head came up. His voice was
sharp with discovery. "It was real! This is the one, isn't it? The
one the stone sword was carved from? Isn't it? Isn't
it?"

"Yes."

"What sword is it,
Myrddin?"

"Do you remember my telling you -- you
and Bedwyr -- the story of Macsen Wledig?"

"Yes, I remember it well. You said
that was the sword carved in the altar here." Again that note of
discovery. "This is the same? His very sword?"

"Yes."

"How did it come there, on the
island?" I said: "I put it there, years back. I brought it from the
place where it had been hidden." He turned fully then, and looked
at me. A long look. "You mean you found it? It's your
sword?"

"I didn't say that."

"You found it by magic?
Where?"

"I can't tell you that, Emrys. Someday
you may need to search for the place yourself."

"Why should I?"

"I don't know. But a man's first need
is a sword, to use against life, and conquer it. Once it is
conquered, and he is older, he needs other food, for the
spirit..."

After a bit I heard him say, softly:
"What are you seeing, Myrddin?"

"I was seeing a settled and shining
land, with corn growing rich in the valleys, and farmers working
their fields in peace as they did in the time of the Romans. I was
seeing a sword growing idle and discontented, and the days of peace
stretching into bickering and division, and the need of a quest for
the idle swords and the unfed spirits. Perhaps it was for this that
the god took the grail and the spear back from me and hid them in
the ground, so that one day you might set out to find the rest of
Macsen's treasure. No, not you, but Bedwyr...It is his spirit, not
yours, which will hunger and thirst, and slake itself in the wrong
fountains."

As if from far away, I heard my own
voice die, and silence come back. The thrush had flown, the bees
seemed quiet. The boy was on his feet now, and staring. He said,
with all the force of simplicity: "Who are you?"

"My name is Myrddin Emrys, but I am
known as Merlin the enchanter."

"Merlin? But then -- but that means
you are -- you were -- " He stopped, and swallowed.

"Merlinus Ambrosius, son of Ambrosius
the High King? Yes."

He stood silent for a long time. I
could see him thinking back, remembering, assessing. Not guessing
about himself -- he had been too deeply rooted, and for too long,
in the person of Ector's bastard fosterson. And, like everyone else
in the kingdom, he assumed that the prince was being royally reared
in some court beyond the sea. He spoke at length quietly, but with
such a kind of inward force and joy that one wondered how he could
contain it. What he said surprised me. "Then the sword was yours.
You found it, not I. I was only sent to bring it to you. It is
yours. I will get it for you now."