Legacy: Arthurian Saga (55 page)

"Of course they are still here. They
cannot go without my leave."

"I see. Has anything yet been said
between you and Gorlois?"

"No."

"But he must know."

"It is the same with him as with me.
If once this thing comes to words, nothing can stop it. And it is
the crowning tomorrow. I cannot speak with him."

"Or with her?"

"No. No. Ah, God, Merlin, I cannot
come near her. She is guarded like Danaë." I frowned. "He has her
guarded, then? Surely that's unusual enough to be a public
admission that there's something wrong?"

"I only mean that his servants are all
round her, and his men. Not only his bodyguard -- many of his
fighting troops are still here, that were with us in the north. I
can only come near her in public, Merlin. They will have told you
this."

"Yes. Have you managed to get any
message to her privately?"

"No. She guards herself. All day she
is with her women, and her servants keep the doors. And he -- " He
paused. There was sweat on his face. "He is with her every
night."

He flung away again with a swish of
the velvet robe, and paced, soft-footed, the length of the room,
into the shadows beyond the firelight. Then he turned. He threw out
his hands and spoke simply, like a boy.

"Merlin, what shall I do?"

I crossed to the fire-place, picked up
the jug and poured two goblets of the spiced wine. I held one out
to him. "To begin with, come and sit down. I cannot talk to a
whirlwind. Here."

He obeyed, sinking back in the big
chair with the goblet between his hands. I drank my own,
gratefully, and sat down on the other side of the
hearth.

Uther did not drink. I think he hardly
knew what he had between his hands. He stared at the fire through
the thinning steam from the goblet. "As soon as he brought her in
and presented her to me, I knew. God knows that at first I thought
it was no more than another passing fever, the kind I've had a
thousand times before, only this time a thousand stronger
--"

"And been cured of," I said, "in a
night, a week of nights, a month. I don't know the longest time a
woman has ever held you, Uther, but is a month, or even three,
enough to wreck a kingdom for?"

The look he gave me, blue as a
sword-flash, was a look from the old Uther I remembered. "By Hades,
why do you think I sent for you? I could have wrecked my kingdom
any time in these past weeks had I been so minded. Why do you think
it has not yet gone beyond folly? Oh, yes, I admit there has been
folly, but I tell you this is a fever, and not the kind I have had
before, and slaked before. This burns me so that I cannot sleep.
How can I rule and fight and deal with men if I cannot
sleep?"

"Have you taken a girl to
bed?"

He stared, then he drank. "Are you
mad?"

"Forgive me, it was a stupid question.
You don't sleep even then?"

"No." He set down the goblet beside
him, and knitted his hands together. "It's no use. Nothing is any
use. You must bring her to me, Merlin. You have the arts. This is
why I sent for you. You are to bring her to me so that no one
knows. Make her love me. Bring her here to me, while he is asleep.
You can do it."

"Make her love you? By magic? No,
Uther, this is something that magic cannot do. You must know
that."

"It is something that every old wife
swears she can do. And you -- you have power beyond any man living.
You lifted the Hanging Stones. You lifted the king-stone where
Tremorinus could not."

"My mathematics are better, that is
all. For God's sake, Uther, whatever men say of that, you know how
it was done. That was no magic."

"You spoke with my brother as he died.
Are you going to deny that now?"

"No."

"Or that you swore to serve me when I
needed you?"

"No."

"I need you now. Your power, whatever
it is. Dare you tell me that you are not a magician?"

"I am not the kind that can walk
through walls," I said, "and bring bodies through locked doors." He
made a sudden movement, and I saw the feverish brightness of his
eyes, not this time with anger, but I thought with pain. I added:
"But I have not refused to help you."

The eyes sparked. "You will help
me?"

"Yes, I will help you. I told you when
last we met that there would come a time when we must deal
together. This is the time. I don't know yet what I must do, but
this will be shown to me, and the outcome is with the god. But one
thing I can do for you, tonight. I can make you sleep. No, be still
and listen...If you are to be crowned tomorrow, and take Britain
into your hands, tonight you will do as I say. I will make you a
drink that will let you sleep, and you'll take a girl to your bed
as usual. It may be better if there is someone besides your servant
who will swear you were in your own chamber."

"Why? What are you going to do?" His
voice was strained. "I shall try to talk with Ygraine." He sat
forward, his hands tight on the arms of the chair. "Yes. Talk to
her. Perhaps you can come to her where I cannot. Tell her
--"

"A moment. A little while back you
told me to 'make her love you.' You want me to invoke any power
there is to bring her to you. If you have never spoken to her of
your love, or seen her except in public, how do you know she would
come to you, even if the way were free? Is her mind clear to you,
my lord King?"

"No. She says nothing. She smiles,
with her eyes on the ground, and says nothing. But I know. I know.
It is as if all the other times I played at love were only single
notes. Put together, they make the song. She is the
song."

There was a silence. Behind him, on a
dais in the corner of the room, was the bed, with the covers drawn
back ready. Above it, leaping up the wall, was a great dragon
fashioned of red gold. In the firelight it moved, stretching its
claws.

He said suddenly: "When we last
talked, there in the middle of the Hanging Stones, you said you
wanted nothing from me. But by all the gods, Merlin, if you help me
now, if I get her, and in safety, then you can ask what you will. I
swear it."

I shook my head, and he said no more.
I think he saw that I was no longer thinking of him; that other
forces pressed me, crowding the firelit room. The dragon flamed and
shimmered up the dark wall. In its shadow another moved, merging
with it, flame into flame. Something struck at my eyes, pain like a
claw. I shut them, and there was silence. When I opened them again
the fire had died, and the wall was dark. I looked across at the
King, motionless in his chair, watching me. I said, slowly: "I will
ask you one thing, now."

"Yes?"

"That when I bring you to her in
safety, you shall make a child." Whatever he had expected, it was
not this. He stared, then, suddenly, laughed. "That's with the
gods, surely?"

"Yes, it is with God." He stretched
back in his chair, as if a weight had been lifted off his
shoulders. "If I come to her, Merlin, I promise you that whatever I
have power to do, I shall do. And anything else you bid me. I shall
even sleep tonight." I stood up. "Then I shall go and make the
draught and send it to you."

"And you'll see her?"

"I shall see her. Good
night."

Ulfin was half asleep on his feet
outside the door. He blinked at me as I came out.

"I'm to go in now?"

"In a minute. Come to my chamber first
and I'll give you a drink for him. See he takes it. It's to give
him sleep. Tomorrow will be a long day."

There was a girl asleep in a corner,
wrapped in a blue blanket on a huddle of pillows. As we passed I
saw the curve of a bare shoulder and a tumble of straight brown
hair. She looked very young.

I raised my brows at Ulfin, and he
nodded, then jerked his head towards the shut door with a look of
enquiry.

"Yes," I said, "but later. When you
take him the drink. Leave her sleeping now. You look as if you
could do with some sleep yourself, Ulfin."

"If he sleeps tonight I might get
some." He gave a flicker of a grin at me. "Make it strong, won't
you, my lord? And see it tastes good."

"Oh, he'll drink it, never
fear."

"I wasn't thinking of him," said
Ulfin. "I was thinking of me."

"Of you? Ah, I see, you mean you'll
have to taste it first?" He nodded. "You have to try everything?
His meals? Even love potions?"

"Love potions? For him?" He stared,
open-mouthed. Then he laughed. "Oh, you're joking!" I smiled. "I
wanted to see if you could laugh. Here we are. Wait now, I won't be
a minute." Cadal was waiting for me by the fire in my chamber. This
was a comfortable room in the curve of a tower wall, and Cadal had
kept a bright fire burning and a big cauldron of water steaming on
the iron dogs. He had got out a woollen bedgown for me and laid it
ready across the bed.

Over a chest near the window lay a
pile of clothes, a shimmer of gold cloth and scarlet and fur.
"What's that?" I asked, as I sat down to let him draw off my
shoes.

"The King sent a robe for tomorrow, my
lord." Cadal, with an eye on the boy who was pouring the bath, was
formal. I noticed the boy's hand shaking a little, and water
splashed on the floor. As soon as he had finished, obedient to a
jerk of Cadal's head, he scuttled out.

"What's the matter with that
boy?"

"It isn't every night you prepare a
bath for a wizard."

"For God's sake. What have you been
telling him?"

"Only that you'd turn him into a bat
if he didn't serve you well."

"Fool. No, a moment, Cadal. Bring me
my box. Ulfin's waiting outside. I promised to make up a draught."
Cadal obeyed me. "What's the matter? His arm still bad?"

"It's not for him. For the
King."

"Ah." He made no further comment, but
when the thing was done and Ulfin had gone, and I was stripping for
the bath, he asked: "It's as bad as they say?"

"Worse." I gave him a brief version of
my conversation with the King. He heard me out, frowning. "And
what's to do now?"

"Find some way to see the lady. No,
not the bedgown; not yet, alas. Get me a clean robe out --
something dark."

"Surely you can't go to her tonight?
It's well past midnight."

"I shall not go anywhere. Whoever is
coming, will come to me."

"But Gorlois will be with her
--"

"No more now, Cadal. I want to think.
Leave me. Good night." When the door had shut on him I went across
to the chair beside the fire. It was not true that I wanted time to
think. All I needed was silence, and the fire. Bit by bit, slowly,
I emptied my mind, feeling thought spill out of me like sand from a
glass, to leave me hollow and light. I waited, my hands slack on
the grey robe, open, empty. It was very quiet. Somewhere, from a
dark corner of the room, came the dry tick of old wood settling in
the night. The fire flickered. I watched it, but absently, as any
man might watch the flames for comfort on a cold night. I did not
need to dream. I lay, light as a dead leaf, on the flood that ran
that night to meet the sea.

Outside the door there were sounds
suddenly, voices. A quick tap at the panel, and Cadal came in,
shutting the door behind him. He looked guarded and a little
apprehensive. "Gorlois?" I asked. He swallowed, then
nodded.

"Well, show him in."

"He asked if you had been to see the
King. I said you'd been here barely a couple of hours, and you had
had time to see nobody. Was that right?"

I smiled. "You were guided. Let him
come in now." Gorlois came in quickly, and I rose to greet him.
There was, I thought, as big a change in him as I had seen in
Uther; his big frame was bent, and for the first time one saw
straight away that he was old. He brushed aside the ceremony of my
greeting. "You're not abed yet? They told me you'd ridden
in."

"Barely in time for the crowning, but
I shall see it after all. Will you sit, my lord?"

"Thanks, but no. I came for your help,
Merlin, for my wife." The quick eyes peered under the grey brows.
"Aye, no one could ever tell what you were thinking, but you've
heard, haven't you?"

"There was talk," I said carefully,
"but then there always was talk about Uther. I have not heard
anyone venture a word against your wife."

"By God, they'd better not! However,
it's not that I've come about tonight. There's nothing you could do
about that -- though it's possible you're the only person who could
talk some sense into the King. You'll not get near him now till
after the crowning, but if you could get him to let us go back to
Cornwall without waiting for the end of the feast...Would you do
that for me?"

"If I can."

"I knew I could count on you. With
things the way they are in the town just now, it's hard to know
who's a friend. Uther's not an easy man to gainsay. But you could
do it -- and what's more, you'd dare. You're your father's son, and
for my old friend's sake --"