Madoc gave only a somber nod in reply and resumed his plodding into the darkness ahead of them. He did not share her relief. Several hundred twisting paces farther, they finally came upon the fork in the tunnel that signaled they had reached the cave. This was the crossroads, Alwen recalled. The tunnel to her left was an escape, a hidden passage that led out of the temple and deep into the White Woods. The opening to her right was the mouth of the cave that contained the Well of Tears.
Madoc entered the cave without hesitation and Fergus followed close behind to light their way. Not that it seemed to matter. Madoc moved as if he did not require sight. Sensing his shepherding was not necessary, Fergus fell back to take a protective stance at the cavern entrance.
Alwen pointed to the iron brace on the wall near the entrance and Fergus seated his flame. “Shall I light the others, Madoc, or do you prefer the dusk?”
Her voice seemed loud in the silence. Alwen hung on tenterhooks, midway between Fergus and the well, clutching the torch she carried so tight her fingers tingled. Anticipation was driving her heart so hard she expected to hear its echo pounding in the chamber. The cave was different, as if the space had taken on a living aura. It had a voice — many voices — whispering from the shadows. In this place, the past and present converged, and Alwen felt the touch of others she could not see or name.
Madoc did not answer. He stepped to the edge of the pool and, with a mighty heave, planted his staff in the loose rock and dirt of the cavern floor. The folds of his robe splayed as he lowered himself to his knees, arms outstretched and palms open, as if he expected the waters to leap into his embrace.
He had begun the rite of succession. Eyes closed to everything but his deepest, innermost sight, Madoc raised his hands in silent beckon to the Ancients whose essence he would soon join with his own. Alwen began to sway in time with the cadence of his incantation, drawn by the call to the spirits.
The waters of the tarn began to swirl with their own rhythm, churning as if moved by hidden currents or an unseen force. And then Madoc began to weep. His tears fell into the pool, and with the tears, he shed bits of himself. Pieces of Madoc’s knowledge and wisdom melded with the magic liquids already stored in the spring and caused it to roil and bubble, fermenting the potent mystical potion that begat the dream-speak. From this well would spring the legacy Madoc intended to entrust to her, and Alwen began to tremble.
Froth from the surging waters spilled onto the cavern floor and raised a mist that filled the air, just as Madoc’s fervor overpoured the banks of his restraint. Alwen could not escape his emotions. Her natural empathies were enticed by his sorrow, joy, and hope until she felt herself reeling with him. Madoc’s quiet chant grew frenzied as his soft weeping turned to shuddering sobs, and then, suddenly, he stopped.
Madoc’s eyes opened. He drew his arms down, pushed himself back onto his haunches, and slowly rose to a stand. The waters of the well receded and then quieted completely, as if they had never been brought to life in the first place.
“Why do you still lurk in the shadows, Machreth?” Madoc called out, peering into the dark.
Alwen turned to see and Fergus made half a move to intercede, but Madoc waved him off. He tugged his staff from the ground and shook it at the blackness before him.
“Show yourself !”
Machreth emerged from a darkened corner at the back of the cave as if he had stepped out of the stone itself. He walked from his hiding hole to the far side of the pool and stood with his feet apart and arms folded loosely across his chest. His posture was effective. Alwen found him unnerving.
Machreth spoke. “You sensed me in spite of my celtar.”
The celtar was a spell of concealment, and a difficult hex to accomplish. But apparently he had not mastered it well enough to fool Madoc.
“Nothing masks the stench of death and betrayal,” Madoc said.
“I think you smell the reek of your own decay.”
“I may be well on my way to the next world, but I am not maggot fodder yet.” Madoc stepped forward, nearer the water, as if to peer more closely at his former apprentice. “You found your way here sooner than I expected. I had thought the labyrinth too well conceived and the cave too well hidden for anyone to ever stumble upon.”
“This was no accidental discovery, Madoc. I did not stumble upon it. Divinity led me to your Well of Tears.” Machreth answered with the assertion of a man who truly believed what he said. “I was chosen.”
“The Ancients have graced you with their guidance, have they?” Madoc chuckled.
“It is a sign,” Machreth bristled. “Proof of my righteousness.”
“Is it?” Madoc challenged Machreth’s assumption in the same manner he would chastise the most ignorant novice. “Perhaps they merely brought you here to put your righteousness to the test. All men stand with one foot on either side of the mortal abyss, Machreth — on one side, redemption, and on the other, damnation. A man’s very destiny hangs in the balance, and which way it swings depends upon where he chooses to throw his weight. A precarious position for even the best of men, don’t you think?”
Machreth began to prowl the far edge of the pool in long strides, which brought him in and out of the flickering light. His gaze remained trained upon Madoc. Alwen thought his eyes had the look of a mountain cat stalking its prey.
“Men make their own destiny,” said Machreth. His calm, quiet words were a stark contrast to the way he carried himself. “On this we agree. But in the end it is power that tips the hand of fate.”
“Power has its influences, yes. Good and bad.” Madoc’s tone was tolerant, even conversational. “It is a strange brew. An alluring elixir that all men thirst after, but not every man will drink. Nor will all who indulge in it succumb to its darker appeal. You are weak, Machreth. You’ve been seduced by the worst part of your nature.” Madoc wagged his head in disgust. “Worse yet, you’ve seduced the dark side in others.”
“Cerrigwen, you mean.” Machreth’s thin-lipped smile was unseemly. “I’m afraid you underestimated her thirst.”
“I have always known that she shared your ambition,” Madoc said. “But I believed that in the end, she would be stronger. I believed she would see beyond her own needs and choose to serve the greater good, rather than succumb to yours.”
“Ah, but we share more than ambition and a lust for power,” Machreth intimated. “Cerrigwen has served me well, in many ways.”
“I see.” Madoc spoke with regret, maybe even disgust. “Apparently I have also underestimated your appeal.”
“I had only to offer her what she coveted most.” Machreth smiled. “What she knew you would never give her. This, you see, was your fatal mistake. You failed to reward Cerrigwen’s loyalty with your trust — something else she and I share. I, on the other hand, brought her into my confidence. I offered her my respect. Such little things, really, easy enough to accommodate, and for these small enticements, she came to me with barely a hesitation. Think of it, Madoc. Cerrigwen betrayed you for little more than the favor of my attention.”
“And perhaps an empty promise or two.”
Machreth shrugged. “Even now she aids me, in the woods, beyond the veil. She has breached your defenses so that my forces may gain entry. Already they ride upon the Fane.”
Madoc stiffened, almost imperceptibly, but Alwen felt his agony. She shared it. The small glimmer of hope that had persisted in spite of her suspicions was snuffed — and with it, any hope of avoiding a civil war. The ranks of the Stewardry would split between two loyalties. Blood would be spilled. Innocents would be trampled, and a way of life destroyed.
“So now we face subjugation at the hands of our own kind.” Madoc glowered across the pond.
“It did not have to come to this,” Machreth snapped. “This was your doing, old man. You left me no choice.”
“You fool.” Madoc shook with rage. “You will reveal us to a world that is not ready to accept us. You will expose us to those who would destroy us, an
d you risk the life of the one king in a thousand years who is sympathetic to our ways. You have doomed us, Machreth. You have doomed everything we are.”
“You are wrong, Madoc,” Machreth raised his voice as he answered. He paced back and forth with furious strides, still eyeing Madoc. “But you still refuse to see. It is for Hywel’s protection that all of this is necessary. Had I allowed you to wait and watch any longer he might not have survived to fulfill your prophecy. Chaos would ravage these lands for another ten generations and the Stewardry would have continued in oblivion forever. But no matter. Nothing you can do will stop what I have set in motion. Your time has passed.”
“That may be,” Madoc conceded. “But I will not hand you my throne.”
Machreth stopped directly opposite Madoc. Alwen sensed a malevolent turn in Machreth’s mood. Even Fergus tensed, prepared to intervene at any moment. Madoc was unmoved.
A long-drawn and unbearable silence followed. Alwen was anxious, trying to calculate what was to likely happen next. Through careful observation of Machreth’s movements, she believed she could anticipate his behavior. As Alwen stood longer in his presence, she became aware that his emotions were open to her. She had somehow entered his mind, although Machreth did not seem to notice. It was an uncomfortable coexistence. His emotions were raw, conflicting, and hatred permeated his entire being.
Machreth took a step forward and squared his stance. His arms hung stiff and straight at his sides, his voice steeped in anger. “Then I shall take the throne from you.”
“I believe you will try.” Madoc ground his feet deeper into the sand, as if to brace himself. “You may even succeed. But I promise you this, Machreth, you black lord…You will never have the well.”
As he spoke, Madoc spread his arms and raised his palms high. The air in the cavern chilled and dimmed the torchlight to a ghostly glow. Madoc uttered a single sound and a sudden wintry breeze blew through the cavern. Alwen swallowed her breath and felt ice on her tongue. Frost formed on the cavern walls and coursed across the rocky canopy above as icy veins crept across the floor toward the well.
Alwen saw Machreth’s face pucker as he, in the same moment as she, realized that in this holiest of places, Madoc’s power knew no limits. Madoc would stop at nothing to keep the secrets of the Ancients from Machreth’s use. He would invoke all the sorcery he possessed, and Machreth knew it.
Machreth howled in fury. Before she could shout or even think a warning, he threw his own hex. Madoc was distracted, lost in his incantation. He was vulnerable. The torch in Alwen’s hands slid from her grasp as she lunged toward the well and the two men.
“Alwen, no!” Fergus snatched her arm as she tried to push forward. “Stay back. There’s nothing you can do.”
“Let me try,” she argued.
Fergus would not release her, though she fought hard against his grasp. Soon Alwen realized that it was no use to struggle. Even had she been able to break Fergus’s hold on her, Alwen could never have approached them. The force Madoc and Machreth exuded was repellant, electric. The very air around them quivered with the charge.
It was a terrible spectacle she and Fergus could neither engage nor escape. Before them battled the most powerful Stewards in existence, but the struggle within was fiercer than the fight they could see.
Sorcery by thought was a discipline of the highest order, a tool of true mastery and a weapon against which there was no defense but a stronger mind. Never, even for a moment, did either man loosen his stranglehold. To Alwen, Madoc and Machreth were so intertwined with one another that they seemed conjoined. And then their magics locked.
Madoc had invoked the natural elements all at once and Machreth had countered with the same spell. In so doing, they had unleashed the wrath of the universal dominions upon one another, and the forces of the cosmos converged within the cave in a cataclysmic rush. The frozen ground beneath their feet heaved until it crackled and split. Small fissures opened in the earth.
“Blood and thunder!” Fergus staggered as the cave began to crumble around them.
“Get out, Fergus, while you still can,” Alwen ordered. “Warn the others.”
His pained scowl bespoke his feelings more strongly than any words. Fergus would never leave her. Alwen knew of no way to stop Machreth, and even had she possessed some knowledge to aid Madoc in his fight, his consciousness was focused too intently on Machreth for her to penetrate his thoughts. It was moments more before Alwen realized that his thoughts could reach her.
The water.
His message rang in her ears, as if he had spoken aloud. The meaning was not as clear, but the impression of the ancient tarn was just as vivid in her mind as it was before her eyes. Whatever Madoc meant for her to know, it had to do with the well.
“Great gods,” Alwen said to herself. Madoc’s rites had been interrupted. The succession was incomplete. Madoc’s knowledge could not be passed unless she drank from the well, and its waters were hardening under his spell.
The earth shuddered again. Fergus caught her elbow as she toppled to her knees. His strong grip was all that kept her from falling flat on her face. Alwen eyed the well, calculating the odds of reaching it without being caught in the war of the wizards.
“I’ve got to get you out of here,” Fergus shouted.
Alwen felt herself being tugged away. Fergus had her by the wrist and was trying to haul her out of the cave. “No, Fergus. Wait!”
“Wait for what?” he barked. “You’re going to be buried alive in here! We’re all going to be buried in here.”
“The well, Fergus.” She resisted with all her strength, throwing her weight against his grasp.
Whether he released her intentionally or simply lost his grip, in the next instant, Alwen tumbled free. On hands and knees, she scrambled the dozen or so feet to the pool. Freshly broken sandstone and razor-sharp granite shards raked the skin from her palms and shins while dirt and rock pelted her from overhead.
Fergus tried to follow but stones the size of half a man broke loose and crashed around them, between them. “Watch yourself ! The ceiling is buckling.”
She heard him, but Alwen dared not look up. A matter of moments might be all she had. She was within reach. With her left hand clamped around a small stone outcropping, Alwen was able to cup her right palm and dip it into the water. She needed only to scoop a single mouthful to finish what Madoc had started. Just as Alwen felt the ice in her grasp, a deafening rumble shook the cave. The earth beneath her pitched and rolled and a dark form plunged over her, into the well.
The splash that followed swamped her and she fell forward, slipping head and shoulders into the well. Alwen thrashed, struggling to pull herself out of the freezing pool with her free hand. The other flailed in the frigid, thickening slush until it struck something solid. Alwen recoiled from the unexpected contact, but her hand was caught. She forced her eyes open to see what gripped her, and for one fleeting instant, Madoc’s gaze met hers. He had fallen into the water.
Alwen held on, but she was not strong enough to pull him to the surface. Madoc grew heavier as the water iced, and Alwen grew weaker. Her breath was waning. The need to surface burned her lungs. Alwen’s fingers numbed so far beyond feeling she no longer knew if anything at all remained within her grasp. And still she clutched at him, or at least the hope of him. Her vision faded as consciousness ebbed away, and then Alwen felt hands hauling her up by her hair.
Up, until she broke the surface, gagging and gasping for life. More water than air filled her swallows. She had meant to drink, not to drown. The enchanted water would do her little good if she did not survive to use it. Her limbs were sodden, too heavy to lift. Alwen felt herself floating, sinking, and then her head landed hard against an unyielding surface. Rocks tore at the flesh between her shoulder blades and dug into her haunches.
A heaviness compressed her chest and she was unable to move her arms or legs. Alwen struggled to see, only to meet Machreth’s malevolent gaze. It was his weight that h
ad her pinned to the cavern floor. Machreth had straddled her waist and was throttling her with his long, sinewy fingers.
Alwen struggled in vain against his chokehold. She had almost no fight left. A moment’s panic fueled one last thrash. She kicked hard, but his grip only tightened, and Alwen’s thoughts began to blur. Deep mourning and regret for the lives she would not live to save set upon her as the darkness closed in.
Twenty-Nine
Bledig was unaccustomed to doubt, but he respected its niggling. Instincts were to be trusted in times such as these, even when they encouraged a man to overrule his sense of heroism and abandon a daring plan. As eager as he was to plunge into the fray, Bledig was wise enough to wait until he understood what he was fighting, and how to kill it.
His horse, battle trained and more experienced than most men, moved toward the fighting without urging, at first. As the air grew thicker and blacker with wood smoke, the animal grew more cautious. Bledig goaded the steed but did not dismiss the horse’s reluctance. He trusted its instincts as well.
“Where are they?” Bledig called to Domagoj, whose mount had carried him a little farther ahead. “What do you see?”
Domagoj sat stone still in his saddle, listening. He pointed into the dust and smoke ahead, just as a pack of rampaging horsemen burst through the haze in desperate retreat. Bledig could not find Odwain in the throng as they passed. The boy might already be dead, he agonized, or was wounded and waiting for rescue. Bledig spurred his horse.
“Bledig!”
Domagoj sidled alongside and grabbed the bit of Bledig’s horse. He turned his mount toward the castle and insisted that Bledig do the same. “I know what you’re thinking, but it is too great a risk. You can help the wolf cub best by leading what is left of his men to victory. With you, they may yet survive, and the temple can still be saved.”
Domagoj was right. If by some chance Odwain were not yet dead — he soon would be. Bledig knew without seeing that the temple forces were overwhelmed; he could hear the enormity of what Odwain’s men had confronted. He could also still hear the clang of clashing metal and the screams of the dying.
The Well of Tears Page 23