by Andre Norton
He smeared his hand across his eyes, willing sight back to them.
The doorway before him was now clear. And, if the sun did not reach beyond it, there was light of another kind in the windowless interior, no light of lamp or torch, but brighter.
Merlin, holding the wand before him, crossed the threshold.
As the cave had been when he first sighted it, so this vast inner room, which must include all of the lower story of the tower, was crowded with a huge number of installations. He recognized some as resembling those which fostered the mirror, having the same flickering of light across their surfaces. Others were strange. And there was no mirror. In whatever way Nimue received her instructions it was not in the same manner as Merlin had his.
There was no life there but for himself, none he could detect. Against the far wall was a stairway which wound up, cut into the stone itself, leading to the floor above.
Merlin strode down an aisle between the flashing boxes. The very familiarity of some of this equipment reassured him. Now he began to climb up to the second story where there were windows. The bold light of the interior came from long rods set into the walls, but those were only below. As he came up through an opening in the floor he was greeted by not only the light of day entering much more dimly and wanly through the slits of the windows, but by scents he himself knew. Here were the odors of herbs and cordials. Sniffing, he could detect that and this which he had harvested and stored in his own chamber.
A long curtain divided the round room into two. On one side were stools, a table, garlands of dried herbs against the wall, a chest with shelves set above it on which stood lidded pots and beakers. Studying this array, Merlin felt entirely at home.
Yet there was something else to be sniffed in this half room—sniffed or discovered by that other sense of his. For the wholesome scent of the herbs did not entirely disguise another odor, and that was far from pleasant. Someone had dealt in illusions here, but such dealing had been reinforced with drugs such as Merlin knew better than to employ. That was the stink of evil, insidious, half hidden, but there.
He passed the edge of the curtain to the other side. Here was a carved bed covered with linen which had been steeped in saffron for a golden tinge. Over that was drawn a coverlet of deeper gold on which was worked a complicated design in sea-green thread, looped here and there to draw a pearl into line. On the walls were hangings worked with gold thread on green. But there were none of the fanciful beasts, hunters, other patterns such as the ladies of the court were wont to use. Rather the lines were sharp and stiff, consisting of angles and squares, drawn in a manner not altogether strange to Merlin.
In his dreams of the tower cities he had glimpsed paintings which were not unlike these. And it was the trick of such work that the longer you stared at it, the more an uneasy feeling grew in you that something lurked within those lines, watching and skulking for no good purpose. Yet he could glimpse nothing he was sure of but the lines themselves.
There was a chest also, carved like the bed and, standing on it, one end propped against the wall, was a mirror. A mirror! Merlin made a careful way across the room, taking every precaution to keep his reflection from its burnished surface. It could well be that this was set as a trap and that on her return Nimue might summon up on the surface the likeness of any intruder. When he came close enough, however, he was certain that this was not the same as the mirror of his cave, merely an article aiding to adornment
This side of the upper chamber was not tainted with that trouble he had found in the other. He decided that it was no more than Nimue’s own quarters. As there was no further way up, the tower must contain only the two rooms.
He had seen no sign of any servants. Nimue must live alone—except for such as needed no quarters and perhaps no food nor drink, unless what he picked up in the herb chamber might be termed that.
Back in the other section, fronted once more by all the raw materials of a healer’s training, Merlin again swung the wand widely, pointing the metal-covered gem at the wall, turning very slowly so that any movement of his indicator would be noted.
But the wand lay quiet in his hand. What was here had no affinity for the star things. All that must lie below. He returned to the crowded lower section.
What he wanted most was complete destruction of everything that stood here. But there might be more than he could hope to control if he attempted that. Slowly he paced among the machines, noting those which were in any way different from the ones he had come to know—if not wholly understand—in the cave.
There were three of the latter. One stood upright, a little taller than Merlin himself. Its front panel was unlike the rest, which were of smooth metal, while the one he faced was pebbled and rather akin in substance to an opaque glass. The wand in his hand came to life. Before he could tighten his grip on it, the gem-and-metal tip thudded against that panel at the height of Merlin’s breast.
Though the panel was not broken there came a change in it. It was as if an inner skin was sloughing away as he watched, to show what stood behind. What stood...
Merlin caught his breath. He was looking now on a woman, propped upright in the cabinet or else standing there. But, though her eyes were open, there was no sign of life about her. She might have been some statue, except she was far too lifelike.
Red hair lay in long, ribbon-entwisted braids down her shoulders, shining brightly against the clear light blue of her robe. She had a torque around her throat, a bracelet of bronze curiously worked around one wrist. To Merlin’s eyes she was young, yet in another way she carried about her a kind of ripeness, as if she knew well the pleasures of the body.
At first he believed that he faced the dead, cunningly preserved after no fashion this world knew. Then he stared more closely, even venturing to tap with one fingertip against the now transparent panel. There was a swirl of small particles across the face of the girl in answer. She stood there fully engulfed in liquid, just as he had lain under the protection of the mirror so that he might live, not die as Nimue willed.
Nimue was once rumored to have brought someone here—Morgause, Uther’s daughter! But this was only a girl. She could not be the mother of Modred, a fully grown youth . . . unless she had been so imprisoned shortly after her son’s birth! When Merlin studied her longer he was sure he could indeed trace a faint likeness to Uther, but certainly none to the dark-browed Modred!
Why did Nimue hold her prisoner so? The Lady of the Lake must foresee some future use for Uther’s daughter, not as she would have been if time had dealt commonly with her, but as she was when Uther had sent her forth from his court. And, knowing Nimue, Merlin did not believe that that purpose could be any good one.
He inspected the box carefully for any fastening or latch. It seemed sealed on all four corners as well as the top. Perhaps it was the sort of coffer which could only be released by the right word, spoken in just the proper tone. Though he pitied the girl who slept, he could see no way of freeing her.
Oddly enough, that opaque backing which had been dislodged by his wand was beginning to gather again, spreading over the inner surface as frost covered a stone. It was thickening and for that he was glad, since the fewer signs left of his visit here the better.
Now he went past Morgause’s strange prison to an object made of fine wires spun with ribbons of metal. This was woven into a crown-like head covering, though some of the wire rose up from the top of that crown into a tall pillar standing behind it, where they were swallowed into the substance of the pillar itself.
Before that pillar on Merlin’s side was a bench, on which the crown waited. He considered the whole thing carefully. Then suddenly he was excited. He had the mirror and the voice; this crown might be a device for communication just as the mirror was for him! If that were so...
Merlin edged around to the back of the pillar. It was entirely smooth and rose nearly to the ceiling overhead. There was a space about half the length of Merlin’s wand between its top and the overhead b
eams. Some glistening rods about the thickness of his little finger jutted into that space from the crest of the pillar at irregular lengths, no two the same.
Not even in his dreams of the lost cities had Merlin ever seen its like, but if this was Nimue’s link with those who had set her tasks here on this earth, and if it could be destroyed__
He had a hearty respect for anything fashioned by the Star People and so little knowledge—simply because he had none of their devices in common use—of what they might be, that he was loath to interfere with any of this. Yet he also knew that he finally had before him the chance to deal his enemy the greatest defeat
The wand warned him of force inside the pillar, such a flow of force that he dared not test it. However, the reaction was far less when he pointed the off-world gem in the direction of the crown on the bench. And those wires that wedded crown to pillar looked very fragile.
Merlin drew a deep breath. Even if he awoke here such a force as would sweep him into death, defeating Nimue and those behind her would be worth such an ending. He had obeyed the orders laid on him—the beacon was set to bring in those of his kin; Arthur knew what they would have of him—so what matter if he died now, as long as he took with him Nimue’s greatest tool?
Slowly, with caution and all the skill he could bring to the task, Merlin slid the tip of the wand along the surface of the bench until it lay directly under, but not touching, the wires that led up to the pillar. Then, just as he had used the knife blade to compel the King Stone to his will, now he began tapping with the metal-encased gem. And in a low voice he chanted. Tap—chant—tap—
He made no move to touch the crown, but bent his will on its anchorage. Slowly the crown itself lifted from the surface of the bench. It rose by jerks, as if it were a sentient thing fighting against his control. But still it rose. Now it was higher than Merlin’s head as he stood there, and the wires to the pillar were pulled taut as harp strings.
Merlin did not hesitate. Tap—chant—tap—
He sensed that beyond the reach of his own mind there were things gathering, prowling unseen, moving on a level not open to the eyes of man. But he would not give heed to those things, concentrating his whole will on what he would do.
The crown tugged fiercely at the wires that held it, bobbing down to strain upward again with a quick snap. Still those thread-like filaments held. But Merlin persevered.
There was a sharp ringing sound. One of the wires had at last broken, trailing back against the pillar limply. The crown, freer now on one side than the other, made desperate swoops and soars to win loose in answer to Merlin’s command.
Another snap. It was held now by a single thread only. Merlin did not allow any feeling of triumph to slow his invocation. The crown dipped low like a tethered bird, nearly flying into Merlin’s face as if it resented what he would make it do and was now minded to attack. He did not flinch but his tapping grew stronger and he raised his voice a fraction, uttering a single loud ringing word of command.
The crown flew from him as if to escape whatever fate he laid upon it, rising in a whirl of motion overhead, and the last wire parted. Now all virtue went out of the crown; it fell to lie at Merlin’s feet and he deliberately set his boot on it, crushing its fragile weaving into a mass of broken wire. Raising the tangle by the tip of his wand, being careful not to touch it with his bare hand, he carried it before him as he went.
The last of the installations he did not understand was another pillar, but this had no crown, no wires, no surface break, not even any flashing lights along its front. He could make nothing of it ... And those presences he sensed when he had attacked the crown were growing more restive.
He did not know them, could only feel that in some way they were akin to the watchers in the forest. His own inner force had been badly eroded by his destruction of the crown so it seemed better to meet out in the open any attack which might be aimed at him now—not facing it in Nimue’s own fortress where the unseen attackers might be able to draw upon energies he could not locate. In spite of Nimue’s usurpation of this section of the forest, Merlin had some strengths which the earth itself would feed and nurture.
He ran through the doorway, out of that well-lighted room. When he reached the break in the causeway he turned and hurled the wreckage of the crown far out into the lake, where the glittering water swallowed it. It would have been better to bury it in the earth—for this water had been englamoured by his enemy—but Merlin now needed his hands free for what might come.
What did happen surprised him so much that he nearly lost control for a startled moment. He had been dreading the return across those slippery stones. Not only did he know that he was already under a silent attack which sucked at his control and his inner powers, but he feared that Nimue’s forest servants had been alerted. Caught on those slimed rocks he would be easy meat
However, when he turned to look in the direction of the land, he glimpsed something that was not the false sheen of the water, but was suspended above it like a nearly invisible link between the two broken portions of the causeway. If water itself could form a bridge, Merlin believed, it would look so.
Dare he trust it? This might be a subtle trap. He thought he had the way of testing that. Leaning forward a little, Merlin stretched out his wand to touch what he could hardly see at all. The stone-metal point thudded down against a surface which was very real indeed.
Thus, tapping gingerly before him with the tip of the rod as he went, Merlin stepped onto the invisible bridge, forcing himself not to see with his eyes but with his mind, to know that he had footing even if it appeared to be only empty air.
16.
* * *
He gained no confidence during that crossing, even though his wand continued to report that steady footing formed the bridge. Only when he was down again on that other length of stone he could see as well as feel did Merlin give a great sigh of relief. Yet this was no time to relax his guard.
Facing the trees in the dark wood through which the trace of that very ancient road ran, he stiffened. They were alert at last, those eerie guardians Nimue had set to patrol her boundaries, and they were closing the path before him. There remained the way he had taken in, the stream. With the memory of the serpent still paramount in his mind, though, descending again into any water fed by this lake was a task which needed firm willing.
Merlin dropped down into the deeper runnel, his wand in hand, feeling the slight swing of that which, added to his extra sense, would be his warning of any imminent attack. The water here was not as clear as it had been farther down the stream and, as he walked, slipping and sliding across a very uneven footing, clouds of silt rose to make it more murky.
He was well down that water road, near the turn where it became a more honest and natural stream, when his wand turned sharply in his hand. At the same moment a strong warning of his sense of Power brought him half around.
He expected to see a monster, perhaps the same monster he had beguiled in the lake. Not—not a woman standing as if her sandals were set on the surface of the water, which had now become a firm flooring at her command.
She smiled lingeringly. As he had first seen her on that night he held the barrow sword, so did Merlin see Nimue now. She made no attempt to conceal her slim white body, which was all woman’s curves; she even shook back her cloak of hair to display herself more wantonly. She was bare save for a girdle of stones as milky white as her skin, two wide armlets of the same and a neck chain which held a single stone carved into the sickle of a new moon, hanging between the proud upsurge of her breasts.
She shook her head in the mock playfulness one might use toward a child who had done ill but did not understand.
“Merlin—” His name came like the sighing of the wind, yet he noted sharply that her lips had not shaped it. And with that small hint of what she might be, he lifted the wand and struck—even as if he handled a spear in battle.
That point fashioned of metal and gem pierced between her brea
sts just below the moon pendant. There was a flurry in the air, then nothingness. Illusion!
But the fact that the illusion had called his name was highly disturbing. Nimue must have suspected that he would come or else she would not have fashioned such an apparition. Or did she know from afar of his invasion, from Camelot itself?
Either way he was disturbed. Though he might deal with certainty and wisdom with everything else in this world, yet this woman could stir his emotions and make him as awkward as any untried youth. It was not the strength she might summon and control, as he summoned and controlled forces, which made him uneasy. No, it was that subtler, other influence which reached the man in him no matter how he tried to control such longings. He knew they endangered all he could command, and that he would be far less than he now was if he were to yield to them.
For a long moment after the disappearance of the illusion Merlin stood waiting where he was, half expecting it to form again, but it did not. Now, feeling like a hunted fugitive, he splashed on, setting the best pace he could out of that evil wood.
Did Nimue know from a distance what damage he had wrought in her tower? He was willing to attribute all kinds of knowledge to her. And had his destruction of the crown defeated her future plans in anyway? He knew so little and needed to know so much!
Breathing faster but turning his head from side to side, gripping the wand so he would feel the first stirring it might give, he pushed on steadily. It seemed to him that gloom gathered under the trees on either side of the stream, folding in thicker, almost like the curtain he had dispensed at the tower. And behind that—what prowled behind? He closed the door of his imagination, refused to allow such speculation. To look for that kind of attack was often to open a way for it.