“I cannot remember,” I confessed, and suddenly I was aware of my deathly weakness; he called the serving-woman and said, speaking in the gently authoritative voice of a Druid and a healer, “Bring your mistress some bread and some warmed milk with honey.”
I raised a hand to protest, and the woman looked indignant, and now I remembered that twice she had tried to coax me to eat with these very things. But she went to do his bidding, and when she returned, Kevin took the bread and soaked it in the milk and fed it to me, gently, a few mouthfuls at a time.
“No more,” he said. “You have been fasting too long. But before you sleep, you must drink a little more milk with an egg beaten into it . . . I will show them what to do. The day after tomorrow, perhaps, you will be strong enough to ride.”
And suddenly I began to cry. I wept, at last, for Accolon lying dead on his pall, and for Arthur who hated me now, and for Elaine who had been my friend . . . and for Viviane, lying dead beneath a Christian tomb, and for Igraine, and for myself, for myself who had lived through all these things . . . and he said again, “Poor Morgaine, poor girl,” and held me against his bony breast, and I cried and cried until at last I was quiet, and he called my women to carry me to my bed.
And for the first time in many days, I slept. And two days later, I rode to Avalon.
I remember little of that northward journey, sick in body and mind. I did not even wonder that Kevin left me before I came to the Lake. I came to those shores at sunset, when the waters of the Lake seemed to run crimson and the sky was all afire; and out of the flame-colored water and sky appeared the barge, painted and draped all in black, oars muffled to the silence of a dream. And for a moment it seemed to me that it was the Sacred Boat on that shoreless sea of which I may not speak, and that the dark figure at the prow was She, and that somehow I bridged the gap between earth and sky . . . but I do not know whether that was real or a dream. And then the mists fell over us, and I felt within my very soul that shifting which told me I was once again within my own place.
Niniane welcomed me at the shore, taking me in her arms, not as the stranger I had seen but twice, but as a daughter greets a mother she has not seen for many years; then she took me away to the house where once Viviane had dwelt. She did not, this time, send young priestesses to tend me, but cared for me herself, putting me to bed in the inner room of the house, bringing me water from the Sacred Well; and when I tasted it, I knew that although the healing would be long, I was not yet beyond healing.
I had known enough of power. I was content to lay down the burdens of the world; it was time to leave that to others, and to let my daughters tend me. Slowly, slowly, in the silence of Avalon, I recovered my strength. There at last I could mourn for Accolon—not for the ruin of my hopes and plans . . . I could see now what madness they had been; I was priestess of Avalon, not Queen. But I could mourn the brief and bitter summer of our love; I could grieve, too, for the child who had not lived long enough to be born, and suffer once again that it had been my own hand that had sent him into the shades.
It was a long season of mourning, and there were times when I wondered if I should mourn all my life and never again be free of it; but at last I could remember without weeping, and recall the days of love without unending sorrow welling up like tears from the very depths of my being. There is no sorrow like the memory of love and the knowledge that it is gone forever; even in dreams, I never saw again his face, and though I longed for it, I came at last to see that it was just as well, lest I live all the rest of my life in dreams . . . but at last there came a day when I could look back and know that the time for mourning was ended; my lover and my child were on the other shore, and even if I should somehow meet them beyond the gates of death, none of us would ever know . . . but I lived, and I was in Avalon, and it was my task now to be Lady there.
I do not know how many years I dwelt in Avalon before the end. I remember only that I floated in a vast and nameless peace, beyond joy and sorrow, knowing only serenity and the little tasks of every day. Niniane stood ever at my side; and I came, too, to know Nimue, who had grown to a tall, silent, fair-haired maiden, as fair as Elaine when first I knew her. She became to me the daughter I had never known, and day after day she came to me, and I taught her all those things I had learned from Viviane in my own early years in Avalon.
In those last days, too, there were some who had seen the tree of the Holy Thorn in its first flowering for the followers of Christ, and worshipped their Christian God in peace, seeking not to drive out the beauty of the world, but loving it as God made it. In those days they came in numbers to Avalon to escape the harsh and shrivelling winds of persecution and bigotry. Patricius had set up new forms of worship, a view of the world wherein there was no room for the real beauty and mystery of the things of nature. From these Christians who came to us to escape the bigotry of their own kind I learned something, at last, of the Nazarene, the carpenter’s son who had attained Godhead in his own life and preached a rule of tolerance; and so I came to see that my quarrel was never with the Christ, but with his foolish and narrow priests who mistook their own narrowness for his.
I know not whether it was three years, or five, or even ten, before the end. I heard whispers of the outside world like shadows, like the echo of the church bells we heard sometimes even on that shore. I knew when Uriens died, but I did not mourn him; he had been dead to me for many years, but I could hope that in the end he had found some healing for his griefs. He had been kind to me as best he might, and so let him rest.
Now and again some rumor of Arthur’s deeds and those of the knights would come to me, but in the serenity of Avalon it seemed not to matter; those deeds sounded like old tales and legends, so that I never knew whether they spoke of Arthur and Cai and Lancelet, or of Llyr and the children of Da’ana; or when tales were whispered of the love of Lancelet and Gwenhwyfar, or later, of Marcus’ wife, Isotta, and young Drustan, they were not after all retelling some old tale of Diarmid and Grainné from the ancient days. It seemed not to matter, it seemed that I had heard all these tales long ago in my childhood.
And then, one spring when the land lay beautiful before us and the first apple trees of Avalon were white with blossom, Raven broke silence with a cry, and perforce my mind returned to the things of that world I had hoped to leave forever behind.
9
The sword, the sword of the Mysteries is gone . . . now look to the cup, now look to all of the Holy Regalia . . . it is gone, it is gone, taken from us. . . .”
Morgaine heard the cry out of sleep, and yet, when she tiptoed to the door of the room where Raven slept, alone and in silence as ever, the women who attended her slept; they had not heard that cry.
“But there is nothing but silence, Lady,” they told her. “Are you certain it was not an evil dream?”
“If it was an evil dream, then it came to the priestess Raven as well,” Morgaine said, staring at the untroubled faces of the girls. It seemed to her that with every passing year, the priestesses in the House of Maidens grew younger and more like children . . . how could little girls like this be entrusted with the holy things? Maidens whose breasts had scarcely formed . . . what could they know of the life of the Goddess which was the life of the world?
Again, it seemed, that shattering cry rang through Avalon, rousing alarm everywhere, but when Morgaine asked, “There—did you hear?” they looked at her again in dismay and said, “Do you dream now, Lady, with your eyes wide open?” and Morgaine realized that in the bitter cry of terror and grief there had been no actual sound.
She said, “I will go to her—”
“But you may not do that—” one of them began, then stepped back, her mouth open, as she realized the full meaning of who Morgaine was, and she bent her head as Morgaine stepped past her.
Raven was sitting up in bed, her long hair flung about her in mad disarray, and her eyes wild with terror; for a moment Morgaine thought that indeed her mind had overheard some evil dream, that Raven
walked in the worlds of dream. . . .
But she shook her head and then she was wide awake and sober. She drew a long breath, and Morgaine knew that she was struggling to speak, to overcome the years of silence; now it was as if her voice would not obey her.
At last, trembling all over, she said, “I saw—I saw it . . . treachery, Morgaine, within the very holy places of Avalon. . . . I could not see his face, but I saw the great sword Excalibur in his hand . . .”
Morgaine put out a hand, quieting her. She said, “We will look within the mirror when the sun rises. Do not trouble yourself to speak, my dearest.” Raven was still trembling; Morgaine put her hand firmly over Raven’s, and by the flickering light of the torch, she saw that her own hand was lined and spotted with the dark spots of age, that Raven’s fingers were like twisted ropes around the narrow, fine bones. We are old, she thought, both of us, who came here maidens in attendance on Viviane . . . ah Goddess, the years that pass. . . .
“But I must speak now,” Raven whispered. “I have been silent too long . . . I kept silence even when I feared this would come . . . listen to the thunder, and the rain—a storm is coming, a storm to break over Avalon and sweep it away in the flood . . . and darkness over the land . . .”
“Hush, my dear! Be still,” Morgaine whispered, and put her arms around the shaking woman, wondering if her mind had snapped, if this was all an illusion, a fever dream . . . there was no thunder, no rain, outside the moon was shining brilliantly over Avalon and the orchards white with blossom in the moonlight. “Don’t be frightened. I will stay here with you, and in the morning we shall look into the mirror and see if any of this is real.”
Raven smiled, a sad smile. She took Morgaine’s torch and put it out; in the sudden darkness Morgaine could see, through the chinks in the wattle, a sudden flare of lightning in the distance. Silence; and then, very far away, a low thundering. “I do not dream, Morgaine. The storm will come, and I am afraid. You have more courage than I. You have lived in the world and known real sorrows, not dreams . . . but now, perhaps, I must go forth and break silence forevermore . . . and I am afraid. . . .”
Morgaine lay down beside her, pulling Raven’s cover over them both, and took Raven in her arms to still her shaking. As she lay quiet, listening to the other woman’s breathing, she remembered the night she had brought Nimue there, and how Raven had come to her then, welcoming her to Avalon . . . why does it seem to me now that of all the love I have known, that is the truest . . . but she only held Raven gently, the other woman’s head on her shoulder, soothing her. After a long time there was a great clap of thunder, startling them, and Raven whispered, “You see?”
“Hush, my dear, it is only a storm.” And as she spoke the rain came down, rushing and rattling, bringing a chilly wind within the room, drowning speech. Morgaine lay silent, her fingers just entwined with Raven’s, and thought, It is only a storm, but something of Raven’s terror communicated itself to her and she felt herself shivering too.
A storm that will drive down out of Heaven and smash into Camelot, and scatter the years of peace that Arthur has made in this land . . .
She tried to call the Sight to her, but the thunder seemed to drown thoughts; she could only lie close to Raven repeating to herself again and again, It is only a storm, a storm, rain and wind and thunder, it is not the wrath of the Goddess. . . .
After a long time the storm subsided, and she woke to a world new-washed, the sky pallid and cloudless, water shimmering on every leaf and raining down from every blade of grass, as if the world had been dipped in water and not dried or shaken. If Raven’s storm were to break in truth over Camelot, would it leave the world thus beautiful in its wake? Somehow she thought not.
Raven woke and looked at her, wide-eyed with dread. Morgaine said, quiet and practical as always, “We shall go to Niniane at once, then to the mirror before the sun rises. If the wrath of the Goddess is to descend on us, we must know how and why.”
Raven gestured her silent assent, but when they were dressed and about to leave the house, Raven touched Morgaine’s arm. “Go to Niniane,” she whispered, with the racking struggle to make her unused voice do her bidding. “I will bring—Nimue. She too is part of this. . . .”
For a moment Morgaine was startled almost to protest; then, with a glance at the paling sky in the east, she went. It might be that Raven had seen, in the evil dream of prophecy, the reason that Nimue had been brought here and kept in seclusion. Remembering the day when Viviane had told her of her own mission, she thought, Poor girl! But it was the will of the Goddess, they were all in her hands. As she went silent and alone through the wet orchard, she could see that all was not so calm and beautiful after all . . . the wind had ravaged the blossoms and the orchard lay under a white drift like snow; there would be little fruit this autumn.
We may plant the grain and till the soil. But only her favor brings the fruit to harvest. . . .
Why then do I trouble myself? It will be as she wills. . . .
Niniane, roused from sleep, looked at her as if she were mad. She is no true priestess, Morgaine thought; the Merlin spoke the truth—she was chosen only because she was Taliesin’s kin. The time has come, perhaps, to stop pretending who is truly the Lady of Avalon and take my proper place. She did not want to offend Niniane, or seem to strive for power and set the younger woman down, she had had enough of power . . . but no true priestess, chosen of the Goddess, could have slept through Raven’s cry. Yet somehow this woman before her had passed through the ordeals which go to the making of a priestess; the Goddess had not rejected her. What would the Goddess have her do?
“I tell you, Niniane, I have seen it and so has Raven . . . we must look before sunrise into the mirror!”
“I put not much faith in such things, either,” said Niniane quietly. “What must come, will surely come . . . but if you will, Morgaine, I will go with you—”
Silent, like spots of blackness in the white and watery world, they moved toward the mirror below the Sacred Well. And as they went Morgaine could see, like a shadow at the corner of her eyes, the tall silent form of Raven, veiled, and Nimue like a pale shadow, all blossom and pale flowers like the morning. Morgaine was struck at the girl’s beauty—even Gwenhwyfar in the fullest flush of her youth had never been so beautiful. She felt a wild stab of pure jealousy and anguish. I had no such gift from the Goddess in return for all I must sacrifice . . .
Niniane said, “Nimue is a maiden. It is she who must look into the mirror.”
Their four dark forms were reflected in the pallid surface of the pool, against the pale reflection of the sky, where a few pale-pink streaks were beginning to herald the sunrise. Nimue moved to the edge of the pool, parting her long fair hair with both hands, and Morgaine found herself seeing in her mind the surface of a silver bowl, and Viviane’s stilled, hypnotic face. . . .
Nimue said in a low, wandering voice, “What would you that I should see, my mother?”
Morgaine waited for Raven to speak, but there was only silence. So Morgaine said at last, “Has Avalon been breached and fallen victim to treachery? What has befallen the Holy Regalia?”
Silence. Only a few birds chirped softly in the trees, and the soft sound of water rippled, falling from the channel which overflowed from the Well to make this still pool. Below them on the slopes Morgaine could see the white drifts of the ruined orchards, and high above, the pale shapes of the ring stones atop the Tor.
Silence. At last Nimue stirred and whispered, “I cannot see his face . . .” and the pool rippled, and it seemed that Morgaine could see a hunched form, moving slowly and with difficulty . . . the room where she had stood silent that day behind Viviane, when Taliesin laid Excalibur in Arthur’s hand and she heard his voice forbidding . . .
“No—it is death to touch the Holy Regalia unprepared. . . .” For a moment Morgaine could hear the voice of Taliesin, not Nimue’s voice . . . but he had the right, he was the Merlin of Britain, and he took them from the hiding place
, spear and cup and dish, and hiding the holy things under his cloak, he went out and across the Lake to where Excalibur gleamed in the darkness . . . the Holy Regalia now reunited.
“Merlin!” whispered Niniane aloud. “But why?”
Morgaine knew her face was like stone as she said, “Once he spoke of this to me. He said that Avalon was now outside the world, and that the holy things must be within the world to the service of man and the Gods, by whatever name men called them. . . .”
“He would profane them,” Niniane said hotly, “and put them to the use of that God who would drive out all other Gods. . . .”
In the silence, Morgaine heard the chanting of monks. Then the sunlight touched the mirror and turned it all to shooting fire which flooded her head and eyes, burning, blazing, and in the glare of the rising sun it seemed as if all the world burned in the light of a flaming cross. . . . She shut her eyes, covering her face with her hands.
“Let them go, Morgaine,” whispered Raven. “The Goddess will certainly care for her own. . . .”
The Mists of Avalon Page 115