Legacy: Arthurian Saga

by Mary Stewart

  Now, although there was a Christian church on Ynys Witrin, and a monastic settlement on the hill near the holy well, the ruling deity of that ancient island was still the Goddess herself, the Mother whose shrine has been there time out of mind, and who is served still by her priestesses, the ancillae. It is a cult similar to, but I believe older than, the keeping of the Vestal fire of old Rome. King Melwas, along with most of his people, was a follower of the older gods; and -- which was more important -- his mother, a formidable old woman, worshipped the Goddess, and had been generous to her priestesses. The present Lady of the shrine (the high priestess, as representing the Goddess, took this title) was related to her.

  Though Arthur himself had been brought up in a Christian household, I was not surprised when he accepted Melwas' invitation. But there were those who were. As we assembled near the King's Gate, ready for the ride, I caught one or two looks thrown at him by his Companions, with, here and there, a hint of uneasiness.

  Arthur caught my eye -- we were waiting while Bedwyr had some word with the guard at the gate -- and grinned. He spoke softly. "Do I have to explain to you?"

  "By no means. You have bethought yourself that Melwas is to be your near neighbor, and has helped you considerably in the building here. You also see the wisdom of pleasing the old queen. And naturally you are remembering Dewdrop and Blackberry, and what you were told about placating the Goddess."

  "Dewdrop and --? Oh, the old man's cows! Yes, of course! I might have known you would get straight to it! As a matter of fact I had a message from the Lady herself. The folk of the island want to give thanks for the year's victories, and call a blessing on Caer Camel. I'm living in fear in case someone tells them that I wore Ygraine's token through the fighting at Caer Guinnion!"

  He was speaking of the brooch with the name Maria engraved around the rim. This is the name of the Christians' goddess. I said: "I doubt if it need trouble you. That shrine is as old as the earth it stands on, and whichever Lady you speak to there, the same one will hear you. There is only one, from the beginning. Or so I think...But what will the bishops say?"

  "I am High King," said Arthur, and left it at that. Bedwyr joined us then, and we rode out through the gateway.

  It was a gentle, grey day, with the promise of summer rain somewhere in the clouds. We were soon clear of the woodland, and into the marsh country. To either side of the road the water stretched, grey and ruffled, as the lynx-paws of the breeze crossed and recrossed it. Poplars whitened in the wayward gusts, and the willows dipped, trailing, in the shallows. Islets and willow-groves and tracts of marshland lay seemingly afloat on the silver surface, their images blurred with the breeze. The paved road, mantled with moss and fern as most roads soon are in that low-lying land, led through this wilderness of reeds and water toward the ridge of high ground that lay like an arm half-encircling one end of the Island. Hoofs rang suddenly on stone, and the road topped a gentle rise. Ahead now was the Lake itself, lying like a sea moating the Island, its waters unbroken save for the narrow causeway that led the road across, and here and there the boats of fishermen, or the barges of the marsh-dwellers.

  From this shining sheet of water rose the hill called the Tor, shaped like a giant cone, as symmetrical as if hand-built by men. It was flanked by a gentler, rounded hill, and beyond that by another, a long, low ridge, like a limb drawn up in the water. Here lay the wharfs; one could see masts like reeds beyond a dip in the green. Beyond the Island's triple hill, stretching into the distance, was a great shining level of water, sown with sedge and bulrush and the clusters of reed thatch among the willows where the marsh people lived. It was all one long, shifting, moving glimmer, as far as the sea. One could see why the Island was called Ynys Witrin, the Isle of Glass. Sometimes, now, men call it Avalon.

  There were orchards everywhere on Ynys Witrin. The trees crowded so thickly along the harbor ridge and up the lower slopes of the Tor that only the plumes of wood-smoke, rising among the boughs, showed where the village lay. (King's capital though it was, it could earn no grander title.) A short way up the hill, above the trees, could be seen the cluster of huts, like hives, where the Christian hermits lived, and the holy women. Melwas left them alone; they even had their own church, built near the Goddess's shrine. The church was a humble affair made of wattle and mud, and roofed with thatch. It looked as if the first bad storm would blow it clean out of the ground.

  Far different was the shrine of the Goddess. It was said that with the centuries the land itself had slowly grown up around it, and possessed it, so that now it lay beneath the level of men's footing, like a crypt. I had never seen it. Men were not normally received within its precincts, but today the Lady herself, with the veiled and white-clad women and girls behind her, all bearing flowers, waited to welcome the High King. The old woman beside her, with the rich mantle, and the royal circlet on her grey hair, must be Melwas' mother, the queen. Here she took precedence of her son. Melwas himself stood off to one side, among his captains and young men. He was a thickset, handsome fellow, with a curled cap of brown hair, and a glossy beard. He had never married: rumor had it that no woman had ever passed the test of his mother's judgment.

  The Lady greeted Arthur, and two of the youngest maidens came forward and hung his neck with flowers. There was singing, all women's voices, high and sweet. The grey sky parted and let through a glint of sunlight. It was seen as an omen; people smiled and looked at one another, and the singing grew more joyous. The Lady turned, and with her women led the way down the long flight of shallow steps into the shrine. The old queen followed, and after her Arthur, with the rest of us. Lastly Melwas came, with his followers. The common folk stayed outside. All through the ceremony we could hear the muttering and shifting, as they waited to catch another look at the legendary Arthur of the nine battles.

  The shrine was not large; our company filled it to capacity. It was dimly lit, with no more than half a dozen scented lamps, grouped to either side of the archway that led to the inner sanctuary. In the smoky light the white robes of the women shone ghostly. Veils hid their faces and covered their hair and floated, cloudy, to the ground. Of them all, only the Lady herself could be seen clearly: she stood full in the lamplight, stoled with silver, and wearing a diadem that caught what light there was. She was a queenly figure; one could well believe that she came of royal stock.

  Veiled, too, was the inner sanctuary; no one save the initiated -- not even the old queen herself -- would ever see beyond that curtain. The ceremony that we saw (though it would not be seemly to write of it here) would not be the customary one sacred to the Goddess. It was certainly lengthy; we endured two hours of it, standing crowded together; but I suspect that the Lady wanted to make the most of the occasion, and who was to blame her if thoughts of future patronage were in her mind? But it came to an end at last. The Lady accepted Arthur's gift, presented it with the appropriate prayer, and we emerged in due order into the daylight, to receive the shouts of the people.

  It was a small incident, which might have left no mark in my memory, but for what came later. As it is, I can still recall the soft, lively feel of the day, the first drops of rain that blew in our faces as we left the shrine, and the thrush's song from the thorn tree standing deep in summer grass spiked with pale orchis and thick with the gold of the small flower they call the Lady's Slipper. The way to Melwas' palace lay through precincts of summer lawn, where among the apple trees grew flowers that could not have come there in nature, all with their uses, as well I knew, in medicine or magic. The ancillae practiced healing, and had planted the virtuous herbs. (I saw no other kind. The Goddess is not the same whose bloody knife was thrown, once, from the Green Chapel.) At least, I thought, if I have to live hereabouts, the country is a better garden for my plants than the open hillside at home.

  With that, we came to the palace, and were welcomed by Melwas into his hall of feasting.

  The feast was much like any other, except (as was natural in that place) for the excellence
and variety of the fish dishes. The old queen occupied the central position at the high table, with Arthur to one side of her and Melwas to the other. None of the women from the shrine, not even the Lady herself, was present. What women there were, I noticed with some amusement, were far from being beauties, and were none of them young. Rumor had perhaps been right about the queen. I recalled a glance and a smile passing between Melwas and a girl in the crowd: well, the old woman could not watch him all the time. His other appetites were well enough; the food was plentiful and well cooked, though nothing fanciful, and there was a singer with a pleasant voice. The wine, which was good, came (we were told) from a vineyard forty miles off, on the chalk. It had recently been destroyed by one of the sharp incursions of the Saxons, who had begun to come closer this summer.

  Once this was said, it was inevitable which way the talk would go. Between dissection of the past and discussion of the future, time passed quickly, with Arthur and Melwas in accord, which augured well.

  We left before midnight. A moon coming toward the full gave a clear light. She hung low and close behind the beacon at the summit of the Tor, marking with sharp shadows the walls of Melwas' stronghold, a fort rebuilt on the site of some ancient hilltop fastness. It was a place for retreat in times of trouble: his palace, where we had been entertained, stood below, on the level near the water.

  We were none too soon. A mist was rising from the Lake. Pale wreaths of it eddied across the grass, below the trees, smoking to our horses' knees. Soon the causeway would be hidden. Melwas, escorting us with his torch-bearers, guided us across the pale fog that was the Lake, and up into clear air, onto the ringing stone of the ridge. Then he made his farewells, and set off for home.

  I drew rein, looking back. From here, of the three hills that made the island, only the Tor was visible, rising from a lake of cloud. From the shrouding mist near its foot could be seen the red torchlit glow of the palace, not yet quenched for the night. The moon had sailed clear of the Tor into a dark sky. Near the beacon tower, on the rising spiral of the road to the high fortress, a light flickered and moved.

  My flesh crept, like a dog's at the sight of a specter. A wisp of mist lay there, high, and across it a shadow strode, like a giant's. The Tor was a known gate to the Otherworld; for a flash I wondered if, with the Sight come back to me, I was watching one of the guardians of the place, one of the fiery spirits who keep the gate. Then my sight cleared, and I saw that it was a man with a torch, running up the steep of the Tor to light the beacon fire.

  As I set spurs to my horse I heard Arthur's voice, lifted in quick command. A rider detached himself from the cavalcade and leaped forward at a stretched gallop. The others, silent all at once, followed him, fast but collected, while behind us the flames went up into the night, calling Arthur of the nine battles to yet another fight.

  10

  The investing of Caer Camel saw the start of the new campaign. Four more years it took: siege and skirmish, flying attack and ambush -- except during the midwinter months he was never at rest. And twice more, towards the end of that time, he triumphed over the enemy in a major engagement.

  The first of these battles was joined in response to a call from Elmet. Eosa himself had landed from Germany, at the head of fresh Saxon war-bands, to be joined by the East Saxons already established north of the Thames. Cerdic added a third point to the spear with a force brought by longboat from Rutupiae. It was the worst threat since Luguvallium. The invaders came swarming in force up the Vale, and were threatening what Arthur had long foreseen, to break through the barrier of the mountains by the Gap.

  Surprised and (no doubt) disconcerted by the readiness of the fort at Olicana, they were checked and held there, while the message was sent flashing south for Arthur. The East Saxon force, which was considerable, was concentrated on Olicana; the King of Elmet held them there, but the others streamed westward through the Gap. Arthur, heading fast up the west road, reached the Tribuit fort before them and, re-forming there in strength, caught them at Nappa Ford. He vanquished them there, in a bloody struggle, then threw his fast cavalry up through the Gap to Olicana, and, side by side with the King of Elmet, drove the enemy back into the Vale. From there a movement beyond countering, right back, east and south, until the old frontiers contained them, and the Saxon "king," looking round on his bleeding and depleted forces, admitted defeat.

  A defeat, as it turned out, all but final. Such was Arthur's name now that its very mention had come to mean victory, and "the coming of Arthur" a synonym for salvation. The next time he was called for -- it was the clearing-up operation of the long campaign -- no sooner had the dreaded cavalry with the white horse at its head and the Dragon glinting over the helmets showed in the mountain pass of Agned than the enemy fell into the disarray of near panic, so that the action was a pursuit rather than a battle, a clearing of territory after the main action. Through all this fighting, Gereint (who knew every foot of the territory) was with the calvary, with a command worthy of him. So Arthur rewarded service.

  Eosa himself had received a wound in the fighting at Nappa. He never took the field again. It was the young Cerdic, the Aetheling, who led the Saxons at Agned, and did his best to hold them against the terror of Arthur's onslaught. It was said that afterwards, as he withdrew -- in creditable order -- to the waiting longboats, he made a vow that when he next set foot on British territory, he would stay, and not even Arthur should prevent him.

  For that, as I could have told him, he would have to wait till Arthur was no longer there.

  It was never my intention here to give details of the years of battle. This is a chronicle of a different kind. Besides, everyone knows now about his campaign to free Britain and cleanse her shores of the Terror. It was all written down in that house up in Vindolanda, by Blaise, and the solemn, quiet clerk who came from time to time to help him. Here I will only repeat that never once during the years it took him to fight the Saxons to a standstill was I able to bring prophecy or magic to his aid. The story of those years is one of human bravery, of endurance and of dedication. It took twelve major engagements, and some seven years' hard work, before the young King could count the country safe at last for husbandry and the arts of peace.

  It is not true, as the poets and singers would have it, that Arthur drove all the Saxons from the shores of Britain. He had come to recognize, as Ambrosius did, that it was impossible to clear lands that stretched for miles of difficult country, and which had, moreover, the easy retreat of the seas behind. Since the time of Vortigern, who first invited the Saxons into Britain as his allies, the southeast shore of our country had been settled Saxon territory, with its own rulers and its own laws. There was some justification for Eosa's assumption of the title of king. Even had it been possible for Arthur to clear the Saxon Shore, he would have had to drive out settlers of perhaps the third generation, who had been born and bred within these shores, and make them take ship back to their grandfathers' country, where they might meet as harsh a welcome as here. Men fight desperately for their homes when the alternative is to be homeless. And, while it was one thing to win the great pitched battles, he knew that to drive men into the hills and forests and waste places, whence they could never be dislodged, or even pinned down and fought, was to invite a long war which could have no victory. He had before him the example of the Old Ones: they had been dispossessed by the Romans and had fled into the waste places of the hills; four hundred years later they were still there, in their remote mountain fastnesses, and the Romans themselves had gone. So, accepting the fact that there must be still Saxon kingdoms lodged within the shores of Britain, Arthur set himself to see that their boundaries were secure, and that for very fear their kings would hold to them.

  So he passed his twentieth year. He came back to Camelot at the end of October, and plunged straight away into council. I was there, appealed to sometimes, but in the main watching and listening only: the counsel I gave him I gave in private, behind closed doors. In the public sight the dec
isions were his. Indeed, they were his as often as mine, and as time went on I was content to let his judgment have its way. He was impulsive sometimes, and in many matters still lacked experience or precedent; but he never let his judgment be ridden by impulse, and he maintained, in spite of the arrogance that success might be expected to bring with it, the habit of letting men talk their fill, so that when finally the King's decision was announced, each man thought that he had had a say in it.

  One of the things that was brought up at length was the question of a new marriage. I could see he had not expected this; but he kept silent, and after a while grew easier, and listened to the older men. They were the ones who knew names and pedigrees and land-claims by heart. It came to me also, watching, that they were the ones who, when Arthur was first proclaimed, would have nothing to do with the claim. Now not even his own companion knights could show more loyal. He had won the elders, as he had won all else. You would have thought each one of them had discovered him unknown in the Wild Forest, and handed him the sword of the Kingdom.

  You would also have thought that each man was discussing the marriage of a favorite son. There was much beard-stroking and head-wagging, and names were suggested and discussed, and even wrangled over, but none met with general acclaim, until one day a man from Gwynedd, who had fought right through the wars with Arthur, and was a kinsman of Maelgon himself, got to his feet and made a speech about his home country.

  Now when you get a black Welshman on his feet and ready to talk, it is like inviting a bard; the thing is done in order, in cadence, and at very great length; but such was this man's way, and such the beauty of his speaking voice, that after the first few minutes men settled back comfortably to listen, as they might have listened at a feast.

  His subject seemed to be his country, the loveliness of its valleys and hills, the blue lakes, the creaming seas, the deer and eagles and the small singing-birds, the bravery of the men and the beauty of the women. Then we heard of the poets and singers, the orchards and flowery meadows, the riches of sheep and cattle and the veined minerals in the rock. From this there followed the brave history of the land, battles and victories, courage in defeat, the tragedy of young death and the fecund beauty of young love.