Centuries of weathering had hollowed a shallow depression in the stone, and now it was filled with rainwater.
Merlin patted the ground, and she sat beside him. “Reflective surfaces are one of the simplest magic tools. They help focus the sight.
“Here, put your hands on each side of this pool. Like that—fine. Now just look into it. Let your mind go free. Just look at the surface, at the reflections, and at the depths beyond them.”
Heather felt foolish. She looked between her hands and saw a hole in a rock filled with stagnant water. The only thing reflected was the mist and the gray sky above her.
She looked and looked until her eyes ached. Her mind tired of even thinking about what she was supposed to do, and she just stared. Eventually he would tell her to quit, and they'd go home.
The reflected mists swirled and thickened into heavy clouds, then suddenly parted, revealing a scene below. She cried in alarm, but the cry was the cry of a bird, a graceful gull with pure white wings.
Bright, clear sunlight sparkled on the water below. The estuary of a great river, it was dotted with boats, some small and active, some huge and quiet in their docks, others sliding majestically along the water.
The gull tilted its wings and soared away from the river, over a great city. The city stretched in all directions, its buildings towering into the blue sky. Windows glinted like jewels in the sun. The noise of rumbling activity rose muted and distant as the gull glided on.
Below, trees replaced buildings. Grass swept in a green wave over the crest of hills. Tiny figures moved over paths and open space. Suddenly their faint voices were drowned under a discordant wail, a piercing cry that swelled to fill the world with its alarm.
The gull veered from the noise and rose up and up, upward toward the sun. Abruptly the sun's brightness and heat consumed the sky and the bird and all creation.
Dizzyingly the brightness faded, and the wings that seemed to carry her were black, a dusty, sullen black. The cry was the hoarse cry of a crow as it glided through the cold gray air. Below, the plain was bare except for wisps of snow harried by an icy wind.
Under a shrouded sun, the bird circled. Below now were two great clusters of figures. There was little movement— a time for scavenging. Lower and lower the crow dropped. Figures sprawled motionless on the ground, upturned faces blank with terror and death. The bird screamed.
And screamed. Heather found arms around her, shaking her as her own screams faded from the air.
“Heather! Come back!” Merlin's command quavered with worry. She sagged in his arms.
“I'm all right, I think,” she said faintly as he helped her lean back against a stone. “Oh, Earl, is it always like that?”
“It depends on what you see. The more alarming the vision, the more alarming the experience. But tell me what you saw, that is, if you're up to it. I don't want to—”
“No, I can tell you. Only the end was really awful, and the middle, maybe. But mostly it was beautiful—and confusing. I really don't understand what I saw.”
With Merlin huddled beside her in the misty cold, she described her vision. At last she drew toward the end. “The armies were spread out over the plain, but when I … when the crow flew lower, the warriors were lying still as death, all over the ground. Earl, I knew some of them! People from here, part of Arthur's army.”
She began sobbing again against his shoulder. “Oh, Earl, what did I see?”
He frowned, shaking his head. “I don't know. These things can be so confused. Past and present and future, or simply allegory, all muddled together. But …”
He was silent until Heather prompted him. “Yes?”
“There's something about it. Somehow it's the same sort of thing I've been sensing. A feeling, a foreboding that's been growing ever since we came out of Avalon with Arthur. It's as though the same cycle is beginning again. An endless, compelling, fatal cycle.”
“I don't understand.”
“Heather.” He sat forward, looking at her tear-smeared face. “Once before, Arthur worked and fought to build a united, peaceful world. He succeeded for a while, until hatred and warfare tore it apart. Later, others built on what he had done, and civilization grew—but so did the wars and hatred until they blasted us back to this.” He swept a hand angrily across the shrouded sky.
“The world is different now,” he continued. “There are new forces moving it. Still, much is the same, too much. I have this dread that the end will also be the same. We will build and create, and in the end, it will all be destroyed. Maybe this time with no remnants left.”
Heather shuddered, haunted by snatches of her vision. “Earl, with your power, isn't there something you can do?”
Frustrated, he slammed a fist against the stone. “I don't know! In this new world, magic has changed somehow, too. My spells and tricks seem to work, yet it's as though I am using an old, dying language, an archaic dialect. I can make myself understood by yelling loud enough, but there's a new language, a new magic abroad, and I don't understand it.
“Once I could prophesy, as Arthur said. I had a silver bowl that I made myself, working spells and power into the design. In it I could sometimes glimpse possible futures and help direct the present to the right course. If I had that bowl now, perhaps I could do that again. But it's long lost, and I don't even know if it would work in this new world. Yet I don't know what else to try! My ideas are as old and dead as the world they came from.”
He huddled into his cloak, resting his hands dejectedly on his knees. Now Heather found herself comforting him.
“Come on, Earl, you'll work it out. You're young now, just like this world. I haven't any idea how to deal with whatever magic I have. I'm not sure I even want to. But I know you can use your power. You'll find something.”
He looked up, smiling gratefully, then shook his head. “Here I am, Merlin the Wizard, just as insecure as any other teenager.” He squeezed her shoulder, then stood up. “Well, we did find out one thing.”
“We did?”
“The nature of your magic. You didn't see those visions, whatever they were, by yourself. You saw them through the eyes of animals. The events with the horse and the sheep, those were tied to animals, too. What about the other times you mentioned?”
“Oh, well … yes, maybe so. I found where the rats were nesting, and I knew that the gatekeeper's horse was dying, and I really found the necklace only because of a spider.”
Merlin was stamping his cold feet, trying to bring some life into them. “That's it, then. Unfortunately, I'm not very adept at animal magic. I'll help where I can, but you'll have to pick up a lot on your own, I'm afraid.”
Heather stood up, turning her head to hide her scowl at that suggestion. Sighing, she brushed the dead grass from her trousers and followed him out of the stone circle.
Mists now hid only the peaks of the surrounding fells. A cold, damp wind carried the contented sound of sheep talking to each other and tearing out mouthfuls of coarse grass.
As they passed the last tilted stone, Merlin looked at his companion, then glanced away shyly. “I am sorry, Heather. I know this still must be very upsetting. Power always is. I wish I could make it easier for you. But I have to confess, I am glad to have someone to share it with.”
Heather tried to smile in reply, but she was too confused to bring any words with it. She wasn't convinced she wanted loneliness, whether shared or not.
WINTER'S TALES
Before winter fully cut off Cumbria, closing its passes, word came to Arthur from two distant trouble spots. Messengers from the Duke of Carlisle reported that Queen Margaret had led her troops south from the frigid borders of the Scottish ice fields. After rampaging through Northumbria, they now threatened Newcastle. And Carlisle, which also bordered Scotland, was nervous.
The other news traveled with a group of traders from the Midlands. Arthur invited them into the great hall the afternoon they arrived. Throwing skins on the floor, the merchants spread their merch
andise temptingly upon them. There were bolts of finely woven linen, dyed red and yellow, and costly carvings of wood from the southwest, where enough trees still grew for such. But the most treasured items were from the olden times.
Heather was particularly intrigued by ancient glass bottles of amber or green, while others looked over pieces of china and a few scraps of rare plastic. Merlin was drawn to a stack of pre-Devastation books.
The metalworker, though, drew the most attention. On the cold hearth, he set up his forge and blew a bowl of carefully conserved coals into life. “I search for scraps of metal everywhere,” he told those around him. “Ruined cities are best. But you've got to be careful about what you take—nothing too rusty, mind. And you mustn't mix most metals. They melt at different temperatures, see. Sometimes I just heat and rework scraps into spear- and arrowheads.” He clattered a handful onto the stones, and Arthur and the others looked them over appraisingly.
“Or I make new beautiful things, like this fine copper necklace. Look at the delicate patterns, at the red glow of the old sun itself. Now, Your Majesty, surely a treasure like this deserves to adorn a royal throat. You're a single man, I understand, but I can't believe you haven't some young mountain beauty you're thinking of making your queen.”
Arthur stood up abruptly. “I am not giving any thought to queens! Being a king is quite trying enough without them.”
The metalsmith knew he'd made a blunder. He was a clever man but not a learned one and was unaware that this particular king had, millennia earlier, bad experiences with one queen. So as not to lose his royal audience completely, the man quickly changed the subject.
“We also, of course, carry news along with our merchandise, and to men of affairs like yourselves, it is often more valued.”
“So, what can you tell us of happenings in the Midlands?” the King asked gruffly.
“Well, Cheshire and Manchester still glower at each other, and there's talk of a full-scale war between them. Manchester wants more land; it's never had much besides old ruins. But Duke Geoffrey of Chester says it can just look elsewhere.
“Now, let's see … oh, yes, there's the Duke of Staffordshire, who married the King of Nottinghamshire's daughter a while ago. All their children were born muties, and he's just sent his wife back. There's trouble brewing between those shires, that's for certain.
“And as for Wales, the old Duke of Glamorganshire died just a couple months past, and now his son's upped the rank and taken on the title of king.”
Three in the crowded room suddenly looked at each other and laughed. “King Nigel!” Welly exclaimed. “A royal pain.”
The merchant nodded. “Yes, Nigel is the gentleman's name, though as to his personality, I cannot say.”
“We can.” Heather giggled, thinking of the last time she and Welly had seen the heir of Glamorganshire—tied up on the floor of her bedroom while they made their escape from Llandoylan School.
Merlin cleared his throat. “We three had the opportunity to make the gentleman's acquaintance in school. I think, Arthur, if you're considering forming alliances in Wales, you'd better look elsewhere than Glamorgan at present.”
The glass merchant spoke at this. “Well, if it's alliances you're wanting, there are some shires that'll be seeking ties with anyone, what with the goings-on in the East and South.”
“You mean Morgan?” Arthur asked sharply.
“Yes, that's the witch who's been leading them. Kent's been hers for a couple of years now, but her army's grown. Mostly muties from the Continent, they say, them and other things best not talked about. Last year they gobbled up Essex and this year Suffolk. The shires nearby are plenty worried, I can tell you. Her army's worse than most; they pillage and murder something awful.”
An old cloth merchant pushed his way into the knot of listeners. “Aye, there's strange doings all over the South. There's a boy with us now, come all the way from Devonshire, what has some pretty rum tales to tell. You ought to talk with him.”
“Yes, perhaps we ought,” Arthur said thoughtfully. “From what I'm hearing, I fear we may have to deal with Morgan before we'd planned. Have him brought in.”
A guard slipped out the door and returned with a boy who looked no more than eight or nine. One arm was shriveled, and he walked with a pronounced limp. But his eyes were held high as he approached the King.
“Well, young man,” Arthur began, “I'd like you to have a seat and tell us—”
“John Wesley Penrose!” Heather suddenly jumped up and ran to the boy, followed closely by Welly. Merlin looked up from a newly made silver bowl he was examining and hurried to join them.
The boy's somber face lit with a smile. “I thought maybe you two would be here. And you, Mister Earl, I knew you would be.”
“You did?” Merlin asked. “How?”
“Well, when you stayed at our farm, you told me such exciting stories of King Arthur that when I heard he had returned, I was sure you'd try to join him, too.”
The King grinned at Merlin. “And you, John Wesley, you came all the way from Devon to join us?”
“Yes, sire. I hadn't anyplace else to go, and from what Earl said of you, I was sure you'd take me in.”
Arthur looked amused, but Merlin frowned. “What do you mean, John Wesley? Where are your parents?”
The boy's face clouded, and he looked down at his hands. “They were killed. Remember that bird-cat that attacked our farm? Shortly after you all left, three more came. They killed everything—my mother and father and most of the sheep and cattle. I hid in the barn under the manure. But they tore up nearly everything.”
Heather knelt beside the boy and grabbed his hands, too upset to say anything. Welly could do no better.
Merlin's face rippled with anger. “Those were Morgan's creatures,” he told Arthur. “She couldn't abide the Penroses being kind to us.”
“It's not your fault,” the boy said, his voice thick with suppressed tears. “When I was trying to find my way here, I saw other things like that and worse. Not regular muties, but really awful things. They make the air feel dirty.”
The King frowned. “You were right, Merlin; she is calling things from the other world. Hasn't changed much, has she? If there's anything filthy Morgan can deal with, she will.”
“And her forces are getting stronger, it seems,” the wizard said flatly.
“Yes, as ours must before we confront her.”
“Sire,” an adviser said, “do we really have to confront this Morgan person? I mean, all her conquests so far are to the south. Surely we aren't threatened by her.”
“We are all threatened by her. At some time, Morgan and I must meet. Our ambitions for Britain are too much at odds. Ask Merlin. He knows.”
But the young wizard was paying no attention. He was once again staring at the silver bowl in his hand and fighting off a sudden wave of dizziness. The bowl seemed to grow and become entwined with interweaving snakes. A vision stirred deeply in its depths, swirling and forming just out of sight.
He gasped and dropped the bowl. It lay on the floor, small and unadorned. Arthur grabbed for him as Merlin swayed over it. “Are you all right? What was it, a vision?”
“No, a vision of a vision. And yes, I'm fine. It's over.” He put shaking hands on John Wesley's shoulders and managed a smile. “Well, young man, it looks as if we're going to live some of those stories for real now.” He looked around. “Heather, why don't you and Welly see that our new recruit gets something to eat.”
Late into the night, by the smoky light of torches sputtering in wall sconces, Arthur and his advisers talked of future strategies and alliances. But Merlin's thoughts kept straying to the past, to a good Devonshire couple murdered for their kindness, and further back, to a silver Bowl of Seeing lost two thousand years earlier.
As winter closed around the lakelands, people and animals huddled together in houses and pens. In hearths, fires were sparingly lit, scarce logs supplemented by dried sheep dung.
Last year, Heather had found this season boring and confining, but at least she had felt part of a whole. Now she wondered if there wasn't some slight difference. Was she imagining it, or were some people avoiding her? Certainly, some were paying her more attention than she wanted. She wished she had a place tending the sheep and horses, as John Wesley now did. But instead, she found herself with three eager tutors and too much to learn.
Merlin taught her magic, but not the spells he knew, for he said their powers were too different. Rather, he tried to teach her how to open her mind to her own power and be sensitive to its messages.
Heather was not an eager pupil. She loved her tie with animals, but the power itself frightened her. Sometimes when she felt it welling up inside her, she would shrink away as if from a venomous snake.
Even Merlin seemed discouraged. “I don't know,” he told her once as they sat bundled up in the snowy garden. “You have power; I can feel it. But maybe I'm just not the one to bring it out.” He sighed. “And it's not only that our powers are different. I'm simply not attuned to this world's new magic. It has a different source, a source I can't quite see yet. My old powers work technically, but more and more they feel dry and out of place.”
He frowned until his dark brows met. “Not that any of this brooding is helping you. At least your power, whatever shape it is, is right for your world. But I wish I could at least get some gauge of it. You might be an ordinary village witch, or you might be something more. I just can't tell.”
“Then don't try,” Heather muttered, then quickly looked up, glad he hadn't heard. She didn't want to hurt him, and it seemed to mean so much to him that she had powers, too.
Other times, Kyle tried to teach her music. She was flattered that the handsome young harper took an interest in her, but she could not respond with much interest in his lessons. He said she had a pleasant voice and could carry a tune, but he seemed to believe it should carry every tune he knew. She liked music well enough but didn't want to live with it every moment of the day.
Tomorrow's Magic Page 21