The Hallowed Isle Book Four

by Diana L. Paxson

  “Your children still need you—” he thought hopelessly.

  “My children are grown! Surely they know I love them. Merlin, you would not condemn me to live on in a body that is outworn! Help me, my dear one. Let me go!”

  He was not so sure of that, but it was his own need, not that of Morgause, that reached out and drew the spirit of the younger woman into the link as well.

  “There you are, my daughter—you see—” Igierne moved closer to the light. “This is what I tried to tell you. There is only this last bit, that is a little. . . difficult, and then all will be well. This, too, is part of your training. Help me. . . .”

  He could sense when the turmoil in Morgause’s spirit began to give way to wonder.

  “You see the doorway opening before you—” The words that the younger woman whispered came from ritual, but they carried conviction now, and resonated in both worlds. “The bright spirits of those you love await you, ready to welcome you home. . . .”

  And as she spoke, Merlin realized that it was so. He glimpsed those radiant beings drawing nearer, and recognized, with a certainty beyond the senses, Uthir, and behind him Igierne’s parents, Amlodius and Argantel.

  “Go through the gate. Let our love support you through your own self-judgment. Over you the dark shall have no power. Farewell—we release you into the Lady’s waiting arms. . . .”

  Somewhere far away, the failing body struggled for breath, sighed, and was still. But that hardly mattered. For a moment, Merlin’s inner vision embraced the brightness and he saw Igierne clearly, growing ever younger as she moved away from them until she was the gold-crowned maiden whom he had loved. And then she passed through the portal. The Light intensified beyond mortal comprehension, and Merlin was blown back into the pallid illumination of an earthly day.

  The surface of the lake wrinkled as wind brushed the water. A vanguard of cloud was just rising beyond the western hills. Morgause shivered, though the temperature had barely begun to drop; the cold she felt came from the soul. Merlin, beside her, moved as she had seen men move coming half-stunned from the battlefield.

  “It was a good death—” she said aloud. “Why am I so angry?” Behind them the ritual wailing of the priestesses swelled and faded like the rising wind, but Morgause felt her throat hard, the muscles tight, and her eyes were dry.

  “Because your mother has abandoned you,” came the deep rumble of his reply. “Even a death less triumphant than this one is a release for the one who passes. We grieve for ourselves, because she has left us alone.”

  Morgause stared. For most of her life she had hated this man, the architect of her father’s death and her mother’s first treachery. Of all people in the world, she had not expected him to understand.

  “I remember when my grandmother was dying,” she said then. “My mother wept, while I played, uncomprehending, on the shore. Argantel foretold that I would be the Lady of the Lake one day. For so many years I fought my mother, fearing she would deny me my destiny. And now that fate is come upon me, and I am afraid.”

  “So was she . . .” answered Merlin. “Like you, she had been long away from the Lake. But you have had your mother’s teaching. Much of the old wisdom has been lost—it is for you to preserve what you can. I do not know your mysteries . . .” he said with some difficulty, “but you have the Cauldron. Call upon your Goddess—surely She will comfort you.”

  “And you—” she answered him.

  Merlin shook his head. “My goddess has gone out of the world. . . .”

  Morgause looked at him in amazement, understanding only now that this man, like her father, had been denied Igierne’s love. The wind blew again, more strongly, hissing in the trees. Merlin had turned to gaze across the lake to the heights where, even in those few moments, the clouds had doubled their size.

  “I must go—” he said then. “Your mother is High Queen now in the Otherworld, and in this world, the Tiernissa is Guendivar. But you are Lady of the Lake, Morgause—the Hidden Queen, the White Raven of Britannia. Guard it well!”

  He held her gaze, and she saw a woman crowned with splendor reflected in his eyes.

  “I am the Lady of the Lake . . .” she affirmed, accepting his vision of her at last. “And who are you?”

  The certainty in Merlin’s eyes flickered out, to be replaced by desolation. “I am a leaf blown by the wind . . . I am a sea-smoothed rock . . . I am a sun-bleached bone . . . I do not know what I am, save that my body lives still in a world that my spirit finds strange. Up there”—he gestured towards the hills—“perhaps I may learn. . . .”

  Above the trees, one entered the kingdom of the wind. Merlin struggled upward, reeling as a new gust swept across the slope and the purple bells of the heather rang with soundless urgency. A wren was tossed skyward, crying, caught by the blast. Clouds boiled above him, flinging splatters of rain. Merlin stumbled, jabbed the Spear into the earth to keep his balance, and pulled himself upright once more.

  “Blow! Blow! Cry out in rage!” he shouted, shaking his fist at the sky. This violence of nature might be harsh to the body, but it matched the anguish in his soul. “World, weep, let my grief gust forth with every blast of wind!”

  He took a step forward, realized he could climb no higher, and sank to his knees. “Why—” he gasped, “am I still alive?”

  There were words in the blast that whipped at hair and beard. Merlin grasped the shaft of the Spear, feeling it thrum beneath his hands like a tree in the wind, and abruptly their meaning became clear.

  “Unless you will it, you shall not leave this world. . . .”

  “Am I less than human, then?”

  “Perhaps you are more. . . .”

  Merlin shivered. The Voice was all around him, in the wail of the wind, the vibration of the spearshaft, the rasp of air in his throat. He shook his head.

  “Who are you?”

  The air rippled with laughter. “I am every breath you take, every thought you think; I am ecstasy.” The laughter rolled once more. “You carry My Spear. . . .”

  Merlin recoiled. “The god of the Saxons!”

  “You may call me that, or Lugos, if it makes you feel easier, or Mercurius. I have walked in many lands, and been called by many names. When men use wit and will and words, I am there. And you have borne my Spear for a dozen winters. Why are you so surprised?”

  “Why did you allow it? What do you want with me?”

  “O, man of Wisdom! Even now, do you not understand?”

  Abruptly the wind failed. The storm was passing. Merlin stared as the light of sunset, blazing suddenly beneath the clouds, filled the world with gold. His grief for Igierne might never leave him, but now his mind buzzed with phrases, riddles, insights and imaginings, and a great curiosity. Holding onto the Spear, he levered himself upright once more. Then he plucked it from the earth and started down the mountain.

  Dust rose in golden clouds, stirred by the feet of the harvesters. The cart they drew was piled with sheaves of corn and garlanded with summer flowers. Singing rose in descant to the rhythmic creak of wheels as they pushed it towards the meadow below the villa where the harvest feast had been laid. Guendivar, sitting with Cai and Gualchmai in the place of honor, drew her veil half over her face. But the precaution was needless, for as evening drew nearer, a light breeze had come up to blow the dust away.

  She had been glad of Cai’s invitation to keep the festival in the place where Artor had been a boy. It was Cai’s home now, though the king’s service had allowed him to spend little time here. His health had not been good, and she had come partly in hopes of getting him to take some rest. He did seem to be better here. She had smiled at his stories, trying to imagine the great king of Britannia as an eager boy. Her only regret was that Artor was not here with them. Five years he had spent campaigning in Gallia, with little result that she could see. He had not even returned when his mother died the year before.

  The procession rounded the last curve, and she heard the chorus more clearly
:

  “Oh where is he hidden, and where has he gone?

  The corn is all cut, and the harvest is done!”

  The workers who had cut and bound the last sheaf, that they called “the neck,” or sometimes, “the old man,” held it high. They had already been soaked with water from the river to bring luck, but in this weather they did not seem to mind. Guendivar remembered with longing the secret pool where she used to bathe when she was a girl, and how she and Julia had discovered the pleasure their bodies could bring. These days, most of the time she felt as virgin as the Mother of God, but as she watched the reapers pursuing the women who had followed to bind the sheaves, she had to suppress a spurt of envy for the fulfillment she had been denied.

  “In the first flush of springtime, the young king is born

  The ploughed fields rejoice in the growth of the corn—

  Oh where is he hidden, and where—”

  Guendivar felt unexpected tears prick in her eyes. Men called her the Flower Bride and swore that her beauty was unchanged. But it was not the way of nature for spring to last forever. . . .

  The cart was drawn up before the tables and the men who had hitched themselves to it threw off the traces. The woman who had been carrying the last sheaf handed it over to laughing girls, who bore it to the central upright of the drying shed and tied it there, wreathed with flowers. The light of the setting sun, slanting through the trees, turned stalk and seed to gold.

  “The sun rises high and the fields they grow green.

  Our king now is bearded, so fair to be seen—”

  Cai held out his beaker to be refilled as the serving girl came by and sat back with a sigh. “It seems strange to sit here drinking cider, after so many years of war.”

  “And Artor not here to enjoy it,” Gualchmai replied. “It is not right for the king to be so long from his own land. If he had the army with which we won at Mons Badonicus, by now he would be emperor!”

  Still singing, men and women joined hands and began to dance around the post.

  “The sun rises high and the fields turn to gold,

  The king hangs his head, now that he has grown old—”

  “Too many died on the quest for the Cauldron, and some of us are getting older . . .” He eyed Gualchmai wryly, rubbing his left arm as if it pained him. “Except, of course, for you.”

  Gualchmai frowned, uncomprehending. Years of war had battered his face like bronze, the sandy hair was receding from his high brow, but his arms were still oak-hard.

  “It is too peaceful,” he said truculently, and Guendivar laughed. “My lord set me here to guard you, but all our enemies are still frightened of his name.” He sighed, and then turned to look at her, his eyes pleading. “Let me go to him, lady. Those Frankish lords would not dare to laugh if I were with him. Artor needs me. I am of use to no one here!”

  “The reaper swings high and the binder bends low,

  The king is cut down and to earth he must go.”

  Guendivar shivered, touched by a fear she thought she had forgotten. For so long, Artor had been a bodiless intelligence that spoke to her through the written word, she had nearly forgotten he wore mortal flesh that was vulnerable to cold, hunger, and enemy swords.

  “Ninive, bring me my shawl—” she said, but the girl was not there. It should not have surprised her; the child made no secret of her discomfort in large gatherings. No doubt she was wandering in the woods on the hill, and would return when darkness fell. And in truth, the chill the queen felt was an internal one, that neither shawl nor mantle could ease.

  “Very well—” Both men turned to look at her. “It comforts me to have you here, and your wife will not thank me for letting you go, but I agree that Artor needs you more.”

  The harvesters rushed inward towards the last sheaf, arms upraised.

  “And we shall make merry with bread and with beer,

  Until he returns with the spring of the year. . . .”

  Then the circle dissolved into laughter as they descended on the vats of harvest ale.

  Grinning, Gualchmai downed his own in a single swallow and held out his cup for more.

  “But be sure that you make good on your boast, my champion,” Guendivar said then. “Beat the breeches off the Franks and bring my lord swiftly home.”

  “Oh where is he hidden, and where has he gone?

  The corn is all cut, and the harvest is done!”

  Merlin walked in the oakwood above the villa in the golden light of a harvest moon. He had to remind himself that Turpilius and Flavia were both dead these twenty years and the farm belonged to Cai, for seen from the hillside, nothing seemed to have changed. Even from here the sound of celebration came clearly. Around the threshing sheds torches glittered; the revellers moving among them in a flickering dance of light and shadow. Stubbled fields gleamed faintly beyond them, waiting to rest through the fallow moons of wintertide.

  He had intended to join the celebration, but the rites of the seeded earth were not his mysteries. Long experience had taught him that his presence would cast a chill on the festival, like a breath of wind from the wilderness beyond their fenced fields. It was far too beautiful a night to sleep, and these days he needed little rest, and had no need for the shelter of walls.

  And so he walked, hair stirred lightly by the breathing darkness, feeding on the rich, organic scents of leaf mold and drying hay. On such a night it was easy to forget the dutiful impulse that had sent him south to offer his counsel to Artor’s queen. He belonged in the wilderness, with only his daimon for companion and the god of the Spear for guide.

  These days, the god was always with him. But the bright spirit that he called his daimon, the companion of his childhood, he had not seen for many years. Now that he was ancient he found himself remembering her bright eyes and shining hair ever more vividly. It was the fate of the old, he had heard, to become childlike.

  Thinking so, he laughed softly, and out of the night, like a shiver of bells, came an answer.

  Merlin stood still, senses questing outward. It was beyond belief that a man could have been present without his knowledge on this hill. What he found at last was a glimmering whiteness perched in an oak tree, the human mind so tuned to the rhythms of the night he had thought it a perturbation of the wind.

  “The hour grows late—” came a silvery voice from the branches. “Why does the greatest Druid in Britannia wander the hills?”

  Merlin shaped his sight to an owl’s vision and saw a fine-boned face haloed by fair hair. For a moment he could not breathe. It was the face of his daimon, and yet she was no part of his imagining—even as a child, he had always understood the difference between the images that came from outside and those that lived within. And now he could sense the warmth of a human body and hear the faint whisper of breath. She stirred, and he glimpsed the glint of embroidery on her gown.

  “Why is a maiden of the court sitting in a tree?”

  “You do not know me, and yet we are kin.” She laughed again. “I am Gualchmai’s daughter by a woman of the hills, and if I cannot be roaming there, in this oak I can at least pretend to be free.”

  “That is so. I have myself lived for a time in a tree. Would it displease you to have an old man’s company?” To his sight, a radiance seemed to flow from her slim form, more lovely than the light of the moon.

  She cocked her head like a bird. “I have never before met anyone who felt like a part of the forest. You know all its secrets, is it not so? Stay then, and talk to me. . . .”

  Merlin swayed, as if something were melting within him that had been frozen since Igierne died. He put out his hand to the oak tree, and carefully eased himself to the solid ground.

  “Gladly . . .” he said softly. “Gladly will I stay with you.”

  Merlin’s return was a wonder that had men buzzing for a season. When they saw how often he walked with the girl Ninive, they laughed, thinking they knew the reason. But Guendivar, having promised Gualchmai that she would watch ove
r his child, understood that there was nothing sexual in the attraction between the old man and the maiden. And she had other, more pressing, concerns.

  Gualchmai’s departure had not loosed all Britannia’s old enemies upon them, as some had feared. The Picts were holding to Artor’s treaty, and there was only an occasional raider from Eriu. It was the princes of Britannia who were beginning to grow restive, like horses kept too long in pasture who forget the governance of bit and rein. Merlin told her that after Uthir died it had been the same. The counsel of the Druid was valuable; with his guidance Guendivar grew into her queenship like a tree in fertile soil. But he could not show an iron fist to the princes. She wrote to Artor, but another year passed, and he did not return.

  Gualchmai had been gone for two years when new trouble between the men of Dumnonia and the West Saxons impelled her to appeal to Artor again. She had summoned Constantine and Cynric to meet with her at Durnovaria. The spring had been a fine one, and they had no excuse for not traveling. But if she could not reconcile them with her wisdom, she and they both knew that she had no teeth with which to compel obedience.

  Through her window came the rich, organic scent of the river that Durnovaria guarded, mixed with the sharper tang of the sea. Few men lived permanently in the town—even the prince preferred to spend most of his time at his villa in the hills. But folk still gathered here for the weekly market, and the clamor of mixed tongues made a deeper background to the crying of gulls. Guendivar set down the vellum on which she had been working and took up the most recent letter that Artor had sent to her.

  “Pompeius Regalis paid me a visit last month; he is building a stronghold near Brioc’s monastery in the west of the coastal plain and has realized he needs allies. There are so many Dumnonians there now the place is called by their name. His son Fracanus was with him. He has invented a new sport that he persuaded some of my men to try. Instead of racing their horses with chariots, they measure out a course and put up the lightest boys into the saddle. Of course it is dangerous if the lad is thrown, but the horses do go faster. . . .”