by Jack Whyte
He regarded me with solemn grey eyes as I stopped directly before him, then he reached out his arm in the Roman fashion, his hand spread to grasp my forearm in the grip of friendship.
"Welcome, Merlyn Britannicus," he said softly, his voice a deep, growling purr. "My son tells me you speak our tongue."
I was caught off guard by the directness of his greeting me, for I had not known what to expect or how to behave. My knowledge of regal protocols was severely limited. Uther Pendragon, Vortigern of Northumbria and Derek of Ravenglass were the only kings I had ever met. Each of them had been signally different from the others and none of them had cared for ceremony. I had been afraid of committing some unseemly indiscretion, cursing myself for not having thought to ask Donuil how a stranger was supposed to greet his father. Now I found myself gazing into this man's eyes and gauging the strength of his arm while my mind floundered, seeking an adequate response.
"My thanks for your welcome, King Athol," I said, and then I found it easy to smile. "If you will permit me, I should like to ask you first, and before all else, about the welfare of the child you hold in trust for me. Is he well?"
The king nodded gravely. "Aye, and not merely well. He grows like a young shoat. You have returned my son to me in better health than I have ever known him to enjoy, and I will do no less for you, although the child in this case is not your son. Is that not so?"
I nodded. "True, Sir King, but he could be no more dear to me were he indeed my son."
"Good. You will see him soon, I promise you. He lives in the house of Connor, with my son's own brood, and takes no ill from anyone." He paused, smiling now, but eyeing me shrewdly nonetheless. "You speak our tongue remarkably well, Master Merlyn, for an Outlander."
I returned his smile, aware of his pointed use of the term I myself had used to describe his son years before, and feeling immeasurably better by the moment.
"You are kind, my lord. I speak it poorly and inadequately, but I was unaware of that before I came into your lands. Your son is a fine teacher, but lenient."
He glanced now towards Donuil, still holding my arm. "Lenient? How so?"
"In permitting me to stumble, without seeking to improve my hesitancy. I speak, as you can hear, at less than half the normal speed."
He smiled again, returning his gaze to me and releasing my hand. "That is mere usage, soon cured by time and custom." He looked beyond my shoulder, to where my men stood at attention. "Your men look fine, Caius Merlyn; a credit to you. But where are the rest of your horses?"
"Outside your gates, my lord. I thought it wise to leave them there until we, or you, should decide where best to keep them. But of those you see here, two are for you in person, a matched breeding pair selected by your son with the guidance of our Master of Horse."
"Hmm. I noticed them as you approached. You honour us. Before we look at them, however, there is a ritual we must share." He raised one hand and a man stepped forward from behind him, bearing a small platter on which lay a flat loaf of bread and a tiny dish of salt. Athol broke the bread, tearing off a small piece and handing the remainder to me. As I, too, broke off a piece, he sprinkled his with a small pinch of salt and then salted mine, too. We ate together. Then, the ritual completed, the king stepped forward and raised his arms in a gesture requiring silence, although the stillness all around was profound.
"It is done," he said, raising his voice by a mere shade, knowing that everyone present, including the advisers ranked behind him, hung on his every word. "My son is returned to us in health. Caius Merlyn Britannicus, Commander of the Forces of Camulod in Britain, has shared our food. He and his men and all his goods are under my protection; treat them as you would me and mine. For now they will rest and recover from their journey. Tonight we will celebrate their coming."
There was no acclamation, no markedly visible or audible reaction, and yet a sense of wellness filled the air as the throng around the courtyard immediately surged into motion and dispersed about their tasks. Athol turned, placing himself between Donuil and me, and taking each of us by one elbow, led us back to where his advisers stood waiting to greet us. Behind us, my own men relaxed and clustered together, awaiting disposition.
There are times when one experiences instinctive revulsion towards a person whom one is meeting for the first time. It doesn't happen often, but I learned long ago to trust the feeling, despite the apparent lack of logic that frequently attends its occurrence. Of course, in most of these cases, the aversion is easy to explain and understand, inspired by the physical appearance of the stranger. It is far easier to like, at first sight, a man or a woman who conforms to one's own notions of attractiveness than it is to feel drawn towards one who is unwashed, ill formed or burdened with some grotesque, dehumanizing affliction. When an unexpected introduction to a total stranger sets my internal alarms jangling discordantly without rhyme or reason, experience has taught me that this gut-level reaction is infallible. During my brief introduction to Athol's counselors, I experienced three such episodes, each of them different from the others.
The first man fell into the category of the easily understandable. His physique, his appearance, the very way he stood and moved repelled me. His name was Mungo, and the sound of it, completely alien to my ears, conjured an image of a large, ugly fish stirring heavily in the bottom mud of deep, murky waters. To my eyes, however, he presented no sign of fishiness. Mungo Rohan was a squat, rock-like presence, massive of chest and shoulder, with enormous hands and wrists that were coated with thick, wiry black hair. A great bush of black and grey beard hid the lower half of his face and obscured what little neck he had. His head, however, was bald as an egg and his eyes were small and porcine, squeezed too tightly together for my taste on either side of a misshapen nose that had been smashed beyond repair in the distant past, and almost hidden beneath the thick bar of eyebrows that sprouted wildly above them. I marked him immediately as one I would neither like nor trust. He glowered at me for long moments before stepping forward to greet me, nodding affably enough once he decided he had made the impression he wished to make, and extending his hand in a fair semblance of courtesy and friendship. I clasped his hand, inclining my own head slightly in return, aware of the deadness of the glaze that hung between his eyes and mine and was evidently intended to mask his true feelings. Adviser to the king he might be, I thought, and senior by age and rank, but any advice this man dispensed would be well weighted to incline any outcome towards the benefit of Mungo Rohan.
As I clasped his hand, aware of the weight and strength of it, I allowed my gaze to drift beyond him to where Connor stood watching me from the far end of the line, his face creased in a smile of. . . what was it? Anticipation? Or was it mere contempt? Mungo released my hand and stepped back, and the king moved me along to the next man in line, who made no more lasting impression upon me than a stranger passing in a crowded street.
Next to him, however, was a face I recognized immediately, and it was smiling in welcome. Fergus, son of Iain, son of Fergus, brother to King Athol, grasped my wrists in both of his and thanked me for safeguarding his nephew as I had promised. We had met only once, on the day I took Donuil hostage and allowed this man and his surviving warriors to depart from the battlefield with their weapons, and therefore their honour. I was as glad to see the big man as he evidently was to see me.
The fourth man was very different, and the sight of him brought my heart bounding into my throat. I knew we two had never met before, and yet I knew this man! I recognized the size of him; the colour of his yellow hair so like my own; and the way his face would twist awry when he laughed in the teeth of a strong wind, showing his own teeth, white and strong but flawed by a missing canine; but I failed completely when I sought a reason for this sudden presentiment. I must have frozen in shock, for the smile on his lips faltered and his eyes clouded momentarily with concern. I had to make a strong effort to collect myself and behave casually.
"Well met," I said, before he could speak.
I nodded, my thoughts still awhirl at the feelings his appearance had brought out in me. "My thanks. . . Kerry? Should I call you that? Not Caerlyle?"
"No, Kerry suits me well. I sometimes fail to answer to Caerlyle, it's been so long since any but my mother called me that." This man was charming, full of self-confidence and strength, his face open and bereft of guile. Why then, I asked myself, were all my internal warning systems vibrating? And whence came this unsettling familiarity I felt with him? I held his hand, gazing directly into his eyes.
"We've never met before, have we?"
His eyes flared with surprise. "No," he said, laughing at the strangeness of the question. "How could we? I have never been away from here and this is your first visit to Eire. Where could we have met?"
I shook my head. "You look amazingly familiar. It must be that you remind me of someone else, someone from long ago." I smiled. "I find that as I grow older I see more and more resemblances with people I have met long since. It disconcerts me sometimes."
King Athol spoke from beside me, his hand on my elbow steering me gently towards the next man in line. "You will find, my friend, that the phenomenon you describe grows even stronger as you approach my age. People tend to fall into types. Meet my good-brother, Liam. I was once wed to his mother's sister."
Liam was a hunchback, small and wiry-looking, with large eyes and a liquid, lilting voice of surprising resonance and beauty. "Twistback, they call me," he said, grinning. "No imagination, some of these people." I grinned back at him, liking him instantly, and turned to the next man in line.
The basilisk stare of utter dislike from this one's eyes caused me to blink at him in astonishment before I could stop myself. Even King Athol, who was on the point of introducing us, hesitated visibly, evidently as nonplussed as I.
"Fingael?" I distinctly heard the note of uncertainty and surprise in the old man's voice. "Fingael, what ails you?"
"Nothing. I'm fine, Father." The man's eyes never left my own as he spoke the words from one corner of his mouth in a whispery voice that was sibilant and ominous. Apart from that response, he made no move either to recognize my presence or greet me in any way. His father cleared his throat, in embarrassment, I thought, and spoke again, this time with iron in his tone.
"Then perhaps you will greet our guest as befits his rank and status, rather than leaving him to suspect that we have lax rules of hospitality in this, my kingdom!"
"His rank and status?" The words came out like a challenge to combat, their insulting tone clear for anyone and everyone to hear. "He is Brother Donuil's friend and jailer. There are those of us who don't make friends that easily or that dishonourably."
I saw Athol stiffen on one side of me and sensed Donuil gathering his strength to move forward angrily in his own defence. I forestalled both of them with raised hands, pressing the back of my right hand against Donuil's breast, restraining him gently. He subsided, although I could feel his unwillingness, and I addressed myself to his uncivil brother.
"You must excuse my uncertainty, but do you and I have some unsettled difference between us of which I'm unaware?"
He sneered at me. "No. We have nothing between us. I don't like you, and that's all there is to it."
"Damn you, Finn, you pig-headed dolt!" Donuil moved forward again, and again I stopped him, this time facing him and stilling him with my eyes and tone.
"Donuil, my friend, this is my concern." I turned back to Fingael. "I can see that you dislike me. Everyone can." I kept my voice level and forced myself to pause, having no wish to add to the damage this lout was attempting to do. "Dislike might even be too mild a word." I paused, looking him straight in the eye and allowing my silence to stretch until I saw him start to say something more. Before he could, I spoke again. "Well, doubtless you have your reasons, sufficient for your own mind at least. But your dislike has the air of long usage, and until we came face to face I had no awareness of your existence. You form your judgments quickly, it would appear."
"Quickly enough." He had ignored Donuil completely and the sneer was still pasted to his face. I resisted the urge to wipe it away. He was a big man, but not as big as I, and younger, and beneath his present scowl he would be, I saw, pleasant-faced, clean-shaven, with bright red hair and green eyes that blazed from a stark white face that was sunburned on nose and brows. His bearing radiated challenge and I knew I could not yet walk away; this man would assume from that a victory of some kind.
"How old are you, Fingael, son of Athol?" I asked him, seeing his eyes widen in surprise at my level tone.
"Old enough to know my mind."
"Aye, but not to trust it, eh?"
"What?" The sneer vanished. He had no idea of my meaning. Neither had I, but I had retained the initiative.
"I would guess you to be two years, perhaps three, older than Donuil. Twenty-six or -seven I'm thirty-two. Do you understand my point?"
He frowned ferociously, indicating that he did not. I continued speaking. "I had lived for more than half a decade before you were born, young Finn. To this point, I have lived throughout your entire lifetime without seeing you or hearing of you until this, our first meeting. I would happily forgo a second meeting for the remainder of it in equal ignorance."
Someone caught his breath in surprise and then there came a shout of laughter in which everyone joined save me, Fingael, Donuil and their father King Athol. While it was ringing, I turning casually away from him, dismissing him as I moved towards the next man in line. Athol the King stalked beside me, rigid with fury at the insult offered me, yet saying nothing that might add to an incendiary situation. I know I greeted the man but have no memory of it. My mind was awash with other, far more serious matters: anger at Fingael's insults and confusion over my strange, unshared recognition of Caerlyle. And so I progressed until I faced the last of Athol's counselors, his son Connor. Here, at least, I found interest and pleasure in his welcome and in the open frankness with which he hugged his brother Donuil.
"You impressed my brother Finn, Yellow Head," he said to me eventually, when he and Donuil had finished belabouring each other's back and shoulders. "He has not met many who can best him either in words or a fight. I must warn you, he makes a bad enemy and cares not for losing."
"Hmm. He's lucky never to have met my cousin Uther."
He smiled at me. "Two of a kind, are they?"
"Aye, you might say they're similar, in much the same way that certain lambs are similar to bears—both may be born black." I turned to look back towards Fingael, but he was nowhere to be seen. "Where did he go?"
"My father marched him off as soon as you had moved away. I imagine the king is speaking to him now of hospitality and the rules of Eirish courtesy."
"Is he always as pleasant with strangers?"
He looked at me, one eyebrow raised. "Who, my father? Or Finn?"
"Fingael."
"He's a boar, with a boar's manners," Donuil muttered.
Connor's gaze, still amused, went to Donuil and then back to me. "In truth, he is not. Neither a boar nor generally unpleasant without reason. I've never seen him quite that way before today. But Finn is. . . difficult at times. He has his own ways. My father, who is no more patient than most kings, has yet great patience in some little things. For twenty years now he has been trying to teach Finn to school himself, but without much success." He threw an arm around my shoulders and I caught a whiff of the remembered smell of him, leather and light, clean sweat and a tang of some wild perfume in his hair. "Come, let's drink some ale before I die of thirst. I have a vat long cooled beneath the g
round. And I have a babby in my house you might wish to see. And if we are to speak of boars, I'd rather hear the tale of the one you killed in the south than of the one you bested here today." He led the way down from the rostrum and directly to his hut, walking with the familiar, rolling gait I recalled so clearly. The cordon of guards that had lined the rostrum had long since disbanded and my own men had disappeared, back to the camp we had established beyond the walls. Only a few of Athol's people paid us any attention as we crossed the now-empty central space.
I spent more than an hour of the time that followed with my young cousin Arthur who was, as the king had said, growing like a young pig. The child was now at least six months old, and possibly seven, by my best reckoning, and was already a large child, although distinctly lacking in regal attributes. He was, indeed, closer to a young shoat than a young king, for his home was the dirt floor of Connor's house, and he sprawled naked and dirty before a banked-up, guarded fire with a large number of other mites, some of them little older than himself. Connor had to search for him amid the tangle of small, bare bodies before hauling him out and handing him to me, and as I waited for him to identify and extract the future Commander of Camulod from the squalling company of his current peers, I found myself smiling in disbelief. In truth, I picked the boy out before Connor did, recognizing him by his startlingly coloured eyes, and feeling gratification at the evident, sturdy strength of the child. But he was filthy, and there was no denying that, stripped of all the rich swaddling that would have covered him in Camulod, and liberally daubed with a moist compound of dirt from the floor and fresh urine from one of his small companions, his regal heritage was far less evident than was his common humanity. I was already reaching for him by the time Connor hauled him out of the press, and I felt ridiculously pleased when the child grinned at me immediately upon being passed to me. I exulted in the solid weight of him at the end of my outstretched arms, and pulled him to me quickly, smiling into his eyes and then opening my mouth in laughing protest as his chubby fingers immediately reached out for me and closed on my face, his tiny nails sinking into the sensitive skin at the end of my nose. Connor did not notice. He was staring down in mild bemusement at the pile of children about his feet.