Ardhu’s eyes ignited, his anger matching the Merlin’s. “I am not your pawn, Merlin. You said yourself it would be good for the tribes to see that I am my own man and not some minion of the Temple. And so I am. An’kelet is the greatest warrior in the world—and he is my friend, with whom I would entrust my life. And, as for the girl,” he faltered here, his cheeks growing red. “You…you have not seen her, Merlin…”
Merlin spat on the ground in derision. “You are no better than your foolish father, swayed by the lure of a woman’s tits and thighs! I was working on a match for you, and now those plans lie in ruins.”
“Good!” Art shouted. “Why should I lie with some trollop with a face like a pig’s arse just because you have chosen her for me?”
“Because I know what is right for you! For Prydn!” Merlin practically shrieked. Spittle flew from his lips, striking Ardhu’s cheek and making him wince in disgust. “I have cast the bones, cast them many times. Each time it comes out the same…Look!”
He grabbed Ardhu’s arm and yanked him down beside the fire-pit. On the packed earth lay a jumble of knucklebones, some new, glowing white in the gloom of the hut, some dark yellow, worn smooth from centuries of use. Merlin passed his long, brown hand over them. His eyes were hot, hooded.
“There it is, written in the bones of our Ancestors. Signs. Dire signs. See the centre? That is the serpent, with you, Ardhu Pendraec, at its head. The Terrible Head. Above your right shoulder is the Sun, brightly shining but burning with fierce power too—that is your stranger from Ar-morah. Above your left shoulder rises a crescent Moon, pale and deathly—the white phantom woman you have chosen in defiance of me. These two shall come together as the Sun and Moon come together at rare and terrible times when the earth plunges into darkness for a time. The shadows cast by their brief union may undo all we have worked to achieve.”
Art felt a chill of fear run up his spine but forced himself to face his mentor. “Pah! Quivering with fear because some chance configuration of the bones! Why, the old women cast such bones for the price of a bead or two on feast—days; it is little more than a game to them!”
Merlin’s hand shot out, grabbing Ardhu’s tunic and dragging him towards him with a strength belied by his lean frame. “The destiny of this land is no game,” he snarled “Or if it is, it is a game we must win. Do you understand?”
“I understand,” said Ardhu frostily. “But I want you to understand too. I will have my own friends and companions. I will have the wife of my choice. If I have done wrong and misjudged their worth, I will pay the price and seek to make amends. Do you understand, Merlin?”
Merlin leaned back, his breath hissing through clenched teeth, rocking on his callused heels. He seemed suddenly old and tired. “Yes, I understand,” he said, voice heavy with sudden weariness. “For all my hard work, you are still your father’s son. I should not have expected otherwise. Go, and leave me in peace; in your absence I have been overseeing the workers who build the great fort of Kham-El-Ard, and I am weary from doing for you, you ungrateful whelp.”
Ardhu left the shaman’s house and returned to his men, who sat waiting on their mounts, a little dismayed that there had not been feasting and celebrations to herald their arrival.
“Trouble, Art?” Ka’hai raised one eyebrow quizzically.
“Yes,” replied his foster-brother. “Merlin trouble! But he’ll get over it. He’ll have to. In the mean time let us move up river and look at the walls of Kham-El-Ard, then fare to the Place-of-Light. I suspect the reception there might be more welcoming.”
*****
Ardhu and the warband rode down river, stopping to marvel at Kham-El-Ard, where oak posts sprouted like trees on the heights, soaring up almost to touch the Sun Himself. It made Ludegran’s promontory fort look humble and mean in comparison. Workers streamed in and out of what would eventually be a great gate with turrets for archers, while others dug banks with antler picks and shovels made of cows’ shoulder bones.
Riding beside Ardhu, An’kelet looked impressed. “One day this place will go down in legend. I am glad that I shall play a part. Our peoples were always close through deepest time; may it always remain so, Ardhu.”
The warriors passed on, following the banks of Abona, which narrowed and began to curve and coil like a serpent. Fording her waters at a weir where water boiled like a cauldron, they then rode East toward the settlement known as Place-of-Light. Standing on a slight plateau, this village was an ancient place of great renown, for here the first great smiths from Faraway changed Prydn forever with their knowledge of the riddle of metal. And more besides—for in their retinues they not only brought the knowledge of copper and gold, but the brewing of mead and ale, the manufacture of drinking-beakers worthy of great warriors, and a burial rite of individual graves, where a man’s spirit could go into the West with his dogs and treasures, even his servants and children if that was his desire. The Galloen had not fought with the people of Albu and Khaledon, but they changed their lives irrevocably; the communal stone tombs of the Ancestors had been sealed, and circles such as Khor Ghor had been reused and remodelled, its vast structures of stone rearranged and made even more magnificent.
The warband spotted the settlement almost at once, rising on top of an escarpment that gave an unobstructed view across open lands from Holy Hill to Deroweth. A line of vast totem poles glowered on the lip of the scarp; behind them loomed the remains of ancient grave mounds and other holy places, some marked by posts, others by pits and deep shafts. Further behind, stood roundhouses and huts, where children and dogs played in the Sun. Cattle lowed in pens, fat with sweet grass, while woolly brown sheep trundled lazily between the wattle walls of the huts. Women sat weaving and making pottery, while men tanned deer and cowhides and dragged in sheaves of wheat to be ground for bread.
As soon as the band became visible a joyous cry went up. A drum started to beat, and every hut seemed to disgorge a stream of children and women, all clamouring to see the returning warriors.
“I told you the reception would be better here,” grinned Art, nudging his foster brother Ka-hai in the ribs. “Look, there is father!”
Ech-tor the smith was striding across the settlement, shoving aside infants and yipping, excited dogs. His face was split by a huge grin. He had abandoned his smithy near Marthodunu and come to live permanently in Place-of-Light, in order to be near Ka’hai and Ardhu. As the village’s own smith had been barrowed the winter before, his skill was sorely needed—and much appreciated. In fact he was considered special, having raised the young Chief himself, and he had even taken a new wife, Kerek, from amongst the villagers.
“My boys!” he cried, arms outstretched, as Ardhu and Ka’hai dismounted. They fell about in bear-hug embrace, while the other warriors laughed. “You have returned to us as blooded warriors of the People! You are true men now—ha, I swear, you even look taller! And Art, what is this we hear… that you have contracted a bride?”
“It is so,” murmured Ardhu, aware he was blushing. "It is said her mother is a goddess-on-earth. She is white as the Moon, and her name means ‘White Phantom.’ She will bring gold and cattle as her dowry.”
Ech-tor glanced sideways at Ka’hai. “You next boy!” he teased. “You mustn’t let your brother outdo you! Now come, we must all celebrate your safe return from battle and hear tales of mighty feats of arms!”
*****
The feasting that accompanied the warriors’ homecoming lasted for three days. Venison and boar was consumed and roast goose sizzled and spat over the fire-pits. Hazelnuts were cracked and consumed, and mushrooms boiled in broth flavoured by dried seaweed imported from the coast. Rare sweet treats were offered afterwards—wheat grains drenched in milk and left till they burst, then flavoured with honey, and possets of tansy leaves mixed with berries from the local woods. There was much merriment, and many a man back from his first battle looked with new respect at domestic life unmarred by war’s violence, and set his gaze upon one of the unwed wom
enfolk. The girls themselves wove flowers in their hair and stained their lips with berry-juice, and acted shy and coy until they got their chosen warrior alone, when they then showed the female-starved men who really held the real power in matters of the heart. That was, of course, the practical older girls, eager to escape their mothers’ hearths—the younger ones sat sighing over Ardhu or An’kelet, who treated them all like sisters and tolerated their constant Mooning and moping better than most of the other young men.
At the end of the third day, as the burnt orange eye of the Moon soared West toward the Stones and the Deadlands, Ardhu gazed down from the height and saw a familiar figure, staff in one hand, climbing slowly to the top of the plateau.
The young king ran forward eagerly. “Merlin! You’ve come! Have you forgiven me yet?”
Merlin pushed back his hood and spat onto the feet-impacted chalk, shining blue in the Moonglow. “No. But there is naught to be gained in dwelling on your rash actions. I must try and make the best of this situation. Maybe I can shield you from what I have seen in the pattern of the bones.”
Ardhu lead Merlin into the headman’s hut, and the feasting continued, though slightly more subdued now that Merlin’s stern eyes were upon the crowd. The shaman was particularly interested by An’kelet and spent hours grilling him about his life and lineage back in Ar-morah. After he was done, he looked more relaxed; the faint hint of a smile even touched his thin lips.
“He is an honourable man,” he said to Ardhu. “A great warrior… but child-like in a strange way. He is ruled by his beliefs, and when he has set his course upon something, he will follow his heart till the end, right or wrong. This is his failing…a failing you must deal with if he is to stay amongst your men.”
Art sipped from his beaker, savouring the rich, fermented honey taste. “And what would you advise?”
“He must go to Khor Ghor and swear absolute obedience to you. This oath will bind him. If he strays from your path, the guilt will break his mind. That is the kind of man this stranger of bronze is—strong as a stone on the outside, but with a fatal flaw inside which might cause him to crumble as an ill-made pot crumbles. Pray you do not lean on him too much lest he falls and takes you down with him.”
Ardhu looked at Merlin through drink-misted eyes. He hated it when the old man went on so. “He already swore to me, when we first met. He even renounced his princely title. Surely, that is good enough for you!”
Merlin thumped the head of his staff against the ground. “No, it is not. I want him to swear before the Ancestors, before the spirits that are all around us. A man may make noises of obedience in moments of triumph or gladness—then have a change of heart when next the wind blows. I want to take no chances; as the son of a priestess An’kelet will be aware of what his fate might be if he shatters the vows he makes.”
“So be it,” said Art, eager to keep the old man happy. “He will be sworn in at the Stones on the next auspicious day, under your guidance, Merlin.” He counted on his fingers. “And then… it will be nigh on the time of the Harvest Feast, the Rage of Trogran, and we must set off for the Crossroads-of-the-World to meet my bride!”
“Aye…lurching from one folly to the next,” Merlin mumbled into his beard, but Ardhu, eyeing him sharply, fancied that his lips bore the trace of a weary smile.
*****
An’kelet’s oath-taking at Khor Ghor took place after the death of the Old Moon, when there was no Moon to be seen in the sky at all. This was a time when the elder powers and shades were said to be strongest, crossing from their barrows into the world of men, rewarding their most faithful descendants and bringing mischief and even death to those who did not venerate them in the proper manner.
The Merlin and other priests of the Temple led the prince of Ar-morah from the Place-of-Light to the banks of Abona. The day was fair, the sky blue as woad, and a warm, surreal light clung to the leaves of the wind-tossed trees and set the waters of the great river sparkling like a breastplate of gold. Swans sailed on the surface, birds of Otherness which, legend said, often turned into beautiful women who entranced men but stayed with them for but a year and a day.
On the bank, An’kelet was divested of his garb, and had the rings taken from his long hair. He was guided into the clear green waters, amidst streaming weeds of green that felt like surreal hands against his skin. The priests and acolytes surrounded him in the river, invoking Abona, the great Cleanser, to take away evil or malice from his heart, to make him born anew that day in the service of his chief.
Then Merlin came up and grasped his head by the hair, forcing his head below the swell. Three times he did this, with three great cries, as An’kelet gasped and thrashed blindly around in the water.
“Now you are purified in the blessed way, and you may continue with your great journey,” Merlin said solemnly, after the third dunking. “Rise now, and take the Sacred Avenue to the Dance of Spirits where your fate awaits you!”
An’kelet clambered out of the water on the far side of the river, and the acolytes brought him plain robes of undyed wool, a token of humility before his lord and the spirits. Then the party of priests gestured him forward, and he was taken into a small, banked monument, black with the ash of burning. Empty stone holes still showed as pits in the earth. An’kelet sensed this was a very old place, perhaps even older than the famous temple he had yet to behold, and it was a dark place too, scented with the funeral pyre. He shivered, wet and cold, as the wind blew.
Merlin bent over and picked up a lump of charcoal. Approaching An’kelet, he drew symbols with it on his face, his exposed arms. "We can never escape what we are— that is, food for the pyre, for the worms in the barrow mound,” he intoned. “Each day might be our last. So remember this, and wear with pride and knowledge the marks of those who have gone before, written in the ash that was their flesh.”
Once he was done, the holy men and women surrounded An’kelet once more, guiding him towards a pair of parallel banks that streaked away across the fields like white, exposed bones of the earth—the Sacred Avenue of Khor Ghor that protected pious men from the malign ghosts that lurked in this haunted landscape of gods and Ancestors.
Halfway up the Avenue, the party halted and a priest came forward holding a blindfold which he tied around An’kelet’s eyes. Once it was on, the holy men turned him in a circle until he was dizzy. He knew it was a deliberate attempt to disorientate, to add to the strangeness and mysticism of his committal to the Young Lord—and it worked. He did not know if he walked into the Sun or with it at his shoulder, did not know who walked behind him or at his side, or even if they were still with him, or had allowed him to wander through some gap in the Avenue bank into sacrosanct lands where men feared to tread without powerful talismans.
At last, after stumbling up and down the rolls of the Great Plain, the Merlin called for An’kelet to stop. Time had passed; he felt the air cooling against his cheek, the first vapours of the evening. Hands reached up to his head, carefully removing his blindfold.
The Merlin was standing beside him, dark and saturnine in headdress and long robe with its clatter of animal teeth and claws. “You look toward the East, where the Sun rises,” he said, and true enough, An’kelet found himself gazing out past the swelling mounds of the Seven Kings to the misted blue hump of Magic Hill. “That is where all life begins, with the rising of the Sun. But now you must turn from that toward the West, towards eternity and death. To your fate as a warrior of the king, sworn to die in his service. Do you still wish to proceed, Prince of Ar-morah?”
“I do, Merlin of Prydn, the choice was made long ere now.”
“Then turn and face the Tomb of Every Hope, the gates of the Sky, the circle of Sun and Moon. Face the spirits who guide us all, and face your sovereign King.”
An’kelet turned, and a gasp was wrest from his lips. He came from a land where many stone monuments stood, of antiquity beyond all others: great marching rows of menhirs like jagged teeth, huge humped tombs with carven ch
ambers, a single standing stone so large it toppled the very day it was raised, its ninety-foot length smashing into fragments—but he had never before seen a structure like Khor Ghor, the Dance-of-Spirits. For it was solitary, unique, and would remain so unto the end of days.
Viewed from his low position in the bottom of the valley, the temple soared up toward the sky in towering layers. Each stone in the vast outer ring was joined to its fellow by mortise and tenon joints, a technique used in the construction of wooden buildings. An’kelet had never seen such an art put to stone before, and he also marvelled at the smooth grey faces of the stones, beaten into shape by long labouring with stone mauls. Inside this outer ring were even larger structures—five massive trilithons built of sarsens weighing many tons. They soared several feet above the outer circle, with the trilithon at the far end being the tallest and most imposing. The Sun was setting and the red light angling down on the great megaliths turned them a magical shade of crimson-gold.
Filled with awe, An’kelet walked up the rest of the Avenue. A gigantic wind-beaten stone confronted him—the Stone of Summer with its wrinkled, natural inward face frowning in the direction of coming Winter. Striding past it, he stopped to reflect on the stone gate of the Three Watchers, also known as the Shadow-stones; sure enough, as the Sun tumbled in the sky, their shadows stretched long over him, black and cold as death.
Then he was beyond them and entering the sacred space of the circle. A ring and oval of small dark stones, some vaguely human in appearance, faced him like a stony army, while the trilithons and outer sarsens rose up and up, seemingly the very pedestals on which the heavens rested.
At the far end, beside a green monolith that glittered dimly, stood Ardhu Pendraec, Stone Lord and king of the West, bearing the insignias of his Kingship—the sword, the mace, the shield, the dagger. The bearskin he had taken from Urienz was on his shoulders, too, snarling mouth open in silent roar.
Around him, framed in each archway of the great circle, were the men of his warband. An’kelet knew them all, but they seemed different now, no longer the battle-worn, weary lads he had met on campaign, but mystic warriors in cloaks of fur and feathers, with axes tied to their belts by bright peace bonds, and totemic talismans jangling around their necks.
Stone Lord: The Legend of King Arthur (The Era Of Stonehenge) Page 21