“Too late to save my sister,” Morgause whispered, her voice like the whispering Anthea themselves. Blood washed across her body, and I saw that my mother’s wounds had been reopened.
The knowledge of it hit me with the force of a storm: She had drunk my mother’s blood, and mingled it with hers. She had delivered half her own soul into Annwn, and drawn back half of my mother’s soul into her own flesh.
Somehow, through these terrible acts—these forbidden acts that could not have been performed if Morgause had not also turned to that goddess of howling places, Namtareth—she had drunk in my mother’s soul. She had tried to murder me, for—in raveling—I had also unraveled and was brought to the brink of death.
My aunt had helped that along with the bath she had pressed me into while I had been in that trance of raveling.
“What in the name of the gods have you done?” I asked, but the room began to spin as I rose from the tub of water, much of which had splashed over the edge onto the tiled floor of my mother’s bedchamber. “What have you done?” I screamed at her, though my voice seemed weak. “You lied to me! You took me into the Otherworld with her! You were there!”
“With me did I take you,” Morgause said, showing me the cuts she’d made at her wrist and forearm. “I drowned you while you raveled, through her, through me, and she unraveled through you into me. I took us all three there, so that she might never die but live within me and share this flesh.”
“But that is—” I gasped. The pains in my body made me tremble. I had to find balance or else fall. I felt as if I any strength in my body had been drained by Morgause’s unspeakable crime against me and against my mother.
“It is the greatest crime against the goddess,” Morgause said. “It is the unpardonable offense against the gods themselves.”
I felt terror clutch at my heart as Morgause said these words. She had attained an even great beauty from that shining black citadel of the dead, and though streaks of what had come into her dark hair, I could not longer distinguish Morgause from my mother, Morgan. It's as if they both were truly in that one flesh. She grabbed me around the neck, not strangling, but drawing me close that she could whisper in my ear. “We live within the one flesh now, and we serve none but Namtareth, the Terrible and the Magnificent, that queen of the ancient mysteries of the Canaanite tomb priestesses, that long-forgotten soul-binding, that twin spirit in one body as one soul may occupy three. No one shall say that Morgan, nor Morgause, is dead, nor shall we die for we are not alive, but dwell in both realms. For we are here, thank that goddess of the blackest night, and your Art, brought into you by your mother and taught to you by Merlin, opened that doorway that we might live. The greatest law of the Lady is that nothing shall interrupt the journey of the soul, and we have all three broken that greatest of laws tonight. I could not have done this without your mastery of the Art.”
Then, she let go of me.
I felt myself falling downward, the result of rising too fast from that state of raveling. I put my hands forward as I fell to protect myself, but I passed out before I hit the floor.
Chapter Fourteen
1
I dreamed of Lancelot. We rode together upon his horse through a soft twilight. I do not remember much of this dream, other than the heavy sorrow I felt.
I awoke from the dream, freezing and burning, the sound of summer rain beyond my bed. A fever had taken hold of me, and wracked my body. I shook so violently I believed that invisible hands held and pushed at me. I awoke with too much knowledge and sorrow. I could think of nothing but my mother. Her face. The last time I had seen her alive, when the drop of her soul had nearly fallen into that great Sea of Glass. My grief, coupled with the pains in my body that were like my bones splitting, overwhelmed me. I wished to die. I did not wish to return to life again, to its losses. I could muster no tears for my mother’s life, for all water poured from me in the form of sweat, yet I felt that same crushing of my emotions as if I lay there sobbing for her. I hated everyone in the world in that moment. I hated my father who had forced my mother to his bed and then sent assassins to kill her and stop my birth. I hated Lukat for abandoning me with his sorrow and need to escape the caverns without me. I hated him for not being able to love me as I would have loved him, for we were more than brothers and yet less than lovers. I hated Lancelot, for as I recalled his crimes and his betrayals of our people, stealing the sword Excalibur’s resting place deep in the forbidden labyrinth below the Lake, as well as for making me love him as I had never wanted to love a man before, I only thought of how he had left me, too. How I lay upon my bed and had not awakened to his face, to his touch, to the way he laughed when I tried to be serious. I hated the tribes in the Isle of Glass for their taboos and their laws and their rituals. I hated Morgause for her treachery, and for making me believe that she had loved me as her nephew when she had no love in her heart to give. I hated Merlin for his part in teaching me the art of raveling and vesseling. My hatred reached the goddess of the Lake herself, that Lady of mystery and power, who seemed to have declared before my birth that all of my life should be accursed. That I should love the man who broke his sacred vows to the Lake that had nurtured him; that I, too, should break my vows that I might try and save my mother’s life to no avail; and all this seemed like a great trick, a joke, as I lay there shivering from that icy fire the fever brought, a great laugh upon me from the nameless Lady in whose care I had entrusted my soul and my life.
And of all of these, I hated my mother the most.
I hated her for that want she had to leave the earth, to not fight against those forces that sought to destroy her. I hated that she had given in to that impulse to hurt herself rather than turn that pain back on those who had hurt her.
But above all this, I hated that she’d left me.
In this state of fear and anger and pain, I drifted in and out of sleep. When my fever cooled slightly, I awoke again, aware of someone’s presence nearby.
2
I saw her face first: pale and wrinkled, but with the bright eyes of a girl, her white hair drawn back and plaited in braids that ran down her shoulders. Viviane.
Viviane sat at the edge of my bed, wrapping cool wet cloths upon my forehead. She smelled of anise and the summer-blossoming houndslip flower, which she used to wash her hair so that, even white as snow, it shone with a reddish-dark hue in the candlelight.
When I parted my lips, she brought a warm soup for me to drink. It tasted of lamb and leeks, heavily salted and spiced so that it opened up my breathing and made me gasp with the way it brought life into me at first gulp.
“Do you feel better?” she asked tenderly. Viviane had seen more of life than any of us, and she had accepted its losses so long that they rarely brought her to sorrow. Yet, she looked now as if the world had taken too much from her.
I could do no more than rasp and wheeze in reply. She brought the bowl to my lips again, lifting my head slightly with her hand to the back of my scalp. “No need to speak now, my child,” she whispered, and though I knew I was no longer a boy, I felt like one there, at the mercy of this body that had not recovered well from the raveling. At the mercy of this world that I hated.
“I am sorry for these tragic days,” she said. “For you are more than son to me than my own children were. Had I seen what Morgause had planned…well, had I understood…” Her words faltered, and she drew the bowl back. “You need to rest, Mordred. Rest until you feel strength again in your blood. The soup is full of healing properties, with owlsbane to quicken the blood that your fever might reach its crisis and pass.” Then she told me of what had come to pass, though I had known much of it. “Morgause has gone mad. She believes that her soul is entwined with your mother’s , both here, within her body and in Annwn at the same time. I cannot say if this is absolutely true, for I have never seen it before. But she has changed, and I fear she has ill-used you to seek this moonless dark of her spirit. I am sorry for your mother’s passing.” As she said this, her
voice broke slightly, and tears came into her eyes. “We cannot stop those who seek death. But we can try. We can…but to stop the soul on its way is an unholy thing to attempt. Morgause has gone mad. She has left us here, and seeks out the places of the restless dead for she no longer thirsts for life, I am afraid.”
She drew the damp cloth down along my neck and shoulders, cooling me as she went. “Do not fear anything, child. I will remain here with you as long as you need me. Others come, too, with offerings and prayers, and the Druids perform ceremonies to appease the gods that this time of trouble might pass swiftly. I have sent ravens to find Merlin that he, too, might come with what grace he brings.”
I nearly did not want to recover, but had hoped I might die that I could simply escape all that I hated and feared and wanted but could not reach. I did not believe I would ever see Lancelot again and I longed for the arms of my mother as if I were, again, a little boy.
I felt as if I had become a man and then lost the best of what life might offer, all within a short span of days.
3
In that month of recovery, I began to feel Morgause within me, as if somehow that terrible raveling at the edge of death had tied us, inextricably, together. I heard her voice in my dreams, and felt haunted by her when I awoke. In some cavernous darkness, I heard the whispers of her voice, as if she were the Anthea, as Morgan and Morgause’s voice growled together. “We are neither dead nor living, my son, my nephew. Our souls are between the worlds, and we have learned many secrets within the black towers of Lord Arawn and his ministers. We have seen the beautiful white shores of Prince Taranis and traveled beneath the sea to Avalon and its groves, though the priestesses there saw us as spirits of the dead. We have found the wandering souls on our journey, those who cannot gain entry into the Otherworld but desire to invade the flesh of the living. They call to us that we might raise them from beneath the stones of the earth.”
The fevered madness within me grew, and I could not tell sometimes when I imagined things, when I dreamed them, or when I saw them clearly.
One late afternoon, my mind seemed to clear, and there was Merlin at my bedside. I was sure that this was a vision as my others had been, a spidery dream that had left its cobweb behind.
“There he is,” Merlin said, leaning over my face, glancing back to Viviane. “He’s with us.”
“I’m glad my message reached you,” Viviane said. “I was afraid he had begun slipping back to Annwn.”
“It draws us back once we’ve journeyed there,” Merlin said, keeping watch upon me, his large, wide face taking up all I could see above me, like he was the moon itself filling my view. “I have been there many times, and it is both dark and lovely to remain among its clear lakes and great cities,” he said, as if speaking to me, though I could not be sure. “But we must return to life, for there is much to be done.” Then he vesseled within my mind, Mordred, can you understand me?
Yes.
I want you to leave off this despair and illness that draws you into the arms of Arawn. You have survived much, and if you were meant to die this summer, it would already have come to pass. Do you wish to live?
I had not thought to ask myself that question, and I could not answer him.
Again he asked. And then a third time.
I felt some fluttering in my chest, as if my heart were a sparrow, beating its wings against its cage of flesh and bone.
You must not return to life unless you truly desire it, he vesseled. You must know that you seek life in order to claim it, whelp. There are many who seek life and they deserve to have it and all its blessings. You feel despair at your mother’s passage, and anger toward that unknown father. You do not understand this ache of love you have felt, briefly, with the outcast of your tribe. You do not feel up for the fight that it takes to live this life. For to truly live, all must be brave, and strong, and must give until there is nothing left to give, and must take when the taking is required. The Dragon of the world is all around us, breathing fire or catching us in its claws. And yet that same Dragon carries us when we struggle, and comforts us when we have pain. But the life in this world is a great gift, Mordred. Even that suffering you feel brings blessings that you cannot understand in one lifetime. I remember all my lifetimes, and I know the value of this life. Even those who pass to Annwn understand this value and are willing to pay its price to return into life again, though Annwn and all who remain there are rich and joyous beyond compare, and the fruit trees always are heavy with their sweet burden, and the stags offer themselves up for the feast, as do the boars, and yet none dies, and none there is in want. And still, those who have passed wish to return for the value of this life, Mordred, is in having it at all. Now, tell me once more, do you wish to die? If so, I shall draw out my curved blade which should only be used for cutting the sacred mistletoe, but I shall use it to slice your throat that you may return now into the Otherworld and enjoy its wonders. There are adventures to be had there, and you will never grow old, for there is no time, there is no want, there is no end to that land once arrived there. You may experience great pleasures without pain. Or, you may choose life, and I will do what I can to lift this fever from you. I will offer some small strength left within me that you might recover. All is not lost, my friend, prince of no country and prince of all countries. You are too important to this life you shall live. I would not have taught you the raveling if I did not know you were destined to greater things than this fever-bed. So tell me now, give me the word, and I shall slit your throat and in seconds you will be back on that flatboat with the old woman who will take your soul to that shore, and I will make sure that Death’s Orphan is there with a stag that you might ride in grandeur to that great city of Glass. You shall tonight sit at a feast with King Arawn himself, and his wives and husbands, and the children of Death, and you will never have pain again. Or will you live, and see this through, this world that has begun to shiver and quake with its own unmaking as the creature that Morgause has become—a twin-soul—seeks to raise the dead through her necromantic arts that she might hang the skin of the lady Guinevere upon the tallest oak as a warning to all who seek to marry the high king? Will you die and allow the Lake of Glass to wither and dry up, with the Cauldron of Rebirth broken, its magick not yet restored, while Morgause has stolen its pieces that she might mend it? Do you not wish to see your mother’s soul join its half that she might be reborn through Annwn into a new life?
Will you, who are good in your soul, take up the gauntlet and play your part among the living and allow the gods themselves to decide when the cup of your life has drained?
My lips, though parched, parted, and I gasped, “I want to live.”
Day and hours mingled in my memory, and I drew in and out of fever. Then, one night, the fever seemed to set my skin afire, and suddenly cooled again. I lay in my bed shivering, while Viviane drew woolen blankets over me. “It has broken,” she said, kissing me upon the forehead. “You will recover.”
“Merlin? Where is Merlin?” I murmured, thinking that his voice had simply been one among the many of the fever dreams.
“He will come by soon enough,” she said. “For he carries me to my own bed tonight that I might rest.” I glanced about my bedchamber, its familiarity a comfort for it reminded me of my childhood, and saw that Viviane had made a nest of blankets for herself near the arched doorway.
She had slept on the floor during those weeks of my fever, and had not gone far from me the entire time.
4
Merlin came to draw my bath late that night after he’d carried Viviane back to her home down the stony stair. He had boiled water to such an extent that it was too hot for me to rest in for a while, so I sat on the edge of my bed, still feeling weak and suffered tremors as if I had drunk too much mead. “Did I dream that you vesseled into me?” I asked.
He offered up that enormous grin that seemed to widen his face, and nodded. “Of course. You understand vesseling. It is as easy as speaking when there are tw
o open vessels.”
“And yet it felt like I dreamt it.”
He paused from his work at stirring cleansing herbs into the bath, and looked up at me as if he could not decide whether to tell me something or not. Finally, he said, “Mordred, if I told you that there are no dreams, as you think of them, what would you make of that?”
“No dreams? And yet I have them.”
“Of course. Most have dreams. But they are not these sleeping ventures that vanish with morning’s first light. All of us live in that other realm, even while we live here. The dreams are the reflection of what we see there.”
“I do not understand this,” I said, and tested the bath again with the tip of my toe.
“I think it’s ready,” he said, and helped me slip into it. The water was immediately soothing, and yet caused me to sweat again with its herbs and spices. As he rubbed a soapy mixture into my hair, he said, “Your aunt and mother have brought their twin souls into one body. But half of each of their souls remains in Annwn. You understand that?”
“Yes.”
“There is yet another realm, between this world and the Otherworld. And to that third realm, these seem as but dreams. It does not have a name, just as our Lady is nameless to us, just as the winter solstice days have remained nameless. All of us visit this realm in our sleep, in our dreams, though not all remember. If we could remember, we would have greater insight into this life, which is but the dream of that realm.”
My head began pounding as he tried to explain this third realm, and yet I could not comprehend it. Finally, I said, “I understand that you speak of this secret realm, my lord. But what of it? Does this not simply mean that we all dream within dreams and therefore all are equal?”
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