I groan and slam my elbows into the desk. My hands cover my face. I don’t want to lose Jen. It feels to me that we aren’t finished yet, that our story together has more pages yet to fill.
What else could I have done? Could I have said it better, at a better time, in a different place? Should I have done something smaller and more subtle like making the wind blow, or should I have done something drastic like shape-shifting? Why have I done this so many times and still I don’t know what to do?
A voice from the open door jerks me upright.
“Head too heavy for you?”
Jen stands in the doorway, a tentative half-smile playing on her mouth. Her eyes remain cautious.
I jump up. My first instinct is to leap across the room and give her a hug, but I refrain. She exudes all the placidity of a frightened deer, ready to bolt at the slightest whiff of the wrong scent. I stay by my desk.
“I’m giving my neck a break. All these brains, you know.”
Jen chuckles quietly. I breathe again. So far, so good. She moves into the room and perches on the edge of my spare stool. I lower myself into my office chair slowly and smoothly to avoid startling her.
“Merry.” Jen stops, sighs, and speaks again. “Was it all a trick or a dream?”
I force my mouth into a smile that I’m sure doesn’t hide the concern in my eyes.
“Sorry, Jen. It was all real.”
Jen nods, slowly at first, but then finishes with a decisive head bob.
“Okay. The world just got a lot weirder. I can handle that. I think.” She straightens her shoulders and sits up taller. “You know what you’re going to do now, Merry?”
“Anything,” I say. I mean it, too. If something I can do will keep Jen in my life, I will gladly do it.
“We’re going to go out. You’re going to buy me a mocha and a very large doughnut. With sprinkles. Then we’re going to a quiet park bench by the ocean and you’re going to tell me everything.” She nods again and gives me a look as if daring me to contradict.
“Mocha, doughnut, sprinkles, bench. Absolutely.” And I will tell her everything I can about the lauvan without going into my history. Maybe one day. But that’s another very large burden that she doesn’t need to bear, not today.
We stand and Jen moves to the door.
“Jen?”
She turns and waits. I try to formulate my thoughts into words.
“I just want to thank you. For trusting me, at Mt. Linnigan. Asking you to stay there was an impossible request, yet you did it with hardly any hesitation. Thank you for your faith in me, even though I haven’t really done anything to earn it.”
Jen frowns, puzzled.
“Honestly, I’m not sure myself why I stayed. It was a very big ask. But,” she smiles and it lights up her face in the way that only a Jen-smile can. “I do trust you. Crazy, I know, but true nonetheless.”
I return her smile. My throat is tight.
***
Jen absentmindedly tears the paper bag that formerly held her doughnut. I just finished answering her questions about the lauvan, and now she looks like she’s turning everything over in her head. Or else trying not to think about it at all.
“So,” she says after a long pause. “Let me get this straight. Everything you look at is covered with these—lauvan. Like some Italian chef has gone crazy with the spaghetti.”
I laugh in surprise at the analogy.
“Something like that. If the spaghetti were alive and multicolored.”
“Isn’t that distracting? All these things are squiggling around, adding so much noise to your vision.”
I consider her question.
“I’ve never thought of it that way. It’s always been like this for me, so I’m used to it and can’t compare to whatever it is you see. But it seems to me that you and everyone else are missing out on a world of information. Sometimes I wonder how you cope.” Jen punches my arm. “No, really. It’d be like losing one of my senses.”
“You’re like Superman with his X-ray vision.”
“Daredevil except with super-sight instead of hearing.”
“An X-man whose mutation gives him extra eyespots and floaties.”
“Hey,” I protest.
“Well, it’s a dubious superpower.”
Instead of answering, I feel out for the lauvan of the nearest seagull. It swoops toward us, shrieking with indignation at its loss of control. I wrinkle my brow in concentration and twitch my finger.
The bird gives a final squawk and sails off, leaving behind a wet splatter on the grass a hand-span from Jen’s sandaled foot.
“Yuck!” Jen moves her feet back instantly. I start to laugh. She looks at me suspiciously.
“Was that you?”
“Dubious mutant power indeed. It’s all in the imagination. The sky’s the limit.”
She stares at me for a long moment, and I wonder if I’ve made light of this too fast. Then her face releases in a slow smile, like petals opening on a flower. She laughs briefly and leans back into the bench.
“Wow. I’m going to have to get creative with you.”
We sit in comfortable silence, gazing at two sailboats fighting the stiff breeze in the distance. Jen seems calm and composed now and her lauvan are back to their usual bouncy swirls. Still, I sense that the dynamic in our relationship has changed. I hope it’s for the better.
“Merry?”
“Hmm?”
“Why do you call them lauvan?”
Uh oh. It’s the first question I can’t answer fully. Normally, I’d say it’s Welsh. Most buy that, if they even ask. But Jen has taken Welsh.
“I, uh, kind of made it up.” Smooth, Merlin. Smooth. “I was studying Cornish and I think I misheard the word for rope, which is lovan. I liked the sound of lauvan, and it just stuck.”
“Huh.” Jen thinks about this. “It’s so close, but yet not.” She tilts her head to one side. “It sounds right, somehow. You know how etymologists trace back to reconstruct what ancient languages sounded like, like Proto-Indo-European? Lauvan sounds like, I don’t know, proto-Cornish or something.”
Damn, Jen is too clever for her own good. I steer the conversation back to safer waters.
“I can’t tell you how relieved I am that you’re taking this so well. I’ve told others before, and they often run as hard as they can in the opposite direction.”
Jen puts a hand on my arm and looks me in the eye.
“I’m not running. Don’t get me wrong, I think you’re really weird, but I can deal with that.” She gives me a small smile. “And thanks for telling me. That was a lot of trust you showed me.”
I smile back. I know it’s a long road to reacquaint ourselves, but my shoulders feel considerably lighter. It’s amazing how great it feels to have someone in your court.
“You’ve more than earned it.” I pat her hand and stand up. “Come on. I’ll take you home.”
***
I wait until after six o’clock Central Time to make the call. Braulio’s nursing home serves dinner from five to six. He’ll be free now. I want to thank him for his advice, and let him know that a disaster was averted thanks to his help. I’m eager to recount the events, especially with someone who understands. He’ll be happy I called.
A pleasant but brisk voice answers in Spanish on the third ring.
“Happy Valleys Care Home, Maria speaking. How can I help you?”
“I’d like to speak to Braulio Fernandez, please. I’m his friend Merlo Nuanez.”
There’s a brief hush on the end of the line. I hear the crackle of the long-distance echo in the silence.
“I’m so sorry, Sr. Nuanez. Braulio left us late last night. His passing was peaceful, in his sleep. Please accept my sincerest condolences.”
I hardly know what to say. I stammer out some thanks, goodbyes, and Maria hangs up. I slowly take the phone away from my ear and press “end.” I’m hollow, devoid of feeling. There is a limit to how many times one can get bad news and still b
e able to process it.
I don’t make too many friends, as a rule. Not deep, lasting friendships. Not ones where I tell the friend everything.
Braulio was one of those few. He and I had rollicked around Central America for years together in the forties. He was my best man when I married Josephine in a dusty little church in Georgia in 1951. He eventually settled down and had a family, but we had kept in touch all these years.
And now, gone. Another friend disappears, and I’m still here.
Underneath the hollowness, emotions gather like storm clouds. Grief, of course, that cloying, familiar bugbear that I never get used to. There’s also anger. Anger that I’m still here, that I am going through this song and dance again. Anger that I’ve waited for fifteen hundred years and Arthur has never shown.
But there’s also something else. It takes some time to identify it. When I do, I’m surprised to feel jealousy. Braulio took the journey that it seems I never will. He lived and loved and aged and died.
I’m so tired. I grind the heels of my hands into my eyes, wiping away the tears that will not come. I don’t want to be alone right now.
I briefly consider sex, going to a club tonight and finding someone, anyone, to touch and hold and pretend I’m not alone, to bring the mindless oblivion of lovemaking. I dismiss that notion quickly. I want to talk, and the wordless voicings of coitus are not what I have in mind.
I could talk to Jen. I reach for the phone before reconsidering. I only just laid the knowledge of the lauvan on her. I don’t want to get into my whole history, not now, if ever. It’s too soon and our relationship is still fragile. I could try to tell her about Braulio, but mostly everything I tell her would be a lie. I don’t have the energy to keep my story straight today.
There’s no one else, really. Not in this place, not in this time…
…except one. I hesitate, then pick up the phone and search for a number. There is someone I can talk to, someone who won’t need explanations, who will just listen.
CHAPTER XXIX
Dreaming
Boys run out to meet us, stable hands and sons of the other warriors, laughing and skipping and grabbing our reins. Women wait at the gate of the villa, Guinevere central among them with a smile on her face. I glance over at Arthur who answers Guinevere’s smile with one of his own, eyes only for her. Their connecting lauvan are clustered in a thick rope of shining flax and leaf green, the product of their many years of love and life together.
I let him trot forward to greet his wife in a few moments of privacy, but it’s not long before Guinevere calls me over.
“Merlin! Will you not greet me?”
I smile broadly and slide off my horse, passing the reins to a nearby stable boy and striding over to two of my favorite people. When I reach Guinevere, I lean over and kiss her cheek.
“I brought your husband home safe and sound, my lady. Are you satisfied he is in good health and in one piece?”
Arthur laughs.
“I’m in one piece, certainly. But my shoulders ache like nothing else. I’m getting too old to fully appreciate the hard earth as a bed and enjoy battle as much as I did.”
I clap my hand on his back.
“You’ll feel better in the morning. Perhaps you’re getting soft. I feel fine, and I have thirteen years on you. Don’t worry, I’ll get you out tomorrow for practice with the squires.”
Arthur punches my shoulder lightly.
“Very amusing. If you dare to make me rise early tomorrow, I will show you exactly how adept I still am at swordplay.”
I laugh, and notice Guinevere looking at me critically. I raise my eyebrow.
“Don’t worry, Guinevere. I won’t disturb your slumber tomorrow. Arthur’s earned a rest before we battle the hordes on the northern borders in a few days. We all have.”
“No, it is not that. It is only—I never noticed, but you look the same as before.” She shakes her head in puzzlement. “The same as when I first met you, I mean. How do you look so young when Arthur has gray in his hair already and I have lines on my face?” She touches the outside corner of her eye.
Arthur looks at me with narrowed eyes, considering.
“He hasn’t really changed, ever. Merlin, you’ve always looked like you do now.” He grins. “Do you use the lauvan somehow? I think you might share your tricks with your friends. It’s only good manners.”
I frown. I very rarely see a representation of myself. I have a burnished copper disk the size of my palm that I use to shave, but the image is fuzzy and distorted. Occasionally, Guinevere will leave her polished mirror where I can pick it up and have a look, but that is a rare occurrence.
“I don’t do anything, I swear.” I look down at my hands, strong and unblemished as always. Even the scars on my left wrist I received only last year have almost disappeared.
“Maybe you sprang from the Earth fully formed. You were a child once, weren’t you?” Arthur hasn’t picked up on the change in my mood, and still speaks in a joking tone.
“Yes, of course.” I run my hand through my hair. “I was born—” I count quickly. “Forty, forty-five years ago? Can that be right?” That sounds old, far older than I feel. What am I, that I can no longer feel the passage of time?
Guinevere must sense my distress, because she lays a hand on my shoulder.
“Never mind, Merlin. You are a little different, that is all.”
***
I pull my sword out of the gut of my twitching opponent, and my eyes flick over to Arthur. Time slows to a crawl as a blade slides out of his abdomen. Arthur sways, blinking. The other warrior watches Arthur to gauge the effect of the killing blow. Slowly, so slowly in my vision, but quicker than a snake in reality, Arthur’s sword whips up and with a blow too powerful for an injured man slices the warrior from the groin up. The other man drops without a word. Arthur sways once more, then clutches his gut and drops to his knees.
“No!” I scream. Time speeds up once more and I lunge toward Arthur. I grab every lauvan that passes me and pull with a vengeance. Men fall around me and shout in alarm and pain when unseen forces incapacitate them. I have eyes only for Arthur, who slumps over onto his side.
I fall to my knees beside him and roughly turn him over so he lies on his back. He hisses in pain but I focus on his lauvan above the terrible gash in his gut. The sword thrust sliced through the leather jerkin and found a soft path into glistening intestines, now exposed to the air. Arthur’s lauvan are tangled beyond recovery, layers upon layers of knots that would take me weeks to sort out. But I don’t have weeks, only minutes at the most.
I press Arthur’s wound hard. Blood leaks out from between my fingers. Arthur lifts his hand and places it over mine on the wound in his abdomen. It’s clearly a great effort. His already gray face blanches even more.
“Don’t move,” I say, frantic. The mess of his lauvan twitches and spasms around my hand. Because we are so close, every touch of his lauvan with mine opens me to his agony. Sweat runs down my temple. My free hand searches for his lauvan. Arthur’s eyes roll back in his head before they stabilize on my face.
“Arthur, I can’t—I can’t fix this. Oh goddess, I don’t know how to fix this.”
Arthur pulls his lips back in an attempt at a smile. His graying hair is streaked with crusted blood from the battle.
“Merlin. Merlin, it’s too late. I’m dying.”
Tears begin to flow down my face in an unending stream. Arthur closes his eyes briefly. When they open, I see acceptance and peace.
“Take care of Guinevere. Please, Merlin, promise me.”
“Of course.” I force the words through my thickening throat.
“And Merlin?” His eyelids flutter.
“Yes?”
“Thank you for being here. You’re always here when I need you. If—” he gasps for air briefly. “If I ever have the chance to come back, I promise I will. Your people believe in rebirth of the spirit, and why not? There’s so much more I want to do.” His hea
d lolls to the side. “I will find you.”
With his last breath, Arthur’s lauvan loosen from his body and float through the air like dandelion seeds in the breeze. As they leave, they fade from the familiar spring green I’ve come to cherish to a translucent gray that quickly disintegrates into nothing, leaving only a few pale strands lying limp on his torso, lifeless. Arthur’s lauvan disappear, and my lauvan that were connected to him flutter untethered between us. An aching, overwhelming sense of emptiness rips at my insides. My tears drip onto his chest.
“Don’t leave me alone, Arthur.” The blood leaking through my fingers from the wound on his abdomen slows, and then stops. I start to sob, pressing my forehead into his chest. “Don’t go where I can’t follow.”
CHAPTER XXX
“It’s good to see you again, Merry,” Dr. Dilleck says when I enter her office. She’s dressed in a matching pink sweater and blouse combo that suits her midnight-blue lauvan. She tucks her hair behind an ear in a gesture I recognize from last time—it must be a nervous tic. She smiles on my approach to the couch, but the smile falters when she sees my face. Huh. I didn’t realize I looked as bad as all that. She asks gently, “Is there anything you’d like to talk about in particular today?”
I sit heavily on the couch. I don’t play around this time. Braulio’s death weighs too profoundly on me for games. I sigh, wondering what to say, wondering why I’m here again. It seemed like a good idea yesterday after hearing the news about Braulio. Now I feel dull resignation settle over me like a deep muffling snowfall. I just want to sleep, to lose myself in memories if I can’t have oblivion. At least my memories are old wounds, familiar bruises that I know how to deal with. Braulio’s death is still too sharp.
“I don’t know why I came,” I say. My voice sounds slow and heavy. “This was a mistake. I should go.”
“Merry, please.” Dr. Dilleck leans forward as if she will get up and force me back down to the couch, although I haven’t yet moved. “Please stay. Please tell me what’s troubling you.”
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