by Sarah Zettel
The coldest part of the night had settled in. The damp wind smelled heavily of more rain to come. Agravain’s skin prickled beneath his woollen tunic and he wished briefly he had thought to get his cloak. But there was no time to waste on minor discomfort. This needed to be done before the whole hall roused itself, before rumour had the full and open light of day to play in. One last secret to be acquired while there was still time. He did not delude himself. His was an audacious request, and he might be refused. If he was successful, he would need time to add what he learned to his current plans.
The plans the king might yet destroy. Agravain’s fist clenched and he strode across the quiet yard.
Near the southern wall of Camelot’s great keep waited one humble edifice set apart from the others. It was a thatched cottage, its wattle and daub walls washed over with lime. But rather than belonging to a herdsman or kitchen woman, it was the chosen dwelling of the king’s chief advisor.
Merlin’s home glowed white in the waning light of the stars, and the door was ajar. Agravain did not bother to knock or to announce himself. He pushed the door open and stepped across the threshold.
A fire burned low in the hearth, giving barely enough light to see by. Shadows filled the cottage. They hung from the rafters with the drying herbs. They lurked on the long work tables amid the plants and earths, clay vessels and pots of inks and dyes, carefully obscuring the drawing instruments required for charting the course of the heavens. They scuttled around the walls like rodents and squatted at the foot of the broad, covered well like toads. They crept close, brushing Agravain’s ankles and leaning over his shoulders.
Merlin stood before one of the work tables. Shadows gathered behind him, like servants waiting for their orders. The sorcerer appeared as he always did, in his robes of unadorned black, a black cap on his sparse white hair. He did not look up at the sound of Agravain’s step. Instead, he stared at a great sheet of parchment, covered in carefully rendered lines and perfect circles. Agravain knew enough to see it was a star chart, an elaborate and detailed horoscope, obviously many days, if not weeks, in its making. But it was ruined now. A huge puddle of black ink crept across its surface, a shadow in liquid form, trickling across the illustration of the future and blotting it all out.
Merlin made no move to rescue the document. He just leaned on his gnarled hands and watched the stain spread.
‘You’re late,’ said Merlin heavily. ‘I expected you before.’
Agravain walked forward warily. He had never known Merlin to be at all unsettled, no matter what came before him. Had he been wearing it, he would have laid his hand on his sword.
‘Then you know why I have come?’
‘In part.’ The sorcerer ducked his head. It was difficult to see in the encroaching shadows, but Agravain thought he closed his eyes. He did sway on his feet, as if exhausted almost beyond endurance.
Agravain waited. The shadows waited too, but restlessly. The firelight pushed and pulled them, holding them back just a little although they were anxious to surge closer. Loyal servants, their master’s distress disturbed them.
‘What is the matter?’ asked Agravain, although a deep part of himself that was either a coward or a wise man hoped Merlin would give no answer.
That part was not disappointed. Merlin just shook his head, turning from the ruined horoscope, shuffling to his chair like an old man, like a blind man. He laid one hand on the carved back. The shadows pressed close, warning, supporting. Merlin looked at his shuttered window. ‘Speak, Agravain.’
Why won’t you look at me? What have you seen? ‘I have a request to make of you,’ Agravain said bluntly, attempting to crush the uneasiness these unwelcome questions raised.
Merlin nodded. He swallowed. Agravain could see his withered Adam’s apple bob clearly beneath his beard. ‘You are the last man I would have expected to seek guidance by such uncertain means as prophecy.’
‘Morgaine holds sway in the invisible countries. I would look into them before I face her.’ Merlin knew of the messenger and message. Of course he knew Morgaine was responsible for the army that threatened Gododdin.
Agravain held his ground while the sorcerer contemplated his shutters. The shadows pressed heavily at his back. They would not hurt him. They existed to frighten the fools and the weak who were not certain of what they did here.
Merlin sighed so deeply his bent shoulders shook. ‘Very well.’ He turned, shuffling again, looking with regret at the horoscope, still not looking at Agravain himself. ‘Give me your question. I shall see it answered.’
‘No,’ said Agravain.
All the restless shadows froze in place, startled. ‘No?’ repeated Merlin softly.
‘I cannot begin this war by shrinking from the invisible. I will do this thing myself.’
It was as if those words were finally too much. Merlin lifted his lined face and met Agravain’s gaze. To show his determination, Agravain looked long and hard into the sorcerer’s eyes. Danger waited there, even now, when Merlin was exhausted and unaccountably afraid. Danger old and deep, going back more years than should belong to mortal man. Agravain felt his resolve tremble.
‘You do this at your peril, Agravain. This is a thing which will dull wits even as sharp as yours. You are not trained to this. It is beyond your understanding.’
Merlin’s eyes were clear blue, like the king’s, but in that moment, it seemed to Agravain that all the room’s shadows looked out at him through that ancient gaze.
‘I will do this thing myself,’ he repeated.
He felt his past stripped from his skin, and folded around his future. All his shields of indifference, pride, reason and isolation were gone in an instant. He felt his self standing naked before the old sorcerer and all his unseen familiars. For one dreadful instant, Agravain knew clearly that Merlin could choose not to give those shields of soul and self back.
But Merlin lowered his gaze, and all disturbance was gone. Agravain was able to breathe again.
‘So it must be,’ he whispered. ‘Come then, Agravain. I can give you three answers only.’
Slowly, Merlin walked to the covered well. A strange chill of anticipation ran down Agravain’s spine. None had ever seen this thing opened. Gareth swore he’d looked once, on a dare, but he was never able to satisfactorily describe what he had seen.
Merlin laid his hands on the heavy lid. He leaned his weight on his hands and stood like that for a moment, his eyes closed, his lips moving soundlessly. Agravain felt suddenly heavy, as if he were being pushed into the earth by the restless shadows around him.
Then, in one surprisingly swift move, Merlin heaved the cover aside, revealing a light more steady and golden than any flame. ‘Look on what you would see, Agravain. Speak your questions as you will.’
Fighting against the unnatural heaviness, Agravain moved forward. He steeled himself, and looked down.
It was no true well, only a shallow depression filled with some clear golden fluid that made him think of honey, save that this shone like the sun made into liquid form, although its light gave no warmth at all.
In this thickened light lay three human heads.
All three rested on their backs, so that he could clearly see the stumps where their necks had been severed from their bodies. They had all been dispatched with clean blows, his reeling mind noticed distantly. All three taken with a strong arm and a sharp blade. There was a man, in the prime of his years, his beard full and his face strong. There was an ancient woman, her eyes wise, her long white hair waving in the subtle currents of the light that surrounded her. There was a youth, younger than even Gareth, his pale face terrible with pain.
Their eyes were open and milk-white with the film of death. They all looked directly at him.
‘Hail Agravain, King of the Gododdin,’ said the man. His voice was the whisper of a sword against skin.
‘Hail Agravain, Heir of Lot and all his deeds,’ said the crone. Her teeth were grey and broken, and her voice trembled but
still held an awful strength.
‘Hail Agravain,’ said the youth, his voice light and fragile as a bird’s. ‘Hold your heart close. You will see far worse than us ere long.’
Fear shook him hard. He had been ready to face a demon, an elf-lord or some other captive spirit. Something with which he could match his wits. Something like the creatures his brothers had already faced and defeated.
This … these … were unnatural, terrible things. Death should not be so violated. These were souls dragged from the ground, hidden from God himself. What power, what blasphemy, could do this? Could mock what was granted only by the Word? What devil had made them? Merlin. Had Merlin’s hand struck the blows so clean and swift as to trap the soul itself?
‘Speak Agravain,’ said Merlin. ‘You have three questions.’
How could he seek truth from such abomination? Agravain groped after his carefully laid plans, but his thoughts had all flown and there was nothing left but shadow. He was blind while these things looked at him, waited for him. Blind, lost, alone.
‘What do you see for Agravain?’ His voice croaked awkwardly, but he did not think it mattered. Surely these three could understand any word. It was their function.
The man answered. ‘War,’ he said in his soft, death-sharp voice. ‘It comes on the raven’s wings. It comes with bloody vengeance and conquest to the walls. It seeps into the stones like the lightest wind and it lurks in the shadows.’
Agravain’s mouth was dry. Sweat sprang out on his brow. His skin itched and crawled from the voice and the gaze of the blind white eyes that saw far too much. Wasted. A question wasted. He must think, must clear his mind and find understanding. He must remember who he was, what brought him here.
‘Who …’ he began, and stopped, and began again. ‘Who is the man in the black armour?’
The crone spoke, clicking and snapping her broken teeth. ‘He is Mordred.’ The words pinched and clutched, leaving cold behind to prick his very heart. ‘Arthur’s bane, Arthur’s son. Morgaine’s hope, Morgaine’s son. Born of prophecy and vengeance, his is the hand that ends the world and begins it again.’
Arthur’s son?
Arthur had no son. Morgaine’s son? No. No. This could not be. Morgaine was Arthur’s sister, his sister. It could not be. He would not, and she, even as she was, she could not have.
No. No. Not even she would do that …
Agravain’s gorge heaved. He gripped the side of the well, digging his fingers into the stone. He could not think. He could not speak. It was too much.
God! God help me! God save me! Take this from me!
‘You have one more question, Agravain.’
‘No!’ Agravain cried out, squeezing his eyes shut. He could not look, could not face what was before him. ‘No more!’
But Merlin’s living voice was harder and more pitiless than the mocking voices of the dead before him. ‘You have begun this thing, Agravain. You cannot leave it until it is done.’
No! No! I will not. But his mouth moved. He could not stop it. Words would tumble out of him, whether he willed it or no. He must find a question. There must be one last question, one way to find out how to put right this terrible, unimaginable wrong.
Agravain had faced death. He knew it, but it was an ending, all pain all horror gone. Death was not supposed to give back, God was not supposed to let go. How could the king keep near him one who had done these things? The king who had lain with his own sister …
His voice trembled as badly as his hands, and he could barely force out the words. One question. One last chance. And there was only one question, one real question. It had haunted him for ten years, and it was what he had come here to learn.
‘How can Morgaine be defeated?’
The youth spoke, and Agravain heard his brothers’ young voices there, and his sister’s, and his own lost childhood. All crumbled to dust, dragged up again and made to serve when they should have been left to lie in peace.
‘Only her own deeds can defeat Morgaine. Her pride is great, Agravain mach Lot, greater than yours. Only when she forgets she is bound by the laws of men and gods will she fall.’
That lightest of voices pressed against his skull as if to crush it. It fell against his back and shoulders with a grave’s worth of weight, bowing him down. Sweat rolled down his cheeks and a groan escaped his clenched teeth. He closed his eyes. He could look no more on this violation. He heard wood grate against stone, and the light winked out.
‘Sit down, Agravain.’
Agravain groped blindly and found a chair’s arm. He slumped into it, his head in his hands. Shame filled him, and disgust, and bewilderment. He looked up at Merlin, as mute as a child who sees death for the first time.
Merlin stood over him, leaning on his white staff. ‘And now you know what few others do. Arthur and Guinevere know. Morgaine who brought this thing into being, and Mordred himself.’
‘How?’ Agravain’s voice cracked on that single word.
‘By trickery,’ said Merlin with weary simplicity. ‘How else? She heard the prophecy that Arthur would be killed by his own son, and she was determined that such a son would be born. It suited her fancy that Arthur’s doom should be conceived by a change of shape, since that was how Arthur himself was conceived.’
Not his fault then. Agravain drew in a long, shuddering breath. It was easier to bear knowing that. One more sin to lay at Morgaine’s door. It was not the king’s fault. He had only been tricked, as others had. He had not sought out this sin. Merlin would not lie about such a thing.
Merlin would not lie about such a thing.
Agravain lifted his head. Merlin had returned to his chair beside the window and slumped into it, turning his staff in his crooked hands. ‘Bespeaking the dead is a hard and terrible thing. You bore it well.’ He was not looking at Agravain. He was looking again at the shutters, as if wondering whether they were stout enough to keep out the night, lest it swallow his guardian shadows in its greater darkness.
Is this what disturbs you so? Did you know I’d find out? Or is there something else?
But he could not make himself speak these new questions. Though his reluctance sickened him, he knew one more heavy truth would break him in two. Agravain rubbed his palms on his trousers. ‘I suppose I should thank you for your help.’ He got to his feet. ‘You did try to warn me.’
‘Agravain.’ His name spoken as a plea stopped him halfway to the door. ‘Do not discard what you have heard. Once prophecy has been spoken, there is danger in ignoring it.’
Agravain laid his hand on the door latch. ‘I will remember.’ He could not make himself look back at the shadows, at Merlin hunched beneath the weight of his unnatural knowledge. Instead, he walked out into the clean night and looked up at the fading stars.
He did not know where to go. He did not know what to do. A year seemed to have passed since Ros first stumbled into his room.
His room. His wedding chamber. Laurel. He looked across at the main keep. A few lights flickered behind some of the shutters. Was one of them from her window?
He walked across the courtyard, empty and silent except for the forms of the watchmen on the walls. He moved quickly, to get away from all he had seen. He would not ignore it, but he could not think on it. Not yet. It made the very stones beneath his boots feel fragile with rot.
Mordred. The Black Knight. Arthur’s son. Morgaine’s son.
Up the stairs and down the corridor, Agravain came up to Laurel’s door. He scratched at it softly, and pushed it open.
A fire burned low in the hearth. In the chairs beside it dozed not Laurel, but her woman Meg, and Gawain’s wife Risa. Risa started and looked up as the door opened. When she saw him, she got to her feet.
‘What news, Agravain?’ Risa asked.
‘Not much,’ he said tersely, looking past her towards Laurel where she lay on the bed, stilled by sleep. ‘There will be more council in the morning.’
Risa followed his gaze. ‘Do you want me to wake h
er?’ she asked softly.
Agravain looked at Laurel lying in that bower they had been meant to share. Her face was troubled in her sleep, her white brow furrowed just a little, as if she must concentrate on the dreams that bore her away. The braid of her white hair lay across her neck and shoulders. As he watched her, her brow smoothed, and her hand lifted, brushing the braid back, exposing her throat, reminding him of how warm and delicate her skin had felt beneath his touch, of how she had laid her hand on his chest. On her other hand, lying on the coverings, he saw the green and gold gleam of the wedding ring he had given her.
He had thought to go to her, to sleep beside her at least. But even as he looked down at her, his skin crept and crawled over his bones, shivering from the memory of what he had seen and done. It filled him with the sense of having been made unclean. He could not go near her, not yet. Not until he mastered himself.
He would master himself. He must. Nothing had changed save his knowledge of what he faced. He had sought that knowledge and could not shrink from it.
But neither could he move towards his pale, beautiful wife where she lay.
I’m sorry. His chest tightened now and he swallowed.
‘Let her sleep,’ said Agravain, and he turned away and left her there.
SIX
Laurel woke slowly. Groggy, she sat up, shoving her hair out of her eyes to see Meg and Lady Risa sitting beside the low fire. Cryda and Elsa were busy beside the hearth, obviously taking care not to make any noise.
Meg was on her feet in an instant to twist Laurel’s hair back from her face and help lace her underdress up around her shoulders.
Risa also came to the bedside. ‘Meg, will you go and see what there is to break your lady’s fast? The queen has sent word, Laurel. You are to come to her, but only once you have eaten properly, and had time to dress yourself.’
Laurel nodded absently at this, and Meg excused herself, bustling out the door.
‘And my lord Agravain?’ Laurel asked.
‘It was he who made sure we were sent for. He apologizes for this necessity and prays your patience with his absence.’