Elaine had chosen not to wear red at her wedding, in the Roman way. She wore her usual white, in the new style of flowing gown she had adapted from Ilsa’s practical garments A long veil covered her hair. She bore no other adornment than a small posy of meadowsweet in her hand. Elaine was a tall, willowy figure on Arawn’s arm, whom Ban could not look away from as he waited with the priest.
Elaine was radiant, in a way which dimmed her sister Evaine’s gravid beauty, for Evaine was heavy with her first child. Even Nimue’s glow diminished compared to the bride.
When the Latin ceremony ended, Ban invited everyone back to the great hall in Bor’s keep for the wedding feast. Over one hundred people stood in the church to witness the union. All of them walked behind the new couple up to the tall palisades of the king’s house.
Even with only two years of peace, the town surrounding Bor’s stronghold had thrived. Although water was as short in Guannes as it was in Brocéliande, the people were still remarkably content and very pleased with this second royal wedding in their midst. They watched and threw flowers as the procession moved up the hill.
“The absence of war provides relief of a kind,” Merlin observed, although his voice was normal, this time.
“The absence of war is peace,” Ilsa said.
“Or merely a lull,” Merlin replied.
She looked at him sharply. “What have you seen?”
“About Guannes? Nothing,” Merlin said blandly. “Do you think they will serve those hotcakes they make with the oats, here? I liked them.”
Even the great hall where they dined showed signs of both peace and a woman’s touch. Evaine had been busy since her wedding. Good, well woven and decorative carpets hung on the walls, adding warmth and color. Many more chairs had replaced the long benches, and there were cushions upon most of the chairs. There were more women in the hall than before, when the only women had been kitchen hands serving food and drink. Their voices added a lighter note to the buzz of talk about the tables.
The braziers had been replaced by hanging lamps. A large stone hearth was built into the wall, to provide warmth when needed. Today it was pleasantly warm and no fire would be needed tonight.
The tables were scoured clean and the platters undented. The food was hot and flavorful. The wine was good and flowed steadily.
Ilsa had been placed at the far left side of the head table. From there, if she turned around the corner beside her, she could see everyone who sat there. Elaine, beside Ban, ate little. Neither did Ban, who gripped his wine cup but did not drink. His head remained turned toward his wife and the two of them spoke with little regard to anyone around them.
Bors and Evaine had given up their big chairs for the new couple and sat together beside Ambrosius, who, with Arawn, had already turned the conversation to war. They were keeping their voices down, in deference to the occasion.
Cadfael, Uther, Lynette, Budic and Hefina chatted politely, although Uther’s gaze wandered about the room measuring, Ilsa knew, the beddability of the women here.
Both Nimue and Merlin were silent. Nimue did not eat and made no pretense to. She looked ill, Ilsa realized. Her pale face was whiter than usual and the energy and glow which surrounded her was subdued. Her gaze remained upon the lamp which sat on the table in front of her.
Either by design or accident, Merlin sat opposite Nimue. He also did not eat. He did not appear as ill as Nimue, yet there was tension in his body and when he did choose to speak, his voice was strained. He watched Nimue with close attention, his hand curled around a big wine cup. Occasionally, he drank from it, although his gaze did not move away from the Lady.
Bors gave a deep belly laugh, farther down the table, and held up his cup. “To my brother and his lovely lady on their wedding night!” he shouted.
Everyone in the hall lifted their cups in agreement and drank.
A man in the far corner of the room got to his feet. “To our king!”
“Aye!” came the roar, as cups were again lifted.
The toasts had begun. Ilsa only sipped each time cups were raised, for she had learned that men could find someone to toast or something to celebrate for as long as the wine held. If she drank as deeply as they every time a call to drink was made, she would be deathly ill the next day.
The toasts went on, becoming increasingly more ribald and suggestive, calling upon the gods for fertile lands and loins and the prowess of bulls and more. Elaine’s cheeks burned a deep red.
Then Nimue got to her feet.
Silence fell as everyone turned to her. Women did not call for toasts although the Lady was an exception no man in the hall would gainsay. She did not pick up her cup. Her gaze stayed on the lamp.
“I, Lady of the Lake, call upon the power of Brocéliande to bless this union.” Nimue’s voice rang across the hall.
Elaine’s blush faded and her expression softened.
Mutters sounded across the hall. Bors was a Christian and this was a Christian kingdom, although only nominally. The power of the Lady and the enchanted forest of Brocéliande still commanded awe, here.
Nimue swayed, then lifted her chin. Her eyes were large and gleamed with blank light. “For the gods have touched them as they have others in this generation of men, in a way they will never repeat in all the ages of men.”
Merlin drew in a sharp breath. Ilsa glanced at him. He was sitting upright, his fingers digging into the horn of his cup, watching Nimue as a hawk watched prey, his gaze unblinking.
Nimue did not seem to see anyone in the room at all. She may have been speaking for herself yet her voice was loud, traveling to all corners of the great hall, helped by the utter silence which gripped it. “The son of this union will be a warrior of warriors, prince of all men, touched by the grace of the gods, yet still a man. It is the weakness of men which will be his downfall from the highest peaks. His name will serve as a lesson to men through the ages.”
Elaine’s gasp was weak and shaking. Ban caught her hand in his, his eyes wide as he stared at Nimue.
A night breeze, common only to the late summer, tore through the unglazed windows, to make the lamps streak, flutter and extinguish.
Nimue shrieked.
Ilsa jumped, as did everyone in the hall. Startled exclamations and oaths sounded, along with the instinctive reach and pull of swords and knives.
In low light of the few lamps left burning, Nimue clutched at her head, her chest heaving. “Blood! Oh, the blood!” Her fingers clawed at her chest, tearing her dress. Her voice was low, like a man’s voice, strained and hoarse. “We suspected nothing! We walked into the place because we believed the king! Now, look at us! Dead! All dead! Curse the Saxons! God deliver us from this hell!”
The murmurs were louder now, tinged with fear.
Nimue gave a tired sigh and dropped to the ground, her eyes rolling back. She writhed upon the floor, her slender body in the white dress jerking as if an invisible someone yanked at her feet and arms and shoulders.
Ilsa pushed her chair out of the way and flew to where Nimue squirmed. Everyone else around the Lady backed away, frightened. Ilsa bent to help the Lady, only she did not know what to do. She had never seen anything like this happen to anyone else.
“Here, put this under her head.” It was Merlin’s voice.
Ilsa looked up. He held a seat cushion toward her.
She took the cushion and Merlin crouched on the other side of Nimue’s pulsing body and lifted her head for Ilsa to slide the cushion beneath.
“All we can do is keep her from harm. The spell will pass soon enough,” Merlin said, his voice low.
“You have seen this before?”
“Seen? No. My servant has, though, many times. He learned how best to deal with it.”
His gaze lifted to Ilsa’s then away.
Then it was Merlin who suffered the same sort of…spell, did he call it?
“This is the price you pay for your Sight?” Ilsa murmured, as Merlin shifted a chair out of the way of Nimue’s thrusting feet.
“Not every time, thank goodness. I think…” He frowned, looking down at Nimue. “I believe it depends upon which god speaks through us. Women with the Sight—other than the Lady,” he qualified, “Women see smaller things. The birth of children, the success of crops. The gods which speak to them are gentler. The cruel gods, those inclined to jest, or those who are vain and demand devotion in return, who bring greater messages, who let us see the ebb and flow of power in the land…” He shook his head. “Or perhaps they are all one god, whose mood changes like the wind. It has not been revealed to me.” He stood up. “See, she rests now.”
Nimue had grown still. Her eyes were closed and her body as lax as someone in deep sleep.
Merlin bent and scooped her up as easily as he might carry a bolt of cloth. “She must rest. Where is her chamber?”
“I’ll take you there,” Ilsa told him. Together, they moved through the hall. Conversation bloomed behind them, thick with whispers and speculation about Nimue’s prophecy.
When Merlin placed Nimue upon the bed in her chamber, he said, “I will stay with her a while. When she wakes, she will be confused.”
Ilsa glanced at him, startled. Confusion was not a state she could easily imagine Merlin suffering. He was too confident, too certain of himself.
“I speak as a physician, now,” he told her gravely. “I can help her recover more swiftly than women with their herbs. Go back to the hall and enjoy your evening, Ilsa the Hunter.”
His tone was confident. Like Nimue, he sounded far older than his years.
Ilsa hesitated. “The Lady’s prophecy…”
“About the warrior? You want to know if it is true?” Merlin said it impatiently, as he held Nimue’s wrist in his fingers to measure the pulse there.
“The other one, about the blood.”
Merlin spoke off-handedly. “That was no prophecy.” He grew still, as if he realized what he had said and regretted it. His gaze met Ilsa’s. “Do not worry. That fate is not yours.”
“It was not my concern,” Ilsa said. “I have learned that to seek the future one has been prescribed is a useless venture.”
Merlin’s smile was small and warm. “Then you have learned a great lesson which by-passes most men, even those who live a long lifetime. You are to be congratulated.”
She hesitated.
“Speak your mind,” Merlin told her.
“Do you care very much that Nimue saw what you did not?”
Merlin’s smile was larger this time. The expression completely changed him, shifting him from the dark, brooding man of power to a younger one who was all too human. “Why do you think I did not see it?”
“You mean, you did? Yet you still stand. Sit,” Ilsa amended.
“What the Lady saw was but a fragment of my vision, trailing days behind the first. The message has become so loud even those with the smallest gift can hear it. The Lady’s Sight is not small, therefore she suffered from the bearing of the message.”
Ilsa puzzled it out, frowning. “Then, you did not speak to anyone about what you saw?”
“Until I know what it means, there is no point. It was more important the leaders of Brittany be here at this time.”
“For the wedding?”
“I suppose.”
“You don’t know?”
Merlin’s smile didn’t shift. “I often don’t know the meaning of what I see. The meaning comes later. I’ve learned to trust whoever speaks to me and do what they say.”
He rested the back of his fingers against Nimue’s forehead, measuring the heat. It was a practiced motion.
Confident he would care for Nimue properly, Ilsa went back to the hall, puzzling over Nimue’s words.
A warrior of warriors, prince of all men, yet still a man with a weakness which would topple him from greatness.
Elaine’s son.
When Ilsa returned to the hall, Elaine had been escorted to her wedding bed. The men sat alone at the table, plying Ban with drink before he departed to join her.
Ilsa went instead to the great chamber to help her sister-by-marriage prepare for her wedding night. She tried to dismiss Nimue’s croaking words of blood and death, and focus instead upon the great son Elaine would bear in the future.
THE NEXT DAY DAWNED dim and dark as a mid-winter morning. Storm clouds gathered, blocking the sun. The darkness swirled in them, bruised grays tinged with yellows and ugly greens. Lightning lit the interiors in flashing pulses.
Thunder rumbled.
“Will it rain, do you think?” Ilsa asked, as she stepped out onto the verandah at the front of the king’s house, which overlooked the palisades and the sprawling town. A dozen people stood upon the verandah, measuring the rolling, boiling clouds, including Arawn.
“Rain isn’t likely,” a grizzled veteran with a scar up his cheek said, from the far end of the verandah. “The air is too dry. Storms bring rain when they come at the end of the day. Early morning like this is a bad sign.”
“Will we leave today then?” Ilsa whispered to Arawn.
“Not while this hangs over us,” Arawn told her. “Our way takes us across open plains, until we meet the forest.”
“What does a plain have to do with it?” she asked.
“Have you ever seen lightning strike the ground?” Uther asked. He leaned against the column, his arms folded, his blue cloak swept back over his shoulders.
Ilsa shook her head. “A tree, once.”
“The tallest tree among others,” Uther said. It wasn’t a question.
Ilsa recalled the trees which had split and burned like kindling. “Most likely,” she said. “It was a long time ago and I don’t remember it well, only that a green tree burned like two-year-old cords.” The memory brought the smell of sizzling pine resin to her nostrils, sharp and clear enough to make her eyes water.
“Lightning picks out the tallest object to strike,” Uther said. “On a plain like the one we must cross, a man on a horse is taller than anything around him, even the standing stones.”
The old, scarred man at the end of the verandah added, “They say your hair stands on end just before the strike. If you move fast enough and lay down, it will move on. Jupiter is placated when you grovel for him.”
“Remember this is a Christian household you stand in, Glyn,” Ambrosius said, his tone mild.
“Aye, my lord,” Glyn replied.
Ambrosius nodded toward the plains which spread beyond the town, stretching out to the marshes which lay between Campbon and the sea. To the north, as a dark line on the horizon, the forest began. “Is that a lone rider on the road, there?”
Arawn gazed, his eyes narrowed. “Moving fast,” he said.
“News,” Ambrosius murmured. He looked at Merlin and raised his brow.
Ilsa had not noticed Merlin standing at the back of the verandah, silent among the warriors and officers and leaders.
Merlin didn’t see his father’s glance. His gaze was upon the lone rider, his body stiff with tension. His hands were curled into fists, hidden in the folds of his cloak. The high cheeks were drawn.
Ilsa’s heart beat heavily, hurting. Merlin’s tension and the waiting stillness in the air drove it.
Ambrosius turned back to the view. “Well, we will hear soon enough. If it is a messenger, they will come straight here. I, for one, would like food and drink while we wait.”
“No, you must pack,” Merlin said. He spoke as if someone gripped his throat and squeezed, barely above a whisper.
Ambrosius turned to him. “We can’t travel with those clouds over us.” He did not speak sharply. His tone was one of enquiry.
“It doesn’t matter,” Merlin said. His gaze was on the far-away rider. “Eat as you travel. You must prepare the horses and yourselves. You will not want to delay when the rider brings his news. Leave the women and the carts behind and men to escort them. They will be safe enough. You must travel as fast as a man can and catch the great tide as it turns.”
“The tide?” Glyn muttered. “Thought we were taking horses.”
Ilsa’s throat felt as Merlin’s sounded, as if someone gripped it hard. Her heart threw itself against the inside of her chest, hurting with each beat and echoing in her temples. She could not rid herself of the images Nimue’s gasping non-prophecy had spawned. Blood. Terror. Death.
Was this, then, the moment when the message that Merlin and Nimue and others with the Sight had seen would finally make sense?
Ambrosius looked at Uther.
Uther rolled his eyes. “I’ll ready the damn horses,” he muttered and left in a swirl of blue frustration.
Arawn gripped Ambrosius’ arm. “As will I.”
Fright tore through Ilsa. As Arawn hurried back into the house, she followed him.
“You mean to go with Ambrosius?” she asked.
“If this is Ambrosius’ time, then my place is by his side.” He shoved the door aside and strode into the room, flinging his cloak aside and unbuckling the ornate belt he used for ceremonial occasions. His traveling gear laid on the chest, yet he did not reach for it. Instead he strode back to the door, opened it and leaned out and shouted for Rhodri and Sawyl and the other officers who had traveled with them. Colwyn and Stilicho had remained in Lorient to protect the house and the town.
The first officer to reach the door was Sawyl, who nodded breathlessly, buckling his sword into place. “My lord?”
“Prepare the horses. We will leave shortly, and it will be a fast ride. No carts, Sawyl. Pack beasts only and light-packed for speed. Rouse the others.”
“Leave, my lord? With those clouds?”
“You heard me. See to it.” Arawn shut the door and turned back to the chest and stripped his good tunic off. “Why are you standing still, woman? Prepare yourself.”
Her heart leapt high and hard. “I am to come with you?”
His gaze met hers. “I assumed you would not be content to sit in a cart and plod back to Lorient.”
Gwen was not here. There was no wash bowl and she had no idea where her comb might be. She didn’t care. Ilsa retrieved her own dark green traveling clothes from the packs stacked against the wall and changed. She stuffed their possessions back into the packs. By then, Sawyl had returned to collect the packs and take them to their horses.
From outside the house, she could hear shouting. It sounded as if it was coming from the gates into the royal keep. The window of the room was facing the wrong direction for her to check. “Listen,” she said to Arawn, as he strapped on his second armguard.
He lifted his head.
The loud voices were coming closer.
“The messenger is here…if it is a messenger,” he added heavily.
“You do not believe Merlin?” Ilsa asked.
“I do not want to believe Merlin,” Arawn said, scowling, as he picked up his heavy cloak and shrugged it about his shoulders. “Shall we find out what the messenger has to say?”
Ilsa walked with him to the big hall, where everyone who had been standing upon the verandah when Merlin gave his instructions had already gathered. They were strapping on swords, settling knives and armor, setting cloaks around their shoulders, ready for the road.
Others in the house hurried into the room, pulled by the sound of raised voices and many feet.
Merlin stood by the big, unlit hearth. He wore black as usual, the short tunic girt with a heavy leather belt and a knife which was more than an eating implement yet not quite a hunting knife. It appeared to be his only weapon and he wore no armor. The rumors that he was not a fighting man, despite his lineage, were clearly true. His cloak was folded back over his shoulders to hang down the back out of the way. The red pendragon brooch was prominently on display at his throat.
He looked at no one. His gaze was upon the great doors where a mass of men moved through them.
In the middle of the men was a dust-coated man wearing the red cloak of Ambrosius’ army. His face was wet with sweat, the wrinkles at the corners of his eyes outlined by the dirt. He had been peering ahead, squinting.
He saw Ambrosius sitting on the corner of the big table by the hearth and saluted. “My lord, a man arrived at Carnac three days ago. A messenger.” He dug at the pouch on his hip, yanking at the ties. “He insisted on riding for Campbon when he found you were not in Carnac, so I came with him. We rode day and night. The man insisted. His horse threw a shoe late last night. He gave me the message to bring on. He said he would pull his sword on me and take my horse if I didn’t deliver the message. It was that urgent, he said.” The man swallowed.
“Give him wine,” Bors said quietly, from behind the table.
“The message, first, Linus,” Ambrosius said, holding out his hand.
The man, Linus, stepped forward and dropped the sealed roll onto Ambrosius’ hand. Then he turned and took the cup thrust at him with a sigh of relief and drank deeply.
Ambrosius unrolled the letter and read. The room was silent while he read. Everyone watched him, even Merlin.
Ambrosius’ face was impassive, giving no hint of what lay in the letter, which was long. When he finished, he let the letter roll itself up and handed the loose scroll to Merlin, leaning across the table to reach him.
Merlin read, as Ambrosius stood and cleared his throat, even though everyone was already watching him.
A small figure pushed through the house servants and slaves at the door. It was Nimue, moving slowly. Her ethereal glow was still dimmed.
“The letter was from King Mabon, in Calleva,” Ambrosius said. “Mabon is loyal to me and through his influence, so is most of the south, including Gorlois in Cornwall. Mabon says that throughout the summer the Saxon raids into the west have been increasing. They were not content to stay upon their shores, likely because they learned of the rift between Vortigern and his son and tried to take advantage of the disharmony.” Ambrosius paused, checking the faces in the room, tallying their attention.
There was no need, Ilsa thought, for every man stood unmoving, their gaze fixed upon Ambrosius. Every woman, too. Everyone had seen and heard Nimue’s prophecy. Word had passed about the new messenger and Merlin’s commands, too. Even people who had not been on the verandah were donning traveling clothes and accoutrements, swords and heavy leather armor and cloaks.
Ambrosius continued, “Vortigern in his usual fashion reached out to the Saxons through his queen, to see if an arrangement could be reached. The Saxons agreed to meet only if Vortigern could demonstrate he spoke for the entire country.”
Ambrosius paused again. Ilsa could see a pulse beating heavily in his neck and his temple. He was controlling himself, holding something back. Her heart beat a little faster.
“Vortigern pressured and badgered and bribed and coerced all the petty kings and dukes and leaders loyal to him to attend the meeting. It was the first any of them, including Mabon, knew of a potential deal. Even though they did not like compromising yet again with the Saxons, they had little choice but to deal with them and get them back behind their walls. It would give Vortigern room to deal with Catigern once and for all and maybe, just maybe, they could have a peaceful summer next year.
“The meeting was to be held in Aquae Sulis on the full moon last month. Three hundred officers, leaders, dukes and kings arrived to demonstrate that Vortigern spoke for all of them. Mabon intended to be there merely to report back to me, only the ford across the Avon was flooded. They were forced to camp to one side to wait for the water to subside and did not arrive in time for the start of the meeting. When they did reach Aquae Sulis, it was all over.”
Ambrosius paused again. This time he did not pause for effect. The working of his throat told Ilsa he gathered his courage to speak the rest of it.
“Mabon spent a day learning what had happened from locals. The British contingent, including Vortigern, waited in the magistrate’s hall for Hengist to arrive. Hengist stopped at the town gates and sent word to Vortigern that he required a personal escort from the High King through a British town which held no love for him and his men.
“When Vortigern left to bring Hengist to the hall, the doors were barred and the hall set afire. The roof and walls had been soaked in oil and Britain’s summer was as dry as ours. Mabon says the hall burned to the ground before Vortigern reached the gates.”
Ilsa moaned. The blood. The death. Nimue’s shriek of horror. Three hundred kings and leaders of men. Now she understood. She looked at Merlin. The man had his eyes closed, pain etched in his face. The letter hung from his nerveless fingers.
Ambrosius swallowed. “Vortigern did not return from the gate. Whether he rides with Hengest or did not dare return to the place where his allies were betrayed, no one knows for sure.” He paused again. “All of Britain rises against Vortigern. He has no one to turn to and few allies. Hengest and his Saxons have returned to their nests on the Saxon Shore and why would they not? Britain will do for them the work they could not finish for themselves. Britons will hunt Vortigern down and smoke him from his nest.” He looked around the room once more. This time, he was gathering their attention, holding them in his palm. “I will be there to see it done and afterward, I will deal with Hengist.”
A soft sigh rippled across the room. At last, the time was here. Ambrosius would cross the channel and take back Britain.
“We ride at once!” Ambrosius said. “We ride hard for the coast and the ships to Britain. The horn will sound in an hour and we wait for no one. Do not be left behind!”
He whirled and strode from the room.
Merlin sank onto the chair at the table and put his face in his hands. Now he knew the meaning of the message from his gods. Now he understood it and was as horrified as everyone else.
Everyone who was not rushing to prepare to leave sat with stunned expressions. Soft sobs sounded.
Ilsa wiped her cheeks and went to collect Mercury.