Merlin's Blade (25 page)

U
ther picked Myrgwen up and placed her in the boat next to Colvarth. Oh, how she'd grown. Just last harvest he could still throw her in the air and catch her, to her squeals of delight. But since he'd returned from his military campaign, he realized the days were numbered for such play.

Igerna smiled at him as he passed her a basket of food. She sat there in the back of the boat next to Eilyne — they were both so pretty. Arthur sat between them. Uther couldn't have been more proud of his son.
What a warrior he'll make!
Descended from two High Kings, he would grow wise and proud. Uther looked forward to teaching him how to fight and how to lead.

Finally ready, Uther was about to push the boat out into the water when Vortigern walked down to the bank and held out a draught skin.

“Here,” the battle chief said. “The last and best mead. Caught Rewan sipping it and thought you could … enjoy it while you're on the island.”

“My gratitude!” Uther smiled as he tucked the skin under his arm. It would do him good against the chill. “And do not forget. After you scatter the druidow, take the Stone to the fortress and occupy it. I want Tregeagle powerless in the morning.”

“Already planned. What will you do with him?”

“Evict him. He can lick the chunks of his broken Stone for all I care.”

Vortigern clucked his tongue. “Eeh. He won't like that.”

“I don't care. That fool of a magister is lucky to still have his neck.”

“True.”

“We'll stay on the island till morning, but have Sydnius row over with word of your success. I'll be glad when this is over.”

Vortigern rubbed his hands together. “Ah, let me push you.”

Uther climbed into the boat, and Vortigern shoved the prow away from the boggy shore. As the craft floated off into the marsh, Uther took a sip of mead and watched his battle chief ascend the bank to the join his already-mounted men.

“Good-bye, brother,” Igerna shouted. “May God fill your horn with every blessing!”

But Vortigern must not have heard, for he didn't turn or wave.

Garth sat, shaking and staring into the face of a man's cut-off head. He began to scream again, but at the last moment muffled it with his sleeve. He didn't want to be discovered going through Mórganthu's things. Because no matter how much he wanted to drop the head, his fingers wouldn't let go.

And he recognized the face.
Old Trothek!

On the man's right cheek lay the same large mole Garth remembered. And even with his face puffed hideously green, his beard cut short, and his jaw slack, the man's identity was clear.

Trothek had opposed Mórganthu, true, but he had seemed kind, even caring. Why would Mórganthu have his head in a barrel? Had the arch druid killed him?

Garth despised that evil High King for cutting off Anviv's head. Didn't this make Mórganthu evil too? Nothing seemed to make sense anymore.

The wind blew again, and the bones noosed to the tent roof jangled their ominous music. Garth's hand shook, and he almost vomited as he set the head back in the barrel.

Good-bye, Trothek
.

No sooner was the top in place when a voice called outside the tent.

He chucked the barrel behind the chair, swabbed his hand on the grass, and ran to the rope. Flinging himself under the side of the tent at the back, he yanked out the coil of rope and tried to make himself as small as possible.

“Who's there? Who be shouting?” the voice called again from the other side of the tent.

Garth saw the fabric quiver, but then he realized the man was walking
around
the tent. Garth froze. The dark shape loomed near the corner. All Garth could think of was his own head in a barrel, and he fainted.

Bedwir kicked his horse in the flanks to catch up to Vortigern.

As the most recent war chieftain chosen by Uther, he calculated the risk of angering Vortigern by questioning the man's obedience. Bedwir could lose his position, even his place as a warrior. Maybe even his life.

He'd seen how Vortigern punished those who had crossed him. But how could he ignore the High King's clear command?
Deal with the druidow and then destroy the Stone
, they'd been told. So why did Vortigern skirt around the mountain and head to Bosventor? The druidow weren't in the village tonight.

Finally reining up near the battle chief, Bedwir shouted, “Vortigern! Sydnius says the druid camp is across the stream. Where are we going?”

“To the Tor. Uther said we take the Tor
first
.”

“What?”

“We'll leave the horses there!” Vortigern shouted. “You think we can sneak up on the druidow riding horses?”

“Who said we should sneak up on them?”

Vortigern pulled his sword and chunked out a small chip of wood from Bedwir's shield. “No more questions.”

Bedwir fell back, swallowed his anger, and checked his damaged shield.

Riding up the long path through Bosventor, the warriors approached Tregeagle's house. The magister had just climbed into his wagon while his wife stood at the door of their house instructing a servant. Vortigern rode ahead, had a quiet word with the magister, and pointed to the fortress on the hill.

Tregeagle pointed as well, a sly smile on his face.

A few more words were exchanged, and then the magister squinted, nodded at Vortigern, and called his wife to join him.

Vortigern backed his horse up and looked at his men.

What is Vortigern's game
? Bedwir knew Uther planned on ridding the village of Tregeagle in the morning, so why engage the traitor in friendly banter? He wished he'd been there the night before and met Tregeagle himself.

Bedwir and his men rode their horses to the side of the path, allowing the magister to thunder past with an impenetrable look on his face.

Vortigern raised his arm, and the men followed him up to the fortress, where a guard stood by the open gate.

From where Bedwir sat on his horse, two-thirds down the line, he saw Vortigern dismount and speak with the guard, who stood up as tall as he could and thumped the ground with his spear. They appeared to be arguing fiercely.

Finally Vortigern laughed long and hard with his hands on his slim waist. And then, quick as an adder, he smashed the guard across the chin with his forearm and knocked him down. Leaping on him, the battle chief sunk a freshly drawn dirk into the man's gut and up into his lungs.

Had Vortigern gone mad? Killing a man who hadn't even attacked him?

The guard gasped, his hand jerking as his spear rolled into the mud.

Vortigern remounted and rode whistling through the gate.

When Bedwir's horse trotted by, he glanced at the guard lying there, barely breathing and calling for help with quivering, silent lips.

After tying up his horse, Bedwir ran back to the man at the gate. “Do you want water?” he asked, instantly regretting the words. Though what was he to say? The man was dying.

But the guard nodded, the dust around his eyes wet with tears. Bedwir pulled out his waterskin and gave him a sip, which he choked on at first but was able to swallow.

“I … said … he could … not come in … with horses … The hay was … for the goats … I … spoke well of Uther … but …”

Bedwir was shocked. This guard was loyal to Uther.

The man vomited blood, and Bedwir helped turn his head. “Die … die …” he choked.

“I know you're dying …”

“No … my name's Dyffresyn. Tell … wife … children … love ‘em, and …”

But his words failed, and the dim light in his eyes faded like two stars eclipsed by the reaching fingers of a coming storm.

Then someone kicked Bedwir.

“Get up!” Vortigern yelled. “And stop dribbling on the dead.”

As Uther pulled the now empty boat farther up the muddy shore, he could see his family, followed by Colvarth, ascending the bank of
the large island. Blackbirds called from the shore, and the croaking of the frogs meant the evening was upon them.

He thought about hiding the boat from prying eyes but surmised there was little danger and decided to lash it to a tree. Who would suspect that the High King and his family had gone to the big island in the marsh?

Uther grabbed the tie rope and attempted to pull it out, but he found it wrapped around an anchor. Pulling the anchor out, he saw that it was none other than the rusty head of a pickaxe that had lost its handle long ago, probably cast away by a tin miner and procured by a local fisherman. Winding this twice around an apple tree, one of hundreds that covered this end of the island, he gave a tug to make sure it was secure.

As he turned back to survey the marsh, he unstrapped the mead skin from his belt, removed the stag horn stopper, and took a quick sip. Whether he looked south beyond the broad end of the island or north beside the long shoreline, all he set his gaze upon were reeds and sedge grasses clumped amid lethargic water channels. The receding rains and the stilling of the winds had brought forth a mist that rose upon the marsh in twisting, white fingers.

Ah, the fishing must be excellent here!
Not since his youth had Uther found time to enjoy the simple pleasures of life, such as fishing. All these he'd denied himself since taking on the mantle of leadership, both as a warrior guarding the people of Britain and later as High King when his father, Aurelianus, had died — Jesu bless his spirit. An old tune his father had hummed one rare day when they did fish came to Uther, and he whistled it now.

Looking back east past the marsh, he scanned the immediate hills, where his campaign tent stood among the warriors' smaller tents, and a distant ridge far beyond them, where a faint line of smoke rose. This marked the camp of the druidow, no doubt, and their pagan stone circle. Soon Vortigern would carry out swift justice there, and this shortsighted rebellion would be over.

Taking a longer swig of mead, Uther found that the drink flowed
across his tongue more sweetly than what he'd become accustomed to on the trail. But as Vortigern declared, this was of premium stock.

He replaced the stopper and slung the skin over his shoulder. Hefting the extra tent from the boat, he limped up the thick, grassy shore, where his family waited for him. Myrgwen ran and hugged his waist while Eilyne balanced on a log nearby. Igerna, smiling, sat on a large rock holding the food basket and young Arthur. The boy leaned forward from her lap, grabbed a twig, and broke it from a length of dead branch sitting at her feet.

Uther patted Myrgwen on the head. “Where's Colvarth?”

“At the tower.”

Igerna stood and reached out her left hand to him. “Shall we follow?”

Soon they approached the ruined blocks of a small fortress, and within that, the old tower. Dark granite stones lay scattered across the ground as if a giant of old had risen from the marsh and broken them with massive hands. Moss clung like leeches to their northward faces, and Uther imagined the centuries of wind whistling across the flat marshlands that had worn smooth their other sides.

Although Uther had passed many flower-adorned apple trees while walking up to the ruins, here their ancestors stood as dead sentinels to a distant age. Each tree bore its fate gauntly, back bent and withered, broken branches outstretched in a fruitless, mocking display.

He found a level place hidden behind a large brush-covered stone and set their temporary lodgings up while Igerna gathered the old applewood for a fire. This gave him time to sip more of the sweet mead as well as study the tower, a marvel of engineering. Uther had seen plenty of fortresses in his time, either supervising their construction or else besieging them. The stones had been fit expertly as the tower tapered from a base of sixteen feet wide to — what Uther estimated — about eight feet wide at the top. Its height rose to nearly forty feet, and vines choked each other on their way to reach the crown like moldy skeletal arms protruding from a grave.

The stout wooden roof had long ago fallen to ruin, and yet enough remained to show a semblance of its conical shape. Uther walked to the doorway of the tower, which remarkably stood three feet up from the ground. “Colvarth, anything of interest?”

The bard poked his nose out from the slim stone archway, and his voice echoed. “Nothing much, my king. But come see … for yourself.”

Uther stepped up onto the high threshold of the doorway and pulled himself through. Blinded for a moment by the swift change to near darkness, he tried to step down and lost his balance. With his bad knee he fell hard onto a rock and then headlong to the dirt.

Colvarth rushed over. “My king! Are you all right? The floor is … higher inside, and rough.”

Uther's knee screamed with pain and his head spun. He rolled onto his back and looked upward, straight to the top of the tower. The top floor Merlin had spoken of had rotted away, and now nothing remained but an empty shell.

A man appeared above him, ghostlike, emerging from nowhere and walking down an invisible stairway. He wore an embroidered sapphire robe with white-gold trim, and at his waist a jeweled belt held the scabbard of a dagger.
A druid?
No, this wasn't the blade of a Briton; it was arched like those of traders he had seen from the eastern lands.

But the oddest thing was the man's face. Though his gray beard hung down to his waist and his eyes wrinkled with wisdom, his cheeks were smooth, his lips young, his nose unmarred, and his forehead unlined. By all accounts, he bore the marks of a youth.

Uther pointed at the man and tried to speak, but his throat was stiff and wouldn't utter a sound.

Colvarth patted him on the shoulder. “A nasty … tumble … yes. Rest awhile, my king.”

The man in Uther's vision reached the bottom of the unseen stairway, put a finger to his lips, and, kneeling, drew the cross of Jesu in the dirt. Then he descended right into the ground as though
it didn't exist. Just before his head sank from sight, he stared straight at Uther, and his eyes held a secret and sorrowful longing.