Night Bird's Reign (16 page)

The horse did not stop running until they were far into the forest. As Elise slowed to a walk, Gwydion thought at first that Arthur was still weeping. But the harsh, dry, heartbroken sobs were not coming from his nephew’s throat.

They were coming from his own.

Gwaithdydd, Disglair Wythnos—early evening

A
T DUSK THE
following day they came to a clearing in the forest, and Elise simply stopped walking. Gwydion blinked in surprise. Arthur, who had been sitting quietly on the saddle in front of Gwydion, craned his neck to look back at his uncle.

“Oh yes, so it is. Thank you,” Gwydion said as he dismounted. He lifted Arthur from Elise’s back and set the boy on his feet.

Arthur, who had not said a word since crying out for his mother the day before, finally spoke. “Who are you talking to?”

“Elise has reminded me that it’s time to make camp. And he’s right. It’s late,” Gwydion replied absently, as he grabbed the saddlebags.

“He talks to you?” Arthur asked in astonishment.

More than you do, Gwydion thought to himself. But he was relieved to hear Arthur speak at last. “In a way,” Gwydion replied as he shuffled through the bags for something to eat—something that didn’t require cooking. “It’s something that telepaths can do with animals. You don’t exactly talk with them—by which I mean that animals don’t communicate with words. But you can sense what they are feeling, which is why they call it Far-Sensing. Telepaths talk to other people with their minds, too, which is called Wind-Speaking.” He set out bread and cheese on the top of a flat rock, and gestured for Arthur to begin eating. Gwydion himself wasn’t really hungry and he decided it would be a good idea to take a look around to be sure they were not being followed.

Without even thinking to tell Arthur what he was doing, Gwydion sat down on the ground, closed his eyes, and sent his awareness out of his body to hover over the clearing. He saw his own body sitting there, motionless and barely breathing, and Arthur’s astonished expression. He scouted the land around them. Far to the north he saw lights, and, investigating closer, found a small farmstead. No problem there, the settlement was over five leagues away. As he scouted east he came close to Tegeingl, but shied away from investigating further. He scouted south and west, but saw nothing to alarm him.

Satisfied, he returned to his body. As he did so, he became aware the Arthur was frantically tugging at his sleeve, begging him to wake up. Gwydion was appalled at the fright on his nephew’s face. The child must have been terrified, thinking that his uncle was deserting him, leaving him all alone in the great forest.

Hesitantly, Gwydion took the hysterical boy in his arms. “I’m sorry, Arthur. I should have explained. I was doing something we call Wind-Riding. It’s a thing that clairvoyants can do. We leave our bodies for a short time, and we can see other places far away. I didn’t mean to frighten you.”

“I—I wasn’t scared,” Arthur lied.

“Oh, I know you weren’t. Probably you were just a little startled, weren’t you?”

Arthur nodded. “Could—could I do that?”

“Maybe someday. Clairvoyants can do another thing called Life-Reading. That’s when they lay hands on someone and can ‘see’ what might be ailing them. That’s why the Dewin are our doctors. Now, would you like to help me gather some wood for the fire?”

Arthur moved off, picking up branches from the forest floor and piling them in the center of the clearing, looking back often to be sure that Gwydion was still there. When enough wood had been gathered, Gwydion told Arthur to stand back. He stared at the pile of wood until it began to glow and then suddenly burst into flames.

“I’ve seen Griffi do that,” Arthur said in a confidential tone.

“Yes. Griffi is a Druid.”

“How do you do that?” Arthur asked, curiously.

“It’s something all psychokinetics do. It’s called Fire-Weaving. There are other things we can do, too, like moving objects with our minds. That’s called Shape-Moving.”

“You can do everything,” Arthur said, in an admiring tone.

“Some people have a combination of two gifts. My father was both psychokinetic and clairvoyant. Your great-uncle Myrrdin is clairvoyant and telepathic. But most people who have the gift are only one thing. People who are telepaths become Bards. Those that are clairvoyants become Dewin. And psychokinetics become Druids. But only the Dreamer has all three gifts, plus others besides. The Dreamers practice something called precognition, which is being able to see the future. Sometimes, if it’s very important, we can also do something called retrocognition, which is the ability to see events from the past. There are many Bards and Dewin and Druids in Kymru. But in each generation there is only one Dreamer.”

“And that’s you.”

“That’s me.”

“I can’t do anything,” Arthur said sadly.

“Oh, maybe you will, one day.”

They settled down by the fire to eat and Gwydion absently scratched at his beard.

“Why do you do that?”

Gwydion stopped, and looked over at Arthur. “Because it itches,” he said flatly.

“Oh,” the boy said, understanding that further comments would be unwelcome.

After they finished their meal Gwydion rolled out a blanket for Arthur to sleep in. Arthur bundled himself up, and laid on the ground, watching the fire.

“Uncle Gwydion?”

“Hmm?”

“Where are we going?”

It was the first time that the boy had asked. “We’re going to a little village called Dinas Emrys. The road we’re on, Sarn Gwyddelin runs right through it. It’s in the great mountain range of Eryi. We’ll be there by tomorrow.”

“What’s it like?”

“Well, it’s very small. Mostly the people who live there raise sheep.”

“What will I do there?”

“You and your great-uncle Myrrdin will raise sheep, like everyone else. Now go to sleep, it’s late.”

“Uncle Gwydion?” Arthur asked, after a brief silence.

Gwydion began to look on Arthur’s previous silence with nostalgia. “Yes?”

“When will I see Da again?”

Gwydion turned from the fire to look down at the small boy. Arthur’s eyes were wide in an effort to keep the tears from falling. Gwydion reached over and picked Arthur up, settling him into his lap. “Your Da will come to see you as soon as I think it’s safe, Arthur. It may be a while. But I will bring him. You remember that where you are is to be a secret, don’t you?”

“Yes, Da told me. He said that I was a very important and special boy. He said I was so special that they had to send me to a place that would be very, very safe. He said Great-uncle Myrrdin would take good care of me. He said that he and Mam would miss me very much but that the most important thing in the world was that I be safe.”

That was the longest speech Gwydion had ever heard Arthur make. The child was obviously too wound up to sleep. “Would you like to hear a story?” he asked.

“About what?”

“About Idris, the first High King of Kymru.”

Arthur considered the question. “All right.”

“Thank you,” Gwydion said dryly. “The story begins four hundred years ago, when Lyonesse sank into the sea.”

“Why?”

“That’s another story for another time. May I go on?”

“Yes,” Arthur said graciously.

“I appreciate that. As I was saying, Lyonesse sank into the sea. But some people escaped. About one thousand folk, all told, survived and landed on the shores of Kymru.”

The moon was full, bathing the tiny clearing in a silvery glow. Far off, a wolf howled. Elise shifted restlessly, then was still. The fire popped and crackled as Gwydion resumed reciting in a soft, singsong voice. “And these are the names of our greatest ancestors who survived the destruction. Llyr the Great, the first Dreamer. Penduran, the first Ardewin, the daughter of the Lady Don. Math, the brother of Don, the first Master Bard. Govannon the Smith, the son of Math, the first Archdruid. Elen of the Roads, the first High Queen. And, finally, Idris, the first High King.

“The people who survived the destruction banded together and began to build their lives again and survived that first, terrible winter. But their tiny settlement was attacked and destroyed in the spring. For the Coranians had come from across the sea and they wanted Kymru for their own. The Coranians plundered and burned and killed. And the survivors cried out for someone to lead them and save them from their enemies.”

Gwydion glanced down at Arthur, but the boy was still wide awake. So he continued. “I have told you that one of the people who survived was a young man named Idris. Idris was a descendant of Amergin, the last High King of Lyonesse. One hundred years before Lyonesse sank, Amergin had been killed, and the Druid theocracy had ruled in his place. But Amergin’s wife had escaped to the Danans with her infant son. The Danans were the magic people who lived high in the mountains. For five generations the Danans kept the descendants of Amergin in secrecy. And Idris was the last of that line.

“Now, the Four Treasures of the Lady Don—the Cauldron, the Sword, the Spear, and the Stone—were saved from the destruction of Lyonesse, although the Lady Don herself was killed. Llyr, the first Dreamer, gathered these Treasures and brought them to Idris. And Idris was tested. The Sword turned, the Cauldron spun, the Spear glowed, and the Stone cried out that Idris was High King.

“Then Idris, Llyr, Penduran, Math, and Govannon took counsel together, and they decided that they would fight the Coranians and push them from our land. And so began many years of struggle.

“Llyr made the testing devices, and they began to seek out others that had special gifts. Penduran taught and trained people with clairvoyance. Math did the same for the telepaths, and Govannon trained the psychokinetics. The clairvoyants were called Dewin, and they became our physicians. The telepaths were called Bards, and became our poets and our lawgivers. The psychokinetics were named Druids, and they became our scientists and philosophers. But Llyr was the only Dreamer, the Walker-between-the-Worlds, and one who could walk through the walls of time.

“Our ancestors built Caer Dathyl, an impregnable fortress in the mountains of Eryi. And Idris led his warriors in battle after battle against the hated Coranians and each time the Kymri won. For Idris was the High King and this meant he could gather the power of those with the gifts. He gathered the power of the Dewin and scouted out the enemy’s movements from many leagues away. He gathered the power of the Bards, and used it to speak with wolves and eagles that attacked the enemy at his order. He gathered the power of the Druids and raised fog and wind and rain to confound the enemy.

“And finally, after twenty years of constant battle, we had won. The land was ours. So our ancestors gathered in Gwytheryn, the land in the middle of Kymru. They built Cadair Idris, the Hall of the High King. They built Caer Duir for the Druids, Neuadd Gorsedd for the Bards, and Y Ty Dewin for the Dewin.

“By this time Idris, who had married Elen of the Roads, was the father of four children. So he divided Kymru into four parts. To Pryderi, his eldest son, he gave the land of Prydyn to rule. To Rhys, his second son, he gave Rheged. Ederynion went to his youngest son, Edern. And Gwynedd was given to Gwynledyr, his daughter. And Idris set Gwytheryn aside for himself and his wife, and for the Druids, Bards, and Dewin. And he gave Caer Dathyl to Llyr to be the home of the Dreamers. And that is the story of how Kymru came to be our land.”

He glanced down again; hoping to see that Arthur was at last asleep. But the boy was as wide-awake as ever.

“Tell me about Lyonesse, Uncle Gwydion,” Arthur begged.

“That story is far too long. You should be asleep.”

“But I’m not sleepy.”

“Hmm. Well, I won’t tell you about Lyonesse. Not tonight. But I’ll sing you a song about it. Listen, and I will sing what Math, the first Master Bard, wrote in mourning for his lost land.

There are three springs

Under the mountain of gifts.

Farewell to Slievegallion, to Aileach

And to Bri-heith, home of the lost Danans.

Your laughter is stilled; your joy is gone.

There is a citadel

Under the wave of the ocean.

Farewell to beautiful Temair,

White city of High Kings,

You are broken, crushed beneath the waves.

There are four fountains

In the land of roses.

Falias and Murius, Gorias and Finias

I remember your proud Lords and Ladies,

And hear the echoes of your dying song.

There is a place of defense

Under the oceans wave.

My heart calls for Lyonesse,

But I hear no answer.

I weep forever for what is no more.

The night was still when Gwydion finished singing. As the last words died away he glanced down at his nephew. Arthur had fallen asleep at last, listening to the tune of ancient sorrow.

Meirgdydd, Disglair Wythnos—late afternoon

T
HEY RODE INTO
Dinas Emrys late in the afternoon. The small village clung tenaciously to the side of the mountain, like a man desperately clinging to life. Twelve primitive but snug thatched huts were perched on both sides of the road. Each hut had a small garden plot and a byre for sheep. A few cows, a small flock of hens, a well, and a very tiny grove of alder trees completed the settlement.

The mountains surrounded the village, not so much protecting it as ignoring it. The mountains in the distance rose blue and majestic purple in the waning light of the late afternoon sun. The closer mountains showed bare, dark rock, sporadically patched with carpets of green clover and overlaid with silver-blue ribbons of sparking streams.

Gwydion stopped the horse at the last tiny hut at the north end of the village. The rickety wood door opened, and Myrrdin stood in the doorway, waiting to welcome them.

Unbidden, Gwydion saw in his mind a picture of Myrrdin as he had last seen him in his quarters at Y Ty Dewin. He remembered the books, the tapestries and carpets, the beautiful tables of shining oak, the white, stone walls bathed in the light of a cheerful fire. Myrrdin didn’t belong in a place like Dinas Emrys. And, of course, neither did Arthur, the heir of Idris, the future High King of Kymru.