The Book of Magic (3 page)

Cairpré

"The people's bard" he was called—a poet who understood both the light and dark sides of mortal creatures. As
Elen
's tutor, he introduced her to the Greek myths; as her lover, he brought her the deepest happiness of her life. Later, as
Merlin
's mentor, he taught magic and lore—and also helped the young man build his first musical instrument, the time-honored tradition of someone who hoped to become a wizard. Cairpré died too soon, in
Fincayra
's final battle, his person just as beloved as his poetry. Like his most famous lines, he is remembered whole-heartedly, with both sweetness and sorrow.

Cwen

Part human and part tree, Cwen's gnarled skin looked very much like bark, while her tangled brown hair resembled a mass of vines. Her rootlike feet remained unshod, and she wore no adornment but the silver rings on the smallest of her twelve knobby fingers. Beneath her white robe, she moved like a tree bending with the wind, wafting a scent of spring blossoms. Yet no one could mistake her age: Her back bent like a trunk weighed down by a long winter's snow. For she was, indeed, very old—the last survivor of her people, the treelings.

Cwen was, for many years,
Rhia
's loyal companion. They lived together in the boughs of the great oak tree
Arbassa
in the heart of
Drama Wood
. Then Cwen succumbed to the temptation of regaining her youth—and betrayed Rhia to a band of
gobsken
. Although Rhia escaped, the two former friends would not meet again until after the
Dance of the Giants
, during
Merlin
's quest of the
Seven Songs
. By then,
Cwen
had changed into a butterfly, which helped Merlin to discover his own power of transformation … and helped Rhia to forgive her at last. And so it was that, in the early days of
Avalon
, Cwen became one of the first people to join Rhia and
Elen
in the
Society of the Whole
.

Dinatius

Tall and strong, Dinatius lived in the squalid village of Caer Vedwyd, not far from the rock-bound coast of Gwynedd, the ancient name for Wales on
Earth
. He could carry heavy loads—and also survive regular beatings from the village smith who housed him. When he was not stoking the smith's fires, Dinatius cut and carried wood, worked the bellows, and hauled iron ore. Yet he still found time to lead a gang of young ruffians who tormented young
Merlin
and the mysterious woman who sheltered him.

As much as Merlin hated this bully, he dashed into a raging fire to save Dinatius's life. But Merlin didn't learn, until much later, whether he had succeeded. For those very flames destroyed his eyes, forcing him to find a new way to see—a way befitting a wizard. And when Merlin did, at last, discover the truth about Dinatius, it was a wrenching surprise.

Domnu

… She is older than time.

Beautiful
is not the word to describe the ancient hag of
Fincayra
's dreaded
Haunted Marsh
. She has no hair on her head; her scalp is so wrinkled that it looks like the folds of an exposed brain. One large wart sprouts like a horn from the middle of her forehead. Her mouth is filled with angular, crooked teeth. And her eyes, utterly black, never blink.

Domnu, whose name means
dark fate,
wears a simple robe that resembles a cloth sack with many pockets and always goes barefoot. Yet despite her simple garb, she carries an aura of great power and deep mystery. She is, after all, older than time—and oblivious to the fickle demands of morality. As the bard
Cairpré
described her to young
Merlin
and
Shim
, "Domnu is neither good nor evil, friend nor foe, mortal nor immortal. She simply is." But she does have a merciful side: When she sees how frightened Shim is, she consoles him, "Be not scared. Dying isn't so bad after the first time."

An avid gambler, she loves to place wagers on things she deems worthless, such as dice, chess pieces, or human lives. Piles of objects she uses for games of chance—bones, jewels,spools of yarn, cards, pebbles, shells, and eyeballs—are everywhere in her lair; the walls are covered with jumbled calculations, symbols, and runes. When Merlin asks for her help, she grins, showing her misshapen teeth, and replies, "What would you like to wager, my pet?"

Elen of the Sapphire Eyes

No wonder she helped
Merlin
become a man of many worlds and many times: Elen's life bridged
Earth
,
Fincayra
, and
Avalon
. On Earth, she was called Branwen; in Fincayra, she was known as Elen of the Sapphire Eyes; and in Avalon, she became Elen the Founder. Her breadth as a person enabled her to love two very different men—the gentle poet
Cairpré
and the ruthless king
Stangmar
.

Similarly, Elen's spiritual breadth enabled her to draw from several different faiths. Combining the wisdom of Druids, Christians, and Jews, she became a skilled healer as well as a bard, and she had a special fondness for Greek myths. As likely to tell a tale about the healer from Galilee as she was to speak of Moses or Athena, she was respected by the most learned people in her midst—and reviled by the most intolerant. In fact, her son, the young
Merlin
, first called upon his magical powers to save her from being burned at the stake by some of her enemies, a gang of young ruffians led by
Dinatius
. While Merlin did manage to save Elen's life, he started a terrible fire that caused him to lose forever the use of his eyes. In time, with Elen's help, he learned to see in an entirely different, more powerful way—not with his eyes, but with his heart.

Later, when Merlin's magical seed gave birth to the world of Avalon, Elen and her daughter,
Rhia
, founded a new spiritual order: the
Society of the Whole
, dedicated to promoting harmony among all living creatures and to protecting the Great Tree that sustains all life. This new faith, which began as just a gleam in its founder's sapphire eyes, spread rapidly across Avalon. It paid close attention to the seven sacred
Elements
—Earth, Air, Fire, Water, Life, LightDark, and Mystery—which together constitute the Whole. Elen and her followers (including Rhia,
Lleu of the One Ear
, and
Babd Catha)
built their sacred compound in
Stoneroot
. And in the compound's very center stood a Great Temple that was, in fact, the circle of stones from Lost Fincayra known as the
Dance of the Giants
.

When Elen died, in the Year of Avalon 37, creatures everywhere grieved. People of all kinds wore sapphires in her honor. And the great spirit
Dagda
personally guided her spirit all the way to the
Otherworld
. There she could, at last, rejoin her life's greatest love, the bard Cairpré.

Eremon

When young
Merlin
saved a pair of deer—a doe and a stag—from huntsmen's arrows, he met two great friends. For they turned out to be deer people of
Fincayra
's Mellwyn-bri-Meath clan:
Hallia
, who would become Merlin's lover and lifelong companion, and Eremon, her true hearted brother. Eremon was the first to trust the young man—and the first to call him Young Hawk. When in human form, Eremon walked with long, loping strides. His feet were bare. Like his sister, he possessed rich brown eyes and the strong chin of the deer people. And like his sister, he knew that the best way to come to know each other was "to circle a story," one of the deer people's oldest traditions.

In time, Eremon saw much of himself in Merlin. That commonality deepened when he asked, "How do you know so much about your faults?"—to which Merlin replied, "That's easy. I have a sister." Finally, Eremon vowed to help Merlin on his quest to save the island from the dragon
Valdearg
—even if Eremon himself did not survive. As the deer man declared, "It is right to help another creature, no matter the shape of his track."

Galator

When young
Merlin
first saw the Galator one night early in his
Lost Years
, the pendant seemed to shine with its own light, not just the moon's. Right away, he noticed that the crystal was deep green, with rivers of violet and blue flowing beneath its surface and glints of red that pulsed with life. Truly, it looked almost like a living eye.

This pendant, once believed to be the last of the fabled
Treasures of Fincayra
, had a long history linking Fincayra with
Avalon
. Its journey connected many key people of both worlds. Worn by
Elen of the Sapphire Eyes
, given to Merlin, prized by
Cairpré
, stolen by
Domnu
, buried in lava during a battle with
kreelixes
, rescued by the great spirit
Dagda
, and carried to Avalon by
Rhia
, this deep green pendant ultimately belonged to the
Lady of the Lake
, her friend
Nuic
, and the young priestess
Elli
. Yet despite its many bearers, only Elli managed to tap its greatest power: to speak with the person she loved, across distances as vast as the sky itself. For the Galator's deepest magic enabled loved ones to see and hear each other beyond any limits of space and time.

Gobsken

… Vicious fighters who respond to fear, lust, and greed.

Looking for exceptionally good warriors who are also exceptionally bad company? Gobsken are your answer—unless you don't enjoy smelling breath so terrible it could fell an ogre. Gobsken have broad chests, burly limbs, greenish gray skin, and eyes as thin as slits. Their three-fingered hands curl naturally into fists. And they are swift to anger.

Like their ancient king
Harshna
, gobsken are vicious fighters who respond to fear, lust, and greed. While they are invariably rude, they are often quite clever, as well as persistent. As
Fincayra
's king
Stangmar
and
Avalon
's sorcerer
Kulwych
both proved, these qualities make gobsken ideal allies for those who serve the spirit warlord
Rhita Gawr
.

Grand Elusa

This enormous white spider, larger than a horse, lived in the Misted Hills of
Lost Fincayra
. Although her appetite was great—she ate so much that even
living stones
trembled at her approach—her wisdom was also great. That is why she sided with young
Merlin
and
Rhia
, and against the hag
Domnu
, at the Great Council that began the quest of the
Seven Songs
. And that is also why the peoples of that world ultimately chose the Grand Elusa to guard the precious
Treasures of Fincayra
, which included the Flowering Harp, the sword Deepercut, the Caller of Dreams, the Orb of Fire, and six of the Seven Wise Tools. (The seventh Tool, most people believed, had been lost in the
Dance of the Giants
that destroyed
Stangmar
's
Shrouded Castle
. But Merlin later discovered it.)

Over his long life, Merlin never forgot the great white spider. But he had a different reason: It was in her lair in the Misted Hills that he first encountered the beauty of a
crystal cave
. Quietly, he vowed that one day he, too, would live in a cave of such natural magnificence.

As a gift to the peoples of
Avalon
, the Grand Elusa wove a glistening gown of spider's silk for
Elen of the Sapphire Eyes
. This became the traditional gown of the High Priestess of the
Society of the Whole
. In time, that gown was worn by Elen's daughter, Rhiannon, as well as by
Coerria
. Yet no one loved its graceful design more than a young apprentice third class named
Elliryanna
.

Gwri of the Golden Hair

On the day young
Merlin
met
Rhia
in the
Druma Wood
of
Fincayra
, she led him to the rarest tree in the forest. It was a shomorra tree, whose branches grew every kind of fruit (including purple larkon fruit, which tasted like liquid sunshine). "This is my garden," she explained. Then she showed Merlin a different kind of garden, high above their heads: the garden of the
stars
. Rhia spoke of the wonders of the Fincayran sky—the constellations formed by the dark spaces between the stars, rather than the stars themselves; the
River of Time
that divided past from future; and the star known as Gwri of the Golden Hair.

Later, in the quest of the
Seven Songs
, Rhia and Merlin met the bright-eyed woman who was, to their astonishment, the spirit of that very star. Gwri told them about the power of Leaping across space and time—and gave the young wizard the knowledge he needed to fulfill his dream of living backward in time. Most important, she helped Merlin understand that everything is connected to everything else—because, as she put it, "all voices join in the great and glorious song of the stars." When Gwri vanished at last, she left on
Merlin's staff
the symbol of a star within a circle. Thus was born the symbol for magical travel through space and time—the very symbol that Merlin's son,
Krystallus
, would one day choose for
Avalon
's famous college of mapmakers.

Gwynnia

When a boulder on the bank of
Fincayra
's River Unceasing began to quiver, then crack, Gwynnia began her life as a baby dragon. Out from the boulderlike egg she crawled, blinking her triangular, orange eyes that glowed as bright as molten lava. Raising one of her claws, the dragon tried to scratch the yellow bump on her forehead. But she missed and poked the soft, crinkled skin of her nose. She whimpered and shook her head, flapping her blue, bannerlike ears. But when she stopped, her right ear refused to lie flat again. Instead, it stretched out to the side like a misplaced horn. Only the gentle droop at the tip hinted that it was, in fact, an ear.

So began the journey of Gwynnia, daughter of the ferocious dragon
Valdearg
. That journey almost ended moments later, with the terrible murder of her siblings, an attack that left behind only broken shells and hacked bits of dragon flesh. She might well have perished herself—but a young wizard named
Merlin
rescued her, calling on powers he didn't even know he possessed. Then her journey continued, taking her to Valdearg's lair in the Lost Lands, to an enduring friendship with the deer woman
Hallia
, and to a crucial role in the final battle to save Fincayra—a battle that combined lost
wings
and dragon wings.