The Eternal Flame (15 page)

A cool clump of mist slid down his nose.
What I really wish most of all is that Merlin himself were here. Right now. He would know what to do!

But Merlin wasn’t here. The farther Tamwyn strode up the grassy path, the sound of his footsteps magnified by the mist, the more he felt certain of that. And yet he couldn’t help wondering why Merlin would choose to stay on the world called Earth when Avalon—the world in between all things mortal and immortal, the world Merlin himself had planted as a seed—faced such terrible peril.

They must be having some serious problems of their own on Earth,
he concluded. And then he wondered: When Merlin went through a star doorway to Earth, which star was that?

Almost imperceptibly, the slope of the trail started to flatten. Tamwyn refused to believe it at first, for he’d trekked so far up this mountain without any sign of change. But no, his feet weren’t lying to him. The trail was definitely leveling out.

Abruptly, the pathway ended, opening into a flat meadow of the same short grass. Could this be the summit? Since the mist crowded so close that he could barely see past his outstretched arm, he started to explore the area. He quickly discovered that the meadow was circular, about twenty paces across. A group of low, rounded stones ringed its edge. Outside the ring of stones, the slope fell sharply away.

So this was the summit! Feeling expectant, and yet unsure what to expect, Tamwyn sat down on one of the stones. Its surface felt slick from the moisture of the mist. As he rested his tired legs, he studied its smooth contours. To his surprise, down where the stone met the grass, he spied a flash of color.

An insect. As soon as he picked it up, though, he could tell this was no ordinary insect. Holding it gently in the palm of his hand, he peered at its spiraling antennae, orange wings, jagged blue scales, and enormous, faceted eyes.

He cocked his head, puzzled. For as strange as this creature was, even stranger was his feeling that he had seen it somewhere before. Yet how could that be?

Suddenly he remembered. And burst out laughing. He
had
seen this little fellow before—but from a completely different perspective. When he had used the drop of Dagda’s dew, given to him by Gwirion, he had been hoping to catch a glimpse of his lost companion Henni. Instead, he found himself staring at a bizarre, colorful dragon with spiraling tusks. The sight had been so terrifying that it nearly knocked him off his feet. But it was really just this insect, magnified millions of times!

“Some dragon you are,” he said to the insect. The tiny creature shook his antennae—or tusks—at him, as if admonishing him for such stupidity.

Amused, Tamwyn set the insect back down in the grass. All of a sudden, he heard the slapping of feet. Someone was coming up the trail! Running fast, from the sound of it.

He stood up and stepped closer to the top of the trail, peering into the impenetrable mist. But he could see nothing beyond the mist itself. He leaned forward, staring hard, when—

A body sprang out of the mist. It slammed right into him, knocking him over backward.

Tamwyn lay on the grass, momentarily stunned. Just as he started to sit up, the same body pounced on top of him, holding his shoulders to the ground and peering down at him with wild eyes.

18
•
The One Called Dark Flame

Tamwyn knew those wild eyes.

He swiftly arched his back and rolled sideways, releasing a roar that echoed loudly in the mist. Caught off guard, his attacker flew to the side. He landed with a thud on the damp grass, not far from one of the rounded stones that ringed the summit of Merlin’s Pinnacle.

Before the assailant could move, Tamwyn leaped on top of his chest and sat on his ribs. Just to be sure there could be no escape, Tamwyn also grabbed both his wrists and pinned them to the ground. All the attacker could do now was to flap the backs of his oversized hands against the ground.

All, that is, except laugh.

“Eehee, eehee, hoohoohoo ahahaha,” came the raucous laughter. “I sure surprised
you,
clumsy man.”

“Henni, you old bag of bear turds!” Tamwyn looked at the hoolah’s sassy grin and familiar red headband (which was much more tattered than the last time he’d seen it). “I’d kill you a dozen times over, except . . .” His voice softened as a smile spread over his face. “I’m so glad to see you.”

Henni’s grin vanished and his eyes narrowed in concern. He peered up at Tamwyn through the gauzy shreds of mist. “Are you all right, clumsy man? You sound almost—”

“Idiotic, I know. But it’s true. I
am
glad to see your worthless, wretched, ugly face, even if you’ve got less sense than a headless troll.”

The hoolah’s grin suddenly returned, like a fire coal bursting into flame. And within his circular eyebrows, two more fires brightened. “That’s better! Oohoo, eehee, I missed you, too.”

“What happened to your headband?” asked Tamwyn with sarcasm. He bent closer, so the hoolah couldn’t mistake the angry look now back in his eyes. “Did you rip it when you threw us both into the Spiral Cascades? Or later, when the waterfall nearly pounded us to death?”

As if this were just a normal question, Henni showed no sign at all of remorse. Lying there on the ground, he merely shrugged his shoulders. “No, no. It got caught.”

“Caught? In what?”

“In the teeth of that dragon-faced boar I met back there on the cliffs. Funny how he didn’t seem to like having me pull on his tail.”

Despite his anger, Tamwyn couldn’t help but smirk. “Still the old Henni, aren’t you? Never met a death trap you didn’t like.”

“Hoohooheeheeha-ha-ha,” the hoolah laughed. “You’re right about that.” He wriggled a bit under Tamwyn’s weight. “Say now, eehee, eehee. Would you mind getting off me? You’re crushing the old ribs.”

But Tamwyn had not heard. For his thoughts had turned to their third companion, who really
had
perished in the Spiral Cascades. Frowning, he said quietly, “I wish we hadn’t lost Batty Lad.”

A small green object suddenly popped out of the folds of Henni’s sacklike tunic. Zipping through the dense mist, it left behind a glowing green trail as it swerved through the vapors.

“Ooee ooee, manny man,” the flying object squeaked as it whizzed past Tamwyn’s ear. “I thought you’d never, ever remember me! Oh yessa ya ya ya.”

“Batty Lad!” Tamwyn leaped to his feet, he was so delighted.

“Hey there, clumsy man,” teased Henni as he, too, regained his feet. “You missed your chance again to kill me.”

Tamwyn shot him a glance. “Don’t worry. I’ll get another chance soon enough.” He turned back to the creature buzzing around his head. “And you, you little green rascal! How did you ever find me?”

Batty Lad flipped over in the mist, did an erratic loop, then skidded to a landing on Tamwyn’s forearm. “Easy, manny man. We justa keeps climbing up and up and up and up, since my most excellenty brain remembers where you’re so wanting to go.”

The young man shook his head, amazed. “You really do have an excellenty brain.”

Batty Lad’s tiny face crinkled into something close to a smile. “The journey was very hard, oh yessa. But the hardest part, absolooteyootly, was keeping this crazy-lazy hoolah from killing
us
both, ya ya ya.”

“I understand, my friend.”

Henni, who was happily swatting at shreds of mist, didn’t respond.

Tamwyn gazed down at the scrawny little fellow whose mouselike face, cupped ears, and leathery wings made him look so much like a bat. But then there was the strange light that surrounded him, sending rays of glowing green into the vapors. What kind of creature
was
Batty Lad, anyway? Tamwyn was no closer to knowing the answer to that question than he’d been on the day they first met.

Suddenly the wind gusted mightily, scattering the mist on the summit. Vapors parted, drawing aside like rows of undulating curtains. At the same time, the air around the companions lightened, sparkling with new radiance.

Tamwyn gazed at the shimmering mist, unsure whether the sudden light came from the stars above or from something else entirely. Another gust of wind whooshed past, making the mist brighten even more. A third gust blew over them, so strongly that Batty Lad’s crumpled little wings flapped on their own and slapped against Tamwyn’s forearm.

With a squeak of fright, Batty Lad dived into the nearest pocket in his friend’s tunic. Just then the mist opened completely, revealing all the stars of Avalon. Hundreds upon hundreds of them shone down on Merlin’s Pinnacle, blazing with such brilliance that Tamwyn and Henni both had to turn aside.

All at once a shadow fell over them. Tamwyn looked straight up to see what had caused the change. Another gust of wind struck his face, with such force that it made his eyes water. Yet he had no trouble seeing what had caused the wind, as well as the shadow.

Wings.

An enormous, winged horse descended from the sky. Announcing her arrival with a rippling neigh, she gave a powerful stroke of her wings, whose silvery white feathers seemed themselves to be made of starlight. Then the great steed landed in the center of the ring of stones, scattering the remaining wisps of mist.

The horse turned her rich brown eyes toward Tamwyn. For an endless moment, they gazed at each other, young man and ageless horse. She was, Tamwyn felt, peering straight into his soul, as a bright shaft of light can reach deep into a murky pool. And he knew that she was deciding whether or not he was truly worthy of a voyage to the stars.

Finally, she swished her graceful tail and spoke directly into his mind. “Are you the one,” she asked in a resonant voice, “who is called Dark Flame?”

Hearing her say the first word of his name, he winced. Yet he managed a hesitant nod.

She ruffled her great white wings, folding them tightly against her back. “I am Ahearna, the Star Galloper. Know that I sense much within you, Dark Flame.”

The horse whinnied, bobbing her head. “I feel the compassion of your mother, and the courage of your father; the joy of running free, a blessing from your grandmother; and the yearning to be wise, a gift from your grandfather. And I sense much more besides.”

Tamwyn straightened, feeling the torch pole against his back. Could it be true? Was she telling him that he was actually worthy—to use Palimyst’s word—of a journey to the stars? And was she the Great Horse of the riddle? Who could carry him up to the River of Time, and onward to the darkened stars of the Wizard’s Staff?

Ahearna studied him some more, her eyes narrowing slightly. “Yet I must tell you that you are
not
worthy.” She lifted her foreleg and stamped the moist grass. “No, definitely not worthy.”

Tamwyn reeled, almost stumbling. “But Avalon! The stars! Rhita Gawr is—”

She neighed briskly, cutting him off. “Quiet, young colt.” Her ears swiveled, pointing right at him. “I was about to say that your grandfather, Merlin, was
also
unworthy. Yet even so, I chose to carry him to the stars.”

He stood rigid.

As smoothly as a shred of mist moves through the air, Ahearna stepped nearer. Now her face was so close that Tamwyn could feel the warmth of her breath against his face. “And so,” she declared, “I shall carry you.”

“Thank you,” he whispered gratefully.

Instead of answering him, she flicked one ear in the direction of Henni, who stood off to the side. Suddenly the hoolah’s eyes widened within his circular eyebrows. He stepped back several paces, so hastily that he tripped over one of the rounded stones and tumbled to the ground.

Stifling a laugh, Tamwyn asked, “What did you just do to him?”

The winged horse snorted with amusement. “I merely told him, right to his mind, that if he even so much as
thought
about pulling my tail, I would kick him all the way to the next branch-realm.”

“You read him well.”

“Just as I read you well, Dark Flame.”

Tamwyn swallowed, eager to ask a question—and also to change the subject. “Are you, then, the Great Horse on High?”

Ahearna tossed her head, making her flowing mane ripple in the starlight. “So I have been called. But to me, the greatest horse of all is Pegasus, the constellation that is my home. You see, I fly endlessly around its centermost star, the one called the Heart of Pegasus. That is where I am always circling, ever galloping.”

Tamwyn recalled his view of that very star from Merlin’s Knothole, and how it had actually seemed to be pulsing with life. In a flash, he realized something. “Your flight around the Heart—the way you keep passing between Avalon and the star—that makes the star look, from down here, like it’s beating.”

“Rightly so,” said Ahearna with a thoughtful tilt of her ears. “For it is my task, you might say, to keep the heart beating. To keep it safe. That is a task I have performed ever since Merlin asked me to do so, when I carried him out of Avalon for the very last: time.”

“Merlin asked you? Why?”

“Because that star—the Heart—is the doorway to Earth! He asked me to guard it not because he went through it to another world, but because he believed that it was the world, after Avalon, which Rhita Gawr would most want to conquer.”

The horse, suddenly agitated, turned a quick circle, her eyes and hooves flashing under the stars. “And he was right! At this very moment, a terrible dragon is attacking the star’s flames with dark magic, trying to extinguish them—and thus open the door.”

Tamwyn caught his breath. “And that dragon—”

“Is Rhita Gawr, I am certain.” She stamped her hooves and flared her nostrils. “I would have stayed to fight him, with all my strength, but Dagda himself came to me in a vision. He told me to cease my flight around the Heart, for the first time in centuries, and to fly as fast as lightning itself to this very mountaintop. Here I would find, he promised, the one called Dark Flame—who, despite his name and his youth, was the only person who could stop Rhita Gawr.”

Try as he might, Tamwyn couldn’t swallow the lump in his throat. “Why,” he asked hoarsely, “doesn’t Dagda just come and fight Rhita Gawr himself?”

“Know you so little of Dagda’s ways?” The steed raised her magnificent head a bit closer to the stars. “Only the strongest immortal spirits, such as Dagda, Lorilanda, and Rhita Gawr—and the very rare mortal who possesses wizard’s powers—can open star doorways. And so only they can move between worlds, and bring their followers with them. Yet Dagda vowed long ago never to use that power, since doing so would violate the basic independence of each world, and its right to choose its own destiny. That is why, whenever Dagda appears in Avalon, it is only as a vision, not as his true self. And that is also why he has now forbidden Merlin to move between the worlds—so that Merlin must remain forever on Earth.”