Stones Of Power - The Last Sword Of Power Part 23

'You speak as a man of great wisdom, and I sense you have power. Will you use that power against Wotan?'

'I am doing exactly that at this moment. Why else would I be here?'

'Are you offering me a weapon against him?'

'No.'

'Then what is the purpose of your visit?'

'What indeed?' answered Pendarric. His image faded and Galead was alone, once more.

The birds were still feeding by the sword and the knight turned to look at them but as he moved they fluttered away in panic. He stood and strapped the blade to his side, covered the fire with earth and saddled his horse.

The coast was a mere eight miles through the woods and he hoped to find a s.h.i.+p that might land him on the sh.o.r.es of Britain. He rode the narrow trails through the forest, lost in thought, listening to the bird-song, enjoying the sunlight that occasionally lanced through the gaps in the overhanging trees. His mood was more tranquil following Pendarric's appearance, though the sorrow remained.

Towards the middle of the morning he met an elderly man and two women, standing alongside a hand-cart with a broken wheel. The cart was piled with possessions - clothes, chests and a very old chair. The man bowed as he approached, the women standing nervously as Galead dismounted.

'May I offer a.s.sistance?' he asked.

'That is truly kind,' said the man, smiling. His hair was long and white, though darker streaks could still be seen in his forked beard. One of the women was elderly, the other young and attractive with auburn hair streaked with gold; her right eye was bruised and her lip cut and swollen. Galead knelt by the cart and saw that the wheel had come loose and torn away from the joining-pin at the axle.

He helped them to unload the cart, then lifted it so that the wheel could be pushed back in place. Using the back of a hatchet blade, he hammered the joining-pin home and then reloaded the cart.

'I am very grateful,' said the man. 'Will you join us for our midday meal?'

Galead nodded and sat down by the roadside as the young woman prepared a fire. The older woman busied herself taking pans and plates from the back of the cart.

'We do not have much,' said the old man, seating himself beside Galead. 'Some oats and salt. But it is filling and there is goodness in the food.'

'It will suffice. My name is Galead.'

'And I am Caterix. That is my wife Oela, and my daughter Pilaras.'

'Your daughter seems in pain.'

'Yes. The journey has not been kind to us, and I pray to the Lord that our troubles may now be over.'

'How was she hurt?'

Caterix looked away. 'Three men robbed us two days ago. They . . . a.s.saulted my daughter and killed her husband, Doren, when he tried to aid her.'

'I am sorry,' said Galead lamely.

The meal was eaten in silence, after a short prayer of thanks from Caterix. Galead thanked the family for their hospitality and offered to ride with them to the coast, where they had friends. Caterix accepted the offer with a bow and the small group followed slowly as Galead rode ahead.

As dusk flowed into evening Galead, rounding a bend in the trail, saw a man sitting with his back to a tree. He rode forward and dismounted. The man was bleeding heavily from a wound in his chest and his face was pale, the eyelids and lips blue from loss of blood.

Ripping open the dirty tunic, Galead staunched the wound as best he could. After several minutes Caterix came upon the scene; he knelt beside the wounded man, lifting his wrist and checking his pulse.

'Get him to the cart,' he said. 'I have some cloth there for bandages, and a needle and thread.' Together they half-lifted, half-dragged the man to a rounded clearing by a silver stream. The two women helped to clean the wound and Caterix expertly sewed the jagged flesh together. Then they wrapped the man in blankets warmed by the fire.

'Will he live?' asked Galead.

Caterix shrugged. 'That is in the Lord's hands. He has lost much blood.'

In the night Galead awoke to see the girl, Pilaras, kneeling by the wounded man.

Moonlight glinted from the knife in her hand.

She sat motionless for a long moment, then raised the knife, resting the point on the sleeping man's neck. Suddenly her head sagged forward and Galead saw that she was weeping. She lifted the knife and replaced it in the sheath at her side, returning to her blankets by the cart.

Galead lay back and returned to his dreams. He watched as the invasion s.h.i.+ps landed on the coasts of Britain, saw the Goths begin their march towards the cities and, over it all, two visions that haunted him: a demonic head filling the sky, surrounded by storm-clouds and lightning, and a Sword s.h.i.+ning like a midnight lantern.

Despite his dreams, he awoke refreshed. The wounded man was sleeping still, but his colour was better. Galead washed in the stream and then approached Caterix, who was sitting beside the victim.

'I must leave you,' said Galead. 'I need to find a s.h.i.+p to take me home.'

'May the Lord guide you and protect you on your journey.'

'And you on yours, Caterix. It was a fine deed to save the man's life.'

'Not fine at all. What are we if we do not aid our fellows in their times of trial?'

Galead rose and walked to his horse, then on impulse he returned to Caterix.

'Last night your daughter held a knife to this man's throat.'

He nodded. 'She told me this morning. I am very proud of her.'

'Why did she do it?'

"This is the man who raped her and killed her husband.'

'And you saved him? Sweet Mithras, he deserves death!'

'More than likely,' answered Caterix, smiling.

'You think he will thank you far saving him?'

'His thanks are not important.'

'Yet you may have saved him only to allow him to butcher other innocent people - to rape more young girls.'

'I am not responsible for his deeds, Galead, only my own. No man willingly allows those he loves to suffer hurt and pain.'

'I do not disagree -with that/ said Galead. 'Love is a fine emotion. But he is not someone you love.'

'Of course he is. He is a brother.'

'You know him?'

'No, I do not mean a brother of the flesh. But he -like you - is my brother. And I must help him. It is very simple.'

'This is no way to deal with an enemy, Caterix.'

The old man looked down at the wounded robber. 'What better way is there of dealing with enemies than making them your friends?'

Galead walked back to his horse and stepped into the saddle. He tugged on the reins and the beast began to walk along the trail. Pilaras was gathering herbs at the wayside and she smiled as he pa.s.sed.

Touching his heels to the horse's sides, he rode for the coast.

Culain sat beneath the stars on his sixteenth night at the Isle of Crystal. Every morning he would wake to find food and drink on a wooden tray outside the tower; every evening the empty dishes would be removed. Often he would catch a glimpse of a shadowy figure on the path below, but always he would walk back inside the tower, allowing his nocturnal visitors the solitude they so obviously desired.

But on this night a moon shadow fell across him as he sat and he looked up to see the woman in white, her face shrouded by a high hood.

'Welcome, lady,' he said, gesturing her to seat herself. As she did so, he saw that beneath the hood she wore a veil. 'Is there need for such modesty even here?' he asked.

'Especially here, Culain.' She threw back the hood and removed the veil and his breath caught in his throat as the moonlight bathed the pale face he knew so well.

'Gian?' he whispered, half-rising and moving towards her.

'Stay where you are,' she told him, her voice stern and lacking all emotion.

'But they told me you were dead.'

'I was tired of your visits, and I was dead to you.' There were silver streaks in her hair and fine lines about the eyes and mouth, but to Culain the Queen had lost none of her beauty.

'And yet now you are here once more,' she continued, 'and once more you torment me.

Why did you bring him to me.'

'I did not know you were here.'

'I have spent sixteen years trying to forget the past and its tragedies. I thought that I had succeeded. You, I decided, were a young girl's fantasy. As a child I loved you - and in so doing destroyed my chance for happiness. As a lonely Queen, I loved you - and in so doing destroyed my son. For several years I hated you, Culain, but that pa.s.sed. Now there is only indifference - both to you and to the Blood King my husband became.'

'You know, of course, that your son did not die?'

'I know many things, Lance Lord. But what I desire to know most is when you will leave this Isle.'

'You have become a hard woman, Gian.'

'I am not Gian Avur, not your little Fawn of the Forest. I am Morgana of the Isle, though I have other names I am told. You should know how that feels, Culain - you who were Apollo, and Aeneas, and Cun.o.belin the King and so many valiant others.'

'I have heard the leader of this community called the Fey Witch. I would never have dreamt it was you. What has happened to you, Laitha?'

'The world changed me, Lance Lord, and I care no longer for it nor for any creature that lives in it.'

'Then why are you here in this sacred place? It is a centre for healing and peace.'

'And so it remains. The Sisters are spectacularly successful, but I and others spend our time with the true Mysteries: the threads that link the stars, the patterns that weave through human lives, criss-crossing and joining, shaping the world's destiny. I used to call it G.o.d, but now I see it is greater than any immortal dreamt of by man. Here in this - '

'I have heard enough, woman. What of Uther?' cut in Culain.

'He is dying,' she hissed, 'and it will be no loss to the world when he pa.s.ses.'

'I never thought to see evil in you, Gian; you were always a woman of exquisite beauty.' He laughed grimly. 'But then evil comes in many guises and it does not have to be ugly. I have sat here in silent penance for many nights, for I believed that when I began this community it was for selfish motives. Well, lady, perhaps they were selfish. Yet the Isle was still fas.h.i.+oned with love and for love, and you - with your search for Mysteries I knew a thousand years before you were born - you have perverted it. I'll stay on this Tor no longer . . . nor wait your bidding.' He rose smoothly, gathered his staff and began the long climb down towards the circle of huts.

Her voice rang out behind him, an edge of cold triumph in her words.

'Your boat is waiting, Culain. If you are on it within the hour, I may not allow the Blood King to die. If you are not, I will withdraw the sisters from him and you may take the corpse where you will.'

He stopped, suffering the taste of defeat. Then he turned.

'You were always wilful and never one to admit an error. Very well, I will go and leave Uther to your tender mercies. But when you pause in your studies of the Mysteries, think on this: I took you in as a tiny child and raised you as a father. I offered nothing to make you feel there should be more. But you it was who whispered my name as you lay with Uther. You it was who bade me stay at Camulodu-num. It is there that my guilt begins - and I will carry it. But perhaps when you look down from your gilded tower, you will see that tiny sc.r.a.p of your own guilt - and find the courage to lift it to your eyes.'

'Are you done, Lance Lord?'

'I am done, Morgana.'

'Then leave my Isle.'

CHAPTER THIRTEEN.

'We leave the road here,' said Maedhlyn, as the party crested a low dusty hill. 'And there is the realm of Goroien,' he continued, pointing to a distant range of forbidding mountains.

The landscape was pitted and broken, but many shadows moved furtively between the dead trees and the cracked boulders. Some slunk on all fours, others flew on black wings, still more slithered or ran.

Cormac took a deep breath, willing himself to step from the sanctuary of the road. He glanced at Victorinus, who smiled and shrugged.

'Let us go,' said the prince, drawing his sword. The fifteen men, weapons ready, moved off into the gloom and at once the shadows converged on them. There were beasts with slavering jaws, men with hollow fangs and red-rimmed eyes, wolves whose faces s.h.i.+fted and changed like mist. . . becoming human, then b.e.s.t.i.a.l. Above them flew giant bats, wheeling and diving, their leather wings slicing the air over the heads of the marchers. But none came within range of the bright swords.

'How far?' asked Cormac, walking beside Maedhlyn at the head of the column.

'Who can judge time here?' replied the former Enchanter. 'But it will take long enough.'

Grey dust rose about their feet as they walked on, flanked by an army of shadows drawing ever more close.

'Will they attack us?' Victorinus whispered.

Maedhlyn spread his hands. The man at the rear of the column screamed as taloned claws wrenched at his cloak, pulling him from his feet.

Victorinus whirled. 'Sword circle!' he called and their blades held high, the warriors leapt into the ranks of the beasts and surrounded their fallen comrade.