We received news, too, from my father's spies in Britain. My father was hoping that Arthur would be killed in battle, though he was unwilling to arrange such an event himself, for the sake of Agravain and for his oath. But there was no such good fortune. Arthur took tribute from every king in Britain, and even from the Church they have there. This last had cost Arthur almost as much as it gained him. All of Britain-except the Saxon kingdoms-held the faith of this Church, and had done so ever since the last Roman High Kings had decreed that they should, and given the Church many privileges. The Church was very rich, holding much land and goods given it by its followers, and being free from tax or tribute because of the privileges it had been granted. It had been expected that Arthur would honor the rights and privileges of the Church; indeed, it had been expected that he would make generous donations to it. He had been raised in a monastery in the west of Britain, living, with other orphans and b.a.s.t.a.r.ds, on the charity of the Church; he was supposed to be devout, and to call upon G.o.d before his battles. The Church had been eager to recognize him as Pendragon, despite his dubious t.i.tle to power. When, instead of showering it with gifts, he had demanded supplies, the outrage of the bishops and abbots resounded as far as Dun Fionn.

I did not understand the problem. Though Britain had long been Christian, and Erin had become so, Caledon and the Orcades knew of that faith only by hearsay. I asked my mother about it.

"It is all stupidity and pretence," she told me sharply. "The Church claims that there is one G.o.d who rules all the world, and that it alone can bring men to this G.o.d. It pretends that the nature of this G.o.d is all justice and love, yet itself cares nothing for either. But it is rich, and it has a strong hold on men's minds. Arthur," she said, smiling, "Arthur will have to beware of it."

"Will you and Father make an alliance with its leaders?" I asked.

But she frowned. "No. They will not ally themselves with pagans or heretics-and they say I am a heretic, for that is a word they use freely for all who abandon their teachings, whether they ever believed those teachings or not. Indeed, that was the one thing that made me glad when I left Britain; that I should hear no more of the pious gruntings of priests! No, they would appear ridiculous should they ally themselves with us against a Christian High King. They will have to obey Arthur, since he has power and is willing to use it. But they will look for some other king to support in a rebellion."

And she and Lot did not send messengers to any of the bishops, even after Arthur had resorted to threats to get the supplies from the Church. But my father listened to all the news and hoped. When Arthur gave some of his new wealth to Bran of Less Britain and sent him home, Lot stayed up all night dictating messages. He also came every day to see how the men were doing at the new methods of fighting, and himself practiced them until he was dripping with sweat. He also began scheming for control over the northern Hebrides, renewing an old enmity with Aengus mac Ere of Dalriada. But something of the brightness had gone from these endeavors. My father was not going to control Britain by means of any puppet kings. Arthur controlled Britain.

My mother also laid plans. In September, in the dark of the moon, we killed a black lamb at midnight. I held its head while she cut it open with a stone knife, examining the entrails while it still struggled and bled over us. She was angry with what she saw, but did not explain it to me. Eventually, the next day, I asked her why she could not simply destroy Arthur, as she had destroyed his father.

"It is not so simple," she told me. "There is some Christian counter-spell he has made against me, and I do not understand the nature of it. Did you not see, in the lamb last night, how the entrails were woven into knots?"

I had not wanted to look. These things still sickened me.

"Do not mind that, though," she said, beginning to smile. "I have cursed him, and the curse lives, and has lived. In the end the Darkness will take him, too."

I watched that Darkness in her eyes as she gloated and was awed by it. I knew that she was planning some other action, though, and that she had killed the lamb to see how it might turn out. She was filled with tension, waiting. But when I asked, she would not tell me what she waited for, only smiling a soft, secret smile.

As October wore slowly away and the great sea-fogs blanketed the islands I began to guess when she would act, if not what she meant to do. At the end of October there is a night called Samhain. It is a festival, one of four great festivals-the others are Midsummer, Lammas, and Beltane-which are sacred to the powers of the earth and sky. Samhain is the night when the gates between the worlds lie open. On that night, the dead can come creeping back to the world they left, and places are laid for them at table among the living. Other, yet darker things come across the worlds on Samhain, and they are not usually spoken of, and still other things can be summoned then, by wish or by rite, and these are mentioned least of all. As the end of October approached, I knew what my mother was waiting for.

On the day of Samhain I went to her room for the usual lesson. But most of the day we did nothing but read. Morgawse had bought a Roman poem called the Aeneid from a travelling merchant for the value of ten cows in gold. She had seventeen books, which were worth a frightening amount, and I had read all of them. I was enjoying the Aeneid more than any of the others, though it was full of strange names and I understood very little of it. I regretted that we had only the first six books, the first half of the poem, and that we had nearly finished these.

"...sic orsa loqui vates: 'sate sanguine divum, Tros Anchisiade, facilis descensus Averni: Noctes atque dies patet atri ianua Ditis; sed revocare gradum superasque evadere ad auras, hoc opus, hic labor est.'"

I smoothed the page and began translating again: "Thus the...prophet?"

"Or poet," Morgawse murmured. "Like an ollamh."

"Thus the prophet began to speak: 'You who are sprung from the blood of G.o.ds, Trojan, son of Anchises, easy is the descent of Avernus: night and day the gate of black Dis is open; but to recall your step and to come out to the upper air, this is toil, this labor...," I stopped, swallowing suddenly. "Avernus. That is Yffern, isn't it? The Dark Otherworld?"

She nodded, her eyes cold and amused. "Does that frighten you, my hawk?"

I put my hand over the page, shaking my head, but the catch was still in my throat. Easy is the descent, but to recall your steps...She was still looking at me.

"Very well, enough for today," she said. "And what do you think of Aeneas now, my hawk?"

"He still...he relies upon his mother, the G.o.ddess, for everything. I don't really like him. Not as much as CuChulainn, or Connall Cearnach, or Noise Mac Usliu. And yet..."

"Och, it is an ill thing to rely upon one's mother, then?" she said, laughing, and I looked at her and felt my face grow hot.

"She was less of a G.o.ddess than you," I said.

"Prettily said! Aeneas is weak, and so is his mother Venus. And yet, the Romans consider this their greatest poem. They were not artists. They could not understand the depths of a thing, the pa.s.sions of the soul. They built a strong empire on the blood of men, and made good roads. Other than that...Arthur is half a Roman."

"He is? But I thought all the Romans left a long time ago."

"The legions left. 'Defend yourselves,' Theodosius told the provinces of the Britains, 'for we cannot defend you any longer.' But they left their memory, men willing to try to set up a fallen empire. In the south, many still think like Romans. Arthur does. That is why he leads the Britons against the Saxons: he wishes to preserve the last stronghold of the empire against the barbarians, one nation defending itself against another. He does not see that Britain is no more one nation than the Saxons are. His is a peculiar way of viewing things, and has many weaknesses. I know them. I have seen and known Arthur."

She fell silent, thinking, smiling.

"Come here tonight," she said in a low voice after a long time. "I have planned that tonight you will have your initiation into real Power. It is a good night for it. I will have you accepted by the Darkness, my son, and you will see why I am strong. After tonight, you will have Power as I do."

I heard, nodded, bowed, and left the room without saying anything. I saddled my horse and went for a long ride out by the sea. I could not stay in Dun Fionn. But with each step my horse made I became more afraid, antic.i.p.ating something I did not know. I had seen deeply into the Darkness by then, and it frightened me. I desired to be like my mother, to have Power and escape from the fear, but I found the Power still more fearful. I did not know what I wanted, now, but I would go that night.

I realized that the path was familiar, and found that I was going to Llyn Gwalch. Well, why not?

I reached the place where the stream fell over the cliff's edge, combing the gravel with clear fingers. There was a light mist that day, which turned all the low hills so soft a shade of green that it seemed they would dissolve into the gentle sky. The sea beat-beat at the cliff, a sound as constant as my heart. It seemed to me that I had never heard it before.

I dismounted and hobbled my horse, then climbed carefully down the path.

When I reached the beach with its little pond, everything seemed smaller than I remembered it, and I realized how long it had been, and how much I must have grown. But it was still beautiful. My old dreams hung about it yet, glowing faintly in my mind with colors brighter than those of earth. The pond was infinitely deep, still and clear, dark in shade because of the multi-hued gravel lying rounded in its bottom. The sea clutched at the beach, hissed on the stones, and sighed out. Its smell was salt and strong, wild, infinite, and sad. A seagull flew over my head, flapping and gliding. It wailed, once, and some more sea-birds hidden in the mist cried back.

I went over to the pool and knelt by it, drank from it, then studied my reflection. A boy, looking fourteen or older, stared back. Thick black hair, held back with a bit of worn leather. Smooth skin still dark from the summer, a face slightly resembling Morgawse's in the shape of the bones. A thoughtful face whose dark eyes met mine openly, trying to look into the confused mind that lurked behind them. It was so very dark in there.

Who is this Gwalchmai? I wondered. A name, but what beyond that? Something beyond my understanding.

I leant back on my heels and looked up at the grey sky. I remembered those dreams I had had of myself as a great warrior, and the dreams that had come at night, the sword burning with light, tattered shreds of glowing color, and, above them all, the song rising from nowhere. Like the sound of a harp played elsewhere on an empty day, but sweet enough for a man to leave his life behind to hear it better. I remembered playing with boats in that very place, sending them out, so far out, into the open sea, dreaming of the Land of the Ever Young. Lugh's Hall, with its walls woven of gold and white bronze and its roof thatched with the wing-feathers of birds. The sea pounded and sighed on the sh.o.r.e, and the birds keened. I wondered what had happened, and where the Darkness had begun. I felt like a man looking back on his childhood, and I wondered if one could truly be a man at fourteen, and what it was that I had lost. I sat and listened to the gulls, drawing my cloak around me. Tonight it would end. Tonight, truly, it would end.

The night was one of wind and broken moonlight which poured raggedly through the clouds driven over the moon, only to be whipped away again. Crossing the yard from the hall, where I slept most of the time now, to the room of Morgawse the Queen, I looked up at the moon's worn face and thought of the old prayers to it. Gem of the night, breast-jewel of heaven...How many, I wondered, had looked up at her face through the years? Warriors planning raids by her light, lovers laughing to her, druids and magicians praying to her, poets making songs to her, all these she must have seen countless times. But surely, it was all chance whether she shone or no, and I could expect no help from her. And perhaps, when I returned this way, I would no longer want any.

The very air seemed to be vibrating when I reached my mother's room, as if with the aftermath of a scream. The door-bolt shivered in my hand like a living thing. There was power in the air, so much dark power that it was hard to breathe.

My mother had already prepared the room. The floor had been laid bare, and the wall-hanging raised so that no light could enter. She had dug a trench across the middle of the floor, and made designs about it with white barley and water, and set candles around it. She stood now in the middle of the room in a gown of a red so dark that it appeared almost black, her bare arms pale and strong and cold-looking in the eerie light. Her hair fell about her, a river of gleaming darkness down to her waist; she was barefoot and ungirded, since it was a time to loosen knots and not to bind them. She was drawing a design in the air about the final candle.

I felt a weakness rise in me, gripping my stomach with icy hands, unstringing my knees. Darkness lay in the air, thick, smothering. I wanted to cry out, beat at it with my hands, run, not looking back to what might follow from the corners of my mind.

I closed the door softly and stood silent, waiting until Morgawse was finished.

She set the final candle down and straightened. She was very tall, and the Darkness hung about her like a cloak, so that all the candle flames bent towards her like seaweed towards a whirlpool. She seemed more than ever to be not of the Earth, but a queen in some other realm. Terrified, I loved her. She smiled when she saw me, a smile blurred by the flickering of the flames and by the darkness she wore around her, but her smile still, secret and triumphant.

"Good," she said. Her voice seemed to come from a deep void, colder than January ice. "Go over there. Stand, be still, wait, and watch what I do."

I obeyed her.

She took a jug of something red,-wine or blood, I was not sure which. If it was not blood, there would be blood before the night was ended. She poured it over the design she had already traced, muttering strange words which I had heard separately before. Then she broke the jug and put half of it at each end of the trench. She turned to me again.

"Could you follow that?"

I nodded, not trusting my voice.

She smiled again and turned to one of the wall-hangings.

Just then, the door opened.

I whirled in guilt and terror, expecting Lot to burst in with angry demands or with armed men. I was ready to fight him, and my hand was at the dagger in my belt.

In the doorway stood Medraut.

"Close the door," Morgawse ordered calmly. "Stand there, opposite Gwalchmai."

"What...?" I asked. How could Medraut have stumbled on to this? I had been careful to tell him nothing. "Medraut, leave. Now. This is not for you."

He looked at me in surprise, and then his wide innocent eyes fixed themselves on the pattern again with a fierce eagerness. "But Mother said I should come."

I suddenly remembered how Medraut had stopped speaking about magic, about unexplained absences of his from training, about a thousand other little things I had never accounted for before, and the realization hit me so that I cried out, "No!"

He stared at me. "What do you mean? Morgawse has been teaching me Latin and witchcraft too. We can all learn together now. Oh, I know that you don't want me to, but it will be much better this way, you can't grudge me the Power that much."

"No!" I repeated. "You cannot. You will destroy yourself, Medraut. The Darkness will crawl inside your mind and devour your soul until it has eaten all that is you and leaves only a sh.e.l.l. Go, while you can!"

He flushed. Morgawse stood, the rope for the hangings in one hand, watching. Her eyes were on me.

"Why?" asked my brother, growing angry. "You never gave a true reason. If this is so wrong, why are you here too? It is just that you don't want me to learn. You want to keep me a little boy forever, while you become wise and powerful."

"Medraut, that is false. It is wrong, but I am all wrong, and you are not, so you must not. Please, for your own sake."

"So this is wrong, and Mother is wrong, too? That is impossible. Mother is..." His eyes sought and found her, and his anger melted into adoration.

"Medraut, get out of here," I said again, desperately, though he was not listening now. "Tonight we will do a very strong and dreadful magic."

"I came for it," he said. "I've been learning too, Gwalchmai..." And then he spoke in the language of sorcery. The ancient syllables spurted from his mouth like the yammering of some strange animal, incongruous, hideous beyond belief. I could not bear to listen and clapped my hands over my ears, staring at him, feeling the tears start to my eyes.

"It is enough," said Morgawse. "Medraut will stay."

I looked at her, ready to cry out in protest, but could not speak. The room became cold, achingly cold and dark. The candle-flames swam before my eyes, as if from miles away. I sobbed for breath in the black tide that drowned me.

Morgawse jerked back the wall-hanging.

One of my father's warriors lay there, bound hand and foot. I had known there would be blood. The man's eyes above the gag were wild with fear, running about the room without fixing on anything. I recognized Connall of Dalriada.

"Oh," I said. There was a sick taste in my mouth.

"He went to Lot and told him of my oath," said Morgawse. "I fulfill a promise. We will do to him as we did to the lamb last month, but a man is better for these things." She smiled again, looking at Connall. "Pull him to the center."

Medraut stepped forward. I stood, staring, sick. Connall's eyes met mine. His held the knowledge of horrible death.

I looked at Medraut and thought of what he had said: "So this is wrong, and Mother is wrong..."

Lastly, I looked at Morgawse, and for the first time saw her without illusion: a power wrapped in human flesh, long ago consuming the mind that had invoked it. A dark power, a Queen of Darkness. She had summoned it as a servant for her hate, had welcomed its control when she controlled it, and every day became more it and less herself. A power that drank life and hope and love like wine. Ancient beyond words, evil beyond thought, hideous despite its beauty, the creature stood there and gazed on me with a black, insatiable hunger.

I screamed and my hand rose to ward it off, and I saw that I held my dagger.

Her face changed, became as a woman's again, turning to fury. She lifted her arms, and power surrounded her leaping up like fire.

"Gwalchmai!" Medraut was shouting. "What are you doing?"

"Get out," I said, finding my voice steady. "This has not been Morgawse, daughter of Uther for years. You must get out, while there is still time. If you love me, if you love your life, get out of here!"

He looked at me, then at the Queen of Darkness. His face twisted desperately-and then he stepped towards Morgawse, stepped again, past me, to stand beside her. "You are mad," he said. "Mother is perfect. It is Father who is wrong. Put down that knife and come and help us."

I began to weep. "She will sacrifice Conall."

He looked uncomfortable for a moment, but she touched his shoulder and the unease faded from his face. "She is perfect. He insulted her. He deserves to die."

"She will kill Father one day."

Medraut actually laughed. "Good! Maybe then...I will be the successor to the kingship! Mother has promised me. And, after all, Arthur is a b.a.s.t.a.r.d too."

I stared at him where he stood under her upraised hand, his eyes again wild with misery, and with a pain I had only suspected. I had been wrong about him. I should have realized that his ambition was not just to be a fine warrior, but rather to be something beyond his reach. It was too late to help, even if I could have. Too late.

I looked again at the creature who had once been Morgawse, daughter of Uther, and knew that my knife could not harm her. I was only alive because she hoped that I would come. And I could come, could drown in the black tide, forgetting confusion and loneliness and guilt and, yes, gain a kind of immortality. Easy is the descent of Avernus, I thought.

I lowered my hand slowly. Medraut smiled with joy, and my mother smiled again also, at me.

And then I threw the dagger straight into Connall's throat, saw the thanks in his dying eyes, and dragged open the door, fleeing the Darkness that rose up behind me.

I heard Medraut run to the door after me, his shout ringing across the yard; "Traitor! Traitor, traitor, traitor..." There was almost a sob in it.

Then I was in the stables and my horse stood waiting in his stall, ready for me to mount and go flying away from Dun Fionn and from the Darkness which ran behind me, thick with the fury of its Queen and heavy with her desire for my death; and I was mounting and riding off through the moonlight and cloud-shadows, riding away from Dun Fionn, riding...

My horse's hooves kicked up stones on the path, and the fortress was limned for a moment against the wracked sky, and then I rounded a hillside and it was gone...

Gone.

Five.

There was sand and gravel under me, and somewhere very near the sea was pounding.

I lifted my head and looked out over the western sea which beat-hissed on the narrow beach and flooded up towards the deep pool of fresh water by the cliff's base. Llyn Gwalch.

The memory of the night before returned to me, and I lay still for a while and considered it. I felt tired, too tired to feel anything, and the memory was heavy and hard. After a while, though, I realized that I was very thirsty, so I crawled up to the pond and drank from it. The water was very cold, clear and fresh, delicious. I splashed it over my head when I had quenched my thirst, then went over and sat down against the cliff to look out at the sea.

I thought about the wild ride, down along the cliff-path, with the demon of Darkness chasing me, catching at the edges of my mind. I remembered reaching Llyn Gwalch, dismounting and sending my horse on with a slap, then scrambling down the cliff to lie, exhausted, in my only refuge. And apparently it was indeed a refuge, for I was still alive and sane. I wondered how long it would last, then wondered again because it did not seem to matter much. I felt weak and empty but not sick. In fact, I felt better than I had for a long, long time. I was free. Even if I lost my life, I was free.

The sun had risen behind the cliff, and its rays crept closer across the ocean. I smiled at the light and spoke an old poem of greeting to it: "Welcome to you, seasons' sun, Travelling the skies from afar Winged with glad strides the heights you run Joyful mother of evening stars.