Avalon (46 page)

They noticed something bumping against the hull of one of the sailboats and, growing curious, walked around the dock for a closer look which confirmed their worst suspicions: the object was a person lying facedown in the water. At first they thought it was a woman, but when the police arrived and fished the body out of the water, they discovered the body was that of a man dressed in a kilt.

At Blair Morven, James and Jenny had been watching TV in James’ room, flicking through the channels to catch the latest word on Donald’s triumph. The collapse of the Waring government knocked every other story off the schedule; most channels were running in-depth coverage of the extraordinary events of the day. BBC Two had abandoned its regular programming to bring in-depth reporting on what they were calling the “Waring revolt.” The regular ten o-clock broadcast had been extended into the night with continual replays of the crisis in Parliament, interviews with MPs, and endless speculation by political pundits of various stripes.

James had been following the unfolding drama from the moment coverage of the parliamentary session began. By six o’clock, the British networks were on the air and giving the play-by-play of the vote. Jenny had braved the entrenched journalists outside the castle to join the King and, together with the entire staff of Blair Morven, gathered in the library before the big-screen TV, they watched the collapse of the Waring government live and in color. They popped a cork in Donald’s honor when he announced the formation of his new political party outside the House of Commons.

Later, they had supper in James’ apartment and settled back to enjoy an evening’s televised news. Both agreed that Donald had acquitted himself well, and his announcement speech struck just the right note. Several broadcasts featured Donald prominently in their coverage of the day’s developments. ITV devoted a ten-minute segment to reporting on the new party, and Donald’s speech was replayed in its entirety.

Still exhausted from the day’s heady events — and slightly buzzed from the champagne — the royal couple found it somewhat difficult to come down from the high. Jenny, remote control in hand, was sitting cross-legged on the edge of the bed, restlessly channel hopping in order not to miss anything.

“He just might pull it off,” Jenny was saying as the phone rang.

James answered, thinking it must be the man himself wanting to share the golden moment. He had been expecting a call all evening, and reached for the phone with congratulations on his lips. A woman’s voice came on the line, speaking so quickly he could not make out what she was saying.

“Caroline? Is that you?” he said.

At these words, Jenny turned to look at him and saw James’ expression change instantly to concern. “What’s wrong?” asked Jenny.

“Yes, by all means, Caroline. I’ll tell him.”

He hung up. “Donald’s missing. She hasn’t seen him since he left for the House of Commons, and he hasn’t called or anything.”

A few moments later, Embries was on the phone trying to calm an increasingly distraught Caroline. “Call the police,” he instructed. “No, do it now. Ask for Chief Inspector Kirkland. Then call me back as soon as you’ve spoken to him.” He paused. “That’s right. We’re on our way.”

They received word of Donald’s death a little after midnight, and were in the air within minutes of the dreadful news: James, Embries, and Rhys. Calum was left to coordinate security at Blair Morven, which had suddenly taken a much higher priority.

The Tempest landed at Ealing’s small airfield, and they sped by taxi straight to Kenzie House through nearly deserted London streets. They arrived to find the entire street blocked by police cars, television vans with satellite equipment, a few dozen photographers, a score of journalists, and several neighbors wearing coats over bathrobes who obviously could not sleep for all the commotion.

Stepping from the cab, they moved quickly to the house, pushing through the crush of cameramen and reporters shouting questions: “Is it true Lord Rothes is dead?” they cried. “Was it suicide or an accident?”

Rhys shoved his way to the door, where they were immediately ushered into the house by a police constable, who closed the door quickly behind them, saying, “You are expected, Your Highness.”

The foyer was full of people, mostly policemen and detectives, but several of Donald and Caroline’s friends and neighbors as well. Caroline and Isobel were in the sitting room, shoulder to shoulder in front of the fireplace in which a blaze was roaring. As James and Embries entered the room, they turned and the look on the women’s faces made the skin on the back of James’ neck tingle; his shoulders felt as if an electric current were passing through his body.

Time seemed to recoil as he stepped through the doorway. The darkened, firelit room took on a dreamlike quality. The quivering firelight illuminated a glowing rectangle on thefigured carpet where Caroline and Isobel stood. The light shimmered, surrounding the women in a radiant halo as they wept. At the sight, the
fiosachd
awakened and James heard, as if from far away, the wind sighing over a distant battlefield.

Into his mind came the image of a darkened, moonlit plain, strewn with the huddled shapes of fallen warriors. There were figures walking among the dead, stoop-shouldered, bent low to peer into the faces of the corpses — women searching for their men. On the wind he could hear the broken sobs of those whose search had ended in cruel discovery. Here and there, the moonlight picked out a shield boss, or spear tip, and glinted with a melancholy gleam.

The sitting room dissolved around him: James was there on that windswept plain once more. The tang of smoke filled his nostrils, and he turned to see a fire on the riverbank a short distance away. The wounded had gathered there to warm themselves and have their injuries cleaned and bound.

As he stood looking on, a great grief descended over him — sadness heavy, cold, and unyielding as a cloak of iron. He could not stand. He sank to his knees and fell forward onto his hands, as a cry of sorrow, quick and sharp, tore from his throat. In this torment, he cried once and again; releasing the third cry, he heard someone call his name.

“Arthur!”

The call startled him, stifling his cry.

“Arise, Arthur. Take up your sword and stand.”

Raising his head, he looked up to see a tall, upright man approaching. His cloak was dark, trimmed with wolf skin. His eyes were stern, and glimmered in the moonlight like pale gold. He came to stand before him, and Arthur looked up into the face of his Wise Counselor.

“I grieve, Myrddin,” he told him. “When will I mourn my Cymbrogi, if not now?”

“You are the Pendragon,” Myrddin replied sternly. “While others mourn you must prepare for the battle to come. The enemy will not be stopped by your heartfelt tears of sorrow, but by the sharp blade in your strong hand.”

Stretching out his hands, he spoke a word in the old DarkTongue, and the King felt strength returning. Seeping up out of the ground and into his bones it came, driving out the dull, clinging weight of grief that hung upon him. The black mist of sorrow lifted; he could see clearly once more. Gathering the raveled threads of his courage, he reached for the sword lying beside him on the ground. Arthur pushed himself up, and stood.

Myrddin placed one hand on the King’s shoulder and raised his staff over his head. “Though grief be your constant companion, Arthur, it is not for you to mourn. You are the strength of your people; you are the mighty tower of their hope and the fortress of their trust. Therefore, harden your heart, seal up your tears, and set your face to the morning.”

He pointed across the plain with his staff. The Pendragon looked and saw the pearly pink blush of sunrise tinting the eastern sky.

“Come away, Arthur,” said his Wise Counselor. “It is the living who have need of you now, not the dead.”

He turned and moved away towards the campfire and the wounded gathered there. The King followed, feeling the solid strength of the earth beneath his feet. He heard the sound of a monk’s bell, and the plain faded, becoming the sitting room once more.

James went to Caroline and Isobel, and gathered them in his strong arms. “I’m so sorry,” he said, his voice cracking with emotion. “I’m so very sorry.”

Caroline nodded, and pulled away, wiping her eyes with a damp handkerchief. She straightened to her full height and, drawing her arm around Isobel, said, “He didn’t commit suicide. That’s preposterous. And he didn’t get drunk and fall into the water. That Inspector Kirkland implied as much — as if Donald were a lager lout with nothing on his mind but…”

Embries, silent and dark beside James, spoke up then. “There will be an autopsy. The truth will be established. Take no heed of the fools who gather outside your door. Be strong.”

Caroline nodded again, and Isobel began to weep softly.

“Be strong,” Embries urged, placing a hand on Isobel’sshoulder. “The enemy is near. The battle is soon joined.” Turning, he walked swiftly to the door.

James kissed Caroline on the cheek, then Isobel, and hurried from the room. He caught up with Embries as he opened the door of the black Jaguar parked in the private driveway behind the house. “You know what happened to Donald,” he said. “He was killed, wasn’t he? I’m going with you.”

Embries gave his head a slight shake. “This is my fight. I will go alone.”

“You’ll need me with you,” James insisted. He started to move around the side of the car.

Embries grabbed him by the arm, and held him. “This fight is mine!” he growled angrily. “You have more important things to do right now.”

“What is more important than finding out what happened to Donald?”

“Dissolving Parliament,” Embries answered. “Schedule your meeting with the Prime Minister for around three. Rhys should have no difficulty looking after you.”

James resisted. “But I want to do something. I want to help.”

“Then pray!” he snapped. “And do as I say.”

Embries softened somewhat and placed a hand on his shoulder. Looking into James’ eyes, he said, “You are the King, the life of your people. It is not for you to mourn.”

At his words the ancient vision flickered, and James glimpsed again that moonlit battlefield. The air was heavy with smoke and the stink of blood. All around him men were moaning softly, but his Wise Counselor was right: there was work to be done. Hardening his heart to the grief he felt for his fallen Cymbrogi, James returned to the house, and to his duty as King.

The drive from London took longer than Embries anticipated, but he did not hurry. There was plenty of time before dark to do all that was required. Upon approaching the town, he turned off the busy highway and proceeded along the single-track farm roads. He much preferred the old, low, winding lanes when traveling in this part of Britain. Some of those deep hollow ways dated from Neolithic times, and he felt the immense age of the place seep into him whenever he used them.

He stopped a little way off from the hill itself, retrieved his staff and rucksack from the boot, locked the car, and continued the rest of the way on foot. The sky was dark and brooding, overcast with a single mass of formless cloud the color of ancient pewter. The wind out of the northwest had a damp, icy scent — rain at least, perhaps sleet in the offing. The sound of the crows gathering in winter-bare trees across the empty fields filled him with a strange melancholy — a lonely nostalgia for all the times he had come to this place.

And then he saw it — rising suddenly before him, green and looming against the blank sky — the Tor, with its solitary tower, like an omphalos pole marking the center point around which the entire world revolved. The sight alwaysmade his breath catch — not because it was so arresting in itself but for how he remembered it to have been long ago. Perhaps for this reason he always felt more at home here than anywhere else in all Britain.

Glastonbury Tor… Ynys Witrin, the Glass Isle of old… the curious conical hump of earth and stone had worn various names throughout the ages. Some even called it Avalon. Embries knew it first as Ynys Avallach, and that is the name he still preferred.

He let himself through a rusty iron gate, and walked across the field below the Tor. Once the field would have been under water; if not for the extensive range of drainage ditches, the Tor would still be surrounded on three sides by lake water even now. Looking across the field to the low hill sheltering behind the Tor, he marked the place where the shrine had been and, near it, the first abbey. Those ruins were long gone; constructed of timber, wicker, and mud, there was little more than a bump on the hillside where they had been.

Reaching the end of the field beneath the Tor, Embries climbed the stile and walked along the road until he came to a tiny, quick-running stream. There, he stopped and took off his shoes and socks; stepping into the icy water, he waded into the middle of the stream, feeling with his feet and toes in the soft mud of the streambed for the stones he knew were there. Whenever he found a suitable stone, he retrieved it, rinsed it, and put the smooth, egg-shaped rock into a net bag he had taken from the rucksack on his back. By the time he had collected enough, the dim, misty daylight was beginning to fade.

Returning quickly the way he had come, he climbed from the stream, put on his shoes and socks once more, and hurried on to the Tor. He pushed through the lopsided metal gate the National Trust had put up generations ago, and entered the sacred precinct of the hill. Squatting on his haunches, he waited, watching the road and listening to the mournful moan of the wind as it flowed over and around the smooth grassy heights above. When he was certain he would not be interrupted, he took up his staff and began the firstcircuit of the Tor, walking quickly in a sunwise circle around the base of the great mound.

The completion of his first round told him there was no one either on or near the Tor — the place had become such a magnet for New Age hippies, neo-druid wannabes, crypto-feminist Earth Mother goddess worshippers, magic mushroom devotes, and latter-day pagan revivalists, he was never sure he wouldn’t encounter someone coming or going on the hillside. The presence of these airy-fairy dabblers was more than irksome to him; it was potentially dangerous — not to himself but to the cheerful ignoramuses who might stumble into far more than they bargained for.