Dawn of Avalon (8 page)

And it was said that any who touched the earth where one of her tears fell would be granted the gift of living a day from the Otherworld, one whole and utterly perfect day. 

An old tale, and perhaps never meant to be believed, even when first told. But I could believe it that morning.

We ate of the food I had brought, and slept, and moved together in shadowed, earth-scented half-light. I was aware of the lightening of the tunnel as the day broke outside, of the movement of the patches of sunlight that dappled the earthen floor. But only in so far as they showed me my companion’s face more clearly, let me see the look in his eyes: a kind of earnest, astonished wonder that made my heart ache with a pain so fierce it was sweet as that first meeting of our lips had been.

Other women had spoken in my hearing of pain, but truly I felt none. Another gift of the Goddess, maybe. For if the weavings of our lives are spun of both joy and sorrow, the fabric of that morning seemed destined to be cast from threads of joy alone.

“Thank you,” I whispered as I clung to him, my face buried against his shoulder. “Thank you.”

“I think—” His voice, too, sounded younger. Husky, and with a break in it, like a youth’s caught in the change from boy to man. “I think that’s supposed to be what I say to you.”

* * *

AFTERWARDS, AS I LAY drowsing with my head on his shoulder and the warmth of his breath a soft tickle against my hair, he stirred all at once and said, “Merlin.” 

“Merlin?” I raised myself on one elbow and looked down at him. “A hawk?”

His hair was rumpled, and he must have been asleep, as well, because he squinted a little at the shafts of sunlight that filtered through the branches at the tunnel’s entrance. He shook his head, one hand rubbing the space between his eyes. “No … my name.”

I must have given a start of surprise, because his hand came up to brush my hair, just lightly, even as his gaze clouded and his brow furrowed in an effort of remembrance. “I was lying here, listening to the birds outside, and I heard one—a merlin, I thought. And then it seemed as though . . as though I’d heard the word before. As though it belonged to me. Or perhaps not ‘merlin’ quite, but something like it. It felt
right
, just for a moment, as though I could remember being called that, sometime before now. But—” He stopped and let out a breath of frustration, shaking his head again. “But it’s gone now. Now I’m just … remembering that I remembered it. It’s not a real memory any more.”

I could hear the bird calls from the forest outside, soft chirps and twitters and the high, wild cry of the hawk he must have heard. 

“I’m sorry.” I could see the lost, shadowed look had crept back into his eyes, and I touched his cheek. “I wish I could give you back your true name, whoever you were before.”

He drew his knees up, resting his chin on his crossed hands and staring at the opposite wall. The Sight-blinded look was gone from his eyes, but his look was distant, all the same, as though he listened to a voice from far off.

“I was a warrior.” His fingers clenched and unclenched themselves. “I must have been, my body remembers it, even if it’s wiped clean from my mind. But I—when I fought with Bron, I knew what to do even without thinking. I wished for a knife. And I knew already how it would feel in my hand, what it would be like to slide the blade between his ribs. As though I’d done it a hundred times before. I could almost feel the blood, hear the little grunt of pain he’d give when the knife found his heart.”

I must have made some movement, some small sound because he turned and looked at me, eyes stricken. He shook his head. “I’m sorry. I don’t know whose warrior I was, or for whose cause I fought, who I supported in what you tell me of the war for Britain’s throne.” A brief, wry smile pulled at the edges of his mouth. “Save that it was not Vortigern. But I don’t—”

And then he stopped, frowning as though searching for the right words. “I don’t know what I was before I woke in Vortigern’s prison cell. I don’t know what these hands of mine may have done. I think in truth”—the shadow crossed his face again—“that I would rather
not
know, though that may be the coward’s choice.”

He held out his hands, the pale golden sunlight dappling his skin. “But since my past is gone, I have nothing else to give but this body, these hands. You saved my life this day and gave me … gave me far more than I deserve. Just in seeing myself reflected in your eyes. A man I might not be ashamed to be. Merlin—”

He stopped, and then he smiled just a little as he spoke the word. “Merlin, whoever he may prove to be, is yours, then. And besides—” he drew my mouth back to his and kissed me with the same earnest, heart-stopping wonder of before. I felt him smile against my lips. A truer smile, this time. “I think you’d always have had the power to make me forget my own name.”

* * *

VORTIGERN’S MEN found us at sunset.

We were asleep, both of us, curled together on the floor of the tunnel, my head still on his shoulder, my palm spread flat on his chest. I could hear, even through the hazy sweetness of whatever I dreamed, the steady beat of his heart, feel the solid warmth of his arms fitted around me.

I had not even realized how much time had passed until he started up, waking me as well, and I saw how the patterns of sunlight had faded to faint, pale streaks of orange. 

Dusk’s shadows blurred the air, but there was yet light enough for me to see my companion’s face. Merlin. Even as my heart stumbled in my chest and quickened, the name came with strange, natural ease. As though he truly had been named and reborn in this place that might have been some secret, close-protected womb of the earth itself.

But protected no more; he was alert, now every muscle taut, poised. And as I sat up, he put a hand across my mouth, warning me to silence.

I heard it a moment later, the noise that must have awakened him: men’s voices, low and angry, though the words were indistinct, and a crunch of dry bracken under heavy booted feet. 

Just for a moment, in the heart-pounding stillness of the tunnel, I let myself hope that it might be my father’s men, at last returned. But in the next heartbeat I heard one of the men’s voices, louder than the rest: “Spread out and start searching. He can’t have got far.”

Vortigern’s men. I felt as though a giant hand was clenched round my chest, wringing the air from my lungs. Vortigern’s men, searching for the man beside me.

And they would find him. The knowledge pulsed in my stomach like sickness. The branches covering the mouth of the tunnel might be enough to deceive an ordinary patrol, weary of the duty and eager to return to the warmth of the ale hall. But searchers, sent out to comb the hillside methodically for any trace of the fugitive man—we could have only a bare handful of moments before they discovered the tunnel’s entrance.

I was looking up at Merlin’s face, and saw the same knowledge reflected in his eyes, in the set of his shoulders and tight line of his mouth. But there was no fear, nor even hesitation. So much so, indeed, that until he put me gently aside and stepped towards the mouth of the tunnel, I did not even realize what he intended to do.

“You can’t!” My voice was a whisper, a breath of sound, no more, but I caught hold of his arm and held him tightly, trying to pull him back. “You can’t go out there. They’ll kill you!”

“And if I wait any longer, we’ll both die.” His voice was the same soundless murmur, but his face was as focused with grim intent as ever I had seen it, even during the days he’d spent in Vortigern’s cell. “If they find us both here, they’ll know it was you helped me escape. They’ll kill you, too.” His mouth twisted. “And that’s the least they’ll do once they discover you’re not a boy.”

I could feel hot tears scalding my eyes, threatening to spill over. I shook my head, unable to trust myself to speak, and he said, his face softening, “Please. I made you a vow. My hands—my self—pledged to your service and protection.” He framed my face, brushed my cheek with his thumb. “Please, don’t make me betray that vow already. I’ve small enough time to make Merlin into a man I’m not ashamed to live—or die—as.”

And then I Saw it, swift as a lightning flash, and knife-edged in its intensity: the visions came more keenly now across the channel between us. I saw him, Merlin, fighting for his life amidst a group of Vortigern’s warriors. He had—from somewhere—gotten a sword, and he moved like a serpent striking, swinging the blade in a fierce, terrible blur. But he was outnumbered, twenty or more against one. His mouth was torn and bleeding freely, and a crimson stain spread on his side. One of his eyes was so bruised it was swollen near shut, but the other eye looked at his attackers with flat, exhausted calm: the look of a man who sees death approach on razored wings.

He kissed me again, just the briefest, gentlest touch of his lips to mine, before the vision had even faded from my sight. And then he took my hand and pressed his mouth against my wrist, resting his forehead a long moment against my arm.

And then before I could move, before I could speak, he was gone, smashing through the branches at the tunnel entrance in one step and sweep of his arm. I heard him shout out a challenge to the warrior’s outside, heard him running hard up the hill, leading them away from where I still hid.

Still, I heard Vortigern’s men fall on him, the volley of kicks and punches that drove him to the ground, before one of Vortigern’s guards—the leader, he must be—snarled an angry reminder that they were to bring back the prisoner alive. And then I heard them coming back, closer to where I hid. I pressed myself back against the earthen wall, heart pounding, feeling as though the air I breathed had thickened and been edged with grit.

He had given me this chance, this one chance, I could not fail him by letting them capture me, as well. That much pierced the numb, icy feeling that had enclosed me like sea fog.

In the end, the warriors passed by the tunnel all unseeing; they were too flushed with bloodlust and triumph to search the hillside more. I felt as though I were encased behind a solid wall of ice, as though my chest had been locked with iron bonds. And I wished—the Goddess knew how hard—that I could have been cowardly enough to close my eyes. But I saw them, just a glimpse as they marched past, dragging their captive back up towards the summit of the hill and the fort.

His head lolled on one shoulder and his arms looked dragged from their sockets by the ropes they had used to bind his wrists. And his face was blood-smeared. I saw that much, through the gathering shadows of night, before they passed by and were gone.

I let myself sink, boneless, to the ground, let myself bury my face against my raised knees. But only for a moment. I dragged in one breath, then another, and another after that. Pressed the heels of my hands fiercely against my eyes.

And then I found my clothes and yanked them on with shaking hands. Boy’s tunic, boy’s ragged breeches. By the time I had dealt with the laces on my boots, I had forced my hands to steadiness and my breathing to slow.

I had let him go, had not stopped him as he saved me from discovery and bartered his life in exchange for mine. But I had made no promise that I would cower here, weeping in the dark, while he went out to meet the death we had both Seen.

“W
E CAN’T GO BACK, LASS.” Bron’s voice was gruff with regret, but his mouth was set in a hard, flat line. “I’m not going to be the one to explain to your father why I helped you get yourself killed.”

We stood at the entrance to the tunnel, silvered, now, by the light of the moon that had risen an hour before.

Bron had left the fortress with Vortigern’s warriors, offering his own supposedly Sight-gifted instincts in searching for the escaped prisoner whose blood would water Vortigern’s tower walls. That had always been our plan, that he would join the searchers and slip away if and when he was able. We had sketched out our intent the previous night, before Bron had gone to Vortigern’s drinking hall and I had walked past the guards to get the prisoner free.

Goddess, that seemed a lifetime and more ago, now. 

And it had taken him until nightfall before the approaching dark had given him a chance. But he had gotten free of Vortigern’s men and made his way here, to where he had found me.

If I had felt no pain before, I did feel it now. My skin felt gritty with dirt from the tunnel’s floor, besides, and my every muscle was tight as a bowstring, quivering with the need for haste. But I clenched my hands and said, “You know where my father and his men should be camped.”