The Third Magic Read online

  "Don't worry, my Queen," he said gently. "I shall not take him to Mona. He wouldn't be accepted there, in any case." The only children permitted on the island were those born to the druids themselves, conceived during the Great Sabbat of Beltane.

  "No, I did not mean—" She reached out a desperate hand to him.

  "Shh. I will take him with me. But he shall be raised in the home of a nobleman, in keeping with his true station. Then who knows? One day perhaps he will succeed Uther."

  Ygraine looked down at the child. "No, I do not believe Uther will ever recognize this child."

  And who says Uther's opinion will matter a fig? Taliesin thought. Still, it would be necessary to tell him about the child. Too many people already knew that the baby had been brought back to the castle. If Taliesin were to leave so soon after his arrival without mentioning the child, Uther would be suspicious. And it would take no more than a suspicion to send Uther into a rage that might harm Ygraine and her servants. The druid understood tyrants: The best way to keep a secret from a man like Uther was to tell him just enough to bore him.

  And so Taliesin approached him the next day. "I was coming to visit you, brother, when I chanced upon a baby lying naked on the rocks," he said, sounding bewildered.

  Uther rolled his eyes. "And what did you think it was, you superstitious fool, a sea spirit?"

  Taliesin laughed lightly. "Perhaps."

  "I suppose you made up a song to it."

  "No, actually, I brought him inside."

  Uther slapped the table in front of him with his fist. "Idiot! That was Ygraine's bastard. I was trying to get rid of it." His eyes bulged with anger as he stared at his illegitimate half brother. "No point in raising a by-blow runt that no one wants," he added maliciously.

  If his words wounded the druid, he made no sign. "The child's nearly dead already," Taliesin said. "I'll take it with me and bury it in the woods if you like. That would spare your wife some little suffering, at least."

  "And it would spare me the bother of having to listen to her." Uther grinned. Taliesin thought he looked like a slavering dog, his yellow teeth bared beneath his unkempt beard.

  "Very well. I'll go straightaway."

  "I thought you were coming to visit."

  Taliesin raised his chin. "Shall we both listen to the queen's lamentations, then?"

  Uther scratched his beard. "I suppose that'll be the case. All right, you can go. Perhaps you'll come back afterward. Write a song for me or something."

  "I'm no longer a bard, brother. I could pray for you, though. Conduct a day-long ritual to cleanse your soul. You'd have to fast for a week beforehand, of course."

  "Er ... Fine. That is ..."

  "If I have time. I have some pressing duties in the east."

  "Then surely you must attend to them, Taliesin," Uther said heartily, although his eyes were already scanning the room for a distraction. "And don't forget the bastard. Bury it somewhere far away from here. I wouldn't want Ygraine to ... while hunting or something…"

  "She'll never find the child, I assure you," Taliesin said. "Nor will you."

  "Good. No marker will be necessary."

  "I understand, my King."

  Appeased by his half brother's recognition of his superiority, Uther nodded beatifically. The interview was over.

  Within the hour, holding a hollow gourd containing a milk-soaked rag, the druid Taliesin, who would one day be known throughout the Celtic world as the Merlin, last of the great magicians, set off into the forest with the future King of Britain.

  And not just any king, the old man thought. Arthur of the House of Pendragon had become the greatest ruler the Celtic world had ever known. On that day in the year 488, when Taliesin bore away Uther's unwanted infant, he took the first step toward the salvation of his country.

  The island had been left bereft after the Romans' abrupt departure. "Defend yourselves!" the governor had admonished in parting.

  Defend against what? the educated among the abandoned Britons asked. For there was more than foreign invasion to fear. Starvation, disease, and ignorance would send a civilization back to the Stone Age more easily than a conquering army. What was to become of the Roman-built cities without Roman supplies to maintain them, and Roman-trained administrators to run them?

  A hundred years before Arthur Pendragon began his journey into destiny in the arms of the druid named Taliesin, Britain was in many ways worse off than the savage hinterlands of the Picts to the far north; for while the Picts had never lost their tribal ways, the Britons had become sufficiently Romanized to have grown accustomed to such trappings of civilization as flush toilets, heated homes, paved roads, and professional armies.

  These, the wise among them realized, were gone forever, along with the Romans' efficient government and superb methods of organization. If Britain were not to fall into utter chaos and ruin, someone had to take charge.

  And this was where the real problem lay.

  For it was not in the makeup of the British Celts to accept leadership easily. They had fought the Romans for fifty years before submitting to the empire's benign yoke. They were a tribal people, with ancient and unbreakable ties to family and clan. During the nightmare years after the end of the Roman occupation, the clans rose again to prominence.

  There were ten of them: ten tribes that functioned as separate kingdoms, constantly at war with one another. Even if there were terms of peace between neighboring clans, skirmishes over cattle rustling and sheep stealing were almost daily occurrences.

  Added to this confusion were the increasingly frequent invasions by Saxon warriors, who were looking not only for the dogs and goldwork for which the Celts were famous, but for land.

  Why did the Britons need so much land? the Saxons argued. Since they were always killing one another off in their clan wars, they would never have enough people to populate the island, anyway. Besides, the Britons' lack of unity made the place vulnerable by sea in all directions. And so, as the ten tribes of the Celts fought among themselves over a stolen pony or a disputed hayfield, the Saxons sharpened their weapons and cast their eyes toward Britain's white shores.

  It was into this world that Arthur came of age. During his rule, he accomplished a feat that any man would have believed impossible: Without using coercion or the shedding of blood, he united the ten tribes of Britain into a single nation, and brought about its first flowering.

  And then he had died, prematurely, unfairly, wrongly. He left no heir. When King Arthur passed into the Summer Country, the nation he had created with his brilliance and his decency sank back into despair and ruin.

  The Saxons took over then, and changed the very face of Britain. Within the span of a few generations, the English people ceased to resemble either Celts or Romans, but became something entirely different, speaking a new language and practicing customs their ancestors had never known.

  The Celts, who had occupied the island of Britain since the time of the oldest legends, who had maintained their identity and their ancient religion through four hundred years of Roman rule, ceased to exist. And their last great hero, Arthur, High King of Britain, passed into the realm of legend, remembered only in stories told to children.

  I could not allow that, the old man thought. His spotted hands were clenched into fists; his whole body trembled. Even now, he felt the same overwhelming anger he had experienced when he had touched Arthur's cold, bloody corpse after the battle of Camlun.

  It had not been time for Arthur to die, Taliesin thought, tasting bile. The King had been cheated of his life through sorcery and evil.

  And so he would get back that lost life. The Merlin would see to it.

  It had been an unreasonable wish, even for a druid of Taliesin's standing. He had studied for more than twenty years on the island of Mona under the aegis of the great blind witch known only as the Innocent. During his years at Camelot, he had served as chief adviser to the King and had been awarded the title of Merlin, or Wise One.

&nb
sp; Among the common people, Taliesin had been a wizard, pure and simple. They believed him capable of performing any magic from transforming men into chickens to taking away the sun. Such claims were untrue, of course, although a trained druid, which Taliesin the Merlin certainly was, knew how to do a number of things that might easily be interpreted as magic by those who were not so well educated. He could chart and predict lunar and solar eclipses, for example. He understood the dynamics of flight. He had a vast knowledge of herbs and their healing properties, and knew almost as much about poisonous plants as the women of Orkney, who were famous for their ability to kill without trace.

  But he had never truly performed any feat that might unequivocally be termed "magic" until that blinding, rage-filled moment when he knew—simply knew—that he must make the impossible occur:

  Arthur Pendragon must be brought back from the dead.

  And so the Merlin set the magic into motion. He did not know how long it would take for the magic to become strong enough to work, but whenever that was, he would be ready. Someday, when the stars were right, the King would return to fulfill his rightful destiny.

  The first thing the magic required was Taliesin's own life.

  This he gave willingly. His life for the King's? It was not even a consideration. Taliesin went into a cave and said good-bye to his days as a human being. What he would become after this death was something other, something bigger, something much more difficult to be.

  But he did not know this at the time. All he knew was that he was weaving a spell, a great spell, that would bring a hero back to the world of the living—a world that was as much in need of heroes as it had been sixteen centuries before.

  Chapter Two

  WALKING THROUGH THE ROCK

  Every light in the old farmhouse was lit. When Arthur walked into the kitchen, there was a roar of welcome from the men.

  "By my balls, boy, where have ye been?" boomed Kay, rising as high as he could before reeling back into his chair. The contents of his tankard sloshed over his shirt.

  The uncles had never heard of sobriety where they came from, and could not fathom why anyone would desire to be in such a state. Their view of alcohol was to drink as much of it as possible whenever the opportunity arose.

  Some of them were truly prodigious drinkers. Kay was among them, as was an equally large Welshman known to his fellows as Dry Lips, and the diminutive but perennially thirsty Curoi MacDaire.

  MacDaire's other half—though he would have fought any man who dared even to bring up the subject—was a huge and shaggy Irishman named Lugh Loinnbheimionach who spoke little, thought less, and fought like a baited bear.

  "Pour young Arthur an ale, Gawain!" Kay ordered. “‘Tis not every day a man celebrates his coming into the world!"

  A thin, melancholy-faced man dressed in green army-surplus fatigues drew a beer from a squat metal keg that occupied the bottom half of the refrigerator.

  "Nay, nay," said MacDaire. "For the lad's birthday, he'll be needing something a wee bit stronger." He poured some colorless liquid from an industrial-size mayonnaise jar into a water tumbler. "Try this potcheen. I made it myself." He winked, holding out the glass. MacDaire's potcheen was more than 180 proof, and had nearly blinded Lugh a few years before during a particularly festive Christmas.

  "No, thanks." Arthur waved the drink away good-naturedly.

  MacDaire sighed. "You've got to stop drinking water sometime, lad," he said with a shake of his head.

  A handsome young man named Fairhands put down the autoharp he had been playing and took the glass out of MacDaire's hands. "No point in wasting it, then," he said before downing the contents.

  Fairhands was one of the younger members of the group, along with Bedwyr, who, at the age of twenty-four, maintained and repaired every piece of machinery on the farm, hook-handed Agravaine, and Tristan, whom women loved. A few years older than these, whom the elder uncles considered children, was Geraint Lightfoot who, true to his name, usually patrolled the far borders of the farm and was therefore rarely in the company of the others.

  Dry Lips wiped foam from his mouth. His head, slick bald and shaped like a dum-dum bullet, shone beneath the incandescent light. "By the by, lad, whilst you were taking the air, did you happen to notice the Merlin?"

  Arthur smiled, startled. "You saw him, too?"

  A roar or laughter went up from the group. "How could you miss him?" Curoi MacDaire said. "Up on that mountain, hopping about like a Pict."

  "Aye, and as lacking in clothes," Kay added.

  "Thought he'd come for you," Gawain said quietly. He looked steadily at the boy.

  "Yes, I... I talked with him." He did not add, At least I think I did.

  "Ah, then he'll be about," Fairhands said, picking up his autoharp and strumming a lively tune upon it. "The bard's a-come, the bard's a-come," he sang.

  A tall man with sandy hair and the bearing of a prince sniffed disdainfully. "Bard!" he muttered. "Sorcerer, you mean."

  "Oh, be still, Launcelot," Kay said, waving him down.

  Launcelot was the eleventh uncle. He belonged with neither the group of hard-drinking senior farmhands nor the younger crowd, nor with Geraint Lightfoot, traveling constantly around the outskirts of the land. Launcelot had always held himself apart, with different, higher standards than the others. He never drank to excess. Indeed, the degree of restraint that he exhibited toward the triple lure of beer, ale, and mead was surpassed only by one other.

  "Hal says the Merlin's no sorcerer," Fairhands said, his sensitive face looking hurt. "He's a great magician, though. The greatest wizard in the world."

  "He's Satan incarnate," Launcelot groused. "Whatever Hal may say."

  Hal was the leader of the group. He drank no alcoholic beverages, which was one of the things that made him an oddity to the others. One of many things.

  "Now, now," Kay admonished. "There's no need for getting your pecker bent about it."

  "It makes no difference to Hal that the old man is a pagan and a practitioner of black arts," Launcelot said.

  Kay tried to speak reasonably. "That's as it should be. Not everyone's a Christian like you, you know."

  "Do not call me that." Launcelot's eyes were downcast. His shoulders slumped. "I am not worthy to be called 'Christian.' "

  All the young men stole glances at one another. Agravaine rolled his eyes. Launcelot had been annoyingly holy back when they had been warriors. As a farmer, he was even more annoying.

  "Well, then that's settled," Curoi MacDaire said, breaking the silence. "Potcheen?" He held out a glass. Launcelot shook his head. "Pity," MacDaire said, tossing the liquid down his own gullet. He exhaled with a wheeze and a smile.

  "Hal is the sorcerer's special companion," Launcelot muttered. "I fear he walks in the path of darkness."

  Kay thumped his fist on the table. "Bloody Mithras," he growled, "will you stop your hangdog complaining? Hal is doing no such thing. Just because he's your son—" He was cut off by the swift slam of a kitchen cabinet.

  Dry Lips spilled the ale he was pouring into a large tankard. "By the gods, what was that?"

  Suddenly the place was aclatter with the noise of cupboards opening and slapping shut of their own will, of doors blowing open, of the pots and pans that hung behind the big iron stove crashing against the walls. Even the cinders in the fireplace whooshed upward.

  And then a meek knock at the door.

  The men roared with laughter. It was a joke, a joke that only ghosts understood. Because the old man didn't need doors. He could have appeared on the kitchen table in a puff of smoke and riding a dragon if he had wanted to.

  "That'll be His Nibs now!" MacDaire shouted.

  Arthur opened the door. There was no one on the other side.

  The men laughed again. "He wants us to look for him," Dry Lips observed.

  "Aye," agreed MacDaire, draining his glass. "But for the search, we'll first need another round of stout."

  Arthur stepped outside. He sh
ivered, though the night was warm. Above, the full moon had sailed above the trees. "No, that's not it," he said. His neck prickled. "Something's happened," he said, turning back toward the men. "Where's Hal?"

  "In town. At the store," MacDaire said. "We need ice cream."

  "And stout," Dry Lips complained, banging his tankard on the table. The others followed suit. Since none of them was frightened by the prospect of death, neither their own nor anyone else's, Arthur's unease was incomprehensible to them.

  Launcelot put his hand on the boy's shoulder. "Don't worry about them," he said gently. "There's not a one on this earth can harm that wicked old man, so much the worse, and he'll be watching over Hal."

  On his way home from the 7-Eleven, Hal Woczniak hit a pedestrian with his truck.

  At least it appeared that way. He hadn't heard or felt anything, but only saw the old man tumbling end over end above the hood of the pickup and coming to a halt in a kind of squat directly in front of the windshield.

  Hal slammed on his brakes and shot out. "Oh God, oh God, oh..." He straightened up. "You!"

  "Quite," the old man said crankily. "Don't bother asking how I am. I suppose if I'm not dead, that's good enough for you."

  "No, it's just that..." He helped the old man off the front of the truck. A crowd was beginning to form. "I'm sorry, Taliesin. I don't know how I hit you. Are you all right?"

  "I'm fine, and you never touched me with your filthy machine," Taliesin said, yanking his arm away from Hal's grip and straightening his clothing, which consisted of a plaid flannel shirt and a pair of bib overalls, topped by a sheepskin jacket. "How do I look?" He turned in a circle, preening.

  "Er... I don't see any blood, if that's—"

  "No, no. I meant my appearance. I'm trying to fit in."

  The crowd, sweating from a hundred-degree day, was whispering. They had never seen the old man, but they knew Hal. And they knew about the boy he was hiding.