by T.A. Barron
Beginning with a spotted conch near the base of my staff, I started hunting for shells. Flat ones, round ones, curling ones, chambered ones, all found their way into my hands. Yet none seemed right. I wasn’t even certain how to look. I could almost hear Rhia saying something as nonsensical as Trust in the berries. Ridiculous, of course. Yet I knew I had to trust in something. I only wished I knew what.
My intellect, perhaps. Yes. That was it. Now, what would the wisest shell look like? It would be striking. Impressive. An emperor of the shore. As large in size as it surely was in wisdom.
Bumbelwy cried out as a large wave splashed over him. As the wave withdrew, grinding against the sand, it revealed the edge of a spiral-shaped shell, bright pink, that was larger than any of the others around. It lay just behind him, although the fellow didn’t seem to have noticed it. Could it be the one I was seeking? Just as I started to move closer, Bumbelwy shook himself, grumbling about the cold water, then leaned backward. As his elbow landed on the shell, I heard a loud crunch. He screeched and rolled to the side, clutching his wounded elbow. Shaking my head, I knew that my search had only begun.
Only the wisest shell . . .
I followed the sandy shore, looking for any shells that might seem right. Despite the wide array of shapes, colors, and textures, none were imposing enough. The few that came close I placed against my ear. But I heard nothing except the endless sighing of the sea.
In time I came to a rocky peninsula that jutted seaward, vanishing into the curling mist. As I stood there, wondering whether to search among the wet rocks, an orange crab ran across the toe of my boot. The crab paused, raising its little eyes as if it were examining me. Then it skittered onto the peninsula and disappeared.
For some reason I felt drawn to this little creature that, like me, wandered this shore alone. Without thinking, I followed it onto the peninsula. Mist enveloped me. I moved carefully across the rocks, trying not to slip. Although the crab seemed to have vanished, I soon spotted another spiral shell. It lay on a flat slab coated with green algae. Even larger than the one Bumbelwy had destroyed, this shell was almost as big as my own head. It glowed with a deep blue luster, despite the unusual shadow that seemed to quiver on its surface. Certain that the shadow was only a trick of the rolling mist, I approached.
With each step I took toward it, the shell seemed more lovely. Gleaming white lines framed its graceful curves. I felt strangely drawn to it, captivated by its radiant hues.
Only the wisest shell . . .
At that moment, a powerful wave surged out of the mist, crashing over the peninsula. Struck by the spray, I felt the sting of salt on my scarred cheeks. The wave receded, pulling the spiral shell off the rock. Before I could grab it, the shell splashed into the water and disappeared in a swirl of mist.
Cursing, I turned back to the flat rock. Although the shell had vanished, the strange shadow still quivered on the algae. I almost reached down to take a closer look, then hesitated. I was not sure why. Just then the orange crab emerged from beneath a nearby rock. It skittered sideways over the peninsula, passing under a ledge before emerging from the other side. As it skirted the rim of a tide pool, it plunged into a tangle of driftwood.
Having lost any interest in following the crab, I turned away. My gaze fell on another tide pool, clear and still. From the bottom, something glistened among the fronds of kelp. Bending lower, I saw only a rather plain shell, brown with a large blue spot, nestled among some purple sea urchins. Still, it aroused my curiosity. Careful to avoid the sea urchins’ sharp spines, I reached into the cold water and pulled out the shell.
Unremarkable as it appeared, the shell fit comfortably in the palm of my hand. Almost as if it belonged there. I hefted it, gauging its weight. It felt much heavier than I would have guessed for something so compact.
I brought it to my ear. Nothing. Yet there was something remarkable about this shell. My voice uncertain, I asked, “Are you the wisest shell?”
To my astonishment, I heard a spitting, crackling voice. “You are a fool, boy.”
“What?” I shook my head. “Did you call me a fool?”
“A stupid fool,” spat the shell.
My cheeks grew hot, but I held my temper. “And who are you?”
“Not the wisest shell, by any means.” The shell seemed to smack its lips. “But I am no fool.”
I felt tempted to hurl it into the waves. Yet my determination to bring back my mother remained stronger than my anger. “Then tell me where I can find the wisest shell.”
The brown shell laughed, dripping water in my ear. “Try someplace where wood and water meet, foolish boy.”
Puzzled, I turned the shell over in my hand. “The nearest trees are on the other side of the dunes. There isn’t any wood by the water.”
“Are you sure?”
“Absolutely sure.”
“Spoken like a fool.”
Reluctantly, I scanned the peninsula. At length, I noticed the scraps of driftwood where the crab had disappeared. Rotting seaweed draped over the wood like tattered rags. I wagged my head in disbelief. “You don’t mean that sorry little pile over there.”
“Spoken like a fool,” repeated the shell.
Not at all sure I was doing the right thing, I dropped the brown shell into the pool and stepped over to the driftwood. Peeling off the seaweed, I searched for any sign of a shell. Nothing.
I was ready to quit when I noticed a tiny shape in a crack in the wood. It was a sand-colored shell, shaped like a little cone. It could have fit easily on my thumbnail. As I lifted the shell toward me, a black, wormlike creature pushed itself partially out of the opening at the base, then quickly shrunk back inside. Hesitant to bring such a thing too close to my ear, I held it some distance away. Although I could not be sure, I thought I heard a faint, watery whisper.
Cautiously, I brought the object closer. The watery voice came again, like a wave crashing in the tiny shell’s innermost chambers. “You, splashhh, have chosen well, Merlin.”
I caught my breath. “Did you say my name?”
“That I did, splishhh, though you know not mine. It is, splashhh, Washamballa, sage among the shells.”
“Washamballa,” I repeated, cradling the moist little cone against my earlobe. Something about its voice made my hopes rise. “Do you also know why I have come?”
“That, splashhh, I do.”
My heart pounded. “Will you—will you help, then? Will you bring her back to Fincayra?”
The shell said nothing for several seconds. At last its small, gurgling voice spoke again. “I should not help you, Merlin. The risks splishhh, are so great, greater than you know.”
“But—”
“I should not,” continued the shell. “Yet I feel something in you . . . something I cannot resist. While you have so much more to learn, sploshhh, this may well be part of it.”
As Washamballa paused, I listened to its watery breathing. I dared not say anything.
“We might succeed, splashhh, or we might fail. I do not know, for even success may be a failure in disguise. Do you still, splashhh, wish to try?”
“Yes,” I declared.
“Then hold me tight, splashhh, against your heart, and concentrate on the one you long for.”
Clasping the shell in both hands, I pressed it against my chest. I thought about my mother. Her table of herbs, pungent and spicy. Her blue eyes, so full of feeling. Her kindness, her quiet demeanor. Her stories about Apollo, Athena, and the place called Olympus. Her faith—in her God, and in me. Her love, silent and strong.
Mist curled about me. Waves licked my boots. Yet nothing more happened.
“Try harder, splishhh. You must try harder.”
I felt Elen’s sadness. That she could never return to Fincayra. That she could never see her son grow into manhood—and that he, in all those years in Gwynedd, had refused to call her Mother. A simple word, a powerful bond. I winced, remembering how much pain I had caused her.
Slowly
, her presence grew stronger. I could feel her embrace, how safe I once felt in her arms. How, for brief moments at least, I could forget all the torments that haunted us. I could smell the shavings of cedar bark by her pillow. I could hear her voice calling me across the oceans of water, the oceans of longing.
Then came the wind. A fierce, howling wind that threw me down on the rocks and soaked me with spray. For several minutes it raged, battering me ceaselessly. Suddenly, I heard a resounding crack, as if something beyond the mist had broken. The billowing clouds before me began to shift, gathering themselves into strange shapes. First I saw a snake, coiling to strike. Before it did, though, its body melted into the misty form of a flower. The flower slowly swelled, changing into a huge, unblinking eye.
Then, in the middle of the eye, a dark shape appeared. Only a shadow at first, it grew swiftly more solid. Before long, it looked almost like a person groping in the mist. Stumbling to shore.
It was my mother.
7: HEADLONG AND HAPPILY
She collapsed, sprawling on the dark, wet rocks. Her eyes were closed, and her creamy skin looked pale and lifeless. Long, unbraided hair, as golden as a summer moon, clung in ragged clumps to her deep blue robe. Yet she was breathing. She was alive.
Giving the little shell a quick squeeze of thanks, I replaced it among the scraps of driftwood. Then I ran to my mother’s side. Hesitantly, I reached toward her. Just as my finger touched her strong, high cheek, she opened her eyes. For a few seconds she gazed up at me, looking confused. Then Elen of the Sapphire Eyes blinked, raised herself up on one elbow, and spoke in the voice I had thought I would never hear again.
“Emrys! It is you.”
Though gratitude choked my voice, I replied, “It is me . . . Mother.”
At hearing me say that word, a touch of pink flushed her cheeks. Slowly, she extended a hand. Though her skin felt as wet and chilled as my own, her touch sent waves of warmth through me. She sat up and we embraced.
After a few seconds, she pushed back. Running her lingers gently over my burned cheeks and eyes, she seemed to be looking under my skin, into my very soul. I could tell that she was trying to feel everything I had felt in the months since we parted.
Suddenly, as she touched my neck, she caught her breath. “The Galator! Oh, Emrys. It’s gone!”
I lowered my sightless eyes. “I lost it.”
How could I tell her that I had lost it on the way to finding my own father? And that, in finally meeting him, I had lost even more?
I raised my head. “But I have you again. We’re together, here on Fincayra.”
She nodded, her eyes brimming with tears.
“And I have a new name, as well.”
“A new name?”
“Merlin.”
“Merlin,” she repeated. “Like the high-flying hawk.”
A pang of sorrow shot through me, as I recalled my friend Trouble, the little hawk who had given his life to save my own. I dearly hoped that he was still soaring, somewhere up there in the Otherworld. Even now, I missed the familiar feeling of him strutting across my shoulder.
And, the truth was, I missed my other friends as well. Friends I had known for a time—and then lost. Cairpré. Honn. T’eilean and Garlatha. Aylah, the wind sister. Even Shim, who had shambled off to the mountains weeks ago. And, yes, Rhia.
I squeezed my mother’s hand. “I won’t lose you again.”
She listened to my vow, her expression both sorrowful and loving. “Nor I you.”
I turned toward the dunes. Bumbelwy sat by the water’s edge, polishing his bells on his sleeve. He seemed determined to ignore the sea gulls who kept tugging on his mud-splattered cloak. The Flowering Harp, along with my staff, remained where I had left them in the sand. Not far beyond, the luscious red flower swayed in the breeze off the sea.
“Come.” I stood, pulling my mother to her feet. “I have something to show you.”
We crossed over the rocky peninsula to the fine-grained sand of the beach. As we moved, arms around each other’s waists, I savored the joy of walking with her again. Of being with her again. And when I thought about showing her the Harp, and all that I could make it do, my heart raced.
I was feeling my own power now, just as she had predicted long ago. She had told me that Tuatha himself came into his powers as he entered his teenage years. So it made sense that I should, as well. After all, hadn’t I already done something that Tuatha, for all his wizardry, had never attempted? I smiled to myself. Even the shifting mists surrounding this isle could not resist me.
As we neared the Flowering Harp, she gasped in wonder. Given her affection for anything alive and growing, I was not surprised to see that it was not the Harp that had caught her attention. It was the red flower sprouting from the dune. Indeed, the flower seemed even more beautiful now than after it had just emerged. The deep cup of its petals, shaped like a bell, sat gracefully upon its arching stalk. Bright green leaves, perfectly round, ringed the stem like dozens of jewels. Dewdrops glistened from the edge of every petal.
“I must smell that flower,” she declared.
“Of course.” My grin broadened. “After all, I made it.”
She halted, turned to me. “You did? Really?”
“With a stroke of my finger,” I said proudly. “Come. Let’s look closer.”
As I drew nearer to the flower, my own urge to smell it grew stronger and stronger. Not just to sip a little of its fragrance, but to immerse my whole face in its petals. To drink deeply of its glorious nectar. To plunge into it, headlong and happily. I hardly noticed the strange, quivering shadow that moved across the petals. Just another trick of the misty light, as I had seen before. And no shadow, however dark, could possibly obscure the radiant beauty of this flower.
My mother’s arm fell from my waist, as my own fell from hers. We continued walking toward the flower, wordlessly, as if we were in a trance. Our feet slapped on the wet sand, leaving a trail of dark prints behind us. All I could think about was breathing the flower’s wondrous aroma. Only a step away, the briney breeze blew against our faces. Heedless, both of us bent toward the inviting cup.
I hesitated for an instant, wondering if I ought to let her go first. She would enjoy it so much. Then the shadow quivered again—and my urge to smell the flower grew even stronger, so much stronger that I forgot everything else. I lowered my face. Closer. Closer.
Suddenly a green shape leaped over the crest of the dune. It crashed into me, bowling me over backward. I rolled to a stop, covered with sand, then whirled around to confront my assailant.
“Rhia!” Full of rage, I spit some sand from my mouth. “Are you trying to kill me?”
Bouncing back to her feet, she ignored me completely and turned toward my mother. “Stop!” she cried with all the force of her lungs. “Don’t do it!”
But Elen paid no attention. With one hand, she pulled her hair back from her face and bent toward the red flower.
Seeing this, Rhia started to dash up the slope of the dune. A terrible scream arrested her—even as it froze the blood in my veins. A dark mass leaped out of the center of the flower, straight into my mother’s face. She staggered backward, clutching her cheeks with both hands.
“No!” I shouted to the sky, the sea, the mist. “No!”
But it was too late. My mother stumbled, rolling down the dune. When she stopped, I saw that her entire face was covered by a writhing shadow. Then, to my horror, the shadow slithered into her mouth and disappeared.
8: THE LANGUAGE OF THE WOUND
I rushed to her side. She lay crumpled near the base of the dune. Wet sand smeared her blue robe and one of her cheeks. The sea breeze rose, sending shreds of mist across the beach.
“Mother!”
“She is your mother?” asked Rhia, joining me. “Your real mother?”
“That I am,” Elen answered weakly, as she rolled onto her back. Her blue eyes searched my face. “Are you safe, my son?”
I brushed the sand off her
cheek. “Safe?” I cried. “Safe? I am destroyed. Totally destroyed. I didn’t bring you here to have you poisoned!”
She coughed savagely, as if she were trying to expel the shadow. Yet her face only grew more pained, more frightened.
I turned to Rhia. “I wish you had saved her instead of me.”
She pulled at one of the vines woven into her garb. “I’m sorry I didn’t arrive sooner. I’ve been searching all over for you. Finally I came to Caer Neithan, several hours after you had left. When Cairpré told me what you were doing, I followed you as fast as I could.” Sadly, she looked down at Elen. “It must feel horrible. Like swallowing a bad dream.”
“I—I am all right,” she replied, though her wretched expression told differently. She tried to sit up, then fell back onto the sand.
Bells jangled behind me. A familiar voice moaned, “I feel death in the air.”
I spun around. “Go away, will you? You’re as bad as that poisonous flower!”
His head drooped even lower than usual. “I share your sorrow. I really do. Perhaps I could lighten your burden with one of Bumbelwy the Mirthful’s humorous songs?”
“No!”
“How about a riddle, then? My famous one about the bells?”
“No!”
“All right,” he snapped. “In that case I won’t tell you it was not the flower that poisoned her.” He scowled several times over. “And I certainly won’t tell you it was Rhita Gawr.”
My stomach tightened, even as my mother gasped. I grabbed his wide sleeve and shook him, making his bells rattle. “What makes you say such a thing?”
“The death shadow. I have heard it described, many times. Too many times for even a fool like me to forget. It’s one of Rhita Gawr’s favorite means of gaining revenge.”
Elen shuddered and groaned painfully. “He speaks the truth, my son. If I hadn’t lost my wits to the spell, I’d have remembered sooner.” Her face contorted, even as the breeze swelled again, as if the ocean itself had heaved a great sigh. “Why me, though? Why me?”
