by T.A. Barron
Even as Tamwyn shuffled over to the window, to see the swelling light of dawn slowly brighten the ravine, Ethaun took an oily rag from the table and started to polish the rusty blade. A few seconds later, the burly fellow whistled. Tamwyn spun back around to see him gazing at the blade with something close to awe.
“What?” asked the young man skeptically. “It’s just an old thing I plowed up in a farmer’s field. He called it a gift from the land, but that’s just a fancy way of saying it’s an old, beat-up dagger nobody wanted.”
Ethaun didn’t respond. All his concentration was on the broken blade. He polished it some more, shifted his bulk so that more starlight from the window struck the metal, then mumbled some archaic-sounding words.
Finally, he lowered the blade and peered at Tamwyn. “No, lad. Yer wrong. This here be somethin’ special.”
“How?” Tamwyn walked back to have a look, almost tripping over a half-made garden rake that lay on the floor. “I tell you, it’s just—”
As if for the first time, he saw the subtle marks engraved on the side of the blade. What he’d thought were merely random scratches were really some kind of script! Like an ancient stream, the script meandered down the length of the blade. How in Avalon’s name could he have carried this with him for so long without ever realizing what those marks were?
He scoffed at himself. Because you never looked closely enough, you dolt!
Ethaun’s big finger jabbed at the script. “This be Old Fincayran, bet me top teeth. See here? How them letters curl back on theirselves? I seen some writin’ jest like this, ages ago, on me old master’s most prized possession, a real ancient shield. He’d never let me touch it, aye, but I sure looked at it plenty. An’ a bard who came through our village showed me how to read its meanin’.”
Tamwyn bent down on one knee to look more closely. “Can you read this?”
“Some parts, leastways.” Brow furrowed, he puffed some on his pipe. “It says somethin’ like, Hallow be this blade when held by Merlin’s heir.”
Tamwyn’s heart leaped over its next beat. Merlin’s heir? Could that really be the dagger’s destiny? And could he really be its rightful owner?
He glanced over his shoulder at his staff by the door. It could have been just a trick of the dawn light coming through the window, but for an instant, the seven symbols carved in the wooden shaft seemed to glow eerily. Then the staff returned to normal.
“Can’t figure what that could mean,” grumbled Ethaun. He set the blade back down on his lap and picked up the rusted handle. Examining it, he scratched the side of his beard. “One thin’ be sure, though. This dagger was made long ago, an’ by elvish folk.”
“Elves? How can you tell?”
He pointed to the sweeping designs, barely visible, that ran along the handle’s edges. “Only elvish metalworkers from Old Fincayra did that.” He turned it over, then ran his cracked and blackened fingernail along the underside, revealing some more script. “Whoa! Will ye look at that?”
“What does it say?”
“Not real sure,” he muttered, scraping away some more layers of dirt and rust. “I can’t see none o’ the first part, but it ends with some sort o’ name. Startin’ with an R, then an h, i, t—”
“Rhita Gawr!”
“Yer right, lad.” Ethaun’s pipe wriggled in his mouth as he chewed thoughtfully. “But Rhita Gawr be a wicked spirit! Why should the elvish folk be makin’ mortal weapons with a spirit’s name?”
“Because long ago,” declared Tamwyn in a flash of insight, “before Rhita Gawr became a spirit, he was a mortal man. A warlord.”
He ran his finger along the handle’s edge. “I’ve heard songs about those days, Ethaun. Terrible things happened. Rhita Gawr rose to power by massacring families, burning villages, and poisoning crops—to stamp out anyone who opposed him. And he came down harder on the elves than anyone, because only they had the skill to make magical weapons.”
The blacksmith looked at him doubtfully. “Magic blades? Never seen one o’ them in all me years! Ye’ve been hearin’ too many fanciful tales from bards, lad.”
“Maybe so. But this one could really have some sort of magic.”
“Even if it does,” said Ethaun, shaking his head, “that still don’t explain why the blade’s got Gawr’s name writ on it.”
“Because the elves could have made this weapon to fight him, don’t you see? Maybe in their own time—or maybe, if they could read the future, in some future time.”
“Which could be why it says that bit about the heir o’ Merlin?”
Tamwyn said nothing.
Ethaun tapped on the metal, which rang clear and cold, like a faraway bell. “Leastways, it still be a treasure. Even without any magic, a real beauty.” He turned to Tamwyn. “I’ll fix it fer ye, right now.”
While Tamwyn watched, the man strapped on his apron and built up the fire, squeezing his bellows to make it burn hot. He set out a tall bucket of cold water, as well as several rags made from leathereed. Wielding his tools with the same ease and confidence as an expert swordsman wielding his blade, Ethaun alternately heated, hammered, twisted, and tempered the dagger. Clangs, squeals, and hisses reverberated around the hut.
At last, the smith wiped his brow with the sleeve of his tunic, and pulled the reforged dagger out of the fire for the last time. Holding it with the tongs, he turned it around, inspecting it from every angle. With a grunt of approval, he set it down on the anvil to cool.
He stretched his huge arms wide. “Well, tickle me toes, that be a good day’s work!” With a glance at Tamwyn, he said, “Might jest take a wee nap, do ye mind? As it happened, I was out an’ about fairly early this mornin’.”
The young man grinned. “I know.”
As he watched Ethaun drop his bulk onto the straw pallet, an idea rose in Tamwyn’s mind. Walking over to his pack, he pulled out the slab of harmóna wood. For a long while he sat beside the hearth, feeling the wood and studying its orange-streaked grain, while Ethaun snored contentedly.
At last, when the dagger had cooled enough to hold, Tamwyn took it and began to carve Elli’s harp. Gradually, the slab’s triangular shape began to change. Almost, the outlines of a soundbox could be seen; almost, the space for strings, imagined. Curling chips of wood sprinkled the stone hearth, humming ever so delicately as they grew warm from the nearby coals.
Ethaun, in time, woke up. Sitting up on the pallet, he stretched his arms, scratched his beard, and then noticed Tamwyn. Rising, he strode over.
“Well, now,” he exclaimed, “toast me turnips! If ye should ever stop explorin’, lad, ye could pass fer a woodcarver.”
“No,” said Tamwyn with a shake of his black locks. “But on this carving, the wood is helping. And maybe the blade, as well.”
The big fellow raised an eyebrow. “Ye know,” he said in a rough whisper, “the legends from Old Fincayra are mighty strange at times. But one o’ the strangest says that a young wizard only came into power when he carved his first musical instrument.”
Tamwyn stopped carving and gave him a wink. Imitating the smith’s tone of voice from before, he said, “Magic instruments? Never seen one o’ them in all me years! Ye’ve been hearin’ too many fanciful tales, lad.”
Ethaun burst out laughing, his lungs heaving with all the force of his bellows. Finally, he stopped, though his eyes kept smiling. Quite gently for such a powerful man, he placed his hand on Tamwyn’s shoulder.
“Ye know, lad, I’m glad ye came here to me part o’ the world. Real glad.” He peered at the young man thoughtfully, and then a strange expression came over his face. “So . . . I’m goin’ to tell ye somethin’ I swore never to reveal.”
Tamwyn ceased working on the harp. He looked up at his bearded host, unsure what to expect.
After a long pause, Ethaun said softly, “Krystallus did come here.”
Tamwyn jolted. “But you said—”
“I know, I know. Fergive me. But ye see, he made me promise never to tel
l.”
“Why?” asked Tamwyn, still stunned.
“Well, lad,” said Ethaun slowly, as if the words themselves hurt his tongue. “What he said was he didn’t want no people from the root-realms comin’ up here, searchin’ fer his famous torch, hopin’ to claim it fer theirselves.”
In a flash, Tamwyn remembered what Nuic had said about that torch, and the only way Krystallus would ever set it down. He opened his mouth to speak, but no words came.
“But methinks his real reason was different. Methinks he jest didn’t want no people tryin’ to carry back his body.”
All the blood drained from Tamwyn’s face. “His . . . body?”
“Aye, lad. Ye see, he arrived here shortly after me, lived with me fer jest a while, and then—died.”
Died. The word dropped on Tamwyn with the weight of an anvil.
“He was hurt bad, real bad—but not in his body. His wounds from them bloody termites had all healed somehow. No, he died from . . .”
“What?”
Ethaun’s gaze moved to the hearth. Orange and gray coals still crackled, as waves of warmth made the air above them tremble. “It could pain ye greatly to hear, lad.”
“Tell me,” croaked Tamwyn.
Ethaun cleared his throat. “He died, pure an’ simple, from grief.”
Tamwyn’s head felt heavier than iron ore, but he managed a nod. “Did he tell you . . . why?”
“Aye, lad. Said he’d lost everythin’ he ever really cared about. His friends, his hopes, an’ worst o’ all, the two people he loved most—his wife an’ son. An’ then he told me that he’d lost somethin’ else, too. Somethin’ that had finally left him fer good.”
“His will to live,” whispered Tamwyn.
“Yer right, lad.”
Tamwyn studied the smith. “Did he say anything else?”
Ethaun drew a deep breath. “Aye. He said he fergave me fer runnin’ off like I did. An’ fer not fightin’ by his side, as well. Told me that he’d been afeared hisself, many times, more than he could even count. An’ then he said . . .”
“Yes?”
“That me true heart . . . was the heart o’ an explorer.”
Tamwyn gazed at him steadily through misted eyes. “And so you buried him up here, as close as he ever got to the stars.”
“Aye. With me bare han’s, I dug his grave.”
He squeezed Tamwyn’s shoulder just slightly. “An’ lad,” he whispered, “I’ll take ye to see the grave.” He nodded slowly. “Fer ye see, I’ve finally realized that yer his son.”
37 • The View from the Grave
Wind whistled as Tamwyn and Ethaun trekked through the fields of tall grasses, climbing up to the rim of Merlin’s Knothole. Their long locks, as well as Ethaun’s beard, streamed out behind them. Though the wind this afternoon only came in gusts, with long moments of tranquility in between, whenever the gusts came the men had to lean over drastically just to keep standing.
Grasses waved all around them, a rippling sea of green, as they worked their way higher. The daytime sky was brighter than Tamwyn had ever seen, so bright that every tree, rock, or blade of grass was flooded with light, and every shadow crisp and dark. The smells of garden vegetables and freshly turned soil gradually lessened as the two men trekked farther above the valley floor.
Meanwhile, clusters of drumalings stood silently watching with narrow, vertical eyes, their knobby limbs gleaming in the starlight. Every so often, some of them would pull their burly roots out of the ground with loud popping noises, spraying dirt, and follow the two humans up the slope. Scared o’ everythin’, Ethaun had described them—and although Tamwyn didn’t try to talk with them, he could feel their currents of fear and doubt.
Both of them were gasping for breath by the time they reached the upper edge of the grasses, above the place where Tamwyn had emerged from the tunnel. They didn’t take time to rest, however. Just a brief pause to look back at the fertile gardens below was all they gave themselves. Then they started to climb one of the brown hills that ringed the Knothole.
Soon the last tufts of grass gave way to crusty brown soil and scattered stones. Every few paces, a new gust of wind tore across the rim, whipping their faces with clouds of dirt. Already Tamwyn had grit in his mouth, ears, and eyes.
Of course, he thought as he hiked up the hillside. Nothing grows up here on the rim because of the wind! He chuckled to himself, thinking that for any seed to stay in place long enough to root, it would have to weigh as much as Ethaun.
Glancing over at the burly blacksmith who was huffing by his side, he added, And that’s a lot.
Just as they neared the top of the rim, a powerful gust roared across the hills. The air howled furiously. Both of them crouched down as dirt swirled around them, stinging any exposed skin, even the backs of their hands. Finally, the wind blew itself out. As they rose again, Ethaun pointed to a small but deep cleft higher on the hill.
“See that notch, me lad? That be the place.” He worked his tongue and spat out some grit. “Protected from the wind it be, leastways mostly. An’ yet up here, close to the stars. That be why I picked it fer the grave.”
Tamwyn merely nodded. This wasn’t how he had hoped to find his father.
Up the last stretch of hillside they trudged. As the gravesite came fully into view, Tamwyn paused to look at it. Leaning on his staff, with wind tousling his hair, he could see a low mound of soil within the notch. The site was unmarked and unadorned, except for a single wooden pole. The torch!
At that instant, a keening cry echoed above their heads. Tamwyn looked up to see another prism bird. As it spun skyward, its wings spread wide and its feathers flashed, sending streams of color across the sky. One cloud, directly behind the top of the torch, caught the wash of brilliance, exploding with light for a brief, shining moment.
“Well, I’ll be a talkin’ turnip,” said Ethaun in awe. “There be no bird er beast more beautiful than that, anywhere in Avalon.”
Tamwyn nodded and started walking toward the gravesite again, thinking about what he’d just seen. It looked just as if the torch itself had burst into colorful flames. An omen, perhaps? Or just another false hope?
The real torch, he could see clearly as they approached, was dark. Dead and dark.
As he entered the notch, just behind Ethaun, the wind abruptly ceased. Tamwyn strode over to the mound of hardpacked soil. Awkwardly, he set down his staff and knelt beside it. He lowered his head, staring into the ground, wishing he could see right through the layers of soil—the layers between life and death—to look upon the man named Krystallus Eopia.
His father.
He saw nothing, though. Nothing but dirt.
Slowly, he lifted his head. Ethaun, too, was kneeling by the grave. He looked up at the same time and their gazes met.
“Ye know,” his growling voice rumbled, “we’re jest the opposite, ye an’ me.”
“How so?”
He gave his beard a thoughtful tug. “Well, fer me, knowin’ Krystallus, even fer a little while, was the best part o’ me life. From the very first moment he let me join the group, he always looked out fer me. Even shared his breakfast biscuits with me, he did! An’ while I never said so to him, I always wished . . . he was really me father. Though o’ course, he wasn’t.”
Tamwyn nodded grimly. “So you knew him, but he wasn’t your father. And for me—just the opposite.”
The smith’s dark eyes glittered. “Rot me roots, a bad deal fer both o’ us! But Tamwyn . . .”
“Yes?”
“At least he really was yer father.”
Tamwyn turned back to the grave. Under his breath, he said, “I’d rather have known him.”
At last, his eyes lifted again. He studied the torch. Its pole was made of simple, unpolished wood—no more remarkable than his own staff had seemed before he’d uttered the magical phrase that made its runes appear. And the top of the torch was merely a charred, oily rag, wrapped tightly and secured with twine.
Even so, he sensed some power within it. Magical power, that rubbed against his own like a pair of iron stones. But would that rubbing, he wondered, produce a spark that could burst into flame?
“Tell me about this torch,” he said to Ethaun.
The man shrugged. “It burned, an’ not jest now an’ then but all the time. Day an’ night. That be all I knows. Fer as long as Krystallus lived, it flamed away. Then, the very instant he died, it went dark. Jest like that.”
“But how did it burn? Do you know?”
“No, lad. Nobody knows. Not even Krystallus, methinks.” He scratched his hairy chin. “Only one person knows, I suspect, an’ that be Merlin hisself.”
“Merlin?”
“Aye. Krystallus said that Merlin gave him the torch, an’ made it flame, way long ago. So the wizard must have knowed. But he be long gone.”
“Maybe he left a clue,” suggested Tamwyn. He got up and circled the dark torch, inspecting it closely. Yet he saw nothing even remotely helpful. It seemed no more unusual than the straw that Ethaun had used for the pallet in his hut.
Still, he did feel something, from down deep in its core. Something magical. If only he knew how to reach it!
At that moment, Ethaun rose. Standing beside Tamwyn, he seemed like a huge, pitted boulder, as much part of the hillside as the notch itself. “It be time,” he growled, “fer me to go. Got some smithin’ to do fer them rootyfeeted friends o’ mine.”
Tamwyn nodded. “Thanks. For everything.”
“Yer welcome, lad.” He reached his burly arms around Tamwyn and gave him a powerful, bone-cracking hug. “I’m thankful, too, ye came here.”
Releasing his hold, Ethaun fumbled in the pockets of his tunic. “There be a little gift I want to give ye now, to help ye on yer journey.”
“No, really. You don’t need to.”
“ ‘Course I don’t need to! But I truly want to.” He pulled something from the folds of a cloth: a glass globe held inside a leather strap. “Here, lad. Take it.”
Tamwyn hesitated. “I saw that on your wall. What is it?”
