Merlin bowed his head, acknowledging his defeat. He had worked for so long to make Britain a Christian kingdom in which magic and the Old Ways would have no place, and all he had wished for had come to pass. But somehow, it did not feel like a victory now.
“Merlin is free to be here, just as any of you are,” Arthur said, but he had lost the hope of Merlin influencing the jury, and he knew it. Merlin retreated to the edge of the room, his words unspoken.
“Let the trial begin,” Arthur said.
“The Queen stands accused,” Sir Boris began, reading from a scroll of charges, “of…” For a moment it seemed as if he could not continue, then the old knight took a deep breath and went on. “Of treason, viz. of betraying the King with the knight known as Sir Lancelot of the Lake. How say you to this charge, Your Majesty? Yes or no?”
He gazed up at Guinevere. She met his eyes unflinchingly.
“I say yes, Sir Boris. I have loved Lancelot of the Lake.”
The room broke into pandemonium, a sound of whooping and wild yells more appropriate to a battlefield than a courtroom. But in a sense, a battlefield was what this was.
Sir Boris looked toward Arthur, misery in his gaze. “The Queen stands accused by her own words. The charge is treason. And the sentence, Sire?”
Arthur looked desperate to escape, but there was no escape to be found. The Queen was guilty by her own admission, and there was only one penalty for treason.
“Death,” the King said, bowing his head.
The little convent garden at Avalon was still and serene, though spring had come late this year and was filled with peculiar portents. There were unseasonable fogs and apparitions, strange lights in the sky. Migrating birds had not returned, and hibernating animals were slow to waken from their winter sleep. The brothers who kept the Abbey’s bees said that their charges were troubled as well, refusing to leave their hives to go in search of nectar. It was as if the orderly progression of seasons had been suspended, pending some unimaginable revelation of Nature or Magic.
Nimue’s life, too, had been jolted from its accustomed path, and things that were once certainties were now indefinite. All the rules had changed, now that Arthur had returned, because Arthur’s return meant that Merlin was free.
And in great danger.
Nimue glanced around the cloister garden, holding her cowl protectively close about her face to hide her scars. The courtyard was completely deserted at this hour—everyone was in the chapel saying the noonday prayers, even Father Giraldus. Nimue should have been there as well, but she was not. The unvarying walls of Avalon that had been her home for half her life now oppressed her, and in her heart Nimue felt it was time to leave.
To be with Merlin.
But there was one last thing she must do before she could be with him. Merlin’s war against Mab had begun because of the death of his foster-mother Ambrosia at Mab’s hands, but her attempt to kill Nimue had given it the fuel that had kept the fires of enmity burning in Merlin’s heart all these long years. If she went to him as she was, the scars on Nimue’s face would always remind Merlin of his vow to war against the Old Ways, and keep the two of them from finding peace.
And Mab had promised Nimue that Merlin would find peace and happiness in a land far from the everyday strife of Britain.
Nimue believed her. Mab had no reason to lie. With Arthur coming home, all the struggle, all the politics of a royal court would begin once more, and as more and more of the land turned to the New Religion, there was no place at that court for Merlin. Father Giraldus was only the first of those who would see Arthur’s return without the Grail as a signal to plunge Britain into an orgy of repentance. Merlin and all the gentle survivals of the Old Ways that still lingered in Britain would be their target. After all his years of service to Britain, of selfless sacrifice, to be hated for something he had never been would break Merlin’s heart.
And to keep it from happening, Nimue would at last accept the devil’s bargain Mab had offered her so many years ago. She had pledged her life to God, but she had not yet taken her final vows. And God had given her, as He had given all His creation, free will, and a heart and a mind to use with it. So she would do this for her own happiness—but more than that, she would do it for Merlin’s happiness… and safety.
She hesitated, knowing the step she was about to take was irrevocable.
“Mab,” Nimue said aloud.
There was a flicker of magic, and Mab appeared behind Nimue, in the shadow of an archway. The Queen of the Old Ways looked dark, almost funereal, in her somber spider-silk robes. There was little of glitter or glamour about her now, only a dark purpose implacable as the night.
“I’m here, Nimue,” Mab said.
There was still the ghost of royalty in her graveyard voice. Mab had once been Queen within these walls, had reigned from this holy place over all of Britain and the Western Isles. Here, if nowhere else, Mab still wore the aura of her queenliness, as if to say that though Time could diminish her, the years could never truly destroy what she had once been.
“You made me a promise, years ago,” Nimue said, turning to face her. “Will you keep it?”
“Yes,” Mab said simply. “But what made you change your mind?”
As she spoke, she stalked past Nimue into the center of the courtyard, glancing about herself at Avalon Abbey as if to measure the strength of her eternal enemy, the New Religion.
“The King is coming home, and Merlin is free to be with me. I’ve discovered that all I want is Merlin,” Nimue said. Her voice trembled as she turned to face Mab. It wasn’t the truth—or not all of it—but let the Queen of the Old Ways see into her heart and read the truth there if she could! One thing that Nimue’s life had taught her was that Truth was a complex thing that could not be caught in a simple net of words.
“Will you agree to live with him in a place I choose?” Mab asked, her back still to Nimue.
“If you make me whole again,” Nimue answered steadily. Whole! This was the crux of the bargain. Nothing else really mattered. If she were whole, Merlin would no longer fight against Mab in her name.
Mab turned to face her, and for the first time Nimue realized how tiny the Queen of the Old Ways was. She looked like a carved saint’s statue from the cathedral at Winchester, like something strange and powerful and alien.
“I have to warn you, Nimue. If you go to this place, you can never leave it,” Mab said.
It was almost as if some human softness was struggling to be born in Mab’s heart. She watched Nimue with anxious eyes, as if every care must be taken with the terms of this bargain.
“Will Merlin come to me there?” Nimue asked. None of this mattered for herself, she insisted silently. It was all for Merlin.
“Yes. He will,” Mab answered, almost reluctantly. Nimue didn’t understand her remorse. Surely this was a triumph for Mab, and not a failure?
But it was not necessary for Nimue to understand, only to make this pact that would take Merlin out of the World of Men before it could deliver its final blow to his warrior spirit. In that moment Nimue was more than a woman, more than the inculpable bride of the White Christ. She was the Goddess Herself, ageless and abiding, harsh with necessity, who bore the warrior-prince she would someday lay to eternal rest in his narrow bed of earth. Merlin was her son, her lover, her victim, and she must play unflinchingly her part in the glorious pageant of his life.
Nimue pulled back her cowl, exposing her burned and branded face.
“Then do it, Mab.”
There was a flash of lightning that turned Nimue’s bones to silver and crystal, a moment when the warm spring sunlight was replaced with the unflinching light from the heart of a star. Nimue felt as if she had been turned inside out—as if she had been remade. And then she was whole.
She put her hands to her face, and could not keep from crying out with joy as she felt smooth unblemished skin beneath both her palms. Gone was the roughness, the stiffness, the scars that had made a warped mas
k of a young woman’s face all those years ago. Nimue was whole again, untouched by the cruelty of the world.
“Now come with me,” Mab said, and she held out her hand.
Trembling inwardly, Nimue laid her own hand against Mab’s. Mab’s skin was cold, her flesh as hard as if it were carved of wood. And when Nimue’s warm mortal flesh touched Mab’s immortal form, both of them vanished, leaving Avalon as if neither of them had ever been there.
Darkness, and light. Nimue opened her eyes to see pillars of stone replaced by pillars of wood. She stood in the middle of a vast enchanted forest.
The trees were bathed in a strange red-gold light, making them look as if they were made of metal. Somehow Nimue knew that this was not a forest in the real world, no matter how much it resembled one, but was instead a part of the Land of Magic where Mab ruled as Queen. There was a crystalline chiming borne upon the air, as though the harps of a thousand bards were playing at once, and the air was scented with a delicious perfume more wonderful than anything Nimue had ever smelled before.
Mab stood beside her. The Queen of the Old Ways looked at home here, as if she belonged in this enchanted forest. She gestured, indicating something that lay ahead of them.
“All this I have created for Merlin—and you. Keep him here, Nimue, and all will be well for both of you. If he leaves, the two of you will be parted forever. It is in your hands.”
“I understand,” Nimue said.
“Then go! Wait for him here. He will not be long,” Mab said imperiously. In the blink of an eye she vanished, and Nimue was alone.
She had been born a princess, and had lived many years among the holy women of Avalon. Her life had always been filled with the presence of other women, but now, for the first time, Princess Nimue was alone. She threw back the cowl of her robe, relishing the feel of the fairy breeze upon her unblemished skin, and set out to explore the home that Mab had made for Merlin and Nimue.
The strange golden light that came from neither sun nor moon illuminated everything she saw, making ordinary objects seem to glow with a sourceless light. Nimue soon found that the path through the forest led to a large clearing, and in the center of the clearing was a large round hut, its thatched roof extending nearly to the ground on every side, so that it most resembled a large haystack.
Nimue had never seen the forest where Merlin had grown to manhood, but he had told her of it many times, and her surroundings seemed to match his description down to the smallest details.
Why, this is Merlin’s home! Mab has re-created it here.
Or had she? Perhaps this was Barnstable Forest itself, taken outside of time by some spell of Mab’s, and turned into a sanctuary for Merlin. It was possible. Anything was possible with the Old Magic.
Nimue walked into the hut, knowing what she would find. On her right were shelves filled with cups and dishes and with pots and jars of good things to eat. There were bunches of herbs hanging from the ceiling along with golden strings of onions and garlic. On her left was a long table flanked by two benches, with a mortar and pestle sitting on it. On the back wall of the room—the center of the hut—was the hearth. The hearth was swept and scrubbed, the broom and a bucket standing ready beside it. Iron pots hung inside the fireplace, and a three-legged stool stood nearby.
Nimue pushed aside the blanket that served as a door and stepped into the inner room. There was a small window in the back wall, closed off with wicker shutters. There was a wardrobe for clothing and a rustic bed heaped with fur coverlets and homemade quilts. The room smelled of lavender, and a small harp hung upon the wall.
I can be happy here, Nimue realized gratefully. Deep in her heart she had feared that a place created for Merlin would seem strange to her, but the little hut was as homely and familiar as bread.
She went back into the outer room and began to build a fire. She would make tea while she waited for Merlin to come. She had no doubt he would come soon, just as Mab had said.
Each day that passed in Camelot made things worse. At first the people had been stunned by the news of the Queen’s death sentence. Only Mordred’s followers seemed pleased at the thought of it. But as the days passed and Mordred’s influence grew, more and more of the people of Camelot began to demand that the sentence be carried out immediately. It was as if some terrible spiritual rot had set in, turning the hearts of the people against the thought of mercy and simple kindness.
The comet was visible now in the morning sky—a disastrous omen. The people called it the Red Dragon, and talked of it coming to punish Arthur for his sins. They would have burned the Queen themselves if they could have gotten their hands on her, but Arthur had stood firm.
Merlin had used every trick he knew to find Mordred in order to stop him spreading his poison, but Mab had prepared her catspaw well for the task of destroying Arthur. Mordred refused to come out and fight. Instead, he hid himself in the twisting alleyways of the town, always eluding Merlin’s searching as he spun the twisted lies that so many were so ready to believe.
Without a single shred of proof, the people believed that Mordred was Arthur’s son, despite the fact that common sense would say that Arthur was not himself old enough to have fathered a son Mordred’s age. They believed that Arthur meant to set himself above the law, to persecute and oppress them with unjust laws that he and his friends would never feel the bite of, when all of Arthur’s life had been spent erasing the distinction between rich and poor, knight and peasant.
They believed that Mordred was their salvation. And that was the greatest lie of all, for Mordred had come to Camelot to destroy it.
Merlin had tried to explain this to Arthur, but the grief-stricken King would not listen to his wizard’s strategies for opposing Mordred. With every hour since his return, Merlin had felt Arthur withdrawing from his responsibilities, as if the exercise of kingship had simply become intolerable.
Merlin knew that in his heart Arthur believed that his beloved subjects would still see reason. That if he showed himself obedient to the law and burned the Queen, the people’s anger and discontent would cease and they would acclaim him once more, as they had on the day he drew Excalibur from the stone.
But that was many years ago, Arthur, Merlin thought sadly. Everything changes. Spring to autumn, morning to night, glorious young King to guilty politician, bargaining to buy back what he thoughtlessly gave away in the morning of his youth.
The direction of his thoughts made Merlin sad. Arthur had nothing to be guilty for. He was doing his best, doing just what he had always done. He was upholding truth and asking no one to do anything that he would not do himself.
And because Arthur was who he was, Guinevere must die. Arthur had delayed setting the date for Guinevere’s execution as long as he could, but in the end he had no choice but to carry out the sentence.
Tomorrow, at noon, the Queen would be burned at the stake.
“I just don’t understand it,” the burly man in the leather hood said plaintively.
He stood almost seven feet tall. In addition to the hood that covered the upper half of his face and his thick neck, he wore leather trousers, boots, and laced bracers on his massive forearms. Iron-Head Gort was a formidable man.
Merlin glanced around the dungeon. He supposed it was rather homey, if you liked that sort of thing. There was a rack over in one corner, an Iron Maiden on the wall, and several stands of pokers and branding irons, along with an empty brazier. None of them had seen any use since Uther had died, of course, but Arthur had kept the Royal Executioner on. After all, the man had done nothing wrong. There was no reason to turn him out of his job.
“I’ve been the Royal Executioner all my working life,” Gort said. “Vortigern… Uther… I’ve always given satisfaction. But I must protest, Master Merlin. Have I failed in some way? Is the King unhappy with my work?”
He gazed anxiously at Merlin. Even seated on a low stool in the corner of the royal dungeon, Gort loomed over Merlin the way a granite cliff would loom over a willo
w tree.
“No. Of course not,” Merlin said soothingly. “I’ve certainly heard no complaints. Why, everyone says Iron-Head Gort is the best there is.”
He’d come to bring the details of the Queen’s execution to Gort himself, as Arthur was simply unable to do it. Coming down here to discuss the details of her execution would have been impossible for the King, racked with guilt at his failure to protect the greatest of his subjects.
“Then why is the Queen being executed at noon?” Gort demanded.
He was a big childlike man, who would never dream of hurting anyone except as a part of his job. But this was the first time Arthur had ever called upon his services, and he was anxious to give satisfaction.
“All executions—whether by fire, ax, or rope—take place at dawn. The sun rises up, the condemned goes down. It’s all very symbolic and beautiful, you know. But now the King has said she’s to die at noon.” Gort shook his head. “I don’t know, Master Merlin. I just don’t know.”
Merlin knew. Though he had given Arthur no reason to hope for such a thing, the King was not a fool. Arthur was hoping that Lancelot would come to rescue Guinevere.
Merlin hoped so, too, but he dared not use his magic to see if Lancelot had understood his message. If Mab or Mordred suspected that Lancelot was coming to save Guinevere, they would surely stop him.
“And another thing,” Gort added. “This is the Queen of Britain’s execution! Shouldn’t we make it a special occasion? Not just a simple burning at the stake—anyone can have that—but a real exhibition? She could be torn in pieces by wild horses, or there’s always beheading—the crowd loves a good beheading—or hanging with a silken rope, or—”
Merlin raised his hand to stem the flow of professionalism from the Royal Executioner. “The King was very specific, Master Gort,” Merlin said. “The Queen is to be burned at noon tomorrow. I can’t tell you any more at the moment, as this touches on highly secret matters, but we all trust you’ll put on a good show.” He smiled coaxingly.
The End of Magic Page 14
