Merlin's Shadow

by Robert Treskillard

  A slight breeze of cool air rose from the depths, bringing with it a pungent smell that reminded Merlin of a cider vinegar jar he’d found at home that’d became infested with dead, putrid flies.

  Bedwir took two rush lamps from their sconces and lit them on a coal from the hearth.

  “Her name is Kensa,” Merlin said as Bedwir handed him one of the lamps. “I hope she’s not hurt.” With one hand on the edge, Merlin led the way, slowly descending the steps. He was glad his head felt better, for the steps had been cut so narrow that he had to be careful not to lose his balance. At about the ninth step he had to sit to avoid hitting his skull. Soon the steps widened and the ceiling raised so he was able to stand. Behind him came Bedwir, Caygek, Peredur, and last of all, Garth, who’d tucked a dull bread knife into his belt.

  Merlin descended in a straight line for about a thirty feet, hesitating when the steps ended in a level passage. Here the walls were rough with cracks, and someone had charcoaled them with ferocious sea serpents who coiled among the waves. Some were crushing charcoal-drawn ships. But a strange thing — a trick to his eyes, perhaps — was that the walls seemed to be moving — no, wiggling — just beyond the rushlight. But as he walked cautiously forward, the walls appeared normal. He stopped to examine the cracks, but finding nothing, he shook his head and kept on.

  Farther down the passage — perhaps midway, for it went beyond Merlin’s ability to see the end — a door of iron bars had been set into the side, with chains securing it, and the party gathered around. Merlin held up his lamp to illuminate the interior. “Kensa?”

  Black hands seized the iron bars and rattled them so hard Merlin was afraid the ancient door would shatter.

  Merlin leapt back and accidentally slammed into Peredur’s shoulder. He lifted the light with a shaky hand to see an enraged visage emerge from the shadow.

  Troslam ran, his spear in his left hand and his other pulling the two girls along. Eilyne kept pace, but the younger, Myrgwen, had bloodied her knee so badly that now tears covered her face. But their lives depended on speed, and she’d have to keep up. They ran west along a path through the village, staying as close as they could to the stone walls. Where the wall’s height wasn’t sufficient to hide their presence, they ducked, praying Vortigern and his men didn’t see them.

  Where were they going? Safrowana and he had talked about this eventuality, but had thought they’d have time to prepare. He and the girls had no provisions, and their clothing of boots and cloaks would hardly keep them warm. The best place was his brother’s farm in the village of Risrud, but that was twelve leagues west, and it would take four days to get there, what with the girls so young. Maybe they could stop at the abbey in Guronstow for rest and help.

  As they ran, Troslam realized his mistake. He’d missed the last turn leading down the mountain, and now the path headed upward. Double back? He didn’t dare. All he could do now was look for a place to cut through. Up ahead lay the barrel maker’s land, and his ramshackle stone wall.

  He helped Myrgwen climb over, then Eilyne, and finally he leapt over. They ran past the barrel maker’s crennig, over his other wall, and to a path leading downward.

  A shout rang out. Troslam turned and spied three, one who was pointing, another with a bow. The third was Vortigern. They were a thousand feet away and running toward them. It was over. Or was it? The marsh! If a fisherman had left his boat at the docks, he and the girls could —

  But there was no time to think. He yanked on Myrgwen’s hand and pointed with his spear for Eilyne to see. “To the docks — hurry!”

  But Vortigern had two men with him. Troslam could kill one, maybe two, but never three. And not an archer, who’d stand back, away from Troslam’s reach. And he’d never taken on trained warriors. He was but a simple weaver. He knew more about selecting the right wool, boiling down dyes, and weaving patterns than he did about war. Sure he had a spear, but it might’ve been a twig for all it mattered.

  The ground began to slope down, and the village’s three docks appeared. Neither the center nor the left had any boats, but the right held three. The dock swayed as they sprinted onto it, their feet banging out a cadence upon the old boards. Troslam led them to the end and set the girls in a long but narrow boat with oars, the bottom of which was filled with an old net and some dead fish. But before he jumped in, he went back to sink the other two vessels. The first was a leather-hulled coracle. He jabbed his spear and sliced it through. The boat began to take on water.

  He ran over to the second, a wooden tub meant for bringing in the larger nets. He thrust his spear at the bottom, but the thick wood resisted his efforts. Again he stabbed it, but no luck.

  He heard a shout and looked up.

  Vortigern and his men were rushing down the hill toward them.

  Ganieda walked south. The sun would set soon, but she didn’t worry, because she was almost there. Her mother would have a fire going, and Ganieda imagined how wonderful the hot oats would taste. Maybe she’d add a little goat milk to her bowl, and she would eat it with her favorite spoon.

  And here was the stream. Just a little farther up the valley, and she’d find Mammu. This was the path they’d taken that night, for she’d led her mother here all by herself. Her mother’d been wailing, and Ganieda had held her hand, the fingers so hot. Had her mother’s arm been infected? But the infection had healed, hadn’t it? And her mother was well again. She would be so happy to see Ganieda. It had been too long.

  Ganieda’s shoes pinched her toes, but only a short distance remained. She rounded the funny oak with its huge, outspread arms and climbed down into the secret glen — near the spring that bubbled out from the rocks — where no one else had ever come except Ganieda and her mother.

  But there was no cheery blaze waiting for her. The sunlight still shone through the trees, but there wasn’t much of it left. Ganieda dashed forward to see if her mother had fallen asleep waiting. Yes, perhaps she’d grown tired. She’d likely built a small crennig in the last few months and was inside.

  But no such building existed. The ferns swayed in the wind. A jay ridiculed her from a nearby pine as Ganieda ran to the spot where her mother had been. She fell to her knees and parted the cold, stiff ferns. And screamed.

  Bones lay upon the ground. Scattered. Picked clean by animals, for teeth marks had been cut into them. And they’d been broken, and the clothing shredded. Her mother’s skull was missing, yet a lock of her hair lay upon what was left of her mother’s shift.

  Ganieda picked up the strand of hair and poured all her tears upon it, weeping there in the dusk. The sun gave up his life, touching her in a final, warm embrace, but Ganieda turned her back and let him sink beyond her reach.

  “Are you finished, dear one?” the voice of a low-timbred man asked from behind her.

  Ganieda slowly turned, wiping tears from her eyes with her sleeve.

  A man in a shadowy cloak stood just a few feet from her.

  CHAPTER 30

  THE GIVING OF SECRETS

  Merlin felt the color drain from his cheeks as the bars rattled again, and in rage the prisoner screamed out, “Ken-sa! Ken-tha! Ken-NA-sa!”

  Merlin swallowed. It was indeed Kensa, dirty almost beyond recognition, and angry.

  He stepped forward and held the light so she could see him. “We’ve come to free you.” He held up the keys.

  The features of her face softened beneath the purple hat, and she blinked at him. “Son of … Theneva?”

  “Yes.”

  “De son … of Theneva Gweviana has come … see old Kensa?” She withdrew her hands from the bars and brought one of her fingers to her pouting lower lip.

  Merlin handed his lamp to Peredur. Then he inserted the smallest key into the lock holding the chains, slid it, unthreaded the chains, and pulled the door open. The rusty hinges groaned and echoed through the tunnel.

  Kensa stepped timidly into the light of the rush lamps and looked at each one of them. Then she opened her arms and gave Me
rlin a warm embrace. She was so short, and her spine so permanently bent over that she barely made it to his chest. “Och, och, och,” she said as she looked up into his eyes. “I nurse Gweviana when she a liddle bairn. Her muther dust, yes. Liddle bairn grown upp, gone long time. You come … save me. Gweviana send ye!”

  Merlin’s face turned red. “Yes, Kensa, I’ve come to save you. Why … why are you so dirty?” He brushed off a layer of soil from her gray hair, and patted her head.

  “Kensa vas diggin’, yes! Kensa tried dig to light, but many stanes hurt Kensa’s old fangers.”

  With her face so sullied, Merlin wondered if she was digging with her nose as well.

  Bedwir stepped in and got her attention by waving his hand. “Kensa … we need your help. The baby, Arthur … where did your king take him?”

  “Take de bairn? Atle gonn with bairn? Ah, den old Kensa vil be dust fer sure.”

  “Where, Kensa? Where did Atle take the child?”

  Kensa looked down as if she were ashamed. “To de dark north.”

  “To the Picts —?”

  “No, no, no,” she said, pushing her hat up off one eye, “nott to Pictland. De child haf been taken over de sea.”

  Merlin took hold of Kensa’s hand. “Across the sea? To where?”

  “Beyond de land o’ de Lochlaners — to de land o’ de dead.” She stamped her foot and looked at them like they should have known such an obvious thing.

  The words thrust into Merlin’s heart like a spear, deadly and true. Fearsome tales were told of this mythical land in the far north where the light never shone and the dead walked. And Atle had taken Arthur there? Surely not —

  “Dis a ninth year … Efery ninth, King Atle and us — his whole house — return home … to de land o’ de dead, andd bring a liddle bairn whose father ess no more. Whose muther ess no more.”

  “Why, Kensa? Why did he take Arthur?”

  “Tay sacrifice the liddle bairn — don’cha know dis? Ever-man know et on Dinpelder.”

  Merlin’s mouth went dry.

  Bedwir’s face turned ashen, as did Garth’s. Peredur’s eyes went wide, but Caygek leaned against the wall and studied the embroidered hem of his sleeve.

  Merlin forced his tongue to move, even though it felt like lead. He had to know. “Kensa, when will Atle sacrifice Arthur?”

  “Och, ye ask a turrible lotsa questions. The babe ess sacrificed when de moon is dark … on de darkest nicht … in de darkest land.”

  A slight grin of triumph formed on Caygek’s face as he looked at Merlin. “The winter solstice? That would mean I was corr —”

  “Nott, nott,” she said, and she tapped him on the chest. “Yerr a druid, and ye know nothin’ o’ Lochlan rites. I said whenn de moon is dark.”

  Merlin tried to think when last he’d seen the moon. It had been a few days ago on their journey, before the clouds had hid its face. It had been waxing, and now it must be half full. That would give them twenty days before Arthur died. And how far would they have to travel to catch Atle? He wanted to ask this, but Kensa began to cry.

  Her tears mixed with the dirt on her face, and she grabbed Merlin’s blue tunic and smeared them off. “Andd Kensa displease her king and he haf forgotten me. Me own king … he nott taken me vith, and so I ess dust … even as me father ess dust.”

  “Merlin hasn’t forgotten you. None of us have.” And he turned and pointed to the others. “We want to help, Kensa.”

  She smiled then, her crooked teeth showing proudly, and reached out to each one in turn, taking their hand and squeezing it. When she got to Garth, she smiled, compared their heights with her gnarled hand, and then gave a little tug on his red hair.

  Merlin addressed them all. “So we know what to do. We have to get to the village below the hill — the one on the seacoast — procure a ship, and follow Atle north. We have less than twenty days.”

  “But how do we know where to go?” Bedwir asked. “Atle will be far ahead of us. We’ll never find him. Not without a guide.”

  Garth jumped, his eyes bright. “I can sail, sir!”

  Merlin nodded. “But where do we go? Kensa, does Atle have any maps to this place?”

  Kensa squinted her eyes and scratched her head. “Aye, he do haf lotsa parchments … efen a codex or two from them suffer-makin’ Romans —”

  “Merlin,” Bedwir interrupted, “we better get back up before the lamps go out.”

  Bedwir’s was burning low, and Peredur’s was even worse.

  Up they went, Merlin helping Kensa on the steep steps.

  Upon emerging to the fresh air in the hall, Merlin gave Garth and Peredur the key ring and sent them up to Atle’s quarters. Then he explained to Colvarth and Natalenya what they’d learned of Arthur. Natalenya covered her eyes at the news, and Colvarth’s shoulder’s drooped.

  Kensa went straight to the kitchen, came back with what looked like a bone-shaped root, and began munching on it. Merlin bent over and sniffed, and the aroma stung his nose. He could hardly believe it: She was eating a raw horseradish root — stripping off the moist fibers and mashing them between her teeth.

  “The sea radish is to helpp me tumm after dem bugs.”

  “Bugs?”

  She looked at him like he was daft. “Och, they all crawls upp de tunnel — an’s I catched ‘em and ett ‘em, I did. I been put there afore, an if ye gets hungry, that’s all der ess to eat.”

  Something about this pricked Merlin’s awareness. “They get in the tunnel from where?”

  She took a big bite and chewed thoughtfully.

  “Kensa … how do the bugs get in the tunnel?”

  She swallowed. “From below … Dey bugs climb en when its cold uttside. De tunnel goes down to de secret door. It be de king’s escape route, but shush, I’m nott supposed to tell.”

  Colvarth, who’d been listening, stepped closer. “Kensa … you mean all of us can take the tunnel down to the ground? There are no guards?”

  “Och, sure, lad. There’re no guards because et ess a secret.” She patted him on the head, took another bite, and smiled.

  Peredur bounded down from the upper levels, a bunch of parchments under his arms. Behind him came Garth carrying a sword.

  Merlin sucked in his breath. It was his blade. The one his father had made.

  Garth bowed as he handed it over, and Merlin was speechless.

  “I found it locked in Atle’s room. He seemed to have forgotten to take it. I also found other blades, but they’re nothin’ special compared to yours.” He handed them to Bedwir, Peredur, and Caygek, keeping a short sword for himself.

  Merlin’s hands fairly shook to hold his father’s old sword once again. It had suffered some rust during its stay with Necton, but not badly. A little rubbing, a little oil, and it would be good as new. “How can I thank you?”

  “You returned me father’s bagpipe once upon a time, and I’ve got the priv’lege o’ giving you back yer father’s sword. Consider us even, captain.”

  Merlin clasped Garth in a bear hug.

  Meanwhile, Bedwir and Caygek had cleared a table for Peredur, who laid out his parchments. Kensa stepped over, and, in between bites of horseradish, pointed to a very old one among the pile.

  Peredur untied its ribbon and unrolled it upon the table. It was a crudely drawn map, but a map nonetheless. Colvarth studied it, bringing his aged eyes within a hand’s breadth of the ink. After a short while, he pointed to a mark on the coast of Britain. “Here is where King Atleuthun’s fortress lies.” And then he slid his finger northward, across the sea … and to the coast of some strange land Merlin had never before seen on a map. “And here is, to the best of my knowledge and understanding of this map, the place Atle is sailing for. It is not close … No, for the runes indicate three hundred leagues.”

  So far in only twenty days. Merlin didn’t know if they could do it. “Are you sure?” he asked, hoping Colvarth was wrong.

  “I have studied Lochlan runes before, and that is my best deduction
. Our current location says ‘The fortress belonging to Atle,’ and far northward, here, in the land of the dead, the runes say ‘Atle’s Temple.’ I cannot be sure, but with what you told me of your conversation with Kensa, and what very little I know of their rites, it seems likely. Why he would go to such a remote place, however, I cannot fathom.”

  Merlin looked to Kensa, and she nodded with pursed lips. “Och, dat be de place.”

  “Have you been there before?”

  “I vas born der, but since … since … I been twenty times, I suppose. Double me fangers. Nort ve always sail for many a day. Rough seas too, dis time o’ year. Et’s always a cold trip.”

  Merlin tried to do the math, but the numbers he calculated didn’t make sense so he turned to a new problem. “Kensa, are there ships in the village?”

  “Aye,” she said as she bit off another strip of horseradish.

  “So who’ll help rescue Arthur?” Merlin asked, turning to the men for the second time.

  Bedwir was the first to step forward. “Like you, I’ve sworn my oath.”

  Garth jumped next to him, a smile on his face. “If it involves savin’ Arth’ and sailin’ then I’m yer man!”

  Caygek shook his head and said nothing.

  Peredur started to speak, blinked, and then swallowed. “I owe my freedom to you, Merlin, and though I don’t want to go anywhere but home, I’ll help … if you’ll have a horse trader’s simple son.”

  Merlin shook his hands and thanked him.

  It didn’t take long to gather everything needed, including food, for their journey — salted meat, stale bread, and some grain. As Garth retrieved his bagpipe from upstairs, Merlin knelt to help Natalenya stand up. She lay facing the wall, apparently asleep, with the dog resting under her hand.

  “It’s time to go,” he said, tenderly tapping her on the shoulder.

  She didn’t answer, but only shook her head.

  “Natalenya …”

  “I’m not coming.”

  Merlin thought about Loth and Natalenya having hushed conversation in her room. Perhaps Loth had been wooing her, and she wanted to stay. Perhaps he could heal her when he came back. Marry her. Maybe he wasn’t like Atle. Maybe he was like Merlin’s mother. “I understand. Loth … and his physician.”