by Sarah Zettel
And she saw Morgaine standing over her, and she saw her heart in the sorceress’s hand, and she saw the wound in her breast, and she felt … she felt …
She felt the wound close. She felt her heart slamming hard against her ribs, driving her lungs to draw great gouts of air and sending her burning blood coursing through her body. Her wounded throat closed, her wounded wrist closed. She felt it. She felt her skin grow whole and sound, but most of all she felt her heart, her own heart within her. She felt its beat driving the river of her living blood in the rhythm that had its echo in every living thing. The whole world lived, and she in its embrace was whole and strong and alive. Alive!
She staggered to her feet. Wild-eyed and wild-hearted she shouted a wordless and ecstatic cry to the heavens. All at once, Geraint was in her arms, crushing her to him with the strength of his one-armed embrace. She kissed him hard for joy, for love, for life itself.
When at last they parted, and she could bear to look away from Geraint’s shining face, she saw what he had done. On the ground of the yard lay the little king, Calonnau held before him like a shield. The spear was already back in Geraint’s hand. On the ground there was only the blood and the broken body of the Little King and the wild hawk.
Elen swallowed hard at the pathetic sight of Calonnau. She could not move for a time. Geraint’s arm curled around her shoulders.
Then, someone she had forgotten about, the mouse-queen, walked silently forward. She held out the golden chain to Elen.
“Please,” she said softly. “Please. Let it be done now.”
Elen’s took the chain from her. She’d dropped it at some point. She could no longer see the unfinished link. She did not let herself fear for it. Instead, she looked to Calonnau broken upon the breast of her enemy. She called up the memory of the hunts, the strength, the wild delight, the feel of the breaking bones beneath strong talons.
With all the strength of Calonnau’s savagery, Elen snapped the golden chain in two.
All the things fell still for a single instant. Then, the air shuddered. The fortress walls melted into the ground, and beyond them the narrow gorges broadened into green vallies. Stands of trees spread out to become whole forests. Streams turned to rivers, pools to silver lakes. It was as if all the world was a fist clenched too tightly that now fell open before their eyes.
All around them, the people, huddled where the shadows had been, so long prisoners stared at each other in reverent wonder like people who see a holy thing. They lifted their hands, reaching out to the land, each of them seeing some familiar shape or place, and then they were gone, Elen was sure, to those homes which had been gathered up so tightly in the Little King’s fist and were now turned loose to resume their proper places.
A warm wind blew, and Elen knew there was more to come. She heard a sound, a shiver, the sharp bark of wood hitting stone. Doors. Doors opening — a hundred, a thousand, and a great column of half-formed shapes rising into the sky. She saw dragons there, she saw the fae, she saw eagles and stags, great boars and white stallions galloping on the wind. All the monsters and beauties painted on the Little King’s walls. Then they too were gone, and the great labyrinth that had trapped them for so long was no more than a ring of standing stones.
It was all so like a dream, Elen could feel no fear, only profound wonder. Beside her, Geraint was bright eyed and staring in his awe.
But they were not alone. The mouse-king and his queen still stood beside them, but they too were changed. The hunched, brown wild people were no more. These two shone, even more brightly than the Lady and the Lord. Husband and wife they were, and so much more. They brimmed with life, like a forest, like a mountain, like the earth itself. God and goddess, they were all they had been, and they stood with their hands clasped before Elen and Geraint. Elen went down on her knees at once. Geraint’s hand moved to cross himself, but he stopped the gesture, and he too knelt.
So many husbands, so many wives in all this long strange time, thought Elen, bemused, thinking back of Morgaine and Urien, the Lady and Lord, even Eynon and Gwin. So much power shared between them all. Was it odd that it was only Gwiffert who did not have someone beside him and Gwiffert was the one who fell?
“Thank you,” said the god, and his voice was warm and green, and flowed like water beneath the summer sky. “We will not forget.”
The goddess did not speak. She went to Calonnau and lifted the bird gently.
Elen licked her lip. “Can you …” she stopped, feeling suddenly like a greedy child.
The goddess shook her head. “It would not be good to reverse the order of things at this time, child. But she will be buried with reverence, and blessings will come from the place she lies.”
Elen bowed her head. “Thank you.”
“What of him?” asked Geraint, nodding toward the body of the Little King.
A light sparked in the god’s eye and Elen felt colder than she ever had while her heart was gone from her. “His doom comes.”
She heard the hoofbeats, and she raised her head. They rode up the hillside on their grey horses, eleven of them, their naked skulls bare to the broad light of day. As they came closer, she saw that the brands that marked them were gone. Elen drew back and Geraint wrapped his arm around her. But the god and goddess made no move. The Grey Men gave no sign that they saw the living beings before them. Two of them dismounted and hoisted the Little King’s body onto the twelfth horse. In silence, they remounted, and in silence they led the twelfth horse away down the hill, vanishing into the tangled forest.
“Now comes your last deed in this place,” said the god to them. “Turn toward the east and walk. You will soon find yourself at your home.”
Elen bowed her head. Geraint did the same. The warm wind blew, smelling of spring and summer together. When they raised their eyes, they were alone on the high hill beside the standing stones.
They stood, shaking a little from fear and from awe. Elen turned to Geraint. Whole for the first time in so long, she looked into his eyes and she felt how her heart beat heavy beneath its burden of joy to see him before her, to feel him take her hands and pull her close so that she might kiss him with all the warmth, all the life that they between them had won.
“Come now, my husband,” she said at last. “Let us go and finish this thing.”
Chapter Twenty-Four
They travelled down the Roman way out of the Black Mountains by the light of the waning moon. Geraint led the way on Donatus, and Elen rode behind on the little brown, holding Manawyddan’s spear in her right hand. They had found the horses grazing beside a swift-running river below the hill of stones. They did not ask questions but accepted their presence and rode away.
Torches shone on both sides of the river, and the hushed sounds of men’s voices rippled like the moonlit water. Elen looked across the Usk and up toward her home. The sparks of torches burned at the high house as well. Urien was on the watch tonight. Did he know they were come?
“Halt!” A stern-voiced shadow stepped out onto the road and brought three friends with him. “Who’s that?”
Geraint reined Donatus to a halt. “Sir Geraint of Camelot and the Table Round,” he said loud enough to be heard by half the world. “With him the Lady Elen, Adara’s daughter and rightful holder of Pont Cymryd!”
The first man’s face went slack with shock. In the next moment he gave out a jubilant whoop. “Sir Geraint!” He ran forward to clasp the knight’s hand. “God’s legs! We thought you were dead! Cyril!” He slapped one of his mates on the shoulder. “Run for Sir Agravain! Sir Geraint’s returned!”
Cyril pelted away toward the camp, shouting out at the top of his lungs, “Sir Geraint’s returned! Sir Geraint is here!” The three men around them were cheering. Soon, the whole world was cheering and running toward them. The men pulled Geraint down off Donatus’s back so they could clasp his hands and beat upon his shoulders and embrace him in brotherhood. Geraint bore all this with a great grin on his face, laughing and calling o
ut the names of those he recognised.
“What the merry hell is all this!” bellowed a new voice. All instantly fell silent. The crowd of grinning men parted, suddenly looking like children who know they have been caught in mischief. Down the lane they made in their ranks stalked the lean, angry man who had been at Geraint’s side when he came in disguise to stand before Urien. Now he was clean- shaven and dressed like a city man in boots, breeches and blue tunic, but there was no mistaking his eyes, nor his voice. “Does the enemy need to know all our business? Are you barbarians or are you soldiers and king’s men? Get away!”
The bravest bore Sir Agravain’s glower for ten heartbeats or so, and then scurried meekly after their companions, all save the sentries who took their posts up again, leaning on their spears and grinning at the show.
Agravain ignored them. He turned to face Geraint.
“God be with you too, Brother,” said Geraint mildly.
Agravain looked him up and down, but Elen could not tell whether or not he was satisfied with what he saw. “We thought Urien had dropped you into the river.” Elen’s command of the eastern tongue was not fluent, but she understood enough to follow Agravain’s drawling words.
Geraint raised his brows, as if a bit surprised at this news. “No, that he failed to do.”
“Gawain will be pleased.”
“How does our brother?”
Agravain sighed, clearly put out by either the question or the answer he must give. “The High King sent him on some business among the Saxons, so I am left to deal with the mess you left behind here.” Agravain folded his arms and turned his glower on Elen. “I see you have retrieved the lady.”
“Mind your tongue, brother,” Geraint’s words took on a warning tone. “We are man and wife.”
Shock silenced Agravain for the space of three breaths. “You are not,” he announced flatly.
“Yes,” replied Geraint. “We are.”
“Geraint …”
But Geraint cut his older brother off. “This is not a subject for debate, brother. Nor will our uncle find it so when he hears the full tale.”
Even in the torchlight, Elen could see Agravain’s face flush red with anger. “Upon my life, Geraint,” he said softly, hoarsely. “This is not even worthy of Gawain. I thought you had some sense.”
Geraint’s face remained quiet and unperturbed. “Odd, I thought the same of you.”
Elen dipped her head to hide her smile. Agravain did not miss this, and his eyes smoldered.
“Geraint …”
Geraint ignored his brother. Instead of answering Agravain, he took Elen’s hand. “Forgive me, my wife. The fond greeting of my brother makes me forget we have serious business still. Let us gather the captains and tell them what has happened.”
Elen’s smile fell away. She pressed Geraint’s hand. “No. I will go to the bridge.”
Donatus stirred, responding to his rider’s uneasiness. Agravain was looking from Geraint to Elen, his mouth pinched into a thin line. “Elen, we can do nothing until morning,” said Geraint.
“No,” she said again. “I know what I must do, and I must do it now.”
Geraint sighed. “Very well. I will take you.”
Which was too much for Agravain. “Geraint, what is this?”
“Geraint …” began Agravain again.
Geraint gathered up Dontaus’s reins. “Step back brother and trust for once. There are matters here more suited to Merlin’s ways than ours.”
At that, Agravain did step back, and Elen rode at Geraint’s side through the maze of pavilions, fires and men, down the slope to the river side. She dismounted and he took the reins from her. The whole camp seemed gathered in their wake to watch whatever was about to happen. She heard the men’s questions to each other, both soft and loud, and the orders of their commanders, and Geraint’s voice making answers and giving yet more orders, but she was beyond understanding any of it. Before her waited the bridge, where all this long and tortured quest had begun and where it must now end.
Elen mounted the steps slowly. The night air was cool against her skin and smelled of river water and coming rain. The Usk murmured and chuckled as it flowed around the supporting stones and hearing it was like hearing the voices of her family.
Across the way, she saw Urien’s men, made white, black and orange by torchlight. She saw them fingering their knives and their staffs and wondering what they should do.
She let them wonder. She stood on the bridge and raised the spear high. “Urien!” she cried out and her voice rang in the darkness. “Urien Y Tarw! Adara’s ghost calls you to the bridge! Urien! Yestin’s ghost calls you to the bridge! The dead of Pont Cymryd murdered by your word rise up this night and call you forth!”
He would hear. If he were a hundred miles away, he would hear that call. Torches flared higher. The guards on the far side of the bridge gathered together, murmuring and pointing, trying to decide what to do. The night wind caught her cloak and sent it billowing behind her like wings.
She waited. Be it a short time or a long time, it didn’t matter. She could wait by her own will now. She was free and alive and this one would never bind her again. She had all the time there was.
At last the darkness that was the men massed beyond the torchlight moved and she saw eyes and armor shine, and through them walked Urien.
“What is this? The little girl’s returned?” He sounded lazy, and annoyed, as if by a busy fly.
“Yes, she’s returned, safe and whole to her home, as was promised,” replied Elen. “Safe and whole, Urien.” She spoke those words slowly, letting the import of them sink into him.
Urien stepped into the torchlight. He was much as she had seen him last when he gloated over her as his prize to dispose of at his whim. “Right glad I am to hear it.” He folded his arms. He wore a dark cloak, pinned with a silver broach. “Where’s that husband I gave you to?” His gaze drifted past Elen, searching the riverbank behind her. “I have a word or two to say to him.”
Elen gripped the spear all the more tightly. It was a calculated insult. Let it go. “His business with you will wait on mine.”
Urien barked out a rough laugh. “You think you have some business with me, little girl?”
They had stood like this before, at the beginning, when she held a sword she did not know how to use, and she did not understand the nature of her enemy. He must brag, he must shout his prowess for all his men to hear. He would not appear afraid to them, but she had learned the ways of watching close since she had been away. He knew that she had changed. She saw the glitter of his eyes as they narrowed, she saw the way his weight came forward onto his toes, and how hard his fingers dug into the flesh of his own arms.
“I’ve come for my home, my land and my people, Urien.” She called it out loudly. Let Urien’s men hear. Let all the world hear.
Urien snorted and climbed the stairs. “You’d have done better to wait for the army behind you to mount up.”
He came to stand before her, his hands loose at his side. The Usk swirled and chattered beneath them, suddenly sounding very loud. “This matter is first between you and me,” said Elen.
Without another word, Urien lunged, knocking Elen onto her back, but she was ready for that, and she tucked her chin to keep her head from banging against the stone. She thrust the spear cross-wise before her, shoving him back to land awkwardly on his buttocks. He laughed and rolled and came up faster than she would have guessed. He grabbed for the spear. Elen thrust it between his legs, tripping him. He slammed down, cracking his head on the stone while she scrambled to her feet. Urien came up, teeth bared, knife in hand, and Elen with all the power of her rage and vengeance, cast the spear out.
It pierced the silver broach at his throat. It pierced flesh and sinew and bone. It sent Urien staggering backward, blood pouring from him, until his body, dead already, fell from the bridge and splashed into the river. The waters swirled with blood for a moment and then closed over him, and Urien the Bu
ll was gone.
The spear was back in Elen’s hand. She scarcely noticed. She was looking at the place in the river where her enemy had fallen. She realized she was not breathing, and she took a breath of air in, and another, and another. Her heart, which had stopped, beat wildly again, and Elen’s whole body shook, and she leaned against the spear for support, but she could not seem to look up from the river.
She heard footsteps and felt Geraint’s familiar touch on her shoulders, but she still could not move. It was done, it was done. After all the fear and pain and awe, it was done, and all she could do was stand and shake.
“Elen,” whispered Geraint.
Elen jerked her head up. Geraint was pointing toward the eastern river bank. But the camp was not there, neither was the bank it had stood upon. There was only the swirling whiteness of a mist, and within it stood a single figure, so pale it was difficult to pick him out from the fog around him. His green eyes shone brightly, and he stretched out one long hand.
Elen nodded, and she cast the spear again. The Lord caught it neatly in his outstretched hand. It shimmered onyx and silver for a moment, and then the mist spread out and was gone, taking them both with it.
The world came back in a rush. Pandemonium had broken out on the western banks with men screaming and shouting and vowing vengeance. A mass of men from Agravain’s camp swirled forward, dragging Elen and Geraint off the bridge. Orders were shouted. Swords rasped as they were freed from sheaths. But none of Urien’s men actually charged the bridge. A few spears were thrown with the howls, but they fell harmlessly into the river.
Geraint held Elen tight, while the crowd of men around them dissappated, running to defences, for torches, for men to get themselves into ordered lines. As the lights sprang up yet more brightly, Elen was able to see that a lean man had still stood between them and the bridge, his sword out and ready in his fist.
Agravain.
As it gradually became clear that the howling across the river would break into no immediate battle, Agravain fell back to stand beside his brother. He shouted to a youth who came panting out of the darkness to stare at Geraint with a boy’s delight plain all over his face.
