by Chris Page
What are you going to do?
Knowing exactly when one’s life is to end concentrates the mind wonderfully upon matters uncompleted and things not done. Of the many tasks, duties, and spontaneous deeds I have attempted, for better or worse, I have never yet repelled an invasion.
The flashes of green, purple, and turquoise glinting on the wings of the pica caught the evening sun like miniature rainbows as they swooped in to perch around the compound. Every now and then a pair of falcons streaked over the tree line like two golden arrowheads aimed at a branch. Slightly uncomfortable in each other’s presence, the massed pica and Merlin population of Wessex gradually settled down until every alert bright brown-and-yellow eye rested upon the log where their liege-lords sat waiting.
Merlin rose to his feet and looked around the tightly packed feathered ranks occupying every available perch and vantage point. As his gaze passed each pair of falcons, their talons came up in a salute. Then Twilight stood up and went through the same process with the pica, of which there were many more pairs.
Merlin spoke loudly, in a tongue they could all understand.
“We have received a visit from a venefica from the north whose name is Elelendise. She is liege-lord of the northern wolf and was accompanied by a particularly ferocious white-furred specimen. Elelendise came to tell us that Wessex is about to be invaded by the army of King Penda, the ruler of Deira and Mercia, to whom she is counselor.”
He looked at Twilight, who picked up the story.
“Elelendise was most threatening, and warned us that any resistance to the invasion of this realm would be met with death. In addition, I am to give up my beloved pica and all other venefical claims and knowledge. I must also return immediately to my settlement and resume my former life as a village boy.”
There was a great deal of affronted shuffling and angry dipping of heads in the massed pica ranks.
“And I, likewise,” said the long magus, “was ordered to renounce my ligamen to you, my trusted falcons, and see out my days here in this compound without using the enchantments against the invader.”
The falcons flapped their wings in agitation and also dipped their heads in disapproval.
Twilight waited for them to settle down again before he continued.
“We have decided not to accept her conditions and to oppose this invasion with all the powers at our command.”
Every bird rose on its spindly legs, flapped its wings, stretched its neck heavenward, and gave way to its own particular ululation. The cacophony continued for some time as the pica vented their entire arsenal of full-throated warbles, and the higher-register falcons screeched in unrestricted stridency.
Merlin held his hand up.
“It is obvious that our decision pleases you, and we thank you for that. However, the way ahead is fraught with danger and uncertainty. This Elelendise has only recently taken up her residency and is a strong and aggressive opponent, and the mighty army of King Penda marches on Wessex fresh from the elation of a great victory in the Welsh Marches.”
In a blur of movement Phi zipped out of the trees and landed alongside them on the log. Seconds later he was joined by Bell. The leaders had arrived for a council of war.
“We saw her arrival with the white dog and knew she brought trouble,” Phi said. “Her power was palpable and carried a signature aura not unlike that of your own. Is her power stronger than yours, my lord?”
Merlin thought for a few moments. “Not stronger, but probably more enduring for she is much younger. Sorcery is a taxing business and will always favor the fittest. However, that gap is made up by my experience, especially in matters of warfare. As you know it is a subject that I am most familiar with. I also have Twilight here, who, although untaught in the enchantments, will still be able to help.”
“Will you continue to control the raging mists?” asked Phi.
“Yes, although she has made it very clear that I am to hand over that control at the next autumn equinox. But I swear on the Seven Hills of Rome I will never usurp ten thousand venefical years of containment by handing that duty to her.”
“When are you expecting this Penda and his cutthroats?” asked Phi.
“Just as soon as it takes his army to walk here from the Marches. No more than a week at most.”
“What do you want us to do?” asked Bell.
“For the time being keep a careful watch all around the northern edges of the Wessex lands, especially for the scouts who will be sent ahead of the army to ensure the way ahead is clear. We need to know exactly when Penda arrives at our borders. Beware also of the conspicuous apparitions that Elelendise will set as her advance warning systems. Watch from high in the skies, from the trees, the bushes, and the long grasses. You will know all her messengers or spies by their power signature, as it will be a weakened version of her own. She can also take many forms, but the one thing she cannot change is her aura. Also, treat all wolves as hers, especially those with white fur. Immediately if you spot any of these things or are suspicious of anything unexplained, let me know. In the meantime Twilight and I will begin to lay our plans.”
Phi cocked his head to one side, rather mockingly.
“Wolves don’t have wings,” he said.
Bell joined in with a chuckle. “Nor do they have a brain.”
Merlin raised a long finger.
“And this white guardian dog of hers is no exception, but you can never be sure just what form or unnatural skills her messengers will display. When you pass this information to all your flocks make sure that they understand this. And remember, if it’s unusual or unexplained, don’t engage it in any way, just let me or the boy here know immediately.”
When all the birds had taken their leave to keep a careful watch on the Wessex borders, Twilight began asking his own questions.
“What is this ‘aura’ you and the birds referred to?”
“Anyone who understands the enchantments and therefore the manipulation of phenomena is in possession of an underlying power pulse with a unique signature. This signature will extend, in a lesser form, to anyone or thing who is representing the veneficus. For example, all my conspicuous apparitions carry my signature aura and can be linked back to me through that aura.”
“Do I have one?” asked the boy.
“Oh yes.” The long magus chuckled. “And a very healthy one at that. It will grow as you accumulate knowledge and experience of the enchantments.”
“Could you see hers?”
“Yes, and a fine strong aura it was. However, there were two odd things about her that trouble me. The first is her name. As you know, the teacher names the tyro at the outset. I, for example, named you Twilight when you arrived here with your father. These names reflect, in some way, the character, ligamen species, or substance of the tyro. On that basis the wolf-woman would have received the name Elelendise from Mael at the beginning of her training. Strangely, ‘Elelendise’ is Old Saxon for ‘misfit’ or ‘outsider.’”
“And the second thing?” Twilight asked.
“She is what the ancients referred to as sinistre, a Latin term meaning left-handed. In venefical lore, people who favor their left hand are flawed. Both of us are right-handed, as were all of our ninety-eight predecessors. Mael could easily have chosen to train her to favor the right hand, but he didn’t.”
They paused to consider these two points.
“It’s beginning to look as if Mael were sending out some sort of message through her name and left-handedness,” said Twilight. “An indication to those who would understand that she was flawed. If that were the case why didn’t he just refuse to train her in the beginning?”
“Because,” said Merlin reflectively, “he probably had no choice.”
“She called you an old man,” blurted the boy.
“She was right, I am an old man, ninety-three years an old man. T
oo old to outrun a fierce white wolf at any rate.”
“That wolf didn’t frighten me one little bit,” said Twilight defiantly. “Was it real?”
“Ahhh, the slashing Lupa. Yes, it was real. I had a quick look at its mental processes - frons est animi janua, the forehead is the door to the mind - while she was posturing. If ever the fearsome creature has to use its crude brain to achieve anything, it will fail badly. Its entire psyche is based upon protecting Elelendise with snarling displays of ferocity and killing anything that is a threat to her. Above that it has no other existence, no other reason to live. The way it holds station by her side reminds me of an ancient Greek story about the Dog Star Sirius, in the constellation of Canis Major. Sirius always appears to be close to the side of Orion, named after the great hunter, but the constellations are constantly shifting, and there are ofttimes when the clouds obscure one from the other. What, I wonder, would the ferocious Lupa do if it could not see the person to whom its wretched life is so malevolently dedicated?”
“Panic, maybe,” Twilight ventured. “Lose its head completely.”
Merlin chuckled. “An interesting vision and one I will give some thought to. Come, it is time for us to prepare to repel an invasion,” the long magus said, his eyes glowing a deep emerald green. “The Saxons and their tame sorceress are coming.”
As far as it was known there were one thousand venefici spread around the earth at various, usually non-competing places. Each selected and trained his own replacement to succeed him at the one hundred year termination of his life. Occasionally a veneficus died before their full term, but this was unusual. The premature death of a holder of the enchantments was very rare and could only be brought about by another holder.
When the Romans left Britain early in the fifth century, there were two resident venefici; one in the north and one in Wessex. Due to the proximity of Stonehenge, the site of the annual Autumn Equinox, the holder of the Wessex enchantments was the most senior veneficus.
It was a good system and had worked reasonably well for the ten thousand years of its existence. It did, however, have a basic flaw that sooner or later would reveal itself.
When Zeus charged Tiresias, the Seer of Thebes, with the maintenance of this domain, he installed a god who had more than the usual Presidium tendency for boredom.
Chapter Seven
“There are,” said Merlin quietly, “defining events in all our lives that are so dramatic, and impact so utterly upon our consciousness, that we are forced to do something about it. Such an event was when King Arthur discovered eight of his own soldiers were spies for Mordred, his cousin and mortal enemy. Against my advice and enraged by their treachery he personally tortured them by putting a lighted flare torch to their faces. I can still hear their screams and smell the sickly pungency of their seething flesh now. That was the moment I turned away from him and from war.”
“How did he react to you turning away?”
“Badly at first. Said he didn’t need me, could manage without me. Then, after a couple of days, he began to entreat me to stay. Got the other knights to work on me.”
“You were tempted?”
“Not at all. I had counseled Arthur through twelve victorious battles, stood on many a green hilltop and watched the valleys run with the blood of his enemies as his men swept all before them. Never again. Burning the faces of those men was the defining event for me. I left the legendary court of Camelot within days and never returned.”
“And he carried on fighting without you?”
“Shortly afterward Arthur was badly wounded in a battle with Mordred and taken to the Isle of Avalon where he eventually succumbed to his wounds. Many times I had counseled against fighting Mordred, and he had always heeded my words. If I had stayed I’m sure he would not have waged that war, would have lived on to fill one of the great places in the history of Britain. In burning the faces of those eight soldiers, Arthur signed his own death warrant and lost all hope of a blessed immortality.”
“Will he be remembered for the twelve victories?” asked the boy.
“For a while, but the thousands of soldiers slaughtered in those campaigns will pale into the maw of historical inconsequence when compared to the eight soldiers whose faces he burned. The significance of that act will live on simply because of its heinous bestiality and the fact that it was carried out by Arthur himself.”
“And you will ensure that it is not forgotten?”
“We will ensure that it’s never forgotten,” Merlin stated with finality.
“Did the famous sword of Excalibur exist or was it a myth?” asked Twilight.
Merlin chuckled. He knew the story of the Lady of the Lake and the mighty sword that only Arthur could draw from the rock was the staple telling piece around the hearths and campfires of the realm. Embellished and shone to a patriotic sheen equaling that of Excalibur itself, the legend had grown into a shining emblem of Celtic lore.
“Excalibur and all its attachments were real,” said the long magus obliquely. “In so much as they truly existed in the form they are known for.”
“You mean that you created them,” suggested Twilight in a half question, half answer.
“I did so.” Merlin smiled.
“Why?”
“Arthur had everything on his side. He was young, handsome, charismatic, the complete warrior king with the sure touch. People will follow someone like that through all sorts of travails, but they won’t necessarily die for them. Blind allegiance requires something extra. In order to accomplish the tasks he’d set himself, Arthur required that blind, unthinking allegiance from the people he ruled and, more especially, from his fighters. For that the pedestal must be high, godlike, inhabited by an ethereal being who is more than man, more than king. So I evolved the myth and setting, among others, that we know today as the legendary sword of freedom called Excalibur, and that whosoever could draw it from the stone was somehow blessed with supernatural powers. Naturally, I made it so that only Arthur could withdraw it. Then the people had a truly abstract, mythical warrior god, someone who they would follow into the furnaces of Hades and for whom dying was considered a great privilege.”
Twilight remembered how the stories of Arthur and Excalibur had excited him when sitting around the communal summer fires at the settlement. Even in his world of self-imposed isolation the story had a resonance. He, too, would have an Excalibur that no one else could use. His only to command, to own. A mighty protector against all evils. Like many other settlement children he had fashioned a crude sword from off-cuts of wood and stuck it in soft mud, only to find that it had set hard the following day and could only be removed by breaking the now hard mud. Another shining dream destroyed. Now he discovered that the whole thing was a myth spread by the clever astounder who had become his mentor. To be that close to the actual formation of such events was, in itself, completely mesmerizing.
After the roof collapsed on the dwelling house, Will had become afraid to concentrate overly on an object in case it moved or, as in the case of his father’s hazel stick - the one he used to beat Will with - which suddenly fell to the ground in small, neat pieces!
As usual he’d been daydreaming in the long summer grass when his father had come looking for him to inquire why he had not been working the other end of the meadow with his mother and brothers, turning the freshly scythed hay. As the stinging hazel stick had descended across his legs for the fourth time, he had fixed his mind on its arc and imagined the mighty Excalibur in his hand. In a blur too quick for the eye to follow, the descending stick dropped to the ground from his father’s hand in a pile of small twigs. As his father stood gaping at the neat pile of twigs that had been his beating stick, Will had disappeared into the dense undergrowth surrounding the meadow.
His own, private Excalibur hadn’t been a myth. It had worked beautifully when called upon to defend him.
He snapped out o
f the train of thought back to the present and asked another question.
“If Arthur had not burned those men’s faces, would he have still gone to the mists?”
“Oh yes, many times over. He was responsible for far too many unnecessary deaths as part of his drive to dominate to ever stay out of the raging grasp of the mists.”
“And he did all of it on your advice?”
“He wouldn’t raise so much as a hand pike against another without it,” said Merlin.
“He got the agony of the raging mists for his part. What did you get?”
Twilight looked pugnacious, and his lips were compressed in a thin line. Merlin glowered down at him.
“The chance to redeem myself, my little accuser … here, with you, now.”
After a long silence they continued their stroll across the meadow bordering the mighty Savernake. Merlin rested his long fingers lightly on the boy’s shoulder.
“In their quest for knowledge and answers to the great mysteries of life, many of the great past civilizations turned to the heavens. They found answers in the continuum of great star and planet auroras that bedecked the celestial welkin. Found many pointers to their own predicaments. They named everything they could see in the night sky. Exotic, omnipresent names that spoke of divinity and glory: Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, Neptune, and Pluto. They broke the year into twelve planetary constellations called a zodiac, and named each one after an earthly species. These have become known as our birth signs, and we are supposed to be similar in mannerisms to the species we are born under. The birthday of all venefici is All Hallows Day - the last day of the month of October - which comes under the sign of Scorpio, named after a creature called the scorpion. The scorpion is an arachnid found in the hot sands of lands far away from here and is a deadly killer with a venomous barbed tail. It is not for nothing that we are so compared. There are also mannerisms associated with each birth sign, and one of ours is a virulent ability to bear a grudge. Once we are crossed we never forgive or forget.”
