The Dragon in Lyonesse

by Gordon R. Dickson

  He stopped talking. He had run out of breath; and neither Carolinus nor Kineteté was responding. He had a sinking feeling that he had lost his audience—that he had explained too much, served them too large a meal of logical thinking; and their minds had ended up rejecting every part of it.

  The uncomfortable silence stretched out.

  "Very interesting," said Kineteté, at last, "but I don't believe a word of it. Carolinus, I hold you responsible for the magick I lent this lad to go to Lyonesse."

  She vanished. Carolinus did not disappear with her immediately. Instead, a remarkably gleeful expression gradually spread out over his face. He looked in a kindly manner at Jim, who had a momentary impression that the venerable magickian was less than an eyelash away from winking at him.

  "Never mind," Carolinus said. "Cheap at half the price—half the price. Well done! Your showing that the magic of Lyonesse alone was usable was worth the whole grand try by Cumberland and Morgan!"

  —And he also was gone; leaving Jim a little stunned between the unexpected praise and his memory of the dying invader who had charged him, and then fallen, from his horse to lie dead at Jim's feet.

  "I am afraid we must also be leaving, now, Sir James," said the voice of Dafydd.

  Jim looked at him. Back with his wife and sons, a father among his family again, Dafydd was changed completely. A different person in the same familiar body had taken a step back from the rest of them into his own private world. His voice had a touch of formality, with that "Sir James"—after a Lyonesse-full of plain "James."

  "It is the Saint's day after which our firstborn, here, is named," Dafydd went on. "But indeed I thank you for your kind help in the time of a dire danger to my Drowned Land. Though it is my home no longer, it would have become a dark place in my heart, if it had fallen to such a pair as the Dark Powers and Morgan le Fay, even for the while. It and I remain in your debt for this as long as life bears with me."

  "No debt involved," said Jim. "You were here when the Dark Powers had the nerve to stick their nose into this Hall. I had my own reasons for going. Besides, with friends we don't keep count, anyway—you know that as well as I do."

  "Ah, but—"

  "Dafydd, the horses wait," broke in Danielle. "It is a ride, and a ride yet, to my father's camp in the Wold. Even now the moon will be well up before we arrive. You may travel as well by night as by day, but the children have had a full day and need their sleep."

  "We will leave in a moment, my golden bird," said Dafydd, without turning his head. "Farewell, then, James. Farewell, Angela. We will meet again before the snow flies."

  "Farewell," said Angie and Jim; and watched the family out through the Hall's front door to the hard-trodden brown earth of the courtyard, still sunset-touched.

  Then the thud of hooves, changing to a brief clatter as they passed over the drawbridge and out of view of the doorway, into silence.

  The white candles, half burned down, were flickering in the little breeze from the open Hall door, above a dinner that had barely been touched, except by the children.

  "Come," said Angie. "We must eat; and then you need sleep."

  Chapter Forty-Seven

  Food, he had eaten; but sleep was as far from him as the World's End Carolinus had sent him to once—the jumping-off place from this planet in its time and space, into the misty eternity of its surrounding universe.

  He could not stop talking.

  It was something he had become familiar with in his early graduate years, when he had held down two part-time jobs in addition to his assistantship and his own studies. From time to time then he would go beyond his state of general exhaustion, into a super bright awakedness in which his mind dashed from answer to answer; and he felt as if he would never need sleep again.

  It was on him now—in exactly the wrong time and place.

  "… Terrific!" he heard himself saying. "That's the only word for it! Terrific. I had to seem coldheaded and magickian-professional when Kineteté and Carolinus were here, but that was the only word for it. Terrific!"

  "I'm sure it was," said Angie, with weary, loving patience.

  "You had to be there and feel it—could you give me another cup of tea?"

  "Jim," she said, "you never drink tea at bedtime. You don't really like it that much; and you say it keeps you from sleeping. That's your fourth cup, and it's a stimulant. Why don't I give you a mazer of wine; or even some—"

  "No, no," said Jim. "I can practically see the Empty Plain now, it's all so clear in my memory! I don't want anything that'll blur that image for me just yet. Angie, it was just as if the whole Earth there and everything living on it rose up to throw back the Dark Powers and their army of invaders—never mind. I've been bothering you to make me tea steadily since we came upstairs here. I can make a cup, myself, this time."

  "No, you don't," said Angie, already out of bed. "Stay there. I'll get it. But this has got to be the last. You have to get some sleep."

  "I might've gone without sleep for a couple of days—time was funny, there. I don't really feel tired, though, now."

  "You're on overdrive," said Angie, from twelve feet away at the fireplace, swinging the refilled little kettle on the long, metal arm from which it hung in over the fire.

  "I believe you," she added, to whatever Jim had begun to say now.

  She had finally got Jim and herself warmly, cozily, tucked into the big bed up here in the privacy of their Solar, at the top of Malencontri's tower. Warmly, because with the setting of the sun a chilly, end-of-summer rain had begun, drumming on their valuable and rare glass windows that now showed only blackness. Cozily, because it was always somehow more that way when you knew that someone else had to be out in the weather.

  The man-at-arms on watch on the thick stone tower top above their heads would be sheltering himself under the little wooden roof on four pillars over the firebox below the great kettle, kept there to heat boiling oil for pouring down on attackers. Not that anyone was likely to come attacking in this weather—but there were small outlaw groups that might try to take advantage of the rain and darkness, putting scaling ladders against the curtain wall; and try a smash-and-grab raid to see if they could not get away safely with whatever they could pick up and carry off.

  Such raids had long been a common trick of marauders on both the Scottish and Welsh borders—and were not unknown here in southern England.

  But it would be an unlucky band of marauders who came marauding here tonight, with the servants—and particularly the men-at-arms—in their present state of mind, thought Angie. Jim had kept himself under control until Dafydd and his family were gone, and Geronde was clearly settled in upstairs, on guard like a she-tiger while an exhausted Brian slept.

  But it was only after the ap Hywels had disappeared into the sunset, and Geronde had sent down word she was settled for the night, that Jim had really uncovered his soaring emotions—and set fire to everyone in the castle. Not that it took much to do that, under any circumstances.

  It was not that he said anything much more about the battle in Lyonesse itself. But he had fairly radiated excitement and martial fever.

  What was the line from that great poem by Edwin Arlington Robinson about Richard Cory? Angie tried to remember. "… He glittered when he walked."—it had fitted Jim tonight, in the eyes of all the staff of Malencontri. To have a Lord who was a Magickian was a great thing. But to have a Lord who also had fought alongside King Arthur like the knight he was—"… Yes, I said that Arthur, lady. And if thee doubt it, just open thy mouth about it once more and I'll give thee some of thy own teeth to chew on!"

  Left to himself, Jim would have sat at the High Table in the Great Hall indefinitely, talking to Angie about the trip, if she had not practically hauled him upstairs here by main force—to where the servants, and above all the men-at-arms, could not find excuses to get close to them, in hopes of overhearing more of the details.

  The men-at-arms in particular were eaten up with admiration and en
vy. They would probably be up drinking and talking until dawn; and in sad shape to take care of their individual duties tomorrow.

  Well, their imaginations would be fed no further tonight. But that still left her with a Jim going off like an endless supply of rockets.

  "… Unbelievable!" he was saying now. "That's the only word for it, Angie! Unbelievable! I had to seem coldheaded and magickian-professional when Kineteté and Carolinus were here, but that was the only word for it!"

  "I'm sure it was," said Angie.

  "You're right, of course. But it was worth it. Arthur! And those Knights of his, fighting like the Legends they are! But you know, Angie, it was the animals—little tiny animals attacking armed men in armor! And those North Gales coming down when they were called, the trees waiting for Cumberland's men if they tried to run from the field—you could feel the earth and sky and everything in between fighting on our side. Cumberland's bunch didn't have a chance!"

  "Then your arranging the lion with Brian to move along next to Arthur while you flew over his head as a dragon wasn't really necessary?"

  Angie almost literally tried to bite the words off the second they were out of her mouth.

  She had been born with a naturally quick tongue, but too often found it made her more enemies than friends. So she had worked all her life to keep it under control; to the point where there were some people who considered her mealy-mouthed.

  But she still slipped occasionally. Funnily, it was easier to slip with those she was closest to. Jim, bless his heart, either didn't notice or chose to ignore it when she slipped with him. There was no one like him in this world or any other.

  "I've already mentioned that business? Sorry. But in fact, it was useful," he was saying now. "Everything contributes, of course. In this case it helped with morale; it raised the spirits of the Knights and very much upset their enemies."

  "Oh," she said, determined to do better, "I didn't think of that."

  Actually, Jim was busy thinking how lucky he was that her question had caught him before he started trying to explain the state of mind into which the battle had worked the Knights—which all too easily could have led to his foolishly giving an example by telling her how he had come within a few breaths of provoking Brian into killing him. That was the sort of incident on his trips that was the last thing he would ever want to tell Angie.

  "It also reminded the Knights of Arthur and how he had believed in chivalry," he said, instead. "Otherwise, in the heat of the moment, they could have slaughtered all the opposition, instead of taking their surrenders and herding them back out through the Witch's Gate, or whatever route only Morgan le Fay would have been magically strong enough to open for them to the Drowned Land—and which they'll be leaving now, since there's no room for outsiders either in there or—That had been close to a bad slip, Jim told himself. He had been talking his silly head off about this particular adventure. He had caught a weary note in Angie's voice just now. No reason to keep talking. He had already given her most of the battle part, anyway. There would be time for the rest later.

  It had indeed been a remarkable experience—wouldn't have believed half of it, himself, if anyone else had told him about it. A mulligan stew of tall tales. Angie had always been too good for her own good. He could tell her the rest later when he was not still geared up over it.

  "On second thought," he called to her, "maybe the wine would be better for me, after all. You're right, I've had too much tea."

  "Well, it's already made and ready," said Angie. "How about this? How about the tea with a little something in it."

  "What sort of something?"

  "Cognac."

  "You mean that white lightning that passes for cognac in this century, in this world?"

  "You never know," said Angie. "It might work with the tea, particularly with as much sugar as you like in it."

  "Well, why not? Yes, Angie—yes, pour in the cognac; a good slug of it."

  "This alcohol tastes better than usual," he said, drinking the tea. "Do you suppose they've improved it?"

  "It's the tea—and the sugar, as I said."

  "I believe you're right," said Jim. "You certainly put in a hearty amount of both. We should offer some of this combination to Kineteté, someday—or even Carolinus. Make them relax."

  He went on watching her as she continued doing something further about the fireplace cooking apparatus. It was a wonderfully comfortable feeling, just sitting, sipping at his cup and watching her; but when she turned more toward him to do something else and he got a full glimpse of her face, he noticed for the first time that she was looking tired and drawn.

  Why hadn't he seen it when he first got here? Too full of his own adventures, of course. Angie had said he was in overdrive, and indeed he had been. But the unnatural brilliance of that rare period was fading in him now. The clearheadedness was still with him, but the unnatural energy was fading.

  Into its place, as he watched her, a flood of empathy—of feeling how it must be for her here at Malencontri when he was away—was filling him. Running the castle twenty-four hours a day—and ready always to fight to defend it with what meager forces were at her disposal: the handful of experienced and trained men-at-arms, and the ordinary servants; who were brave enough and strong enough (men and women both) to stand around the curtain wall with spears and push scaling ladders back down, with the attackers already climbing them. But that was about all—and they were equally likely to lose their heads and want to rush out at the first fake retreat of the attackers.

  He had not worried about her while he had been gone, immersed in the activity of each moment—had hardly thought of her at all except to feel a sense of satisfaction over the fact that Malencontri was in good hands. But she would have worried about him, imagined him in one dangerous situation after another, fretted when time went by and she had not had any word from him—and when at last he returned, said nothing at all about these things; only listened to his endless talk about what he had said and done.

  A heavy sense of guilt oppressed Jim. It was true—he had admitted it to himself. Like it or not, he was still a prisoner of the future time in which he had been raised.

  Unthinkingly, he was still unceasingly searching for a scientific and technological order to impose on this world of magic, Naturals, Forces, and a late medieval people to whom the words he knew had different values. Duly meant far more to them than it did to him, death far less. They were prepared to put their personal survival on the line every day in the line of duty, or to face up to any personal challenge. They did not expect a nonviolent death, and took it for granted that their moment of dying, natural or not, would probably be unpleasant.

  So much for him. Angie, likewise, would be naturally reaching almost unthinkingly for a permanent and secure life, with Robert, their young ward, growing up into an ordered world where he could live a long and happy life.

  Perhaps, one day, all these illusions from six hundred years later on would blow up in their faces—

  "—What was I just talking about?" he asked hastily, for Angie was now turning back toward the bed and he did not want her to guess how his thoughts had been running.

  There was a slight moment's frowning hesitation as she paused in swinging the kettle arm out of the fire.

  "The little animals, I think," she said. "And how they impressed you, fighting alongside the Knights, and the way you said it made me feel for them, too."

  "I think that's probably the one memory that'll stick with me the longest—unless it's the pain King Pellinore's feeling at losing his two sons just after he'd found them again; and his feeling he has to keep it locked inside him. But that's the way things are here—have always been, probably, for some in our time, too."

  "Yes," said Angie, "but he's doing something to himself he's chosen to do. The one I feel for is his friend."

  "His friend? What friend?"

  "The only close friend he's got, apparently—since he insists on living inside a set of rules t
ighter than sleeping in his armor—the friend he's had for centuries, and who's got no choice now but to suffer silently with him since that's the way Pellinore's picked to bear it—the Questing Beast!"

  Angle's tongue had run away with her again. Well, I said it, she told herself. I probably shouldn't have, but I did.

  Meanwhile, Jim was feeling as if he had run into a brick wall.

  "Oh, I don't think the QB takes it that hard," he said. "He feels for Pellinore all right, but—"

  "Pellinore made the choice," said Angie, "but it's your QB who's stuck with it. He can't help Pellinore, and he can't help himself from suffering for his friend—and he is suffering, I know he is—but with no choice. Nothing he can do to help and no hope of helping—in silence."

  "Oh, I think you underestimate the QB," said Jim. "He's a Lord of Lyonesse, after all. He'll have friends down there he can talk to."

  "Who? Merlin?"

  "Well, maybe not Merlin. Pellinore losing his sons is something happening in the present, and Merlin avoids the present to concentrate on the whole sweep of past and future—"

  "The trees?"

  "Well, no, I don't suppose the trees, either. Their way of looking at things—"

  "Who, then? You talk about him as if he was human as we are. But he's an animal, the only one of his kind—you told me tonight he even reminded you of that when you went with him to talk to the other animals. The only kin or family he has is Pellinore."

  "I can't explain it," said Jim, driven into a corner at last. "But if you knew him, I think you'd feel differently."

  Angie stared at him.

  "Could you bring him here—the way Kineteté brought you all back? Magically, I mean—so I could meet him?"