Named of the Dragon

by Susanna Kearsley

  "Poor thing," James said, putting the Merc into gear. "It must be murder having migraines."

  Not trusting my voice to reply, I turned my head and watched the passing street. The stone wall in front of Gar-eth's pink cottage was ablaze with cotoneaster, bright red berries thickly sprayed against the grey. Upstairs, one of the casement windows stood open, and a cheerful curl of coal smoke drifted upwards from the chimney. He was in the house and waiting for her. Bridget, I felt sure, would find some way to keep the rendezvous, Dilys or no Dilys. Bridget, I'd learned, thrived on obstacles.

  Christopher, shifting his legs in the backseat, remarked that an afternoon with Dilys was more likely to produce a headache than to cure one. "She simply will not stop talking. And if I hear one more word about her bloody son ..."

  "Ah yes." James grinned. "Cardiff's answer to Louis Pasteur."

  "It's a bit much for someone who spends his days sorting through vials of semen."

  "You're such a snob," said James.

  Christopher, having bitten his tongue all through Dilys's short visit, had no trouble biting it now. He raised his arms and linked his hands behind his head, attempting to get comfortable.

  I turned, feeling guilty. "Are you sure you don't want to trade seats?"

  "No, I'm fine. I've got plenty of room." More than he'd had yesterday, at any rate. I'd shifted my own seat a few notches forwards. "Besides," he said, "you ought to have the better view—I've seen this all a thousand times."

  I wasn't sure a thousand times would be enough to tire me of the beauty of this landscape. We turned south this time, off the main Pembroke road, and kept to the coast, past a place where the red-tinged cliffs fell sharply away to a long sweeping crescent of pale sandy beach. The view was unexpected, and breathtaking.

  James pulled the car over to let me have a proper look. "This is Freshwater West."

  I looked with new eyes at the rough waves that had picked up the tiny black speck of a surfer and hurled him at the shore. So this, I thought, would be the place where Elen's husband died. Christopher, behind me, read my thoughts.

  "Tony was probably up on those rocks, when it happened," he said, leaning forwards to point. "That's where he and Gareth always used to go."

  There was no one there angling now, thankfully. That would have been too creepy. "Poor Elen." I bit my lip a moment. If either of the brothers was responsible for last night's crisis, they'd hardly admit it. But I couldn't help prodding. "Has anyone seen her this morning? I ought to have checked, to see how she was doing."

  "She seemed fine," said Christopher. "No ill effects."

  James glanced back over his shoulder as he started the car again. "When the devil were you over there?"

  "Before breakfast. She's always up early. I thought I'd pop round and make sure she was all right."

  Spotting an opening, I said, as casually as possible, "It's a pity there isn't a door, you know, linking the houses. Then maybe she wouldn't feel quite so alone."

  "There is one," said James. "But it hasn't been opened in years. I wouldn't think there'd even be a key for it, anymore. That reminds me," he said, "I did look for that key to the tower, you know, like I promised. Seeing you climb all those stairs at die castle reminded me how you had asked to go up. But no luck, I'm afraid."

  "Never mind," I excused him.

  We had dipped down now between the dunes, where the soft russet sand spilled out over the tarmac in heaps and the coarse marram grass bent to the wind, shivering in waves that showed an undercoat of green beneath the gold.

  "They've done a good job with this stretch of the coastline," said Christopher. "It's fairly unspoilt. There were caravans down here at one time, but they've been cleared out. And the dunes are protected—no holiday cottages."

  Which was, I admitted, a rare thing indeed for any stretch of British coastline. The road brought us up for a last look at Freshwater West and the dangerous surf, with a red warning flag flapping high on our right. Then we turned briefly inland, through a small village and round an unusual roundabout with a truncated stone turret set at its centre. I might have asked what it was if we hadn't, at that moment, rolled down and over a bumpity cattle grid. It rattled my fillings, fragmenting my thoughts as I brought my eyes back to the road.

  I couldn't see cattle, but sheep stood at odd tilted angles all over the banks at the sides of the road, blinking down at the car without any real interest. Twice we were forced to slow almost to stopping, to edge past a clog of the creatures. "I think I prefer the tanks to this," said Christopher.

  I turned my head. "I'm sorry?"

  "The tanks," he repeated, nodding out the window as we passed more red flags and a small unmanned guardhouse. "This is all MOD land. We're on the Castlemartin firing range."

  "I see. Should I duck?"

  "Not to worry. They keep it closed off when they're blasting things."

  "Unless, of course," said James, "it's the element of surprise they're after." He glanced over. "Speaking of surprises, I must say that what you did last night was not what I'd expected."

  "Oh?"

  "If I'd left Ivor in that house alone, he would have spent the night helping himself to my brandy and reading my manuscript. Whereas you, from what I can tell, didn't even go into die writing-room."

  Not for want of curiosity, I could have told him. Ivor and I weren't so different on that level. But I did consider trust to be a vital part of my relationships with authors, and the thought of drinking James's brandy never crossed my mind. "And how do you know," I asked him, "that I'm not just good at sneaking into rooms?''

  "Because I'm good at catching people sneaking into rooms."

  Christopher confirmed this. "He used to set some damned clever traps, when we were kids. Hairs in the door-jamb, and that sort of thing. Like James Bond."

  I leaned back with a smile. "Well, I'm glad I behaved myself, then."

  "Perhaps," said James, "you're not so keen to read my manuscript..."

  "I'm longing to read it, of course, but I don't need to read it to know that it's good."

  "Is that a fact?"

  "It is. Everything you write is brilliant," I told him honestly, and was rewarded with a pleased look that informed me I had scored another point. Take that, Ivor Whitcomb, I thought.

  A second cattle grid jolted me out of my self-satisfaction. We were leaving the firing range, from the looks of things. A barracks compound loomed up on our right, its gates guarded by two enormous tanks, guns pointed outwards. After that the hedged road ran without much incident to another roundabout, where a sign informed us that the road to St. Govan's was open.

  I had to endure one final cattle grid before we came out on to a level stretch of vibrant green that ran along the cliff-top, and a long, deserted car park with a dizzying view of the sea. There didn't appear to be anything here that would warrant a car park, except for the view, but I gamely followed Christopher and James as they got out and walked without fear to the edge of the cliff.

  Here a winding set of steps wound downwards through a fissure in the grey, imposing limestone, and between us and the sea below, a steep slate-tiled roof sat angled in among the boulders as though some giant hand at play had wedged it there, a square peg forced into an oddly shaped hole and forgotten.

  "There's a legend," said Christopher, "that the steps to the chapel can't ever be properly counted."

  "Why is that?" I asked.

  "I haven't a clue. But I always get a different number going down than coming up."

  Careful not to lose my footing on the sea-slicked stone, I counted the steps as I followed him down: Fifty-two. Lodging the number away in my memory, I ducked through the open stone doorway and into the chapel proper, blinking to adjust my eyes to the sudden dimness.

  St. Govan, Christopher informed me, had been a sixth-century hermit, and his chapel reflected a hermit's austerity. It was small and high ceilinged, with one tiny window that looked on the sea and an even tinier square hole beside that, above
the piscina. Stone benches had been built into the two side walls, and to my left, beside the rustic stone altar, a half-flight of steps scrambled up to a cleft in the naked rock, lit from above by a pale shaft of daylight.

  It was definitely, as Bridget had promised, my kind of place.

  And in return, as thanks to Bridget, I did my level best to keep the men occupied, taking my time as I poked my way round every nook of the chapel. Not that James really needed occupying. He'd retreated into private thought, showing as little interest here as he had at Pembroke Castle, and leaving it up to his brother to lead me around. My favourite feature proved to be an odd little rock-cleft with strange rib-like markings to show where the saint had supposedly pressed himself into the cliff in an effort to hide from marauders.

  "And the rock opened up," Christopher said, telling the story, "and closed around St. Govan, sealing him inside, and he hid there until his pursuers had gone."

  I touched the damp and time-worn stone. "So these are the marks of his ribs, then."

  "Presumably. Just like a fossil. It's said to change shape to accommodate anyone, no matter how big or how small they are. See?'' he said, fitting himself to the wall. ' 'Now you try it."

  Curving my back to the marble-like smoothness, I closed my eyes tightly and tried to imagine the feeling of being entombed in the cliff-face, surrounded by stone. Something dripped in the darkness. A sigh, like the breath of a man, floated past me. I opened my eyes.

  Christopher watched me, indulgent, hands thrust in his pockets. "There's not much more to see, after this."

  He was clearly suggesting I might want to leave, but knowing that Bridget would want us to stay out till tea-time at least, I tried to extend the tour. Venturing outside the chapel, I spent as much time as I could climbing over the boulders that tumbled down into the sea. It was slow going anyway. The boulders were huge, some as tall as me or taller, and I had to use my hands to climb, and set my feet with care. And then there were the limpets, whole colonies of them, stuck to the rock where the tide had abandoned them, pointy hard shells that I tried to avoid for fear of crushing them underfoot.

  "You needn't bother," said Christopher, stepping firmly to show me. "They're indestructible."

  "Still, it can't be much fun to be trodden on," I said. I didn't go down to the water—I'd always had a healthy respect for the sea, and having just been reminded of how Elen's husband had died, I felt no great desire to go any nearer the waves. Christopher was braver. Picking his way through the limpets, he slipped through a shadowy cleft in the rock—more like a narrow tunnel than a proper cave— and disappeared.

  "He's only gone around the corner," James assured me. "He'll be back."

  He lit a cigarette while we waited. Bending, he plucked something from the edge of a tidal pool, near his feet, and straightened to show me. "Something for Bridget," he said, pocketing the empty limpet shell.

  I smiled. "I don't know why she doesn't like them."

  "They cling. Bridget isn't fond of anything that clings." He exhaled, rather thoughtfully, and watched the wind gather the smoke. "Her last two husbands, I believe, both tried to keep her on the lead. A mistake I intend to avoid." His tone was mild, confiding, as he turned his gaze to mine. "You should know that I'm planning to ask her to marry me."

  "Oh?" I held my smile with an effort, recognizing the recipe for disaster. I could see it now—James proposing, Bridget amusedly turning him down, and me being stuck in the middle of everything. Smashing. "How ... wonderful. When?"

  "Christmas morning. Have you ever agented a husband and wife? No? Then we might be your first."

  I wouldn't hold my breath, I thought. And if James's decision to sign with me depended on Bridget's accepting his ring, I was doomed. All my efforts were wasted. I looked away, watching the spray of the incoming waves on the boulders. "You're sure that Christopher's all right? He's been an age."

  James raised his voice and called his brother. When nothing came back, he pitched his cigarette away and headed down towards the cave himself, to please me. "Won't be a minute," he promised. "He likely can't hear me, because of the waves."

  Left alone, I watched the tidal pool awhile, seeing no real sign of life in the murky green water. The waves crashed again and the shadows shifted at the mouth of the cave, but the man who came out was neither James nor Christopher.

  He was an older man, tall and thin with stooped shoulders and wispy white hair that blew wild in the wind. He was wearing some sort of a dark woolen wrap, like a cape,

  and its tattered edge trailed in the pools on the rocks as he made his way over the boulders towards me. But as odd as he looked, he seemed friendly enough. He stopped a short distance off and nodded a greeting.

  "Hello," I said back. "It's a lovely afternoon, isn't it?"

  But the weather didn't interest him. His eyes on mine were uncommonly wise, sharp as chips of grey granite, and his voice, when he spoke, held a melody hard to describe.

  "Take you care of the boy."

  And with that quite remarkable speech he moved on again, smiling a secret, and vanished round the headland as the sea spat up a violent spray of mist.

  XXIV

  Here are snakes within the grass.

  Alfred, Lord Tennyson, "Merlin and Vivien"

  I saw him, too," said Christopher. "Quite the character. He recited that rhyme for me... you know the one, James. Mother used to say it. The one about the bell."

  "Oh, right." We were passing through the dimness of the chapel, and I could only see the edge of James's smile. "How does that go, again?"

  Christopher, having just heard it afresh, had no trouble remembering. "There is nothing to hope, and nothing to fear, when the wind sounds low on Bosherston Mere," he said, dramatically. " "There is much to fear and little to hope, when unseen hands pull St. Govan's rope. And the magic stones, as the wise know well, promise sorrow and death, like St. Govan's bell.' " And then, to me, he added, "There, you see? I have a memory, too, for poetry."

  "So you do," I congratulated him. "But what, exactly, does your poem mean? There's no bell at the chapel—the bellcote was empty. I looked."

  "There used to be a silver bell, but it was supposedly stolen by pirates, and lost until a sea-nymph brought it back to shore and sealed it for safety in one of the rocks by the water. Tradition says that if you tap the rock, it rings."

  Resisting the impulse to climb down again and experiment, I started up the curve of stone steps after James, counting silently as I went. "Fifty-three," I announced, as I came to the top of the cliff. One more than I'd counted before.

  Christopher, behind me, made it fifty-one. "It never fails."

  So at least one of the legends appeared to be true, I thought—none of us had been able to number the steps of St. Govan's.

  "Where did St. Govan come from?" I asked, as we started across the car park.

  Christopher shrugged. "Nobody knows. He was probably one of the old Celtic monks who came over from Ireland around the same time as St. David, but I always preferred the Arthurian angle."

  "And what might that be?"

  "That St. Govan was really Sir Gawaine."

  "Of the Round Table?" James glanced back. "I thought Sir Launcelot finished him off."

  Christopher shrugged in defence of his argument. ' 'Perhaps it was only a flesh wound."

  "Like something out of Monty Python," I suggested.

  "More like something out of Mother's daft imagination," said James. "She goes all potty over Arthur, always did. She'd have named me Galahad, if Father hadn't put his foot down."

  Christopher admitted that his father's intervention had saved them both the trauma of countless playground fights. "Although I must say that Galahad Swift would have looked smashing on a book jacket."

  "Well, I'm happy being James, thanks all the same. Bad enough that she read us those same bloody stories, over and over."

  I looked at him. "So how did you escape hearing about the prophecies of Merlin?''

&n
bsp; "What?"

  "Escape?" Christopher laughed. "You must be joking. I can practically recite the prophecies. We both can, can't we, James?"

  "My memory, as you're so fond of reminding me, is not as keen as yours."

  We'd reached the car. The conversation died. But I couldn't help feeling uneasy, as I always felt when I suspected someone wasn't being truthful—a sort of sixth sense that I'd learned to rely on after all my years of contract negotiations and dealings with difficult people. Of course, I reasoned, James might not be lying—he might really have forgotten the tales that he'd heard as a child. It happened. But if that were the case, why then hadn't he suggested I ask Christopher about the prophecies, instead of sending me to Gareth?

  James felt my sideways glance, and turned. "Are you bored, yet?"

  "Not a bit."

  "Good, because I thought we might make a short stopover. .."

  His brother knowingly pointed out that it was only half past three. "The pubs are closed."

  "Well, naturally," said James, whipping the Merc round the bends in the village of Bosherston. "But we haven't stopped in yet to say happy Christmas to dear old Aunt Effie, at Stackpole. She always keeps a little something tucked away, for visitors."

  I hadn't stopped to think that James had gone since lunch without a drink. He must be near exploding. I thought I detected a certain urgency in his driving, now, and he did seem unusually focused on the road ahead.

  Again, it was left to Christopher to tell me what sights we were passing.

  "... and if you can bear yet another local legend," he said, leaning forward so his head drew level with my shoulder, "King Arthur's sword, Excalibur, supposedly lies just a stone's throw over there. You'll be able to see better, in a moment."

  I turned to look past James, the way Christopher was pointing, as we turned again along a road with forest to the right of us and a steep field rising to the left. Through the thick screen of trees I could see the flash of sunlight on still water. ·

  "Bosherston Pools," announced Christopher.