The Giants' Dance

by Robert Carter

  ‘That’s right enough.’

  ‘It’s said that in Trinovant the Sightless Ones are offering large loans. They lend only to lords, so what does that tell you?’ Morann’s eyes twinkled. ‘If lords are borrowing gold, it’s for only one purpose.’

  Will laced his fingers together, stretched and yawned. ‘They’ll spend gold enough on the feeding and equipping of soldiers, but it’s a risk they care to take. They go to war in hope to gain the lands held by their enemies.’

  The large green stone in Morann’s ring seemed to glow with crystal fire, and his voice became passionate. ‘I tell you, Willand, the queen has spent most of the past four years trying every way to undermine Duke Richard’s rule as Lord Protector. If he’s stopped taking Master Gwydion’s good advice there’ll be a clash soon. That’s why I must be on my way tomorrow.’

  ‘Not you too?’ Will’s spirit rebelled at the idea. ‘Am I to wait here all alone and do nothing?’

  ‘It can’t be helped. Master Gwydion asked me to go to Trinovant. I’m to do what I can to steady events. I could hardly refuse him, so I’ve agreed to speak to some friends I know there. They are people of influence who owe me a small debt of gratitude and are willing to pay it – which is the best kind of friend a man can have.’

  ‘What will these friends do?’

  ‘Tell me how things truly stand at court. It’s rumoured that the king’s latest insanity is ended. Perhaps it was a natural brain fever, but poison cannot be ruled out, and Master Gwydion suspects that the queen has arranged for spells to be cast upon his mind to make him appear well again.’

  ‘She’s done that kind of thing before, and that was at Maskull’s prompting.’

  ‘These days Master Gwydion sees the sorcerer’s hand in everything.’

  Will took the remark without comment and thought to console himself with a slice of cheese. He reached out for Morann’s knife, which was handy, but when he came to cut the cheese the blade would not enter.

  ‘Either this cheese is a lot older than I thought,’ Will said, frowning at the knife, ‘or your steel has lost its edge.’

  Morann laughed. ‘Do not worry yourself. Being a knife-grinder I’m never far from a whetstone.’

  Will tried again, but looked up, seeing the cheese rind was untouched. ‘What’s wrong with it?’

  ‘Nothing’s wrong with it. What you have in your hand is the second most precious item that I have ever clapped eyes upon.’

  ‘This old knife?’

  ‘It’s an old knife, surely, but not any old knife. This knife has been sharpened on the Whetstone of Tudwal, which is one of the spoils that was brought forth from Annuin by Great Arthur of old.’

  Will’s interest deepened. ‘Master Gwydion has spoken many times of prophecies that concern Great Arthur, but he’s never told me much.’

  Morann sat back in his chair and began to sing,

  ‘Where is the man who is mightier?

  The four winds tell it not!

  When greater the treasures that were taken?

  Won in war and fair fight.

  How bright was the blessing

  Brought upon Albion?

  Whose land now shall be the Wasteland?

  Before Great Arthur led,

  the Cauldron swirled…

  Before Great Arthur sailed,

  the Sword smote…

  Before Great Arthur entered,

  the Staff upheld…

  Before Great Arthur’s coming,

  the Star shone…

  ‘Aye, Willand. In those early days the Hallows were bound, blind and in darkness all, down in Annuin, in the Realm Below.

  ‘The spoils were brought out by Arthur, upon his ship,’ he said as if half remembering. ‘Out from a sea cave in the north. The Cave of Finglas, which was then a mouth into the Realm Below…

  ‘Many adventurers sailed with Great Arthur aboard the ship Prydwen. Bards, warriors and harpers – great men of old, they were! Among them, the famous Wordmaster Taliesin, who was one of seven who survived to tell the tale. He wrought a great poem about it called “The Breaking of the Dark”. Much went missing from the Black Book in the days when giants ruled the land of Albion, yet there was enough of it remaining for it to speak of a promise to be redeemed – a king shall come, a king whose forewarning sign shall be the drawing forth of a sword from a stone.’ And Morann sang again,

  ‘Child of magical union,

  Hidden among hunters, weaned upon warriors.

  Brave son of a poisoned father,

  Sent to the city, tried at the tourney.

  A king of tender years,

  Sired by a sovereign, but made by Merlyn,

  Drew he forth Branstock,

  Great Arthur, the once and future king…’

  The loremaster’s eyes softened, and he smiled. ‘So you see, Willand, you are not the only one to have been named in the Black Book. Master Gwydion is there too, when Master Merlyn was his name.’

  Will tried to smile back. ‘It’s an uncomfortable feeling sometimes knowing that whatever path you choose, the outcome has long been decided.’

  ‘Don’t think that! Master Gwydion did not mean that when he said your life was hardly your own, only that you were mantled with duties and responsibilities that are heavier than those of most men. But your choices have always been free. It’s not the fulfilment of prophecies that matters, so much as the manner in which they are fulfilled. That’s where final outcomes are decided. Consider the next fragment of the Black Book in which we hear of Great Arthur’s passing, there by the lakeshore of Llyn Llydaw. He made another promise without fear or faltering, one that was to last a thousand years. The verses tell it thus:

  ‘The worth of my life, such that it be,

  Has chained the future to a fateful turn.

  When comes the final catastrophe,

  Then, only then, shall I return!’

  ‘When rises the greatest need I shall come again…’ Will whispered in the true tongue.

  ‘Those were your words. And what turbulent times have we seen since the overrunning of the Realm by the Easterlings. Though none have been worse than those that are upon us now. I will say it straightly, this is the final catastrophe.’

  ‘The once and future king did not come to save us from the Conquest.’

  ‘Perhaps the arrival of Gillan might have seemed to warrant it, but in the end the Phantarch, Semias, reached an understanding with the Conqueror and we saw that his invasion was not the ending of the world such as we had feared. That was near four hundred years ago.’

  ‘How long is it since Arthur fought his last fight at Camlan?’

  ‘I think you already know the answer to that – near a thousand. So we come to you, Will, and the last pitiful fragments of the Black Book that Master Gwydion has cherished in a secret place down so many generations. This also seems to speak of a king, though no one can be certain. One who is “…a True King, born of Strife, born of Calamity, born at Beltane in the Twentieth Year, when the beams of Eluned are strongest at the ending of the world”.’

  ‘The ending of the world?’ Will felt the shock of the idea. ‘I was born in a twentieth year…’

  ‘Aye, in the twentieth year of the reign of King Hal. And on the night of the full moon. And it was said that you would deny yourself thrice, and so you did.’

  ‘And “One being made two”?’ Will said, looking up suddenly from the strange knife that lay upon the table. ‘What does that mean?’

  ‘It too seems to be a part of the prophecy.’ Morann looked away. ‘As also is the suggestion that “two shall be made one”.’

  Will straightened. ‘Then it was written all along that the Doomstone would mend itself!’

  ‘That could be one interpretation.’

  Morann reached out to take his blade but Will stayed his hand. ‘You said this had been sharpened on the Whetstone of Tudwal. So what if it was?’

  ‘Ah, well, you see, a blade so sharpened will deal only a lethal
blow, or no blow at all.’

  Will quickly put the knife down.

  ‘Morann, if you’re leaving tomorrow, may I ask a favour of you tonight? Could you go to Trinovant by way of Nether Norton? I don’t know of another messenger who could find his way into the Vale.’

  ‘You may consider it done.’

  CHAPTER FIVE

  MAGICIAN, HEAL THYSELF!

  When Will woke the next day at first light, he found that Morann had already left. He sat down at a small oak table and, while he waited for breakfast, took out the little red fish from his pouch. It was so like his own green fish that there could be no doubt that it had come from the same place. And as Gwydion always reminded him, a famous rede said there was no such thing as a coincidence. But what the meaning might be in the fish was far from clear. As he turned it over in his fingers he wondered why he had not shown it to Gwydion, or to Morann, who was surely the best person to give an opinion. He had just put it in his pouch and forgotten about it. Or had he?

  Delicious smells wafted in from the kitchens and soon the Plough began to fill with Eiton’s harvesters. Will, who was sitting alone in the corner, saw how they first noticed him then touched their foreheads and shook him by the hand as they filed in.

  ‘Morning. Morning…’

  Will breathed deep. He seemed to have lost his appetite, and took a little oatmeal. When he had finished it he took up the red fish and studied it again, while its beady little green eye studied him. It was so like his own talisman, yet the comfort he had always got from the green fish did not come from this one.

  Now, as he looked up, he saw the harvesters holding out their sickles towards him.

  ‘Thank you, Master,’ the nearest of them said.

  ‘What?’

  ‘For your blessings upon our trade tools.’

  He looked back at the man blankly, then he saw that his quarterstaff was propped up behind him and he realized with a bump what the men had taken him for.

  They think I’m a wizard, he thought, smiling. A wizard! Would you believe it?

  The men would not leave until he had touched each of their sickles in turn and muttered the name of it in the true tongue.

  As the last of the harvesters left, a young mother came to him and asked to have a blessing laid on her child.

  ‘A blessing? Well, I don’t think I—’

  ‘Please. Just a good word for the babe, Master,’ she said. ‘To keep the horse flies off her while I ties up the corn stooks. See?’

  ‘You want me to put a good word on the baby?’ Will asked doubtfully. He looked across the room and saw Dimmet watching with folded arms. Will inclined his head, then shrugged. ‘Here. Give him to me. What’s his name?’

  ‘Rosy,’ said the child’s mother.

  ‘Oh, yes. Yes…of course.’

  Will made a sign on the babe’s forehead, while muttering a spell of general protection against insects. He realized he couldn’t remember the true name for horse flies, so he protected her from wasps and creepy-crafties of all kinds, then he handed the child back.

  ‘She’ll be fine in the fields, but make sure she stays out of the sun, won’t you?’

  ‘Thank you, Master,’ the woman said and went away.

  But no sooner had she gone than a toothless old woman appeared. She had with her a girl of five or six. When Will looked up the old woman said nothing, but the child smiled the most astonishing smile. She had no more teeth than the old woman, and was also cross-eyed.

  ‘Can I…help?’ Will said at last.

  ‘Begging your pardon, Master,’ the old woman said. ‘I brung the daughter’s daughter when I heard you was here.’

  Will waited, but when nothing more came from the old woman except an expectant look, he said, ‘What I mean is…is there something I can do for you?’

  He watched as the old woman shuffled and then said something to the child, pointing to Will’s staff. Straight away the child put her hands to her mouth and grinned shyly, then she darted forward to touch the staff.

  ‘Hoy! What’s this?’ Will asked. ‘What did you just tell her? That’s no wizard’s staff.’

  The old woman looked suddenly cast down and began to beg piteously. ‘Is there nothing can be done for the poor little one, Master?’

  ‘What’s your name?’ Will asked the girl.

  ‘Thithwin.’

  ‘Thithwin. What a very nice name.’

  ‘It’s Siswin,’ said the old woman. ‘I’m africkened she’ll never get a husband looking like she do, Master.’

  ‘Surely it’s a mite early to be thinking of husbands for…ah, Siswin,’ Will said frowning. He was uncomfortable discussing the child’s looks in her hearing.

  ‘Ain’t there nothing at all can be done against plug ugliness, Master?’

  ‘Just…wait a moment.’

  He thought back to his studies and knew there was something that could be done, if only it was to make the child believe that she was beautiful. According to the magic book Gwydion had given him that usually did the trick, for children had a way of growing into what they thought they wanted to be most of the time.

  He took the girl’s shoulders in both hands, steadying her before him. Then he brushed back the hair from her face with his thumbs and put a pinch of salt on top of her head, after which he muttered a spell that was used to untangle knots.

  ‘Look at this finger with this eye, and that finger with that eye,’ he said holding up two fingers before her. Then he slowly moved his two fingers apart and muttered a ‘let it be’ spell.

  ‘You are a very pretty girl, do you know that?’ he said solemnly, and the girl nodded.

  ‘Now will you make my teeth grow, pleeth?’ she said.

  ‘Don’t worry about them. They’ll grow out in their own good time. They always do.’

  Will waited for them to leave and allow him to finish his breakfast in peace, but they did not move.

  ‘And what about grandmammy? Will her teeth grow out ath well?’

  Will spread his hands in regret. ‘Now that I can’t promise.’

  ‘Say “thank you” to the Master,’ the old woman said.

  ‘Thank you, Mathter.’

  When they had gone Will finished his meal then, alerted by a buzz of voices, he got up to look along the passageway. There was a knot of people at the door of the inn, and all of them were marvelling at the improvement in the girl’s eyes. Dimmet was foremost among them, his voice booming.

  Will spoke to Dimmet the moment he came in. ‘What did you tell them?’

  ‘Oh, ‘twern’t me. Word has just got about.’

  ‘What word?’

  ‘Why, that there’s a wizard in the district.’

  Will tried to lower his voice. ‘But I’m not a wizard.’

  ‘You could have fooled me about that. That was as pretty a piece of healing as what ever I’ve seen. And I’ve seen a fair few healers in my time, genuine as well as the other sort.’

  ‘But that was just a little helper magic.’

  ‘Well, that’s it! Folks’ll walk for days to have a touch of magic. Don’t you know that? Many a time when Master Gwydion’s come here there’s been a crowd of folk started to gather outside. One time there was a line stretched halfway up to Lawn Hill. That’s why he don’t never stop in a place for too long.’ Dimmet grinned. ‘I expect he asked you to look after business for him for a day or two, did he? Save him the bother?’

  ‘What?’ Will said, aghast.

  ‘You’re welcome to stay here as long as you like, Willand, you know that!’ Dimmet winked. ‘I expect I can handle all the extra customers. And there’s generally a powerful thirst on folk who’ve walked a half dozen leagues or more on a summer’s day in search of a cure.’

  Just then Duffred put his head in. ‘There’s a man out here says can he bring his cow in to see the wizard?’

  ‘No, he cannot!’ Dimmet said and marched off down the passageway.

  ‘Where’re you going?’ Will called after
him. ‘Duffred, where’s your father gone?’

  But Duffred only grinned and said, ‘He’s found a mare’s nest and he’s gone to laugh at the eggs. What do you think? You’d better come out here before they start breaking the door down.’

  Will groaned, and resigned himself to a long day.

  A clamour began as he came to the alehouse door.

  ‘One at a time!’ he said. ‘Please!’

  Duffred and two of his father’s serving men came out and marshalled the folk into a line, saying that if they did not stand quietly and in good order the wizard would not see anybody.

  ‘What did you say that for?’ Will hissed as Duffred went back inside.

  ‘Eh?’

  ‘What did you call me a wizard for?’

  ‘Oh, they don’t know no different. Besides, you are a wizard to us.’ And Duffred went off whistling.

  When noon came, Will hardly stopped to eat. He had not bothered to count but he supposed that over a hundred folk had gone away happier than when they had arrived. He helped them over everything from bunions and hens that refused to lay to pig-bitten fingers and a troublesome toothache. But no matter how hard he listened, or how many signs he placed on heads, still more folk presented themselves.

  Throughout the afternoon it seemed that two hopefuls arrived for every one who went away, and as the heat of the day began to mount, Will began to wonder how many folk there were left in this part of the Realm. The promise he had made to Gwydion to lie low had somehow failed without any intention on his part, and that was worrying. If I keep on like this, he thought, someone nasty is bound to hear of me and be drawn here – if only to have a cure for their boils.

  ‘I don’t want to disappoint anyone,’ he told Dimmet at last as the innkeeper brought him out another tankard of cider. ‘They come here with such faith in me. But there’s got to be a limit. I’ll have to call it a day when the sun does the same.’

  ‘You’ll never get through this lot by sundown!’

  ‘I’ll have to. It’s necessary to transpose spells when they’re cast at night. And of that art I know very little.’

  The end of the line was still a long way down the road, and only when Will refused to see another person did Dimmet send Duffred along to guard the end so that newly arriving folk could be sent away.