The Hallowed Isle Book One

by Diana L. Paxson

  “The stars are like the watchfires of a great host encamped in the heavens,” said Uthir. “Will those spirit warriors come to help us in our need?”

  “They will come if I call them. You must keep silence now, no matter what you see or hear.” Merlin drew from his pouch a handful of herbs and sprinkled them in a protective circle around the princes. Then, chanting softly, he paced sunwise around the henge. As he reached each stone, he saluted it, and within the lichened rock he seemed to see the beginnings of an answering glow. The henge was awakening.

  He stripped off his own clothing, laid his wolfskin on the ground halfway between the two pairs of trilithons, and sat cross-legged on the hide. He gazed upward, watching as the great round of the sky wheeled towards the sacred hour, and in the moment when the stars stood still in mid-heaven, the spirit awakened within him and he began to sing.

  Bright-shining stars, brilliant above,

  As fires of foemen burn below,

  Silent, you shall tell your story;

  Stones shall sing histories. . . .

  He remembered that night he had spent in the barrow with the smith when he was a child. Then the visions had come uncontrolled and unexpected. Now he was a man in the fullness of his power, and he called them. He sang, and slowly the shining shapes began to come forth from the mounds.

  He heard the rhythmic chanting of many voices as men strained to pull the massive blocks over the ground. Stone by stone, the circle was completed. He saw the blood of bulls poured out to bless them; he saw kings with gold upon their shoulders, and queens with gold twined in their curling hair. Season by season he saw the ceremonies; the inaugurations and burials and the foot races and chariot races around the mounds.

  All these things he saw; these things he sang, and as the stars began to pale with the approach of dawn, he summoned the spirits.

  “You who have loved this land, defend it from those who would destroy. You whose bones have become this earth, defend it from the death-bringers. You who have dwelt here in a time before time, welcome the spirits who are newly come to your realm!”

  The glow from the stones grew brighter, raying out across the plain. Where it fell, transparent figures rose from the earth, more and more of them with every moment. As the wind lifts the leaves, his song moved them toward the new mound. In the east the sky grew bright with the approach of dawn. The fires were veiled by an opalescent cloud, swirling ever more swiftly until the earth of the barrow opened and the spirits of the newly dead burst free.

  In that instant the burning edge of the sun rimmed the horizon. Merlin heard a gasp of awe from behind him; then he blinked at the explosion of radiance above the mound. The sun lifted free of earth’s shadow and light flamed in a burning path from the mound across the grass to flare from the stones of the henge.

  The living and the dead and the earth itself joined in a great shout of praise. Merlin felt his spirit reft away in a timeless moment of unity. Then he fell back into his body, and sat up, blinking at the morning light of Samhain Day.

  “Their sacrifice has been accepted,” said a voice behind him. “They are one with the land.”

  It was Aurelianus, his face still radiant with awe. He looked younger than Merlin had yet seen him, but fragile, as if the spirit within him burned too fiercely for his flesh to bear. He knew then that the emperor would not live long. Uthir stood beside him, steadying his elbow.

  This was the king that he would serve, thought Merlin, until the time for the Defender should come.

  “They would ask no greater honor,” said Uthir, “nor would I.”

  From that day, Merlin rode with Uthir’s band. While Aurelianus traveled back to Venta to direct the defense of Britannia along the new frontier, his brother marched toward Demetia. While the combrogi had been focused on defending their eastern territories, the Picts and Scotii—the ancient enemy—took advantage of the situation to renew their raiding. Their numbers were reinforced by a band of Saxons led by Pascentius, who had been beaten off by Amlodius the year before, and had taken refuge in Eriu.

  For a time, the heavens themselves seemed to be fighting on the side of their foes, for clouds rolled in from the west, washing out tracks and slowing the combrogi army. Uthir rallied them with cheerful obscenities and said that the storms had been sent by God to pin the enemy down until they could catch up with him. He was, observed Merlin, a good commander, willing to listen to advice when there was time and decisive when there was not. He asked his men to endure no hardship that he himself did not share.

  As the campaign continued, Merlin grew to know the other commanders as well, Caius Turpilius, whose family had a prosperous estate near Venta Silurum and still held to the old Roman ways; Eldaul of Glevum the younger, a distant cousin of Vitalinus who always sought the most dangerous fighting in an attempt to avenge his father, and Gorlosius of the Cornovii, eldest son and heir of Gerontius, who ruled Dumnonia.

  Igierne’s husband.

  Merlin studied him more closely than the others, and found little to like, though there was much to admire. He too fought fiercely, though it seemed sometimes that his ruthlessness came from outrage that anyone would dare to oppose him. If ever Merlin had thought of offering Igierne more than a kinsman’s love, recognition of his own origins would have prevented it, but it galled him to think of her bound to this arrogant princeling, when she was herself the equal of a queen.

  They had marched all the way through Demetia and were pushing up the coast toward Guenet before the clouds began to break up and they saw the naked heavens once more.

  When they made camp that evening, the only remains of the storm were a few tattered banners of flame across the sky. Merlin—whose usual reaction to rain was to bundle his leather clothing into a chest and go clad only in the twist of linen about his loins—was salving a sore where the wet saddle blanket had galled his pony, when he heard a shout. It was not the standard alarm for an approaching enemy. He turned and saw men pointing at the heavens.

  Half these men had been shepherds before the wars. Even the farmers among them were accustomed to tell the seasons by searching the skies. Merlin had been making regular observations since Maugantius began to teach him when he was ten years old. It took no more than a moment for him to see what they were looking at—a brilliant point of light in the southeast where there had been no star before. For an hour it was visible in the heavens, then it sank behind the trees.

  The next night it was brighter still, and they could see a blur of light behind it. It was a comet, Merlin told them, such as often foretold events of great import. But it was still rising. They must wait until it reached full magnitude before he could attempt to discover what it might mean.

  The three nights that followed were overcast. The combrogi pushed northward, eager to come to grips with the foe. Smoke still rose from the burned timbers of the looted farmsteads they were passing now. The enemy army could not be far away.

  The next day a wind came up that tossed the treetops and scoured the clouds from the sky. They made camp early that evening, choosing a rise with a clear view to the south. Merlin put on a good tunic of white wool that Aurelianus had given him; it made no difference to the magic, but to look like a druid would inspire confidence. By now, he himself was as anxious to know the comet’s meaning as any of the men. But mingled with his anticipation was fear.

  As daylight faded the tension grew. Merlin felt their apprehension as a pressure against his awareness and braced his mind against it. His discomfort lessened, but so did his ability to perceive the subtle currents of the universe. Frowning, he chose a good vantage point on the hill and drew the circle of herbs around him. Not even Uthir would dare to cross it, and as he closed it he felt the strain ease.

  He took his place upon the wolfhide, breathing deeply and regularly and rooting his soul in the earth below. He sensed the delicate branchings of power that nourished the land; but they were only tributaries, not a mighty river such as he had tapped at the Giant’s Dance.
Yet even these tiny channels were troubled. Some change was coming, and soon.

  The blue of the sky deepened to a luminous cobalt. The first stars gleamed suddenly, but where had the comet gone? A murmur from the men brought his attention upward and he realized that it was traveling more quickly than he had expected, for it was already high. Merlin lay back, gazing upward and, anchored by his link to the earth, allowed his spirit to soar.

  The head of the comet blazed more brightly than Venus when she is the morning star, and its tail seemed to stretch halfway across the sky. Transfixed by its beauty, it took Merlin a little while to realize that someone was calling him.

  “Prophet, tell me—” Uthir’s voice was thin with strain, “what is this wild star?”

  Already half-tranced, Merlin responded to the note of command as a horse obeys the rein. Awareness of the outer world faded; he stared up at the comet until it filled his vision. Its head had seemed a ball of light, but now it was pulsing wildly, and suddenly it was the head of a dragon. Distantly he heard his own voice reporting what he saw.

  There was a mutter of awe from the men around him. Then the prince spoke again.

  “Such marvels don’t come by chance. What does this one mean?”

  At the question, knowledge cascaded into conscious awareness with an intensity that brought Merlin upright, tears welling in his eyes.

  “Woe and sorrow,” he whispered, “woe and weeping for you, my lord, and for all Britannia. Your brother is dead. The noble prince is gone, and the people left without their leader.” Blindly he turned toward Uthir and stretched out his hand. “Arise, son of Ambrosius, and hasten to strike your foe. Go now, while the head of the Dragon rules the sky and promises you victory. Destroy your enemy and take Britannia into your keeping.”

  He gazed upward once more and saw the mouth of the Dragon opening, and from its jaws blazed a tongue of fire. “You will have victory!” he shouted suddenly, “and a son greater even than his father who will save his people and win fame unending!”

  Now others were clamoring, asking how Aurelianus had died, where the enemy was, what they should do. Merlin shook his head, striving to hear the voice that spoke within.

  “You shall find your foes camped on the shore where the Isle of the Dead guards the bay—” he whispered. “March now, and take them as they are sleeping. You must move swiftly, for they mean to sail on the morning tide!”

  They marched through the night, and the Dragon blazed above them, showing the way. And just as it was growing ghostly with the approach of dawn, the combrogi army wound down from the hills above Madoc’s Bay and saw the enemy encampment sprawled across the sands below. They had sent out scouts, and every man knew what to expect and what he must do.

  Except for Merlin. Uthir had made it quite clear that he must not risk himself. In any case he had never learned how men fought with weapons of iron, and he had been taught that to use his other gifts to take life would destroy both those gifts, and him. He waited on the brow of the hill, in the shelter of a thornbush. To an enemy passing by he would have been invisible, but his prophecy had brought these men to battle; he owed it to them to watch them fight.

  The raiders had thought themselves safe. But they were not stupid. As Uthir’s force came sweeping down the hill, guards gave the alarm, and men burst from their rude shelters or struggled free from the cloaks in which they had wrapped themselves to sleep, weapons in hand. Uthir had divided his men into three wings; one to strike from each side and the third to circle round to the shore. In such confusion the horses gave little advantage. After the first wild ride through the encampment, stabbing with lance and spear, most of the riders slid off their mounts and began to lay about them with their swords.

  Surprise had evened the odds, but the enemy fought well, and all the more so when the men Uthir had delegated to the task waded out with torches and fired the vessels waiting to carry them away. Most of the plunder had already been loaded into them. Deprived of both escape and reward, the enemy had little to lose, but Uthir was determined that this lot of raiders would not return another day.

  The prince had kept his mount. From the hill, Merlin marked him, reining the bay mare in tight circles, stabbing with his lance as if each man he faced was responsible for Aurelianus’s loss. It was one way to deal with grief, or at least to put off facing it. The true pain would come later on.

  Gorlosius was still mounted as well, on a wiry stallion with a coat as black as his own hair. What he might lack in brute strength he made up in quickness. No sooner had an enemy focused on him than he was gone. Eldaul, on the other hand, was too big a man for most horses. He waded into battle with a sword in each hand, and when one blade shattered, replaced it with an axe he had won from a foe. As he fought his way through the camp the bodies piled up behind him like earth thrown up by the plough.

  Then the men who had attacked the ships regrouped at the water’s edge and drove those who were trying to escape that way back onto the attackers’ swords. The incoming tide ran red above the bloodstained sands.

  After that it was soon over. Merlin made his way down the hill. The Frisian, Pascentius, had been killed, and the Irish chieftain, Gillomanus, was captured. But in the battle his leg had been half severed. Even if he were ransomed, he would fight no more against Britannia. Most of the other prisoners were put to the sword.

  Merlin moved among their own wounded, cleaning and binding the dreadful gashes, stitching when there was need. Most of these men were scarred already, and they were as healthy as their own ponies. There was good reason to hope they would heal, though he had known a tiny scratch to bring death to a man in his prime. He wondered how Aurelianus had died—for after finding the enemy where he had predicted, he no longer doubted that the first part of his vision was also true. Had some disease stricken the emperor, or had his heart given out at last?

  Angry voices roused him from his absorption. He finished securing a bandage and got to his feet. One voice was that of Uthir, clipped and low. The other, louder, belonged to Gorlosius.

  “All that those wretches had stolen was on those ships, and you burned them!” exclaimed the Cornovian.

  “Would you rather they escaped with it?” Uthir was hanging onto his temper surprisingly well.

  “We would have prevented that—” Gorlosius gestured toward the bodies being dragged towards the pyre.

  “Perhaps. I had to be sure.”

  “We should have returned that wealth to its owners, or used it to feed our forces if the owners could not be found. We all bled for this—we deserve a share in the reward!”

  “Do you?” Uthir’s voice sharpened. “Dumnonia has suffered least of all. If the rest of us can do without, you can afford it as well!”

  “Don’t use that tone with me!” exclaimed Gorlosius. “You have only the word of this sorcerer that the emperor is dead and yet you are claiming his mantle. Do you think because you’re his brother it will automatically go to you? The new High King must be elected from among all the princes when that time comes.”

  “And so he will be.” Uthir’s voice shook with the effort he was making to retain control. “But until we return to Venta, the command of this army is mine, and you will obey!”

  They took the road south as soon as their wounded could travel. By the time they reached Demetia the messengers had found them. Aurelianus was dead indeed—of illness, said some, while others whispered of poison, though no culprit could be found. The comet had been seen all over the land, and its meaning widely disputed. But by that time, one of Uthir’s men had made a banner bearing a red dragon, its head haloed in light. Pendragon, “Dragonhead,” they hailed him, and the word ran ahead of them so that by the time they reached Venta Belgarum, the whole countryside was calling him by that name.

  And it was as Uthir Pendragon that the princes of Britannia hailed him as their High King.

  VII

  A HERITAGE OF POWER

  A.D. 461

  THE HOUSE OF THE HIGH PRIESTESS
SMELLED OF SICKNESS. AFTER THE fresh breeze off the lake, it was almost overpowering. Igierne stopped short in the entry, summoning her self-control, and little Morgause bumped into her. The message had said that Argantel was ill and wanted her, but the figure in the bed seemed shrunken, and even the lamplight could not lend a healthy color to her skin. The old woman who sat by her stood up and motioned to them to enter; Igierne recognized Ebrdila, who had served as Argantel’s deputy when the High Priestess was away.

  Igierne grasped the child’s shoulder, holding her tightly, and Morgause, who could never bear to be restrained, struggled to get free.

  “Your grandmother is resting, little one—” With an effort she kept her voice steady. “Why don’t you run down to the shore to play?”

  She felt the girl shake her head. “I want to kiss her.”

  Igierne looked down at Morgause’s ruddy curls with the exasperation her daughter so often aroused in her. This was not how she wished the child to remember her grandmother, but Morgause was almost six, old enough to face the reality of death. With a sigh she released her grip, and followed her inside.

  “Mother—”

  Argantel’s eyelids quivered. For a moment she gazed unseeing, then the blue eyes focused and she smiled. Her hair had just begun to gray before Amlodius died; it was white now. Igierne swallowed. Her parents had always been so matter-of-fact about their marriage. Who would have thought that losing her husband would blight Argantel’s autumnal splendor?

  “You came . . . and the little one too. . . . It is well that you had a daughter first . . . to inherit . . . the trust.”

  “I’m not ready,” said Igierne.

  “Neither was I. . . . Your path lies still in the world . . .” Argantel reached out and grasped her daughter’s hand. “You must go back, and be Tigernissa. But a time will come when you will return to be the Lady of the Lake on this Isle. And this one . . . shall rule after you. . . .” She reached out to the child.