Avilion

by Robert Holdstock

  ‘What a keen man you are, old friend. I always admired that in you. Is the blade cleaned?’

  ‘Bright as if it were newly forged.’

  ‘Show me . . .’

  From the look in Gwei’s eyes it was clear that orders had been disobeyed. Gwei pulled the blade from its scabbard. Morthdred’s blood remained, dark and crisp on the metal.

  Gwei said: ‘I want to return his own moment of failure to the failing life when I sever that neck of his. Why wipe away the moment of his wound? Rust on iron! Let the bastard suffer!’

  Arthur struggled to sit up against his own killing pierce. Everything about him now was frail. ‘Gwei: a clean blade, a clean strike. It’s the certainty I want, the certainty of his silence in this life. Clean the blade in the lake. Let the blade shine as it strikes the traitor who brought me to my own end.’

  Gwei withdrew, back to the reeds, back to the dusk-dark water.

  ‘Light a fire,’ Arthur said. ‘Do we have supplies? Food? Enough for a dying feast?’

  ‘Enough for a dying drink,’ said Ethryn, the youngest of the surviving shield men. ‘Food enough for twelve scavengers.’

  ‘Scavenge after I’m gone. Just sing and laugh and wait until the barge comes for me.’

  ‘Barge or boat,’ Emereth reminded him.

  ‘Whatever comes, make sure I’m in my war cloth, and that my face is helmeted, and my hair is tied tightly. Whatever happens, don’t resist it. My friends, your other friends are finding their own way to Avilion. My dream told me the nature of my own transit.’

  Emereth said, ‘We won’t interfere. We’ll drink your health at the funeral games, and the health of Avilion as it welcomes Arthur.’

  ‘Good man.’

  Gwei returned from the lake, his face grim. Arthur said, ‘Have you cleaned the blade?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘No? Why not?’

  Gwei looked around at the others, then at Arthur. ‘Because you’re wrong. If I clean the blade, then the blade is new. We want the blade old; stained; hungry for vengeance. A new blade might seek new blood. It’s old blood you want, and the blood trail. After the strike in the belly of your cousin, the bastard Morthdred, it will be keener for the rust stain. Keener on the scent. The final act, which I shall deliver with pleasure, my friend, will be the harsher and the more final for it. Do you understand what I’m saying?’

  Arthur nodded. ‘You’re right. I see your point. Don’t wash the blade.’

  ‘It makes sense,’ Gwei said.

  ‘I agree,’ Arthur replied. ‘Sometimes what seems right isn’t truly right. If we don’t listen, we don’t understand fully. Listening makes things right. I can trust you to do the final work for me. Like an old man trusting his son, even though we are the same age. And you will keep things right for me.’

  ‘Yes,’ said Gwei. ‘I will.’

  And Emereth added, looking round at the rest of the men. ‘Shall we begin the funeral games? Is it too soon?’

  Yssobel was watching from the tree line, the red side in her beating hard, the green side savouring this edge of worlds, the lake shore, the distance to another world. She had imagined it would be misty. In fact it was clear and vast, more like an ocean than a lake, stretching away to the horizon, a gleam of dusk grey and blue, with the first glimmer of starlight on its breeze-ruffled surface.

  As dusk made shadows of all things that moved, so a shadow moved towards her, one of the companions, a burly, half-armoured man. He walked up to Yssobel’s hiding place, and she drew back into the embrace of the coiled tree roots where she had been lurking, watching.

  The shadow loomed and the man urinated, sighing with relief. For a moment as he tucked himself away he peered into the bosk, as if sensing a presence. It was Bydavere.

  Yssobel practised the death breath, and held it for a long time.

  With a curious sound, a grunt of dismissal, the man turned away and went back to where the war chief now lay on a bier of branches, his face and body armoured. Dressed again in the war cloth, face hidden, arms folded.

  Two of Arthur’s men had slipped back to the battlefield, to the looted baggage train, to the place of the dead and dying. They had joined among the scavengers. They had weapons, and the war chief’s standard, which had been left, broken, halfway down the hill. They stripped the long banner from the shaft of ash and folded it between the silent man’s hands.

  They had also brought flagons of wine.

  As their horses grazed the shoreline, so Arthur’s entourage drank and became drunk. Night fell, and the men fell, curled by the lake, curled in their cloaks; men at the end of days.

  Yssobel slipped out of cover. She shed the armour of Morthdred’s warrior and crept as quietly as possible to where Arthur lay on the bed of branches, enclosed and almost completely hidden behind his mask and cloak. Gwei stirred slightly, mumbled in his sleep, sat up and stared at the lake - a moment of alarm for Yssobel - then flopped back. He seemed to be crying in his dreams. So much had been lost that day.

  For a moment Yssobel considered what she was doing. The lake was still. Stars illuminated its silent waters. The moon was hidden. Avilion, the place of her dreams, lay on the far side of this stretch of water, and she knew that a barge would be coming for the man who lay dead before her.

  Gently, quietly, she eased Arthur from the bier. Step by step she pulled him from the wood frame. Breath by gentle breath she dragged him to the trees.

  No one stirred.

  When she was in cover, she dragged more fiercely, pulled the body deep into the copse.

  By green light she surveyed the calm and handsome features of the man. His face was light with stubble, his hair tied elaborately. She drew out the small, open silver ring that Jack had fashioned for her, and copied the hair knot of the dying king, tying her own long locks into place.

  Then she leaned down and kissed Arthur full on the mouth. His lips were cold, yet not death-cold. He didn’t stir. She kissed him again, held the embrace, reached to hold his face in her hands. Bloodied, yes, but beautiful. A man of strength and certainty, a face of love and humour. She pushed back the long, lank hair from his brow, kissed him between the eyes, then let her face rest against his for a while; breathing.

  ‘You don’t need the passage,’ Yssobel whispered. ‘You belong here. But I know you won’t forgive me for stealing your journey.’

  Then she stripped him naked, every scrap of clothing, running her hands down his body, touching every part of him.

  And then she stripped herself. The night was cool. She lay on Arthur’s body for a while, embracing him with her limbs, enclosing him, thinking of this most audacious of acts she planned, letting the warmth of her body seep into the hardening frost of his own flesh. Her skin bristled with the breeze. She lay on him and held his face again, and kissed him again, wondering if the eyes would open and his hands reach round for her.

  She almost hoped for it.

  He lay quiet. Cool but not cold, though he was certainly on the death road.

  ‘I’m stealing the armour of a king,’ she whispered to him. ‘I’ve dreamed of this moment. I never knew why I would steal the armour, just that I would have to do it. I do have a reason.’

  Arthur lay silent. Yssobel sang quietly:And I knew I had to hold on to what I had been given

  And that my world was changing. And that I had to hold.

  And everything that I had once been given was gone

  Yet everything I had been newly given was with me.

  Stay with me. For a mother’s sake.

  I will embrace your armour.

  Hold on. Let me steal this little time inside your skin.

  I can’t afford to break.

  ‘I will go to Avilion instead of you. But I will return and make good this theft. I promise.’

  He lay silent.

  There was no more time. His shield men lay sprawled and unconscious inside their cloaks, close to the lake. Ale-slumber was deep, but surfacing from that sleep was fast, as
she’d often seen happen with Ealdwulf and his son.

  She dressed Arthur as best she could in her own clothing. Rona was nearby, and Yssobel took the animal’s blanket and covered the dying king with it. Then she released Rona with a kiss and a word, leading her quietly to the track and sending her back to where worlds changed, hoping that the horse would struggle into imarn uklyss and gallop home, home to the villa.

  Arthur’s clothing, his boots and armour were on the large side for Yssobel but not so much that she felt uncomfortable. She walked to the lake, lay down on the bier, crossed her hands and though the helm-mask watched the stars as they shifted in and out of clouds.

  Her breathing slowed. At dawn, Gwei rose sleepily and stood by the lake, staring across the reeds, to where the mist was lifting.

  And then he called out, ‘The boat is coming. This is the time.’

  Yssobel could hear the gentle stroke of oars. Aware that the shield men were lined up, watching the water and paying no attention to her, she lifted her head slightly. The reeds parted and a snub-bowed barge nosed into the shallows. It was wide and ugly, with a crude sail drooping around a roughly hewn mast. Two tall men stood at the stern, each with a long pole which they pushed easily into the mud. Two women in brilliant red and green garb, their faces veiled in white, held short oars. The barge was trimmed with purple, and the long, lean shapes of three hares, dancing in a circle, had been carved into the prow itself.

  The two women rose to their feet and beckoned to the shield men to bring the bier onto the vessel. Yssobel felt herself lifted, then raised onto shoulders. One of the men cried quietly, others whispered words that might have been goodbye, or good fortune, or good journey.

  Eyes closed, breathing hardly at all, Yssobel waited for the bier to settle into the barge. She lay between the two women.

  The men dug their poles into the mud and pushed away from the shore. The two women sat beside the bier, staring ahead of them, unmoving, watching the land until the barge turned and faced open water. When they were out on the lake again, they lifted their veils, took up their oars and began to stroke slowly and steadily. They sang softly. Yssobel watched the clouds through the face-helm, experiencing a strange peace.

  After a while the poles were placed down and the men crouched and took the oars from the women. The barge shifted on the water as a breeze came up and the crude sail unfurled and stayed. The men stared impassively ahead, but Yssobel was suddenly aware that one of the women was watching her from the corner of her eye. She tried to breathe as shallowly as possible, keeping her eyes closed, sensing the woman rather than seeing her.

  A hand rested on her chest. A voice whispered so quietly that it might have been the passing hiss of a breeze: ‘Stay still. Don’t arouse the boatmen. If you do, they’ll turn the barge around. They are dedicated to their task, and you are not the task.’

  That same woman lifted her white veil. A pale, drawn face turned to look down at Yssobel, a face without decoration and almost without blood; ghostly, yet kind.

  Again they sang, this time in harmony, but they sang in a language that was obscure even to Yssobel’s green side, though she sensed that its theme was life being rescued from the hill of crows and taken to the island of the lost.

  She repressed all tendency to engage with these women in case she should respond without control and make herself known to the wrong eyes.

  Night came and the stars appeared. The sail billowed out and the lake became choppy. She couldn’t hold her bladder any more and hoped that the men would not notice the sudden release, though she was so thirsty that her body was preserving water.

  With the new dawn the sail flopped, and the men tied it to the mast and picked up the long poles, pushing down into the shallows, feeling for the lake bed.

  Suddenly the barge was passing through the upper branches of drowned trees. The women pushed with their short oars and the vessel at last came to a slow halt on the lake’s bank. The men jumped down and hauled the barge further onto the land. Each then took one end of the crude bier, lifted it and carried it ashore.

  Something was said. Angry words spoken by one of the barge-men. From his gestures it was clear that he was questioning the lightness of the corpse; that he was suspicious.

  The other man reached down suddenly, lifting the helm from Yssobel’s face, and the act of audacity was exposed. A hand hauled at Yssobel, dragging her upright. It was one of the women. The men glowered, reaching for the knives at their waists, but the two women shed their robes of red and green, exposing leather armour of the same colours. They were a striking sight, one, clearly the younger of the two, with luxurious black hair, the other with long braids of silver.

  There was an exchange of shouts and threats. The older of the men leaned towards Yssobel, his pale eyes furious. ‘What have you done?’ he asked in a voice that sounded like a wolf’s growl. ‘What have you done with the man we came to fetch?’

  ‘I took his place. I had my reasons.’

  ‘Get back in the barge,’ said the other. ‘Do it now.’

  ‘She stays,’ said the younger woman, stepping in front of Yssobel.

  The man nodded slowly, looking between all three of the women. ‘But we don’t. We’ll fetch the man who waits for us, and when he arrives here you’ll pay for this with more than your life.’

  The boatmen spat on the ground, then turned away and pushed the barge from the shore, leaping aboard and taking up the poles. For a long while Yssobel watched them go, aware that hands were on her arms.

  When at last she looked round, she saw that she was being greeted by warm eyes and warm smiles. The younger woman said, ‘I’m Uzana. My sister is Narine.’

  ‘Where am I? Is this Avilion?’

  ‘It’s a part of it, but remote,’ Uzana said. ‘This is one island among many islands. We know them quite well. And a friend of yours is waiting for you. Though he doesn’t know it.’

  ‘How do you know?’ Yssobel asked, confused.

  ‘We read your dreams.’

  ‘Welcome to the place you’ve made your own,’ said Narine.

  During Yssobel’s long transit across the lake, her red side had abandoned her.

  Her green side, existing in a different realm, did not recognise at first the place to which she had come. As the barge drifted away, angry abuse being shouted from it by the men on board, Uzana helped Yssobel remove Arthur’s armour and fold it carefully, ready to be stowed on the packhorse which Narine had fetched out of cover, along with their own mounts. There was a fourth horse, saddled and bridled, with green colours tied to its mane and fetlocks. Narine tossed Yssobel the reins.

  ‘We have a long ride. Do you need to wash? Take relief?’

  ‘Both. And food and water. That lake was a long crossing, and I was supposed to be dead. I held for a long time, but couldn’t hold for ever. I need to get clean and feel alive again.’

  The two women laughed at something private while waiting for Yssobel. Then they passed her a flask and a good-sized piece of cold beef, which she chewed as they started off at a slow pace.

  They broke to a canter as they approached a narrow defile in a dwarf-tree-covered hill. As they eased their way through the narrow, treacherous and winding gap, Yssobel asked, ‘If this is not the Isle of Avilion, what is it?’

  ‘Wait!’ called Narine, riding at the front.

  They emerged from the hill and were looking down at a shoreline - rocky coves and short sandy beaches. The cliffs behind were riddled with caves, and there were bright, white-marbled structures scattered here and there.

  ‘Which island is it?’ Yssobel persisted.

  ‘The island of the lost,’ Uzana said, and Yssobel was startled, but pleasantly so.

  ‘But I know a song about this place! My mother’s song. She always called it the Song of the Islands of the Lost.’

  And my grandfather is associated with the place, she thought. It is the first of his rune snakes.

  Without thinking, without noticing the ala
rm on her new companions’ faces, she started to sing the song that Guiwenneth had been so fond of. Almost at once, Narine had clapped a hand to Yssobel’s mouth, silencing her. Uzana reared as her horse reacted with alarm, then reached out to squeeze Yssobel’s arm. She was shaking her head, but smiling.

  ‘Don’t sing it! Don’t ever sing it! If you do, then, like your friend, you’ll be lost.’

  Who was this friend? Yssobel wondered. And then remembered Rianna’s sad words:

  ‘She was singing that lovely song. The sad one. The one that suddenly bursts into joy.’

  ‘Come on!’ Narine urged, but Yssobel held back.

  ‘I don’t understand. There is something I don’t understand.’

  The other women turned around to look at her. Patient, now. Time seemed to stop; there was silence in the air.

  And Yssobel said, ‘You came for the dead, didn’t you? That’s what I was taught. You came for Arthur after his death.’

  They laughed.

  ‘Death?’ questioned Narine. ‘We come for all deaths. Even the living ones. We’re collectors. Especially from battlefields.’

  ‘Some of the dead hold on,’ Uzana added. ‘They value what they’ve been given and will not give it up.’

  And Yssobel asked, ‘Then what are you?’

  ‘Waylanders,’ Narine replied.

  ‘We show you the way to other lands.’

  ‘Sometimes we’re called “waylands”.’

  ‘Guides, leaders, valks, morgvalks, peckcrows, morrikans . . .’ Uzana added.

  ‘So many names.’

  ‘So simple a task.’

  They laughed again, but kept their gaze on Yssobel.

  Yssobel thought for a moment. ‘And the task?’

  Narine said, ‘To take you to where you have to go.’

  ‘And to take you carefully. We care about the journey.’

  ‘But you came for Arthur!’