Merlin

At first I thought the man in the chair by the window must be dead – perhaps had died this very day, this hour. But his head turned as I crossed the threshold and I saw he had been sleeping. Indeed, he had the look of one who had been asleep for many years.

His white hair hung in wisps, thin as spidersilk; his hands, crossed on his breast, were boney and long, the untrimmed fingernails thick and yellowed. His face was that of one long dead: grey and spotted with blotches that faded into his moth-eaten scalp. The eyes that stared from his head were sunken pits rimmed red and weepy.

In contrast to this wraith's wasted appearance, his robe was rich velvet, embroidered with fantastic symbols and cunning designs in threadwork of gold and silver. Still, it hung on him like the rags of a corpse.

He did not seem at all surprised to see me, and I knew he was not. 'So,' he said after a moment. Just that. I felt Pelleas tug my sleeve.

'I am Merlin,' I said, using the form of my name most common among my mother's people.

He made no sign of recognition, but said, 'Why have you come?'

'To find you.'

'You have found me.' He lowered his hands to his knees, where they lay twitching feebly.

Yes, and having found him I did not know what to say to him.

'What will you now, Merlin?' he asked after a moment. He did not look at me when he spoke. 'Kill me?'

'Kill you! I have not come to harm you in any way.'

'Why not?' the wretched creature snapped. 'Death is all that is left me, and I deserve it.'

'It is not for me to take your life,' I told him.

'No, of course not. You believe in love, do you? You believe in kindness – like that ridiculous Jesu of yours, eh?' The mockery in his words was stinging sharp. As he spoke I did feel foolish for believing in such things. 'Well?'

'Yes, I believe.'

'Then kill me!' he shouted suddenly, his head snapping round. Spittle flecked his lips. 'Kill me now. It would be kindness itself!'

'Perhaps it would,' I allowed. 'But I will not take your life.'

He glared at me with those dead eyes of his. 'How not, if I told you I was responsible for your father's death.' His grisly grin sickened me. 'Yes, I murdered Taliesin. I, Annubi, killed him.'

Even as he said those hideous words, I did not believe him. He hated, yes, but it was not me he hated, nor my father,. If he could have killed, I think he would have killed himself instead, but he could not. This was part of the thing that was poisoning him. Still, he knew… oh yes, he knew who killed Taliesin.

'You are Annubi?'

I had heard of him – not from my mother, but from Avallach, who, in his stories of Lost Atlantis, had told me about his seer. The man I had imagined bore no resemblance to the shrunken wretch before me.

'What do you want here?'

'Nothing.'

'Then why have you come?'

I lifted a hand helplessly. 'I had to come… to find out -'

'Go away from here, boy,' Annubi said, turning his dead eyes away from me. 'If she found you here… ' He sighed, then added in a whisper,'… but it is too late… too late.'

'Who?' I demanded. 'You said "she" – who did you mean?"

'Just go. I can do nothing for you.'

'Who did you mean?'

I saw a flicker of something cross his face – the vestige of an emotion other than hate or despair, but I did not know what it was. 'Need you ask? There is only Morgian… ' When I said nothing, he looked at me. 'The name means nothing to you?'

'Should it?'

'Wise Merlin… Intelligent Merlin… Hawk of Knowledge. Ha! You do not even know who your enemies are.'

'Morgian is my enemy?'

A spasm twisted his mouth. 'Morgian is every man's enemy, boy. Supreme Goddess of the Night, she has the hunger and the hate. Her touch can freeze the blood in your veins; her look can stop your heart beating. Death is her delight… her sole delight.'

'Where is she?' I asked, my voice a whisper in the fading light.

He only wobbled his head. 'If I knew, would I stay here?'

Pelleas, behind me, tugged on my arm. With the setting sun I felt the doom of the place increasing and wanted suddenly to be away. Yet, if there was something I could do I must do it.

'Yes, go,' rasped Annubi, as if reading my thoughts. 'Go and never come back lest you find Morgian here when you return.'

'Do you need anything?' He was so pathetic in his misery, I could not help asking.

'Belyn looks after me.'

I nodded and turned away. I had to run in order to keep up with Pelleas, who led the way back through the tower as though Morgian's breath singed the back of his neck. He reached the front door, still standing open as we had left it, and dashed outside.

I was right behind him. But before leaving that place, I knelt on the threshold and prayed a prayer against evil. Then, taking up a handful of white pebbles from the path, I marked out the sign of the cross before the door. Let it be a warning, I thought. Let her know who it was she had chosen to fight.

Our party left Llyonesse the next day, but the sense of lingering doom stayed with me a very long time. Riding back through that cheerless land was no great help, serving only to reinforce my already doleful mood. Gwendolau and Baram felt it, too, but less keenly. For a time, Gwendolau tried to keep up his usual travel banter, but it became too much and eventually he lapsed into moody silence like the rest of us.

I did not feel myself until the Tor came into view across the marshland. By then, just seeing the Glass Isle was enough to make our hearts leap in wild relief. In any event, my mother was waiting for me at the gate – which I wondered about, until I realized that she had guessed about Morgian and Annubi.

They left here on the night your father was killed,' she told me, her voice soft and low. We were sitting in a corner of the hearth and it was very late at night. Nearly everyone else had gone to their beds. Charis had waited until we were alone to tell me. 'I never found out where they had gone.'

'But you guessed.'

'Llyonesse? Of course it was a possibility.' She made a small, empty gesture. 'I should have told you.'

I remained silent.

'I know I should have told it all long before now… but I could not bring myself to it – and then you were gone. So -' She made that curious gesture again, a small warding off movement of her hand against an unseen adversary. But then she settled herself, straightened her back, and squared her shoulders. 'Well, you must know the truth.

'After my mother was killed in that ghastly ambush -' she broke off, but continued in a moment. 'Forgive me, Merlin, I did not know how hard these words would be.'

'Your mother was killed?'

'That is what started the war between Avallach and Seithe-nin. Well, in the ninth year Avallach was wounded in a battle – I knew nothing about it; at the time I was bull dancing in the High Temple. When I returned home, my father had taken another wife, Lile. She was a young woman who had a knack for healing and she nursed my father. He was grateful to her and married her.'

'Lile? I do not remember her. What became of her?'

'No, you would not remember. She disappeared when you were very young.'

'Disappeared?' That was an odd way to put it. 'What happened to her?'

Charis shook her head slowly, but more from puzzlement than sorrow. 'No one knows. It was only a few months after Taliesin was killed; I had come back here to live. And although Lile and I were not the best of friends, we had learned to respect one another; there was no trouble between us.' Charis smiled, remembering. 'She liked you, Merlin. "How is my little Hawk today?" she always asked when she saw you. She liked holding you, rocking you… ' she shook her head once more. 'I never understood her, Merlin. I never did.'