Stephen Lawhead - Merlin

'You have not answered my question, Lot.'

He shrugged. 'All my life I have heard of Londinium. So, fancying a sea-voyage, I said to my chieftains, "Let us go and see this wonder for ourselves. If we like it, perhaps we will stay." Imagine our surprise when we discovered a king choosing taking place.'

His whole demeanour was mockery. But I detected a thread of truth in his answer: he did not know about the king choosing when he set out from Orcady. He had come for an altogether different reason and had learned of the council somewhere along the way – perhaps, as he said, only upon his arrival. Still, I reflected, he had not answered the question I asked.

I sipped from my cup and then passed it on. 'Now that you are here, what will you do?'

'That, unless I am far wrong, will very much depend upon how I am treated.'

'I find that I am generally treated as well as I treat others.'

'Oh, but it is not so simple for some of us as that, dear cousin. Would that it were.' He sniffed unhappily. 'Ah, but you would know little of the adversity lesser mortals must endure.'

Was he trying to provoke me? I thought it likely, though could perceive no reason for it. 'Is your life so burdensome to you?' I asked, not expecting any particular reaction. But, as if I had fingered a very raw and painful wound, Lot winced. His eyes narrowed and his smile grew tight.

'Burdensome is not the word I would choose,' he replied stiffly. 'Where is that cup?' He reached for it and took it from the hand of one of his men, tossing back the remaining draught. 'Empty so soon? Then we must leave,' he said, and walked to the door.

Reaching the doorway, he paused, saying, 'You know, Myrddin, I had hoped our first meeting would be different.' He turned abruptly and started away.

I can, when I choose to, make my command almost irresistible. I made it so now. 'Do not leave!" I called after him. Lot halted. He stood for a moment and then turned round slowly, as if expecting a swordpoint against his throat.

The uncertainty of that gesture argued eloquently for him. He was an untried boy playing bravely at being a king, and I was moved with compassion for him. 'We should not part like this,' I told him.

His grey-blue eyes searched mine for any hint of deception – I think he was a master of discerning it – but found none in me. 'How would you have us part?' His tone was wary, testing.

'As friends.'

'I have no friends in this place.' It was an unthinking response; nevertheless, I know he believed it.

'You can hold to that,' I replied, 'or accept my friendship and prove yourself wrong.'

'I am not often proved wrong, Emrys. Farewell.' His men followed him and in a moment I heard the clatter of hooves in the street and they were gone.

Pelleas closed the door, and then turned to me. 'He is a dangerous man, my lord Myrddin. The more so because he is confused.'

I knew Pelleas to possess no mean ability in weighing out the character of a man. 'Confused, there is no doubt. But I do not think he intends me harm. I am not certain he knows what he intends.'

My companion shook his head slowly. 'The man who does not know his own heart is a man to be feared. Have nothing to do with him, my lord.' Then he spoke my own misgivings. 'Who can say how Morgian has twisted the youth?'

If my meeting with Lot was disconcerting, my dinner with Ygerna was all delight. She had dressed in her finest clothes, and, in the glimmering, golden sheen of light from a hundred candles – light that Ygerna herself seemed to radiate – she appeared more lovely than I had ever seen her.

She kissed me as I entered the room where a table had been set up, and took my hands and led me to a chair. 'Myrddin, I was afraid you would not come tonight and I would be disappointed.'

'How so, my lady? Had you eaten as many suppers cold by the side of the lonely road as I have, you would never let pass an opportunity to dine in comfort. And were you a man, you would never disappoint a lady as beautiful as I see before me, my queen.'

She blushed with the innocent pride of a maid. 'Dear Myrddin,' she murmured, then stopped suddenly. 'You have not brought the sword?' Ygerna looked at my hands as if expecting to see it there.

'I have not forgotten,' I replied. 'Pelleas will bring it later. I thought it best not to be seen carrying it with me. Someone might notice.'

'A wise thought.' Sitting me in my chair, she turned to the table and poured wine into two silver cups. She knelt beside -i my chair and offered one to me; it was the formal gesture of ' a servant to a lord. I made a movement of protest, but she held out the cup, saying, 'Allow me to serve you tonight. Please, it is small enough repayment for the kindness in all you have done for me.'

I shook my head gently. 'All I have done? My lady, you honour me too highly. I have done nothing to warrant such affection.'

'Indeed? Then I will tell you, shall I? When everyone else thought me a foolish girl, you treated me as a woman and the equal of any man. You have ever been my true friend, Myrddin. And true friendship, for a woman, is difficult to find in this world.' She pressed the cup into my hand with her cool fingers. 'Let us drink together in friendship.'

We drank, and then she rose and began setting the meal on the board. I allowed her ministrations to me and it made her happy. It saddens me now to admit that the kindness she referred to had been extended to her not because she was Ygerna, and therefore worthy of such consideration: no, it was that she was Aurelius' bride, or Uther's wife. In truth, I had given her no particular consideration as a fellow human being; but so barren was her life on that seabound rock that my small courtesies loomed large with her. I thought of this and my shame overwhelmed me.

Great Light, we are blind men all of us; slay us and be done with it!

Oh, Ygerna, trusting heart, if you only knew. That she loved where she should rightly despise was her glory. I think I did not taste a single bite of the meal she laid before me. But I know I have seldom enjoyed a repast more. Ygerna fairly shone in her beauty and happiness.

In this, I should have had my warning of what she was planning. Although it is likely that Ygerna herself did not yet know. I believe that she acted out of the pureness of her heart and there was no other motive.

Pelleas was mistaken; one who did not know what he intended might be turned to the light as easily as the darkness. Good is always possible, and redemption is never more distant than the next breath. Somehow, Ygerna reminded me of this.

All the same, when Pelleas arrived with Uther's sword and I realized how quickly the evening had passed, I bade Ygerna good night and stepped out into a star-filled night without the slightest suspicion of what would take place on the morrow.

The next morning the kings assembled in the church once more. And once more, as at all the other times, Dunaut and Morcant devised to hobble the proceedings with insulting and outrageous demands. If they could not realize their ambitions in council, at least they might provoke the others to arms and win in that way. It was all the same to them.

But from the beginning that day's events took shape differently. Ygerna and Lot were present and the others were forced to take account of them. As Dunaut was wanning to his long harangue, Ygerna simply rose from the chair that had been added to the circle for her, and stood.

She stood until Dunaut, distracted by her quiet presence, stopped and acknowledged her. 'My lords,' he sneered, 'it appears that Queen Ygerna wishes to speak. Perhaps she does not understand the proper observances of this assembly.'

'Oh, indeed,' she replied. 'I have observed much in the short time since I have joined this noble assembly. It appears to me that the only way to be heard is to shout at the top of one's lungs while impugning the characters of those present. That, I think, would avail me little, so I stand and wait to be recognized.'