Bernard Cornwell - Excalibur

Caddwg was the boatman who had rescued us from Ynys Trebes so many years before, and the man who had hunted Merlin’s piddocks. ‘I remember Caddwg,’ I said.

‘He lives at Camlann now,’ Merlin said in a whisper. ‘Look for him, Derfel, and seek the silver mist. Remember that. If Nimue fails and horror comes, then take Arthur to Camlann, find Caddwg and look for the silver mist. It is the last enchantment. My last gift to those who were my friends.’ His fingers tightened on my arm. ‘Promise me you will seek it?’

‘I shall, Lord,’ I promised him.

He seemed relieved. He sat for a time, clutching my arm, then sighed. ‘I wish I could come with you. But I can’t.’

‘You can, Lord,’ I said.

‘Don’t be absurd, Derfel. I am to stay here and Nimue will use me one last time. I might be old, blind, half mad and nearly dead, but there is still power in me. She wants it.’ He uttered a horrid little whimper.

‘I cannot even weep any longer,’ he said, ‘and there are times when all I wish to do is weep. But in the silver mist, Derfel, in that silver mist, you will find no weeping and no time, just joy.’

He slept again, and when he woke it was dawn and Olwen had come for me. I stroked Merlin’s hair, but he was gone into the madness again. He yapped like a dog, and Olwen laughed to hear it. I wished there had been something I could give him, some small thing to give him comfort, but I had nothing. So I left him, and took his last gift with me even though I did not understand what it was; the last enchantment. Olwen did not take me back by the same path that had brought me to Nimue’s encampment, but instead led me down a steep combe, and then into a dark wood where a stream tumbled between rocks. It had begun to rain and our path was treacherous, but Olwen danced ahead of me in her damp cloak. ‘I like the rain!’ she called out to me once.

‘I thought you liked the sun,’ I said sourly.

‘I like both, Lord,’ she said. She was her usual merry self, but I scarcely listened to most of what she said. I was thinking of Ceinwyn, and of Merlin, and of Gwydre and Excalibur. I was thinking that I was in a trap, and I saw no way out. Must I choose between Ceinwyn and Gwydre? Olwen must have guessed what I was thinking because she came and slipped her arm through mine. ‘Your troubles will soon be over, Lord,’ she said comfortingly.

I took my arm away. ‘They are just beginning,’ I said bitterly.

‘But Gwydre won’t stay dead!’ she said encouragingly. ‘He will lie in the Cauldron, and the Cauldron gives life.’ She believed, but I did not. I still believed in the Gods, but I no longer believed we could bend them to our will. Arthur, I thought, had been right. It is to ourselves we must look, not to the Gods. They have their own amusements, and if we are not their toys, then we should be glad. Olwen stopped beside a pool under the trees. ‘There are beavers here,’ she said, staring at the rain-pitted water, and when I said nothing she looked up and smiled. ‘If you keep walking down the stream, Lord, you will come to a track. Follow it down the hill and you will find a road.’

I followed the track and the road, emerging from the hills near the old Roman fort of Cicucium that was now home to a group of nervous families. Their menfolk saw me and came from the fort’s broken gate with spears and dogs, but I waded the stream and scrambled uphill and when they saw I meant no harm, had no weapons and was evidently not the scout for a raiding party, they contented themselves with jeering at me. I could not remember being so long without a sword since childhood. It made a man feel naked.

It took me two days to reach home; two days of bleak thinking without any answer. Gwydre was the first to see me coming down Isca’s main street and he ran to greet me. ‘She’s better than she was, Lord,’

he called.

‘But getting worse again,’ I said.

He hesitated. ‘Yes. But two nights ago we thought she was recovering.’ He looked at me anxiously, worried by my grim appearance.

‘And each day since,’ I said, ‘she has slipped back.’

‘There must be hope, though,’ Gwydre tried to encourage me.

‘Maybe,’ I said, though I had none. I went to Ceinwyn’s bedside and she recognized me and tried to smile, but the pain was building in her again and the smile showed as a skull-like grimace. She had a fine layer of new hair, but it was all white. I bent, dirty as I was, and kissed her forehead. I changed my clothes, washed and shaved, strapped Hywelbane to my waist and then sought Arthur. I told him all that Nimue had told me, but Arthur had no answers, or none he would tell me. He would not surrender Gwydre, and that condemned Ceinwyn, but he could not say that to my face. Instead he looked angry. ‘I’ve had enough of this nonsense, Derfel.’

‘A nonsense that is giving Ceinwyn agony, Lord,’ I reproved him.

‘Then we must cure her,’ he said, but conscience gave him pause. He frowned. ‘Do you believe Gwydre will live again if he is placed in the Cauldron?’

I thought about it and could not lie to him. ‘No, Lord.’

‘Nor I,’ he said, and called for Guinevere, but the only suggestion she could make was that we should consult Taliesin.

Taliesin listened to my tale. ‘Name the curses again, Lord,’ he said when I was done.

‘The curse of fire,’ I said, ‘the curse of water, the curse of the blackthorn and the dark curse of the Otherbody.’

He flinched when I said the last. ‘The first three I can lift,’ he said, ‘but the last? I know of no one who can lift that.’

‘Why not?’ Guinevere demanded sharply.

Taliesin shrugged. ‘It is the higher knowledge, Lady. A Druid’s learning does not cease with his training, but goes on into new mysteries. I have not trodden that path. Nor, I suspect, has any man in Britain other than Merlin. The Otherbody is a great magic and to counter it we need a magic just as great. Alas, I don’t have it.’

I stared at the rainclouds above Isca’s roofs. ‘If I cut off Ceinwyn’s head, Lord,’ I spoke to Arthur,

‘will you cut off mine a heartbeat later?’

‘No,’ he said in disgust.

‘Lord!’ I pleaded.

‘No!’ he said angrily. He was offended by the talk of magic. He wanted a world in which reason ruled, not magic, but none of his reason helped us now.

Then Guinevere spoke softly. ‘Morgan,’ she said.

‘What of her?’ Arthur asked.

‘She was Merlin’s priestess before Nimue,’ Guinevere said. ‘If anyone knows Merlin’s magic, it is Morgan.’

So Morgan was summoned. She limped into the courtyard, as ever managing to bring an aura of anger with her. Her gold mask glinted as she looked at each of us in turn and, seeing no Christian present, she made the sign of the cross. Arthur fetched her a chair, but she refused it, implying that she had little time for us. Since her husband had gone to Gwent, Morgan had busied herself in a Christian shrine to the north of Isca. Sick folk went there to die and she fed them, nursed them and prayed for them. Folk call her husband a saint to this day, but I think the wife is called a saint by God. Arthur told her the tale and Morgan grunted with each revelation, but when Arthur spoke of the curse of the Otherbody she made the sign of the cross, then spat through the mask’s mouthpiece. ‘So what do you want of me?’ she asked belligerently.

‘Can you counter the curse?’ Guinevere asked.

‘Prayer can counter it!’ Morgan declared.

‘But you have prayed,’ Arthur said in exasperation, ‘and Bishop Emrys has prayed. All the Christians of Isca have prayed and Ceinwyn lies sick still.’

‘Because she is a pagan,’ Morgan said vituperatively. ‘Why should God waste his mercy on pagans when He has His own flock to look after?’