Clash of Kings (55 page)

The new king stopped before a simple door, knocked, then entered a small room that opened onto a little courtyard hard against the side of the cliff. Sheltered from the sea breezes, and in a rare pocket of clear sunshine, the courtyard was a mass of colour from large troughs of porous stone or fired clay pots filled with hardy daisies, roses, herbs and an ancient vine that bore brilliant purple flowers. The mix of colour was so surprising against a backdrop of grey, rocky hillside that Myrddion almost missed the tiny, wizened creature who sat on a soft stool amid the riot of flowers, for she was huddled in a heavy shawl of vividly dyed wool so that only a small, brown face and a pair of inquisitive hazel eyes peered out to survey her visitors.

‘Well done, Melvyn. I take it that you have brought Olwyn’s lad to visit with me, for I see a young beanpole standing behind you.’ She smiled up at her young visitor before turning towards a door at the rear of her rooms. ‘Lindon?’ she bellowed with surprising strength. ‘Where are you, you lazy baggage? The new king has come calling with a young visitor. Bring me heated wine and fruit, for I can see my kinsman is fond of apples.’

Embarrassed, Myrddion crunched the last of the core with his sharp white teeth. He bowed, in considerable respect, and smiled as engagingly as he knew how.

A plump, middle-aged woman with a weather-beaten face came bustling out through the folded shutters that separated the tiny sleeping chamber from the courtyard. Her work-roughened hands already held a pitcher on a wooden tray with several beakers made of horn that had been polished to the sheen and colour of amber.

‘Very well, you old besom. Always nagging a body, though I slave from sunrise to sunset to keep your scrawny body comfortable and well. Here’s the honeyed wine you demanded, warmed as you like it, but I’ll have to find some fruit, if you still want it.’

Myrddion was surprised by the maidservant’s tone and manner, until he realised that such talk was familiar and pleasurable to both women. Auntie Rhyll swore like a soldier, grunted, and then waved Lindon away to fetch apples, pears and berries.

‘This young man is Myrddion, Auntie, and he is Olwyn’s grandson. As I’ve told you, he is a healer of renown, even at this very young age. He serves Vortigern, the High King, on his campaigns and has travelled to far-off places since his childhood. He has come to Canovium to fulfil my father’s last wish.’

‘This nonsense about beheading, I take it. Never mind. There’s nothing so strange in this world that some moon-mad fool won’t believe it and adopt its customs. Still, it does no real harm, I suppose, for Melvig is already dead. The Mother save us, it might even work.’ Then old Rhyll cackled away merrily as if she had made a particularly amusing joke. Both men were too polite to respond.

‘Well? Drink, then! And you, boy, pour a cup for me. I’m not so old that I’ve forgotten the taste of sweet, honeyed wine. And if my lazy maid ever returns, we’ll enjoy the fruit of the season as well. I do love a ripe, juicy peach.’

Myrddion wondered how Rhyll could eat any fruit, since her sunken, seamed mouth suggested that she lacked a single tooth in her head. However, as soon as Lindon returned, the old woman made a gesture that ordered haste more powerfully than words, and the servant cut a blushing peach in half, removing the stone. Toothless or not, Rhyll speedily demolished the fruit, without any thought for the juice that ran down her face and her scrawny neck.

As Lindon washed the tiny face with a clean scrap of linen, the old autocrat ordered Melvig to be about his business. Meekly, the new king obeyed.

‘I’m terrified of you, kinswoman Rhyll,’ Myrddion began in the comfortable silence. He softened the edges of his abrupt words with a smile that reached his eyes. ‘What can you want of a nameless bastard who is not yet a grown man?’ He was fully aware that Rhyll was examining him closely.

‘Ah, but you’re a beautiful boy, kinsman. Just like my roses.’

Her hand plucked a red rose, full blown and blowsy with a perfume that was almost too sweet. Myrddion wondered at the strength in the skeletal fingers that could snap a stem with such ease. She sought out another rose, as pale as the first was red. Even opened, the petals were tighter and the smell less heady, but the stamens at the heart of the rose were golden.

Wordlessly, Rhyll offered the roses to Myrddion, who took them with a frown.

‘Your heart is closed. Love will not touch you until three women come into your life. Of these, a woman with red hair will break your heart and freeze it to solid ice, but another woman with white hair will make it whole again. I will not discuss the third for I am only a poor seer from the hill country and I am not permitted to do so. All of them will cause you to suffer, kinsman, but the worst blows won’t come from the hands of women, but from beloved men.’

‘Are you truly a seer, Auntie Rhyll? Do you see the pictures of the future in your head, or in your dreams?’

Rhyll’s wizened face split into a broad, gummy grin. ‘You test me, boy! I have the sight, waking and sleeping, as did my mother before me. My sister and her daughter Olwyn never knew the curse, so they were free to marry without seeing the fate of their offspring in their dreams. You have the sight, boy, but it is a man’s gift that is entangled with power, swords and kings uncrowned. Beware of hubris, Myrddion, for you will rise very high and you will come to dictate the lives and the decisions of kings.’

Even though he shuddered inside, Myrddion forced himself to laugh. ‘I am a healer, Auntie Rhyll. Short of healing wounds and caring for noble patients, I can think of no situation where a healer could influence the actions of great men.’

‘You are a healer, but you are much more,’ Rhyll retorted, repeating Cadoc’s words. ‘But I’ll speak no further of these things. Go, child. You must win your name from a man with black eyes, but I wonder if you’ll believe it was worth the blood, the pain and the weary miles that you will be forced to travel? But you will learn many more skills on the journey, not the least being the nature of your own soul. I will be long dead when you return to Canovium, but you will understand my warnings one day. Beware of hubris, as I have already said.’

Rhyll would say nothing more of his future, regardless of how sweetly Myrddion smiled or how long they conversed in the quiet arbour built into the side of the hill. When the long afternoon began to darken, Myrddion kissed Rhyll’s withered cheek and left her to her roses and the night.

The air was thrumming within the dark hall as if random breezes were plucking an invisible harp. Myrddion knew that the strange, internal noise had its origins in the power of the men who stood around the bier and waited for the healer’s arrival.

Before he had entered the Great Hall, he had washed himself carefully in the bowl of water under the hazel tree, having first stripped to his loincloth. Once he had dressed in the silent courtyard, he had pushed Melvig’s ring onto his left hand, closest to his heart. Snapping open the old, stiff clasp of his bulla, he removed the birth gift from the lord of light and thrust the sunstone ring onto the index finger of his right hand. Then, holding Melvig’s sword across his palms, he entered the Great Hall.

The air was close, and the floral scent failed to mask the smell of corruption that left Myrddion feeling light-headed and nauseous. The druids were imposing figures, their long robes of homespun wool in black, brown and a raw, undyed cream elongating their bodies until they seemed taller and thinner than they were even in natural sunlight. Within the hall, lit by the flames of oil lamps and crossed by wavering shadows in the uneven light, their cowled faces took on an eerie, otherworld quality. The bridge of an aquiline nose, a pointed chin, the strands of a flowing beard or high cheekbones caught the flame and gave the druids the insubstantiality of grave wights or spirits.

As if they knew the effect of their presence on the male kin of Melvig ap Melwy, the druids began to chant in the old language. The voices melded together imperfectly, for one of the druids was a castrato, but the solemnity of the ritual could not be doubted. The weight of Melvig’s ceremonial sword dragged at Myrddion’s still-developing muscles.

The day before, at Melvyn’s bidding, he had examined the blade that he’d been given in order to perform his grisly duty. Like his great-grandfather, the sword was crudely powerful and utilitarian. The blade had been forged over a hundred years earlier, so Myrddion was unable to tell if it had been made with the benefit of Celtic workmanship. It was shorter than the usual warrior’s sword, but Melvig had a long reach and had never found any lack in it. Perhaps a long-dead Roman smith had made it for an officer. No man could know, for time had washed over its origins and left nothing that could be used for comparison with other blades.

Its hilt lacked a crosspiece and was covered with fish-skin to improve the grip, but the plain iron pommel had been beautified with gold and a single stone of brilliant red that had been carved with an intaglio of a hunting bird. In the early morning sunshine, Myrddion hefted the blade, felt its excellent balance and enjoyed the weight of the weapon as it sat in his hand.

Now, with the ceremony of beheading about to begin, something had caught his attention on the silken texture of the blade. He had been trying to decipher the worn inscription when Melvig had opened the rear door of the hall and ushered him in.

As the druids chanted, Myrddion moved forward to stand by Melvig’s corpse. The blade was raised, but at rest, between his open palms.

At the foot of Melvig’s bier, Melvyn ap Melvig’s shadow seemed huge, menacing and patient. Only when the druids ceased to chant did the uncrowned king raise both hands, turn and speak to the assembly of male kin, Deceangli dignitaries and various friends, including King Bryn of the Ordovice and his son, Prince Llanwith.

‘Rejoice, kinsmen and citizens, friends and allies, for Melvig ap Melwy prepares to journey to the shadows where he will feast in glory with his illustrious ancestors. While he drew breath, Melvig ruled this land with courage, dignity and justice. He raised his children in security, and served his tribe with honesty and a fine sense of duty. The gods rewarded him with a long and peaceful life, so we should not mourn his death, but honour his passage from this world to the next.’

A chorus of agreement broke the silence, but then the stifling darkness and the power emanating from the bier withered the words of affirmation on the tongues of the guests.

‘The Sword Bearer, Myrddion, has been asked to free Melvig’s soul from his body in the ancient way. Only kin or a druid may wield a blade for such a purpose, and Healer Myrddion is a direct descendant of our deceased king. Stand forth, witnesses and masters of the groves, while Myrddion, healer of Segontium, frees the soul of our lord.’

The tallest druid approached Myrddion, who stood at attention, with the sword placed at rest across his naked hands. Three other druids flanked him, carrying the religious artefacts necessary for their part in the ceremony.

The master took a handful of soil from a bowl of sandy loam carried by the first druid and, with due ceremony, sprinkled it along the length of the blade, which Myrddion turned so that both sides could be blessed.

‘By the power of the earth!’ the priest intoned solemnly.

The second druid, clad in brown, stepped forward bearing a large oil lamp that the priest took in both hands. Slowly, he anointed the blade with liquid fire so that the steel surface flickered with scarlet and sanguine light.

‘By the power of fire!’

The last druid bore a basin of water that was liberally sprinkled over the shining blade and hissed as it struck the heated metal.

‘By the power of water!’ The priest turned to one side to face the witnesses. ‘Let the soul of King Melvig ap Melwy soar forth with the eagles until he reaches our Father, the Sun, who is your namesake and the master of us all.’

In the stillness, Myrddion moved to the side of the bier as the druid freed the robes that enclosed the old man’s withered and wrinkled throat. Moved by the ceremony despite his scepticism, Myrddion raised the sword above his head with both hands so it caught the flames of the lamps and condensed them into a single focus of light. Then he permitted the blade to fall swiftly, but with minimal force. Honed to razor sharpness by Melvig’s whetstone, the blade sheared through skin and bone to strike the wooden bier with a dull thud.

The blow was clean and well aimed.

As the master raised Melvig’s head, now noble with age, the watchers sighed long exhalations of breath as if the old king’s spirit was rising, rising, towards the roof of the hall, through it, and onwards into a sun that now stood high over the eaves of the building. A sudden gust of wind from outside stirred the woollen hangings and caused the flames from the oil lamps to dance. Then, with due reverence, Melvig’s decapitated head was placed beside his torso and the ceremony was over.

Later, surrounded by his family and yet alone in the sanctity of the deed, Myrddion examined the sword that now belonged to him for life. The inscription on the blade was very faint, but as he played light along its smooth surface he was able to read a single line of Latin that gave the weapon its name.

Truth lies in Death.

Myrddion thought of the name, Blood Bringer, that had been bestowed on it by its owner, Melvig ap Melwy, who had never learned to read.

‘Truth and Death! Such an ambiguous marriage of words,’ Myrddion murmured softly. Eddius heard his mutterings, and asked what he meant, so Myrddion was forced to explain his comments to those kinfolk present.

‘Perhaps the sword should be renamed,’ Eddius said thoughtfully. ‘Only Melvig could ever wield Blood Bringer with the true courage and nobility that the name requires.’

‘I’ll think on it,’ Myrddion replied. ‘Still, it’s strange to find a Roman sword among the weaponry of a Deceangli king. If I believed in omens, I would be hesitant to accept this weapon.’

‘Do you still dream, Myrddion? Do you still suffer your waking fits?’ Eddius asked eagerly. ‘Have you ever seen my Olwyn? If death could be defeated, I know she would come to you.’