The Broken Sword (41 page)

Ygraine looked down at the child. "No, I do not believe Uther will ever recognize this child."

And who says Uther's opinion will matter a fig?
Taliesin thought. Still, it would be necessary to tell him about the child. Too many people already knew that the baby had been brought back to the castle. If Taliesin were to leave so soon after his arrival without mentioning the child, Uther would be suspicious. And it would take no more than a suspicion to send Uther into a rage that might harm Ygraine and her servants. The druid understood tyrants: The best way to keep a secret from a man like Uther was to tell him just enough to bore him.

And so Taliesin approached him the next day. "I was coming to visit you, brother, when I chanced upon a baby lying naked on the rocks," he said, sounding bewildered.

Uther rolled his eyes. "And what did you think it was, you superstitious fool, a sea spirit?"

Taliesin laughed lightly. "Perhaps."

"I suppose you made up a song to it."

"No, actually, I brought him inside."

Uther slapped the table in front of him. "Idiot! That was Ygraine's bastard. I was trying to get rid of it." His eyes bulged with anger as he stared at his illegitimate half brother. "No point in raising a by-blow runt that no one wants," he added maliciously.

If his words wounded the druid, he made no sign. "The child's nearly dead already," Taliesin said. "I'll take it with me and bury it in the woods if you like. That would spare your wife some little suffering, at least."

"And it would spare me the bother of having to listen to her." Uther grinned. Taliesin thought he looked like a slavering dog, his yellow teeth bared beneath his unkempt beard.

"Very well. I'll go straightaway."

"I thought you were coming to visit."

Taliesin raised his chin. "Shall we both listen to the queen's lamentations, then?"

Uther scratched his beard. "I suppose that'll be the case. All right, you can go. Perhaps you'll come back afterward. Write a song for me or something."

"I'm no longer a bard, brother. I could pray for you, though. Conduct a day-long ritual to cleanse your soul. You'd have to fast for a week beforehand, of course."

"Er... Fine. That is..."

"If I have time. I have some pressing duties in the east."

"Then surely you must attend to them, Taliesin," Uther said heartily, although his eyes were already scanning the room for a distraction. "And don't forget the bastard. Bury it somewhere far away from here. I wouldn't want Ygraine to... while hunting or something…"

"She'll never find the child, I assure you," Taliesin said. "Nor will you."

"Good. No marker will be necessary."

"I understand, my King."

Appeased by his half brother's recognition of his superiority, Uther nodded beatifically. The interview was over.

Within the hour, holding a hollow gourd containing a milk-soaked rag, the druid Taliesin, who would one day be known throughout the Celtic world as the Merlin, last of the great magicians, set off into the forest with the future king of Britain.

And not just any king, the old man thought. Arthur of the House of Pendragon would become the greatest ruler the Celtic world had ever known. On that day in the year 488, when Taliesin bore away Uther's unwanted infant, he took the first step toward the salvation of Britain.

The island had been left bereft after the Romans' abrupt departure. "Defend yourselves!" the governor had admonished in parting.
Defend against what?
the educated among the abandoned Britons asked. For there was more than foreign invasion to fear. Starvation, disease, and ignorance would send a civilization back to the Stone Age more easily than a conquering army. What was to become of the Roman-built cities without Roman supplies to maintain them, and Roman-trained administrators to run them?

A hundred years before Arthur Pendragon began his journey into destiny in the arms of the druid named Taliesin, Britain was in many ways worse off than the savage hinterlands of the Picts to the far north; for while the Picts had never lost their tribal ways, the Britons had become sufficiently Romanized to have grown accustomed to such trappings of civilization as flush toilets, heated homes, paved roads, and professional armies.

These, the wise among them realized, were gone forever, along with the Romans' efficient government and superb methods of organization. If Britain were not to fall into utter chaos and ruin, someone had to take charge.

This was where the real problem lay.

For it was not in the makeup of the British Celts to accept leadership easily. They had fought the Romans for fifty years before submitting to the empire's benign yoke. They were a tribal people, with ancient and unbreakable ties to family and clan. During the nightmare years after the end of the Roman occupation, the clans rose again to prominence.

There were ten of them: ten tribes that functioned as separate kingdoms, constantly at war with one another. Even if there were terms of peace between neighboring clans, skirmishes over cattle rustling and sheep stealing were almost daily occurrences.

Added to this confusion were the increasingly frequent invasions by Saxon warriors, who were looking not only for the dogs and goldwork for which the Celts were famous, but for land.

Why did the Britons need so much land? the Saxons argued. Since they were always killing one another off in their clan wars, they would never have enough people to populate the island, anyway. Besides, the Britons' lack of unity made the place vulnerable by sea in all directions. And so, as the ten tribes of the Celts fought among themselves over a stolen pony or a disputed hayfield, the Saxons sharpened their weapons and cast their eyes toward Britain's white shores.

It was into this world that Arthur came of age. During his rule, he accomplished a feat that any man would have believed impossible: Without using coercion or the shedding of blood, he united the ten tribes of Britain into a single nation, and brought about its first flowering.

And then he had died, prematurely, unfairly, wrongly. He left no heir. When King Arthur passed into the Summer Country, the nation he had created with his brilliance and his decency sank back into despair and ruin.

The Saxons took over then, and changed the very face of Britain. Within the span of a few generations, the English people ceased to resemble either Celts or Romans, but became something entirely different, speaking a new language and practicing customs their ancestors had never known.

The Celts, who had occupied the island of Britain since the time of the oldest legends, who had maintained their identity and their ancient religion through four hundred years of Roman rule, ceased to exist. And their last great hero, Arthur, High King of Britain, passed into the realm of legend, remembered only in stories told to children.

I
could not allow that
, thought the old man in the woods at the foothills of Puma Mountain. His spotted hands were clenched into fists; his whole body trembled. Even now, he felt the same overwhelming anger he had experienced when he had touched Arthur's cold, bloody corpse after the battle of Camlun.

It had not been time for Arthur to die, Taliesin thought, tasting bile. The King had been cheated of his life through sorcery and evil.

And so he would get back that lost life. The Merlin would see to it.

I
t had been an
unreasonable wish, even for a druid of Taliesin's standing. He had studied for more than twenty years on the island of Mona under the aegis of the great blind witch known as the Innocent. During his years at Camelot, he had served as chief adviser to the King and had been awarded the title of Merlin, or Wise One.

Among the common people, Taliesin had been a wizard, pure and simple. They believed him capable of performing any magic from transforming men into chickens to taking away the sun. Such claims were untrue, of course, although a trained druid—which Taliesin the Merlin certainly was— knew how to do a number of things that might easily be interpreted as magic by those who were not so well educated. He could chart and predict lunar and solar eclipses, for example. He understood the dynamics of flight. He had a vast knowledge of herbs and their healing properties, and knew almost as much about poisonous plants as the women of Orkney, who were famous for their ability to kill without trace.

But he had never truly performed any feat that might unequivocally be termed "magic" until that blinding, rage-filled moment when he knew—simply knew—that he must make the impossible occur:

Arthur Pendragon must be brought back from the dead.

And so the Merlin set the magic into motion. He did not know how long it would take for the magic to become strong enough to work, but whenever that was, he would be ready. Someday, when the stars were right, the King would return to fulfill his rightful destiny.

The first thing the magic required was Taliesin's own life.

This he gave willingly. His life for the King's? It was not even a consideration. Taliesin went into a cave and said good-bye to his days as a human being. What he would become after this death was something other, something bigger, something much more difficult to be.

But he did not know this at the time. All he knew was that he was weaving a spell, a great spell, that would bring a hero back to the world of the living—a world that was as much in need of heroes as it had been sixteen centuries before.

The authors would like to thank the following for their assistance and support:

Brian Murphy, Fred Koehler, Karen Hartman, Pat Hilliard, Megan Coles, Deirdre Abbots, Eleanore Muller, Eiko Nishimoto, Albert Neumeyer, Shirlee Kovacs, Penelope Lawbaugh, Ralph Rudolph, Jo Ann Jones, Barbara Conrad, and Joann Meier; the Moroccan Embassy in New York; and most especially, Sherry Schwartz.

Molly Cochran has written and ghostwritten 30 novels and nonfiction books, including the Edgar-winning bestseller
Grandmaster, The Temple Dogs,
and
The Forever King
, recipient of the New York Public Library award for Books of the Teen Age, all co-written with Warren Murphy, and the nonfiction bestseller
Dressing Thin
. Her most recent works are the Young Adult novels
Legacy,
Poison,
and
Seduction
, published by Simon & Schuster, and the adult novel
Mireille
.

Warren Murphy is the author of the long-running satirical action/adventure series
The Destroyer
, which has sold more than 50 million copies and on which the movie
Remo Williams: The Adventure Begins
was based; the
Trace
series of detective novels which spawned the television series
Murphy's Law
; and a number of other books, stories, and screenplays. His film credits include
The Eiger Sanction
and
Lethal Weapon II
. His work has won a dozen national awards, including two Edgars and two Shamuses.

This is a work of fiction. All of the characters, organizations, and events portrayed in this novel are either products of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously.

 

Copyright © 1997 by M. C. Murphy

First edition: April 1997

First mass market edition: October 1998

 

All rights reserved.

 

No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means including information storage and retrieval systems, without permission in writing from the author. The only exception is by a reviewer, who may quote short excerpts in a review.

 

eISBN: 978-1-942356-00-4