Yseult: A Tale of Love in the Age of King Arthur (77 page)

Brangwyn's happiness was far from her mind, however, when the news from Bro Leon arrived. Drystan had gone missing.

According to the message from Yseult of the White Hands, her husband had disappeared on a trip to Kemper at the end of October. Yseult knew well enough where he had been in November, but they had all assumed he had returned to Armorica after they heard no more from him. But if he was neither in Isca nor Leonis, where was he?

"Is this your doing?" Marcus railed at her, slapping her across the room.

Yseult shook her head. "I have no idea where Drystan is."

He hit her again, and she winced, holding her hand to her cheek. "Careful, Husband. Arthur, Cador and others are coming to the wedding and may take note if my face is bruised."

He turned away with a snarl of frustration. "Arthur or no Arthur, I will kill you with my own hands this time if I find you are behind this."

The plans for the wedding were too far advanced to be called off, even for the news that Kurvenal's best friend was missing. They knew he had not disappeared in Kemper, but they feared something might have happened to him on the way back to Armorica.

Yseult sensed that Marcus was relieved she was so listless and cried so often during the days leading up to the wedding and the Christmas celebration — it meant that she had told the truth, and his son was not hiding somewhere nearby.

But where
was
Drystan?

* * * *

The cold reminded him of something, if only he could remember what. He had been this cold before, he knew that. Cold and happy.

The happiness was the reason he was here now, he knew that too. But why did so much of what he knew keep escaping him?

He bent down and picked up a smooth agate from the sand, silvery and pale, the color of the full moon, a color that meant joy to him. It was the joy he sought, another glimpse of it, but it eluded him. It wasn't here. He kept searching for it, but it wouldn't come.

He gazed up at the rocky promontory jutting out into the sea ahead of him, empty. Empty of life, empty of delight. The tangled mat of his hair whipped around his face, and he shoved it back with one chapped and calloused hand. He was hungry. It was time to catch fish for dinner.

His bare feet made squeaking noises in the sand as he walked, rubbing grains together, against his skin, squeak, squeak, a strange sound, and he watched his naked toes in fascination for a while, smiling, forgetting his hunger, forgetting what he had lost.

A noise broke through the peaceful sound of surf and sand, human, jarring, wanting something from him.

"Hey!"

He looked up, frozen, not knowing what to do. Down the beach was a fisher hauling in a small coracle. The fisher turned towards him, waving.

He whirled and ran, down the beach, back into the caves. Caves were good. Caves meant safety and protection. The caves would hide him.

But once they had meant more. Why wouldn't the joy come?

* * * *

Some times he knew more than at others. When he touched the wall of the cave, damp and hard against his hand, he remembered her, his joy, remembered the feel of her in his arms, her long hair flowing across his forearms, remembered the scent of her, hot and sweet, not like the cold moonlight of her eyes, remembered the sharp pleasure of entering her.

She had drawn him back here to the Rock, where he first brought her, where he had given her up, where they had made love against the wall of the cave. Where was she now?

* * * *

He spent his days foraging for food and walking the beach and hiding. He didn't understand why they were after him. He meant no one harm, wanted only to keep to himself and wait for her. As the days grew longer and warmer, there were more of them to hide from, but the one he waited for still did not come.

On the cliffs above and the bluffs to the south, the wildflowers were beginning to bloom, and he felt a smile coming to his lips more often as color returned to his life. The sun was warm sun on his back when he dug for clams in the morning. But as life became easier and more pleasant, more people began to intrude on his isolation, none of them the one he looked for, the reason he was here. At least there were places to hide in the rocky cliffs along the beach, formations of rock, slate and granite, jutting out into the sand, into the sea, jumbles of boulders beside and below them, with caves in between, many, many caves. He knew them all now, had explored this thin stretch of beach thoroughly while he hid and waited.

He waited, but still she didn't come.

A noise above alerted him, and he gathered his tools and scampered into one of his hiding places. While he watched from behind a tumble of rocks, a large group of people came down on a steep path from the bluff, more than he had ever seen here at one time. They wore tunics belted at the waist and breeches tied at the ankles, and they had daggers tucked into their belts and swords slung over their backs. Warriors. Why would warriors be combing this beach, a place for fishermen and lost souls?

Two of them came near his hiding place, a dark-haired one with a sarcastic slant to his mouth, and another with wavy brown hair and the pain of loss around his eyes. The sight of them tugged at something in his mind. He ducked down, peeking between two boulders leaning into each other.

"This is futile," the dark-haired one said, shaking his head. "We don't even knows if this monster or madman the villagers keep seeing is him."

The other warrior pursed his lips. "Perhaps not, but he disappeared at about the same time the sightings began, and they are always on these beaches near Dyn Tagell."

Dyn Tagell
. He gave a start. That name meant something to him, many things. Summers and seagulls and ships, arriving and leaving, ships carrying tin, ships carrying enemies; another cave, an herb garden, baths. Things he wanted and didn't want.

"Perhaps we should try calling him," the brown-haired warrior suggested. His speech was punctuated by the regular sound of the waves, a soothing rhythm, constant, something he could rely on. Not like the things he wanted and didn't want, the things that tugged at him at the sight of these two men.

"He may not know his name — if it is even him, which I doubt."

"But it's worth a try."

The warrior with the sardonic expression shrugged, and then cupped his hands to his mouth.

"Drystan!"

He jumped, even more startled than before.
Drystan
.

He pressed himself back against the boulder. There was even more meaning here, meaning he no longer wanted.

"Drys!" the other one called out. "Are you there, Drys?"

No
. That voice, saying that name ...
no
.

They moved away, still calling out in competition with the wind and the waves, and he crawled farther back into his lair, hiding from them, from the name they had given him, from the things that had driven him away.

* * * *

Drystan
.

The name brought fear, and the fear put a rent in the veil in his mind. He didn't want the knowledge that came with that name. He wanted only the sand and the sea and the rocks, the clams he dug in the morning and the fish he captured in the evening, wanted to wait here for his joy to return, with none of the worry and pain he kept at bay.

His fingers traced a wavy pattern of on the cliff beside him, curved and twisted as if it were soft as clay, bent by the hand of some god.

Drystan
. Ever since he had first heard it, the name danced in his head, teasing him to remember. When he built a small fire in the lee of a rock or fetched water from the stream tumbling down from the bluff, the names haunted him, like a marching chant, orders to follow.

Drystan, Dyn Tagell, Drystan, Dyn Tagell, Drystan, Dyn Tagell
.

"Drystan!"

He looked up, startled, dropping his bucket. Had the words in his mind taken to the wind?

"Drys!"

No, they were there again. How could he not have noticed? Had he been so lost in his own mind, contemplating the meaning of that name?

And then
she
stepped out from behind a young, golden warrior who had not been here on the beach before.

She had finally come, his joy. Her moonlight hair trailed down her back in a tight braid, and her moonlight eyes gazed at him questioningly as she approached.

"Drystan?"

He rose. If she spoke the name, he would have to accept it, and everything that went with it.

"Ah, Danu — Drystan, it is you, isn't it?"

He walked forward, aware suddenly that his hair was a mess of tangles well past his shoulders and his clothes were in rags, while she wore the garments of a queen, a long tunic of stiff green silk imported from lands so far away they were more like legends than real places, belted at the waist with a chain of gold. She wore golden bracelets around her wrists and upper arms and a torc of gold around her neck. He touched his own upper arm and realized that he too wore such bracelets.

And barefoot, she was barefoot to walk in the sand.

Finally her name came to him. "Yseult."

"Ah, Danu," she said again. "What have I done?"

He smiled. "You have returned to me."

She broke into tears.

The brown-haired one approached him, taking his arm. "Do you remember me too, Drys?"

Drystan stared at him. The face was familiar, as familiar as his own hand, but the effort to put a name to the face made his head hurt.

"Kurvenal," the man prompted.

"Kurvenal," he repeated. Yes, he knew that name, remembered journeys through Gaul and Armorica, remembered battles shoulder to shoulder, remembered loyalty more complete than any one man deserved. "Kurvi."

Kurvenal's eyes lit up. "You'll come with us now, Drystan, won't you? We'll take care of you, help you recover. Arthur needs every one of his companions now."

Arthur
. Arthur needed him? "But there is peace now."

The others looked at each other.

The golden one spoke. "No longer. But we will speak of that when you are recovered."

"Will you come, Drystan?" Yseult asked.

He looked from face to face, the features that tugged at his mind and broke down the protective wall he had built, features and faces he loved. There was pain waiting for him if he went with them, he knew that, the pain he had fled from. He wished he could hide from it, leave it behind forever, but that would only be possible in death.

He nodded. "Yes."

* * * *

Drystan awoke from strange nightmares, filled with faces he should know and names he couldn't remember. The bed was soft beneath his back and the woven blanket warm, very different from the bedding of dry leaves and grass he had made for himself in the cave and the covers of old clothing. Soft voices murmured nearby, Kurvenal and a voice he knew but had no name for. He tried to remember, but his mind resisted and began to ache. He settled for listening.

"He's so thin. It scares me."

"At least we've found him," Kurvenal said, and in his mind's eye, Drystan could see him shrug. "Now that we have him here at Dyn Tagell, Yseult can care for him and he can recover."

There was a short pause. "But he's lost his mind."

"No, it's only in hiding."

Drystan chuckled, a rusty sound, more like wheezing than laughter, and opened his eyes. Two heads whipped around to stare at him.

Kurvenal hurried over. "Drys, are you all right?"

"No, my mind is in hiding, remember?" His voice sounded rough even to his own ears. He wondered when the last time had been that he had spoken a complete sentence.

"How long have you been awake?" Kurvenal asked.

"Not long."