“You are he whom they call Myrddin?” he asked abruptly, as if he could not believe that.
“I am he.”
“Yet you are but a youth. How can such as you be this prophet, this one who moves rocks by his will and the tapping of a sword? Who are you in truth?”
“I have been told I am son of no man,” Myrddin returned. “As for my gift, it was given to me for a certain purpose, first that the King Stone return into its place for the good of this land.”
Uther set his hands on his hips; his chin was thrust forward a little as if he were about to utter a challenge.
“Who are you to decide the good of Britain? You have not even bloodied that sword of yours in her service, if rumor speaks true.” He nodded toward the blade, once more hidden by its bark trappings, where it hung from Myrddin’s belt.
“The sword is not mine, lord. I only hold it guardian for a space. And my gifts are other than the gifts of war.”
“I have heard that you prophesy. If that is true, tell me if Pendragon has won!”
“He has won,” agreed Myrddin. “Yet shall the white dragon return and return again. Lord King, hammer this land into one kingdom, if you would rule in truth.
Uther nodded. “That needs no prophecy, boy. It is only what any man knows must be done. Tell me something which I cannot foresee for myself. My brother did not like sorcery, and those of the belief of the Christus, who now come into the land, say such is of the Dark and should be driven out. I am of two minds yet, boy. Tell me something I can believe and I shall give protection in return, a place for you at my hall, honor due—“
Myrddin shook his head. “Lord King, I am not for courts nor the honors you offer. Your brother once said to me that as a warrior I might ride with him, but as a prophet I had no place among his liege men. If you lean even the slightest on my words, then this fear of theirs will touch you also. It is better you have no such forces of dissension in your court. But you have asked for a foreseeing, and I shall give you one:
“You will breed an heir, but do this in a hidden fashion. And he will be such a king as this land has not seen since the days of the Emperor Maximus, perhaps even greater than that one who seized the Purple and made us safe for a space. His name shall be remembered through the centuries. And if he does as he is designed to do, then shall this land be blessed above all others of the world.”
“Most men breed sons,” Uther returned, “if they have not daughters. And who will come after me—that is of no matter now. Nor shall / know to prove you true or false. Do better than this, sorcerer, if you would show your magic.”
“Lord King, do you expect me to summon a clap of thunder, or turn your men yonder into a pack of hounds? I deal not with what you call magic but with Old Wisdom. This much I can say: before next year winds to its end you shall have a use for me. When that moment comes let your messenger ride to where stood the clan house of Nyren and there among its ruins light a fire. I shall answer to your sending.”
Uther laughed. “Boy, I cannot think what use I would have for you. It seems to me that your talents are small ones, mainly dealing with illusions and making men see what is not. You are right that my men are mistrustful of your magic and you are better apart. I do not know what manner of man you will make when your years are ripe, but I think that we cannot deal easily together, you and L”
He swept his cloak about him and walked away. Myrddin watched him go but in those moments he had a flash of vision. That tall man in his scarlet cloak, his bronze armor, was suddenly bent and shrunk, his face drawn and bluish, his strong-muscled arms hardly more than sticks over bone; death looked from his eyes. Not in battle would death come to Uther, Myrddin knew in that moment of other sight, but by treachery and slow degrees. And he would have called after Uther in warning, but he knew any words he spoke would be shrugged aside.
He sighed, thinking his a perilous gift if it would show him what he could not aid; he would be better off without it if he could see a man’s death lying behind his face and had to keep still about it. But he did not turn away at once from the King Stone, rather rested his hand on its surface and wondered mightily what there was about this one stone, out of the many in this place, that made it so necessary to the purposes of the Sky People. The mirror had told him it was a beacon, but he could not understand its properties as such. He only knew that it held within it the same feeling of leashed energy he had sensed in many of the other stones of this place.
Lugaid was waiting for him when he trudged back to the hut. The Druid had made a bundle of Myrddin’s few possessions. He held the pony bridled and ready for riding.
“You must go.”
The abruptness of that startled the boy.
“Why?”
“There is a seeking now reaching toward this place. You have done what those of the Dark did not want you to, therefore they may well seek to end your life before you can accomplish anything further. Last night there were Shadow Dancers among the circles. As yet none has the power to take substance from the stones to build a body. But I think they shall return as long as you linger here. And with each of their visits they shall grow stronger, until they can indeed prove a threat against body as well as mind.
“I have not asked you the source of the power you have learned to use. Nor, I think, will that be given me to know. But now I warn you, Myrddin, go to that place and thereby renew your own strength. For that which has taught you must have defenses beyond the weaving of our race and, I hope, may be impervious to penetration by the Dark Ones.”
“Come with me!” Myrddin said impulsively.
The Druid shook his head. “To each his own. What you have found is for your use alone because you are of the breed you are. No, I shall remain here.”
“And the Shadow Dancers, then?” Myrddin turned to look down the avenues of standing stones. Under this sun there were slight shadows reaching from the foot of each, that was true, but there was no threat or mystery in them. He knew what Lugaid spoke of those things which Nimue had threatened him with on the night of their meeting.
“I am no fit prey for them, being of little account in the game they have been sent to play. Just as I am of little account in what you must do.”
Myrddin thought of the loneliness of the cave, its nearest neighbor being the destroyed clan house, which he never wished to look on again.
“You are not of small account to me,” he said. “To live only with the wild things among the high places, that is little to look forward to.”
“There speaks fear,” Lugaid replied sternly. “Each man walks his own road in his life; only a few times may he reach out and in truth touch another. You, being who you are, must accept that you stand alone in this world. If you would have company of your kind, then do what you are lessoned in doing.”
So Myrddin rode from the Place of the Sun, leaving behind him a newly set stone among the many, and holding in him the stark knowledge that indeed he could look for nothing but loneliness, as was the lot of one who would use the Old Power. He went back to the hillside with its cleft entrance by ways which were little traveled.
It was far more difficult for him to force an entrance to the cave this time, for his body had grown. At length he won into the inner chamber where the installations still clicked and purred. Tired in both body and mind, he settled down before the mirror.
“You have returned,” the voice observed, speaking as monotonously as ever. “And that beacon is now in place. So far you have answered to your birthright”
Myrddin did not know how the mirror could know of his success, unless, by some art similar to sorcery, it picked the thoughts from his mind. And he did not like (hat suggestion. Was he only the servant of this alien thing, a slave not allowed any desires or actions of his own? Ill then was his birth, for no man should be born subject to a destiny he could not choose nor change.