The Road to Avalon Read Free

could be no mistake about that: the ink-black hair, the dark brows and lashes, the light gray eyes. But the bone structure was Igraine’s. He was dressed like a peasant and his hair was greasy and there was a dirt smudge on one high cheekbone, but he wore his heritage in every lineament of his face.
    Merlin searched for what to say. That blank, shuttered look rejected him before he had even begun. “Arthur,” he began determinedly, “I am here as an emissary from your father.”
    The boy said nothing. The look on his face did not change.
    “He . . . he did not know that your . . . that Malwyn was dead.”
    Still nothing.
    “How old were you when she died?”
    There was a long pause. Merlin was beginning to wonder if the boy had been able to understand him, when Arthur finally spoke. “I don’t know.” His British was the local dialect; his voice was sullen.
    Merlin stared at his grandson in frustration. Finally he said baldly, “I have come to take you away.”
    Something flashed briefly behind those gray eyes before the shutters came down again. But it was a reaction. Encouraged, Merlin went on with the story he had prepared during his journey to Cornwall. It had to do with Arthur’s fictitious father being an old army friend of his. Flavius, he named him. Flavius had been married, he told the boy, and so unable to marry Malwyn. But he had always intended to send for Arthur. When Flavius had died a few months ago, Merlin had promised to look out for the boy. And so here he was, come to take Arthur home.
    The story had not sounded very plausible even when he thought it up. It sounded even less plausible now as he confronted the still, closed face of his grandson. No, Merlin thought heavily, they had not done well by Arthur at all.
    For the first time the boy volunteered speech. “Will he let me go?” he asked.
    “Do you mean Esus?”
    “Yes.”
    “I have not yet spoken to him. But he has no claim on you, boy. He will let you go.”
    A breeze came rustling up the hill, making Merlin’s cloak swirl around him, lifting the tangled black hair off Arthur’s forehead. It should be a beautiful face, Merlin thought, but it was marred by that sullen, withdrawn expression. “Come,” he said decisively, “we will go and find Esus.”
    It was not, in fact, quite as simple as Merlin had anticipated, the business of removing Arthur from his guardian. Esus, large, grim-faced, argumentative, was not inclined to give the boy up easily. It was a matter, Merlin finally gathered, of the yearly payments from Uther.
    He got Arthur, finally, because of who he was. Even in Cornwall they knew of Merlin, the Romano-Celtic prince who had been one of Constantine’s captains, who was the father of the queen. He got Arthur, although Esus had not liked it. All through the long discussion the boy had sat to the side and said nothing. When bidden, he had made a packet of his belongings and followed Merlin. He had said nothing to Esus at the parting.
    It was late afternoon when they left the village, but Merlin had no disposition to linger within its inhospitable environs. He would be more comfortable sleeping under the stars than in that circular hut with the smoke and the pigs and Esus’ hostility.
    They made camp beside a small stream and Merlin shot a rabbit with his bow. The boy ate the meat hungrily and lay down obediently at Merlin’s command. He was asleep almost instantly.
    Merlin looked at the tousled black hair of his sleeping grandson, illuminated by the dying light of the fire. The boy was no dirtier than most village-dwellers, but he was a long way from Merlin’s fastidious Roman standards of cleanliness. Tomorrow, he thought, he would bathe Arthur in the stream. He had brought fresh clothes for the boy in his own saddlebag. With a bath and clean clothes, the boy would look presentable enough to bring to Avalon.
    Arthur made no objection when Merlin announced his intentions the following morning. The sun was bright and