The Mists of Avalon Read online

  “And that is why we came here,” said the Merlin suddenly, and his voice was like the tolling of a great bell, so that Morgaine sat up suddenly and began to whimper in fright.

  “I do not understand,” said Igraine, suddenly uneasy. “Surely the two lie close together. . . .”

  “The two are one,” said the Merlin, sitting very erect, “but the followers of Christ have chosen to say, not that they shall have no other Gods before their God, but that there is no other God save for their God; that he alone made the world, that he rules it alone, that he alone made the stars and the whole of creation.”

  Igraine quickly made the holy sign against blasphemy.

  “But that cannot be,” she insisted. “No single God can rule all things . . . and what of the Goddess? What of the Mother . . . ?”

  “They believe,” said Viviane, in her smooth low voice, “that there is no Goddess; for the principle of woman, so they say, is the principle of all evil; through woman, so they say, Evil entered this world; there is some fantastic Jewish tale about an apple and a snake.”

  “The Goddess will punish them,” Igraine said, shaken. “And yet you married me to one of them?”

  “We did not know that their blasphemy was so all-encompassing,” Merlin said, “for there have been followers of other Gods in our time. But they respected the Gods of others.”

  “But what has this to do with the length of the road from Avalon?” asked Igraine.

  “We come, then, to the reason for our visit,” said the Merlin, “for, as the Druids know, it is the belief of mankind which shapes the world, and all of reality. Long ago, when the followers of Christ first came to our isle, I knew that this was a powerful pivot in time, a moment to change the world.”

  Morgause looked up at the old man, her eyes wide in awe.

  “Are you so old, Venerable One?”

  The Merlin smiled down at the girl and said, “Not in my own body. But I have read much in the great hall which is not in this world, there the Record of All Things is written. And also, I was living then. Those who are the Lords of this world permitted me to come back, but in another body of flesh.”

  “These matters are too abstruse for the little one, Venerable Father,” Viviane said, gently rebuking him. “She is not a priestess. What the Merlin means, little sister, is that he was living when the Christians first came here, and that he chose, and was allowed, to reincarnate at once, to follow his work through. These are Mysteries, which you need not try to understand. Father, go on.”

  “I knew that this was one of those moments where the history of all mankind would be changed,” the Merlin said. “The Christians seek to blot out all wisdom save their own; and in that strife they are banishing from this world all forms of mystery save that which will fit into their religious faith. They have pronounced it a heresy that men live more than one life—which every peasant knows to be true—”

  “But if men do not believe in more than one life,” Igraine protested, shaken, “how will they avoid despair? What just God would create some men wretched, and others happy and prosperous, if one life were all that they could have?”

  “I do not know,” said the Merlin. “Perhaps they wish men to despair at the harshness of fate, so that they may come on their knees to the Christ who will take them to heaven. I do not know what the followers of Christ believe, or what they hope for.” His eyes were closed for a moment, the lines of his face bitter. “But whatever it is that they believe, the views they hold are altering this world; not only in the spirit, but on the material plane. As they deny the world of the spirit, and the realms of Avalon, so those realms cease to exist for them. They still exist, of course; but not in the same world with the world of the followers of Christ. Avalon, the Holy Isle, is now no longer the same island as the Glastonbury where we of the Old Faith once allowed the monks to build their chapel and their monastery. For our wisdom and their wisdom—how much do you know of natural philosophy, Igraine?”

  “Very little,” said the young woman, shaken, looking at the priestess and the great Druid. “I have never been taught.”

  “A pity,” said the Merlin, “for you must understand this, Igraine. I will try to make it simple for you. Look you,” he said, and took the gold torque from his throat, then drew his dagger. “Can I put this bronze and this gold into the same place, at once?”

  She blinked and stared, not understanding. “No, of course not. They can be side by side, but not in the same place unless you move one of them first.”

  “And so it is with the Holy Isle,” said Merlin. “The priests swore an oath to us, four hundreds of years ago, before even the Romans came here and tried to conquer, that they would never rise against us and drive us forth with weapons; for we were here before them, and then they were suppliants, and weak. And they have honored that oath—so much I must give to them. But in spirit, in their prayers, they have never ceased to strive with us for their God to drive away our Gods, their wisdom to rule over our wisdom. In our world, Igraine, there is room enough for many Gods and many Goddesses. But in the universe of the Christians—how can I say this?—there is no room for our vision or our wisdom. In their world there is one God alone; not only must he conquer over all Gods, he must make it as if there were no other Gods, had never been any Gods but only false idols, the work of their Devil. So that, believing in him, all men may be saved in this one life. This is what they believe. And as men believe, so their world goes. And so the worlds which once were one are drifting apart.

  “There are now two Britains, Igraine: their world under their One God and the Christ; and, beside it and behind it, the world where the Great Mother still rules, the world where the Old People have chosen to live and worship. This has happened before. There was the time when the fairy folk, the Shining Ones, withdrew from our world, going further and further into the mists, so that only an occasional wanderer now can spend a night within the elf-mounds, and if he should do so, time drifts on without him, and he may come out after a single night and find that his kinfolk are all dead and that a dozen years have gone by. And now, I tell you, Igraine, it is happening again. Our world—ruled by the Goddess and the Horned One, her consort, the world you know, the world of many truths—is being forced away from the mainstream course of time. Even now, Igraine, if a traveller sets out with no guide for the Isle of Avalon, unless he know the way very well, he cannot come there, but will find only the Isle of the Priests. To most men, our world is now lost in the mists of the Summer Sea. Even before the Romans left us, this was beginning to happen; now, as churches cover the whole of Britain, our world grows further and further away. That is why it took us so long to come here; fewer and fewer of the cities and roads of the Old People remain for our guide. The worlds still touch, still lie upon one another, close as lovers; but they are drifting apart, and if they are not stopped, one day there will be two worlds, and none can come and go between the two—”

  “Let them go!” interrupted Viviane angrily. “I still think we should let them go! I do not want to live in a world of Christians, who deny the Mother—”

  “But what of all the others, what of those who will live in despair?” The Merlin’s voice was like a great soft bell again. “No, a pathway must remain, even if it is secret. Parts of the world are still one. The Saxons raid in both worlds, but more and more of our warriors are followers of Christ. The Saxons—”

  “The Saxons are barbarians, and cruel,” said Viviane. “The Tribes alone cannot drive them from these shores, and the Merlin and I have seen that Ambrosius is not long for this world, and that his war duke, the Pendragon—is it Uther they call him?—will succeed him. But there are many in this country who will not rally to the Pendragon. Whatever may befall our world in the spirit, neither of our worlds can long survive the fire and sword of the Saxons. Before we can fight the spiritual battle which will keep the worlds from moving further apart, we must save the very heart of Britain from being ravaged by Saxon fires. Not only the Saxons assau
lt us, but Jutes, Scots, all the wild folk who are moving down from the North. Every place, even Rome itself, is being overpowered; there are so many of them. Your husband has been fighting all his life. Ambrosius, Duke of Britain, is a good man, but he can command loyalty only from those who once followed Rome; his father wore the purple, and Ambrosius too was ambitious to be emperor. But we must have a leader who will appeal to all the folk of Britain.”

  “But—Rome remains,” Igraine protested. “Gorlois told me that when Rome had overcome her troubles in the Great City, the legions would return! Can we not look to Rome for help against the wild folk from the North? The Romans were the greatest fighters of the world, they built the great wall to the North to hold back the wild raiders—”

  Merlin’s voice took on the empty sound that was like the tolling of a great bell. “I have seen it in the Holy Well,” he said. “The Eagle has flown, and shall never return to Britain.”

  “Rome can do nothing,” Viviane said. “We must have our own leader, one who can command all of Britain. Otherwise, when they mass against us, all Britain will fall, and for hundreds and hundreds of years, we will lie in ruins beneath the Saxon barbarians. The worlds will drift irrevocably apart and the memory of Avalon will not remain even in legend, to give hope to mankind. No, we must have a leader who can command loyalty from all the people of both the Britains—the Britain of the priests, and the world of the mists, ruled from Avalon. Healed by this Great King"—her voice took on the clear, mystical ring of prophecy—"the worlds shall once again come together, a world with room for the Goddess and for the Christ, the cauldron and the cross. And this leader shall make us one.”

  “But where shall we find such a king?” Igraine asked. “Who shall give us such a leader?”

  And then, suddenly, she was afraid, felt ice pouring down her back, as the Merlin and the priestess turned to look at her, their eyes seeming to hold her motionless as a small bird under the shadow of a great hawk, and she understood why the messenger-prophet of the Druids was called the Merlin.

  But when Viviane spoke her voice was very soft.

  She said, “You, Igraine. You shall bear this Great King.”

  2

  There was silence in the room, except for the small crackle of the fire. At last Igraine heard herself draw a long breath, as if she had just wakened from sleep. “What is this that you are telling me? Do you mean that Gorlois is to be the father of this Great King?” She heard the words echoing in her mind and ringing there, and wondered why she had never suspected Gorlois of so great a destiny. She saw her sister and the Merlin exchange glances, and saw, too, the small gesture with which the priestess silenced the old man.

  “No, Lord Merlin, a woman must say this to a woman. . . . Igraine, Gorlois is Roman. The Tribes will not follow any man born to a son of Rome. The High King they follow must be a child of the Holy Isle, a true son of the Goddess. Your son, Igraine, yes. But it is not the Tribes alone that will fight away the Saxons and the other wild folk from the North. We will need the support of Romans and Celts and Cymry, and they will follow only their own war duke, their Pendragon, son of a man they trust to lead them and rule. And the Old People, too, who seek the son of a royal mother. Your son, Igraine—but the father will be Uther Pendragon.”

  Igraine stared at them, understanding, until rage slowly broke through against the numbness. Then she flared at them, “No! I have a husband, and I have borne him a child! I will not let you play again at skipping-stones with my life! I married as you bade me—and you will never know—” The words choked in her throat. There would never be any way to tell them of that first year; even Viviane would never know. She could say, I was afraid, or I was alone and terrified, or Rape would have been easier because I could have run away to die afterward, but any of those would have been only words, conveying only the smallest part of what she had felt.

  And even if Viviane had known the whole, touching her mind and knowing all that she could not say, Viviane would have looked on her with compassion and even a little pity, but would not have changed her mind or demanded even a little less from Igraine. She had heard her sister say it often enough when Viviane still believed Igraine would become priestess of the Mysteries: If you seek to avoid your fate or to delay suffering, it only condemns you to suffer it redoubled in another life.

  So she did not say any of those things, only glared at Viviane with the stifled resentment of the last four years, when she had done her duty valiantly and alone, submitting to her fate with no more outcry than any woman was allowed to make. But again? Never, Igraine told herself silently, never. She shook her head stubbornly.

  “Listen to me, Igraine,” said the Merlin. “I fathered you, though that gives me no rights; it is the blood of the Lady which confers royalty, and you are of the oldest royal blood, descended from daughter to daughter of the Holy Isle. It is written in the stars, child, that only a king who comes of two royalties, one royalty of the Tribes who follow the Goddess, and one royalty of those who look to Rome, will heal our land of all this strife. A peace must come when these two lands can dwell side by side, a peace long enough for the cross and the cauldron, too, to come to such a peace. If there is such a reign as this, Igraine, even those who follow the cross will have the knowledge of the Mysteries to comfort them in their bleak lives of suffering and sin, and their belief in one brief life to choose forever between Hell or Heaven for all eternity. Otherwise, our world will fade into the mists, and there will be hundreds of years—thousands, perhaps—where the Goddess and the Holy Mysteries will be forgotten by all mankind except those few who can come and go between the worlds. Would you let the Goddess and her work fade from this world, Igraine, you who were born of the Lady of the Holy Isle, and the Merlin of Britain?”

  Igraine bent her head, barricading her mind against the tenderness in the old man’s voice. She had always known, without being told, that Taliesin, Merlin of Britain, had shared with her mother the spark of life which had made her, but a daughter of the Holy Isle did not speak of such things. A daughter of the Lady belonged only to the Goddess, and to that man into whose hands the Lady chose to give its care—most often her brother, only very rarely the man who had begotten it. There was a reason for this: no pious man should claim fatherhood to a child of the Goddess, and all children born to the Lady were considered so. That Taliesin should use this argument now shocked her deeply, but it touched her, too.

  Yet she said stubbornly, refusing to look at him, “Gorlois might have been chosen Pendragon. Surely this Uther cannot be so much beyond all sons of mankind as that. If you must have such a one, could you not have used your spells so that Gorlois would be acclaimed war duke of Britain, and Great Dragon? Then, when our son was born, you would have had your High King—”

  The Merlin shook his head, but again it was Viviane who spoke, and this silent collusion further angered Igraine. Why should they act in concert this way against her?

  Viviane said softly, “You will bear no son to Gorlois, Igraine.”

  “Are you the Goddess, then, that you dispense childbearing to women in her name?” Igraine demanded rudely, knowing the words childish. “Gorlois has fathered sons by other women; why should I not give him one born in wedlock, as he desires?”

  Viviane did not answer. She only looked directly at Igraine and said, her voice very soft, “Do you love Gorlois, Igraine?”

  Igraine stared at the floor. “That has nothing to do with it. It is a matter of honor. He was kind to me—” She broke off, but her thoughts ran on unchecked: Kind to me when I had nowhere to turn, when I was alone and deserted, and even you had abandoned me to my fate. What is love to that?

  “It is a matter of honor,” she repeated. “I owe him this. He let me keep Morgaine, when she was all I had in my loneliness. He has been kind and patient, and for a man of his years it cannot be easy. He wants a son, he believes it all-important to his life and honor, and I will not deny him this. If I bear a son, it will be the son of Duke Gorlois,
and of no other man living. And this I swear, by fire and—”

  “Silence!” Viviane’s voice, like the loud clang of a great bell, shocked Igraine’s words silent. “I command you, Igraine, swear no oath lest you be forever forsworn!”

  “And why should you think I would not keep my oath?” Igraine raged. “I was reared to truth! I too am a child of the Holy Isle, Viviane! You may be my elder sister and my priestess and the Lady of Avalon, but you shall not treat me as if I were a babbling child like Morgaine there, who cannot understand a word of what is said to her, nor knows the meaning of an oath—”

  Morgaine, hearing her name spoken, sat bolt upright in the Lady’s lap. The Lady of the Lake smiled and smoothed the dark hair. “Do not think that this little one cannot understand. Babes know more than we imagine; they cannot speak their minds, and so we believe they do not think. As for your babe—well, that is for the future, and I will not speak of it before her; but who knows, one day she too will be a great priestess—”