"Stewart, Mary - Merlin 01 - The Crystal Cave" - читать интересную книгу автора (Stewart Mary)

She was silent for a minute. Then all she said was: "How long?"

He did not pretend to misunderstand her. 'We have an hour, two, no more."

She said flatly: "You will come back." Then as he started to speak: 'No. Not now, not any more. We have said it all, and now there is no 'more time. I only meant that you will be safe, and you will come back safely. I tell you, I know these things. I have the Sight. You will come back."

"It hardly needs the Sight to tell me that. I must come back. And then perhaps you will listen to me-"

"No." She stopped him again, almost angrily. "It doesn't matter. What does it matter? We have only an hour, and we are wasting it, Let us, go in."

He was already pulling out the jewelled pin that held her cloak together, as he put an arm round her and led her towards the cave.

"Yes, let us go in."



BOOK I

THE DOVE

The day my uncle Camlach came home, I was just six years old.

I remember him well as I first saw him, a tall young man, fiery like my grandfather, with the blue eyes and reddish hair that I thought so beautiful in my mother. He came to Maridunum near sunset of a September evening, with a small troop of men. Being only small, I was with the women in the long, old-fashioned room where they did the weaving. My mother was sitting at the loom; I remember the cloth; it was of scarlet, with a narrow pattern of green at the edge. I sat near her on the floor, playing knuckle- bones, right hand against left. The sun slanted through the windows, making oblong pools of bright gold on the cracked mosaics of the floor; bees droned in the herbs outside, and even the click and rattle of the loom sounded sleepy. The women were talking among themselves over their spindles, but softly, heads together, and Moravik, my nurse, was frankly asleep on her stool in one of the pools of sunlight.

When the clatter, and then the shouts, came from the courtyard, the loom stopped abruptly, and with it the soft chatter from the women. Moravik came awake with a snort and a stare. My mother was sitting very straight, bead lifted, listening. She had dropped her shuttle. I saw her eyes meet Moravik's.

I was halfway to the window when Moravik called to me sharply, and there was something in her voice that made me stop and go back to her without protest. She began to fuss with my clothing, pulling my tunic straight and smoothing my hair, so that I understood the visitor to be someone of importance. I felt excitement, and also surprise that apparently I was to be presented to him; I was used to being kept out of the way In those days. I stood patiently while Moravik dragged the comb through my hair, and over my head she and my mother exchanged some quick, breathless talk which, hardly heeding, I did not understand. I was listening to the tramp of horses in the yard and the shouting of men, words here and there coming clearly in, a language neither Welsh nor Latin, but Celtic with some accent like the one of Less Britain, which I understood because my nurse, Moravik, was a Breton, and her language came to me as readily as my own.

I heard my grandfather's great laugh, and another voice replying. Then he must have swept the newcomer indoors with him, for the voices receded, leaving only the jingle and stamp of the horses being led to the stables.

I broke from Moravik and ran to my mother.

"Who is it?"

"My brother Camlach, the King's son." She did not look at me, but pointed to the fallen shuttle. I picked it up and handed it to her. slowly, and rather mechanically, she set the loom moving again.

"Is the war over, then?

"The war has been over a long time. Your uncle has been with the High King in the south.'

'And now he has to come home because my uncle Dyved died?" Dyved had been the heir, the King's eldest son. He had died suddenly, and in great pain, of cramps in the stomach, and Elen his widow, who was childless, had gone back to her father. Naturally there had been the usual talk of poison, but nobody took it seriously; Dyved had been well liked, a tough fighter and a careful man, but, generous where it suited. "They say he'll have to marry. Will he, Mother?" I was excited, important at knowing so much, thinking of the wedding feast. "Will he marry Keridwen, now that my uncle, Dyved--?'

"What?" The shuttle stopped, and she swung round, startled. But what she saw, in my face appeased her, for the anger went out of her voice, though she still frowned, and I heard Moravik clucking and fussing behind me. "Where in the world did you get that? You hear too much, whether you understand it or not. Forget such matters, and hold your tongue." The shuttle moved again, slowly. "Listen to me, Merlin. When they come to see you, you will do well to keep quiet, 'Do you understand me?"

"Yes, Mother." I understood very well. I was well accustomed to keeping out of the King's way. "But will they come to see me? Why me?"

She said, with a thin bitterness that made her look all at once older, almost as old as Moravik. "Why do you think?"

The loom clacked again, fiercely. She was feeding in the green thread, and I could see that she was malting a mistake, but it looked pretty, so I said nothing; watching her and staying close, fill at length the curtain at the doorway was pushed aside, and the two men came in.