For a while I knew nothing but what Bellina, Brunor and Petal knew. When they woke they found me with them. The rising water had lifted us almost at the top of the well. But the water was pouring from me so fast that the air, completely sealed in by the cap of ice, was heavy and difficult to breathe. They were so close to the cap now that they could touch it. Brunor struck the ice with his fist, trying to break it, or at least attract the attention of someone on the other side.
They could not wake me. Petal and Bellina were keeping my unconscious body afloat.
The water was inches from the ice now. In a moment there would be no air left for them to breathe. They would drown. Bellina screamed, and then the water covered her mouth. Brunor pounded at the icecap, but still it would not crack. They were drowning a second time.
A form appeared through the distortion of the icecap. The figure was standing on top of the ice. It brought a heavy implement down hard in the centre of the cover, and great white cracks formed in the seal. Another blow, and the pressure of the air in the well forced the broken bits of thick ice off the top in a great explosion, throwing our saviour to one side.
The first thing I knew again for myself was when Martha’s huge hand lifted me out of the well and put me on the floor. I felt the blessed release of silence in my mind, as the connections between me and the other three were finally broken. Their memories were wholly jumbled up, but within me now was everything they knew, or thought they knew; their whole lives to that moment. I knew about the murder of Brunor’s father by the Red Knight – or was it Sir Breuse Saunce Pité? Petal’s – or Bellina’s – tendency to fall in and out of love in moments; Bellina’s – or Brunor’s – many mothers, and their second mother in Queen Melody of Cornwall.
Martha hauled the other three out of the well. They were soaked, and Bellina wept at her ordeal, but they were otherwise unharmed. Brunor whooped his joy at being alive until Martha hushed him.
‘M-M-Martha,’ I said. ‘Y-Y-You came b-back.’
‘Aye, lad. Your mother rode past me as I was leaving, and I thought I’d better make sure you were well –’ she checked herself – ‘no pun intended. I mean: alive.’
‘Can I have a go of your hammer?’ said Petal. Martha had her huge silver sledgehammer by her side, it was this she’d used to break the ice.
‘Perhaps later, pretty one,’ said Martha. ‘But at the moment none of us are welcome here. We should quit this castle and the Lands of the Lake as quickly as we can.’
* * *
We crept through my mother’s castle, along corridors and up staircases, encountering only one maid on the way. Brunor caught her before she ran, stifled her screams with his hand, and locked her in a room with no other exits, leaving her to hammer on the door. We hoped her noise would attract the notice of the other servants before we did.
I don’t know what time it was when we made it to the courtyard, but it was deep into the night. The rain had stopped. Because of the barrier across her lands, my mother had little need to keep a guard, so the gates were open and the walls deserted. We crept across to the stables, and saddled our horses in silence. Martha had left her own steed by the hollow tree, and ran off to fetch her. I was concerned that the noise of the horses’ hooves would rouse Nerina, so I suggested that we mount as soon as we were out of the stable and ride hard to the gate. For that purpose I made Bellina harness her own horse with a normal saddle, which she found decidedly unladylike.
Soon we were ready to go. ‘R-R-R-R-Remember: out of the g-g-g-g-gates as quick as you c-c-can.’
Brunor led us – his horse was the fastest – followed by Petal and Bellina. I took a last look around the castle, determining never to return to the place ever again. I urged Tommy after the others, but as Bellina disappeared into the darkness beyond the gates I heard a gush and a creak. The gates were moving of their own accord: the water-engine that drove their locking mechanism had been set in motion. I urged Tommy faster, hoping that we could squeeze through the fast-closing exit, but with twenty feet to go I realised Tommy was in danger of being crushed between the heavy gates, and pulled him to a halt. I wheeled him around. Nerina was at the entrance that led through to the great hall, illuminated only by the moonlight, which beamed brightly from the now-clear sky.
I dismounted, and walked towards her.
‘The others can go,’ said my sister. ‘But you stay, shrimp. I will not let you leave and put Natalie in danger.’
She was quite serious. There was love in her such as, I thought at the time, I had never witnessed in the eyes of any of my family. There was no way I could reason with a mother’s overwhelming love for her child, but I tried anyway.
‘Y-Y-You think you c-can keep her safe without M-M-Mother here? W-Without Neave, if Mother’s c-c-c-correct and she’s alive? W-W-Without Neave’s boy, and with Nemone’s p-p-p-p-power gone? I-I-I saw Merlin at the b-b-boundary of the Lake; it’s only a m-m-m-matter of time before he c-c-comes for you and Natalie and Mother.’
‘Mother will bring Neave and the boy back,’ she said. ‘And then we’ll be complete, and we’ll be safe.’ She stepped towards me, and touched my cheek in an imitation of affection. ‘Drift, we have been cruel to you, I know. But that can change now. It will change. Think of what’s gone before as... as an initiation into the family. We wanted to make you tough enough to be one of us, you see. It was nothing different from what I, or Neave or Nemone experienced. We do love you; we always have, dear Drift. It was all a game, just a silly game. I’ll tell you your real name, the name we always planned to give you when you came of age. You were to be Neptune. You are Neptune.’
And then my sister smiled at me, and I felt such a longing in my heart. For my whole life, for sixteen long years, I had hoped for a single word of kindness or affection from them; I had prayed to all the gods and to none for it. Here was my eldest sister, giving me everything I had ever needed: a kind touch, a soft tone, an explanation and an excuse for everything they had put me through.
‘Mama?’
Natalie had toddled out of the castle in her nightdress. Nerina’s eyes broke from mine, and –
I ran to my niece and scooped her up, as she had asked me to in the wood. She giggled and grabbed my hair with her little hand.
‘M’Uncle,’ she said.
‘I-I-I am,’ I told her. ‘I’m Uncle D-Drift.’
‘Put her down, Drift,’ said my sister softly. ‘She should be in bed.’
I shook my head sadly. ‘I-I’m sorry, s-s-sister, but I’m n-n-not a child anymore. You’re not going to f-f-f-f-fool me like that ever again. I-I-I-I only have to see you with this one to know y-y-y-you’re lying to me.’
Nerina reached out for her child. ‘Then give her back to me and go,’ she said sharply. And then I knew for certain I was right. She had been making a fool of me, as my mother, she and my other sisters had so often before.
I smiled at Natalie. ‘Shortly, N-N-Nerina. F-F-F-First I’m going to t-t-take my niece for a quick n-nighttime ride.’ I tickled Natalie under her chin, and she giggled. ‘You’ll like that N-N-Natalie, won’t you?’
‘Off,’ said Natalie, trying to push my fingers away from her neck.
I walked towards Tommy, and mounted with Natalie still on my hip. ‘Open the g-g-gates,’ I said over my deformed shoulder.
My sister, her eyes always on her child, clicked her finger and thumb and the gate mechanism reversed, opening the heavy wooden doors. Brunor was outside, staring up at the doors as they swung open.
‘I-I-It’s alright, Brunor. I-I-I was just saying g-g-goodbye to my sister and m-my niece.’
Tommy took me to Brunor’s horse, and the two beasts nuzzled each other. They had become good friends on the road, those two.
I kissed Natalie’s golden hair, for, I believed, the first and last time. ‘Goodbye, Natalie,’ I whispered to her. ‘You’re one of the good ones. I’ll try and keep you and your mammy safe, but I can’t do it here.’ I leant out of my saddle and put her down. The moment her feet touched the ground she ran back to her mother.
I was going to say some words of goodbye to my sister, give her some assurance that I would do all I could to protect the Lands of the Lake, but she looked at me with such renewed hatred that no kind words came to mind. The gates closed behind us, and Brunor and I rode into the trees.
* * *
We camped just beyond the border of the Lands of the Lake that night. Without Garnish we had no tents, so we slept in the open air. It was lucky that it was a mild evening in the middle of May, because none of us had dried from our long soak in the well. Martha lit a fire, but Bellina was badly affected by the cold. In the end we all huddled together, apart from Martha. Bellina fell asleep in my arms.
I woke to the smell of cooking meat. Martha was tending a new fire. She had found a few rabbits in the nearby meadow. I smiled when I saw the skinned meat, spitted on sticks and roasting over the heat. The thought flashed through my mind that the smell reminded me of happier times on Avalon, but then I wondered what had been so happy about them. I eased myself from Bellina’s arms, careful not to wake her. I folded my cloak and left it for her pillow. In the repose of sleep, in the misty early morning sun, with her long golden hair a halo round her face she was very beautiful. Sleeping, her expression was simple and pure, with none of the hardness she wore as her defence against a world she understood to be cruel.
My sleep had been full of dreams, but they had not been my dreams. I had seen Castillo Orgulloso and its vineyards, Tintagel and its rocky islands, the busy riches of London and the meadows of Kent. It was as if sleep had untangled the three new heads that had seeped into me in the well. I now understood these three – Bellina, Brunor and Petal – as I had never understood anyone, perhaps even better than I understood myself. Though I was still Drift, I knew I would never be able to condemn any of them for what they did from that point on. I had sympathy with their unique structures of thinking: the triumphs and tragedies, virtues and sins, excitements and boredoms that made the three themselves, unified and incorrupt.
I went to the fire, and crouched down beside Martha. For a long while we said nothing.
‘A glamour is it, lad?’ she said after a while.
I touched my face. My glamour had re-woven itself in my sleep. It seemed wearing it was now more natural to me than not. ‘Yes, Martha.’
A curl strayed over her eye. ‘You sure you want to wear one?’
‘Where I’m going, with what happens next, I’m going to have to convince people to follow my lead. That will be easier if I speak clearly.’
She blinked, and looked at me uncertainly. She thought about saying something, but eventually turned back to the fire. Later, she told me what she had been thinking at that moment. I wish, I wish she had spoken then; though I suppose I would not have heard her.
‘What will you do now?’ I said.
‘Breakfast,’ she smiled. ‘And then...’ She looked back towards the woods at the edge of my mother’s lands. ‘I’m coming with you.’
‘Are you sure? Mother’s on her way to where I’m going.’
‘Aye, aye,’ she said wistfully. ‘I’ve hidden away from the world in Lady Nemue’s kingdom for too long.’ She looked up to the blue sky, spotted with white fluffy clouds. ‘Something terrible is coming, lad. I’ve closed my ears and shut my eyes to it for too long. I’ve hidden away – I’ve been scared.’ I found it almost impossible to imagine Martha being scared of anything; she had been the one who always soothed my fears. ‘It’s time to pick sides, and it’s your side I choose.’ She didn’t look at me as she said this. She poked at the fire. Sparks caught in the gentle wind and drifted over the fields.
The others woke one-by-one. We breakfasted on Martha’s rabbits, sitting round the fire. Bellina wore my cloak around her shoulders as she ate.
‘We have not got we came for,’ said Brunor glumly. ‘The Lady of the Lake will not ally with Orkney and Cornwall. Throwing emissaries down a well is a clear signal of that.’
‘Quite the reader of diplomatic subtleties we have here.’ Petal grinned, and punched the Moor lightly in the chest.
‘Where’s Garnish?’ said Bellina. ‘Is he dead? Did Sir Lamorak kill him?’
I shuddered at the memory of Garnish’s cloudy eyes, the feel of his empty shell at the tips of the watersnakes. ‘No, he’s alive. But it might be best he’s gone. Merlin said –’
‘Merlin was here?’ said Bellina, suddenly frightened. Although I had been cruelly fooled by Merlin on Avalon, Bellina had spent almost the whole of our time on that island under his spell. She had thought herself in love with the fragment of Merlin who called himself Prince Accolon.
‘It’s alright, he’s gone,’ I said. ‘I can feel him still moving south. But Garnish –’
I stopped talking. I knew everything they did about the boy from the forests north of Vellion. Mordred had told Brunor to be careful of what he said around the ever-crying boy. Norma, it had been Norma who told Petal and Bellina to watch their words, even as they were travelling from Spar-longius to the tower by the loch. Just as I had been confused by it, none of three had understood why Mordred allowed the boy to remain, when it was clear he was distrusted by everyone.
‘What of Garnish?’ said Bellina.
‘It doesn’t matter,’ I said. ‘Nothing you don’t already know. Merlin, that’s what matters. He sent Sir Lamorak north to find Dinadan, and then go after Epicene. Merlin doesn’t know they’re on Orkney yet, but my mother’s also going north, and she does know where they are.’
‘You told her?’ said Petal. ‘She didn’t seem keen on us; what’s she going to do with them?’
‘I didn’t tell her; she stole the knowledge from my mind. She’s mad, I think, a bit. She thinks my dead sister –’ I paused. Bellina had been sitting close by when the Knight with Two Swords threw the Spear of Longius and killed Nemone. My youngest sister was definitely gone. But she hadn’t seen Neave fall. My middle sister had disappeared from the royal box shortly before the final joust of the tournament. ‘Mother thinks my sister Neave is with us, but she can’t be; I couldn’t sense any magic at all in camp in the valley. Well, I could feel Garnish’s half-magic, but...’ My voice trailed off. ‘I couldn’t even sense Epicene.’ The fire-magician hadn’t explained to me how she had achieved that effect... which gave me an idea I did not like.
‘We must go north, and quickly,’ said Brunor, tossing the last little fragment of rabbit gristle behind him.
‘Quicker even than that, my friend.’ I described to them what the Spear of Longius had done to Garnish in the least upsetting terms I could find. ‘Lamorak plans on doing the same to Epicene –’
‘My horse is fastest,’ Brunor agreed before I had even made the suggestion. ‘I go to warn Princess Epicene.’ There was no further discussion. He kissed each of the women’s hands, even Martha’s, though she did not seem particularly pleased by the gesture, mounted his horse, and was gone from eye and ear in minutes.
‘And us?’ said Martha.
‘We do the same,’ I said. ‘At the best speed we can manage.’