The crystal cave - Mary Stewart [29]
"Who hasn't? I've a fancy to see it myself. But if you're thinking of asking the King..." He let it hang. "Not but what it's time you got out of the place and saw a thing or two, shake you a bit out of yourself, it's what you need, but I can't say I see it happening. You'll never go to the King?"
"Why not? All he can do is refuse."
"All he can do -- ? Jupiter's balls, listen to the boy. Take my advice and get your supper and go to bed. And don't try Camlach, neither. He's had a right stand-up fight with that wife of his and he's like a stoat with the toothache. -- You can't be serious?"
"The gods only go with you, Cerdic, if you put yourself in their path."
"Well, all right, but some of them have got mighty big hoofs to walk over you with. Do you want Christian burial?"
"I don't really mind. I suppose I'll work my way up to Christian baptism fairly soon, if the bishop has his way, but till then I've not signed on officially for anyone."
He laughed. "I hope they'll give me the flames when my turn comes. It's a cleaner way to go. Well, if you won't listen, you won't listen, but don't face him on an empty belly, that's all."
"I'll promise you that," I said, and went to forage for supper. After I had eaten, and changed into a decent tunic, I went to look for my grandfather.
To my relief Camlach was not with him. The King was in his bedchamber, sprawled at ease in his big chair before a roaring log fire, with his two hounds asleep at his feet. At first I thought the woman in the high-backed chair on the other side of the hearth was Olwen, the Queen, but then I saw it was my mother. She had been sewing, but her hands had dropped idle in her lap, and the white stuff lay still over the brown robe. She turned and smiled at me, but with a look of surprise. One of the wolfhounds beat his tail on the floor, and the other opened an eye and rolled it round and closed it again. My grandfather glowered at me from under his brows, but said kindly enough: "Well, boy, don't stand there. Come in, come in, there's a cursed draught. Shut the door."
I obeyed, approaching the fire.
"May I see you, sir?"
"You're seeing me. What do you want? Get a stool and sit down."
There was one near my mother's chair. I pulled it away, to show I was not sitting in her shadow, and sat down between them.
"Well? Haven't seen you for some time, have I? Been at your books?"
"Yes, sir." On the principle that it is better to attack than to defend, I went straight to the point. "I...I had leave this afternoon, and I went out riding, so I -- "
"Where to?"
"Along the river path. Nowhere special, only to improve my horsemanship, so -- "
"It could do with it."
"Yes, sir. So I missed the messenger. They tell me you ride out tomorrow, sir."
"What's that to you?"
"Only that I would like to come with you."
"You would like? You would like? What's this, all of a sudden?"
A dozen answers all sounding equally well jostled in my head for expression. I thought I saw my mother watching me with pity, and I knew that my grandfather waited with indifference and impatience only faintly tempered with amusement. I told the simple truth. "Because I am more than twelve years old, and have never been out of Maridunum. Because I know that if my uncle has his way, I shall soon be shut up, in this valley or elsewhere, to study as a clerk, and before that happens -- "
The terrifying brows came down. "Are you trying to tell me you don't want to study?"
"No. It's what I want more than anything in the world. But study means more if one has seen just a little of the world -- indeed, sir, it does. If you would allow me to go with you -- "
"I'm going to Segontium, did they tell you that? It's not a feast-day hunting-party, it's a long ride and a hard one, and no quarter given for poor riders."
It was like lifting a heavy weight, to keep my eyes level on that fierce blue glare. "I've been practicing, sir, and I've a good pony now."
"Ha, yes, Dinias' breakdown. Well, that's about your measure. No, Merlin, I don't take children."