The Hollow Hills - Mary Stewart [196]
To Ector he spoke long and quietly, so that no man could hear save they two, and when he raised him, kissed him.
Thereafter for a long span of time he stood by the altar, as men knelt before him and swore loyalty on the hilt of the sword. To each one he spoke, directly as a boy, and grandly as a king. Between his hands, held like a cross, Caliburn shone with his own light only, but the altar with its nine dead lamps was dark.
As each man took his oath and pledged himself, he withdrew, and the chapel slowly emptied. As it grew quieter, the encircling forest filled with life and expectation and noise, where they crowded, clamorously excited now, waiting for their sworn King. They were bringing up the horses out of the wood, and the clearing filled with torchlight and trampling and the jingling of accoutrements.
Last of all Mab and the men of the hills withdrew, and save for the bodyguard ranged back against the shadowed wall, the King and I were alone.
Stiffly, for pain still locked my bones, I came round the altar till I stood before him. He was almost as tall as I. The eyes that looked back at me might have been my own.
I knelt in front of him and put out my hands for his. But he cried out at that, and pulled me to my feet, and kissed me.
"You do not kneel to me. Not you."
"You are High King, and I am your servant."
"What of it? The sword was yours, and we two know it. It doesn't matter what you call yourself, my servant, cousin, father, what you will -- you are Merlin, and I'm nothing without you beside me." He laughed then, naturally, the grandeur of the occasion fitting him as easily as the hilt had fitted his hand. "What became of your state robe? Only you could have worn that dreadful old thing on such an occasion. I shall give you a robe of gold tissue, embroidered with stars, as befits your position. Will you wear it for me?"
"Not even for you."
He smiled. "Then come as you are. You'll ride down with me now, won't you?"
"Later. When you have time to look round for me, you will find that I am beside you. Listen, they are ready to take you to your place. It's time to go."
I went with him to the door. The torches still tossed flaring, though the moon had set long since and the last of the stars had died into a morning sky. Golden and tranquil, the light grew.
They had brought the white stallion up to the steps. When Arthur made to mount they would not let him, but Cador and Lot and half a dozen petty kings lifted him between them to the saddle, and at last men's hopes and joy rang up into the pines in a great shout. So they raised to be king Arthur the young.
***
I carried the nine lamps out of the chapel. Come daylight, I would take them where they now belonged, up to the caves of the hollow hills, where their gods had gone. Of the nine, all had been overturned, the oil spilled unburned along the floor. With them lay the stone bowl, shattered, and a pile of dust and crumbled fragments where the cold fire | had struck. When I swept these away, with the oil that had soaked into them, it could be seen that the carving had gone from the front of the altar. These were the fragments that I held, caked with oil. All that was left of the carving on the altar's face was the hilt of the sword, and a word.
I swept and cleaned the place and made it fair again. I moved slowly, like an old man. I still remember how my body ached, and how at length, when I knelt again, my sight blurred and darkened as if still blind with vision, or with tears.
The tears showed me the altar now, bare of the nine-fold light that had pleasured the old, small gods; bare of the soldier's sword and the name of the soldiers' god. All it held now was the hilt of the carved sword standing in the stone like a cross, and the letters still deep and distinct above it: TO HIM UNCONQUERED.
THE LEGEND
When Aurelius Ambrosius was High King of Britain, Merlin, also called Ambrosius, brought the Giants' Dance out of Ireland and set it up near Amesbury, at Stonehenge. Shortly after this