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By Root 558 0

knees to his parents' God. But he is a man of this land, and he knows the gods of this land, and the people who still serve those gods on the hills and by the springs and fording-places." My eye had caught, on a broad shelf opposite the fire, a crowd of objects, carefully arranged. I had seen similar things in Pergamum and other places of divine healing; they were offerings to the gods; models of parts of the human body, or carved statues of animals or fish, that carried some message of supplication or gratitude. "You will find," I told Mog, "that his armies will pass by without harm, and that if he ever comes here himself he will say a prayer to the god and make an offering. As I did, and as I will."

"That's good talking," said the boy suddenly, and showed a white-toothed grin.

I smiled at him, and dropped two coins into the outstretched palm. "For the shrine, and for its servants."

Mog grunted something, and the boy Constant slid to his feet and went to a cupboard in the corner. He came back with a leather bottle and a chipped cup for me. Mog lifted his own cup up off the floor and the boy tipped the liquor in. "Your health," said Mog. I answered, and we drank. The stuff was mead, sweet and strong.

Mog drank again, and drew his sleeve across his mouth. "You've been asking about times long past, and we've told you as best we may. Now do you, sir, tell us what's been happening up there in the north. All we heard down here were stories of battles, and kings dying and being made. Is it true the Saxons have gone? Is it true that King Uther Pendragon kept this prince hidden all this time, and brought him out, sudden as a thunderclap, there in the battlefield, and he killed four hundred of the Saxon beasts with a magic sword that sang and drank blood?"

So once more I told the story, while the boy quietly fed the fire, and the flames spat and leaped and shone on the carefully polished offerings ranged on the shelf. The dog slept again, its head on my foot, the fire hot on its rough coat. As I talked the bottle passed and the mead went down in it, and at last the fire dwindled and the logs fell to ash, and I finished my tale with Uther's burial and Arthur's plans to hold Caerleon in readiness for the spring campaigning.

My host upended the bottle and shook it. "It's out. And a better night's work it never did. Thank you, sir, for your news. We live our own ways up here, but you'll know, being down in the press of affairs, that even things happening out yonder in Britain" -- he spoke of it as if of a foreign land, a hundred miles from his quiet refuge -- "can have their echoes, in pain and trouble sometimes, in the small and lonely places. We'll pray you're right about the new King. You can tell him, if ever you get near enough to have speech with him, that as long as he's loyal to the true land, he has two men here who are his servants, too."

"I shall tell him." I rose. "Thank you for the welcome, and the drink. I'm sorry I disturbed your sleep. I'll go and leave you to it now."

"Go now? Why, it's getting on for the dawning. They'll have locked you out of your lodging, that's for sure. Or were you in the camp down yonder? Then no sentry'll let you through, without you've got the King's own token. You'd best stay here. No," as I started some sort of protest, "there's a room still kept, just as it was in the old days, when they came here from far and wide to have the dreams. The bed's good, and the place is kept dry. You'd fare worse in many a tavern. Do us the favour and stay."

I hesitated. The boy nodded at me, eyes bright, and the dog, which had risen when I rose, wagged its tail and gave a wide, whining yawn, stretching the stiff forepaws.

"Yes. Stay," begged the boy.

I could see that it would mean something to them if I complied. To stay would be to bring back some of the ancient sanctity of the place; a guest in the guest-house, so carefully swept and aired and kept for the guests who no longer came.

"I shall be glad to," I said.

Constant, beaming, thrust a torch into the ashes and held it till it kindled. "Then