Winter's Blossom: The Seasons of Arthur

Chapter 9

Each morning Merlin would have us rise with the dawn, eat a cold breakfast and be on the road. He was never keen to stay in one place, perhaps fearful of bandits finding out that two young noblemen were unprotected on the road. Not that anyone would are try and snatch us. My uncle would have gone to war against every robber in the hills of Britain just to erase the insult to his name, even if it were only to go home and secretly celebrate the demise of two ill-favoured kin.

Mist hung heavy in the mountains as we made our way through them. A grey swirl that engulfed us so that we rode slowly. I found myself forcing conversation with Owain to try and break through the superstitious dread that gripped me as we rode. Owain was happy to lose himself in the mist though, and talking to him I felt that his mind must be misted too and it did not take a man of Merlin's wits to understand why that was.

Merlin liked to sing in that fog, though I hated it when he did. Merlin was the greatest bard in Britain or so it was said, and his voice was indeed magnificent. But his songs were deep chants, almost mystic and I felt like he was talking to the ghosts of the land. Worse was that I felt like I could hear the ghosts talk back to him, the soft breeze seemed to whisper in response to his words, I'm sure it was not just me, because my horse tossed his head anxiously on more than one occasion. Though God knows, that could have been because I was such a poor rider. I was the last of our little column and more than once I rode into the rear of Owain's horse in the clear of the day, let alone the thick shrouds of the fog.

Three nights after we had left home we came upon a small village where we would stay for the night. Dusk was approaching. Above us the pinks and oranges of the setting sun swept across the sky and cast long shadows before us. The road we had approached ran up a long gentle slope through the middle of a wide field that was being used for grazing. A mixture of sheep and a few cows eyed us almost as warily as the handful of boys by their charges. It was a perfect for place for grazing, for it was a huge expanse and could have supported a huge herd if the village had been big enough to support the people. From besides the village a small river ran, cutting a shallow path through the field by the road before meandering away to the north where, perhaps half a mile away there was a lake that shimmered in the golden light of the dying day.

It took us longer than I had imagined to reach the village from the base of the slope and I realised that the slope was deceptively steep and long. The horses were breathing heavily as we finally reached the clutch of buildings. There could have been no more than a score of buildings, and the village, I saw was a mere clutch of tiny homes built with wood, wattle and thatch that looked damp and rotting. The buildings though all seemed to surround a ramshackle church that was in poor repair, but at least had someone trying to fix it. Upon its roof, a man was trying to spread fresh, green looking thatch across what looked like a large hole.

'Good evening.' Merlin called cheerfully up to the man. 'I'm looking for the priest.'

'That's me.' The man replied cheerfully, He edged ungainly to the edge of the building to look down on us, though not by much as, despite the church's status as being the largest building there he barely sat higher than the level of our shoulders as we sat upon the backs of our horses. 'Father Pyrlig is my name.' He told me happily. 'How may I be of service to gentlemen such as yourselves.' Was he mocking us? I bristled a little. The priest, I noticed was overweight, as a surprising number of priests were despite their vows of poverty, but he looked strong and I guessed he had been a warrior or a farmer before he had found God.

'We are in need of a place to stay tonight.' Merlin told him. 'We could sleep in the church?'

'Aye, you could.' Father Pyrlig allowed. 'Though if it rains, you'd probably be drier under a roof of trees rather than this sorry excuse for a roof. Whoever built this house of God clearly wanted a direct line to Him.' He indicated skywards, and then barked a laugh at our shocked expressions that he would talk thus. He clambered down to the ground. 'I can find you stabling for your horses with some of the livestock if you like. There are few enough wolves to worry about here.'