I could feel the sweat starting on my body, the drops trickling down beside my nose, under my arms, into my groin till my thighs stuck together. My hands worked on one another, tight between my knees till the bones hurt. My temples ached. I shook my head sharply to clear it, and looked up. “My lord, it’s no use. I’m sorry, but it’s no use. I don’t command the god, he commands me. Some day it may be I shall see at will, or when you command me, but now it comes itself, or not at all.” I spread my hands, trying to explain. “It’s like waiting below a cover of cloud, then suddenly a wind shifts it and it breaks, and the light stabs down and catches me, sometimes full, sometimes only the flying edge of the pillars of sunlight. One day I shall be free of the whole temple. But not yet. I can see nothing.” Exhaustion dragged at me. I could hear it in my voice. “I’m sorry, my lord. I’m no use to you. You haven’t got your prophet yet.”

“No,” said Ambrosius. He put a hand down, and as I stood, drew me to him and kissed me. “Only a son, who has had no supper and who is tired out. Go to bed, Merlin, and sleep the rest of the night without dreaming. There is plenty of time for visions. Good night.”

*   *   *

I had no more visions that night, but I did have a dream. I never told Ambrosius. I saw again the cave on the hillside, and the girl Niniane coming through the mist, and the man who waited for her beside the cave. But the face of Niniane was not the face of my mother, and the man by the cave was not the young Ambrosius. He was an old man, and his face was mine.

Book III: THE WOLF

Book III

THE WOLF

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER ONE

I WAS five years with Ambrosius in Brittany. Looking back now, I see that much of what happened has been changed in my memory, like a smashed mosaic which is mended in later years by a man who has almost forgotten the first picture. Certain things come back to me plain, in all their colours and details; others—perhaps more important—come hazy, as if the picture had been dusted over by what has happened since, death, sorrow, changes of the heart. Places I always remember well, some of them so clearly that I feel even now as if I could walk into them, and that if I had the strength to concentrate, and the power that once fitted me like my robe, I might even now rebuild them here in the dark as I rebuilt the Giants’ Dance for Ambrosius, all those years ago.