“That’s what they all say. All wrapped up, it was, with eagles and wolves and lions and boars and as many other beasts as they’ve ever had in the arena and a few more besides, dragons and such—and going hundreds of years forward, which is safe enough, Dia knows, but Berric said it sounded, the lot of it, as true as a trumpet, and as if you’d have given odds on it with your last penny.”

“I may have to,” I said drily, “if I said anything about Vortigern or my father.”

“Which you did,” said Cadal.

“Well, I’d better know; I’m going to have to stick by it.”

“It was all dressed up, like poets’ stuff, red dragons and white dragons fighting and laying the place waste, showers of blood, all that kind of thing. But it seems you gave them chapter and verse for everything that’s going to happen; the white dragon of the Saxons and the red dragon of Ambrosius fighting it out, the red dragon looking not so clever to begin with, but winning in the end. Yes. Then a bear coming out of Cornwall to sweep the field clear.”

“A bear? You mean the Boar, surely; that’s Cornwall’s badge. Hm. Then he may be still for my father after all . . .”

“Berric said a bear. Artos was the word . . . he took notice, because he wondered about it himself. But you were clear about it, he says. Artos, you called him, Arthur . . . some name like that. You mean to tell me you don’t remember a word of it?”

“Not a word.”

“Well look, now, I can’t remember any more, but if they start coming at you about it, you could find some way of getting them to tell you everything you said. It’s quite the thing, isn’t it, for prophets not to know what they were talking about? Oracles and that?”

“I believe so.”

“All I mean is, if you’ve finished eating, and if you really feel all right, perhaps you’d better get up and dress. They’re all waiting for you out there.”

“What for? For the god’s sake, they don’t want more advice? Are they moving the site of the tower?”

“No. They’re doing what you told them to do.”

“What’s that?”

“Draining the pool by a conduit. They’ve been working all night and day getting a pump rigged up to get the water out through the adit.”

“But why? That won’t make the tower any safer. In fact it might bring the whole top of the crag in. Yes, I’m finished, take it away.” I pushed the tray into his hands, and threw back the bed-covers. “Cadal, are you trying to tell me I said this in my—delirium?”