Uther checked when he saw me, then came across as I got stiffly to my feet. The night must have shown still in my face, for in the group of officers behind him I saw the look I had grown used to, of men both wary and amazed, and even Uther spoke a fraction too loudly.

“So your magic is as strong as theirs.”

The light was too strong for my eyes. He looked vivid and unreal, like an image seen in moving water. I tried to speak, cleared my throat, and tried again. “I’m still alive, if that’s what you mean.”

Tremorinus said gruffly: “There’s not another man in the army would have spent the night here.”

“Afraid of the black stone?”

I saw Uther’s hand move in an involuntary gesture as if it sprang of itself to make the sign. He saw I had noticed, and looked angry. “Who told you about the black stone?”

Before I could answer, the Irishman said suddenly: “You saw it? Who are you?”

“My name is Merlin.”

He nodded slowly. He still showed no sign of fear or awe. He read my thought, and smiled, as if to say, “You and I, we can look after ourselves.”

“Why do they bring you here like this?”I asked him.

“To tell them which is the king-stone.”

Uther said: “He has told us. It’s the carved altar over there.”

“Let him go,” I said. “You have no need of him. And leave the altar alone. This is the stone.”

There was a pause. Then the Irishman laughed. “Faith, if you bring the King’s enchanter himself, what hope had a poor poet? It was written in the stars that you would take it, and indeed, it is nothing but justice. It’s not the heart of Ireland that that stone has been but the curse of it, and maybe Ireland will be all the better to see it go.”

“How so?” I asked him. Then, to Uther: “Tell them to loose him.”

Uther nodded, and the men loosed the prisoner’s hands. He rubbed his wrists, smiling at me. You would have thought we two were alone in the Dance. “They say that in times past that stone came out of Britain, out of the mountains of the west, in sight of the Irish Sea, and that the great King of all Ireland, Fionn Mac Cumhaill was his name, carried it in his hand one night and walked through the sea with it to Ireland, and set it here.”

“And now,” I said, “we carry it a little more painfully back to Britain.”

He laughed. “I would have thought the great magician that’s yourself would have picked it up in one hand.”