"Mary Stewart - The Arthurian Saga 02 - The Hollow Hills" - читать интересную книгу автора (Stewart Mary)

bracken the bluebell leaves showed glossy green, and blackthorn was budding. Somewhere, lambs were
crying. That, and the mewing of a buzzard high over the crags, and the rustle of the dead bracken where
my tired horse trod, were all the sounds in the valley. I was home, to the solace of simplicity and quiet.

The people had not forgotten me, and word must have gone round that I was expected. When I
dismounted in the thorn grove below the cliff and stabled my horse in the shed there I found that bracken
had been freshly strewn for bedding, and a netful of fodder hung from a hook beside the door; and when
I climbed to the little apron of lawn which lay in front of my cave I found cheese and new bread wrapped
in a clean cloth, and a goatskin full of the local thin, sour wine, which had been left for me beside the
spring.

This was a small spring, a trickle of pure water welling out of a ferny crack in the rock to one side of the
entrance to the cave. The water ran down, sometimes in a steady flow, sometimes no more than a sliding
glimmer over the mosses, to drip into a rounded basin of stone. Above the spring the little statue of the
god Myrddin, he of the winged spaces of the air, stared from between the ferns. Beneath his cracked
wooden feet the water bubbled and dripped into the stone basin, lipping over into the grass below. Deep
in the clear water metal glinted; I knew that the wine and bread, like the thrown coins, had been left as
much as an offering to the god as to me; in the minds of the simple folk I had already become part of the
legend of the hill, their god made flesh who came and went as quietly as the air, and brought with him the
gifts of healing.

I lifted down the cup of horn which stood above the spring, filled it from the goatskin, then poured wine
for the god, and drank the rest myself. The god would know whether there was more in the gesture than
ritual homage. I myself was tired beyond thought, and had no prayer to offer; the drink was for courage,
nothing more.

To the other side of the cave entrance, opposite the spring, was a tumble of grass-grown stones, where
saplings of oak and mountain ash had seeded themselves, and grew in a thick tangle against the rocky
face. In summer their boughs cast a wide pool of shade, but now, though overhanging it, they did nothing
to conceal the entrance to the cave. This was a smallish arch, regular and rounded, as if made by hand. I
pushed the hanging boughs aside and went in.

Just inside the entrance the remnants of a fire still lay in white ash on the hearth, and twigs and damp
leaves had drifted over it. The place smelled already of disuse. It seemed strange that it was barely a
month since I had ridden out at the King's urgent summons to help him in the matter of Ygraine of
Cornwall. Beside the cold hearth stood the unwashed dishes from the last, hasty meal my servant had
prepared before we set out.

Well, I would have to be my own servant now. I put the goatskin of wine and the bundle of bread and
cheese on the table, then turned to re-make the fire.Flint and tinder lay to hand where they had always
lain, but I knelt down by the cold faggots and stretched out my hands for the magic. This was the first
magic I had been taught, and the simplest, the bringing of fire out of the air. It had been taught me in this
very cave, where as a child I had learned all I knew of natural lore from Galapas, the old hermit of the
hill. Here, too, in the cave of crystal which lay deeper in the hill, I had seen my first visions, and found
myself as a seer. "Some day," Galapas had said, "you will go where even with the Sight I cannot follow
you." It had been true. I had left him, and gone where my god had driven me; where none but I, Merlin,
could have gone. But now the god's will was done, and he had forsaken me. Back there in Dimilioc,
beside Gorlois' bier, I had found myself to be an empty husk; blind and deaf as men are blind and deaf;
the great power gone. Now, weary though I was, I knew I would not rest until I saw if, here in my
magic's birthplace, the first and smallest of my powers was left to me.