The golden boy hovered at the door. “You didn’t do badly at all, Arthur. If I hadn’t been at this for ages, I might even boast a bit.”

“Thanks.” I stretched and yawned. “But now I really ought to get up.”

“Up!” Merlin sang, opening the door. “You’re still king and people are waiting to see you. You don’t think you’re finished, do you?”

Finished? I was just starting. I jumped out of bed as Merlin disappeared, struggling into my harness as Ambrosius strode in energetically.

“My lord Ambrosius! Oh, now I am dreaming.”

My king and teacher planted himself in the middle of the floor, dressed in his plain field harness, the imperial robe slung carelessly over one arm.

“Get dressed, Artorius. You’re posted with me.”

“Good, sir. Where?”

“To safe keeping.” The old emperor bit off the words, never one to waste time. “Now snap to and try to look like an officer.”

“No more Roman uniforms, sir. Not for years.”

Ambrosius grunted. “Hell, we’ve run out of Rome itself. I’ve got to keep you safe, Tribune. I’m only a fact, but you’re going to be a legend.”

“What? Balls!”

“That’s what I say.” Ambrosius drummed his fingers on the hilt of his shorts word. “I’ve got to save some of you for the historians.”

I finished buckling the harness, set the helmet on my head. “Ready, Imperator.”

“Good, let’s go.” Ambrosius struck his hands together. “It won’t be too bad. Historians take forever but they do get you squared off in the end. Organization, by the gods! People get fuzzy without it. And who cares if they don’t love you? They need you—and they never seem to forgive that. Come on, Tribune, and don’t slouch.”

And we hurried off to work.

And in the dream, I watched the young tribune go off with-

366

Ftrelord

Rest You Gentle, Sleep You Sound

367

Ambrosius. The door was hardly shut on them when it was flung open again.

“Hail, my comet!”

Trystan, arms folded, lounging against the door, graceful and insolent in his best finery, the harp slung over one shoulder. I jumped out of bed to greet him.

“Tryst! My God, it’s the most extraordinary luck, but I met your son at Badon.”

“My son.” Over the old supercilious smile, his brows arched in mild curiosity. “My son?”

“His name’s Dafydd. He’s an archer.”

Trystan considered. “Forgive me, I’ve rather forgotten things like time. Can’t seem to place his mother.”

“In Eburacum.”

“Oh, yes!” with a finger snap. “Tawny hair, marvelous figure. A common archer?”

“Most uncommon, lad. Like his harp. She said he had your touch..”

“Then someone did remember me.” His superiority softened to something finer. “Well enough. Are you ready to go?”

“I just did. I mean, I’m not sure. Where?”

“Where?” Trystan raised his arms in dramatic invocation. “Arthur, my comet, my king, you have no idea what a legend you’re going to become. You, me, all of us. Magnificent!”

“Yes, Ambrosius warned me that—”

“The founder of Camelot! Palace of the mind that will endure as long as men dream. The Grail, the great deeds, the battles, the songs. I’ve been writing some of them myself. Ought to have something tasteful before the Christians get hold of you.” He unslung his harp, eager to play for me. “Here, listen.”

“No, wait. Tryst, where are you taking me?”

“A long way,” my friend said, lyrical as always. “Long as time, swift as memory, to saddle scrolls and sharpen pens to lances, ride patrol on a hundred books to keep them shining with life and not too ordinary.”

I finished dressing in the strange, impractical armor. Trystan fastened the purple cloak and set the gaudy crown on my head.

“I know,” said my legend-wise friend. “It’s not what you were, but what they’ll think you meant. Ready?”

I doubted it.

“Let’s be off!” Trystan dragged me to the door, looking marvelously vital, twenty again. “Geraint is waiting for us.”

“Geraint? Oh, bless him, how’s he been?”

“Volcanic as ever. A day’s talk to a minute’s meaning, and a positive desert for conversation. But he’s part of the legend.”

But he wasn’t, none of us were. He was real as myself.

And real he was, peacock-florid in his brilliant armor and flower-decked helmet, sitting one of three magnificent white stallions whose saddles and harness sagged with the weight of jewels. Geraint drew his sword and swept it out in a lavish salute.

“Hail, Arthur! Where you go, so do I. What else for the friend who stood with me at Neth Dun More, three against three hundred!”

I winced, “For shame, Geraint. As I recall, there were no more than—”

“Oh well.” He shrugged blithely. “Of course you’ve lived longer and your memory, look you, may not be keen as mine, but they were at least three hundred and many say more, including my sainted sister who has always had naught but charity to speak of you, save for your carelessness. Arthur Pendragon is a good man, says she, but …”

Trystan signed philosophically. “As I said, doomed to legend. What historian would believe in him—Hi!”

With a shout, Trystan spurred the great improbable charger to a gallop. I suddenly felt I could ride forever and called after him: “Then we’ll make it a good story, Tryst. By God, a great one! Come on, Geraint. I’ll race you!”

And in the dream I watched from my bed as the three of them rode off, preposterous in their gaudy trappings, on horses bigger and in armor more ornate and impractical than anyone ever wore.

A light, rapid tap at the open door. “May I come in?”

Guenevere in her state robes, a new gold crown set firmly over the plaited auburn hair.

“Come in, Gwen! ! don’t know what they put in that last medicine, but this is the most delicious dream. You look ravishing.”

She came to fuss at my pillows, leaning over, teasing my mouth with hers. “You were always the most illegally handsome king, Arthur.”

“And very relieved. Thought I was gone for a minute there, riding off with all those memories and futures.”

“You’ll never die, Arthur, you’re not the sort.” Guenevere sprang up, not a moment to waste, deftly smoothing her hair under the crown. “I only have a moment. The Council’s waiting.”

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“Don’t try to do it all alone, Gwen. Listen to Bedivere and Gareth and don’t scold them too much when they tell you off. The people can deify you all they want, but start to believe it and you’re in trouble.”

“Don’t tell me how to rule, Arthur Pendragon. My blood was crowned when—” Her dagger-look of impatience broke suddenly in a smile. “Oh, you’re right. Oh, Arthur, I could have been such a wonderful little tyrant but for you. Now I don’t have the ego for it; just the job and the habit.”

“Keep at it, love. And mind out for Trystan. He’s stuffed the lot of us into some overdressed legend.”

“A legend?” She has the most beautiful laugher in the world, my Gwen. “That’s so like him. He can’t resist an audience. There, I’m late, but I do love you, sweet.”

She came to kiss me again in her cool, lingering way.

“Most of the time, Gwen?”

In a queen’s hurry, she paused one last time at the door, vital and full of destinies. “A grand time, Arthur. We didn’t win it all, but we gave it a fine try. The two of us in a legend: I’ve always fancied it, but won’t we shock them?” She blew me a final kiss. “Rest you gentle.”

Sleep you sound, Gwen.

Well now, I do feel a bit subtracted with ail those selves flying off and no telling where they’ll light.

But I’m still here and feeling marvelous, feeling twenty like Tryst. Alive? I yearn toward the open hills beyond the sunny casement, want to fill my lungs with air and run for the pure joy of being. And by God, I will—

But there’s a movement in the corner of my eye, and a smothered giggle. The dark little head rises up from the foot of the bed where she’s been hiding all along, and—

“Yah!” cries Morgana as she springs up, arms shooting high in her eager child-greeting, and then she ducks down again quick as a thought to hide from me.

Sly, mouse-quiet, I slip from the bed and down on my knees, and—

“Yah!”

—grab her, laughing, as she leaps up into my arms, kissing and nipping at my mouth and ears and chin.

“Belrix, Belrix, did wait for thee.”

And holding Morgana, I look back at the empty shell in the

Rest You Gentle. Steep You Sound 359 bed and know it’s time to go. This is the last and best of me Morgana s mouth is next my ear as she kneads my shoulders with brown fingers that slip down over my back and thighs She pulls her sheepskin vest aside to push her small breasts against me, rousing me like new Bel-tern flame rekindled from old “Do thee come home now,” she whispers. She kisses my mouth, a long kiss sweet with the magic that passes from her to me. The old hollow place in me is filled with Morgana, and I . feel

myself

waking,

growing

to my true self joined with hers as we spring light as deer over the casement sill and out into Lugh’s sunlight, and Morgana takes my hand to pull me after her.

“Summer king, summer king, come with me! Will dance on the hill of the fires.”

And in the dream we run like the wind, run home forever under the hill.

1

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

PARK GODWIN is coauthor of The Masters of Solitude and the forthcoming sequel, Winter-mind. He has been a radio operator, research technician, professional actor, advertising layout man, dishwasher and maitre d’hdtel. Recently he traveled to Scotland to participate in an archaeological dig.