stout wooden roof had long ago fallen to ruin, and yet enough remained to show a semblance of its conical shape. Uther walked to the doorway of the tower, which remarkably stood three feet up from the ground. “Colvarth, anything of interest?”
The bard poked his nose out from the slim stone archway, and his voice echoed. “Nothing much, my king. But come see … for yourself.”
Uther stepped up onto the high threshold of the doorway and pulled himself through. Blinded for a moment by the swift change to near darkness, he tried to step down and lost his balance. With his bad knee he fell hard onto a rock and then headlong to the dirt.
Colvarth rushed over. “My king! Are you all right? The floor is … higher inside, and rough.”
Uther’s knee screamed with pain and his head spun. He rolled onto his back and looked upward, straight to the top of the tower. The top floor Merlin had spoken of had rotted away, and now nothing remained but an empty shell.
A man appeared above him, ghostlike, emerging from nowhere and walking down an invisible stairway. He wore an embroidered sapphire robe with white-gold trim, and at his waist a jeweled belt held the scabbard of a dagger. A druid? No, this wasn’t the blade of a Briton; it was arched like those of traders he had seen from the eastern lands.
But the oddest thing was the man’s face. Though his gray beard hung down to his waist and his eyes wrinkled with wisdom, his cheeks were smooth, his lips young, his nose unmarred, and his forehead unlined. By all accounts, he bore the marks of a youth.
Uther pointed at the man and tried to speak, but his throat was stiff and wouldn’t utter a sound.
Colvarth patted him on the shoulder. “A nasty … tumble … yes. Rest awhile, my king.”
The man in Uther’s vision reached the bottom of the unseen stairway, put a finger to his lips, and, kneeling, drew the cross of Jesu in the dirt. Then he descended right into the ground as though it didn’t exist. Just before his head sank from sight, he stared straight at Uther, and his eyes held a secret and sorrowful longing.
With that he disappeared.
Uther’s knee suddenly felt no pain, and his tongue loosed. He jumped up, almost knocking Colvarth over. “Did you not see him?”
“Arthur is … outside, my king.”
“The man, dressed in blue.” Uther looked up again to the top of the tower. The angled daylight filtered through the bones of the roof, and the empty window sat like an eye to the outside. Nothing else could be seen. No floor to stand on. No metal hung there to reflect sunlight to onlookers.
Nothing. So what had he seen? The flash of light from before, this he could have imagined. But twice now he’d seen the man in blue. What of him?
The ground! The man had descended through the ground.
Uther swallowed a long draught from the mead skin and then felt dizzy for a moment. Soon the feeling passed, and he sank to his knees at the spot where the sign of the cross had been only moments before and dug frantically in the soft soil with his knife. “Colvarth, bring Igerna and the children. Bring them here!”
Waking with great shivers, Garth looked up into the eyes of Caygek, who bent over him with concern on his face, his long blond beard almost touching Garth’s nose.
The druid’s hand brushed dirt from Garth’s forehead. “Are you unharmed?”
Garth blinked.
“Why are you so white?” Caygek asked. “I saw you go into Mórganthu’s tent. Something there scare you?”
Garth shook his head, then changed it to a nod.
“You hollered. No one else paid any mind — too much talk about tonight. But those who keep their ears open get to question the thief. So … did you see Trothek?”
Garth nodded again, this time firmly.
Caygek’s eyes became soft. “He was my friend, and I’m sorry you had to see him that way. The arch druid killed him when the moon was under the foot of the Druid constellation, perhaps twelve days ago. Slit his throat and cut off his head before us all.”
“Why?” Garth croaked.
“Because Trothek opposed his plans,” Caygek answered. “It’s painful to think about, but it’s exactly what a warrior does with his enemy. Doesn’t Mórganthu gain Trothek’s wisdom by keeping his head?”
Garth had heard of such practices but never imagined it could happen here in Bosventor. Sitting up, he pulled the coil of