The Heart of Gryffindor
by SJR0301
Part III - Chapter Thirty-Three
As the winged thestral descended, the land below could be seen in complete and perfect relief. The long line of a tall stone wall lay to the south, the wall known as Hadrian's Wall, Johnny supposed, a wall built to keep the invading barbarians out of the more settled Roman south. Somewhat north of the wall, a stone fortress loomed atop a hill. Whoever held that fortress could command the countryside. Johnny strained his eyes to see if the fortress was inhabited, but he was too far up to tell. The land sloped downward from the fortress, leading to woods that were divided by a crooked ravine. Anyone caught in that ravine would be caught in an inescapable trap, he thought. Further north, a river flowed out toward the sea, and beyond the river lay a town. The town seemed still and uninhabited, but as dusk was falling, Johnny thought he could pick out the small lights of fires throughout the woods that lay south of the river and north of the ravine.
The ground rushed up too quickly and the thestrals landed too close to where those flickering fires were. Harry had dismounted and Sirius as well. Johnny followed suit, wishing he could quell the anxiety that rose as the thestrals soared away, their forms rapidly lost in the darkening sky.
"What now?" he asked.
"Let's get a look and see if these are Arthur's men or not," Harry replied. Except for his untidy mane of hair, Harry looked perfectly unruffled and sounded as though he were suggesting a stroll in Hyde Park rather than through a forest with unidentified, possibly hostile men on the brink of war. He strode through the woods in the direction of the fires, and Johnny flinched at every twig that snapped and every breath that sounded.
They worked their way through the darkness and all of them stopped to stare as they reached an area where the trees thinned and the number of men camped there was revealed. There had to be upwards of sixty thousand men, Johnny thought, a huge number for an army of that time. The camp seemed to be divided into two sections of about equal size and at the head and in the middle of them was a large tent. They were so intent on seeing who might be there that not one of them heard the soft creep of feet and as one they turned as a voice spoke.
At least a dozen men surrounded them, each holding a formidable and sharp looking spear or axe. "Don't move," the leader cautioned. He was tall enough, far taller than the small men they had met at Glastonbury, but none were quite as tall as Johnny. His pale hair fell past his shoulders and his beard nearly as far. Harry opened his mouth but closed it again when the man jabbed at him with the spear and said, "We know what to do with spies."
"We're not..." Harry said, but he cut off when the man jabbed at him again and the others prodded Johnny and Sirius. They pushed the three of them ahead with the occasional jab of a spear or gesture with an axe. They soon reached a clearing where the large tent stood and Johnny could not help commenting acidly to Harry, "We're just observers, are we?"
He closed his mouth at a glare from Harry, but he could see that Harry was looking quite unhappy. His face closed up into pure inscrutability, however, when a man flung himself out of the tent angrily, followed by the most beautiful woman Johnny had ever seen in his life. Her hair fell nearly to her waist in a river of gold and her eyes were the deepest blue of a summer lake. Her skin shone as pale and fair as the moon and every male eye there was riveted upon her. She reminded Johnny ineluctably of his mother and grandmother and he could feel the magic she shed that pulled one to her.
"It's true," she said angrily. "Arthur lives!"
The man, whom Johnny noticed for the first time, swung around and said reluctantly, "Yes. He does. But so what?"
The man's auburn hair was a twin to the flames contained in a stone circle before the tent and his pale eyes were defiant.
"You love me," he said. "You told me so. You're my wife now, not his. My Queen now, not Arthur's."
"You told me he was dead," she said. "You lied, didn't you?"
"No!" the man said. "I didn't lie. I thought he was dead. He gave me charge when he left. I kept my promise, when I heard he died. I did what I had to do to keep you safe. To keep the land safe, when he left. Arthur was the one who broke his promise, his oath as king. He should not have left the land and the people. He left us without enough men for a proper defense and I kept us safe. I did."
"By joining with your Picts and Saxons," the Queen replied. "Arthur's enemies."
"They live here, too," the man, Medraut - it had to be Medraut - answered. "I made peace with them and gave them lands in return for peace."
"I must go," the Queen said. "If Arthur is back, my place is at his side."
"No!" Medraut said. "Your place is here with me. You love me. You said so."
The Queen backed away from him one step, and in that one step, as the Queen spoke, you could see the change in the man's face, from pleading to hatred. "I did love you, yes, as one loves a near imitation that's the best you can get. You were the closest thing to Arthur I could get once he was dead. But he's not and you're no Arthur."
"He shall never have you," Medraut said coldly. He gestured and two of the men broke away from the circle to point their spears at the Queen. She went still, but her eyes flashed with rage and Johnny wondered fleetingly whether she would transform and fling fire at her lover. Both, however, stared at him and Harry and Sirius.
"Who are they?" Medraut asked.
"Spies," their captor said. "We caught them watching the camp. Likely getting information to take back to Arthur."
Medraut's pale eyes grew colder and he looked them up and down, his stare resting most of all on Johnny.
"Do you know him?" he asked the Queen. "Is he your kin?"
The Queen replied, after the briefest hesitation, "Yes. And if you kill him, I will never be yours again."
"And these others?" Medraut looked at Harry and Sirius with dislike and suspicion, and that suspicion grew into fear and loathing the longer he looked. "Dragonskin," he said. "You serve him, the Pendragon. Wizards, Merlin's get, aren't you?"
Surprisingly, it was Sirius who answered. "Why would you mind wizards," he asked, "when your mother Morgause is a witch?"
"She was," Medraut responded, "but that didn't save her from my father Lot when he found her with another in his bed."
I closed my mouth with a snap and thought, this can't be real. Here I am, talking to Medraut about his mother Morgause. Here I am, standing in the same place as Gwenhyvar. I glanced at Dad, hoping for some kind of clue as to what to say, what to do. Dad was watching Medraut with the same concentrated stare he had when he fought, but there was something else there, I thought. Pity, perhaps, however odd that might be.
Medraut looked at Dad, at his round glasses with a frown. "What magic do those things do?" he asked.
Dad looked surprised and I guessed it hadn't occurred to him that no one wore spectacles in Arthur's time. "They're for seeing," he said calmly.
Not surprisingly, Medraut misunderstood. "And what do you See, wizard?" he asked. "Tell me what tomorrow will bring."
"Death," Dad answered. "Many, many deaths." He looked inordinately weary as he added, "That's all I ever see is death."
"Everyone dies," Medraut said dismissively. "I think you are another of these false prophets, always telling of gloom and doom. Like my mother. All she ever thought of was death - how to escape it and how to inflict it on others in her way. She even tried to kill Arthur, but she was no match for Merlin."
"And Arthur took you in despite that," Dad said questioningly.
Medraut shrugged. "He said I had to be trained in a proper household, not among the savage Picts. He forgot, my uncle did, that I am half-savage Pict myself. He always ignores the things that matter - men's hatreds, their desire for survival, their need for land to live on - in favor of his Roman and Christian ideals. As if the Romans were ever anything but cleaner and more efficient killers. And look where it's got him. He went to help the King of Rome and left this land to chaos."
"He left you in charge," Dad said, careless now of interference. "He put his trust in you."
"I keep my oath to the land," Medraut said angrily. "He can't see, none of you can, that the future is with them." He waved at the flickering fires of the two camps as he added, "The ones you call savages. The Romans are gone, and we savages are their successors and we will hold the land the same as the Romans did, by the sword, and by the spear and by the axe." He took a deep breath, visible in the heave of his chest and then said coldly, "Bind them. We'll see how Arthur values them come dawn."
The men bound their hands in front of them and led them to the large tent where the Queen was also under guard. Dad looked seriously unhappy, and he tugged at his bonds for a moment as though he would tear them off. Then he shook himself and took a deep breath, visibly calming himself, and sat as still as a cat meditating on a fire. My godfather watched Dad with some anxiety and then asked, "Aren't you going to try?"
He cut off when Dad shook his head with a glance at the Queen. "We will see what the morning will bring," he answered. "The less we do just now, the better," he added, reminding us of the pact we had made not to interfere. I thought that the stricture was useless now as our presence in the Queen's tent could not have been part of the histories. I racked my brain to recall what the stories said about the Battle of Camlann. There were some versions in which it was said that Medraut had taken prisoners as a threat to hold over Arthur's head. I tried not to think about what the stories said about the fate of those prisoners.
The Queen was not bound, but the presence of armed warriors outside the tent must have kept her inside; or perhaps it was curiosity. She sat on a carved wooden chair as though it were a throne and watched us, her deep blue eyes full of puzzlement. Her gaze strayed most to my godfather, who also kept stealing surreptitious glances at her, though not I thought for the same reason.
"Why don't I know you?" the Queen asked after a moment or two. "If you are Arthur's men or Merlin's, I should know you." She looked again at Johnny, with a look that raised the hair on the back of my neck. "I have never seen one like you before. A male. What circle do you dance with?"
Unaccountably, my godfather looked shocked, almost frightened even. "None," he answered. Reluctantly, under her inquisitive gaze, he continued, "My mother is one such as you. My father is ...full human."
I glanced at Dad to see what effect this had on him, but he sat serene and unsurprised and I supposed that he had known what I ought to have guessed long before, that my godfather was in truth, part Veela. I stared back at Gwenhyvar, and I understood why the stories spoke of her unearthly beauty and of the obsessive love men had for her. She must be at least half Veela, perhaps even whole, though that would not be clear without asking and none of us dared to.
The Queen's face firmed and though she still seemed to emit the most potent magical attraction, I saw that she was not thinking of it herself, and was only intent on gaining answers. "Where is Arthur?" she asked eagerly. "Have you seen him? or Merlin?"
None of us answered immediately and Dad's serenity was broken by the faintest frown, as though he was trying to decide what to say, what could he say. "I have not seen Merlin," he said giving the literal truth.
"The enchantment holds him still," the Queen. "Vivien told me what she did. She should not have," the Queen continued fiercely. "None of this would have happened if she had not. Arthur would have stayed and not gone to Rome if Merlin had advised him. He would not have let loyalty to his distant cousin outweigh his duties here. Merlin would have warned him of Medraut's plans."
"You went along with him," Dad said. I don't know how he managed it, to make that more like a question than an accusation.
"At first, we managed things together," she said. "I did not seek to make him love me. It was after Arthur died - after we had the letter, saying he was dead, that I turned to him." Her fair face was full of sorrow as she added, "You know how it was then. All the petty kings at each others' throats again, as it was before. It seemed we would have chaos and the Saecsens and Picts would come in behind to pick at the leftovers. He persuaded me, it would be for the better, if I, the Queen, married him and secured the High Kingship. For the land, he said. And I thought he was right then." She stopped abruptly and said almost angrily, "I don't know why I am justifying myself to you. When Arthur comes, he will make it right." She stopped again and asked, almost pleadingly, "He is coming, isn't he?
None of us answered, but Dad nodded after a moment, though his eyes looked sad beyond measure. We settled in and spent the remainder of the night in silence, each wrapped in his own thoughts. It was quite cold, even with my Dragonhide jacket and gloves and my muscles cramped where I sat. I did not quite see why Dad did not want us to break out. It would have been easy enough to get to our wands or even our swords, which no one seemed to have noticed. It occurred to me that Dad must have made that a part of their protection, some repelling spell that made it impossible for anyone to notice the swords unless they were wizards or the wearer chose for them to be seen.
A faint lightening outside the tent brought a false dawn. Soon, too soon, true dawn would come and with it the day of truth. The Queen stirred and then rose from her chair. Her face showed no sign of strain or weariness and her beauty was undimmed by age or the sleepless night. She knelt beside us and put a finger to her lips to hush us as she loosened our bonds one by one.
"You must say nothing," she said quietly, "and act as if you are still properly bound. I believe Medraut will bring you with him to the parley. He knows Arthur cannot bear to have his men harmed. Arthur will see you safe if at all possible. You will know your opportunity when you see it."
I stammered some thanks, I don't know what. My godfather said nothing. He simply nodded, and I wondered whether he had fallen under her spell, though he should have been immune. Dad, however, looked at her as though he were an artist recording every feature, and I could not interpret what he thought at all. For a moment I feared he, too, had succumbed to her marvelous beauty and charm, so bright and gem-like was the quality of his emerald gaze. Unexpectedly, he bowed slightly, as wizards do when they give courtesy to their opponents or their compatriots.
"You are," he said, "far more brave and great and beautiful than any story can tell."
Unaccountably, she flushed, but her voice was quite steady as she replied. "I have been graced with beauty; yet it has been as much a curse as a blessing. And any courage I have, is stolen from my husband, or comes from knowing he will be here soon to mend all my errors." She paused and said, "I would know your names, sirs, that I may commend you to Arthur when this day is done."
"Augustus John Carter," my godfather responded. She looked at me and I thought nothing of the fact that we were giving our names where we weren't supposed to exist. "Sirius Albus," was as much as I got out. "Those are fine Roman names," she said. "Your families were among Uthyr's men then, or Ambrosius's?"
We did not get a chance to correct her and Dad did not give her his name as the sky really had lightened while we spoke and at that moment the armsmen came and poked at us with their weapons to go out. They did not actually touch the Queen, but I was so far under her thrall at that point that I would have slain any one of them if they had. She walked out between them as though they were still her honor guard and not her captors.
We were made to walk at spearpooint through the woods until we reached the glen. Medraut walked ahead of us a pace. At the end, next to Gwenhyvar, the Picti leader walked. He was painted or tattooed blue all over and nearly naked. I could not imagine why anyone would want to go into a possible battle like that even aside from the fact that it was really quite cold. On the Queen's other side was the Saxon leader, Cerdic, I think his name was. He was quite tall, though not as tall as Johnny and he carried a huge battleaxe. They had placed Dad next to him and me and Johnny after. More Picts guarded the other end and behind us were more Saxons. I supposed that Medraut wished to underline his power by bringing men from both groups with him.
For all his talk of being a Pict, Medraut was fully armed in the Roman fashion and he wore a crown on his auburn hair. On the other side, in the middle of the clearing, another man stood waiting. It was Arthur, I knew, and he was entirely alone.
Behind us, the main body of the Pict and Saxons warriors were hidden in the woods, waiting for the signal to attack. This was different, I thought from the stories, and I could not help wondering just how accurate any of our histories were, or whether things were different here because we were there. We moved forward at Medraut's gesture, until we were only ten paces apart. Arthur, I saw, was tall enough for his time, but not excessively tall. In fact, he might have been an inch shorter than Dad, who is an inch or so shorter than I am. That was a bit of a shock, to see that this legend, the hero, was perfectly human. I did not look closely at his face, though. I could not help staring at the sword still in its sheath and buckled at his waist. The leather sheath was quite nice, but not any more beautifully tooled than the one my father had given me for my own sword. The hilt was indeed decorated with a red enameled dragon, but no gold or gems at all.
Not seeming at all disturbed by the sight of the line of armed men in front of him, Arthur spoke to Medraut.
"What have you done, bringing these, our enemies here?"
"They are not our enemies," Medraut answered. His tone was defiant, and his face was pale. He was a man grown, yet I could not help thinking his stance held something of the boy who had tried to ride a whirlwind and had no means of getting off.
Arthur did not speak, he waited until Medraut continued. "These are my people, my father's people," he said, gesturing at the Picts. "And these men are my friends, who helped bring peace among our warring factions. You left," he said accusingly, "without thought, without care for the people, and all the petty kings took advantage. I have reined them in, and made peace with those who were our enemies."
"I left Britain in your care," Arthur said. "I gave you the trust, and you greet me here with an army that will devour us all." He stared at Medraut and though he said nothing further, his gaze touched briefly on each of us who stood bound and at the mercy of spears. Most of all, his gaze touched on Gwenhyvar.
"If your men are friends and truly come in peace," Arthur added, "tell them to take their weapons and go home. Release my Queen and my men now."
I glanced at Dad and my godfather to see how took this, that Arthur, the King, had claimed us, strangers, as his men. Dad wore that inscrutable look he puts on when he wants no one to tell what he's thinking. But at that moment, I saw in his eyes admiration and understanding.
"They will not go," Medraut answered, "unless you acknowledge my promise to them, that they may stay here and keep their homes and live among us, and be men of Britain as we are." He did not wait for Arthur's answer, but rushed on. "You must see, it is the future. They are here to stay. How we deal with them, how we accept them, will tell what our future may be."
"And you Medraut?" Arthur asked. "I have raised you and taught you. Where will you go and what will you do and to whom shall you give oath?"
The two men faced each other and I could see the similarities about them, the way they stood, the shape of their faces, the straight slope of their noses.
"I did what I could, what I thought was best," Medraut said slowly. "I thought you were dead and everything would fall apart. I did not betray you as you think." His light eyes were no longer combative. Instead, he said almost pleadingly, "You made me your heir and I did only what I thought you might have done had circumstances been the same. And besides," he continued, "it was you who taught me to respect all men for what they are. It was you who taught me to know that peace is better than slaughter. Will you tell me now that I should have killed every last man of ours, every last lesser king, so you could come back to a land empty of men altogether?"
"I will honor your promise," Arthur said, "If you but tell these men to lay down arms and release my wife and my men."
"They will lay down their arms," Medraut said. He turned and said, "Cut their bonds and let them go."
I know I was gawping as I thought this wasn't what had happened, was it? Had everything changed simply because we were there?
Medraut laid a hand on Gwenhyvar's arm and said, "I will give back everything. I will take off the crown and tell them to lay down their arms, if you agree Gwenhyvar is mine."
The Queen froze and would have spoken, but Arthur spoke first. "That is the one thing I cannot do," he said. He looked again at his wife, but his gaze returned to Medraut and his face want pale. "She is the one thing you cannot have. You may keep the crown and the Saxons and Picts, whom I have fought my whole life, may stay. But you cannot have my wife."
"I married her when you were dead, declared so by law," Medraut said. "Let her go and there will be peace between us."
"You don't understand," Arthur said. Now it was he who seemed to plead. "I had thought not to tell you, but you must see, you can't have her because of who you are and who I am. It's a sin."
"What if I am your nephew?" Medraut asked. "There is no sin in it."
Arthur shook his head and said, "You are not only my nephew, you are also my son."
"I know you have fostered me," Medraut answered, "you took me in after my father Lot killed my mother. I know that. You raised me as your son. I know that. But that's not the same - "
Arthur looked at Medraut. There no words to describe what was in that look. "No," he whispered. "Lot was never your father. I am your father and that is why you cannot have my wife."
"That's a lie," Medraut said. "My mother was your sister. It can't be. I won't believe it." He tossed his head as horse might shy at a bothersome fly, seeking to evict the unthinkable thought. "You wouldn't have done that. You couldn't have."
"We were raised apart," Arthur said painfully. "I didn't even know who she was when it happened. She was beautiful, and a witch, and she enchanted me."
Medraut shuddered and turned to the Queen. "Did you know?"
She shook her head wordlessly and I thought I had never seen anything so piteous as the look of betrayal and horror on his face, unless it was the sorrow and guilt on his father's. Peculiarly, Dad had gone completely white, and he looked as though he had seen something awful, but I forgot about that as Medraut abruptly tore the crown from his head and threw it at Arthur in fury and distress. We all watched mesmerized by the interplay between father and son and wife and none of us, and none of them remembered the armed men beside us. When Medraut threw the crown, the Saxon leader raised his arm and thrust the spear through him, killing him in an instant. "Arthur will never be king of the Saxons," he said.
Gwenhyvar ran for her husband then, but before she took three steps, another spear caught her, and she went down. Arthur cried out, a great and wordless cry of grief and he drew his sword and pointed it at the sky. Flames shot up in the air, and at the sudden streak of brilliance, the thunder of a thousand horses sounded. Down from the far slope of the hilltop fortress Camboglenna, Arthur's army rode. The Saxons and Picts roared forward to meet them. From behind us, another sound came as more horses thundered in from the rear. After, I realized that Arthur had brought half his men right up the river behind the Saxon and Picti camp. The two armies met with a crash on either side and Arthur and we were sandwiched in between them.
One of the Picts struck at Dad from the rear. I don't know how I did it, but I managed to draw my sword and block his blade just as we had been taught in class. We should not have been there; we should not have been fighting in a battle before we were even born. But that thought was lost in the brutal melee that followed as we fought, perforce, for our lives, just three among many.
Seemingly without effort, Arthur cut his way through the attacking Picts and Saxons toward us. His sword shone with a bright fire as it swept the men before him. Dad had drawn his sword too, but he only fended off those who attacked directly. With one motion, he banished a fallen man's sword towards Johnny, who had come armed for our adventure with a handgun, not a wand or a sword. Following with an impediment spell, Dad cleared the space around Medraut and Gwenhyvar's fallen bodies. I did not know what he intended to do, but his face was set in stony determination as he forced the armed men away. In no time at all, the men were nearly as frightened of Dad's sword as Arthur's, and I thought I heard more than one cry of witchcraft from the attackers.
"Did Merlin send you? Is the enchantment broken?" Arthur asked, and when Dad shook his head, "Vivien, then?"
I thought that Dad was afraid to say anything. Anything he said would change things, I was sure, if they hadn't been changed already, and unalterably so. I was surprised, though, that Dad had been willing to use so much magic in the fight. I knew that we had to defend ourselves and that the worst event of all would be if one of us who was out of time should die. Yet I did not understand why Dad had gone so far as he had until I saw the look of sympathy he had for Arthur.
Arthur knelt by Medraut and touched his face and his neck. Ignoring the shouts and the fury of battle about him, he lifted up his son's dead body and embraced it, kissing the now cold cheeks, before laying him down again. He moved to Gwenhyvar and did the same, but instead of laying her down, he said urgently, almost frantically, "She lives yet." He looked around at the chaos that encircled us, clearly torn between his desire to take his wounded wife to a place of safety and his duty to his army.
"Let me," Dad said gently. He conjured pallets and laid Medraut's dead body on one and waited for the King to ease Gwenhyvar onto the other.
"Take them to the river," Arthur said, "and put them into the first of my ships. And if you can," he added, stopping to look at Dad with a faint hope, "see to her wounds. Try to keep her from bleeding to death and when the day is done, we will take her to Ynis Avallion for healing."
"You should come with us," Dad answered. But Arthur shook his head and said, "Medraut was right. I misjudged and failed the people and the land. I won't betray my oath again." He turned away and fought back into the center of the battle, where the fighting was the fiercest.
Dad wafted the bodies before him and my godfather and I defended him as he went. The Saxons came at us in waves as we penetrated through to their rear, and I fear I may have slain more than one, though I tried to disable and stun, rather than kill.
At length, we found our way behind the enemy lines and all the way to the river, from where the second half of Arthur's men had come, trapping the Saxons and Picts in that crooked glen, which was now a killing ground.
The ships were larger than I would have expected, with deep keels and three sails each. The largest sail bore a red dragon, the symbol of the King. Dad laid the bodies down in the ship and knelt down beside the Queen. Her eyes were closed and her white woolen robes were scarlet with blood from where the spear had pierced her side. Her breath came slowly, and it sounded funny, bubbly, as though she were underwater, and I realized that she would die quite soon without assistance.
Dad put aside his sword and drew his wand, checking the Queen, I supposed, to see how far she was gone. He shook his head after exposing her wound and said, "This is completely beyond me. I don't have any healing talent for dealing with something like this."
His voice was full of grief and guilt and I saw that tears were sliding down his cheeks to mix with the streak of blood that dripped from a cut he'd taken high on his cheekbone. In the bright sunlight, his tears had a peculiar, pearly cast to them, unlike the faint beads of sweat that glistened on his forehead.
"We've changed things," he said. "She's not supposed to die, is she? But she will, if she's not healed now. And it's my fault, for acting without thinking." His gaze fell on Medraut and, if anything, he seemed even more full of sorrow than when he had spoken of the Queen, though he said nothing.
"You don't know that we've changed anything," Johnny said suddenly. "All the sources we had were corrupt, romances and fictions, and none of them were true histories."
Dad shook his head again, but Johnny took him by the arm and stared at him intently. "You were trying to prevent a greater horror, Harry. We still are. We have to remember what we came for, and what will happen if we fail."
Dad took a deep breath and looked from Johnny to the unconscious Queen and back again. His eyes lightened suddenly. "It might work," he said softly. "You have the same blood as she does. You have the magic to do it."
"What?" Johnny asked. "I don't...you know it's only my grandmother who was like her. And I have no real training."
"You don't need training to heal her," Dad said. "Your grandmother healed me once, and she never had training. Her magic is innate and so is yours."
"I can't," Johnny said. He sounded almost panicked, and this time it was Dad who gripped him and who held his gaze. "You must," Dad said. "She has to live or things will change. I know it."
"I've never...I've never even been in the circle," Johnny said.
"You have to sing," Dad said. "That will call her spirit and keep her here long enough for the rest."
"You don't know what you're asking," Johnny said. He stared at Dad as if mesmerized and Dad turned to look at me and said, "Sing. It will help him. Sing, Sirius. You can make music from anything."
I know I gawped at him as I'd never heard of anyone healing by music, but I sang a bit from a popular tune, one that had never been heard in the time we were in. My godfather joined in, and I gawped again, as his voice was extraordinary, unearthly, and inexpressibly beautiful. He still was looking at Dad, and he broke off to say, "I need something more."
Dad nodded. "Blood," he said calmly. "Will mine do?"
His hand trembling, my godfather reached toward Dad and touched his face where blood seeped from the cut, then he moved to touch his cheeks where pearly traces of tears still lay. "Your blood has so much magic in it," Johnny said hoarsely, "and your tears, too."
He licked the blood and tears from his fingers and shivered. "More," he said, and I shivered when Dad took his wand and cut his hand to make a bigger stream. I could not help but be almost horrified as my godfather cupped his hand and drank the blood that dripped as another would drink water from a spring.
He moved to the Queen and took up his song again, and the Queen's breath steadied. Still singing, he drew his hands apart and a blue fire came from them, which he directed at her wound. Where the fire touched, her wound closed, and soon she lay there sleeping only, her golden hair making an aureole about her, and falling in silken waves, a river of living gold, and I knew she would live after all.
Though we were out of the battle there on the river, we could hear the clashing sounds of thousands of men killing each other, and as the day progressed, the sound of carrion birds cawing as they circled the bloody conflict in anticipation of the feeding to come. Sooner than one might have expected, considering the number of men who had engaged there, Arthur came striding from the woods to join us at the river, and contrary to all reports, both historical and fictional, he appeared to be entirely unhurt. A few other men followed him, though none were Saxons or Picts, and I thought with wonder that Arthur had actually won the battle, not lost.
He tore off his battle helmet and made to join us in the ship, but a small portly man in priest's robes called to him.
"Gildas," Arthur said, turning back to speak to the priest. "I see you have chosen a more righteous calling than your brother Heuil." He paused momentarily and added, "Do you come to pray and give unction to the dead and dying?"
"I do," Gildas answered softly. I found myself staring at him for his tone was unexpected in a holy man, full of unguarded malevolence. His venom reminded me of Narcissus Malfoy, in fact, being so much in contrast with his exterior, and so evident in the glance of his watery blue eyes.
Arthur seemed not to notice, or perhaps he was so distracted by grief and fatigue that his perceptions were dulled. In any event, he gestured to the ship and said, "There are those here who require your prayers, the Queen and Medraut."
"They are not the only ones," Gildas replied. This time, he had got his voice under control as he added, "I do believe you are in need of prayer yourself."
"No doubt I am," Arthur said simply. He turned back to step into the ship and as he did, Gildas moved in a sudden flash, striking at the King. I cried out something and the King swerved to avoid the stroke, but he could not entirely avoid the knife that struck home, piercing his side through a join in his armor.
Both Johnny and I moved from the boat and leapt on the priest, who struggled more fiercely than one would believe of one of his calling. Arthur sank to his knees and Dad reached his side and caught him so that he did not fall into the muddy banks of the river.
"Why?" Arthur asked.
"For my brother, Heuil," Gildas said, "whom you killed. He was the son of a king, and you killed him."
"He was a pirate, a murderer," Arthur answered. "The law is meaningless, and there can only be chaos, if it does not apply to all." With difficulty, he added, "Even to you, Father Gildas, as it did to your brother."
"Only the Church can try a priest," Gildas said coldly. "Unhand me," he said to me and Johnny, "or be charged with sacrilege for laying violent hands on a priest."
"You shall die like your brother," Arthur said angrily, "for betraying your King." He shivered, though, and gasped, turning to Dad to clutch at him for support. "As I am like to now," he added faintly.
Dad lifted him up, though he was a large man, and his armor must have made him even heavier. Gently, Dad placed Arthur in the ship beside his dead son and his sleeping wife and he turned to look at Gildas, whose watery eyes were full of an obscene satisfaction at the sight of his wounded enemy. The look Dad turned on him reminded me quite strongly of the look he had when he was dueling, only worse. His green eyes blazed with a cold, green fire, and marked Gildas for his crimes with certain judgment.
"We have to let him go," Johnny reminded Dad. "We can't interfere."
"We already have," Dad answered. His face was set and Gildas must have seen the judgment there, for he cried out, "Will you scorn God's laws and his priests? Will you burn hereafter for your blasphemy?"
"It is you that should be concerned about the hereafter," Dad answered softly. His face changed, grew calm, and his eyes took on a far away look, as though they saw something we could not.
Quickly Johnny said, "He must be released. He will write a book, a history. If he dies now, it will never happen."
"How do you know?" Gildas asked. "Are you accursed witches like Merlin, that you know men's secrets?" He wrenched himself halfway out of our grip, and Johnny let him go altogether. I would not have released him, but I recalled that Johnny was right. Gildas would write his history. Gildas, who was born on the very day that Arthur broke the invaders' backs at Badon Hill and brought peace to Britain for a brief time in those dark ages, would write a history that never mentioned Arthur at all and would leave historians puzzling at Arthur's legend forever.
Gildas raced away as fast as his short, chubby body could go, disappearing into the woods and out of sight. Johnny and I returned to the ship as Dad knelt beside Arthur. Dad stared at Arthur's face and at his bright blue eyes and whispered, "I know you. The fisherman king. You are the fisherman king."
Dad looked at Johnny in mute plea, but Johnny shook his head. "You have bled more than is safe as it is," he said.
Arthur drew breath and whispered to Dad. "Take me to Ynys Avallion. They will heal me there, if any healing can be had. If not, I shall lie beside my son, whom I failed."
So we embarked on a journey from the river and out to sea, to the island more historians have written about, the island of legend, the isle of apples and fair weather. Only instead of three queens to take Arthur on his journey, there were only we three wizards, Dad and Johnny and I, and I could not help thinking that history and legend had a strange way of transforming over time. Had we sailed merely by ordinary wind and oar, Arthur would have died before we could reach the fabled sanctuary. But we were, after all, wizards, and Dad is one of the greatest of all of them. He waved his wand and the great sail with the red dragon filled with a steady wind, and we slid through the seas as easily and quickly as a dream flies through time.
The coast of the mainland was a purple curve to the rear as we approached the island. Rough currents drove us away from the western face and forced us north around rocky cliffs. The sea formed a misty cloud and it was only when the sun cleared to shine through flying cumulus shapes that we spotted a channel into a sheltered cove. We beached the boat on a sandy shore, the only shore upon which a boat could land, and we breathed in the air of the enchanted isle. The still bitter chill of early spring had been left behind on the mainland. Here, soft breezes caressed ones cheeks and the scents of apple trees in blossom was everywhere, a perfume almost intoxicating after the reek of the bloody battle.
In the distance, several miles away, I could see the outlines of a great castle. It reminded me of Hogwarts and I supposed that it, too, had been built with magic. Unlike Hogwarts, or any other castle I had ever seen, this one was built of some white stone, perhaps some kind of limestone or marble. Pink and gold veins ran through the stone and the entire edifice shone in the sun.
We approached the Castle from across a fast running river, which fed into a huge lake with deep blue water. A stone bridge made of the same marble as the Castle arched across the water. Dad floated Arthur, Gwenhyvar and Medraut before him. Surprisingly, no one challenged us and I had begun to think that all the tales of terrible enchantments guarding Arthur's stronghold must simply be romance.
The Castle doors opened before us without need of even a knock and we proceeded into a long, high hall which shone brightly as the sun reflected off of the alabaster walls. We passed through galleries hung with glowing tapestries into a great, round room topped with an enormous dome. The center of the dome appeared to be open to the sky, like a single large eye looking out into the heavens.
Dad laid Arthur and Gwenhyvar down on long, low couches. Medraut was set upon a table with his arms crossed peacefully upon his breast. Arthur was so still that I thought he might have joined his son in the next world after all and I jumped when he opened his eyes and whispered something so softly that the words could not be distinguished. I cannot say what I felt when the maidens arrived, all robed in white silk, and each carried a seven branched candlesticks. There were seven women in all and each more beautiful than the last. The one in the middle carried set down her candles and the others followed, so that seven times seven white candles lit the room. Their light was reflected in silver and gilt and the tallest woman brought forward a golden platter on which there sat a simple silver cup.
"Mother," Arthur said, and the woman, the famed Ygraine of Cornwall, lifted his head so that he could drink.
* * *
Harry could not get rid of the feeling that he was back inside his dream. The man who lay upon the couch was the King in his dreams. Eyes as blue or bluer than any sky focused on the queen with a great weight of sorrow and pain. When the King tipped the cup and drank, Harry was sure that what came out was a dazzling light and nothing that looked like any liquid he had ever seen.
He blinked to clear the sudden tears that came to his eyes from the sudden, dazzling light. The light, however, seemed to have transferred from the cup to Arthur, so that his face glowed as if from some illumination within, and the hole in his side disappeared as though it had never been.
"I dreamed of you," Harry said quietly. He felt odd, filled with astonishment and awe. "You were fishing and you drew that cup from the lake."
Arthur sat up and stared at Harry in equal surprise. "I don't know you, though," he replied. "I ought to know you." He looked in puzzlement at the attendant women and addressed one whose long hair was a deep auburn. "I thought he was Merlin at first, but he's not. Who is he, Vivien?" When she shook her head wordlessly, he turned back to Harry and asked with some force, "Who are you and how is it you knew of the Goblet of Light?"
The question confused Harry. "The only Goblet I know of is the Goblet of Fire. But that's a different one."
Arthur moved swiftly, as though he had never been hurt in the first place, seizing Harry's arm in a strong grip. "How do you know all these things? You bear a wizard's sword, a magic sword, yet I thought only Merlin knew the art of their making these days. Tell me who you are."
Harry knew, of course, that the last thing he should do is tell Arthur anything further. To do so would change everything, even more hopelessly than things had already been changed. Yet he felt compelled by that blue gaze, which was as blue as the pure blue horizon of the other world he had glimpsed only once so long ago, and so he told the truth, all of it that he dared. He could hear the hiss of Johnny's drawn breath as he spoke his name and told his story. Almost, he could feel Sirius's start of worry as he spoke of many things Sirius had never heard of before, of Voldemort's evil, of his own connection to Voldemort, of the way in which he had defeated Voldemort, and of the evil of Voldemort's successors, and Hayden's claim to descent from Hengist and Cerdic, and his obsessive desire to find Arthur's sword. But he was most careful not to mention the two infants the Death Eaters had held, seeking to bring Voldemort back through possession of one or the other, or the question of who Sirius's father might really be.
After a few moments, Arthur released him and sank back down on the low couch to listen in fascination, and his gaze was as attentive as Harry's children had been when the listened to a fairy tale told for a bedtime story.
"I know it sounds impossible," Harry concluded at the end, "but it is true."
"What you have done," Arthur said, "is against all the rules. No wizard I know of has ever dared to manipulate time as you have."
Harry felt abashed, much as he might have if Dumbledore had said the same. Worse, his own conscience told him that Arthur was right at least in part.
"I did not intend to manipulate, to change things," Harry answered. He paused and tried to think how to explain better. "We came," he continued, "because I feared that Hayden had gotten his hands on the sword - your sword - and that the balance of power would be so changed that we could not stop him."
"Even if he had," Arthur said, "what could he do with it that you could not oppose with your sword?" Arthur reached out as if to take Harry's sword, and Harry unstrapped the sheath and held it out to Arthur, though he did not know quite why.
Arthur drew out the sword and ran a hand along the length of the blade and hefted it, as if testing its weight and balance. He lit the sword wordlessly and then quenched its crimson-gold fire just as fast. "This is a sword fit for a king, Harry Potter. What makes you think you are not this man's equal, even if he had my sword and could wield it?"
"If he has your sword," Harry answered, "he will use it to claim the crown, and that is something I cannot combat, not even with this sword."
Johnny moved, as though to say something, but Harry plunged on, feeling the need to unburden himself, to gain the King's trust. "I did not intend to change anything here, only to observe, so that when I return I could locate the sword and hide it away where Hayden can never reach it. What he intends to do, what he will do, will truly change everything forever. He would tear down the wall of secrecy between the wizard world and the non-wizards and he would rule in tyranny, using the darkest of magiks. And he does not care how many people he has to kill to do it. He will destroy the land and the people and make Britain hell on earth."
Arthur frowned and said, "It is a pity, this separation between wizards and non-wizards."
A faint snort of derision drew their attention. "The Church encourages it," Gwenhyvar said. Harry gawped at her a moment as he had been so intent on explaining himself to Arthur that he had not realized she had woken. "And the humans who fear us believe their superstition, that all magic is evil. Even you, Arthur, have had to bow to it, and even you conceal the fact that you are a wizard nearly as great as Merlin. They would have you off your throne tomorrow." She looked from Harry to Johnny to Sirius and added, "I am not sorry they came. I should be dead without them."
"Yes," Arthur said. His tone was baritone mixture of sorrow and joy, threaded through with a grim bass note. "They interfered, they changed things. And what am I as King to do about it?"
"You don't understand," Sirius blurted out, "we had to heal her because we knew she wasn't supposed to die."
I wished immediately that I had kept quiet as the King looked at me, really looked at me for the first time. His dark brows had risen and he seemed to be deciding whether to have me punished or whether to ask another question. I hurried on, hoping that I could say something, anything, that would distract him from laying blame unfairly on Dad.
"All the histories and all the legends about this time are very vague, but they all agree on two things: Medraut died at the Battle of Camlann and the Queen survived."
"And what did they say about me?" Arthur asked dangerously. "Perhaps my life now is bought improperly. Perhaps I should have died with my son."
I swallowed and could not think what to answer. Fortunately, my godfather stepped. "They tell different stories," he replied, "and none consistent. All placed you at the Battle of Camlann. In some, you die, in others, you take great hurt and you are borne off to the Isle of Avalon, here, to be healed. Gildas wrote you out of his history altogether, and several say that you wait here, in Avalon, to return." He stopped as Arthur continued to stare at us, weighing each of us in turn. "The last one is bound to be untrue," he said dryly. "I am as mortal as anyone else."
"The last one is the truest one of all," Vivien interrupted, "else why did Merlin command me to the one thing I would never have done - to place an unending sleep upon him until your return, and the day you should have need of him again?"
We all of us gawped at her this time, and even Arthur looked astonished. Vivien's eyes were a peculiar sea green, almost turquoise at times, and she looked at us all with a drawn breath, as though some bit of a puzzle had fallen into place.
"I don't see it," Dad said worriedly, "I don't see how it can be. How could it work? Those stories are the worst romances. If you came forward with us, how would you return as king, when there is a Queen already?"
"Merlin told me it would be so," Vivien said. "I will sleep, he said, and the King will wait, until desperate need calls for our return." She turned back and said, "I don't know how it will be exactly, but this seems quite close."
"But the need," Dad said, "could still be a thousand years in the future from our time." He looked utterly fatigued, as though he had come to the end of his resources all at once, as though one more burden had been laid upon him than he had strength to bear, and I recalled that he had drained himself of blood to help heal the Queen. Arthur seemed to have sensed it somehow. He looked at Dad with a sudden sympathy, a knowing of what his moment must be for him.
"Are you hurt?" the King asked. "I have been remiss not to have asked you before, when you have done so much for us already."
Dad shook his head but Johnny reached out and turned his wrist upward so they could see the place where he had cut himself. He bled himself to give the blood needed for the Queen to live."
Dad pulled his hand away looking almost annoyed. "It wasn't much, and it was necessary. I'm fine," he added with more force than was necessary.
Arthur studied him and reached out to touch the now clotted cut on Dad's cheek and then to touch the very fine line of his lightning scar. "Your story is extraordinary," he said. "It's really true, that you survived the Killing Curse with only this scar?"
Dad nodded and I thought he was taken aback at the change of subject. I also thought he would have liked to step away from the King's touch, as I had noticed in the past that Dad did not like people touching him whom he did not know enough to trust.
"You have taken many wounds," the Kings continued. He laid his hand flat over Dad's scar, and as though he were a blind man reading a story by touch, he said, "the one near your heart is an evil one, and the scars from that go all the way through. There is a faint residue of dark magic that clings to those scars even now."
Dad tensed, and though he did not move, I could see that he was controlling the impulse to flight as the King added, "There were others, too. Poison, by fang and by pincer and by sword. You have endured much, and I guess that the pain of those wounds is small beside the injuries to the heart and to the soul."
Dad did step back that time, though he tried to make it a courteous gesture by bowing to the King. "These are nothing," he said, "beside the wounds Hayden and the Death Eaters will inflict upon the land. That was why I had to come."
"How do you know what they will do?" the King asked. I was pretty sure he weighed things and found for us. He would not have touched Dad, or spoken to him the way he had if not.
"Hayden as much as told me," Dad answered. "The rest, I dream at night, over and over, people dying and destruction."
I swallowed and thought with anxiety that perhaps Dad's long acquaintance with horror had taught him to see nightmares everywhere and to believe in the certainty of their reality. Vivien, however, changed my quite logical inferences. "You have the Gift, do you not? Do you See only through true dreams, or in other ways as well?"
Dad opened his mouth and I thought he would deny it, but the King interrupted dryly. "It's not what he Sees that matters now, Vivien, it is who he serves." He looked at Dad expectantly and Dad looked again taken aback, but he clutched at the offered interruption almost with relief. "I keep my oath, to serve Britain and the Crown."
"And should the time come," Arthur asked, "will you give oath to serve me?"
Dad's eyes widened, but he sank to his knees and drew his sword back out and held it out to the King. "The ruby you see on this sword is the Heart of Gryffindor. It was given by the king to my ancestor, Godric Gryffindor, and in its magic is contained the promise that binds me and all mine to serve the land and the king. As you are the King, I would serve you with all my heart."
The King smiled for the first time and he took the Goblet of Light from the platter on which it sat and offered it to Dad. "Drink then, and be healed. Drink and be sealed to the Task."
Dad took the cup and drank and I was sure that what he drank was the light of the stars.
Whatever magic the Goblet had must be very potent indeed, I thought. I saw that the cut on Dad's face was gone as though it had never been and all of the weariness and strain that had shadowed his eyes and made him, if you knew him, seem drawn too tight, coiled tensely, ready always to spring. His green eyes were calm and clear and seemed to see some prospect far off and serene that was utterly opaque to me. He nodded to Arthur, and I had the feeling that there was more in that small gesture that sealed their pact than in Dad's prior words of oath.
"What will you do now?" Dad asked Arthur.
The King considered him and then Johnny and me and I had, again, the feeling of being weighed, only this time, we were weighed by the King as his men, tools for his use to rule. I felt, too, that it was a greater honor being his man than it might be to be a king myself. I don't know what it was, some charisma, or perhaps one could not help knowing that he was special, that he had some kind of quality, a purity, that raised him above most men, but the look of approval in those blue eyes was something I was instantly ready to die for.
"I have already lost what I fought for," Arthur answered. "There is nothing for me now but for Vivien to send me to sleep, like Merlin." He grimaced then and added, "I hate to sleep too much. I always feel like I'll miss something."
"But you won," I blurted out- my second interruption. "You were great. Your men squeezed the Saxons and Picts into a trap. You turned their trap on them."
"I lost by winning," the King answered. I felt abashed that I had spoken out without permission again, but also surprised that Arthur had answered me directly, as though I were his friend and equal. "I had too few men left to begin with," he continued, "and too many of the enemy escaped. They have enough for a whole army yet; but mine is gone." He looked weary again then, as though the burden he had carried had been so great that not even the Goblet could wholly bring him peace. His eyes strayed to Medraut's still form and he added softly, "Everything of mine is gone, but those of you here, and this place of magic." He turned then to Vivien and said, "Well?"
Vivien shook her head and her strange eyes looked troubled. "I am not the one to do it. Merlin said you would wait, not sleep. I must wait with you so I can wake Merlin when the time comes. But I am not the one."
"This is a strange puzzle," Arthur said. "I must wait, for how long? Fifteen hundred years, or longer, and you, Vivien, can't tell me how? Nor you," he added, turning to us, but mostly to Dad, "can't tell me when, or even if this is so."
Both Johnny and I flinched at the intensity of his gaze, but Dad looked away and up to the vault of the heavens that illumined the dome through its central eye. I followed his line of sight and there one half the sky was already darkening to twilight, while the other half was all red and gold and brilliant with the glory of the setting sun. Dad said nothing, just looked at the sky as though it would provide an answer.
"It is a mystery," he said finally, and not to Arthur's satisfaction.
Impatiently, Arthur said, "How can I wait fifteen hundred years here, without dying, without sleeping, without Cerdic and his men seeking me out to ensure my death and to solidify his grasp on my kingdom? It's not possible," he said flatly, "no man can live so long, not even with the Goblet of Light to heal him."
Dad continued to watch the sky as the light rapidly dimmed and the stars began to show themselves, tiny pinpoints making glittering shapes in a dusky violet shroud. "Time," he said finally, "is a very peculiar force. It isn't at all like we think it is. People think it's like a river, rushing by inexorably, never ceasing, and never going backwards. And it is. But it is also a kind of gyre, it turns in circles, growing towards eternity, and it is possible to be outside of it, just as when we apparate, we go outside the space we are in to travel to a farther, other place."
"If I didn't know better," I said, "I would think you'd been reading my physics books."
Forgetting everything, Dad turned to me and grinned. "Not a chance. I don't understand one word in three of those."
"Then how do you know?" I asked and everyone there stared at him waiting for an answer.
He shrugged and his answer would have terrified me if I'd had enough time then to really think about it. "That's the thing about dying," he said, "or coming as close to it as you can without it being final and irreversible. You see things you can't otherwise." Decisively, he turned to Arthur and said, "I know what to do. You will wait here, hidden from all men, outside of time itself, until you are called."
Arthur turned then, not to Vivien, nor Ygraine, nor Gwenhyvar, but to a fourth woman. "Morgana," he asked, "Is this possible?"
I gawped at her as I had seen images of this woman on the chocolate frog cards I collected when I was young. Morgana, one of the most powerful witches ever. I realized that she was quite beautiful and that she looked very like Arthur, although her hair was a deep auburn as Medraut's had been.
"I have never heard of anyone doing such a thing," Morgana answered. I stared again. Her voice was lovely, husky and low, and I thought she must be able to do magic simply by speaking or singing. "It would take an enormous amount of power," she said. Her eyes, so like her brother's, focused on Dad with curiosity, and something very peculiarly like desire.
"Less than you think," Dad said. "It's knowing how thin the boundaries are between this world and the other that makes it possible." He bowed to the King and said gravely, "I would be honored to do this for you, sir, but only if you choose it. As you heard, our histories are vague and I have no way of knowing whether this is truly what is meant to be. And in my experience, prophecies are...well...often they are fulfilled because those about whom they are made choose to fulfill them."
We all fell silent, and it was Arthur's turn to study the heavens. I could not help noticing odd details, the spiky scent of some incense, the flare of the torches that lit the dome, illumining the hall with a golden light that I thought came from everlasting fire, and always, beneath everything, the scent of apple trees in flower.
"If you can do this," Arthur said, "if you can turn back time itself, can you take me back, so I can change what happened today?" He looked down at Medraut and his face was full of grief. "I killed my son," he said, "as surely as if I held the weapon myself."
Dad shuddered as though he had been struck, and his face went utterly white, but he shook his head nevertheless. "I am sorry," he said, "but that is something I would truly be punished for. It is not allowed to change the things that truly have been. And," he added, "you don't know whether doing things over again might not bring the same result, only worse. Perhaps in some other possibility you did hold the weapon that killed Medraut. Perhaps in that other possibility, it was Medraut who held the weapon that wounded you and not Gildas."
"It appears," Arthur said, "that I shall have a very long time to grieve. I would rather death had come to me than to my son."
"We all die eventually," Dad said compassionately, "and those who are a left alive are the ones who sorrow. Medraut is beyond sorrow now, beyond ambition, beyond pain, and beyond tears."
"He is beyond being human, then," Arthur answered. He knelt by his son's body and wept and not one of us dared to go to him.
The sun had set entirely when Arthur rose and said calmly, "I am ready. My life here is finished. If I have yet some thing to do that matters to Britain, then do what you can, and I will wait."
Dad opened his mouth to say something, but Arthur said, "Merlin's prophecies are always true. If he said I would wait, then so I will."
Dad bowed and wordlessly he led Johnny and me back out of the castle.
We followed Dad all the way to the stone bridge and turned with him when he turned to look back at the Castle, which now shone white in the moonlight. I could not even begin to imagine what Dad would do, although I had supposed that he would use his time turner somehow. In fact, I could not have been more wrong.
He drew his sword and lit it. Light streamed from it, more gold than crimson, and he drew the shape of an arch in the air. The arch glowed in a golden outline, and with another gesture of Dad's sword, it split down the middle so that it appeared there were doors that might open. With a third gesture, the split in the golden arch did open, and inside those doors I saw that the night sky did not exist. Instead, the arch opened out into a seemingly endless vault of blue, which was illuminated from everywhere and nowhere, that I could discern. I could have sworn that I could hear music coming out of the arch, and I moved toward it in fascination, wanting to hear that melody that teased at the edge of hearing. My godfather grabbed hold of me and said softly in my ear, "That is no place for you."
I would have pulled away, but Dad had not finished yet. A fourth gesture enlarged the archway, and the archway began to recede. As it moved, what existed behind it disappeared, and I watched in amazement as Arthur's shining castle was swallowed up inside the arch. As the archway retreated, however, we did not see the Castle inside it; rather, all we could see was the immutable blue that was everywhere and nowhere. Dad took a step forward, and for a moment I thought he would step inside the arch. He was so close that the golden light of it shone upon him, turning him into a creature who seemed more than human. In the distance, in the immutable blue, another shape began to form, only that shape was not the Castle, but what looked like another archway.
My godfather said something, Dad's name maybe, but I was so intent on listening for the music and trying to see what was inside that arch that I did not absorb his words. Dad turned back to us and his green eyes were lit by the gold light so that they seemed unusually bright, yet they were quite serene and I wondered if he could see things in there that we could not.
"How," Johnny asked, "will anyone ever call them back?"
His knees shook and he thought he was using Sirius as a support to hang on to as much as he was holding Sirius back from stepping inside that place. Harry looked at him and Johnny felt more worried than ever as the look in his eyes was as remote as it had been at times in those very first months of training, as remote and knowing as when he had entered into just such a gateway, taking the disembodied soul of Lord Voldemort out of the world forever. Instead of replying directly, Harry said, "Every door needs a lock. I think," he continued softly, "I'll need something special for the key."
Johnny started to say, this is madness, but Harry simply held out his hand and said to Sirius, "Can I borrow your sword?", just as though he were asking to borrow something quite mundane, a pencil or an ordinary door key.
Sirius drew his sword and handed it to Harry. The look on the boy's face was a study in wonder and worship. Without any words, Harry took the sword and slid it through the air in a single stroke, right into the blue nothingness inside the archway. Where the sword went in, it disappeared so that all one could see was the hilt, with its two dragons sticking out. Then Harry turned it to the right, a quarter turn, just as though he were turning a key in a lock and Johnny thought he could hear a single clear note chime. Harry withdrew the sword then and it came back out quite whole and unharmed and the golden archway shimmered one more moment and then faded from sight. Where the Castle had been before was nothing but unbroken ground.
Harry nodded to himself and swept the empty island with his gaze. He stood poised a moment, and then moved with sudden decision back across the white stone bridge and Johnny and Sirius followed him unquestioningly. When they reached the far said of the bridge, Harry said thoughtfully, "We'll need a bit more in the way of protection, I think. Just in case."
He raised his own sword and this time the light that came from the sword was more crimson than gold. As the crimson light touched the bridge, each of the stone railings was transformed from stone to pointed steel, so that the entire bridge appeared to be made of swords with their tips pointing up. As he came to the very last railing, the one to the right and first at the entrance to the bridge, Harry took Sirius's sword and plunged it straight down, so that of all the bridge of swords, only that one stood hilt up. As he had with the archway, Harry turned the sword one quarter of a turn, this time to the left, but instead of withdrawing it, he stepped away and looked to his son. "You take it out," he said to Sirius. "You are the key, and only you can unlock the bridge and the door."
Sirius stepped out of Johnny's hand and laid his hand on the sword. His face was exalted as he withdrew the sword and then turned to Harry to ask wonderingly, "Why me?"
Harry smiled and said only, "Because you are worthy and you will not be corrupted."
"Does that mean the time will come so soon?" Johnny found himself asking. "And how do you know?"
"I don't," Harry answered. "It's a mystery, really. If it isn't in our time, then Sirius will pass the secret on."
He slid his sword back in its sheath and drew his wand. As though he were a painter sweeping color across a canvas, he swept the wand in an upward arc, from right to left. Where the wand went, behind it trailed a new scene. The bridge of swords now appeared to be made of stone once more, but the stone was grey and pitted with age and the bridge sagged, clearly unsafe for any foot to tread on. Behind the bridge, a ruined stone building wavered into existence. A final wave turned a scattered stone into a tall sign that read, Danger. Unsafe. Do not enter. Without further word or warning, Harry wrapped his arms around Johnny and Sirius and touched the curious watch on his wrist. The world dissolved once more, and Johnny had only an instant of time to wonder whether the feeling of being nowhere was what death felt like. Then the world resolved once more and they were still standing in front of the pitted, crumbling bridge and on its other side the ancient ruins drooped sadly in the mist.
