Corbenic

Chapter Twenty-five

I am a messenger to thee from Arthur, to beg thee come and see him.

Peredur

Cal stepped back. Behind him the sheer slope of the hill plummeted into darkness.

Kai looked anxious. “We’re here to help.”

“Then leave me alone.” He glanced around at them. They were tense. They were afraid of what he might do. He realized how wild he must look and laughed, a hollow, vicious laugh that even scared him.

“For God’s sake, Cal,” Hawk said hoarsely. “We’re your friends. We just . . .”

“How did you know where to find me? Shadow?”

Kai flashed a glance at Hawk; the big man nodded. “You can’t blame her. She was worried.”

Cal shook his head, savoring the irony. So she had done it to him now. Stepped in, interfered. She had shown him what it felt like.

“Come back with us,” Kai said quietly. “You can stay at Caerleon. No questions, no bother. The Company will look after you.”

They only wanted to help; he knew that. So he said, “I can’t. I have to find this place. Corbenic. I’m close to it, I know I am.” He waved into the dark. “It’s out there. Just out there.”

Kai took a step to the side. “You say you’ve seen the Grail.”

“And I don’t suppose you believe me.”

The tall man laughed calmly. “On the contrary, Cal. We know about the Grail. The search for it goes on always. Don’t you think we haven’t searched for centuries? But then, you don’t believe us either, do you?”

For a long moment only the wind raged between them. Until Cal said, very quietly, “I believe you are who you think you are.” Then he turned, and stepped off the edge.

Hawk’s howl, the grab of his great hands, the thump of the grass: he remembered those, and then his whole body was out of control, a breathless, crashing, flailing roll down the sheer slope, banging, bruised, tumbled, flung out and smashed back against the ridges of the hill until he hit the stone and the night went black.

Maybe only for a second. Because when he came to, the pain was so intense he could hardly draw a breath, and he knew he’d broken a rib, maybe more than one. His arms and shoulders were so sore he groaned as he pushed himself up, but he could stand, and even run, in a doubled-up, uneven agony. The hill above him was alive with shouts and torches; they were coming down, skidding, wild with anxiety. He backed into a hedge, forced his way through, snapping the thick stalks of hemlock, wading through stiff grass.

“Cal!” Hawk’s shout was a nightmare of fear; gasping, Cal stumbled away from it, through a field into the garden of a cottage, deep in weeds. They must think he’d broken his neck. It was a miracle he hadn’t.

The castle had been close. Beyond Chalice Hill. At the bottom of the town.

There were hens in the garden; they cackled and set up a terrible clucking racket. Then a dog barked, and a back door opened.

Cal swore, flung himself at the wall and clambered over it. It hurt so much he had to stop then, coughing and retching, holding onto the wall to keep on his feet. Breathing was an agony. Maybe he should give up. Let them take him home.

Home. There was no home. Not Sutton Street, not Otter’s Brook. Not the farm at Caerleon. Not Shadow’s Georgian palace. None of them was his. Only Corbenic was his.

He lifted his head, dragged a breath in. “Show me,” he hissed to the dark. “If you want me to come, show me.”

“Cal!” They’d heard the hens. The yell was close. He ran, loping down the lane, around the corner into the main road.

Amber lamplight dyed the night; cars droned past him, a truck. He ran along the narrow pavements, past the entrance to the Chalice Well, every breath a struggle, an ache clutched tight to his chest.

They were close; too close. He could never outrun them. He ducked off the road into a garage forecourt; it was closed and dark, but he slipped into the shadows and found a doorway and slid down onto his heels, head on knees, a knot of pain, gasping.

Footsteps. Running, then slow. Still.

Then Kai’s voice. “He can’t be far. He’s in no state . . .”

“When we find him, let me talk to him.” That was Hawk, sounding anguished.

“You two that way. The rest, up into the town. Work your way down to the abbey. Get a grip, Hawk of May. We’ll find him.”

Cal knew that was true. Kai was relentless, and would find him. Soon. He waited until it was quiet. Then edged out.

Glastonbury was silent. The pubs had shut and in the houses televisions flickered blue and gray behind the curtains. He walked slowly, warily, his footsteps echoing, his shadow lengthening as he left the lampposts behind, until he came to a high wall on the right and he knew this was the abbey, the grounds of which took up most of the center of town. But the castle had been here.

If he stayed on the road the Company would find him, so he reached up with both hands and grasped the top of the stonework, then dug his toes in and pulled. The pain was so staggering he let go at once and crumpled onto the pavement; he wanted only to lie there and die, but it was already too late.

A sound in the street made him turn. Two dark figures flitted behind a parked car.

Instantly, without letting himself think about it, he grabbed the wall and climbed, got to the top, kicked out at the sudden tight grip on his ankle. Then he was over and running across the dark expanse of lawn, racing toward the twin stark ruins of the abbey, and behind him boots were scrambling over the wall, Hawk was calling his name, and his heart was thudding behind the pain of his ribs as if it would burst out.

“Where?” he gasped. “Where?”

The building was a bewilderment of shadows; in the cold dimness of the windy night its trees roared and small fragments of masonry rattled from the snapped stumps of windows. Cal swung into the vast roofless nave and stopped dead.

A man was sitting on an enclosed rectangle of grass there. A big man, in a scruffy tweed jacket. He stood up slowly. He seemed unsurprised.

Cal held out his hands. “Don’t try to stop me.”

Arthur nodded. He looked down at the stone. “This is my grave,” he said wryly.

“What?”

“Only that nothing is what it seems. Death, even. It’s never too late, Cal.”

Shadow was with him. She was sitting so still Cal barely registered her; the tattoo was back on her face, and for a second then he was absolutely certain that none of this was real, that it was all in his mind and that he’d wake soon, in the room at Trevor’s maybe, and hear Thérèse singing in the bathroom.

Shadow stood up, and said, “What will happen if you find it?”

“Bron will be healed. I’ll be healed. There will be no Waste Land.”

Sadly, she shook her head. “Will you come back?”

“Would you want me to?”

“Of course.” She glared at him.

“Then I’ll come back. If I can.”

She went to step toward him, but Arthur held her wrist. “That’s all I want,” she whispered. And for a second, it was all he wanted. Then he sidestepped past her, and saw the castle. It was there, over the grass. Heedless, he ran toward its open gates.

“Cal! Be careful!” The shout was Hawk’s, close; Cal turned, stumbled backward, tripped over some stonework. Then he fell with a splash and a yell, and before he could even breathe, water closed over his face. He kicked, fought, swallowed black gunge, found the air, coughed it up, sank. Darkness filled his eyes and nostrils, choked his throat, rose into his lungs, webbed his mouth, trapping an unheard scream like a bubble that grew and grew and would never burst, and he was caught and tangled in a net of terror, drowning, dying, dead, surely, till the big hands came down and hauled him out, into an explosion of air, a lifting, a gripping of the wet grass with both hands, a retching, vomiting relief.

The hands held him tight, around his shoulders, till he had finished. Then they peeled the wet strands of net from his hair, passed him a rag that he took and wiped his face with, his fingers trembling with exhaustion. Finally, shaking, sick, desperate, he looked up.

“So,” Leo said sourly. “It’s you.”