Legend

XV

Ahalf dozen candles sputtered and flickered, giving off an inconsistent light and filling the chamber with a slightly foul odor. The lone occupant of the room was wrapped in a dirty black robe with a tattered blanket over his shoulders. He was in his early thirties but looked much older, the hard conditions living in the caverns inside the tor having taken their toll on his body. A tic twitched unnoticed on his left temple, not able to disturb his fierce concentration upon the documents lying on the large wooden table that took up most of the chamber’s space.

He was reading, which was what he did almost all the time. The walls of the cavern were lined with sagging wooden racks, which were full of documents ranging from rolled-up papyrus to crudely bound books. For eighteen years he had been there, reading. Not that he was a slow reader, for eighteen years was more than enough time to have gone through all the documents, but because he’d had to learn all the languages in which the various reports were written.

He’d worked his way backward in time. And in that manner he was able to trace inversely the changes in the languages and work on comprehending each one that preceded the other. He was now arriving at the beginning.

His name was Merlin. He’d spent his childhood in a swamp far from there, raised by his mother who told him nothing of his destiny until one day when he was twelve, his father, whom he had never met, showed up at their hut. His father brought him to the cavern and told him that he would be the next Watcher of Avalon, a position of great importance.

Merlin had not been impressed with either his father or the position.

Until he found the document room.

His father had died less than a year after bringing Merlin to Avalon. Merlin had buried him on the side of the tor, alongside the long line of graves of the Watchers who had preceded them. When he did so, he knew that his own grave would be next in line, and that had given him a strange sense of foreboding. Not of death, but of a fate that seemed ordained to bring nothing of value to the world, despite his father’s grand words about what an important job being a Watcher was.

Merlin looked down at the parchment covered with High Runes. It told of the First Gathering and the edict to watch the Airlia and their minions. It had been many years since any Watcher report had come to Avalon — none in Merlin’s time on the tor and only once during his father’s.

Merlin read of Atlantis and could only shake his head in wonderment at the description of the city and the way people lived. Few here in England lived past thirty. Starvation and disease were rampant. There was practically no law. Each little cluster of huts was a world unto itself. It seemed to Merlin that Watching had not done mankind much good. Even the stories he’d heard as a child of the Romans spoke of a better world than the one in which he lived. There were some petty kingdoms here and there on the island where a powerful man managed to bring others under his rule, but hardly any of them lasted beyond a few generations.

Merlin ran a dirty finger over the parchment, mouthing the words to himself. The Grail. He had read of it in quite a few of the documents. A most wondrous thing — something that promised eternal life. And it was there. He had held it in his own hands many times. But, according to report made by Joseph of Arimathea, who had brought it to Avalon so long ago, the Grail was useless without two special stones, and they were not to be found.

And then there was the sword. Merlin passed it every day in the crystal cavern on his way in and out of the tunnel complex. It was a magnificent thing. His father had beaten into him that he was never to touch the sword, but had never given a reason why. The sword was powerful, very powerful, in a different way from the Grail, his father had said. Merlin had sensed that even his father didn’t know what exactly that power was, although the old man had indicated it was power that could only be wielded by one man, just as the sword itself could only be wielded by one.

Merlin shuffled through the pile of parchments until he found the one that had caused him great excitement the previous evening when he’d first translated it. One paragraph had riveted him:

It was not clear who had written those lines. From the language and the placement in the racks, Merlin estimated that it had been penned about three hundred years previously. One of the candles sputtered and went out. Merlin slowly got to his feet and stretched out his back, sore from so many hours bent over the reading table. He picked up one of the candles still burning. He left the room and walked down atunnel, exiting into a larger cavern. The light from the single candle was magnified a thousand times over by the crystals embedded in the wall.

Away from the wall, set in a red crystal that jutted up from the floor, was Excalibur inside its sheath. Merlin, as he had done many times before, ran his hand over the pommel of the sword. He felt a surge into the hand, up his arm, and into his chest, igniting a warm glow inside of him despite the constant chill of the caverns.

A king.

Unnoticed, tears were flowing down his cheeks. He had no son. Not any longer. Just a week ago he had been summoned to the cluster of shacks where his own family eked out a living from the swamp. His son was dead, was all the dirty scrap of paper said, most of the words spelled wrong in the handwriting he recognized as his wife’s.

He’d traveled there. By the time he arrived, his son was already in the ground and his wife was well on her way to joining him. Merlin knew he was the last of his line. The instructions he had been given by his father indicated he should do one of two things — find another woman to marry to bear another son — a chancy proposition at best — or find an orphan to bring into Avalon to be taught the ways of the Wedjat.

To what end though?

To sit there and spend a life doing nothing, passing down rules that accomplished nothing? What if no more reports came? What if there were no other Watchers remaining? And all to end up in a hole in the ground, the next in a long line of graves?

And even if there were other Watchers, to what good? There was only death and despair all around.

A king.

Could things to be like they were back in Atlantis, but without the Airlia? That was how Merlin read the parchment. The sword would allow a man to become king.

Merlin’s other hand was now on the handle of the sword. With one smooth motion he pulled it out of the crystal, the sheath still guarding the blade.

Merlin was perfectly still, feeling the surprisingly light weight of the weapon in his hands. Keeping one hand on the grip, he put the other on the sheath and freed the blade. It glimmered in the light reflected in the crystals.

Nothing happened.

Not in the cavern under the tor of Avalon, at least.

Inside the mothership hidden inside what would one day be called Mount Ararat, the bloodred twenty-foot-high pyramid that was the Airlia Master Guardian came alive. The surface pulsed with power, stirred from its hibernation by the freeing of its control key, Excalibur.

The first thing the machine did was reach out and contact all of its subordinate guardians. And they in turn contacted those whom they were instructed to.

Aspasia’s Shadow did not move when the top of his deep sleep tube swung open. He instinctively knew it was not the time he had scheduled to be brought into consciousness. His instinct was confirmed by the dull red flash that met his eyes as he slowly opened them. Something had happened. Something that demanded his attention.

Still Aspasia’s Shadow did not leave the tube.

It could not be good news. That was a strange revelation that slowly seeped through Aspasia’s Shadow’s thoughts. An awareness he had been coming to for millennia. There was no positive outcome to all of this for him. At best, Aspasia, once he took the reins of this planet and these people, would allow his Shadow access to the Grail and a place on his council. At worst, Aspasia would dispatch him as a tool that had served its purpose and now was no longer needed.

Aspasia’s Shadow roused himself from these morbid thoughts and climbed out of the deep sleep tube. He slipped on a heavy wool robe and left the deep sleep chamber. He descended to the chamber that held the guardian computer that had been deposited there, like Aspasia’s Shadow, so many years ago.

As soon as he entered the chamber, Aspasia’s Shadow had a good idea what was wrong: The golden surface of the computer was glowing vibrantly. He walked to the alien machine and placed his hands on it.

The Master Guardian was active. Which meant that someone had unsheathed Excalibur — the sword that was so much more than simply a sword. Throughout the hundreds of thousands of years of war against the Swarm, the Airlia had, naturally, lost many worlds and ships to their enemy. Guardian computers, including system masters, had also been captured. Because of this the Airlia had learned to safeguard their computer systems. The sword transmitted an authorization code that allowed the Master Guardian to power up and link with all subordinate guardian computers. But the sheath blocked the transmission, allowing someone far away from the Master Guardian to keep it shut down. There was also a destruct built into Excalibur that could be triggered, resulting in the complete cleansing of all memory data in the Master Guardian and subordinate guardians and shuttingthem down forever. This destruct code was something that had not been transmitted to Aspasia’s Shadow from Aspasia.

There was something else built into Excalibur.

Aspasia’s Shadow had his guardian link with the Master Guardian and then routed his inquiry to the guardian on Mars and sensors built into the base there, which were oriented toward Earth. Aspasia’s Shadow could “see” the surface of Earth and a small red dot. He increased the image, zeroing in on it until he recognized the location.

Aspasia’s Shadow stepped back from the guardian computer, cutting the connection. He had a long journey ahead.

Ts’ang Chieh, once known to the outside world as adviser to the Great Emperor ShiHuangdi, ruler of China and all the known world, came out of the deep sleep with more vigor than Aspasia’s Shadow. He had been born of a slave girl in the royal court and been taught to obey without question his entire life. So great was his obsession with duty to ShiHuangdi that he had been brought into the elite inner circle of those who knew the true nature of the First Emperor. For ShiHuangdi was not a human, but rather Artad, consolidating his power in this part of the world so he could rest in peace as the Atlantis Truce wore on.

Ts’ang Chieh was delayed slightly after getting out of the tube by the necessary ritual of donning the full regalia of his office as the voice of the Emperor. Once all the accouterments were in place he paused and turned toward a shimmering black wall that bisected the large chamber in which his deep sleep tube was located. He bowed toward the wall, for he knew on the other side of the power field lay Artad and the rest of the Airlia, who were in the deep sleep.

Ts’ang Chieh then left the chamber and went to where Artad’s guardian computer was located. He immediately noticed the same thing that Aspasia’s Shadow had — that the computer was active. Placing both hands on the shimmering, golden surface, Ts’ang Chieh accessed the alien device.

Excalibur was unsheathed.

Ts’ang Chieh crossed the chamber to another control panel. He passed his hands over it and a series of hexagonals were backlit with High Runes written on them. Ts’ang Chieh tapped out a sequence on the hexagonals. A holographic image of Earth appeared in the air above the control panel. A small red dot flashed on the screen.

Ts’ang Chieh sighed. He had received a report from one of the Ones Who Wait that Excalibur, along with the Grail, had been removed from Giza long ago. The Human-Airlia clones that Artad had left on the planet’s surface to look after his interests had tried to keep track of both artifacts just as Aspasia’s Shadow had. And had lost track of both for a while, until they learned by torturing a Watcher that both were located at Watcher headquarters in Avalon, where the glowing red dot indicated Excalibur was still situated.

Ts’ang Chieh pondered this for a while.

He was not concerned about the Watchers. Foolish humans meddling in things beyond their comprehension. But he knew that Aspasia’s Shadow would now also know the location of the key — something that heretofore had escaped him.

Action had to be taken.

Ts’ang Chieh briefly contemplated waking Artad, but decided he could handle this matter. He left the guardian chamber and went to another room inside the huge mountain lair. In the room was a deep sleep tube and inside of it a human body — a spectacular specimen, over six and a half feet tall with thick black hair. The red eyes, though, were nothuman, but Airlia, a defect that Artad had been working on but not quite fixed. They were vacant, showing no sign of intelligence. The body was that of a prototype warrior that Artad had been tinkering with on the voyage to the Sol System.

Ts’ang Chieh sat down at the command console and brought up Artad’s personality. He had been prepared for something like this by Artad himself, so he was able to run through the procedure quickly. Part, but not all, of Artad’s personality and knowledge base was transmitted by the computer to the body in the tube.

As the body stirred in the tube and became aware, Ts’ang Chieh turned to another console and tapped out a message.

The mountains were called the Twin Sisters by the people in the area around the two peaks because at a certain angle they resembled each other almost perfectly in form. They could be seen from far away, because they rose almost six thousand meters into the air, the highest peaks on the continent. They were over sixty kilometers apart and dominated the land all around. One of the peaks had a smaller peak attached to it by an eleven-kilometer ridge. However it was the other peak toward which Ts’ang Chieh has sent his message.

In a cavern hollowed out deep inside the peak, three creatures were alerted by their guardian computer that the key to the Master Guardian had been unsheathed. Unlike Ts’ang Chieh and Aspasia’s Shadow they took no immediate action and instead waited for further instruction. They were, after all, the Ones Who Wait. Technically that meant they were waiting for Artad to return and take his rightful place ascommander of this outpost, but in the meanwhile they were to do his bidding.

They were Airlia-Human clones. Outwardly they were mostly human, the most noticeable alien influence being their catlike red eyes, just like the creature Ts’ang Chieh was bringing to life in Qian-Ling. The leader of the three was female and named Lexina. Flanking her were Elek and Coridan.

They read the message from Ts’ang Chieh. There was no need for them to send an acknowledgment that they would comply — they had no choice. They had been programmed to obey.

Merlin stood on top of the tor with the sword in his hands, turning it to and fro, letting the sun reflect off the metal of the blade. He had no clue as to the sequence of events he had just initiated. Indeed, he had not thought his actions through any further than removing the sword from the cavern.

But he did know two things — the right man with this sword could accomplish wonderful things. He was not to be that man. But, according to what he had read, that man would come soon.

Gwalcmai cursed as he put his feet onto the cold floor plating. “What now?” he demanded of Donnchadh, who was already in the copilot’s seat, checking the computer.

“Someone has unsheathed the key to the Master Guardian,” Donnchadh said.

“Someone took it from Avalon?”

“No,” Donnchadh said, reading the intercepted message traffic between the guardian computers. “It’s still at Avalon.”

“Damn Watchers,” Gwalcmai muttered as he reached for his garments and weapons.

Donnchadh ran her fingers over the hexagonals and frowned. “Someone in Qian-Ling has contacted the Ones Who Wait.”

“And?” Gwalcmai asked as he strapped his sword belt on.

“The message says: The dragon comes.”

Gwalcmai paused. “That’s it?”

“That’s it.”

“What the hell is that supposed to mean?”

“I have a bad feeling we’re going to find out very soon,” Donnchadh said as she got up from the chair and headed for her own gear.

He was Artad’s Shadow, but not as complete a Shadow of his master as Aspasia’s Shadow was of his. From the Ones Who Wait, Ts’ang Chieh had some information about the land called England, where the Watchers were headquartered. Using what he knew, he had fashioned a persona for the creature that kept within the template of Artad, yet was adapted for the land to which he would be traveling.

“Arthur,” Ts’ang Chieh said.

The creature turned to look at him with bloodred cat eyes. “Yes?”

Ts’ang Chieh held up two pieces of glittering blue. “You must use these.”

Arthur remained still as Ts’ang Chieh placed the Airlia version of contact lenses over his eyes. When he was done, Arthur’s eyes appeared human, although they were a remarkably deep blue.

“Come with me,” Ts’ang Chieh said.

Arthur followed him without a word. They went past the room where the guardian computer rested and entered a massive open space. Large metal struts swept overhead, supporting the rock ceiling. The floor was filled with numerous containers of various sizes. Ts’ang Chieh led Arthur up to one of them and he tapped on the small panel on the front. With a hiss, the end began to slowly fold down.

Nestled inside the container was a glittering, metal dragon. Ten meters long, by five wide, it had short, stubby wings and a long, arced neck leading up to a facsimile of a serpent’s face, including a jawful of black teeth. Dark red unblinking eyes completed the fearful visage.

“This is Chi Yu,” Ts’ang Chieh said.

Arthur turned to Ts’ang Chieh in confusion.

“This is how you will get to England,” Ts’ang Chieh continued. “In the belly of the beast, so to speak.” He smiled, remembering. “It is what ShiHuangdi used to defeat his enemies a long time ago. You will use it to defeat our enemies now.”

Aspasia’s Shadow had gathered his fifty best Guides to provide him an escort for his journey to England and to form the core of a fighting force if it came to that. He had made the journey to England a long time ago and knew the difficulties involved in covering such a distance given the primitive state of technology and transportation capabilities of Earth. He’d considered taking the bouncer he had secreted in Mount Sinai but decided against it. It was for emergency use only and this was not yet an emergency.

As dawn came to the desert, the small caravan started out from the base of Mount Sinai, heading to the north and west, toward Alexandria, where they would find passage on a ship across the Mediterranean.

As Donnchadh stepped out of the stone doorway into the midst of the complex known as Stonehenge, she immediately knew she was in trouble. It was night, but the area was lit by the flame of hundreds of torches and several surrounding bonfires. The stones were surrounded by a circle of people garbed in robes, chanting, which came to a stuttering halt as the apparition of Donnchadh and Gwalcmai coming out of the rock itself became noticed.

“Not good,” Gwalcmai muttered, his hand drifting to the pommel of his sword.

Donnchadh ignored him. She lifted both hands, arms spread wide, and cried out in her own tongue. “I know you cannot understand what I’m saying. Which is why I’m using this language.”

Gwalcmai glanced at her as if she’d lost her mind.

“Just follow my lead,” she shouted, the message obviously for the only person who could understand her. “We have to make them believe we’re part of whatever it is they’re worshipping here.”

It didn’t work exactly the way Donnchadh planned. A woman screamed and panic spread through the crowd. Those closest to the stones turned and pressed up against the people behind them. Within two minutes, there wasn’t a person within two hundred meters of the stones and the circle was growing wider by the second.

“That went well,” Gwalcmai noted.

“We gave them something to talk about,” Donnchadh said as she shouldered her pack. “Let’s go.”

Merlin looked across the water to the tor that had been his home for his entire adult life.

A thick fog covered the water and hid the island’s base, giving the appearance that it was floating in air. Excalibur was wrapped in a blanket and tucked inside his cloak, tight against his body.

He was not content to wait for whoever was to wield the sword to come to him. There had been too much sitting around and waiting over the centuries. He had no idea where to go, but he had an overwhelming sense that anything would be better than doing nothing.

Merlin looked away from the island. He could go in any direction. He knew that there were pockets of Saxon invaders to the east and south. And to the north were the fierce barbarians who painted their faces blue and were known to kill all interlopers.

West.

Merlin had heard of a king named Uther who ruled in Cornwall. Apparently a powerful man who had banded together several neighboring kingdoms into a loose confederation that was able to hold the Saxons and other invaders at bay. Such a man could use the sword.

Merlin also carried the Grail in a pack slung over one shoulder. He did not plan to give it away. From the records he knew it was even more important than the sword. Whatever lay ahead, he planned to be the only one who knew its location.