VII - Sleepless Night

Ere he forgot them, his fingers entwined with his lashes, he went over the raven’s words in his mind. The pain pressing at the base of his skull and his temples—which had tensed his neck until he feared it might snap if he moved it—was beginning to subside.

His grandmother’s hands released his, and with maternal tenderness lifted his legs onto the soft duvet. Lying back, his body floated as if on a raft heading towards the depths of the ocean.

He fell asleep.

A bald old man, robed in a thick black garment en composé with the chamber’s armchairs, rose from his stool. Aided by a stout staff—as tall as he was, formed of three branches intertwined around a gleaming glass sphere—he made his way to the table where part of the council was seated.

'I remind you that, within these walls, both your manners and the volume of your voices must be observed to the utmost. If you wish to relax, I beg you to go to the tavern. The office the king has bestowed upon you does not permit you to disturb the silence of this reading room.'

Seated about a long table, Cheas, Maed, Gregor, Owin, Kuopio and Bartón wore the sleeveless red woollen tunics that set them apart from the rest of the troop, upon which the Raven’s coat of arms was embroidered across the breast. He was speaking to them all, yet it was Maed whom he regarded.

His reply was imminent; a smile flickered alongside a glint that flared from his olive eyes just as Gregor, knowing him well, turned towards him.

Swiftly, yet without violence, he covered his mouth with his hand to prevent that sarcastic—and doubtless amusing—remark from getting them cast out of the library.

They were awaiting GG, Gwion Gerinson, to arrive; he was signing the note and keeping them in suspense.

He knew not how much time had passed when a thought yawned: 'Have I fallen asleep? Well, yes. No—I am awake, for I am thinking; that means I am awake. Am I?'

He strained to open his eyes and, failing to do so, strained even harder. 'I ought not even have to think about it. Have I opened them? I have gone blind! Have I?' His mind fell silent for a long while, during which no thoughts came to him. He felt at peace and whole.

It was his sense of sight that returned, yet he beheld only darkness. 'It is true, I have gone blind,' he concluded. But the feeling of lightness that filled his soul, and the absence of pain, were so immense that naught else mattered to him.

His awareness settled upon the tip of his nose. He could feel every muscle contracting and relaxing, as cold air entered and warm air was expelled. 'I am blind, but I am not dead, because I am breathing. Am I?'

His chest rose and fell in a hypnotic, steady, deep rhythm. He beheld it as, once again, a sense of peace and nothingness washed over him. From that nothingness there emerged an image that vanished instantly before he could discern it, and he pondered whether it had ever been there.

His eyes took centre stage once more, and the darkness, which fell over them like a veil, prompted him to think: 'My people. My poor people, my Old Minister. My warriors. My poor, faithful warriors. What will become of them all if I linger here, like this—blind?'

A tear tickled his cheek and a knotted anguish quickened his heartbeat. He felt that sensation of fear, of adrenaline, of being ready for battle, but what battle?

In his mind the memory played out as an altered repetition of the scene: his sword raised, Halfdan’s blood bathing the snow like a perfect canvas, forming a pair of jaws at his feet.

A hooded figure began to chase him. He beheld himself running through a labyrinth and, when he turned right, without realising it, he fell asleep.

Arwel hastened through the corridors of the castle’s ground floor, huffing and puffing in annoyance. He abhorred tardiness and punished it, but as a good commander, he knew his men. Gwion was methodical and precise, and the half-hour they had been waiting for him made him uneasy.

He took the corridor on the right as he reached the junction when he beheld a slender man, bearing a wooden tray, at the door of Gwion’s chamber.

'I shall handle this,' said Arwel, quickening his pace until he was by his side. 'Is he asleep?'

He could not tell if the man was coming or going, for by way of reply he found no expression upon the wrinkled visage overshadowed by thick black eyebrows that concealed his eyes.

Arwel opened the door and, in the dim light, heard Gwion snoring. Relieved, he shook his head and kicked the bed.

'Arise!' he bellowed, delivering another blow. 'You shall be polishing my boots for a week. Rise, or you shall face the wrath of the rest of the council.'

He hearkened to the sound of his breathing, the faint growl produced by his throat and escaping through his half-closed mouth. He could feel the veins running across his face swelling and deflating with every heartbeat.

The peace that had filled him with joy was fading. Fear, anxiety and Perkolon were taking hold of him once more. The pain flickered in time with the contractions of his muscles.

'What will become of them? I am a blind king.

' Blind was the word that, after Perkolon, cut deepest into his breast. He did not know which blindness troubled him more: that of his eyes, or the inability to see what lay so clearly—so transparently—before his destiny.

Blind, and yet he even thought he could read the letters floating above his head, but 'how, if I am blind? ' , he asked himself.

In truth, he beheld them plainly; the yellow letters upon a black mantle whirled to and fro, up and down, together and asunder, commingling and realigning themselves.

From this dance he began to discern that something else was taking shape, another word, though he could not read it, for it grew blurred, merging with the penetrating darkness that encompassed them.

He beheld with unwavering gaze until he sensed a subtle pressure betwixt his brows; then it came to pass: first the c joined with the i to fashion a d, then the d dissolved into the e and, suspended in the air, the word EGO took shape.

Ego. The golden radiance took centre stage as, with each heartbeat, it drew closer to his eyes.

The light soon overpowered the darkness, and the letters grew so large that, with a violent movement, they struck his forehead.

The radiance that took hold of him engulfed his entire body, and then, darkness.

Evening was falling and darkness was setting in.

The library, situated upon the second floor of the castle’s main building, was, by reason of its large windows and elliptical shape, one of the last chambers to be left without natural light.

Two servants, commanding the attention of Cheas and Maed, lit the lamp from both ends as if in a ritual, and the light gradually bathed the walls in a coral glow.

It was the Water Candle that ran from north to south. It consisted of a wooden trough filled to the brim with water, in which floated an elongated stone channel filled with resin, into which thick sisal-thread pistils were set every half-metre.

Cheas puffed out his chest, sensing his father’s presence in that invention. It had been his ingenuity that had created that perfect piece, which served as an eternal and reliable light.

Another pistil lit up and Maed felt the same extreme boredom as on the day that candle had been commissioned.

'Accident-proof,' he said to Owin at his side, nudging him with his elbow.

It was during a freezing winter’s afternoon, when training in the arena was tantamount to tempting fate in the face of a possible storm, that, shut away in the library, Maltón was teaching them field medicine.

Keeping the two youngest, Cheas and Maed, still had been a titanic task.

Seated apart, Maltón instructed them to take notes on the lesson.

Cheas strove to comply, but Maed, by the second paragraph, bored, lifted his head from the papyrus.

He beheld Owin nodding off and, without a moment’s hesitation, hurled the inkwell straight at him, splashing everything in its path.

Startled and in pain, Owin reacted and accidentally knocked over the candle to his right.

The flammable ink caught fire and began to spread.

Chaos reigned: a fire in a library, with young folk desperately seeking escape.

Yet Maltón was a puissant sorcerer, and whilst giving Owin another lesson in magic, he prevented the castle and its lore from going up in flames.

That very day he ordered the Water Candle to be made, with enough wax to provide light for days and enough water to extinguish any trace of fire.

When the last pistil burned out, the two servants made for the exit, yet ere they might unbar it, the solid wooden door began to move slowly.

Narg stepped through a portal. One step and then another—he watched his boots advance. Before him, a still pool reflected his image. The static electricity in the air raised his ash-grey hair on end, as he could see in his own reflection. The energy prickled his skin like a hedgehog’s quills.

He found himself within a cavern of vaulted ceiling and circular walls built of whitish stone which, though uneven, appeared to coexist in solid equilibrium. A few paces before him, a leaden mist, like a curtain, danced to the rhythm of the drops falling from the ceiling.

A breeze blew against the nape of his neck and parted that curtain to reveal six hooded figures, three men and three women, who had their backs to him.

One of them turned towards him. She held a human head in her hands, which she raised until it was level with Narg’s eyes.

They looked at each other. He thought he knew who it was: dark hair, a thin moustache and puffed-up cheeks.

He could feel it, it was on the tip of his tongue, and just as he was about to say the name, the head opened its mouth wide and vomited a hundred black feathers onto Narg’s face.