moderate blow would kill him, but he could only watch from a great distance, feeling the outlines of a blissful peace beginning to enfold him … He’d felt like a child after a long, weary day … and then the knight, mace high, was pulled over backward by its weight and the last thing Parsival registered or could recall now was the distant clanging crunch of his fall …
… He blinked himself back to the present. He walked on a few steps. The band of black horsemen had poured up this way and he’d fought them every inch and slew as in a dream. They had swept over him without seeming end. I must have died , he thought, smiling, bending, poking around in the loose stones … touched the steel he’d thought he spotted. He pulled a rusted, rotted mail gauntlet loose. Through the rents he could see yellow, bony fingers still clutched within it. He was amazed.
He turned quickly, hearing a distant, approaching crunch and clink. Then he relaxed with a shake of his head. That stubborn knight still followed. For days he’d dogged his trail.
By twilight Parsival had passed the ruined wall, which was as far from home as he’d ever gone as a boy before he ran away to find King Arthur’s kingdom on the swayed back of his bent horse, Spavint. He’d traded Spavint for his first charger, Niva, at Camelot. Spavint had walked and wandered him in circles for weeks …
The rounded, spilled stones here had been set in the days of the Pictish kings to hold back someone from something long lost and forgotten. Time went on melting and shifting the landscape. Parsival wondered who and how many had died in defense of whatever at this mysterious border … The twilight flowed in like a tide and the wall curved across the hill into a tantalizing obscurity, as if (he thought) you might encounter the long-lost phantoms by following it into the deepening mists of evening …
A few steps farther on he felt something, a presence. He turned suddenly. A shadowy shape floated or stood back in the violet wash of fugitive light. He felt a strange, steady, pulsing tugging at the pit of his stomach. He used to assume it was fear until he learned it was a wizard’s way of touching things, that his inner perception was reaching out to finger or be gripped by forms unknowable to the daily senses.
He paused and waited. He knew he was vulnerable. The price of his powers. The defense of ignorance secured the ordinary man. He began controlling his breathing, clasped his hands over his stomach. He focused his will there to create a kind of shield. This , he reflected, is another kind of jousting . And his legendary strength was no assurance here of anything.
“You,” he called into the evanescent gleamings. No response. The figure seemed armored, the face a seamless reflection of vague shimmers. “You,” he repeated, “do you seek to bar my path?"
The figure may have moved, walked smoothly as water flow, or drifted a little closer. There was a liquid shimmer of sword, which the knight apparently held at his side. Parsival still couldn't be certain if it was a substantial form or not. He wondered if the sword could cut living flesh … He wished his master were here: the frail monk Limus whose eyes could stun a strong man with a look. Limus, who’d pushed him half out of the world so that he could never be sure again of the borders of life and death … Limus, friend of Merlinus …
The squat, blurry knight was flowing toward him now, rapid, silent, as if wind-borne, as if the fading twilight had condensed and exhaled this phantom. Parsival braced his body, feeling the onrush of terror and doubt, worked his breath as he'd been taught, felt the pressure of the figure’s coming, and as it reached him his perception exploded and he flashed a vast, dark, chilling, wing-like flutter so that for a moment he felt shrunk to a speck in a vast and resistless sea of obliteration and his thoughts cried: Lord God save me ! Save me ! And he vibrated like a
… He blinked himself back to the present. He walked on a few steps. The band of black horsemen had poured up this way and he’d fought them every inch and slew as in a dream. They had swept over him without seeming end. I must have died , he thought, smiling, bending, poking around in the loose stones … touched the steel he’d thought he spotted. He pulled a rusted, rotted mail gauntlet loose. Through the rents he could see yellow, bony fingers still clutched within it. He was amazed.
He turned quickly, hearing a distant, approaching crunch and clink. Then he relaxed with a shake of his head. That stubborn knight still followed. For days he’d dogged his trail.
By twilight Parsival had passed the ruined wall, which was as far from home as he’d ever gone as a boy before he ran away to find King Arthur’s kingdom on the swayed back of his bent horse, Spavint. He’d traded Spavint for his first charger, Niva, at Camelot. Spavint had walked and wandered him in circles for weeks …
The rounded, spilled stones here had been set in the days of the Pictish kings to hold back someone from something long lost and forgotten. Time went on melting and shifting the landscape. Parsival wondered who and how many had died in defense of whatever at this mysterious border … The twilight flowed in like a tide and the wall curved across the hill into a tantalizing obscurity, as if (he thought) you might encounter the long-lost phantoms by following it into the deepening mists of evening …
A few steps farther on he felt something, a presence. He turned suddenly. A shadowy shape floated or stood back in the violet wash of fugitive light. He felt a strange, steady, pulsing tugging at the pit of his stomach. He used to assume it was fear until he learned it was a wizard’s way of touching things, that his inner perception was reaching out to finger or be gripped by forms unknowable to the daily senses.
He paused and waited. He knew he was vulnerable. The price of his powers. The defense of ignorance secured the ordinary man. He began controlling his breathing, clasped his hands over his stomach. He focused his will there to create a kind of shield. This , he reflected, is another kind of jousting . And his legendary strength was no assurance here of anything.
“You,” he called into the evanescent gleamings. No response. The figure seemed armored, the face a seamless reflection of vague shimmers. “You,” he repeated, “do you seek to bar my path?"
The figure may have moved, walked smoothly as water flow, or drifted a little closer. There was a liquid shimmer of sword, which the knight apparently held at his side. Parsival still couldn't be certain if it was a substantial form or not. He wondered if the sword could cut living flesh … He wished his master were here: the frail monk Limus whose eyes could stun a strong man with a look. Limus, who’d pushed him half out of the world so that he could never be sure again of the borders of life and death … Limus, friend of Merlinus …
The squat, blurry knight was flowing toward him now, rapid, silent, as if wind-borne, as if the fading twilight had condensed and exhaled this phantom. Parsival braced his body, feeling the onrush of terror and doubt, worked his breath as he'd been taught, felt the pressure of the figure’s coming, and as it reached him his perception exploded and he flashed a vast, dark, chilling, wing-like flutter so that for a moment he felt shrunk to a speck in a vast and resistless sea of obliteration and his thoughts cried: Lord God save me ! Save me ! And he vibrated like a
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