Four sorceresses, alike in face and power
Shalt fight on one Auspicious Hour
To light the flame which they hold dear
Two witches muddy, two gem-like clear
Test fate with hope and strength with fear,
When the eye of the moon sheds a single tear,
Thou shalt know that the time is near.
Freya had found this in a book when she had ransacked the library that day, desperate to find out anything, something, about the woman Nimueh. All she had found was this-a prophecy she had torn out of the book, and also that the last Court Sorceress, in the days before the Great Purge, had been named Nimueh. She had decided at once that it had something-no, everything-to do with what was going on now. Four sorceresses; that would be her, Morgana, Morgause, and Nimueh. The clear ones were her and Morgause, and the muddy ones were Nimueh and Morgause. The flame would be what they all hoped for. Merlin and Arthur were already "testing fate with hope and strength with fear."
But what about the moon's tear? Freya had absolutely no idea whatsoever what that might mean.
She asked the scribe whether he knew what the moon's tear was.
"The tear of the moon, my lady?" he asked. "It is a rare celestial event which occurs only once every two centuries. It will be happening this month."
"And what happens, during the moon's tear?"
"Why, a ray of light seems to fall from the moon to the surface of the earth. Sailors thought the moon was weeping when it was first seen about eight or nine milennia past. And since that time the name 'the moon's tear' has been used for this."
Freya's heart was pounding as she returned to her room. This meant that this month she and Morgana would be fighting Nimueh and Morgause...
Did it?
Morgause's heart was pounding just like Freya's as she watched Freya from the crystal ball in her tower. She had though that the witch Nimueh was dead. Had the boy Merlin not killed her when he was only fifteen years old? But she knew that Ania could not be mistaken. The insight of dragons was something which never failed; and Ania was remembering, beginning to remember, her existence as Anharra more than fifty years past. How odd it was, all of it! And what did Nimueh want? Revenge on Merlin? On Arthur?
Nimueh could prove to be a valuable ally. She would have to convince Nimueh somehow not to hurt Morgana...and in return something worthwhile. And how, how had Nimueh survived that bolt of lightning? Probably her soul, stripped from its body, had found a way to regenerate her body. She was, after all, seven or eight hundred years old.
Morgause mused over this. How very, very strange that Fate had provided her with an ally so very, very strong...
Quietly, she went over to her dovecote. They fluttered their wings in fear. Morgause took one out of the cage, careful not to let the others out as she did so. This dove she immobilized with a quick Freeze spell, and then wrote out a note.
Nimueh-
You have an ally, oldest daughter of Uther Pendragon.
I will come to the Isle of the Blessed tomorrow night, at sundown.
Morgause then breathed out over the dove, infusing its mind with her sense of urgency.
Then she threw the dove out of the window.
The dove plummeted like a stone, and at the base of the tower it had recovered its senses enough to begin flying, quickly. Morgause watched as the dove sped out of sight. She smiled.
Merlin, Arthur, and Lancelot were riding quickly through the forest; they expected to reach Camelot by sunrise when they heard a yell that sounded like "CHARGE!" and turned to see sixty men rushing toward them. Merlin threw out spell after spell to protect them, but these men seemed to be sorcerers, able to push away Merlin's cursory wards with their hands.
"Shield Lancelot!" yelled Merlin.
The two men bodily shielded Lancelot, and Arthur caught sight of an arrow come from who knew where, speeding towards Merlin's unprotected side. He threw Merlin out of the way; the arrow stopped two inches from his chest and hung, quivering in midair.
"I don't understand," said Merlin. "It should have hit me-"
All the weapons and spells hurled at them were promptly flung back upon their casters. Several men were killed by returning arrows and curses, and the three men had only to wait until there were none of them left-for the soldiers had not yet grasped the fact that the arrows and spells hitting them were in truth their own. And Merlin worried. There was only one thing that could protect the caster of a blood ward...and that was if truth had been shifted.
He knew he was not strong enough to shift truth. And Morgause would only have taken full advantage of the fact that he was unprotected . There was only one person he knew of who was strong enough to do it...his daughter Ania.
And with that he looked behind for the horses.
They had been killed.
Merlin and Arthur felt sharp twinges of regret at the sight of the proud, dead horses. They had carried their masters faithfully for years, ahad been companions and friends as well as steeds. But the bodies had to be left.
Merlin raised his head and cried out in the tongue of dragons for Kilgarrah to come for them.
A shadow crossed the moon.
Kilgarrah had come for the Dragonlord.