Part 9 (2/2)
”And how did the one force get crippled?”
”These guidances are put among humans in human terms. The antichrist was baptized! His mother confessed her visitation to a man who had the power to do it. And that is Merlin-fully possessed of the dark powers, but unable to use them for their intended purposes!”
”And the Grail?”
”Pure and simple, a power source. That jewel is a reservoir of vital energy. It was left in charge of a line of kings-the most cohesive form of authority at that time-and of them, the revered Arthur pen Dragon...I hope I'm not knocking over any childhood idols.”
”Not mine,” said Guinn sullenly.
”King Arthur was a petty, self-righteous little martinet with a weak mind and a strong arm. He fell in accord with a renegade Druid who got him to turn the Grail completely to the powers of light. It shouldn't be denied them, of course; but neither should it be monopolized. The Grail itself, in its symbolized chalice form, was put into an immaterial form, keyed to the very special aura of a certain kind of man, a man who couldn't exist as long as the dark powers were crippled! who couldn't exist as long as the dark powers were crippled!
”So we-Merlin and I-searched until we found suitable material, and then made what environmental changes we could until we got one. You. Percival almost made it, but not quite. He wasn't-well-dirty enough.”
”Thanks.”
”It's been tough sledding. Merlin had to keep his powers under forced draft by any means he could. That ritual you saw is one of the ways. The combination of auras of hypnotized animals, a virgin, oak, mistletoe and fresh-killed mammals is a tremendous recharge. With the Grail it won't be necessary.”
”And Mordi?”
”A madman. Happened to be a genealogist and found that he was of the true pen Dragon stock-the last of the pure line, most fortunately. Got to fooling around with old rituals and found that the Druids, even Merlin himself, were bound to him. He wanted the Grail as a personal power-source-which, G.o.d knows, it certainly is.”
Guinn drove thoughtfully for a while. Then, ”I called him Mordred.” Morgan laughed. ”There may be more pattern behind this than anyone-even Merlin and I-know. For we have a Gareth and his Lynette; we had a Percival, the good man who almost had the Grail. And Mordred, the deputy King who turned so evil.”
”There was a gasp from the back seat. Lynn said, ”Mordi-he saw the Grail. He'll live eight days?”
”At least,” said Morgan cheerfully. And Guinn, holding the wheel, saw a flash of that bodiless head, blinking and tonguing up at him. Then he thought of Gary propped up against the cave entrance, dying, and watching...and he drove without speaking.
”So it's up to you, chum,” said Morgan. ”Give Merlin the Grail, and restore some balance to this rock, or don't, and we'll keep on building Babel.”
”Excalibur and the atom, is that it? Wait. The atom bomb is a disruptive dark-power device if anything ever was. Right?”
”Right,” said Morgan. ”A feeble victory for Merlin's side. It's the H-bomb we're worried about. That's fusion fusion-that's building. Darling, if you give Merlin the Grail, that d.a.m.ned thing...won't...work!”
Garry said, weakly, ”Hey, boss. Just who are you?”
When Guinn didn't answer, Morgan laughed and said, ”He's Hadley Guinn. He got his last name from the only name anyone knew his mother by. It was Guinevere. He called himself Hadley because he got sick and tired of getting kidded about his real name.” She hugged him. ”In a couple thousand years, he'll get over that.”
Guinn took a deep breath and said it, all by himself-the one word that had been anathema to him all his life, that had poisoned the whole Round Table legend for him.
”Galahad,” he said. ”By G.o.d, I'm Galahad, that's who I am!”
And when they test the H-bomb, you'll know what he decided.
Administrivia: From: Baby is Three-Volume VI: The Complete Stories of Theodore Sturgeon
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