anything, I know that.”
The druid glided closer, his eyes focused intently on Taliesin. “You are not like the others.” He looked him up and down. “I am forbidden to say more. Know only that the one you fear is close, and he seeks you too.”
Taliesin assumed the shade meant Efnysien, but whether he was right didn’t seem like a question he could ask. “I seek nothing for myself.”
“So we understand. That is the only reason you have been permitted to continue.” The ghost faded backwards, towards the legionnaire, and his last words echoed in Taliesin’s ear. “You are a rare one, Taliesin, and more important than you know.”
Taliesin found himself shaking a little as he approached the stair. Mabon had picked up a candle from the monks’ altar and was waiting for Taliesin with it. Though Taliesin had been to the church before and for years had wanted to descend into the crypt, he’d never done so. Perhaps that was just as well, since from what the ghost had said, he might not have been given admittance.
The abbey had been built over the top of an ancient cave in which his people had worshipped before the Romans had come to their land. Inside Taliesin, a chorus rose up as the men who’d come before him worried about what damage the monks might have done to their sacred site. He told them to hush and that they would soon find out.
This adopting and coopting of ancient holy sites had been happening since the first priests came to Britain, as Christians attempted to convince the people that worshipping the Christ was only a step from worshipping the old gods. It meant that tunnels, whether built by the ancients, Romans, or early Christians, were found at virtually every church and fort throughout Britain. In many cases, the secrets that lay beneath had been forgotten or destroyed but, as at Dinas Bran, the core of what had once been a holy site to someone remained.
Taliesin resented the way this new religion appropriated the symbols of the old for its own purposes, but he told himself to be pleased too, for their actions meant the Christian monks hadn’t destroyed the cave, as they could have. It was to this cave, in fact, that Joseph of Arimathea had first brought the Cup of Christ for safekeeping, knowing that nobody would look for it among pagan artifacts. When he died, he’d been buried beneath the mountain upon which the castle of Dinas Bran rested—also above a sacred druidic site and entry point to the Otherworld—and the Cup with him.
Until Cade and Taliesin had permanently buried Joseph and his Cup inside the mountain, Taliesin hadn’t connected the Cup of Christ to the horn recorded in his own tradition as a great Treasure. But he was beginning to understand that the connection was not limited to the cup.
He wasn’t a Christian, but he’d learned their myths out of self-preservation. If the Cup of Christ was the same Horn of Immortality of druidic legend, then other artifacts could have a similar counterpart. For example, it might be that the Mantle was made from the cloth in which Christ’s body had been wrapped; the knife, which had also been found, was the weapon that had pierced Christ’s side as he hung on the cross at Calvary; even Dyrnwyn was the sword of fire held by the angel of heaven who guarded the entrance to the Garden of Eden. And so on.
Goronwy looked at Taliesin over the top of Catrin’s head. “It’s really dark down there.”
Taliesin studied the unlit steps. “I fear it too.”
When the others looked at him anxiously, Taliesin blinked, realizing that he’d spoken those last words out loud. As at Dinas Bran, Taliesin felt the dark force beneath his feet, thrumming to get out. “I fear that you may regret coming with me.”
Goronwy had one hand on the hilt of his sword and held Catrin’s hand in the other. “That may be, but we’re coming anyway.”
Taliesin put out a hand, blocking the descent of the others and said, “I will go first.”
With a blink
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