merlin, with the tame wolf that was his servant beside him, was standing by the white tower on the morning of that midsummer day. and vivien was upon the tower, singing to her colored birds and looking out over the sea.
vivien, who played with her colored birds, had still the look of a child in her face. her hair was no longer in tangles; it was softer than it was once, and it fell softly over her shoulders. her eyes, for all the child’s look that was in her face, were as if they had seen many things come and change and pass.
like a king, or like one who had been always near a king, was merlin the enchanter. he smiled, and his smile was calm and royal. but one might have said that his eyes were strangely close to each other and that his lips were strangely red.
his beard was long and gray. he wore a white robe with a belt of green leaves around it, and a chaplet of oak leaves was on his head. vivien[pg 153] was dressed in green, with a golden belt clasped around her, and with green leaves in her soft hair.
so they were standing by and on the tower, merlin, vivien, and merlin’s tame wolf, when the tokens that were from the atlantes came. merlin laid his hand upon the wolf, and the wolf gave the howl that was the signal for eean and bird-of-gold to come on the island of the white tower. the enchanter saw them ride their horses into the water. and then another token came to him—the token that one magician sends to another, a bird of foam it was, and zabulun sent it.
deep were the waters, but great-hearted were the horses of king manus, the white horse and the red horse, and with eean and bird-of-gold astride of them they swam to the island of the white tower. they came to the sloping shore, and the riders helped the horses up to the hard ground. the white and the red horse stood shivering from their plunge into the ocean. afterward they threw themselves on the grass and lay as still as if they were dead.
[pg 154]
not to the horses, but out to the sea did eean and bird-of-gold look. the black horse with zabulun astride him was swimming now. swiftly to the white tower where they saw merlin stand they went.
“o, merlin,” eean cried, “to you we have come to save us from the enchanter who has pursued us from one end of the world to the other.”
“from whom have you come, you who have sent such tokens?” said merlin.
“from hermes trismegistus in his secret cell. and hermes bade us say to you that we have heard from him the answer to the riddle that the sphinx asks, and that we crossed the desert to come to you, answering the sphinx.”
“who is the magician who pursues you?”
“zabulun, once a prince in babylon, o merlin.”
“is it he who pursues you?—zabulun! i shall have a welcome for zabulun.”
“save us, o merlin, from zabulun,” bird-of-gold cried.
vivien came down from the tower. “it is zabulun who comes to our island in chase of these[pg 155] two, my vivien,” merlin said. “now you shall see me match my power with zabulun’s.”
“a match between magicians, how entertaining it will be!” cried vivien, clapping her hands.
“o lady, if zabulun is not baffled it will be death or separation for us,” said bird-of-gold to her.
“merlin will baffle him—you will find that merlin will baffle him,” said vivien. “you see, he has done nothing to impress me for an age.”
now merlin had sent the tame wolf that was his servant upon an errand, and the wolf at this moment returned leading nine men who wore white robes and who had chaplets of oak leaves upon their brows. these were the nine prime bards of the isle of britain who had come to the island of the white tower with merlin, their chief.
they stood as he bade them, four on one side and five on the other, with the enchanter of the isle of britain between them. merlin bade eean stand with the four bards. he touched them with his staff, and the row of bards and eean with them became all as alike as ten peas in a pea pod.[pg 156] and merlin went to bird-of-gold and touched her also, and she became like the lady vivien exactly.
now the black horse that bore zabulun came to the sloping bank of the island of the white tower, and zabulun sprang off his back and drew the black horse up on the bank. the horse breathed mightily, and then like the others lay down on the grass.
with great and sure strides zabulun came to the white tower where merlin stood. “hail, merlin,” he cried in a loud voice.
“hail, zabulun.”
“you know of an apprentice of mine who has come to your island.”
“find him, o mighty magician.”
zabulun looked and saw the ten men who looked exactly alike, and the two women whom one could not tell one from the other. he turned to merlin then and he said, “what a simple trick you would play upon me! nine bards you have, and there are ten before us. one of them is eean, the boy apprenticed to me.”
“then you will take him, zabulun.”
[pg 157]
it is certain that merlin did not think that zabulun would do what he did now. he changed himself into a hound. running amongst the ten that were there he snuffed at them. by the smell of the horse he had ridden he would find eean.
but as he ran amongst them merlin touched each of the ten bards and eean with them with his staff. they all became pigeons and flew up into the air. one had a feather awry. this was eean on whom zabulun had laid a paw just as he was being transformed.
instantly zabulun changed himself into a hawk and strove to rise above the flock of pigeons. as he did he saw the one that had a feather awry. over him he came.
then eean, seeing the hawk above him, dropped instantly to the earth. the others flew down with him, crowding around to hide the ruffled feather. they came before the door of merlin’s house. they flew in and lighted down on the floor while the hawk came sweeping up to the doorway.
merlin touched the pigeons with his staff and again transformed them. they became ten rings[pg 158] of gold that lay upon the floor. as the hawk flew in and perched on a chair to fix his eyes upon them, the rings of gold rolled into the fire.
then zabulun transformed himself into a tongs, and went hunting through the fire for the rings. he picked up one ring and flung it out on the floor, he picked up another ring and flung it out on the floor, and so on, until the ten rings were out of the fire. merlin touched the rings with his staff, and they were transformed into ten grains of corn. upon these ten grains vivien and bird-of-gold threw handful after handful of grains of corn.
but now zabulun changed himself into a cock with strong legs and wide claws and a hungry beak. with his claws he scratched through the heap of grain. with his beak he picked the grains up. vivien and bird-of-gold kept throwing on the floor handful after handful of corn to cover the ten grains.
but the beak of the cock went so fiercely and so hungrily amongst them that only a few grains more than the ten were left upon the floor when vivien and bird-of-gold found out they had no more handfuls to fling. then it seemed as if[pg 159] the cock with his sharp eye would soon pick out the grain that was eean.
then with his staff merlin touched nine of the grains, leaving one untouched. the one he left untouched was eean. the nine were changed into weasels, and they faced the cock fiercely. then was zabulun startled. instead of picking at the grain that was eean he fluttered up from the ground, and went out of the door of the house.
merlin touched the grain that was left and eean stood up. bird-of-gold clapped her hands for joy on seeing him again. but eean ran out of the door of the house after the cock that was zabulun the enchanter. he snatched up a strong staff as he ran.
zabulun had changed back into his own form. but now eean had no fear of him. he ran toward him. and zabulun took up a staff that was lying there and made to defend himself.
then began the battle between eean and zabulun. eean struck at zabulun, and zabulun struck at eean, and each defended himself with the staff that he had. they fought their way[pg 160] across the island, from one side to the other. they fought until their staves were broken and until they were covered with bruises. then they threw away their staves and gripped one another. all around the island they wrestled. strong were the hands of zabulun upon eean, and yet eean was not thrown by zabulun. eean felt his own hands were strong upon zabulun, and yet he could not throw him. soon eean lost sense of everything except two gripping and rocking figures.
they wrestled their way across the island, down to the shore where they had landed and where the three horses of king manus were lying. they wrestled until the sea water came over their feet. again things became clear to eean. he knew that if he could overthrow the enchanter he would win his freedom from him.
he fastened upon zabulun a grip that seemed to be stronger than his own life. he heaved with a power that seemed to bring up his last breath. he bent zabulun over. he brought him down, his head in the water. he flung himself upon the prone enchanter.
[pg 161]
“what would you have of me?” zabulun said at last.
“release. say you have no more mastership in me.”
“i say it. i have no more mastership in you. you have release from me.”
“i let you rise.”
then eean took his grip off zabulun. the enchanter rose up and took himself out of the water.
so zabulun was defeated, and so release was given to eean, the boy apprenticed to the enchanter. zabulun mounted the black horse that was king manus’s and had him swim the water. he rode across the plain and over one mountain and another mountain until he came to the castle of king manus. there he left the horse to neigh for his grooms.
what became of zabulun afterward is not written in the book that is the history of the enchanters. some say that from that midsummer’s day he ceased to be named with the great enchanters. the powers he had gained, they say, shrank from him. afterward a famous[pg 162] juggler appeared in the world. he used to go into the halls of kings on festival nights and do marvelous feats with balls and rings and knives, and play music on all manner of instruments, going from king’s castle to king’s castle. that juggler, they say—but they may be mistaken—was zabulun, once prince of babylon, and once master of the inaccessible island.
eean and bird-of-gold went within the white tower, and conversed from noon to dusk with merlin and the lady vivien. before that midsummer’s day had passed into darkness, they mounted the white steed and the red steed and had them swim across the waters. when they came to the farther shore they let the horses stand for a while. then mounting them again they rode over the mountains and across the plains and came again to the castle of king manus.
