The sharp point ran true and caught the giant in the same wound. The impact was not as devastating as it might be for a man full tilt on a horse, but it was enough. The giant screamed now and tried to fall back and escape, but Richard kept pushing on.

Then the giant's feet tangled upon each other, and down he dropped.

Richard let go the lance and hurried to retrieve the sword. He returned just as the giant began to right himself.

Richard threw a side kick at the helmet. That hurt his foot, but it resulted in the giant's sudden collapse.

"Yield!" he cried, standing over him. He pressed the broken sword up under the helm, past the chain mail coif, the shattered end on the vulnerable flesh under his jaw. "Yield and live."

"Never! Kill me and be done!"

"As you wish!"

Richard drove in solidly with all his remaining strength, driving the broken sword deep. The great body flailed in its death throes; one massive arm caught Richard, sending him staggering.

His legs gave out, the earth jarred his back. He shut his eyes against the spinning sky above and lay inert on the grass, striving to breathe again. God, but he was tired. And how he thirsted. How strange it was to thirst this way, without hunger, without the strength of his beast to carry him forward to hunt.

When the dizziness passed and he could trust himself to walk without falling, he rose and went to the giant. Blood had fair gushed from him, soaking the turf. Richard felt no hunger for it; indeed, he was repulsed and wished to avoid contact, but hanging from the man's belt was a key.

He took it away and went to the lady. Though he must have been a fearsome sight himself with his batterings, torn clothes, bloodings, and doubtless wild eyes, she did not shrink from him. Instead, once he'd unlocked her bindings, she gathered him close to give comfort.

"I thank thee, good Richard," she whispered.

He had no surprise that she knew him, for he seemed to know her. He pulled back to look at her, but there was something odd about her face. It seemed to change like an image trapped in water, shifting as light and shadow played over it. He shook his head, rubbing his eyes. She left him a moment, then returned with a water skin. He eagerly drank; though warm and tasting of leather it was yet sweet on his parched lips and dust-dry throat.

"Who was that knight?" he asked.

"He was your life and death. Ending and deliverance."

Richard twitched a smile. "That wants explaining."

"You will find the answer with him."

"Who art thou?"

"Your death and life. Beginning and continuance."

And perhaps she would give a more clear reply, when the time was right for him to hear it. "Why did he treat you so?"

"He did love and seduce me once upon a time. Fate and his own cruelty made him hate me."

An old story, he thought, and went back to the knight. He dragged off the huge helmet.

The man's eyes were open, giving the world one last angry glare. Though definitely dead, there was still a movement about him. Like the lady, his face seemed to change, rippling.

In that face Richard recognized the features of many men; his father, his brother, Luis, Alejandro... they and more like them shifted skin and bone like malleable clay. Hundreds of faces, callous enemies all, some he'd killed himself, others he'd simply outlived.

He thought he understood now, and returned to the lady. She was also one of hundreds, perhaps thousands. For a few seconds she was Elaine, then Stephanie, then Ghislaine, then Elena and Seraphina, both grown to the womanhood they'd been denied-all were beautiful to him. One face he did not know, yet she above the others drew him the strongest.

"Do I know thee, lady?"

"You have always known me."

How can such ice-blue eyes be so warm? he wondered. Then the answer came to him and he was on his knees, arms around her, holding her like life itself. He had no tears, for he'd wept them out centuries ago, wept them for the mother he'd never seen, the mother who had bled out her life delivering him...

She crooned to him, gentle hands caressing his hair. "You cannot stay, good Richard."

"I know, but 'tis sweet. There is so much I would say to thee, so much I would hear."

"Then speak to me in thy dreams, for I have always heard you."

"But I shall not hear you in turn."

"Nay, but you do. Thy heart has ever known my voice. I love thee and am proud of thee."

He'd thought himself exhausted of tears. Fresh ones sprang to his eyes.

"You must find the child, now," she said after an all-too-brief moment. "And quickly."

"Yes, I swear it. Come with me. Guide me to him."

"You know the way yourself. Though you walk in the darkness, the light within has ever guided you. Let it guide you again."

"Mother..."

"Fare thee well, sweet Dickon."

And she was gone. He remained on his knees, arms out as though in prayer. Between them was a shaft of sunlight from a summer out of time. It flared brightly, then faded. The wood around him dimmed for want of her presence.

His heart ached, his whole being ached. Pierced right through he was, yet he took a strange comfort from it. She loved him, had always been there, though he'd known it not.

That was changed. "I will speak with thee again and soon," he promised.

No reply came. Saddening, and he could not linger to mourn. He got tiredly to his feet, looking around for the next sign to follow. The big war-horse snorted and stamped as though to mock his lack of perception.

Richard boosted onto its back, dug his heels in, but held the reins loose. As he presumed, the big beast knew its own way, taking a trail from the clearing. A sudden turning around a stand of beech trees marked the end of the wild forest and the beginning of open fields. He was on a rise, his road leading down to a lake and a shallow fording.

Of course. It had to be.

Beyond the lake was his father's castle. No reflection of it lay on the water, yet he knew it to be real. To himself at least. In this place.

He kicked the horse forward to a gallop, splashing over the ford, surging up the next rise and thence to the gates and through. Within, all was silent. No armsmen called a challenge, no servants scuttled up to attend him; he was quite alone but for his stamping mount.

He threw a leg over its neck and slipped down. Untethered, it trotted off to the stables, there to vanish, he supposed, as the hart had done, as had his mother. This journey, he now understood, was less to do with Michael than with himself. His prayer was that he'd not been delayed too long.

Ignoring his stiff muscles and bruises, he pushed into a shambling run, going through the tall doors that opened to the feasting hall. It was also empty, having no sign that anyone had been there in centuries.

He took the door opposite into the winding hall. No light shone here, but he knew the way, had walked it often enough in nightmares. It ended, as the dreams always did, with the door to his father's chamber.

He pushed through.

The great throne was yet there, next to it a simple table. The air stank of fat from the burning torches along the walls. Their light was red, unsteady, the smokes rising black to layer the sooty ceiling.

On the throne... Michael, looking very small and frail. His dead eyes gazed out, all unseeing. He leaned wearily against one arm of the chair.

To his horror, Richard saw that the boy was bleeding from his side, a deep wound, the blood flow slow but steady.

The terrible stream marched down the base of the throne to the floor, where it pooled, growing.

Richard rushed to him, but the closer he got the thicker the air seemed, until he was unable to move forward at all.

"Let me go to him!" he shouted at he knew not what.

"Would you heal him?" a voice asked. It was neither male nor female, kind or cruel. It just was.

"Yes! Of course!" he answered, looking wildly about for the source. "Let me pass. Please!"

"You know him not."

"I don't have to!"

"Then learn."

Michael's face changed, his form shifted, grew. No longer a little boy, a grown man sat in his place, the same agonized posture, the same dead eyes. Such eyes Richard had last seen on Michel when they both lay wounded on the grass that day so long ago.

He could not breathe. Before him was the truth he'd always known in his heart, but never dared to speak. How many lives have you had, boy? How many woundings? Could I have spared you?

"Do you forgive?" the voice asked. "Do you forgive what had to be, what you could not help?"

He shook his fists in frustration. "I forgave, years past I forgave. You know it to be so."

"You never forgave yourself. You still carry anger within for not doing more to stop the impossible."

"My anger is nothing to his need. Please, let me pass."

The man's form shrank in upon itself to that of the desperately hurt child. "Wouldst heal him of this living death?"

"Yes!"

"You know not the price."

"Name it, I will pay." "See it first."

The form on the throne shifted, grew. Richard saw himself seated there, face gray and gaunt, eyes hollow and lost, but wretchedly aware. He was old, ancient, hair and beard gone so white as to be transparent, his wrinkled, spotted flesh hanging loose from aching bones. One skeletal hand was pressed to his bleeding side; the pain like cold fire, unable to consume itself and die. His shrunken body trembled from relentless weariness; he could not lay himself down. There was no escape, no rest, only the unending torment of an injured soul.

"Thus will it come to pass, thus will it be for you forever," said the voice. "To save the boy, you must take his place, assume his hurts. You will live on in this agony until the last fall of night. And when that may be no one knows."

Richard swallowed hard. "Never to die and find release?"

"Never. The cup of life will ever sustain you."

On the table was the Grail. Its presence alone, he knew, had power enough for miracles. But that the miracle of life could be so twisted... how could they ask so much of him? To leave him perpetually dying, yet alive, without hope, alone...

But such was what the boy now endured, where he was trapped, and unlike Richard, he had no understanding of why.

Richard was himself again, standing before the throne, looking at Michael-and just able to step forward. The resistance was less than it was, but still strong. "I've seen your price and it matters not. Do what thou wilt with me, but save the boy. Restore and heal him, I beg you."

"Are you certain, Richard d'Orleans?"

In answer, he pushed closer until he could reach Michael. As soon as he touched him the thick resistance ceased. He gently gathered the boy into his arms. Precious burden. The last time he would ever hold him. It would have to be enough.

He reached for the Grail. Picked it up. There was dark red wine in it, or something that appeared to be wine.

He put the cup to the boy's lips, persuading him to drink. Michael did so, then shut his dead eyes, seeming to sleep.

God and Goddess, help him!

Richard searched his face for some sign of change, then held him close. "There is so much I would say to thee, so much I would hear. Speak to me in thy dreams, my son. If the gods are kind they may let me listen. They may let me reply."

The voice around him was silent to this. No sound was within the chamber except for his own breath and the hiss and burn of the torch fires.

He felt a wet warmth on his hand. Michael yet bled.

No! No more!

He put the holy cup on the table, then stepped away from the throne, taking Michael clear of the pool of blood at its base. With nowhere else to put him, he had to lie on the cold flags, no covering, no pillow. Richard peeled off his tunic.

A wretched blanket, torn, bloody, and sweat-stained, but better than nothing.

He wrapped Michael with it, kissed his brow, and backed away. "Sleep, boy, and may heaven have pity on thee."

Richard approached the throne. A memory of his near-fatal childhood punishment came to him. He tiredly thrust it away, turned, and sat.

It was worse than in the vision. The wounding he'd taken in the field in the far past was negligible to this. In that same spot as the spear thrust, his flesh parted from within to without in a gash longer than his hand. He gasped as though struck, clutching his side as though to stave the blood flow and agony, all for naught. The pain devoured all his senses. Nothing else existed. Weak unto fainting, he leaned against the arm of the throne to wait until the first shock of it passed.

Only it did not.

The bitterness held undiminished. Each time he shifted to ease himself only added to his suffering.

I chose this. I will endure. Better me than him.

So he did not cry out; he bit off all complaint. He remained in place, and watched as his blood trickled down the same path as Michael's to merge with the pool already there. In the hours, the years to come, it would cover the whole of the floor, spread to the rest of the castle, be soaked up by the earth outside, cloak the world.

He shivered. How could such a close-aired chamber be so chill? The gooseflesh plucked at his bare back and arms like knife points. He dared not move to rub warmth into them, lest his pain increase.

He wondered if his face and form would also shift before the eyes of any who saw him. Would a visitor someday come and take pity on him, try to ease his pain? He doubted it. This was his world from now on, this drab, cold chamber with the smoking torches, season beyond season unchanged forever. In unbroken solitude he would count the stones of the walls and listen to his own heartbeat and groans of anguish. Sabra had warned him of danger, but not the depth of it, not the permanence. There were worse things than dying. He hoped she would forgive him for leaving her. Perhaps she would wait for him as she'd done before, but this time he would not return.

But Michael... there, he was waking. All would be worth it if he could live free.