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Authors: Charles de Lint
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tree-boy?” Julie asked.
Another giggle welled up in Julie’s throat, but Sara’s gaze had drifted back out the window and become all dreamy again.
“I don’t know,” she said. “I was just looking out at the garden and I suddenly found myself remembering. I wonder whatever happened to him?”
* * *
“Jamie gave me some books about a man with the same name as you,” she told the red-haired boy the next time she saw him. “And after I read them, I went into the library and found some more. He was quite famous, you know.”
“So I’m told,” the boy said with a smile.
“But it’s all so confusing,” Sara went on. “There’s all these different stories, supposedly about the same man…. How are you supposed to know which of them is true?”
“That’s what happens when legend and myth meet,” the boy said. “Everything gets tangled.”
“Was there even a real Merlin, do you think? I mean, besides you.”
“A great magician who was eventually trapped in a tree?”
Sara nodded.
“I don’t think so,” the boy said.
“Oh.”
Sara didn’t even try to hide her disappointment.
“But that’s not to say there was never a man named Merlin,” the boy added. “He might have been a bard, or a follower of old wisdoms. His enchantments might have been more subtle than the great acts of wizardry ascribed to him in the stories.”
“And did he end up in a tree?” Sara asked eagerly. “That would make him like you. I’ve also read that he got trapped in a cave, but I think a tree’s much more interesting, don’t you?”
Because her Merlin lived in a tree.
“Perhaps it was in the idea of a tree,” the boy said.
Sara blinked in confusion. “What do you mean?”
“The stories seem to be saying that one shouldn’t teach, or else the student becomes too knowledgeable and then turns on the teacher. I don’t believe that. It’s not the passing on of knowledge that would root someone like Merlin.”
“Well, then what would?”
“Getting too tangled up in his own quest for understanding. Delving so deeply into the calendaring trees that he lost track of where he left his body, until one day he looked around to find that he’d become what he was studying.”
“I don’t understand.”
The red-haired boy smiled. “I know. But I can’t speak any more clearly.”
“Why not?” Sara asked, her mind still bubbling with the tales of quests and wizards and knights that she’d been reading. “Were you enchanted? Are you trapped in that oak tree?”
She was full of curiosity and determined to find out all she could, but in that practiced way that the boy had, he artfully turned the conversation onto a different track and she never did get an answer to her questions.
It rained that night, but the next night the skies were clear. The moon hung above the Mondream Wood like a fat ball of golden honey; the stars were so bright and close Sara felt she could just reach up and pluck one as though it was an apple, hanging in a tree. She had crept from her bedroom in the northwest tower and gone out into the garden, stepping secretly as a thought through the long darkened corridors of the house until she was finally outside.
She was looking for magic.
Dreams were one thing. She knew the difference between what you found in a dream and when you were awake; between a fey red-haired boy who lived in a tree and real boys; between the dream-like enchantments of the books she’d been reading—enchantments that lay thick as acorns under an oak tree—and the real world where magic was a card trick, or a stage magician pulling a rabbit out of a hat on the Ed Sullivan Show .
But the books also said that magic came awake in the night. It crept from its secret hidden places—called out by starlight and the moon—and lived until the dawn pinked the eastern skies. She always dreamed of the red-haired boy when she slept under his oak in the middle of the garden. But what if he was more than a dream?
Another giggle welled up in Julie’s throat, but Sara’s gaze had drifted back out the window and become all dreamy again.
“I don’t know,” she said. “I was just looking out at the garden and I suddenly found myself remembering. I wonder whatever happened to him?”
* * *
“Jamie gave me some books about a man with the same name as you,” she told the red-haired boy the next time she saw him. “And after I read them, I went into the library and found some more. He was quite famous, you know.”
“So I’m told,” the boy said with a smile.
“But it’s all so confusing,” Sara went on. “There’s all these different stories, supposedly about the same man…. How are you supposed to know which of them is true?”
“That’s what happens when legend and myth meet,” the boy said. “Everything gets tangled.”
“Was there even a real Merlin, do you think? I mean, besides you.”
“A great magician who was eventually trapped in a tree?”
Sara nodded.
“I don’t think so,” the boy said.
“Oh.”
Sara didn’t even try to hide her disappointment.
“But that’s not to say there was never a man named Merlin,” the boy added. “He might have been a bard, or a follower of old wisdoms. His enchantments might have been more subtle than the great acts of wizardry ascribed to him in the stories.”
“And did he end up in a tree?” Sara asked eagerly. “That would make him like you. I’ve also read that he got trapped in a cave, but I think a tree’s much more interesting, don’t you?”
Because her Merlin lived in a tree.
“Perhaps it was in the idea of a tree,” the boy said.
Sara blinked in confusion. “What do you mean?”
“The stories seem to be saying that one shouldn’t teach, or else the student becomes too knowledgeable and then turns on the teacher. I don’t believe that. It’s not the passing on of knowledge that would root someone like Merlin.”
“Well, then what would?”
“Getting too tangled up in his own quest for understanding. Delving so deeply into the calendaring trees that he lost track of where he left his body, until one day he looked around to find that he’d become what he was studying.”
“I don’t understand.”
The red-haired boy smiled. “I know. But I can’t speak any more clearly.”
“Why not?” Sara asked, her mind still bubbling with the tales of quests and wizards and knights that she’d been reading. “Were you enchanted? Are you trapped in that oak tree?”
She was full of curiosity and determined to find out all she could, but in that practiced way that the boy had, he artfully turned the conversation onto a different track and she never did get an answer to her questions.
It rained that night, but the next night the skies were clear. The moon hung above the Mondream Wood like a fat ball of golden honey; the stars were so bright and close Sara felt she could just reach up and pluck one as though it was an apple, hanging in a tree. She had crept from her bedroom in the northwest tower and gone out into the garden, stepping secretly as a thought through the long darkened corridors of the house until she was finally outside.
She was looking for magic.
Dreams were one thing. She knew the difference between what you found in a dream and when you were awake; between a fey red-haired boy who lived in a tree and real boys; between the dream-like enchantments of the books she’d been reading—enchantments that lay thick as acorns under an oak tree—and the real world where magic was a card trick, or a stage magician pulling a rabbit out of a hat on the Ed Sullivan Show .
But the books also said that magic came awake in the night. It crept from its secret hidden places—called out by starlight and the moon—and lived until the dawn pinked the eastern skies. She always dreamed of the red-haired boy when she slept under his oak in the middle of the garden. But what if he was more than a dream?
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