XIII

What Helmas Directed

Now the Count of Poictesme departs from Provence, with his lackeys
carrying his images, and early in April he comes to Helmas the
Deep-Minded. The wise King was then playing with his small daughter
Melusine (who later dethroned and imprisoned him), but he sent the child
away with a kiss, and he attentively heard Dom Manuel through.

King Helmas looked at the images, prodded them with a shriveled
forefinger, and cleared his throat; and then said nothing, because,
after all, Dom Manuel was Count of Poictesme.

"What is needed?" said Manuel.

"They are not true to life," replied Helmas--"particularly this one
which has the look of me."

"Yes, I know that: but who can give life to my images?"

King Helmas pushed back his second best crown, wherein was set the
feather from the wing of the miller's goose, and he scratched his
forehead. He said, "There is a power over all figures of earth and a
queen whose will is neither to loose nor to bind." Helmas turned toward
a thick book, wherein was magic.

"Yes, _queen_ is the same as _cwen_. Therefore Queen Freydis of Audela
might help you."

"Yes, for it is she that owns Schamir. But the falcons are not nesting
now, and how can I go to Freydis, that woman of strange deeds?"

"Oh, people nowadays no longer use falcons; and of course nobody can go
to Freydis uninvited. Still, it can be managed that Freydis will come to
you when the moon is void and powerless, and when this and that has been
arranged."

Thereafter Helmas the Deep-Minded told Count Manuel what was requisite.
"So you will need such and such things," says King Helmas, "but, above
all, do not forget the ointment."

Count Manuel went alone into Poictesme, which was his fief if only he
could get it. He came secretly to Upper Morven, that place of horrible
fame. Near the ten-colored stone, whereon men had sacrificed to Vel-Tyno
in time's youth, he builded an enclosure of peeled willow wands, and
spread butter upon them, and tied them with knots of yellow ribbons, as
Helmas had directed. Manuel arranged all matters within the enclosure as
Helmas had directed. There Manuel waited, on the last night in April,
regarding the full moon.

In a while you saw the shadowings on the moon's radiancy begin to waver
and move: later they passed from the moon's face like little clouds, and
the moon was naked of markings. This was a token that the Moon-Children
had gone to the well from which o