"If you'll kindly refrain from interrupting, I will tell you," Merlin said.
"Sorry."
"That's all right."
"It's just that I ain't never 'ad no archmage in me 'ead before, y'know?
Takes
gettin' used to."
"So does your grammar," Merlin said wryly. "Now, then, where were we?"
"Old Gorlois and the rest of the Old Bleeders done scattered after they fixed
the Darkies," Billy said.
"I think I understand now," Merlin said morosely. "You're a punishment from
God."
"Yeah, an' you're probably a bloody case o' indigestion," Billy said. "Get on
with it."
Billy had the sense that Merlin was slowly counting to ten. A moment later he
continued with the story.
The few remaining Old Ones soon learned to conceal what they were if they
wanted
to survive. They hid among the humans and interbred with them, producing
children who often displayed unusual abilities, abilities that in future
years
would be referred to as "paranormal." Abilities that these children also soon
learned to conceal, because the Old Ones and their descendants were
mercilessly
hunted down.
The hunt had continued through the centuries, said Merlin, even when the true
reason for it was no longer remembered clearly. Anyone who was even slightly
different was immediately suspect. The persecution of the druids, the
extermination of the Aztecs, the Spanish Inquisition, the Salem witch-hunts,
the
efforts of Fundamental Christians to suppress the quest for knowledge... the
old
fears remained deeply embedded in human racial memory.
Gorlois was one of the few who had survived the persecution of his race. He
traveled far from the Euphrates Valley, where the Dark Ones had been
entombed,
making his way to a cold and windswept island in the north. There he took a
human wife from a tribe known as the De Dannan. She bore him a son named
Merlin.
"'Ey, that's your name," Billy said.
"It was me, you young idiot."
"So this Gorlois bloke was your old man, then?"
"Brilliant deduction."
"Well, bleedin' Christ, 'ow the 'ell was I supposed to. know? I thought this
all