All round the pool was
green grass, bright with the treacherous greenness that tells of
deep bog beneath it, and then fair turf, and beyond the turf the
rocky scree from the cliffs again. The menhir was full thrice a
man's height.
It was even as I had seen it. I knew every rock and patch of green,
and the very outline of the edge of the beetling crags that had
been so plain to me in the dream light ere Owen called me.
But I did not heed these things at the first. My eyes went to the
place where Nona the princess had seen the sword in the long grass
on the hither side of the pool's edge, but I could not see it now.
Then I must ride forward and search for it, and at that time Howel
was close to me, and together we rode yet a little farther into the
circle that the cliffs made, and as we drew closer to the edge of
the pool I scanned every inch of the ground, seeking the sword
which it seemed impossible that I should not find.
"It has gone," said Howel in a hushed voice.
And at that moment I saw a sparkle among the new grass at the very
edge of the bog that surrounded the pool, and I threw the reins to
the prince and sprang from my horse and went toward it. The light
was very dull here, though it was nigh midday now, and indeed so
high and overhanging were the cliffs that I do not think the sun
ever reached the surface of the pool, save at this high midsummer,
and then but as it passed athwart the narrow entrance, which faced
south.
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