The Crystal Cave Book Four, Chapter 6 Summary

  • Ambrosius and his army head out to York next to find Octa and Eosa. He needs to get rid of these bad dudes.
  • Ambrosius doesn't have a hard time convincing these guys that fighting is useless. They're already scared of Ambrosius from his last victories, so they pretty much give up right away.
  • Surprisingly, Ambrosius does not chop off their heads. He sends Octa and Eosa to the nearly uninhabitable lands north of Hadrian's Wall (think Cumbria or Northumberland).
  • York is the first major town taken by Ambrosius, so he wants to do it up right. He gets his Breton troops to work organizing and fixing up the city.
  • Then comes the ritual bit, an "investiture" ceremony in which everyone gets to see Ambrosius made king.
  • Ambrosius has a public ceremony in a church because the Britons are officially Christian (though he isn't). He doesn't want to ruffle any feathers at this time.
  • But Ambrosius' men have also found a decaying temple of Mithras underground, and Uther has done his best to spiff it up for a private ceremony, just for a select group of Ambrosius' men.
  • Merlin describes this secret meeting full of masked men to celebrate the feast of Mithras and Ambrosius' victory.
  • Merlin's wearing a raven mask that's really hard to see out of. He really has no idea who the men are in the other masks, which include a Lion and a Courier of the Sun. Great party, right?
  • Merlin's pretty sure that his dad is playing the part of the Courier, and that Uther might be the Lion dude. But he turns out to be wrong on both counts.
  • Uther has been upgraded to Courier status. There's one more role that Ambrosius might be playing in this dramatic ceremony—the Father. How appropriate.
  • But Ambrosius isn't the Father, either. Instead, the person in the Father mask is a stranger. Ambrosius seems not to be at his own pagan ceremony. Hmm.
  • It turns out that Ambrosius has a pretty chill view of religion. He sees Mithras and Christ as pretty much the same figure and has decided that in Britain, they'll worship Christ.
  • Ambrosius then makes his way to London with little fighting. He finds that the country has been destroyed by the Saxons, so he sets his crews to work fixing things.
  • Merlin stays with Ambrosius for two years and helps him design and build new cities. But this work gets on his nerves after a while, mostly because he has no time for "the god."
  • Ambrosius changes a lot in this time, because hey, kingship is some heavy stuff. He's not thrilled that his son will leave, but he gets pretty excited when he learns that it has something to do with the god.
  • Basically, Ambrosius is expecting some cool new revelations. So he says goodbye and tells Merlin to come back to him one day.