XLIt was many months before Artos came back from death. He lay in his palace at Caer Leon, surrounded by his friends and doctors. They told him that the winter had passed and that spring was almost come again. He smiled calmly and whispered, “I have been for a long journey alone. I have seen strange things that no man has told me of before.”
Bedwyr and Cei were there, their wounds long since healed. They wept to hear their master speak so weakly, like a woman after her labour.
“What have you seen, Master?” asked Bedwyr, trying to humour the Bear.
Artos lay still for many minutes, as though he had not heard the question; but at last he answered and said, “It is not as terrible in hell as we were told, Bedwyr. A man can survive it if he has but sufficient courage. That is all a man needs,
