So the hermit was satisfied and went away, and left the lady alone with Sir Pellias.
The Lady of the Lake healeth Sir Pellias.
Now when the lady was thus alone with the wounded knight she immediately set about doing sundry very strange things. For first she brought forth a loadstone of great power and potency and this she set to the wound. And, lo! the iron of the spear-head came forth from the wound; and as it came Sir Pellias groaned with great passion. And when the spear-point came forth there burst out a great issue of blood like to a fountain of crimson. But the lady immediately pressed a fragrant napkin of fine cambric linen to the wound and stanched the blood, and it bled no more, for she held it within the veins by very potent spells of magic. So, the blood being stanched in this wise, the lady brought forth from her bosom a small crystal phial filled with an elixir of blue color and of a very singular fragrance. And she poured some of this elixir between the cold and leaden lips of the knight; and when the elixir touched his lips the life began to enter into his body once more; for, in a little while, he opened his eyes and gazed about him with a very strange look, and the first thing that he beheld was that lady clad in green who stood beside him, and she was so beautiful that he thought that haply he had died and was in Paradise, wherefore he said, “Am I then dead?”
“Nay, thou art not dead,” said the lady, “yet hast thou been parlously nigh to death.” “Where then am I?” said Sir Pellias. And she replied, “Thou art in a deep part of the forest, and this is the cell of a saint-like hermit of the forest.” At this Sir Pellias said, “Who is it that hath brought me back to life?” Upon this the lady smiled and said, “It was I.”
Now for a little while Sir Pellias lay very silent, then by and by he spake and said, “Lady, I feel very strangely.” “Yea,” said the lady, “that is because thou hast now a different life.” Then Sir Pellias said, “How is it with me?” And the lady said, “It is thus: that to bring thee back to life I gave thee to drink of a certain draught of an elixir vitæ so that thou art now only half as thou wert before; for if by the one half thou art mortal, by the other half thou art fay.”
Sir Pellias loveth the Lady of the Lake.
Then Sir Pellias looked up and beheld that the lady had about her neck the collar of emeralds and opal stones and gold which he had aforetime worn. And, lo! his heart went out to her with exceeding ardor, and he said, “Lady, thou sayest that I am half fay, and I do perceive that thou art altogether fay. Now, I pray thee to let it be that henceforth I may abide nigh unto where thou art.” And the lady said, “It shall be as thou dost ask, for it was to that end I have suffered thee nearly to die, and then have brought thee back unto life again.”
Then Sir Pellias said, “When may I go with thee?” And she said, “In a little when thou hast had to drink.” “How may that be?” said Sir Pellias, “seeing that I am but yet like unto a little child for weakness.” To the which the lady made reply, “When thou hast drunk of water thy strength shall return unto thee, and thou shalt be altogether well and whole again.”
So the Lady of the Lake went out, and presently returned, bearing in her hand an earthen crock filled with water from the fountain near at hand. And when Sir Pellias had drunk that water he felt, of a sudden, his strength come altogether back to him.
Yet he was not at all as he had been before, for now his body felt as light as air, and his soul was dilated with a pure joy such as he had never felt in his life before that time. Wherefore he immediately uprose from his couch of pain, and he said, “Thou hast given life unto me again, now do I give that life unto thee forever.”