Queen of the Summer Stars (43 page)

Nimue remained in London an extra day, visiting the shrines of Isis and Cybele in search of ways to counteract the treachery of Arthur’s wounds. I intended to go with her when she returned to Arthur, but there were so many visiting monarchs, it was decided I should stay and make sure the last days of the gathering went smoothly.

With Bedivere and Gawain at my side I was able to reassure the members of the Round Table that Arthur, although wounded, would soon be on his feet again. I presided over the last Council meeting, concluding various treaties and standing in state to receive the farewells of those Saxons who were now free to return to their homes.

Nimue reported that Arthur’s wounds reopened at the slightest provocation, and it was a fortnight before she deemed it safe to move him. By then the summer doldrums had settled over London, with the river going sluggish and foul, and the various leaders began returning to their own realms.

When the King of Cornwall decided to leave, the other guests from the south made plans to join his party. A sizable group gathered that morning, and Cook put out food and ale for anyone who wanted a meal for the Road.

Geraint had brought Accolon’s body back to Court and stayed to help me during the last days of the Round Table. I thanked him now as we shared a bannock before he departed.

“You make serving the High Queen a pleasure, M’lady. Would that you had a sister to share my throne in Devon,” the gallant replied.

“Come now, M’lord, with your charm you have the whole of Britain’s womanhood to choose from.” I laughed.

He sighed. “Most of them seem too busy in front of their mirrors…perhaps they don’t make Queens the way they used to.”

“Then find someone you like and teach her,” I joked, remembering my own tomboy beginnings.

“Not a bad idea.” The King of Devon ran an appreciative eye over my ladies. Ettard was standing near enough to hear our exchange; with a flutter of eyelashes she asked to accompany him to his horse. Grinning, the courtier bade me adieu and swept the girl out the door in fine style.

I was shaking my head in amusement when Isolde made her way through the throng and, pausing shyly, extended her hand.

“Thank you for your hospitality, M’lady,” she murmured. “There’s few places I feel comfortable these days, what with the Cornish people always finding fault and Mark surrounding me with spies.”

I was shocked by the realization that the Cornish King would demean his wife by spying on her and looked at the girl with pity.

“It’s a relief to be treated like a human being, and not just a pretty toy,” she went on. “I know Mark means well, but he’d never allow me to do half the things your husband expects of you.”

“Perhaps you should ask him,” I suggested, but the beauty gave a derisive snort.

“I’ve tried. He just laughs and says I don’t need to trouble my head about such matters…as though the only thing I’m good for is singing Irish songs and gracing M’lord’s bed.”

The anger in her voice surprised me, and I was trying to think how to respond when her portly husband bellied up to us.

“Now don’t you go filling my little love’s head full of heathen notions,” he cautioned me jocularly, insinuating himself between us. “She’s as pure as an angel, and I’d not take kindly to seeing her corrupted.”

The man’s inane twaddle disgusted me; the girl was Pagan to the core and only wore the mantle of Christianity because he imposed it on her. Besides, if he was suspicious enough to resort to spies, it seemed hypocritical to mouth such praises of her purity—unless he only wanted to reassure himself rather than discover the truth.

It appeared that Mark was a blatant example of the old saying that love is blind. I wouldn’t want to be present when his eyes were opened.

***

After the last of our guests were gone I walked slowly through the Imperial Palace, worn out and thankful that the public ordeal was over. In the kitchen Enid greeted me with a row of picnic hampers all packed and ready to go. I grinned tiredly and told her how much I appreciated it.

Tomorrow I would finally get to my husband’s side.

Recuperation

We boarded the barges and headed upriver in the cool of the morning. A flock of swans accompanied us; the white adults glided regally beyond reach, but the young gray cygnets came over to investigate when I splashed my feet in the water.

Bedivere laughed and, standing up, called out, “I hereby proclaim all the swans on the river Thames belong to Her Majesty the Queen, and are to be held safe in her name from this day forth.”

“Fat lot of good that will do during a bad year,” I told him, but he shrugged.

“Who knows…maybe someone will remember.”

I grinned up at him, glad that he would be staying on at Court with us again. Faced with the losses he had known, many another man would have retreated into anger or resentment. But Bedivere had come to terms with his moira and not turned warped and bitter. It made him all the more dear.

We tied up to a stand of willows beside a meadow near Windsor’s cliff, where dragonflies glimmered over the water.

“I’m surprised no one’s built a fort on it, commanding the river as it does,” Bedivere noted.

“Give them time,” Enid commented. “If it can be turned to a military advantage, someone will find a way to do it.” My lady-in-waiting took a dim view of grandiose military postures, an attitude which did not endear her to the more arrogant warriors.

“I have some new riddles,” Lynette piped up. The Saxons are extraordinarily fond of riddling, and during her childhood in London the Grounds Keeper’s daughter had collected quite a store. She brought them with her when she joined the Court, and now we all took turns laughing and testing each other’s wit.

Some we could guess, and some not, but all of a sudden Bedivere asked, “What is rippling red, streaks across the heavens, and moves out of the forest without touching the ground?”

His gaze flicked to something over my shoulder, and with a glad cry of “The Red Dragon of Britain!” I turned around.

A small procession of warriors and healers were making their way through the trees to the water’s edge, carrying Arthur propped and cushioned on a stretcher. I scrambled onto the bank and ran through the green-dappled sunlight toward him, shocked by his wasted condition, delirious with joy because he was alive. Nimue had called on every bit of medical art and magic at her command, and the treacherous wounds were healing slowly. He would continue to sleep much of the time, but she was confident he would make a full recovery.

When I reached his side my husband opened his eyes and recognized me, but before I could speak he stayed me with a lifted hand.

“The Pendragon extends greetings to the competent and admirable High Queen of Britain,” he said. “They tell me you have done a fine job in my absence. Behooves me to get well before you decide you can do it all by yourself.”

“This Celtic Queen has no desire to rule alone.” I grinned in reply and helped to get him settled comfortably on the barge. As we cast off, Taliesin played one of his melodic songs, adding to the festive air of our voyage.

It occurred to me how odd time is, stretching and twisting in a most peculiar way. It was barely three weeks since Lance had left, yet with all that had happened, I’d had no time to think about it—and now the scene in the Park might have taken place in another lifetime entirely. On the other hand, Arthur and I had been married for seven years, and the whole of that time was as close to my fingertips as the ripples of the trout rising on the river ahead of us.

Watching my husband nap under the canopy, I tried to remember when I first knew I loved him. Certainly not when he was announced as my intended groom. Perhaps it was the night at the Wrekin, when I saw our moirai were entwined for life—or during the wild ride away from Morgan, with the horse pounding under us and the wedding lying ahead.

Or the time he’d come back from war, wounded and weak and barely hanging on to life. Seeing him so vulnerable, even as he was now, always made my heart leap up. Nimue had said once that she loved Merlin not for his magic and power, but for the humanness of the man.

I knew exactly what she meant as I looked at Arthur.

It’s fine to see you proud and regal, sending shivers through the crowd and gathering the warriors to your side—or thoughtful in the quiet times, testing, searching, always trying to evaluate what will bring your Britain into its own. No one could help but love you then, my dear…but oh, my love, how much more we could share, if you would just…

I reached over and brushed the hair from his forehead, not even knowing what I wished he would do, yet still hungering for something I couldn’t put into words.

I’ll never cease to love you, I thought, though I may starve to death in the process.

***

Arthur’s recovery was difficult at best, and for the next few weeks he drifted in and out of melancholy, sometimes turning snappish and sharp, sometimes just staring off into space. How much was the effect of his wounds and how much due to anguish over his sister’s betrayal, I couldn’t tell. One never knew when his sunny countenance would go hard as flint, and if I tried to talk with him at such times, I’d only be rebuffed. Finally I decided to wait until he himself brought up the things that were gnawing at him.

Bedivere and I had chosen Oxford because it was easy to get to by water but remote enough to provide some sanctuary. It proved to be a lovely spot, surrounded by meadows and farms as well as a rich, wild wood. Along this part of the Thames the people were as patchwork as the land, with British aristocrats longtime neighbors of Saxon Federates. They not only seemed to live in peace, they were delighted to have the High King in their midst, even if he wasn’t on his feet and among them yet.

Frieda went often to visit her family, who had remained loyal to us, fighting at Cador’s side to stop the Saxon drive to the midlands. And once her kin returned with her, coming to pay their respects to the High King. I watched them curiously, noting that her mother was an older, plumper version of the girl I’d come to regard as part of my family.

“We appreciate all you have done for our daughter,” her father told Arthur. “Sons are companions in war and work, but daughters are special gifts from the Gods.”

He smiled broadly at the girl, though he never even looked at Griflet standing beside her, and when he called down the blessing of his Thunder God, the gesture clearly did not include the Master of the Kennels. Perhaps the Saxon Gods were as intolerant of Christians as the Roman bishops were of them.

It occurred to me that with so many disparate beliefs, the Cause could founder if religious warfare ever broke out in Britain!

***

One afternoon as I was coming back from gathering the last of the wild strawberries at Wytham, I found a venerable old man resting under an ancient oak by the ford where they drive the oxen across. My ladies and I greeted him cordially and asked if we could share the shade. The old fellow nodded and, after looking our party over carefully, began extolling Arthur’s fame and glory. I noted with relief that he left out all mention of Maelgwn, concentrating on the battles and adventures of the warriors instead.

“I’m writing ’em down,” he explained, stroking the white beard that splayed out across his chest. “Learned to write back when I was going to become a monk—not much use for it since. I couldn’t live holy enough to please the bishop, and the sinners I get on best with never learned to read. But the Pendragon ought to have some archives, so I thought I’d draw ’em up.”

I told Arthur about it that evening, thinking he’d be pleased, but he grumbled darkly instead.

“And what will history say of King Arthur…that he came of a family riddled with death and treachery? Born by the grace of an old man’s dying in a righteous cause, risen to the throne over the body of one sister’s husband and marked for extinction by the arts of the other…What will they say of Arthur in the end? That kith killing kin runs unavoidably through his days?”

He turned away from me, deep lines of despair scriven on his face. I ached to see him so tormented and sat down beside him on the bed in silent commiseration.

“My own sister, Gwen.” It was the first time he had mentioned Morgan, and I held my breath. “My own sister, the very one who gave me the Sword of State. Was she plotting even then to see me dead? Has there been nothing real behind her friendship and support? I trusted her second only to Merlin…”

The words were hard and harsh, forced out between his teeth with the same constrained anger as when he spoke of Morgause.

He paused, and I kept very quiet, not needing to bring forth my own record of pain and loss at Morgan’s hand. At last I ventured a small comment.

“Surely it is not so much that she hates us personally as it is the old Celtic tragedy—the blood feud. Most probably she’s never forgiven Gorlois’s death.”

“Ye Gods, am I to be held accountable for my parents’ acts?” Arthur cried. “It’s the Christians, not Pagans, who saddle the sons with the sins of the fathers, isn’t it? And if it were so, what hope would there be for me or my children?”

He was staring at the wall, not me, but the realization that in spite of his protestations Arthur too had contemplated raising children sent a wave of sympathy through me, and I put my hand on his shoulder.