The Chessboard Queen (19 page)

“It’s very general. There are rumors that Lancelot has become good friends with King Arthur, but there is no mention of him on the King’s recent journey. Torres, however, was there. There is some tale that he was seen at the home of the Queen’s family, but I doubt this. Also, one report said that he had been overheard asking for the wife of King Ban of Benoit. He seems to believe that she is his mother.”

“His mother!” The Lady sat bolt upright upon her couch. “She died. She must have. She was almost dead when I found him.”

She sat for a while, chewing on her knuckle. Her attendants stood warily, wondering what she would demand of them next.

Finally she noticed them. Her eyes raked the room, looking for a likely “volunteer.”

“Do you know where Lancelot is now?” she asked Adon.

He jumped. “Not exactly. I know where he is going—to Caerleon for the winter court.”

“Still obsessed, I suppose, with his messianic nonsense?”

Adon shrugged.

“He needs to be distracted,” the Lady announced. “It won’t make any difference to the rules if one of you seduces him. He still has to discover his own kind. But one of you might at least comfort him, offer him some solace in his misery. Yes, I know you couldn’t interest him while he was here, men or women. But now, after a few weeks out there, he may be more susceptible. But to whom? . . . Nimuë!”

“Yes, my Lady?” Nimuë came forward. She had been busy flirting with Riogh, to whom she had promised the night. She hoped she hadn’t missed anything essential.

“I want you to find Lancelot and bring him our love. Show him how he is missed. As soon as possible. Do you understand?”

“Find him? But how?”

“Ask Adon. I want you to leave at once. Take a horse and some trappings. You need not be uncomfortable just because everyone else out there is. But be sure he receives as much affection as you can give.”

Nimuë was crushed. What an assignment! “Yes, my Lady,” she mumbled.

“Good.” The Lady left the chamber, followed by most of her retinue. Riogh gave Nimuë a sorrowful wave as he went. She turned to Adon.

“What am I to do?” she moaned. “You know I love Lancelot dearly, but
making
love to him? How can she ask it? It would be easier to have sex with a dead fish.”

Adon patted her shoulder. What could he say? Nimuë was right. But the Lady had made her orders clear.

“Perhaps he has changed since he’s been living with humans. Maybe he is lonely and would appreciate your comfort.”

“Of course, and diamonds grow on daffodils.”

He abandoned solace. “Nimuë, you have no choice. You have been ordered. Who knows? You may be surprised.”

She sighed. “Lilith showed me a different make-up. I’ll try that on him. Perhaps Ori will lend me that diaphanous dress of hers with all the glitter.”

“There. You see? I could not resist you in that. Lancelot won’t be able to, either.”

• • •

Two nights later, Lancelot had made camp a day’s ride away from Caerleon. The weather had broken and the night was mild for a change. He sat by the fire and listened to the sounds of the forest. He felt oddly peaceful. He had tried. He had failed. Soon there would be another job to do, but for now he would rest body and spirit.

A sound like the tinkle of a thousand tiny bells mingled with the rustle of night creatures and the sleepy calls of the birds. Lancelot stood. It was coming nearer. He listened, apprehension growing. A soft blue light was glowing through the trees. He had seen that shimmer in only one other place.

“Who is it?” he called out, half-pleased and half-angry.

“Only me,” a timid voice replied. “Nimuë. The Lady sent me to you, to see if you were all right.”

“Nimuë!” Lancelot relaxed. “You shouldn’t be traveling alone!”

She was near him, both she and the horse enveloped in the gentle light. She smiled at him. “Who would dare hurt me?” she asked.

He helped her down and waited while she untied the knots that bound her bed and pavilion. She closed her eyes and chanted a few words. When she opened them, the pavilion stood nearby, the covers on the bed turned down.

“Oh dear,” she said. “I wanted the bed to face the moonrise. Well, never mind. I’m much too tired to change it.”

“Nimuë,” Lancelot expostulated, “there was no need for you to come looking for me. I want to take care of myself. I don’t need anyone to watch over me. I’m not a child!”

“But, Lancelot,” she pouted and swirled closer to him. “We all miss you so. We worry about you. Are you eating properly, dressing warmly? Are you sleeping well?”

She was almost touching him now and he noticed for the first time that he could see through her gown and that she was naked underneath. He felt a tinge of suspicion.

“Nimuë,” he said fiercely, “why are you here?”

She smiled and put her arms around him. “To ease your sojourn in this ugly land, Lancelot. Come, lie with me tonight, just for a respite.”

Horrified, Lancelot pushed her away. “How can you? I have never done any wrong or evil to any woman or girl and I shall not begin with you!”

“Done wrong?” Nimuë was fascinated. “You can do me wrong only by refusing my request. It is lonely here, so far from our home, and you are a dear reminder of it. Here is our bed; share it with me as you did when you were a child.”

“I have told you, I am a child no longer!” he huffed. “And I know you would not be content to tell me a story and rock me to sleep as you did then.”

“Of course I would; I can tell you some wonderful stories.” She took his hand and tried to guide it under her gown.

He yanked it back as if burnt. “It is a sinful thing you ask of me. Would you have me contribute to the damnation of your soul?”

“Lancelot, you keep forgetting! I am immortal. I have no soul. There is no heaven or hell for me; there is only the Lake. When it vanishes, so shall I. Until then I may do whatever I wish. Tonight I wish to make you happy.”

“Then leave at once!” He folded his arms and turned his back on her.

“Lancelot, how can you be so cruel?” She put her arms around him and tried to draw him to the bed. Harshly, he pulled away from her. She hurried around to face him again and held her hand to his chin to force him to look as she opened her gown.

“My dear,” she crooned, “no man of any make has yet refused this. There is no sin. I am not human. Enjoy yourself for one night of your life.”

He looked at her body, taut and ready, and his gorge rose. He threw her from him so hard that she landed on the earth.

“How can you reject me?” she sobbed. “Is there nothing in your code about kindness to women?”

“No, Nimuë, only to ladies,” he stated.

“I see.” She got up and dusted herself off. “Well, if you will have nothing to do with me despite my honest offers, then I will go. Will you at least give me a kiss good-bye?”

“All right, for our friendship.” He bent down to her and she raised her lips to his. As they touched, she grabbed him again and held him until she cried out sharply and fell back.

“You bit me!” she screamed, holding her lip. “You monster! How dare you?”

Lancelot was equally angry. “You stuck your tongue in my mouth! You are disgusting! I don’t believe the Lady knows you’re here! Get out of my sight!”

“That is all! No one but the Lady could have forced me to attempt to give you a little pleasure.” She glared at him as she snapped the bed and pavilion back on the horse. “I hope, Lancelot du Lac, that someday you get a mistress as cold and cruel as yourself! It’s a pity you are not like Torres. He knows how to respect a woman’s wishes!”

A moment later she was gone. Lancelot sank down to the earth, his sense of peace shattered. He felt sick. How could anyone want a woman like that, one who simply appeared and offered herself? He had known Nimuë all his life, but he could not remember ever seeing her body before. It was revolting. Then a thought hit him. Guinevere was a woman. She must look something like that, too, under her garments. He tried to recall Nimuë, to see her with Guinevere’s face. His breath came more quickly. Somehow he knew that Guinevere’s body would not disgust him.

He tried to blot out the image, but it lured him on. He beat his hands upon the earth, crying. Finally, he sat there rocking, his face buried in his arms.

• • •

Furious and afraid, Nimuë trotted down the road. What would the Lady say when she reported her failure? Did she have to go back at once? A few days, she could be absent that long. Maybe by then something would happen to distract the Lady from Lancelot.

Dawn was stretching her fingers across the sky when she rounded a bend and came upon a man sitting beneath a tree. He seemed quite at home there and did not bother to look up as she jingled nearer. He was doing something. She got off the horse and came closer. He had several thin rods of glass in his hands and, one by one, he was holding them up to catch the morning light. As he did, rainbows were cast upon the leaves and rocks. Nimuë was entranced.

“How do you do that?” she said, forgetting everything but the beauty of it.

The man looked up, startled. He was not used to meeting exotic women in transparent gowns on the road at dawn.

“Hello,” he greeted her. “I didn’t catch that. What did you say?”

She pointed. “Those rainbows. How do you make them without water?”

“Ah, yes,” he considered. “There is something in the property of the glass. I haven’t figured it out exactly, but somehow the curve of the glass causes the rainbow to appear. I am beginning to learn how to shape it properly, but I am still not sure why it works.”

She smiled at him. “May I stay with you and watch?”

“Of course. Is there no one with you?”

“No. Just the horse.”

He nodded politely at the horse, since that seemed indicated. Then he returned to the woman.

“I do not know your name,” he said. “But it seems to me that I have seen someone very like you, long ago, in a place of light and flowers.”

She clapped her hands. “I remember you now! Merlin! The man who could answer all the Lady’s questions. You stayed with her awhile. But then you left. No man before had ever asked to leave her. She was amazed.”

“Was she angry?”

“No, just surprised. She has other amusements.”

“That is reassuring. I had hoped she wasn’t vengeful.”

“Oh, no. She has watched you with interest now and then. You are with that Arthur-man now aren’t you? The one she sent Lancelot to.”

“Yes, I am. Was that why she sent Lancelot to him, because of me?”

“You led her to him. That was all.”

“I should have expected that it would be my fault. I have always held a double-edged sword.”

He seemed so discouraged that Nimuë ventured to place a hand on his arm. “Lancelot is rather unusual, even under the Lake, but for some reason we are still very fond of him. Is he causing you trouble, too?”

He shook his head. “Not now, but I sense it coming. There is a dark scent when he and the Queen are in the same room. I can’t explain it, but some calamity is associated with them. Whether they will cause it or be destroyed by it, I don’t know. But you said, ‘too.’ Do you have a complaint against him?”

“Yes.” Nimuë still felt grievously wronged. “I came out here, left the Lake and all its pleasures to bring Lancelot a bit of sympathy and cosseting, and do you know what he did?”

“No,” he answered, amused.

“He bit me.”

“What!”

“Right on the lip. See!” She puckered for him to notice. “Tell me truly. If I had come to you and offered you this”—she opened her gown—“would you throw me on the ground and yell at me?”

He studied her body seriously and finally smiled. “Not at all,” he said flatly. “I would have been honored.”

She let the robe fall back into place and gazed at him with a half-puzzled, half-delighted expression. “The Lady said there was something different about you. I don’t have any swords to offer, but I can give you a goose-feather bed with silken sheets on a silver pavilion. And,” she added as an afterthought, “myself.”

Merlin smiled again. How long had it been since he had known anything from others but fear or respect? He thought he remembered her better now. Thirty years ago it had been and she was still young and beautiful. Nimuë her name was. He wondered how many millennia she had existed and then dismissed it as irrelevant. She was soft and warm and lovely and inviting him to share her bed. And, he remembered, she had just been callously rejected. What else could he do but agree?

“Really?” she asked and her eyes shone. “Oh, thank you! And later can you show me some more rainbows?”

She set up the pavilion a few yards into the woods, away from the road, and she led him in. Hours later they didn’t hear Lancelot pass by at a gallop, hell-bent for Caerleon.

Chapter Ten

Until he left Tintagel, Gareth had never walked more than a mile or so in his life. He was prepared for tired and aching feet, but how could he have known that every muscle in his legs and hips would also hurt terribly? On the morning of his second day away from home he found that he could barely hobble. So much for his plan of reaching Caerleon in a two- or three-day walk.

A farmer on his way to the fields found him collapsed by the side of the road and took him home with him. Neither he nor his wife believed a word of Gareth’s story that he was a poor itinerant laborer hunting for work. But because they liked his looks, they fed him and taught him a few simple tasks to earn his keep: cutting rushes to spread on the dirt floor, weeding the kitchen garden, scrubbing the pots. He paid them for their kindness by trading his fur and leather boots for clogs of wood and lamb’s wool made by the farmer. He did not realize until later that he had gotten the better deal.

He spent the summer traveling and doing menial work for his dinner and bed. After the quiet, cool gloom of Tintagel, Gareth found the rough and jovial contacts he made with the farmers and artisans he met along the way stimulating. Those that peddled their skill in metal or leather also carried news, moderately fresh, to all those who gave them shelter. Much of it was about King Arthur. In this way Gareth soon discovered that there was no need for him to hurry; it would be weeks before Arthur returned to Caerleon. As that time passed, Gareth became less an insecure princeling from Cornwall and more a solid, hard-working citizen of Britain.