THE WARRIOR QUEEN (The Guinevere Trilogy Book 1) (15 page)

“Of course, of course. It was just the drink.” There were not words enough, or the right words, for what I really wanted to say. To say, I wanted it and I didn’t want it. I needed it, it held us close together. There were only words to say that all was well. He leaned up to kiss me lightly and then sighed with content. His thoughts were simply soothed, and I was glad of it tonight.

“I know things have been different with us, since the war. I have been busy. But the knights coming here from all around will make Camelot, and Logrys, and Britain great. It is something as King I have to do. I have to show them my strength, and the grandness of my court. I know it has been hard. And I have missed you.”

I made a noise of agreement, and he kissed my hair.

“It was Morgan, you know, with the drink,” he added, after a short quiet. I was shocked.
He knew
. He did not seem too worried about it. “And I know it was meant for Lancelot.”
What?
“Oh, she’s harmless really. She’s just been in love with him since we were children. He was an orphan child, raised on Avalon not far from where she was raised. He used to stay with us, sometimes, when we were all boys together, he Kay and I, and so would Morgan; of course, I didn’t know then that she came because she was my sister. Well, she always liked him. Used to follow him around. She and he would have been about fifteen, I suppose, a little older than I was. Well, it turned out that she wasn’t a maiden when she married Uriens, and he came to me blustering and complaining about it and I offered him the choice of living with it, or rejecting the King’s sister, and he decided that it wasn’t so important after all. Anyway, a lot of people said that was Lancelot, though there are others who say it was Kay. Some even say it was Merlin, because he was around often enough. I don’t know. But anyway, the other day she came to me, dragging Lancelot with her, demanding that I marry them. I suppose she had been waiting to get free of old Uriens for a long time. I offered him the choice, and he said he thought marriage was well enough for kings, but not for him. He didn’t want to leave fighting and adventures to care for a wife. He said he was not the sort of man to take a wife. Well, I doubt if it was either him or Kay, anyway.” He shifted under me, gently pulling me closer. He seemed suddenly hesitant. “Kay and he, well, when we were that age they used to sleep in the same bed.” That didn’t seem that odd to me. Breton boys or girls often shared with relatives if there was not enough room. “Kay seems to have grown out of it, but Lancelot... I don’t know.” I realised what he meant. “He never took any of the women who came with the camp to Rome to his bed. He’s quiet. I’m not surprised he didn’t want Morgan, but he doesn’t want
any
woman. But he might truly just want a life of fighting. With him, I can’t tell.” He sighed and kissed my forehead. I could feel he was settling down to sleep. I supposed I ought not to be surprised; many young men were so with one another. I just did not – could not – believe that things were still so with Lancelot. “I’m glad you had him read to you. I was afraid that the two of you did not like one another. I never saw you speak together before. It’s good. A queen should show some favour to her champion.”

He was already drifting off to sleep. I rolled on to my back, feeling my eyes wide open, pressing against the black. The information rushed around me, but it seemed also to sluice off me, and all I could feel was a sudden acute awareness that the way I loved Arthur was not enough. I suddenly felt very naked, and small and alone. His love was strong and insistent, but it did not fill me to the heart. There was an emptiness in the pit of my stomach that was filled over and over again in the darkness by Lancelot’s name. Lancelot didn’t want to take a wife. He had not lain with any of the camp women. Arthur, implicitly, had. When I imagined his voice again, it was as though his lips were by my ear, forbidden and velvety. Why had Arthur had to say his name? Saying his name was like calling him into being, between us in the bed. What if Lancelot had refused Morgan not out of love for Kay, but out of love for me? What if his love could make me whole? Arthur was a good man. He was good, and kind, and he loved me the best way he could. There must be something rotten and hollow with me that the love of a good man could not make me whole. I had been happy. I was sure I had been happy.
I want to feel whole
. What had changed? What had become of me for my happiness to evaporate around me like a fog, and leave me with this terrifying sense of my emptiness?

In the darkness, Arthur sleeping beside me, all I could think of was Lancelot.

Chapter Eighteen

When I woke in the morning, all the thoughts of the night before seemed distant, and out of proportion, as though I had dreamed them. Alone in the dark I had allowed myself to half dream, half think something that was not true. Arthur was still sleeping beside me as I woke, and I slipped out of bed to dress. I wanted a hot bath, but if I called for one then I would wake him, and I wanted to run out into the beautiful frosty morning I could see out of my window. As I dressed quietly in a simple wool dress and fur-lined cloak, I thought again of everything Arthur had told me last night. Morgan’s desire for Lancelot; I was not surprised, although I did not see why sending him to sleep would help her in that. Lancelot and Kay; though I thought Arthur was seeing something that wasn’t there in order to try to understand a man who was not controlled by his desire for women. And yet all that I could grasp in my mind were his words
I was afraid the two of you did not like each other. A queen should show some favour to her champion
.

He had saved my life, and I intended to do my queenly duty and show favour. Everything else was the half-sleeping mirage of my dreams. He had not
said
anything to me either way. I could not know if it was Kay or Morgan or I that he thought of when he was alone. There was nothing, only the vaporous late-night thoughts. And yet when I turned to go and looked at Arthur, and felt the warmth within me of the love we had shared for years now, I had the sense again that something had changed within me and I was aware it was not enough. I put the thought out of my mind as I slipped from the room and down the stairs.

I was up early enough to smell the baking bread in the courtyard, and the smell of it made me hungry. I was not sure what I had come down for, apart from to feel the cool air against my face, and look at the white winter sun in the morning. Gareth was out there, sharpening his sword. He smiled when he saw me, and I walked over to him.

“That’s a fine sword,” I told him, lifting it out of his hands. It was heavy for me, and it took me two hands to hold it up when it would have taken Gareth only one. Still, I could feel its steady balance, I could feel that for a man’s sword it was light and quick. So Gareth was old enough to own a sword, to be expected to kill. I looked at him, thoughtful. He was beginning to look like a man. The winter and the company of men had brought that on him. His kind, open face had a shadow of stubble across the skin, and across his shoulders, from the training in the yard, the muscles of a man were growing. I touched his cheek lightly with my hand, unable to restrain the motherly impulse, and said, “You’re half a man these days, Gareth. I will have to find a knight for you to squire.”

“More than half, I hope,” he answered, grinning.

I took a step away and swung the sword a little, testing the feel of it in my hand. It had been a long time since I had held a sword. The one made for me that I had tried to smuggle in from Carhais had been lost or stolen on the journey and I missed it. I had not thought it would be impossible to get a woman’s sword in Logrys; nor had I thought I would have a need for it. The thought had been half in my mind as I crossed the sea that the only sword I would bear was one against myself. Perhaps if I had had a sword on the battlefield rather than a spear – I pushed the thought away. No sense in re-thinking the moment again and again. The young man’s light sword was the closest thing, but I still had trouble lifting it and wielding it as I was used to. Still, it felt good to hold a sword again.

Then, from behind me, a mailed fist grabbed the sword as I lifted it and wrenched it out of my hands. I wheeled around. It was Gawain.

“A sword is not a toy, my lady,” he said gruffly. Gareth had jumped to his feet, unsure whose side he was meant to take. I was sure he could see from my face, and Gawain’s, that there
would
be a fight.

“I was not playing,
sir
.”

I reached for the sword and he stepped back. I felt my face flush with anger and stepped forward for it again. He was holding a sword and dressed all in chainmail, and yet in my anger I did not see that, and as he stepped away, I stepped forward with a hand raised, ready to strike him. Gareth stepped between us.

“It’s
my
sword.” Gareth reached out his hand for it, and Gawain, not looking away from me with his sullen eyes, handed it back to him.

“Don’t give your sword to a woman again,” Gawain told him, still not looking from me. I held myself drawn up with trembling rage, but I let him go. I wished I was taller, stronger, bigger. I wished I had my sword. I was angry enough I would have struck him with my bare hand, though it would only have torn against the chainmail. I wanted Gawain to be sorry for all of the things he had said to me. I wanted to force him to respect me, to see that though I was not a man I was brave and strong enough to fight, but I could not. Again, again I felt my powerlessness.

“Is everything well, here?” Lancelot, who to my surprise I had not noticed across the yard, had come over. But he did not speak to me, he spoke to Gareth. He did not meet my look, and he stood warily at a distance from me.
This is because Arthur found us reading together
,
I thought. He’s wary. He feels guilty. I was surprised, and at the back of my mind, the thought came that he would not feel this if he had not felt, as I had, a secret, illicit thrill at being alone together. But it only stoked my frustration harder, that after that brief moment together the day before, he was ignoring me again. Or perhaps he really did not like me, or he was afraid of Morgan, or he
wanted
Morgan and he didn’t want Arthur to have told her and made her jealous. Arthur had only said that he did not want to
marry
Morgan.

Gareth nodded, and Lancelot moved away, back across the yard, and Gawain followed him. I could hear them beginning to fight, not with the wooden practice-swords that the young men like Gareth used, but blunted iron swords that drew sparks from one another and rang out through the courtyard as they met. Gareth looked at me apologetically and went back to sharpening his sword. I sat down beside him, looking out at the fighting.

“Where I grew up,” I told him, thoughtfully, as I watched Lancelot and Gawain fight, “women fought and hunted alongside men. I’m still getting used to Logrys.”

“You would get hurt,” Gareth replied, his tone half-defensive of his brother’s actions.

I looked at Lancelot and Gawain. Gareth
was
right; the Breton men fought as the women did, lightly armoured, with bows and light little shortswords, and our warfare had been different, little skirmishes fought in forests, small-scale ambush attacks. Compared to the men I had seen growing up, Arthur’s knights were giants all, rippling with muscle from bearing heavy platemail on their backs and the huge two-handed broadswords they fought with in their hands. The lances, too, they took into battle, I could never have lifted. These huge men with their armoured horses and faceless steel helms were
made
for war. No wonder Arthur had defeated my father’s forces so easily. In any woodland we Bretons would have won, but in open war I did not see how anyone could have stood against Arthur’s knights.

The two men were laying into each other hard, I thought. Perhaps it was because they were alone in the yard, but I felt as though I had not seen any two others fighting like that before. Gawain was giving ground fast. He was taller, broader, but he was also heavier on his feet, slower to block Lancelot’s blows, and he was being edged back into a corner. I glanced at Gareth. He had stopped sharpening his sword, and was watching.

“Look at the way he moves,” Gareth sighed in admiration. He must have meant Lancelot, because Gawain was shuffling backwards awkwardly. “He’s like a cat. Like a lion. I haven’t seen a lion, but Gawain saw one in Rome, and I expect a lion is just like Lancelot.”

He was right. Lancelot moved like a predator, soft, swift and fluid. Gawain yielded as, backed into a corner, Lancelot knocked the sword from his hands. He raised them over his head in a gesture of surrender. The thought flickered through me that Lancelot might have done that for me. But Gawain did not seem chastened. He laughed, and clapped Lancelot on the back.

Gareth jumped up, snatching up his practice sword and ran over, eager to try his strength against Lancelot. Lancelot smiled indulgently at the boy, and let him fight long enough to feel his opponent’s strength, letting him take ground, until more knights began to come out into the yard, and he made an excuse to leave. I watched him go, feeling it burn inside me. He did not glance towards me once.

Chapter Nineteen

That night Arthur called his council. I sat at his side at the Round Table. At first, when I had come to the councils, I had heard men whispering. Obviously, in Lothian women had not played a part in politics while their husbands lived, because it had come mainly from Gawain and his brothers, but they had got used to my presence, and they were not surprised when Nimue replaced Merlin at Arthur’s left side. They regarded her woaded face with suspicion, but they listened to her soft little voice with rapt attention the few times she did speak, because her voice was the voice of Avalon, and though they all suspected its power, they also feared it. I noticed that Lancelot sat as far as he could manage from me, across at the other side of table. The frustration burning within me made me determined to get him to speak to me. It wasn’t fair for him to be kind and then distant. I hadn’t asked him for anything inappropriate and
he
was the one who had kissed
me
.

The knights came in a variety of dress. Among them Gawain and his brothers Aggravain and Gaheris came dressed in armour, apart from their helms, and with their swords at their side; Ector and Bors came in light leather armour and with their swords, but Lancelot and Kay came only in their shirt and breeches. Lancelot had come with his hair wet, as though he had just stepped from the bath. I tried not to picture it. I was getting used to the other faces around the table, too. A quiet, serious man with short sandy-brown hair, cut close to his head, was called Percival, and I thought I remembered him from the party who had collected me at Dover, and another with fair hair, swept back from his face and a vain look about him was called Lamerocke. He had come in a velvet doublet. There was also a dark little man who moved with funny little quick darting motions who was called Dinadan. These had been with Arthur when he sacked Rome; these had been those who had led parts of his army, who had given their riches and lands and the lives of their people to him. The strongest men in Europe. And yet, all looked nervously on Nimue, who rarely spoke aloud to the group once it was gathered, but if she had something to say, would whisper it in Arthur’s ear. I wondered occasionally if Arthur had ever taken her to bed. I could not imagine it. Sometimes, too, Morgan would stand at the back of the room in the shadows, watching. She was not there today, and I was glad. Arthur himself was dressed in light armour, embossed on the front with a brass dragon across the chest and he had Excalibur by his side. He slept always with that sword at his side. I supposed he was afraid of losing it again, or perhaps he was still afraid for his life.

“I called you all here today because I have had news from Cornwall.” He had learned in his time as ruler, the voice of a king. It was steady and strong, and everyone fell quiet to hear it. “My lady mother Igraine has died, may the Lord rest her soul. She has been buried by her people and rests in Tintagel. Tintagel itself has been taken over by one of my vassal-kings Mark. Mark has written begging for a champion to defend him from a
giant
, he says.” A few men around the table laughed. I was sure, to them, the man would look like a normal man, but if Kay had come to Carhais looking for war, there were brothers of mine who would have written to other lords to complain of being besieged by a giant. “But I think we could spare someone. I have to be seen to defend my vassal kings; even
Mark
.” The men laughed. Clearly, they knew something about Mark that I didn’t. “But whoever I send must be able to behave himself.” I did not think I imagined the look that Arthur cast on Gawain. “Mark has married Isolde of Ireland, and he is a very jealous man, they say.”

“I hear the girl is simple,” Kay interjected, with a wicked smile.

I expected Arthur to admonish him, but he just inclined his head in unwilling agreement.

“I heard that she has taken Mark’s nephew as her lover,” Aggravain suggested. That man always had one piece of gossip or another.

“I heard it was a Saracen man,” Dinadan said. “A heathen.”

Arthur raised a hand for quiet and it fell.

“Nonetheless, we are not here to debate Mark’s wife’s intelligence or fidelity to her marriage-bed, we are here to decide who we will send to Cornwall.”

“Send Lancelot,” Kay suggested, flashing a look at him I could not read across the table. “Isolde won’t be in any danger from
him
.”

Arthur shifted uncomfortably in his seat. Clearly, he had his own ideas about exactly what Kay meant. Was Kay saying it because they were lovers? Or had Lancelot said something to Kay about me? Or about Morgan? The awful thought shimmered past that Kay might want Lancelot out of his way. I glanced at Lancelot; he was sitting back in his chair, fixing Kay with an even look, one knee drawn up to his chest and his arm resting forward on it. He was not giving anything away.

“What about you, Kay? Could you not go?” I asked.

“I’m Seneschal. I have to stay at court.” He gave me a knowing little smile. I was not sure what I was supposed to know.

“Lancelot is Queen’s Champion,” Lamerocke argued, running a hand over his smooth wave of hair, as though he was subconsciously smoothing it into place. “He should stay, too.”

“He can go if she lets him go,” Kay said pointedly. “He would finish it fastest. If we send someone who fails, or makes a mess of it, then Mark might see it as a sign of weakness, as an opportunity to rise against Arthur.”

The voices rose arguing around me, but Lancelot did not look towards me at all. They had gone past arguing about who should go, and the argument had passed to Mark. Gawain was now saying they should send a small garrison of men, set up an outpost in Cornwall to make sure that Mark didn’t try anything, and Kay was still arguing for sending a single knight. Dinadan was tapping his fingernails against the table, trying to interject but failing. Lamerocke was blustering on, offended because he thought Kay had suggested that
he
might make a mess of it if he was sent instead of Lancelot. By all accounts I had heard of him, he wouldn’t, but I thought Kay
had
said it to antagonise him. Percival leaned over and whispered something in Lancelot’s ear, and Lancelot nodded. I felt as though I was fading away, fading in the face of Lancelot’s refusal to look at me, and the shouting rising around me.

Before I knew what I was doing I was on my feet. The room fell silent around me. I felt Nimue’s cold blue eyes on me, considering, seeing everything. I felt myself blush lightly as they all turned to me. They were waiting for me to speak.

“If we send more than one knight, Mark might see that as an act of aggression, and ride against us anyway. We send one knight to him, to kill this giant. And we invite Isolde to court.”

Arthur nodded, putting his hand tenderly on mine. It was warm and rough with fighting, comforting, familiar. His touch made me feel a little better, a little more centred. I sat slowly back in my chair, feeling embarrassed.

“That seems the best solution. Mark will not cause trouble if his wife is with us. Besides, Isolde ought to come. It is only polite to
my
queen if Mark sends his to court.”

I was pleased with what I had improvised. I was curious, anyway, to see this great beauty Isolde.

There was a murmur of agreement around the table.

“As for who we send,” Arthur continued, “I will leave that among you. But if someone does not come to me to offer himself as a champion I will choose one of you.” Nimue leaned over and whispered in his ear, and he nodded. “You must excuse me.” He leaned down to me and whispered, “Wait for me in my room.” I nodded, and he left with Nimue. Obviously, she had something in Merlin’s old room below us to show him. Some map of the stars that promised more success for him, something in her little whirring astrolabe that portended something or other. Some secret that I would never know.

Gawain and his brothers left right away, then Lamerocke chattering with Dinadan, and then Percival, with a soft word to Lancelot. Kay lounged in his seat, grinning at me, making no move to leave. Lancelot did not leave either. I was not sure if he wanted to speak to me at last, or if he was afraid to move in case I spoke to him. Or in case Kay said something. Kay was always just saying whatever came into his head.

I cast Kay a wary look, narrowing my eyes at him. If he had something to say, he could go ahead and say it. He had a wicked look about him, tonight.

“Excuse me.” Lancelot, seeing the look, or sensing it, stood to leave.

“No!” I protested, the words out of me before I was aware of forming them. “No, I have to speak with you.”

“I know what this is about.” Kay grinned.

“Oh, you do?” I rounded on him, suddenly fired with anger. I wanted him to go. I wanted him to stop being so smug. I wanted to slap his grinning face. “Do tell us.”

“It’s about lovestruck little Gareth,” Kay teased. “Guinevere needs you to protect her from his loving advances.” He made a joking grab at the skirts of my dress and I slapped his hand. He rolled back into his seat, laughing.

“
Get out, Kay
,” I shouted, louder than I had intended to. I saw the hurt flicker in his eyes, and the smile dropped off his face. He pushed himself up smartly from his chair and strode out, slamming the door behind him. I winced at the sound. I should not, perhaps, have shouted, but all the patience had drained from me, after all the waiting, and at last
at last
I was alone again with Lancelot. He stood and walked towards the door. I slid out of my chair and darted around the table and into his path.

“Where are you going? I
said
I needed to talk to you.”

He turned his face away from me. “Not now,” he said softly.

How dare he? Whatever was going on in his head, I was his queen and he would stay if I wanted him to. I crossed my arms over my chest, standing my ground. I was between him and the door. He would speak to me before he left. I didn’t want any promises from him, or anything, but he
would
speak with me. I didn’t care what about.

“I want you to take Gareth as your squire. He is the right age, and he looks up to you.”

Lancelot rubbed his face with his hands, turning away from me, walking a few steps back into the room.

“I don’t know why you are being like this with me. First you save my life, then you ignore me, then you agree to read with me, then you ignore me again, and now you’re refusing me this. What is
wrong
with you?” I was trying to sound calm, but it was failing. I could feel myself trembling with frustration; I could feel the heat rising up inside me. I tried to hold it back, but I was half-shouting. “Have I
offended
you in some way?”

I stepped forward and put a hand on his shoulder, lightly. He twisted around and grabbed my wrist, holding my hand away. He moved so fast, as though he knew what I had been about to do before I had done it. His eyes were wild and I could see his chest rising and falling fast, but his grip on my wrist was soft, and he left my hand fall away after a moment.

“My lady, you
must
let me go,” he insisted.

Once more I stood my ground, crossing my arms in front of me. The candlelight flickered over both of us in the moment of silence.

“Say you’ll take Gareth as your squire, and that you will come with me to tell him so tomorrow. Say you won’t go to Cornwall.”

Lancelot leaned against the back of a chair, as though he was holding himself back from something. Perhaps it was from striking me; I couldn’t tell. But I was not afraid; I was too angry for fear. He looked down again, away from me.
Why won’t you look at me?
I reached out and took him by the arm.

“Answer me,” I demanded.

“Stop
tormenting
me,” he shouted suddenly. He looked up at me, pulling his arm from my grip, his eyes flashing with anger, striding two steps away from me across the room. I felt the blood rise in me in response. He would
not
speak to me like that.

“I’m not
tormenting
you, Lancelot. It’s a simple enough request. You’re
my
champion; you ought to take
my
suggestion,” I shouted back. He wouldn’t turn back round to face me, but I could see his shoulders rising and falling with his breaths. He was being irrational. I didn’t see why he didn’t want to listen to me about this. I didn’t know why he was so desperate to deny me what I was asking. He might even have done it anyway without my suggestion and I felt as if he was dismissing it just because I had asked. I didn’t know what was wrong with him, why he had to be so distant, so opaque.

“That’s not what I mean,” he growled, low.

No, I knew what he meant. He didn’t like me looking for him, calling him to me, asking him to do his
duties
as a champion. I didn’t know if he thought he was above it, or if he just wanted time away from
me.
I could feel the anger pulsing within me, sharp now, and red-hot. I didn’t want anything other than for him to speak to me, to be close to me. I did not think that was too much for him to concede to me.

“Well I don’t
know
what you mean. You’re my champion, but you don’t want to see me. You
obviously
care about me, but you don’t want to talk to me. I’m not asking very much of you, Lancelot. I just want to speak with you sometimes, to see you, to be, to be nearby –”