Yseult: A Tale of Love in the Age of King Arthur (82 page)

The body of his father.

The stench of burnt buildings, blood, and death was in his nostrils, and they walked together, silent. Kurvenal kicked over a body to inspect the one beneath, but once again it wasn't Marcus Cunomorus.

Agravaine was taken and Lot dead. Gawain, Gaheris and Gareth mourned — for the death of a father and for what they had done to bring it about. Drystan feared the same fate — but nearly as much he feared not finding his father at all.

It would mean he was responsible for the escape of a traitor.

"I have told no one that you had Marcus in your power," Kurvenal murmured.

Drystan nodded shortly.

"Why did you release him?" Kurvenal asked.

"Would you have had me execute him?"

His friend stared at him for a moment, not answering. "He had no such qualms about you."

Yes, and that was why he had thought he was free of filial ties. How wrong he had been.

He turned over another body, knowing from the build and the clothing that it would not be the man he was looking for. But he did not want to answer Kurvenal just now.

They made their rounds of the fortress without success, returning to Arthur empty-handed.

"No sign of Marcus?" Arthur asked. Those who had been fighting with the rebel kings were gathered east of the fortress, closely guarded. Behind the Dux Bellorum, the sky was turning brilliant hues of orange and red with the onset of day.

Drystan shook his head.

"What of the other rebel leaders?" Kurvenal asked.

"Hueil son of Caw fell with Lot," Arthur said. "There is no news yet of Cadwallon of Gwynedd or Idres of Dumnonia, nor of Cerdic. But we already suspected that he disappeared even before the battle began."

"And the other sons of Caw?" Drystan wondered how close Labiane was to her step-sons — if at all — and what this might mean for her.

"Nothing."

"And ours?" Drystan asked.

Arthur looked away. "There is no news yet as to the whereabouts of Ludd or Aircol."

Drystan drew in a deep breath. He had fought next to Aircol so many times now, he could no longer count them. His memories may have left him for a time, but they were back now, and he could see Aircol beside him, sailing up the Sabrina Estuary at the battle of Glevum. If he had fallen, what would become of his young son Vortipor?

Kurvenal took his shoulder in a bracing grip. "Come, my friend. We will be returning to Dumnonia soon with this battle won. Brangwyn and Yseult are waiting for us."

He blinked and gazed past his friend at the fortress they had just conquered, the early morning sun bright on the rocky cliffs on which it stood. Kurvenal was right. It was Yseult he had been thinking of on the way north, Yseult he wrote to when a messenger was going south, Yseult who made his dreams sweet and his future finally bright.

Soon he would be see her again. And once he had spoken with Yseult of the White Hands, he would be returning to her to stay.

* * * *

Yseult stared at the hand she held between hers, the covering of light hairs on the back, much denser than on her own. How could she give this hand up again so soon after having it back, having it between her own, here, where everyone could see them and no one would say them nay?

She clenched her hands tighter around his and felt an answering pressure.

"I won't be gone long, Yseult," Drystan said. "But Yseult of Armorica deserves to hear my decision in person. Perhaps when faced with facts she will agree to an annulment."

Yseult leaned her head back on her shoulders, grateful of the late summer sun on her face, grateful of this bench she'd had built on a rise near her herb garden at Dyn Tagell. The air was full of the constant, soothing hum of bees, busy with the lemon balm; full of the pleasantly astringent smell, the sour from the leaves and the sweet from the flowers. Above them, the gulls cried, and all around them were the rhythmic sounds of the sea.

"Can it not wait until Spring?" she asked. "What if the seas turn rough early this year?"

Drystan laughed and gave her a quick kiss on the lips. "Your eagerness is such a joy to me. Yseult, it is only August. There is at least another month of good sailing weather."

Near them, Kustennin barked out a childish order to the other children of Dyn Tagell, assuming naturally that his word would be followed. Yseult watched them for a while, and for the first time she found herself wondering how, at the age of five, her son already had the attitude and bearing of a king. He would have had that attitude and that bearing no matter what course she had chosen to follow, she was sure of it — and the other children would have followed him exactly as they were doing now.

She turned Drystan's hand over in hers, traced the lines on his palm with her fingers, wishing she could keep him here with her. But she had turned him away so often, how could she beg him now to stay?

She shook her head. "I wish we could finally start our life together."

He gazed out at the sea, his expression distant. "I would like to start it honestly this time."

Honestly? Yseult sighed. "Has there been any word of Marcus Cunomorus?" she asked.

"No."

She released his hand and rose, moving towards the southern cliffs, as if that would tell her where the man she had married was. Everyone expected Marcus to show up at his Armorican seat at Caer Haes eventually, and that was where she had sent the message asking for a divorce, but she had not yet heard back from him.

"Marcus is no longer important," Drystan said beside her, his voice low. "He has betrayed too many people. You rule here now."

They came to the top of the rise, and the wind tore at her hair and whipped the curls around Drystan's face. "And what of you?" she asked.

Finally he laughed again. "Yseult, I have never ruled here. But you are queen of the people of Dumnonia, and Arthur knows that. It is you who will rule in the name of your son."

After the battle of Din Eidyn, Arthur had pardoned the rebel kings who promised to abide by whatever decision might be reached by the council regarding the high kingship of Britain; those pardoned would retain all lands and titles they were born to. But Marcus had disappeared, promising nothing, and he had no inherited Dumnonian lands — only his Armorican holdings were his by birth. Arthur had declared Marcus's Dumnonian seats forfeit and named Yseult, to her great surprise, regent.

Why had he not named his cousin Drystan, Marcus's heir?

"We will rule together," she said.

"I have no experience in ruling."

She smiled. "You ruled for a time in Bro Leon. And you learn quickly."

Drystan chuckled. "But we do not know how things will play out. We need not talk of this yet."

She could feel it the moment an unexpected thought occurred to him, a thought with a touch of alarm.

"Do you not want the ruling of Dumnonia?" he asked. "Would you rather return to Eriu?"

She shook her head; almost she would have laughed, but the question was a serious one for him.

"No. My place is here now." To her surprise, it was true. Somehow when she hadn't been looking, this land had become her land, its fights her fights.

She turned and looked back at the children playing between the rows of huts and her herb garden. Suddenly, she could no longer abide by her own promise to herself. She turned to him and took his tunic in both hands. "Don't go, Drystan, don't return to your other Yseult. There's no need."

It was a mistake; she could feel him withdraw from her as soon as she said the words.

He shook his head. "I gave her a promise, as wrong-headed as it was. I have to return."

Yseult swallowed, fighting back her protests. "Yes, of course."

Why was she so against it? If he needed this journey for his peace of mind, so be it. She hoped it wasn't unreasoning jealousy that had her reacting in such a way — that was below her as Yseult the Fair of the Tuatha Dé.

Drystan took her face in his hands and placed a gentle kiss on her forehead. "I will return before the leaves on the trees change colors, and then we will have the whole winter to ourselves, and all the winters thereafter."

Ah, perhaps he should have been a bard, her reluctant warrior. His fine words made the tears she had been repressing come rushing to the corners of her eyes, and a painful sigh escaped her.

She gave the linen of his tunic — which she still held —a light shake. "I will hold you to that promise, my love."

Chapter 35

Iseult of Brittany?—but where

Is that other Iseult fair,

That proud, first Iseult, Cornwall's queen? ...

There were two Iseults who did sway

Each her hour of Tristram's day;

But one possess'd his waning time,

The other his resplendent prime.

Mathew Arnold, "Tristram and Iseult"

Yseult of the White Hands stared at her husband, unable to believe what she was hearing. She had known for months now that he was still alive, had wondered when he would return to Leonis, if ever, had tried to reconcile herself to her humiliating position as abandoned wife, and now this: an annulment. She knew no one whose marriage had been annulled. Tales were told of an early of wife of Marcus Cunomorus whom he had divorced; he had forced her into it in order to contract the more advantageous marriage to Drystan's mother Argante. After she had been turned aside, the poor woman had thrown herself from the cliffs south of Kemper into the sea.

"That way you would be free to marry again," he was saying now.

She stopped to smell a salmon-colored rose from one of the rose bushes she had imported to Leonis. Ygerna had a beautiful garden at Caer Brioc, and when Yseult had come here as Drystan's betrothed, she had started a garden of her own. No longer her own now: if Labiane and Caw came here to stay, she would have to leave, and she could hardly take the rose garden with her.

She straightened again, not looking at him. "Who would have me, the discards of Drystan son of Cunomorus?"

"But you're young, beautiful, even untouched, and I would be able to give you a generous settlement." He was silent for a moment, waiting for an answer. When she didn't provide it, he continued. "With the settlement, it should be clear to all that I am not just casting you off."

She could hear the frustration in his voice, and she glanced over her shoulder at him, shaking her head. How could he possibly think it would be so easy? "Of course they will. It is what you are doing, isn't it?"

At least he had the good grace and honesty to look away at that. "I did you wrong in marrying you. But I tried to explain even before the ceremony. I gave you the opportunity to call it off."

"Yes, after most of the wedding guests had arrived."

She saw his shoulders tighten, and he turned back to her, the look of frustration in his eyes again.

"And you think a lifetime of misery is not too high a price to pay for giving a few wedding guests what they came for?"

She clenched her famed long-fingered hands in her skirts, the hands that had given her her name. He made it sound so petty, but it was much more than that, and he knew it. All the local kings had been invited, it had been a bigger event even than the funeral of Riwallon. Their marriage had Blodewedd's approval, she had made him regent of Bro Leon in her will, and he might even have become king here in Leonis if he had not run away so foolishly. Now she was allowed to remain only through the generosity of Labiane, who had arrived in the spring after Drystan's disappearance — and after he had recovered his senses and sent word to his cousin that he would have to go to war with Arthur again.

He had sent no word to her.

"We wouldn't have had to be miserable," she said bitterly. "That is your doing." She stopped next to a costly white rose, the blooms full and pure; it was one of her favorites. He had it all wrong — calling the wedding off would have led to a lifetime of misery. She would have been sent back to her brother's seat at Karke in disgrace. Exactly what he was asking her to do now.

He shook his head, the bronze of his queue glancing in the sunlight, the long braid gone, sacrificed to masquerade and madness.