Gawain and Lady Green (7 page)

Gawain awoke.

He came wide awake lying on his side, staring into clear white moonlight.

That’s the door of Lady Green’s bower,
he thought.
She left it open.

He reached around behind him on the pallet and found it empty. She’s gone out and left the door open.

Close by, an owl hooted.

Gawain sat up slowly, to avoid dizziness. This time it did not come.
Not dizzy. Head clear.

Remembrance flooded in.

Drank no ale yesterday. Dribbled it all on the ground when she wasn’t looking. Why?

That ale of hers is spiked.

His deep mind spoke up.
Come, Sir! Up and out of here. Let’s find what we can see our self with no lovely Lady Green at our elbow.

Perfectly awake, Gawain rose, stooped under the low-arched roof. He ducked through the bower doorway and out among the half-moonlit oaks.

An owl called quickly twice from just above him. Another answered twice from the river.

Here we are, at last by ourself. Which way, Sir?

Gawain considered. North lay the pasturelands where herds wandered, guarded by youngsters with packs and tents, on their own for the first time.
Like us, Sir!

Northeast stretched the Fair-Field and mowings. East, over the shallow river, flourished the crops whose growth Gawain and Lady Green encouraged.

She’s never let you go south.

Lady Green said that south was sacred grove, then deeper and more sacred grove. She said that nobody goes south.

Maybe that’s for us!

Gawain considered this uneasily. A feeling he did not care to call fear prickled his stomach.
I think not this time.

He found himself moving northwest. An owl hooted above him. Two far owls answered. Gawain stopped short, hand on oak trunk.

Those aren’t owls. Those are sentries.

Inner Mind commented.
You are right, Sir. Notice now that wherever you move, an owl signals.

I am a prisoner.

Aye.

God’s teeth! What do they want? Do they plan to attack King Arthur and fear I might warn him?

Let us not joke, Sir.

Gently, Gawain stepped northeast from oak shade to moonlight to oak shade. Sure enough, hooting owls kept pace, and once a twig snapped nearby.

I’ve been half asleep since I came here. It’s that hell-damned ale she gives me. But, God’s bones, what can they want?

Little Ynis said in his head, “We couldn’t do Midsummer.” Midsummer was now well past.

“So we skipped to Summerend.”

Summerend.

Gawain came to an edge of grove. He glanced up at the moon. How long now till Summerend? He stood on a rise looking out over the moor.

Long, long ago he had stood like this on a cold cliff looking over a cold, moonlit sea. A calm voice overhead had said, “At Summerend, the Old Ones cut the May King down like the crops. They gave his blood to the Goddess.” Little Gawain had shivered.

“We don’t do that now,” the voice continued. “Now we sacrifice a straw man, a John Barleycorn. But in the old days the blood was real.”

His mother, Morgause, had stood over Gawain, a tower between him and a fierce north wind. Her dark cloak blew about his back. Fascinated, he had asked, “How did they cut him down?”

“They cut off his head with a scythe. Like the crops.”

Gawain stood now rooted, staring over moonlit moor instead of moonlit sea.
God and Mary shield!

That’s it, Sir. Your eyes open at last.

The old ways still lived in this God-forgotten north!

You remember the fellow they were going to crown May King when you came along? Remember his face, how miserable? And then how happy, when they crowned you instead!

“God’s blood!” Gawain murmured aloud as his own blood congealed in his veins.

Hush, Sir. The guard might hear. Let them think you’re still drugged out of your skull.

Must get out of here!

Truly, Sir. But how?

Must think how.

Drink no more ale, Sir.

That wretched girl! That Delilah! I’ll strangle her with her own rich red hair!

Not yet, Sir.

Far out on the white moor something moved. Something moon-large, moon-white.

That’s a horse, Sir.

Too big. All they’ve got here is rough little northern ponies.

That’s a knight’s charger.

It is! Big as my own Warrior that the savages ate. Angel Michael, that’s what I need! If I could catch that horse—

Someone else has.

The great white horse ambled closer through white moonlight. A figure sat upright on its back. Two figures.

That’s a woman, Sir. With a child before her.

She rode easily, swaying erect, guiding the charger apparently with heels and thighs. Gawain saw no sign of reins.

My mother told me once of a Goddess of horses. Maybe this…

Goddess? Or ghost, on a ghost horse? Gawain prickled. His tongue swelled fuzzily to fill his mouth.

Come, Sir! You’ve been thinking too much about the past. That’s a real woman out there with a real child, on a real horse. And they’re really too far to catch.

Disgustedly, Gawain shook himself. He spit out fear.
God’s teeth! I’m crazed. I’ve been crazed since May Day.

You’ve been drunk-drugged.

True. Now I’m clear, must stay clear. I’ve wits enough, strength enough, to escape from here.

In truth, Sir!

I am a Christian. Angels and Saints will aid me.

Very true.

I am Sir Gawain, King’s Companion! If I but keep my head, no northern savages can hold me.

Right, Sir. Keep your head and keep your head.

I’ll escape. And Merlin shall sing of my adventure.

The great moon-white horse paced slowly out of sight into deep moonlight.

The squat, rough-coated pony shied away from the joust.

Gawain cursed, clapped heels to hide, beat rump with awkwardly
gathered reins. The pony changed its untrained mind. Gawain barely had time to aim “lance” and heft “shield” before the pony bore him, bouncing, into battle.

The Square Table roared and clashed. Half-wild ponies reared and plunged. Men whacked and thwacked with “lances” (peasant cudgels); “shields” dropped unheeded and were broken under-hoof. Knaves struck each other down, leaped down themselves, and wrestled. Snarling, they lost themselves in crazy rage like fighting dogs. It was by Merry’s good thought that they bore no knives, no weapons but the ungainly “lances.”

Even so, Gawain did damage.

As he reeled almost helplessly bareback, young Doon charged him. Gawain aimed his “lance” square at the oncoming face. He fully expected the boy to raise his shield. To his surprise, his “lance” crashed square into an astonished, unprotected face. Gawain felt the hard, familiar jolt.

Heels over head, Doon went down over his pony’s tail.

Gawain rode on through the melee, clashing cudgels with all he met, toppling many to the ground.

Reaching open, uncluttered space he managed to turn the bucking pony. Behind him his challengers found their feet, alone or with help. Ponies bucked loose and galloped away. Men grinned and joked even as they limped.

Gawain gave a quick glance southward, over the open fields. He imagined himself beating the pony into a gallop. He imagined the Square Table thundering after him, “lances” aloft. Slowly, he rode back into their midst.

A hand caught his rein. Merry looked up at him soberly. He said, “Doon’s hurt bad. Come see.”

Merry led the sidestepping, bridling pony back to the boy on the ground. Doon’s friends moved aside to let Gawain look down on the damage.

Dark young Doon held a fresh-torn rag over his left eye. He rocked back and forth and around and moaned to hurt his friends’ ears. They glared up at Gawain.

He slid down from the pony. Better not stand out above the crowd like a straw-man target. “He’s alive, God-thank!”

“No thanks to you, May King,” one man growled.

Merry said fairly, “We knew this jousting could jar us.”

Another man spat past Gawain’s boot toe. “The eye’s out, Merry.”

“Holy Gods.”

“If this stranger weren’t the May King—”

“But he is, Bert.”

“Aye,” men murmured, nodding around Gawain. “Aye, he’ll get it back. Well see him get it back, ayah.”

Clearheaded, Gawain understood their jargon. They would rejoice to see Doon’s eye avenged at Summerend. Gawain straightened tall. He said sincerely, “Holy Mary! I did not mean for that.” (Or did he? He was angry enough with all these murderous yokels!) “But you could hardly hope to joust without injury. I struck too truly. But I expected him to shield himself.”

Merry said again, “We all knew jousting was chancy. You and you, get Doon safe home. I’ll see him there later. May King, what does the Round Table do after an accident like this?”

“Why, the joust goes on.”

“Ech, ayah. What I thought. Back at it, men!”

That morning Gawain learned what to expect of the Square Table. They were savages, fierce and brave, but untrained. They had no notion how to ride and fight at the same time. They did one or the other. The use of saddles, stirrups, and spurs would much aid their horsemanship. But Gawain was not the man to tell them that. Pitted against the Round Table, they would offer no contest. No contest against a bunch of squires!

And he himself, rightly a-horse, could doubtless fight off the lot of them.

“What? What can you mean, May King?”

“I know why you won’t use my name.” Quietly, dully, he says this. Quiet, dull dread echoes his voice in my bones.

“Gawain. What do you mean, you will not love me? Am I less lovely than before?”

“No less. Maybe more.” Moonlit, his dark eyes glint.

We sit under our awning between pea rows, knees touching. Eagerly, my body yearns toward him. In the act of unloosing my girdle, I lean over and slide its soft silk along his furry chest. This gesture has always stirred him. Till now. Now he pushes girdle and hand roughly away. Leaning forward, he challenges me with his eyes.

Mind shines in his eyes. Ah! Too much mind, much too keen.

“Wait, love. I know what you need.” I reach out for the bottle.

“No!”

“Eh?” Fingers pause on the bottle.

“
Ale will I never drink again, till I come again under Arthur’s reign.
”

“What?” I remember this line, or one like it, from one of Merlin’s stranger songs. “You will not drink…Gawain, you are not yourself.”

Till now, our May King has seemed a simple enough fellow; brave, honest (not like me!), always ready to drink and love. In truth, many have marveled at his capacity for drink and love. Now I seem to be looking an entirely other, unknown man in the face. Here is a time for slow caution, for feeling my way.

“Very well, May—Gawain. You need not drink. But love—”

“
You I will never love again, till I love you under Arthur’s reign
.”

I strain to see his aura. What shape, what color, flares around him now? If I could see that…but auras do not shine in the dark. All I see is his solid, beautifully male silhouette against stars.

“You have lost your senses.”

“No, Lady Green. I have found them at length.”

I reach out to touch him. Again he pushes my hand away.

Sitting here so close, my hungry body cries out for him. It is all I can do to not hurl myself upon him. “You don’t want me to touch you?”

“I do not.”

Can it be…can he…dare I ask?

I undo and shrug my green gown down about my waist. Now I dare. “Why? May—Gawain. My love. Why?”

“Let us be honest together, you and I.”

“In truth! I have always—”

“You have not, Lady Green.” Dry severity. As though he did not see my body hunger.

“You are ungallant…”

“No more games.”

“Very well, Gawain. Be you honest with me.”

“Very well, Lady Green. I must away, and that with all good speed.”

“Away?” Step carefully here! “You know we need you here while the crops grow. After Summerend—”