Guinevere: The Legend in Autumn (33 page)

Chapter XXVI

Lancelot

Those who had left Caerleon for the Quest had been gone for a year now, and news about them filtered back to us piecemeal. Some had met with mischance, some with adventure, but no one else claimed to have found the Grail.

Stories about Lancelot’s exploits abounded, passed from peddler to holy man to farmer to noble, but nothing indicated he had heard of Galahad’s achievement or was heading for Carbonek. Bors maintained he would go there as soon as he learned that his son had become its new king, but I had my doubts. Elaine may have been silent all these years, but that didn’t mean Lance wanted to see her again, even accidentally.

Word that the Grail had been part of the Christian sacrifice brought a sudden surge of interest in the Church. Father Baldwin was in great demand both at Court and in the nearby towns. Sometimes he had so many converts, he baptized them in groups, all standing in midstream or being dunked in a pond, or taking turns climbing into the tin tubs that were common in the village chapels. He even tried urging me, gently, in that direction. “It’s a miracle, M’lady. A real miracle. Are you sure you don’t want to be part of it?”

All I could do was shake my head. The White Christ might be an admirable and loving figure, but I’d ally myself with many another deity before I accepted the pompous dictates of his Father.

Many of the household members converted—Melias, who had been Bagdemagus’s squire, and Cook’s nephew, Kanahins, among them. Cook herself began incorporating Christian customs into her never-ending battle with the sprites and took to marking her cakes and biscuits with a cross on the top—“Keeps the fairies from dancing on them, and spoiling their tops with dimples, M’lady,” she explained earnestly.

Before long a delegation came to Arthur asking permission to build a church at Camelot. They had already drawn up the plans for the little building and conferred long and hard with Bedivere and Cei about the feasibility of finding materials. I personally was much less concerned about where we would put it than about the effect its presence would have on the non-Christians in the Court.

“If His Highness isn’t Christian, M’lady, why should he want a church?” Lynette looped a braid up to the top of my head and stood back to study the effect.

Gareth’s wife was pregnant for the third time. Their first two children were girls—sober little Lora, who had her father’s blond hair and gentle ways, and lively Megan, who was busy climbing into my lap at the moment. The girl was as much of a tomboy as I had ever been, and I took delight in playing with the child; it was possible she was as close as I would come to having a grandchild.

“Or is the High King planning to convert?” Lynette queried.

The idea was so preposterous, I laughed aloud before pointing out that both Arthur and I honored all the religions of our subjects. But neither marriage nor motherhood had mellowed Lynette’s nature, and she harried the matter with the tenacity of a terrier.

“They’re saying you were married in a church, instead of by the High Priestess.”

“True, we were. We would have been prayed over first by the Lady of the Lake if Arthur hadn’t been going off to war that afternoon! But that was close on to three decades ago, child. Stop and think—who slits the throat of the white bull every year at Samhain so that the blood flows into the caldron?”

“King Arthur.”

“And who leads the fertility dance at Beltane?”

“You and King Arthur.”

“And who starts all the bells ringing at midwinter, to call the sun back from the frozen north?”

By now Lynette was grinning from ear to ear. “You and King Arthur.”

“I don’t think you need fear for the King’s spiritual health,” I concluded, wishing I felt as confident as I sounded. The memory of the Frankish monarch who converted for political reasons had not diminished with time.

When I mentioned the matter to Arthur, he looked up from the horse-breeding chart and gave me a quizzical frown. “I thought we agreed to support whatever Gods our people choose…” I nodded, and he gave a silent shrug. “There are more Christians at Court than all other beliefs combined, Gwen, and they say the Mother’s Church at Glastonbury is too far to go to, particularly in bad weather.”

“That many?” I exclaimed, startled by the notion so much had changed without my realizing it.

“Indeed. And not just among the Companions who are here. Gwyn tells me Lancelot has converted as well.”

I turned on the little Welshman with a sharp inquiry to which he gave a laconic reply. “So the monks at Glastonbury tell me. Surely it comes as no surprise, M’lady?”

As usual Gwyn’s expression was one of conspiracy, as though we shared a secret only he was privy to. But for once it didn’t amuse me, and I turned on my heel with a few well-chosen invectives. I wouldn’t believe such nonsense till I heard it from Lance himself.

The Queen’s Champion presented himself to Arthur on a day when the hedge-sparrows were flitting happily through my garden. I was down in the winnowing room at the time, counting fleeces from the summer sheering. Word of his arrival raced through the barn and, dropping my tallying tablet, I ran headlong for the Hall.

“Of course I’m glad Galahad found it,” he was saying as I burst through the door to the office, “and that everything is going smoothly in Carbonek.”

I was halfway across the room when he turned to face me, and I froze on the spot. The finest warrior in the realm now stood before his king, a thin, lank shadow of the man he once was. If Bors lived on bread and water, Lance looked as if he partook of neither. And whereas he used to move with the fine, lithe grace of an athlete ready at any moment to leap to action, now every motion was constrained, though he bore no visible sign of wounds.

His angular face was drawn and gaunt, high cheekbones craggy over sunken cheeks, while the wide blue eyes that once held all the laughter in the world were as sober and guarded as Mordred’s.

Our gaze met briefly, but instead of the expected joy, the trusted, silent pledge of love between us, I saw only the slightest flicker of recognition before he turned back to Arthur.

“I have learned much about pride, M’lord. There was never before a task I could not complete, a battle I could not win, a prize I could not attain. Blessed—or cursed—by the Gods, I’ve had fame and fortune and the highest of respect heaped on me all my life…until now. Perhaps I was overdue for a few strong lessons in humility.”

“Oh, come now,” Arthur replied lightly, “you’ve earned every accolade you’ve ever had. A braver, more loyal, absolutely trustworthy lieutenant doesn’t exist, and I’ll not have you discounting those qualities in yourself.”

Lance’s full lips gathered in a partial smile, but it never reached his eyes. “Those things are fine for worldly matters, but they don’t help much in a spiritual Quest.” He looked off into some unknown space, and I wondered what inner voices he was listening to.

Arthur was insisting that he tell us his adventures, so he settled into the guest’s chair while I drew up a cushion and the High King perched on the table. Still the Breton kept a distant reserve, as though he were only half aware of our presence.

“I—I thought you didn’t believe in the Quest—that you went seeking the Grail to protect Galahad…” I stammered, and for the first time Lance looked at me fully.

“Indeed. Perhaps that was part of my arrogance—thinking I was above such an endeavor. But riding alone with only one’s God and one’s horse for company clarifies the mind, and I began to see the Grail as something much bigger than a bit of country magic. In the end, I discovered that it could become the heart of my life.”

The Breton gave Arthur a sheepish look, suddenly embarrassed about putting such matters into words. Arthur was carefully avoiding his lieutenant’s eyes, and Lance let a quick glance slide my way before continuing.

“After weeks alone—sometimes finding shelter with peasants, sometimes sleeping under the canopy of stars—I had formed the habit of spending a part of each day in silent communion with God…thinking, or praying, or slipping, trancelike, into some other state in which I hoped to approach the Divine. So when my path crossed that of Galahad, I was delighted to discover the lad meditates in much the same way every day. It became a kind of bridge for us, and before long we were sharing all sorts of ideas and feelings. I was amazed at how much we had to talk about, to catch up on after all the years of not knowing each other.”

This time it was the Breton who avoided Arthur’s eyes, knowing that talk of such closeness between father and son was not likely to set well with the High King. But in the end the man was too honest to gloss over the truth, regardless of Arthur’s reaction.

“I’m proud to have a son like Galahad and I’m glad we had this chance to find out how much we mean to each other. It’s only a beginning, but we’ve years still ahead of us, after he takes care of the problems in Carbonek.”

“Are you going to visit him there?” Arthur queried.

“Carbonek is not my favorite place, M’lord,” Lance answered evenly, without mentioning his desire to avoid Elaine. “Perceval joined us at a tiny hermitage, and as the lads were eager to go off on their own, I stayed there with the holy man. It was he who pointed out that all my achievements have been in the worldly vein. Things that brought glory to myself, honor to the Round Table, peace for you”—he nodded toward Arthur—“and admiration from the rest. But still, in all, I was not worthy to find the Grail…not then, maybe never.”

The dark head bowed sadly, and I wanted to put my arms about him and hold him close, telling him about the Goddess, about looking inside oneself. But Arthur’s presence stopped me; that and the fact that Lance himself had begged me to leave him alone and let him get on with his own life. It was not a request made lightly, or easily forgotten.

Later that night, when Lance recounted his adventures to the whole of the household, Arthur made sure that everyone knew he did not consider the Breton’s Quest to have been a failure.

The older Companions were thrilled to have him home again, and Arthur insisted that he return to the seat beside him as his lieutenant. Gawain, who sat there whenever Lance was not available, moved aside with a withering look. Some little instinct awakened in me; with Pellinore and Lamorak both dead, Gawain might shift the focus of his anger to Lancelot.

“Oh, I don’t think so,” the Breton reassured me when he found me on my knees in the garden next morning. “He’s been a good friend and ally all these years, in spite of his roaring temper. I can’t imagine him turning against me now.”

“Maybe. But he was angry at being displaced from Arthur’s side,” I cautioned as I scrambled to my feet.

Lance nodded thoughtfully. “Well, it won’t be a problem in the future. I’ve decided to go live in Joyous Gard, Gwen—permanently.”

I heard the words, weighed their meaning, even took a step toward him before the full scope of what he’d said hit home. The idea of his leaving Camelot forever left me dumbstruck, and I stood for a moment with my mouth open and no words coming out. The Breton smiled gently and lifted my chin with his finger.

“So many things happened on the Quest—so much that I don’t even know how to begin to tell you. But first I would like to sit down.”

I watched anxiously as he lowered himself to the marble bench. There was still something stiff and uneasy about the way he moved, and I wondered if his ribs had been bandaged. A dozen questions rattled in my head but I was determined to keep silent lest harsh words drive him away again.

“Gwen, next to God I have loved you best of anything in the world—there, the word is said. I love you, have loved you, will love you…” The admission was quickly followed by a rueful smile. “Ah well, you knew that. Have known it for years. But you…whatever else there is between us, you are still my king’s wife, and completely unattainable.”

I looked away, not wanting to open old wounds. Ever since his near-death at the hands of the bear, I had kept my distance, never pressing for the expressions of love I had so long wanted. Now, when his very soul was drawn taut, I dared not touch upon the matter.

Instead, I leaned over and, picking one of the honeysuckle clusters from the vine beside the bench, silently handed it to him. He reached for it gingerly, but I let it drop just before his fingers closed on it so that it fluttered to the ground. When Lance bent to pick it up, I grabbed hold of his tunic and lifted the skirt well up above his waist since he was wearing no sword belt to hold it down.

There was no sign of bandaging, but under the linen outer garment was a short, coarse shirt made of hair.

“What on earth?” we both exploded, him in amazement at my boldness, me in horror at the sores abraded around his waist by the thing.

“Why?” I sputtered. “Why are you wearing that contraption?”

“Mortification of the flesh,” he responded, carefully not meeting my eyes.

“But whatever for?” Heaven knew he hadn’t indulged any of the fleshy delights I could have thought up.

“Because I am far more subject to loving you than I was willing to admit. What you’ve never known was how much I
wanted
you, or how deeply, or with what guilt. Gwen, it was the sin of that wanting that kept me from attaining the Grail. Because for all that we never consummated our love, my desire is as profane as adultery itself in the eyes of the Church.”