Shadow of the King (56 page)

safe distance between them. He could have bolted, but he saw her now as a slip

of a woman, was ashamed of his fear, sensed that perhaps his life was not in any

danger from her.

She sat quiet a long while, sliding the blade through her fingers, through

and through again. “And what if Gwenhwyfar finds him, the Pendragon,

who ought to be dead?” Morgaine knew that answer also, knew enough of

Lady Winifred.

The Saxon shrugged. “As you say. He ought to be dead.”

Morgaine rose to her feet, threaded the dagger through her waist-girdle, her

smile a malicious, scheming smile, one that, had she known it, would have set

as easily on the face of her mother, Morgause, the woman Arthur had called

witch. The woman who had brought fear and hatred to him as boy and king.

“Are you two alone to murder one such as the Pendragon?” she scoffed.

She could not see this pair of fools mastering the ability to butcher even a

suckling pig!

At least he had the decency to flush. “Others of us are concealed a day’s

ride behind. There is many an armed band roaming Gaul; beyond a cursory

S h a d o w o f t h e k i n g 3 3 9

glance, we have passed unnoticed.” He met her cold, marble-faced stare head

on, confessed, “If the Pendragon should be found, one of us is to fetch them

forward.” The rest he left unfinished.

Morgaine unfastened a leather pouch hanging from her waist girdle, tossed it at

him. He caught it neatly, one-handed. “The woman will not leave this valley.”

The Saxon had no reason to contradict her; the hair was rising on the nape

of his neck. This was no threat, no boast. A statement. A curse.

That narrow-eyed, evil smile again. “You will ensure it is so.”

“What of the Pendragon?” the man queried as, greedily, he pulled open the

leather thongs, tipped several rings into the palm of his hand. All were of good

gold, one, the one shaped as a dragon, with an impressively expensive ruby for

its eye.

It had been Arthur’s ring, a symbol of his supremacy. Morgaine had removed

it from his bloodied and broken hand when he lay mortally close to death, kept

it safe, secreted, intending for him to have it one day, should he ever ask its

whereabouts. But he had never asked, never questioned what had happened to

his ring or his banner or his sword. Never had he talked of his kingdom, or of

Gwenhwyfar. That he thought of her, Morgaine knew, but of the other things?

Who knew of what Arthur thought?

There came no answer to the Saxon’s question. When he looked up again,

his eyes as wide as his gloating smile, the woman was gone. No trace of her, no

sound of her going. No bush moved, no branch or leaf stirred. It was as if she

had never been.

He shivered. There were tales about these woods and the women who lived

near here. Priestesses of the old Goddess. Witches, some called them.

He had no doubting he had just met one.

Fifty-Seven

When Medraut shouted, gleefully, that Da was come home, a

great tide of relief surged through Morgaine sending her stomach

churning, her head spinning. He had returned! Had chosen her, Morgaine,

over Gwenhwyfar! She ran from the house-place, her hands flour-covered from

the baking, her delight almost childish. Then she saw the horse. A war horse

and, irrationally, all the jealousies and petty imbalances welled into her. She

waited, feet planted wide, arms folded, barring access onto the dusty track that

led through the gateway into the open, hard-baked yard that dallied between

house-place, byre and a variety of outbuildings.

“Where did he come from?” she asked, pointing with an expression of

repugnance, at Onager. She had never challenged Arthur’s authority before,

nor queried his action, questioned his doing. She always accepted his word; his

way was law. He was here and she would do anything—anything—to keep him

here, but the horse, like that sword, was a threat. A reminder of the past, too

close a link with an alternative future that did not, would not, involve her.

Arthur’s anger and pain was knotted so tight within him that, superficially,

he failed to notice the unusual aggression. His anger was directed at himself,

leaving no room for analysing the reaction and feeling of others. At the Place

of the Lady he had said and done all the wrong things—acted the opposite of

what he had intended. But then, what had been the intention behind going

there? To establish whether Gweir had told him the truth? Why would the

lad have lied over such a thing in the first place? Had he gone merely to have

seen Gwenhwyfar, to have talked with her? Why? What would either have

achieved? Gone to explain what had happened to him? Or had he intended to

leave here, go back with Gwenhwyfar? As she had wanted. As he wanted—in

the name of all the gods, that ever were or ever would be, as he wanted!

But he could not. He had not the courage to confront his own weakness, his

fear. Both had reared up at him like some pain-angered monster. And he had

S h a d o w o f t h e k i n g 3 4 1

turned and fled. Not even Gwenhwyfar had been able to keep that raw fear of

what had been at bay.

He answered Morgaine curtly. “He is mine.”

“We have no room for a horse.”

“I will make room.”

It was late afternoon and it had taken Arthur many hours to coax Onager

slowly up that steep, winding road. Stopping often, resting, encouraging.

Occasionally forcing. They were both tired, bone-weary, mind numbed, and

dead tired. Arthur had realised the idiocy of taking the horse fifty yards from

the tavern stables. Pride, irrational anger, frustration, all those things made it

too late to turn back. To admit he was wrong—huh, to admit it for one thing,

meant facing again all those other things.

Morgaine persisted. She did not want Arthur to have a horse. He could so easily

ride away from her on a horse. “
From where did he come? What do you want him for?
”

As he pushed past, elbowing the woman out of his way, pushing her against

the low, wattle-built wall of the sow’s pen, Arthur regarded Morgaine with a

look that could almost have been interpreted as contempt, except he barely saw

her. He headed direct for the byre, settled the horse in an empty stall where in

winter the one or two cattle they kept would be sheltered. He busied himself

fetching bedding, water, and feed. Everyday things to keep the mind occupied,

thoughts shut aside.

Hovering at the doorway, Medraut was uncertain what to do. His Da was

in a strange mood, and his mother was angry; why, he did not understand. He

had never known her to be openly angry at his Da before. It had something, he

thought, to do with that sword, or was it the horse? His mother disliked horses,

he knew, for she had told him so. He could not see why, for although it was

obviously ill, this horse was a beautiful one. He stepped a pace into the byre,

stood sucking the tip of his thumb.

“Have you brought him here for Mam to heal?”

Arthur, scattering bedding, regarded the boy. He was small, Medraut, thin,

with mouse-brown hair and wide, dark eyes that always, for some unexplained

reason, held a little more than their fair share of fear in them. Had he been born

a pig or a sheep he would have been despatched as a worthless runt. Six years

old, painfully shy, with seemingly no confidence or courage. Arthur tried to

remember what it had been like to be six years of age. All he could recall of

his childhood was the stench of fear and the presence of evil in the shape of

Morgause. And the unbearable longing to have known his father.

3 4 2 H e l e n H o l l i c k

“No,” he said. “I have brought him here for us to heal, you and I, lad.”

The boy’s face lit with a sunburst of pride and pleasure. Arthur would never

have had such an expression at that age. His early life had been one of constant

blows and taunts. There was no obvious cruelty in Morgaine—he had never

seen her strike or rebuke the lad with unnecessary harshness—and yet she was

not close to him, not as Gwenhwyfar had been to her sons. Morgaine never

fussed the boy, be it at bedtime or when he had fallen, hurt himself. That occa-

sion when he was so ill? Morgaine tended him, administering potions, draughts,

and cordials, but it had been Arthur who had held the boy close, who had

stroked the wet hair from his forehead. Given him the comforting reassurance

of love and protection.

Gwenhwyfar had always shown love. In contrast, Morgaine was remote,

kept her feelings close guarded. She never questioned, never queried. Some

days, Arthur forgot she was there.

“From where did he come? What do you want him for?” she had asked.

Arthur shook the last armful of bedding, frowned. Morgaine, questioning?

He shrugged the thought aside, beckoned the boy forward.

He ran, delighted, but Arthur clasped at his shoulder, stopped him short.

“Never run up to a horse, lad, they startle easily—especially this one. When he

is well he’ll use his teeth and feet and not need an excuse for it. I have fought

battles on this horse.”

Medraut’s jaw dropped as wide as his eyes, his esteem for this splendid

creature doubling. Onager stood almost six and ten hands measured at the

withers, bigger than the few scruffy, ill-bred ponies from the valley. A rich,

dark chestnut horse, with a short back, deep chest, and fine head. His eyes were

bold, set to either side of a wide forehead that sat above a dished, slender face.

This was a horse that would surely gallop for hours and never tire, a horse to

race the very wind! Medraut loved him, he was superb!

Gathering the boy into his arms, Arthur took him closer, let him reach out to

touch that high, proud crest, stroke down the neck, pat the shoulder. Patient,

Arthur explained what was wrong, what need be done to make him well.

Emphasised Medraut was not to go near him unless he, Arthur, was here also.

Solemnly, the thumb going back into his mouth, Medraut promised.

The door creaking open attracted their attention, Arthur swung around, the

boy in his arms. Morgaine stood, silhouetted against the low, late afternoon

sun. They could not see her face, for it was in deep shadow; only her voice told

that she was displeased.

S h a d o w o f t h e k i n g 3 4 3

“I do not want the boy near the horse.”

Arthur made no answer.

“Horses are not to be trusted.”

Setting the boy to his feet, Arthur nudged him in the direction of his mother,

and the outside. “Run along lad—do you not have chores to attend?”

The boy gone, he said, “What I do, where I go, is of my business, not yours.

You are not my keeper, Morgaine.”

Tartly, her fists on her hips, head upright, she responded with the only

weapon she had. “Mayhap not, but I am the mother of your son.”

Arthur returned to tending the horse. Taking up a handful of straw, he

twisted it into a plait, began grooming Onager’s dulled, poor coat. When the

light brightened, he assumed Morgaine to be gone, leaving the door wide. He

guided the plait of straw across the horse’s shoulders, using firm, even strokes

along his back and rump, down his quarters. Aye, Morgaine was that, the

mother of his son.

She was also his sister. Uthr, the first Pendragon, had the siring of them both.

Arthur had not known it, then, when he had lain with her at a time when

a great fear had clouded all sense, all reason. He had gone to the Lady by the

Lake for her healing; his eldest son was ill and it was all he could think of to

save him, to go to the pagan woman who lived, then, at Yns Witrin. Would

he have lain with her if she had not asked? If she had not given the impression

that it was a thing demanded by the Mother, the Goddess of all life? If he had

not thought the union might bring some benefit of healing to his most precious

boy? Possibly. Probably—but alternatively, he might have discovered her siring

first. And then, Morgaine would not have held this weight of shame and guilt

over him. Not that she knew. No one else knew, only he realised the father of

Morgause’s daughter.

Arthur dropped the straw wisp, laced his fingers into Onager’s long mane, leant

his cheek against the warmth of the animal’s coat. Stood there a long while.

Soon, it began to grow dark outside. Night. Morgaine would be putting the

boy to bed, preparing supper.

He ought tell her the reason why he stayed here. Tell her he stayed because

there was nowhere else to go. That here there was no one to sneer he was a

failure, a lost man with not the guts to pick up his sword again. No one to lay

blame for the massacre of his men.

Morgaine settled Medraut into his bed, an arrangement of furs and blankets

set on a wooden platform above one end of the dwelling. Medraut liked his

3 4 4 H e l e n H o l l i c k

private, upstairs place. When he was older, he intended to ask if the wooden

ladder could be hoisted up at night. That would make it even more secretive.