The Bloody Cup (25 page)

‘Modred never says anything that is directly critical of you. His listeners draw obvious conclusions from his hints and lies and he leaves them to cast any slurs. He can deny that he has ever encouraged treason while creating a climate where it is bound to flourish. Beware, my lord. I sit quietly in the queen’s arbor and I listen to them when they talk.’

‘Modred’s not my true heir. He doesn’t have the breeding and he carries all his mother’s bitterness without possessing an iota of her justification. I’d sooner die without an heir and risk the safety of the west than expose the kingdom to a vain pretender like Modred. Nor need I worry that he’ll find support for his claim after my death. His illegitimacy will always be a handicap for him with the tribes.’

The High King lapsed into silence, but Lady Elayne couldn’t relinquish the conversation so readily.

‘The Brigante tribe controls a huge territory,’ she said, her voice low. ‘And they have a large population - dangerously large. I’m fearful of Modred, my king. Something in him repulses me, although he can be very charming when he chooses. There’s something womanish in the way he delights in cruel gossip.’ Elayne flushed, and Artor could clearly see a dusting of golden freckles across her cheeks and nose. She seemed to realize that her insights insulted her own sex, so she lurched back into explanation.

‘If Modred was a man who finds his pleasure in the love of men, well, that would be no impediment to his succession. Many warriors have put aside the love of women for men, so few Celts would be critical of Lord Modred on that account. But something in the way he looks at me makes me feel soiled and poisoned, as if he takes pleasure in any predicament that causes pain. Servants who are clumsy, fools who are caught in some crime - Modred enjoys their fears and punishments. Such sadism isn’t healthy in anyone, and in a king it is terrifying.’

Now Lady Elayne blushed scarlet, for it occurred to her that her conversation with the king was quite improper. Artor saw her embarrassment, and laughed.

‘I’m sorry, my lord,’ she apologized. ‘I really didn’t consider what I was saying. Forgive me if I have been overly frank.’

‘I don’t mind, Lady Elayne. I agree with everything that you say, but such talk might not be appropriate in the queen’s bower.’

It was now Elayne’s turn to laugh. ‘Lord, if you believe that, then you haven’t been privy to many of the conversations of well-reared maidens.’

‘Anyway, I’ve never considered Modred as a viable heir - never! I know far too much about that gilded young man to countenance his flaws as a ruler, or even as a member of my family.’

The king’s strong hands twisted in a way that Elayne had come to associate with shame. Artor seemed to be screwing up his courage to share a secret with her that he found deeply distasteful.

‘Modred isn’t even a true man!’

Elayne looked puzzled and Artor wished he’d remained silent. Some secrets were better left unsaid, and some nasty habits were bearable only when they were kept from the light of day.

‘I don’t understand, sire.’ Elayne’s open face glowed with concern and curiosity in the semi-darkness of the hall.

‘Forget everything I’ve said about him, Lady Elayne,’ Artor murmured. ‘I was rambling like an old grandam, and I should learn to keep my opinions of my kin to myself.’

Artor had been nurtured in the Roman world and had absorbed their sexual tolerance with the milk of his wet nurse. Where a man chose to find his sexual gratification was a matter between his conscience and his gods - and no concern of the High King. But Modred had gone beyond what Artor could condone, and had raised an ancient spectre that troubled the king’s already burdened spirit.

The High King had discovered Modred’s secret life by pure chance, for the Brigante understood Cadbury too well to hunt for prey within the confines of the tor. A crofter had approached the king when he was riding with his guard and had spoken the unspeakable to his lord and master.

The farmer had leapt out into the roadway, almost under Artor’s horse.

‘By the gods!’ the king shouted and wrenched back on the reins so that his horse almost fell backwards on its haunches.

Odin drew his fighting axe and for a moment the roadway was a mêlée of wheeling horses, drawn weapons and angry men.

‘My lord! Save me! Save my son!’ the crofter cried out, his face streaked with dust and tears. As the man pawed at his leg, Artor caught the reek of fear and filth.

‘Leave him be, Odin,’ the king ordered. ‘He’s unarmed and can’t harm me.’

Artor dismounted and helped the man to his feet from where he was kneeling in the dust of the roadway.

‘Why have you stopped me at such risk to yourself? My bodyguard could have killed you for your foolishness. Come, man! Speak up if you want something of me. I cannot guess.’

‘I can’t speak in front of them,’ the farmer whispered, and pointed in the direction of Artor’s bodyguard. ‘Please, my lord, I’m fearful and ashamed.’

The farmer couldn’t have been above thirty years of age, but his back was twisted as if he was twice those years. From his unkempt hair to his mended clothing, he stank of poverty.

Pitying the man, the High King drew him a short distance away from his bodyguard so they were just beyond earshot. Odin expressed his displeasure in every muscle.

‘We are a poor family, my lord, for our land is not as rich as it could be, and I owe part of my crops to my landlord. Otherwise, I’d never have sent my Finbarr off with the young master.’

Artor nodded in understanding.

‘Finbarr is my oldest boy, but he’s small, and not much use on the farm. The young lord rode past our croft one day, saw my boy and offered to take him into service. I couldn’t see any harm in it. I swear, my lord, I’d not have taken his coin if I’d known there’d be any hurt done to the boy.’

Awkwardly, Artor patted the man’s shoulder in a gesture of sympathy, although he wondered if the farmer was too full of excuses to be completely innocent.

‘Finbarr went to Cadbury and we heard nothing of the boy for some weeks until he arrived home three days ago. He was bleeding, and he told me he’d been raped and beaten. His spirit is crushed, and he lies beside the fire and won’t eat. What can I do, my lord? I’ve already spent the coin that the young lord gave me.’

Even then, Artor felt little concern. The man had sold off his eldest son and now, in the aftermath of his greed, the crofter wanted some kind of justice for the boy. Contempt creased the High King’s features.

‘How old is Finbarr?’ Artor asked.

‘He’s eight, my lord, but he’s small for his age.’

‘Faugh!’ Artor made an involuntary sound of disgust. The boy’s youth made the father’s crime even worse, for what innocent reason could a noble want with a small child? In his heart of hearts, the crofter must have suspected that his son was in danger.

The abuse of children was the taint of every society and frowned on by all. A memory returned to Artor of a hellish crypt that he had entered during his youth, a place where young boys had been taken by perverted men, now mercifully dead, who had indulged their sick fantasies on the children’s tender flesh. With the memory came the smell of decomposing flesh and the keening of bereaved women. It haunted Artor still.

‘Who was the young lordling who purchased your son?’ Artor’s voice was wintry and hard, and his words didn’t spare the sensibilities of the cringing father.

‘He didn’t give his name to me, but Finbarr called him Lord Modred.’

Appalled, Artor wheeled away. He ordered Odin to give the farmer a gold coin to care for his son and, later, sent a trusted healer to visit the croft.

Artor attempted to assuage his conscience as best he could, for he chose to avoid raising the subject with Modred. What was there to say? The Brigante alliance was far more important than a tow-headed boy, but Artor carried the guilt of his inaction.

As Artor explained to Taliesin that evening, the Union of Kings had cost him dearly, for he had been forced to tolerate behaviour that he found repugnant. When Lady Elayne was unavailable, Taliesin had become an excellent sounding board for, unlike the lady, Artor could tell the young harper anything he desired.

‘You didn’t consider the tribes when you punished Luka’s murderers,’ Gareth murmured as he offered his king a flask of clean water and a bowl of apples. ‘You rode roughshod over your own rules.’

‘That was different!’ Artor snapped.

Odin raised one eyebrow and Artor had the grace to colour.

‘Very well. I lost my temper when Luka was killed and I didn’t wait for the tribal kings to pass judgement on his murderers.’

Odin handed his king a small paring knife to cut his fruit.

‘My bad temper doesn’t change the present situation. The Brigante tribe is important to our cause, because they control the central west and are essential to our campaign against the barbarians. Can you imagine what would happen if the Saxons made a concerted attack on the Brigante lands and defeated them? They could fight their way through Modred’s lands to the Oceanus Hibernicus. The whole north would be cut off and defenceless. How, then, could we hold our enemies at bay? We couldn’t! Eventually, we would lose the entire west!’

Or so Artor tried to tell himself. But, when he watched Modred sit among the women with his mobile brows raised sardonically and his well-shaped mouth spouting ugly nothings, the High King felt genuine disgust with himself.

Careful checking by Gruffydd soon revealed the full extent of Modred’s sins. Girls, slaves, boys and vulnerable women were all food for the Brigante king’s table, and anyone could become his victim if they fell under his power. Modred wasn’t fussy, because what he enjoyed was the infliction of pain and humiliation, not the drive of sexuality. The sex of the partner didn’t seem to matter, and Artor became certain that all his prey were stand-ins for that one person who had rejected Modred before he was even aware of what humiliation meant - his mother, Queen Morgause.

Modred might appear to be sophisticated and self-contained, but Artor was sure that he was seeking revenge on all the Brigante people, particularly those men, women and children who had bullied and brutalized him during his lonely childhood. A volcano of rage must boil under Modred’s quiet face. With a vague sense of regret, Artor felt some empathy for Modred’s motivation, for he could easily have travelled that same bleak landscape of pain if the three travellers had not come to the Villa Poppinidii forty-eight years earlier and if Frith had not given him her unconditional love.

‘Modred will never be whole - never!’ Artor muttered to himself. ‘Caius was the same. He demonstrated that people cannot escape the damage done by the traumas and hurts of their youth. They can only hide their true selves for a time, for the poison festers and must find an outlet sooner or later.’

So he let Modred be, and knew that he was merely delaying the inevitable. But he continued to watch the Brigante carefully because he understood that the circle of his life was beginning to close.

Later that week, Elayne and Artor once again strolled round the king’s hall in private. Artor was explaining the pleas for help from Portus Adurni and its fear of Anderida, the now-impregnable Saxon fortress on the southern coast, when he heard a small noise from outside the door. Still speaking naturally, he walked quietly to it and abruptly pulled it open.

Modred stood in the doorway with his body slightly crouched as if he had been caught rising from his knees. The King of the Brigante appeared unembarrassed by his exposure and continued to straighten slowly before falling into a low, ironic bow.

‘Have you heard all you wanted to know, Modred?’ Artor asked pleasantly. Elayne had noticed that the High King always controlled his temper around Modred.

‘The population of Portus Adurni always jumps at shadows,’ Modred drawled. ‘Of course, you could repeat history by taking the Anderida fortress once again, but I’d be reluctant to crawl through mud if I were your age, my liege.’

‘I wouldn’t dream of asking you to do so, Modred. By all reports, the mud you favour is moral and beyond my understanding.’ Full of false bonhomie, Artor clapped the smaller man on the back a little too enthusiastically. ‘Besides, all the real heroes of Anderida, except for Odin and myself, are dead. Perhaps you’d not last long anyway, stripped of your little . . . comforts.’

Modred frowned, showing his discomfiture. The Brigante rarely revealed his feelings on his disciplined face, so Artor savoured his small victory.

‘I don’t know what you mean, sire?’

‘Yes, you do!’ Artor grinned. ‘I don’t suppose you ever dreamed I’d discover your secret. I’ve been riding out of Cadbury recently to meet my poorest vassals. It’s amazing what they’ll do for a few coins.’

Modred whitened.

‘As for dealing with the Saxons of Anderida, that is soldiers’ work,’ Artor continued urbanely, ‘and I’ve noticed you prefer the company of women - and children.’

‘That failing seems to run through our family, my lord.’ Modred smiled down the hall at Lady Elayne. ‘I bid you good morning, my lady. Does the noble Bedwyr find life at Ratae congenial when he is so far from your arms? I’m sure he must miss the felicity of your presence.’ Modred stared at the shadows beyond Lady Elayne.

‘Aye, Lord Modred,’ she replied pleasantly. ‘He writes quite often to tell me so.’ Her cool eyes met Modred’s with a contempt that was palpable. She moved forward into the light that spread inward from the open doorway, and behind her came Odin and her maid. ‘He bids me to take good care of our king, as all loyal subjects should. I notice you listen at doors carefully, my lord. Is it, perhaps, to learn whether our king has need of you?’

‘Of course,’ Modred answered, and inclined his head sardonically. He enjoyed these cat-and-mouse games, especially when he was on safe ground. It was unfortunate that Artor had discovered his secret and now had a potent weapon to hold over his head, but there was always some saving grace in any disappointing situation. Artor had said nothing openly. And he won’t, Modred thought smugly, not when he needs my warriors more than ever, now that we have a Saxon summer upon us.