The Book of Mordred (5 page)

"What did he look like?" Lambert asked.

"Ugly," Alayna said, and knew Lambert was going to ask it before she had even closed her lips on the word.

"Ugly, how?"

Ugliness was a subjective quality. "Big nose, pocked skin." She added, "And he had dark hair." She indicated just below her ear before Lambert could ask and added, "Neither curly, nor exactly straight."

"Any scars, distinguishing features?"

"No," Alayna said.

Lambert made a dismissive gesture. "Could be anyone."

"No," Alayna insisted. "I would recognize him."

"You think," Lambert reminded her.

The younger knight with the fair hair—Percival—said, "Tell us about the child."

Beside her, Galen rested his hand on her shoulder.

"My husband," Alayna said, "was a wizard. Kiera may have some of his"—even after all this she hesitated—"...ability."

"What sort of ability?" asked a man at the table who had not previously spoken, a stout man with very little hair. "Precisely."

"Precisely, it's hard to say," Alayna said. "You know how little children are." But there was a good chance they did not. Guinevere, despite being a queen, despite being childless, would probably understand. Men, even fathers, rarely knew as much about young children or noticed things as women did. "She might or might not be able to talk to animals.
Sometimes
" she admitted, "she truly seems to be able to; sometimes, she seems to be simply playing a game."

She expected the men would be losing patience with her, but—with the exception of Lambert, who was sitting on the edge of his seat but had his head tipped back so that he was staring at the ceiling—they gave no outward signs of wanting to hurry her.

"Sometimes," she continued, "she tells me something will happen, and it does." She found it difficult to break her old habit of trying to find natural explanations for Kiera's unnatural abilities, and couldn't help but add, "Though sometimes it does not. This morning..." She licked her lips:
Why
hadn't she paid closer attention? Why hadn't she believed? Could all this have been prevented if she had done something based on Kiera's warning? But it had been so vague:
Something had is coming.
How could one prepare for that? But still, Kiera safe at home, Ned alive and well: It was an alluring picture. She swallowed hard and said, "This morning she was afraid of something. She said she saw something bad happening, something dangerous. I thought she'd had a bad dream."

The knight closest to her, the stout, balding man, reached over to give her hand a squeeze.

Lambert sighed. Loudly.

Percival asked, "How many people know of the child?"

"Know of her?" Alayna repeated.

Lambert sighed yet again and said, "I think what Sir Percival is trying to ask is this: How many are aware of her so-called abilities? From the way you have presented the matter, you yourself are not certain whether they truly exist or not. Does this mean you ignored these abilities, or have you worked to conceal them?"

"I..." One made her sound a fool, the other—someone who would use people and try to manipulate them. Was that what she was?

Quietly, evenly, Mordred said, "Anyone who knew the father was a wizard might suspect the child. Whether the child truly has power is unimportant; the fact that she
might
may well be the reason she was taken."

Percival, with a glance at Lambert—who hadn't had a chance to say anything—said, "I think what Sir Lambert is trying to say is he agrees."

"Much more reasonable," Lambert argued with a sour look for the younger man's mockery, "that some ruffians, wearing stolen or discarded armor chose a well-born lady living alone at a remote residence, and—intent on extorting a ransom—"

"They burned her house down around her," Mordred pointed out. "Hard to collect a ransom, if you destroy all the property; harder yet if you kill the person most likely to pay the ransom."

"Please do not interrupt," Lambert said. "That would still leave Sir Galen, who might—"

This time it was Arthur who interrupted. "Mordred and Percival may well have a point," he said. "There seems little reason to suppose that abductors would choose the roundabout way of seeking ransom from an uncle rather than a parent.
Or,
" he added quickly since Lambert was opening his mouth, apparently ready with a rebuttal, "if the mother did not have as much money as the abductors hoped to gain, why not hold her as hostage, too, and call on the ties of brother, as well as uncle?"

"A child is easier to control than a grown woman," Lambert objected.

Arthur nodded but said, "Nonetheless..." and—incredibly—Lambert finally bowed his head to acquiesce. "So," Arthur continued, "we have a child taken, apparently by knights, apparently because of her abilities—real or imagined—in the art of magic. Therefore, we will start our search by questioning the wizards of the realm."

Mordred said, "I will call upon Halbert of Burrstone."

Lambert said, "You always suspect Halbert of everything, ever since you lost that joust with his nephew Bayard. Lances
do
break, you know, without magical intervention."

Mordred gave a tight smile and said, "Halbert is also closest, which makes him most likely to have heard of this child."

The other young knight, Sir Percival, gave the name of another wizard, and said he would ride to that one's home. Several of the other knights called out the names of wizards they would seek out.

They were discussing her daughter, and nobody looked ready to explain the direction the discussion had taken, so—feeling like a child unable to understand the discourse of adults—Alayna raised her hand and timidly asked, "Why wizards?"

Arthur answered, "Ever since Merlin left Camelot to be with Nimue,"—Alayna saw a few smiles, a few smirks around the table, but Arthur never blinked—"there has been no clear leader, no master magician. Some have started actively vying for power."

Alayna cleared her throat and asked the King in a whisper, "How do you mean 'vying'? Magical contests?"

"Well, yes, contests," Arthur said. "Sometimes." Then he admitted, "Sometimes assassinations."

Alayna couldn't help herself, even though this was the King of whom she was demanding answers. "What are you saying?" She was aware that several of the men around the table leaned forward to hear her better, but she couldn't get her voice above a whisper. Beside her, Galen squeezed her shoulder, which might have been a warning that she shouldn't interrupt the King. But she continued. "Do you think that Kiera was eliminated as a potential rival?"

Arthur didn't answer. Mordred was looking steadfastly at his own hands. Galen, she saw, was chewing the inside of his cheeks—a habit she remembered from their childhood whenever their father unexpectedly summoned them before him. Kiera had picked the trait up from him.

Alayna felt an ache in her chest—a need to be reassured that her daughter was warm and well treated whether in a wizard's captivity or elsewhere. "Kiera is still alive," she said steadily. "I am her mother; and I can feel it."

Arthur and Mordred exchanged a glance, but had the good grace not to offer their opinions.

Although Galen had not participated in the council, now he spoke. "I would like to take part in the search for my niece. I do not know any of these wizards of whom you speak, but if someone tells me the name of one who might be involved, and where he is likely to be found..."

Arthur said, "The five who have just been spoken for
are
the most likely. There are, of course, always village-wizards and country witch women, but if we begin to question all of them..." He shook his head. "That would be a task for more knights than there are in all of Camelot, if we were to seek them out in a timely manner. And I think it unlikely that the wizards of other lands would concern themselves with a five-year-old girl whose abilities may or may not surpass her father's."

He was reminding them, Alayna thought, in as gentle a way as he could in front of Toland's widow, that Toland himself had been nothing but a village-wizard, not powerful enough to attract attention, so his daughter's fame was not likely to spread far.

The stout, bald-headed man seated beside Alayna said, "But the earlier the power manifests itself, the stronger it is likely to be."

"So it is said," Arthur agreed. Turning back to Galen, he said, "Still, Sir Galen, if there is a wizard behind this, it is likely to be one of the five just spoken of. Leave that quest to the older knights."

"Such as Sir Mordred?" Galen asked, for Galen was probably closer in age to Percival, with Mordred being the youngest.

But the King did not take this boldness amiss. He smiled indulgently—again Alayna was reminded of a forbearing father. "I agree it would be an excellent arrangement for you to accompany Sir Mordred," he said, which wasn't, exactly, what Galen had asked. "And at the same time, we will see if a ransom is demanded. And the child will be remembered in our prayers." He stood to indicate the council was over. "I believe supper must be almost ready, if not already set out."

The others stood also and began to move toward the door.

Prayers. Was that all that was left to her now? Was praying the most she could do to help Kiera?

Mordred said to Galen, "I would be honored to have you accompany me," in too smooth a tone for Alayna to decipher if he meant what he said or its opposite. But if, in truth, he wasn't disposed to have Galen's company thrust on him, she thought, he certainly would not be pleased to hear that she, too, wanted to face Kiera's abductor.

Mordred was continuing, "Castle Burrstone is three days' journey to the northeast, assuming a fairly fast ride. I recommend simple breastplates—giving up some measure of protection for the extra speed that lightness will bring. How much time will you require to prepare?"

Alayna answered before Galen could. "I lost everything in the fire, so I must depend on the charity of someone here, please." Trying to make light, as though that would prove she would not be dead weight to slow them down, she added, "Of course, I never did have a breastplate."

It took several moments for either Mordred or Galen to grasp her meaning. In fact, she thought it was Sir Percival who understood first. She saw him stop, his expression exhilarated, unwilling to leave before this new, interesting diversion was settled.

In the doorway, Arthur turned back to say something to Percival, saw the younger man was no longer beside him, and paused also—which left the entire i council to either push ahead of their king or remain and listen to Alayna argue with her brother.

"You cant come with us," Galen said, aghast.

"Firstly," Alayna said, "that would be Sir Mordred's choice, not yours, because—after all—
you
are accompanying
him.
" And then, because—judging by Mordred's face—he was no more inclined than Galen to have her, she added, "Secondly, do not forget, I
saw
the men. I would recognize them." Lambert, annoyingly precise, said, "You think."

"I would come closer to it than anyone else." Alayna could hear the displeased murmur of the knights about her.

"Don't be absurd," Galen started, sputtering a bit—more and more like their father—at the same moment Mordred said, quietly, reasonably, "Lady Alayna, surely the child's best interests—"

"I would not slow you down," Alayna said—she honestly didn't think she would. She was certainly lighter than the men, and yet capable of riding a good horse. "Without me, you go to this wizard you suspect, you question him, you look around: What else will he say but
no,
he had nothing to do with stealing away Kiera? But there is a good chance I will know.
I
can say
yae
or
nay. I
can say:
This is the man, no matter what he tells you,
or
We are wasting our time; he wasn't there.
"

Mordred said, "The wizard was not likely one of the two knights himself."

Alayna brushed this argument away with an impatient hand. "His men, then. If he has nothing to hide, he will have no objection to presenting his knights to me."

The burly Gawain—who had not spoken up at the council—now said, "This is not women's work."

Galen said, "Alayna, use some sense. I know you are distraught—"

Someone interrupted, "If it comes to a fight, you are likely to get everybody killed, the girl included."

Alayna couldn't let herself believe that. She said, "I was trained to fight."

Her statement was met with looks and snorts of derision.

"Until I was twelve."

This was meant to show that the training was beyond a young child's playing, but obviously they were not impressed.

"I know I am not as strong as a man," Alayna said over their upraised voices. "But neither am I a helpless maiden who can do no more than clutch her hands together and faint at the first sign of trouble."

Unexpected ally, Mordred said, "Of which we have ample proof, by the fact of your being here."