The Road to Avalon (38 page)

“Fifteen, my lord.”

Gawain’s face wavered, out of focus, and Arthur fought to get a grip on himself. “Thank you, Gawain,” he forced out between stiff lips. “You may go.”

Gawain stood up, bowed slightly, and went down the center aisle with great dignity. No one watched him go. All eyes, surreptitiously, were on the king.

Next to him Cai said, “It won’t sell. The eyes, the hair: they’re from Uther, not Igraine.”

“Cai,” said Arthur, and even to himself his voice sounded odd, “I must get out of here.”

Cai grunted. “Give me ten minutes, and then you can leave.”

Arthur nodded mutely and sat in anguished silence as Cai had the final course served and then almost immediately removed.

It was in fact thirty minutes before Arthur could rise and officially close the officers’ dinner that had begun what seemed to him a lifetime ago.

Chapter 31

G
WENHWYFAR
took Morgause and her sons through the great hall, down a corridor and into a smaller hall that was also encircled by a colonnaded gallery. Mordred was too confused to do more than look around in bewilderment. Then they went through a door into an anteroom, through another door and into a room where three girls were sitting, sewing and talking. The talk stopped when the queen came in with her visitors.

Gwenhwyfar spoke to one of them. “Olwen, the Queen of Lothian has come to pay us a visit and she is weary from her long journey.” Gwenhwyfar smiled at Morgause. “I shall give you a room here in my quarters for the night, my lady. Olwen will see that you have all that you need.”

“Thank you.” Morgause looked worriedly at Mordred. “And my sons?”

“Doubtless they will like to stay with Gawain. For this night, however, I will lodge them in the palace also.”

“Thank you,” Morgause said again, obviously deciding to let things happen as they would. “The guards at your gates would not allow our packhorses in, so I shall have need of your kindness, my lady.”

“The men have orders not to admit anyone after seven,” Gwenhwyfar replied. “I shall be sure to have your things brought up to the palace early in the morning.”

Olwen came forward and Morgause, with one more look at Mordred, followed the queen’s serving woman out of the room.

Gwenhwyfar turned to the two princes. The older boy, Agravaine, had a very thoughtful look on his handsome face. It was to him that Gwenhwyfar spoke. “If you will follow me?”

They went back through the little hall, to the corridor they had come along earlier. Gwenhwyfar reached for a door that opened off the corridor and went through, with the two princes following her. The room they entered was obviously an anteroom with two doors opening off it. “This is your room, Prince” the queen said to Agravaine, and opened one of the doors to reveal a bedroom. Agravaine gave her a considering look before he slowly walked in. “A servant will be here shortly to attend to your needs” Gwenhwyfar said, and closed the door firmly behind him. Then she turned to Mordred and said, “This way”

He was surprised when she turned back to the corridor. This evidently was a suite of rooms; why was he not to sleep in the room opposite Agravaine’s? The answer came to him as he followed her across the corridor to another door and another antechamber. They wanted to keep him separated from his family. He did not understand why.

He entered the room she indicated and turned to look at her warily as she followed him in. He wished Agravaine were with him.

Gwenhwyfar felt pain knife through her as she met the boy’s eyes. Just so must Arthur have looked when he was this age. Just so might a son of hers have looked. “You bear a great resemblance to the king” she said, and now her voice did not sound normal.

“I know.” The wariness mixed with bewilderment. “Gawain did tell me once that I looked like the king, but I had no idea of how close the resemblance was.”

His bewilderment was genuine, she thought. He really had no idea of who he was.

Gwenhwyfar knew. He was Arthur’s son. He had to be. There could be no other explanation for such a resemblance. Nor had Arthur been prepared for it. Clever as he was at hiding his feelings, he had not been able to hide his shock at the sight of Mordred.

The boy was Arthur’s son. By Morgause? Gwenhwyfar did not think so. All her feminine instincts told her that her fastidious husband was unlikely ever to have been attracted by Morgause’s voluptuous charms. The knife edge of pain ripped through her once more. She thought she knew who Mordred’s mother was. Not Morgause, but Morgause’s sister. The witch. Morgan.

The boy was gazing at her with Arthur’s eyes. There was more in those eyes than bewilderment, however. There was also the dazzled wonder that was most men’s tribute to her extraordinary beauty. It was not a look she had ever seen on Arthur’s face, but it was there, unmistakably, on his son’s.

She forced herself to meet those uncannily familiar eyes with a semblance of equanimity. “It
is
rather a striking likeness. I wonder that your mother never noticed it.”

“My mother has never met the high king,” came the simple, devastating reply.

“That explains it, then,” said Gwenhwyfar through stiff lips. She turned to the door. “I wish you a good night’s rest, Prince. Ask the servant for anything you may need.”

“Good night, my lady,” came the boy’s polite reply. At least he did not have Arthur’s voice, she thought as she closed the door of his room behind her.

She retraced her steps to her own rooms, looked in quickly on Morgause, then sent Olwen on one last errand. She was to tell Arthur’s body servant, Gereint, that the queen wished to see the king as soon as possible.

She waited for two hours, until the dinner was long finished, before she sent Olwen with another message.

The reply was from Gereint, not Arthur. The king could not come to his wife tonight. The king had ridden out of Camelot an hour ago. Gwenhwyfar knew instantly where he had gone. To Avalon.

Arthur was in as little doubt as Gwenhwyfar as to Mordred’s identity. As he cantered Ruadh through the light July night, his mind was working, remembering, adding, subtracting, and coming up with its inevitable conclusion.

No child of Morgause’s and Lot’s would look like Mordred.

It was not Morgause who had borne a son fifteen years ago, but Morgan.

That was why she went so faithfully every year to Lothian. Not to see Morgause, but to see Mordred.

Mordred was his son. His son and Morgan’s.

Why had she never told him?

The last of the lingering July sunset had faded from the sky when Arthur rode into the courtyard of Avalon. All was quiet. The household, including Morgan, rose very early. It was after eleven o’clock now; they had probably all been abed for an hour.

Arthur rode Ruadh to the stable, woke up one of the grooms who slept in the attic, and told him to take care of the horse. Then he walked back to the house.

The night air was cool and he wore only a short-sleeved tunic, but he was not chilled. His mind was conjuring up for him another night, another time he had ridden alone to Avalon. He had been sixteen then, not much older than the boy at Camelot. He was thirty-one now, and the emotions tearing at him had not changed much over the years.

It was summer and all the shutters were open. Arthur went around to the back of the house to the window he knew was Morgan’s. It was slightly ajar. The high king of all Britain pulled it open, levered himself up with his hands, and climbed into the room.

He landed very softly on the floor inside, too softly to awaken any sleeper. But even though the room was dark, she was not asleep. “Arthur?” she said in a soft, worried voice.

“Yes. You knew I was coming?” He walked to the table where he knew there was a lamp. She heard him pick up a tinder box.

“I knew something had happened to distress you. A few hours ago. I didn’t know if you were coming here, though.” The lamp was lit and he turned to look at her. She was dressed in a thin, white round-necked gown, and her bare throat and arms were round and slender as a young girl’s. A strand of hair had caught in her eyelashes and she pushed it out of the way. She had been lying down; the light cover was pulled up to her waist and the pillow was dented. But she looked wide-awake.

“Morgause came to Camelot tonight,” he said. “She brought Mordred with her.” He watched her face change.

There was a very long silence. “I’m sorry. I never meant you to find out this way.”

His composure cracked. “How could you, Morgan? How could you have done this to me? Kept him from me? Not told me? And then to let me meet him like that, in front of everyone!”

She turned her face away as if she couldn’t bear to look at him. “I didn’t know, Arthur. I didn’t know they were coming to Camelot.”

“Well, they did.” His voice was bitter. “Gawain brought them into the dining room. I saw him for the first time in the full view of all my officers.”

She flinched, picturing the scene. He walked from the table to the foot of her bed. She felt his eyes on her face. He said, “I always swore that no child of mine would ever be reared the way I was.”

Her eyes lifted instantly. “He wasn’t! I would never have let that happen! He has been happy, Arthur. Please believe that.”

“I don’t know what to believe.” He was dark under the eyes and white about the mouth. “I still can’t believe that you did this to me.”

She drew a long breath. “I did it because it was the only thing I could do,” she answered steadily. “We could not marry. You know the reasons for that. Then I discovered I was to have a child.” She made her voice stay quiet and dispassionate, refusing to let him see the anguish that had filled her then, that filled her now. “Morgause saw it first, actually. I was too stupid, or too unhappy, to understand the signs. She saw it and she told Father. He wanted me to marry Cai.”

She saw, and perfectly understood, the look that flickered across his face. Her quiet voice continued. “I refused. I refused also to consider trying to abort the child. Father then said my only other choice was to go away, have the child in secret, and give it to someone else to rear.” It was so hard to say all this. It brought back the pain too vividly. She cleared her throat. “When I refused to do that too, Father said he would send for you.” She met his eyes. “He was ready to do that, Arthur. You must not blame this . . . situation on him.”

“
You
wouldn’t.” His voice was expressionless.

“I wouldn’t. I said that I would give up my child only if I could be assured he would be loved and cared for. I could see how Morgause was with her own children. When she said she would take the baby and pretend he was hers, I agreed.”

The lamplight was shining up under his face, lighting it from below, making the cheekbones look higher, the cheeks more hollow than they really were. “You told me you could not have children.”

“I can have no more children. Mordred’s birth was very hard. It did something to my insides.”

His head snapped up as if he had been punched in the jaw. “What do you mean, his birth was very hard?” Then, as she did not answer: “God. Your mother died in childbirth, didn’t she?”

“Arthur—” she began, but he cut in furiously.

“Was Merlin insane? What was he thinking of? He sent you off into some remote corner of Wales. You might have died!”

“Well, I didn’t. It was Morgause who got me through, actually. She was better than any doctor.”

He came around the bed and sat down. “I never knew.” He seemed to find that incredible. “You went through all that, and I never knew.” He found he was beginning to shake.

“I didn’t want you to know.”

“I don’t understand.” Even his teeth were chattering. “That time in Calleva, when I almost died. You said there was work for me. Then you hid your thoughts. You were thinking of him, weren’t you?”

“Yes.”

“Why didn’t you tell me?”

She looked at him out of grave brown eyes. “I didn’t tell you because I knew what you would do. You would never have left him in Lothian, Arthur. You would have acknowledged him and made him your heir.”

He stopped his teeth from chattering by sheer force of will. “He is my heir. I have no other son.”

Her eyes closed very briefly. “I know. And I am sorry.”

“Well, I’m not.” His eyes blazed. “I’m glad Gwenhwyfar has no children. I want our son to be high king after me.” He stared at her, his mouth hard. “Why wouldn’t you marry me, Morgan? Why did you send me to Gwenhwyfar? It didn’t matter that you could have no more children. We had a son. We could have had him made legitimate.”

“You don’t understand,” she began to say.

“No,” he shot back with corrosive bitterness. “I don’t understand. I wish to God I did.”

“It is really very simple,” she replied, not giving an inch before his anger. “I was not thinking of your need in this, Arthur. I was thinking of his. It was better for Mordred to stay in Lothian. He was happy. At least I could give him that, a happy childhood.”

There was silence. All that Morgan could hear was the tapping of a loose shutter as it bumped against the house in the soft night breeze.

“He would have been happy with you and me,” he said at last. His narrow nostrils were still pinched with temper, but his voice was quieter.

“No.” The shutter was tapping harder now. “He was better off in Lothian with Morgause. Happier. Safer. As you were happier and safer in Avalon than you would have been with Uther and Igraine.”

“I was happy in Avalon because I had you.”

She bowed her ruffled head. “I know.”

He reached out his hand to cover hers where it lay on top of the cover over her lap. He lifted it and kissed her palm once, hard, and then dropped it. “You’re right,” he said. “I would not have left him in Lothian. I have never been any good at giving up what is mine.”

Her hand tingled from the violence of his caress. “I have had a lot of practice,” she said.

He moved then and she was in his arms. She closed her eyes and pressed her forehead against his shoulder. He put his mouth to her hair. “Was it very bad?” he asked.

She had never talked about that time with anyone, but she had never forgotten it. “Yes,” she said. “Very bad. The hardest thing I have ever done in my life.” His arms tightened. “Even when he was a baby,” she added, very low, “he looked like you.”