Under Camelot's Banner (48 page)

God's teeth would they not stop? He clenched his teeth but he had no will left. He could not even feel the strength of Morgaine's expectation and promise that he had carried so closely since she kissed him. He was alone, and sick with that knowledge, because it meant all he had done had come to nothing, and made him less than nothing, since he now had no clan to return to.

It was not possible that Kole was still there.

Peran saw Tam's face before him, his bright blue eyes closed off and cold, his disapproval at having to wait so long for his return to life shining in them so plain.

He had to do something, had to bring this madness to some good end. But how could he act alone? His head ached. His throat ached as if the Lady had never worked her healing on him. Perhaps his uselessness had revoked the balm she had bestowed on him, as his failure to watch over Tam had revoked the life she had returned to him.

I should go after Mesek. Kill him outright. Kill Lady Laurel before she can warn her sister …

And hold the whole of Cambryn alone against its men who will rise up and slaughter me if my own are not waiting for me to return so they can do it first.

Someone was going to come out of this door soon. Someone was going to come looking for him. If not Seleven, then one of Laurel's men. She was not fool enough to let him wander about her place unwatched. But he could not make himself move. The reality of his circumstance wrapped around him, seizing hold of his thoughts, twisting them mercilessly into new shapes, leaving head and gut cramped and sour. The woman he had held hostage now had but to reach out and strike him down and all would be over.

Then, slowly, another thought, a hazy dream of a memory came to him. He remembered Laurel's eyes as they stood together on the watchtower. He remembered pity. Pity, not hatred or anger as one would expect from an enemy, just a bottomless empathy, an expression of understanding that made him want to weep like a woman. He could not, no matter how he tried, remember what he had done to earn pity from her, but he remembered that it had been there.

What if she also remembered that pity? He had done her no real wrong. He had failed in that as he had in all other things. What if he went to her now and begged forgiveness and asylum? Mesek swore she had power that could thwart even Morgaine, and Mesek was a far more honest man than he.

The world bent and swam in front of him, and Peran felt that his skull would split in two. He bowed his head and clenched his eyes shut.

Please,
he prayed as the tears began to run down his face.
Please, Mother Mary, I beg you, I beg you, release me from this bewilderment. Please. Find me forgiveness, show me the way. Please, Holy Mother of Mercy, show me what to do!

In that painful, private darkness he suddenly saw the Lady Laurel. She stood at her loom as she had stood day after day with his men uselessly watching her. Unchanged by what had happened, infinitely patient, she waited. He saw again the sympathy in her green eyes. As he saw all these things, the trembling eased in his hands.

He straightened and opened his eyes. His vision had cleared and he could once more see the door in front of him. Laurel was there inside, unafraid and carrying within her all the power of her line, more than he would ever understand. That calm white lady whose eyes had shone with sympathy for him. Laurel, would know what to do.

But as he moved his hand to push open the portal, his heart filled with terrible hope, a harsh croak made him turn his head.

In the branches of the crooked apple tree that had been planted for luck near the tower door, crouched a raven. Little more than a patch of darkness in the greening branches, it looked at him with one eye.

I'm watching you,
the thought entered his mind unbidden.
I'm always watching you.
And in the gleam of that black eye, he saw Tam, and Tam told him what he must do.

Then, the raven took wing. Ignoring the rain, it soared up and for a moment, its black wings blotted out the sun. Then, it was gone, carrying his son away with it.

A kind of numbness overtook Peran. Despair, bottomless and endless swallowed him whole and it left no room for any other sensation. For he understood the truth now. God did not condemn him, nor had He abandoned him. God simply was not there. The Holy Spirit was nothing at all. There was only Morgaine, and nothing human or Divine stood before her. All his tiny struggles, all his fear and even this despair that slowed his heart beat and drove his chest to heave like a bellows, was nothing at all. She was the raven and the nightmare, and God was the illusion, and there was nothing to be done.

“I understand, Morgaine,” he told her. “I understand.”

Silent and solemn, Peran pushed open the door, but instead of walking toward the new hall where Laurel waited, he climbed the stairs and walked the long corridor with its closed doors concealing Roman-style apartments, until he reached the far end where the pair of Cambryn guards stood before the last door.

“I am come from the lady,” he said, without thinking. The words just came to him and he spoke them. He had no will, no volition left at all. “I am to try to talk some sense into her brother, to try to get him to tell what he knows.”

The men blinked, a little sleepily, and swayed on their feet as indecision took hold of them. Peran looked from one to the other, and then stepped between them and pushed open the door.

He walked into the damp and chill room, and Colan Carnbrea turned toward him.

“I am sorry about this, Peran,” he said as Peran closed the door securely behind him. “But my sister has managed to build a good defence against my lady and does not mean to let me live much longer. I must go now, and I need your help.”

“As our lady commands,” said Peran, his voice as steady as his hands. The pain in his throat had vanished, a sign that her grace had returned.

“Good.” Colan nodded. “Then give me your hand.”

Peran reached out and Colan seized on him with an unexpected strength. A wave of pain coursed through him. It seemed that all his bones were being swiftly broken, crushed and compacted. His throat so twisted and constricted so tightly that he could not even cry out. His skull squeezed down and his hands stretched and lengthened. His ribs shrank against his lungs and every fiber of him burned as if flesh and muscle melted away. He could not move, could not even close his eyes, and while the agony shot lightning before his eyes. He saw Colan Carnbrea grinning in his personal madness begin to stretch and change; his skin darkening, his beard thickening, and the right half of his face turning to the pebbled hide of a healing burn.

The pain and the vision were too much. Peran toppled over. The thing that had been Colan, caught him gently and swung him up onto the bed. From there, Peran watched himself stride out the door. Weakly he pushed himself up. He could scarcely move. It was as if all his fibers had become chains for his broken bones. But he managed to stumble to the window, leaning against the wall, breathing harsh and hard against the agony within him.

After a little time, he saw himself down in the yard, leading a great black mare by a simple halter. The mare tossed her head playfully, jerking the halter out of his hands. Peran down below made no move to retrieve it. He just bowed to the mare, and mounted onto her bare back. Horse and man looked up to him there in the window, and the man bowed, and Peran saw the horse had a woman's eyes.

We will need to find Mesek first,
the nightmare told Colan.
He is too dangerous to leave wandering about.

She pawed the ground once, wheeled herself around and trotted easily away. No one would stop them. Peran knew that. No one would even see them if she did not want them to.

Peran slid down to the floor. It was done then. His heart pounded against his new, narrower ribcage and his blood pressed hard against his skull, and Peran Treanhal gave himself over to that pain and slowly, let himself die.

The pale dawn light seeped slowly into the queen's pavilion. Lynet watched it with eyes gone dry from their sleepless staring. For hours she had prayed for daylight to come and wipe away the shadows. Now that it was come, she was too tired to do more than render dull and silent thanks as they faded.

Queen Guinevere was the first to wake. She shifted and rolled over, rising without protest or hesitation from her bed.

She had kept the mirror in her girdle. Lynet could feel the sick nagging weight of it as the queen stood and stretched. She turned and saw Lynet's open eyes. She nodded in greeting, and Lynet returned the gesture, glad to be spared the necessity of speech. She was cold. She ached, yet again. She lifted her face in hopes that the pale light would spare her some hint of warmth to move her sluggish blood and ease her dry eyes.

Around the queen, the ladies stirred, aware that something was happening, but wishing to deny it and sleep just that much longer.

“Come my women,” said Queen Guinevere gently, but firmly. “It is the morning, and we must make ready to enter Tintagel.”

As the women began to mutter and blink their eyes, waking reluctantly but obediently, Lynet saw a stranger behind the queen; a woman with black hair and startlingly bright blue eyes.

Morgaine!
Lynet jerked backwards.

“What is it, Lynet?” Queen Guinevere asked quickly. Behind her, the blue-eyed Morgaine was holding hands with a second Guinevere. The two of them spoke soft and low, and both had tears rolling down their cheeks, and Lynet knew that this was Morgause — Morgaine's sister, Guinevere's dear foster sister, Gareth's mother — and that this was the last time Queen Guinevere had seen this woman alive.

It was a shadow, a shadow walking in daylight and drifting behind the queen.

“Lynet?” Guinevere lifted her hand as Daere scrambled to her feet, blinking hard trying to clear her own mind.

“It is nothing,” Lynet said, closing her eyes and breathing deeply. “It was a pain in my arm.”

“These bandages should be changed and washed at once,” said Guinevere to Daere. “And mind her for fever.”

“Yes, Majesty,” the maid replied, with a rustling of cloth that was her curtsey. The queen believed. For the moment. Her mind was taken up with her plans and her memories. Lynet opened her eyes. The shadow was gone and she was able to breathe more easily.

It was nothing, a remnant of the night and of her folly. As the light grew stronger, surely there would be no more. She let Daere help her to sit up.
Surely there will be no more.

So began the preparations to enter Tintagel. The queen gave herself entirely over to her waiting women, not even delaying for breakfast to be served. She was bathed. Her long, rich hair was taken down from its simple plait, and brushed. Then it was twined with gold thread and pearls before being rebound again beneath a veil of snow white silk. Her underdress was also white as snow and over this was draped a robe of scarlet embroidered with swans that swam on a river of pearls. Gold rings ornamented her fingers and her arms. Her girdle was made of gold as well, each link shaped to resemble a different summer flower and studded with a different jewel.

Lastly, her crown was placed upon her head, and Guinevere stood, so rich and regal in her bearing that all her ladies made their curtsies to her, and Lynet with them.

Like all the other ladies, Lynet had been dressed in their finest. Her clothing was yet another gift from the queen and it weighed heavily on her. She dressed in blue and silver; a soft grey underdress overlaid by a robe of deep blue silk. Her silver girdle was in the shape of sea birds, their wings spread wide, and a silver band enameled with bluebells and hyacinths held her grey veil in place. It was more wealth and finery than she had ever worn at one time, and yet somehow it gave the appearance of grave modesty.

She stepped outside to breathe the morning air and to give those remaining more room to make their own preparations. She looked at the chaotic dance that was the process of decamping and of making ready for a grand procession, and blinked hard. It was as if she was seeing not double, but triple. Each human form had a shadow following it — one or more figures playing out some scene from the past. It was like seeing a thousand different mummers wandering about amidst the soldiers. Their voices whispered to her, trying to tell her their stories, explain all their secrets, all at once.

Stop.
Lynet closed her eyes.
Stop!

She stood like that for a long moment, praying Daere would stay inside. She did not want her maid to see. She did not want anyone near her. She felt as if her self had been hollowed out and refilled with some alien element that stretched her so tightly she would burst if touched by a careless hand.

Slowly, she opened her eyes, and now she saw only the mortal around her. The shadows were gone again, removed by with some shifting of light or awareness. Lynet tried to breathe, but could not draw in enough air.

It is only shadows,
she told herself.
You have seen enough of shadows now. It is nothing to fear. They are gone now.

Fortunately, the whole company was so busy with their own tasks, no one noticed her standing there trying not to see. The wagons that had carried the ceremonial trappings all this way were unloaded. The horses were brushed and combed, their harness hung with colored ribbons. The men polished their armor and weapons and scrubbed and cleaned their shields and themselves.

One group of men assembled the queen's litter chair. Lynet had never seen anything like it. It was, Daere said, a conveyance used by empresses of Rome. It was like a gilded throne, cushioned with silk. Pearls, garnets, amethysts and rubies overlaid the dragons and swans carved in sharp relief. The platform beneath the chair though was fitted with stout poles so that eight strong men could lift the queen onto their shoulders and bear her forward. Lynet herself was to ride with the other ladies. Her palfrey was blanketed in blue and grey to match herself, and its reins hung with blue ribbons.