Legacy: Arthurian Saga (149 page)

"On my word as High King," he
finished.

It was not clear whether, even now,
the old herdsman believed him. "Well, call yourself king or not,"
he said, "for a lad you show some sort of sense. You listen to them
that knows, not like some" -- this with a malevolent glance in
Cei's direction -- "that's all noise and wind. Fighting men,
indeed! Anyone who knows aught about fighting and the like knows
there's no man can fight with an empty belly. You give my cows the
grass, and we'll fill your bellies for you."

"I have said you shall have
it."

"And when yon builder" -- this was
myself -- "has got Caer Camel spoiled, what land will you give me
then?"

Arthur had perhaps not meant to be
taken so quickly at his word, but he hesitated only for a moment.
"I saw good green stretches down by the river yonder, beyond the
village. If I can --"

"That's no manner of good for beasts.
Goats, maybe, and geese, but not cattle. That's sour grass, that
is, and full of buttercups. That's poison to grazing."

"Indeed? I didn't know that. Where
would be good land, then?"

"Over to the badgers' hill. That's
yonder." He pointed. "Buttercups!" he cackled. "King or not, young
master, however much folks know, there's always someone as knows
more."

Arthur said gravely: "That is
something else I shall remember. Very well. If I can come by the
badgers' hill, it shall be yours."

Then he reined back to let the old man
by, and with a salute to me, rode away downhill, with his knights
behind him.

Derwen was waiting for me by the
foundations of the southwest tower. I walked that way. A plover --
the same, perhaps -- tilted and side-slipped, calling, in the
breezy air. Memory came back, halting me...

...The Green Chapel above Galava. The
same two young faces, Arthur's and Bedwyr's, watching me as I told
them stories of battles and far-off places. And across the room,
thrown by the lamplight, the shadow of a bird floating -- the white
owl that lived in the roof -- guenhwyvar, the white shadow, at
whose name I had felt a creeping of the flesh, a moment of troubled
prevision which now I could scarcely recall, except for the fear
that the name Guenever was somehow a doom for him.

I had felt no such warning today. I
did not expect it. I knew just what was left of the power I had
once had to warn and to protect. Today I was no more than the old
herdsman had called me, a builder.

"No more?" I recalled the pride and
awe in the King's eyes as he surveyed the groundwork of the
"miracle" I was working for him now. I looked down at the plans in
my hand, and felt the familiar, purely human excitement of the
maker stir in me. The shadow fled and vanished into sunshine, and I
hurried to meet Derwen. At least I still possessed skill enough to
build my boy a safe stronghold.

4

Three months later Arthur married
Guenever at Caerleon. He had had no chance to see the bride again;
indeed, I believe he had had no more speech with her than what
slight formalities had passed between them at the crowning. He
himself had to go north again early in July, so could spare no time
to travel into Cornwall to escort her to Guent. In any case, since
he was High King, it was proper that his bride should be brought to
him. So he spared Bedwyr for one precious month to ride down to
Tintagel and bring the bride to Caerleon.

All through that summer there was
sporadic fighting in the north, mostly a business (in that forested
hill country) of ambush and running skirmish, but late in July
Arthur forced a battle by a crossing on the River Bassas. This he
won so decisively as to create a welcome lull that prolonged itself
into a truce through harvest-time, and allowed him at length to
travel to Caerleon with a quiet mind. For all that, his was a
garrison wedding; he could afford to sacrifice no sort of
readiness, so the bridal was fitted in, so to speak, among his
other preoccupations. The bride seemed to expect it, taking
everything as happily as if it had been some great festive occasion
in London, and there was as much gaiety and gorgeousness about the
ceremony as I have ever seen on such occasions, even though men
kept their spears stacked outside the hall of feasting, and their
swords laid ready to lift, and the King himself spent every
available moment in counsel with his officers, or out in the
exercise grounds, or -- late into the night sometimes -- poring
over his maps, with his spies' reports on the table beside
him.

I left Caer Camel in the first week of
September, and rode across country to Caerleon. The work on the
fortress was going well, and could be left to Derwen to carry out.
I went with a light heart. All I had been able to find out about
the girl was in her favor; she was young, healthy, and of good
stock, and it was time Arthur was married and thinking of getting
himself sons. I thought about her no further than that.

I was in Caerleon in time to see the
wedding party arrive. They did not use the ferry-crossing, but came
riding up the road from Glevum, their horses gay with gilded
leather and colored tassels, and the women's litters bright with
fresh paint. The younger of the ladies wore mantles of every color,
and had flowers plaited into their horses' manes.

The bride herself disdained a litter;
she rode a pretty cream-colored horse, a gift from Arthur's
stables. Bedwyr, in a new cloak of russet, kept close by her
bridle-hand, and on his other side rode the Princess Morgan,
Arthur's sister. Her mount was as fiery as Guenever's was gentle,
but she controlled it without effort. She appeared to be in
excellent spirits, as excited, one gathered, over her own
approaching marriage as over the other, more important wedding. Nor
did she seem to grudge Guenever her central role in the
festivities, or the deference she received for her new state.
Morgan herself had state and to spare: she had come, in Ygraine's
absence, to represent the Queen, and, with the Duke of Cornwall, to
place Guenever's hand in that of the High King.

Arthur, being still ignorant of the
seriousness of Ygraine's illness, had expected her to come. Bedwyr
had a quiet word with him on arrival, and I saw a shadow touch the
King's face, then he banished it to greet Guenever. His greeting
was public and formal, but with a smile behind it that she answered
with a demure dimple. The ladies rustled and cooed and eyed him,
and the men looked on indulgently, the older ones approving her
youth and freshness, their thoughts already turning toward an heir
to the kingdom. The young men watched with the same approval,
colored with simple envy.

Guenever was fifteen now. She was a
shade taller than when I had last seen her, and more womanly, but
she was still a little creature, with fresh skin and merry eyes,
patently delighted with the fortune that had brought her out of
Cornwall as bride of the land's darling, Arthur the young
King.

She gave the Queen's excuses prettily,
with no hint that Ygraine suffered from anything other than a
passing ailment, and the King accepted them smoothly, then gave her
his arm, and himself escorted her, with Morgan, to the house
prepared for them and their ladies. This was the best of the town
houses outside the fortress walls, where they could rest and make
ready for the marriage.

He came back to his rooms soon after,
and while he was still some way down the corridor I could hear him
talking busily to Bedwyr. Nor was the talk of weddings and women.
He came into the room already shedding his finery, and Ulfin, who
knew his ways, was there ready to catch the splendid cloak as it
was flung off, and to lift the heavy sword-belt and lay it
aside.

Arthur greeted me gaily.

"Well? What do you think? Has she not
grown lovely?"

"She is very fair. She will be a match
for you."

"And she isn't shy or mim-mouthed,
thank God. I've no time for that."

I saw Bedwyr smiling. We both knew he
meant it literally. He had no time to trouble with wooing a
delicate bride; he wanted marriage and bedding, and then, with the
elder nobles satisfied at last, and his own mind free, he could get
back to the unfinished business in the north.

So much he was saying now, as he led
the way into the anteroom where the map table stood.

"But we'll talk of that in a moment,
when the rest of the Council comes. I've sent for them. There was
fresh news last night, by courier. Incidentally, Merlin, I told
you, didn't I, that I was sending for your young man Gereint, from
Olicana? He got here last night -- have you seen him yet? No? Well,
he'll be coming with the rest. I'm grateful to you; he's a find,
and has proved his value already three times over. He brought news
from Elmet...But leave that now. Before they come, I want to ask
you about Queen Ygraine. Bedwyr tells me there was no question of
her coming north for the wedding. Did you know she was
ill?"

"I knew at Amesbury that she was
ailing, but she would not talk about it, then or later, and she
never consulted me. Why, Bedwyr, what's the news of her
now?"

"I'm no judge," said Bedwyr, "but she
looked gravely ill to me. Even since the crowning I could see a
change in her, thin as a ghost, and spending most of her time in
bed. She sent a letter to Arthur, and she would have written to
you, she said, but it was beyond her strength. I was to give you
her greetings, and to thank you for your letters, and your thought
of her. She watches for them."

Arthur looked at me. "Did you suspect
anything like this when you saw her? Is this a mortal
sickness?"

"I would guess so. When I saw her at
Amesbury, the seeds of the sickness were already sown. And when I
spoke to her again at the crowning, I think she knew herself to be
failing. But to guess at how long...even had I been her own
physician, I doubt if I could have judged of that."

He might have been expected to ask why
I had kept my suspicions from him, but the reasons were obvious
enough so he wasted no breath on them. He merely nodded, looking
troubled. "I cannot...You know that I must go north again as soon
as this business is done." He spoke as if the wedding were a
council, or a battle. "I cannot go down into Cornwall. Ought I to
send you?"

"It would be useless. Besides, her own
physician is as good a man as you could wish for. I knew him when
he was a young student in Pergamum."

"Well," he said, accepting it, and
then again, "Well..."

But he moved restlessly, fidgeting
with the pins that were stuck here and there in the clay map. "The
trouble is, one always feels there is something one should be
doing. I like to load the dice, not sit waiting for someone else to
throw them. Oh, yes, I know what you will say -- that the essence
of wisdom is to know when to be doing, and when it is useless even
to try. But I sometimes think I shall never be old enough to be
wise."

"Perhaps the best thing you can do,
both for Queen Ygraine and for yourself, is to get this marriage
consummated, and see your sister Morgan crowned Queen of Rheged," I
said, and Bedwyr nodded.

"I agree. From the way she spoke about
it, I got the impression that she lives only to see both
marriage-bonds safely tied."

"That is what she says in her letter
to me," said the King. He turned his head. Faintly, from the
corridor, came the sound of challenge and answer. "Well, Merlin, I
could ill have spared you for a journey into Cornwall. I want to
send you north again. Can Derwen be left in charge at Caer
Camel?"

"If you wish it, of course. He will do
very well, though I should like to be back myself in good time for
the spring weather."

"There's no reason why you shouldn't
be."

"Is it Morgan's wedding? Or -- perhaps
I should have been more cautious? Is it Morgause again? ... I warn
you, if it's a trip to Orkney, I shall refuse."

He laughed. He certainly neither
looked nor spoke as if Morgause or her bastard had been on his
mind. "I wouldn't put you at such risk, either from Morgause or the
northern seas. No, it is Morgan. I want you to take her to
Rheged."

"That will be a pleasure." It would,
indeed. The years I had spent in Rheged, in the Wild Forest which
is part of the great tract of land they call the Caledonian Forest,
had been the crest of my life; they had been the years when I had
guided and taught Arthur as a boy. "I trust I'll be able to see
Ector?"

"Why not, once you've seen Morgan
safely wedded? I must admit it will ease my mind, as well as the
Queen's, to see her settled there in Rheged. It's possible that by
spring-time there will be war in the north again."

Put like that, it sounded strange, but
in the context of those times it made sense. Those were years of
winter weddings; men left home in spring to fight, and it was as
well to leave a secure hearth behind them. For a man like Urbgen of
Rheged, no longer young, lord of great domains, and a keen fighting
man, it would be foolish to put off the proposed marriage any
longer. I said: "Of course I will take her there. How
soon?"

"As soon as things are done here, and
before winter sets in."

"Will you be there?"