The Book of Mordred (34 page)

"It's too complicated," Alayna said.

"Does it have anything to do with Halbert?" Still Kiera didn't look directly at her mother. She had the feeling she was approaching something she would never again be able to back away from, no matter what she learned. "Mordred mentioned Halbert that day ... that day Bayard rescued me. It seems I should know the name ... Shouldn't I?"

Alayna came and knelt beside her. She sighed twice and swallowed repeatedly before saying, "Halbert was a wizard, an evil man who had great power ... and wanted more."

"Mine?" Kiera asked. Of course hers. Why else would her mother have such trouble saying it?

Alayna hesitated, then nodded.

"And Bayard worked with him?" Kiera guessed.

"No! I mean yes, but..." Alayna got up, and started to pace. "Bayard did not
ask to
be Halbert's nephew. And Halbert used people. He had enough power that he could force people, or trick them." She turned to face Kiera. "Halbert was the cause of how your Uncle Galen came to die."

That was part of the quest Alayna had been on, so many years ago, that nobody—not Alayna, not the great-aunts—ever wanted to talk about. Kiera pictured herself very, very young—probably no more than two or three years old—and her uncle, holding her by the hands and twirling, twirling, twirling her, while she kept saying, "Do it again!" And she realized—for the first time—that he was also the vacant-eyed man she had occasionally glimpsed in her visions.

Alayna was saying, "He used me, too, for a while."

Kiera shuddered, yet couldn't think why.

"But Mordred remembers what he wants to remember. And Mordred's perception of things does not allow for Bayard to be as much a victim as I was." Alayna forced a cheery smile. "Surely we can talk about this some other time."

Kiera forced herself not to give in, not to make peace. She asked, "How many years have you been telling me that?"

Alayna straightened her loom. She picked up the shuttle and began to undo the part she had ruined. "Bayard is a good man," she said. "You can see it in his eyes. Besides, would the evil accomplice of an evil wizard have helped you?" For one moment, she looked directly into Kiera's eyes. "Sometimes Halbert worked with corrupt people, but he forced good men to his will, too, and that didn't make them any less good."

Kiera could see that. "Yes, but—"

"I do not want to talk about this anymore," Alayna said so firmly that Kiera knew she would not learn any more today.

She sighed. "No, Mother," she agreed.

Kiera saw little of the sweeping changes Alayna had been afraid Arthur's return would bring, but neither did things go back to normal.

Then again, Arthur only stayed for one day.

Lancelot formally committed Queen Guinevere to Arthur's care, then immediately returned to France, to Joyous Gard.

Kiera glimpsed Guinevere, accompanied by the ladies who had waited on her at Lancelots castle, but she was not invited to join them. They made immediate preparations to leave for London, away from court for an indefinite stay.

Meanwhile Arthur, looking dull-eyed and stooped, announced that he, too, was leaving again at dawn. Now the men were confident of an easy victory—for at last Lancelot could no longer hide behind concern for the Queen. People gleefully reminded each other that Merlin had prophesied Arthur would never lose a battle throughout his life. Camelot's mood was one of exhilaration.

Kiera stood at a parapet and watched the army leave once again. Below, sunlight shone on burnished metal and brightly colored caparisons; but all around her, Camelot began to settle down to the routine of the working day. A servant girl leaned out of a nearby window, not watching the army, but shaking out linens, while the voice of the new stable master called to his assistants.

Long after the army had become indistinct in the distance, Kiera remained where she was, letting the early morning breeze blow her hair away from her face.

Finally she pushed away from the balustrade, but then she leaned forward again. A sudden fog had formed in the hollow the men were just entering. It was too quick to be earthly fog, for in a moment it had engulfed not just army and hillside but was sweeping up toward her.

"No," she whispered, but had no power beyond that to resist.

The gray swirled up and she could no longer see the balustrade, just a handbreadth away from her fingers. The air hissed about her and stung her eyes and she saw the shadows of knights fighting near her, although that would mean they were suspended high above the countryside.

"
Arthur," she called, though she couldn't get her voice above a whisper for she saw the King bent double, on his knees, his silver armor bloodied.

"
Mordred," she heard Arthur gasp. "Mordred.
"

Kiera stepped back, unmindful that her senses had become confounded and she might be heading for the edge. "No," she said, afraid of what her vision could possibly mean. "Please, Mordred, no."

She glimpsed him in his black armor; his sword raised, turning to face her.

"
No!
"

The scream was echoed by the buzzards that wheeled above.

She covered her face, staggered, felt the rough stone of the parapet against her knees. The air smelled of dew on grass, not burning bodies, and the sun was warm on the back of her hair. She lowered her hands. Far away, King Arthur's army continued to march under the cloudless sky, and—not quite so far—a herd of sheep grazed unperturbed on a green hillside.

She passed her hands over her face and turned to go back indoors.

And met the appraising gaze of Hildy, watching her steadily. Hildy, who had been so friendly that first day in Queen Guinevere's service.

Hildy said, "
Please, Mordred, no
—what?"

Kiera moved to walk by her, but Hildy put her arm out to block the way.

"You said, 'Please, Mordred, no.' And you also said, 'Arthur.' Why?"

She was not answerable to Hildy, but she said, "I ... I must have just been thinking out loud. Daydreaming."

Hildy glared at her with loathing. "Another dream?" she said. "Such as the one you had that night in the ladies' chamber?"

"Please," Kiera said, "it's
not
that
I
caused anything bad to happen. I had a nightmare."

Hildy folded her arms and asked, "Oh, yes?"

Her sneering tone made Kiera add, "And you can't seem to make up your mind if that makes me a traitor or a witch. But I am neither. It was just I..." How could she possibly explain this, her confusion, her constantly shifting vision of what she now realized was a battlefield? "...I dreamt I saw Sir Gawain's dead face, only it didn't even happen exactly as in my dream—"

"Sir Gawain?" Hildy asked in an outrush of breath.

Kiera clapped her hands over her mouth. What had she said? "Agravaine," she whispered. "I meant to say Agravaine." She fought back a wave of nausea. "Of course Gawain is still alive. I just misspoke. I dreamed Agravaine was dead the night he was killed. But it didn't happen the way it did in my dream, so it wasn't any kind of prophecy—please don't hate me: I had that dream, and Agravaine is dead, but Gawain is fine, and I didn't mean to say Gawain, truly I didn't."

Hildy was watching her with a smile that was eager and hungry.

"I have to go now," Kiera said.

"Witch," Hildy called her.

It was no use arguing. Kiera turned to go.

"Witch," Hildy repeated, much louder.

Kiera fled indoors, but Hildy followed.

"Witch!" Hildy shouted.

People looked up. People stopped what they were doing.

"She's a witch!" Hildy's face was all red and puffy. "She just put a curse on King Arthur."

Kiera whirled around. "I did not!"

"She's a witch! She just put a curse on King Arthur! She's a witch!"

Hildy just wasn't going to stop. Kiera ran down the corridor and still Hildy followed, shouting, demanding attention. Kiera gathered up her skirts and ran down the flight of stairs leading to the level where she and her mother had their room.

"She's a witch!" Hildy screamed yet again.

As she reached the bottom of the stairs, Kiera looked back just in time to see Hildy start down after her. Except that Hildy was too busy pointing to hold up her skirts.

"She's a witch! She just put a curse—" Hildy's foot came down on the hem of her dress. She grabbed for the walls, but tumbled all the way down.

Mercifully, she didn't hit her head. Kiera ran to her side, and for a few moments, Hildy was too shaken to utter a sound. Then she began to wail. And finally, when it seemed everyone in the castle was gathered there around her, Hildy sobbed, "She's a witch! Did you see her make me fall? I heard her put a curse on King Arthur, so she tried to kill me."

"That's not true," Kiera said to the horrified faces around her.

"She looked at me," Hildy insisted. "She has the Evil Eye and she willed me to fall."

"I didn't do anything!"

"No," Hildy said, fighting back a sob, "and she didn't know anything about Agravaine's plans the night he broke into the Queen's chambers, either."

It didn't matter that Kiera couldn't find an answer. They wouldn't believe her anyway; they chose to believe the injured Hildy instead.

Somebody was pushing his way through the crowd—Padraic from the infirmary. But he hardly made note of Hildy. He took hold of Kiera's arm, hard enough to hurt. He told her, "You are an abomination against the natural order of God and his most Christian church."

"But," Kiera said, "but—"

"Throw her in the river and see if she floats," someone suggested.

Kiera whirled around but couldn't tell who had spoken.

Padraic smiled. "We shall bring her to Prince Mordred," he said. "We shall present our testimony. The result will be the same: trial by ordeal, trial by combat, or trial by jury—the truth shall be known, regardless of who may try to hide it. Then, Mordred himself will have to condemn her."

Kiera didn't know what they called Mordred away from, but he was obviously displeased. Sitting on his father's throne in the Great Hall, with a crowd of loud people all demanding immediate action, he looked at her coldly. She had hoped she would be brought to him in the smaller council room, where only a dozen people could fit—if that many—beyond whichever twelve men were seated at the Round Table. But this, apparently, was a matter for the entire court.

Alayna came rushing in, before the hearing started, but the guards that kept the crowd at bay would not let her approach where Kiera stood, along with those who would testify against her.

Mordred didn't even look at her. Kiera rested her fingertips against her throat and could feel the pounding of her heart there. It was only Mordred, she told herself, and she had never been afraid of Mordred before.

And so it began...

"She looked at my sister," Enid addressed the assembly. "From across the courtyard—glared at her, and my poor sister miscarried."

"Across the courtyard?" Kiera said. "I would not have even been able to recognize her from that far. I can't see that well."

Enid sucked in her breath. As did several others.

"Even if I had wanted to," Kiera added belatedly. Mother Mary, she'd made things worse.

"You heard her!" Enid cried. "She admitted it! She was after my sister!"

"No!"

"Four fine babies she has had," Enid persisted. "Four healthy, perfect babies in four years, and never a problem until you look at her. Explain that."

Mordred said nothing, and Alayna finally managed to push her way forward. Kiera fought the inclination to cling to her, as a toddling child might.
Can she see?
she wondered.
Can she see how grateful I am to have her here?

Not that she believed there was anything her mother could do to save her.

Alayna stepped between Kiera and Enid. "Come, come. These things happen, ask any midwife. You can't—"

"Well, what of my cakes then?" asked an older woman Kiera didn't even recognize. "I'm making sweet cakes for my niece's first-born's Christening, and
that one
comes by my window, and none of the cakes turn out. They're all hard and heavy and no good to eat, and sweet cakes has always been my specialty."