Drystan sighed; his breath seemed to be coming with difficulty and only sighs provided him enough air.
"Yseult, I never consummated my marriage to Yseult of the White Hands. I couldn't."
A little whimper came from between her lips, and now it was her eyes she clenched shut before opening them again. "And I need to know this why?"
"Because I need to know if there's a future for us."
She let out a violent breath. "No."
His world died faster than he would have believed possible, in the space of one small word. The pain was like a giant fist clenching his chest. How could he have thought she would give him any other answer?
"I haven't been able to stop loving you, it's not that," she was saying now, but it was no comfort. "It's been so long, it's part of me now. It just hurts even more than it used to. You're married."
"And you are married to my father. You always have been."
Yseult shook her head, a bitter smile touching her lips. "Not always. The last five years. You have only been married what, four months?"
"Five."
"Five months. It was seven months ago I learned that you no longer loved me, that you had decided to marry another."
Any chance he had of changing their fate was slipping away, and he didn't know how to hold on to it. "I was angry."
"And because you were angry, you punish both me and Yseult of the White Hands. And yourself."
"And myself," he whispered.
"I love you as much as my life, as much as the son you have given me, but this is too sudden. I have spent the last half year trying to kill any feelings I have for you. And then there is your other Yseult."
Drystan nodded. His head felt light. He had attempted and lost. She ministered to the false sores on his skin, and he knew that his whole life was just as false, play-acting to hide the real pain beneath.
* * * *
Yseult could hardly explain to herself why she had reacted to Drystan the way she did, what had possessed her. Since spring, her plans for running away from Marcus had slowly become more concrete. Most important was to arrange the escape so that he could not take her or her son back. His plot with Lot and the other rebel kings would provide the perfect opportunity. Why hadn't she told Drystan that?
Because she had wanted to hurt him, that was why. She had wanted him to feel the kind of pain she had felt when Andred had brought her the news of his betrothal.
But the fact remained that she couldn't run away with him, not now. Not only was her pain still too fresh, she did not want Marcus distracted from his plan to take over the leadership of Britain: if he became an traitor, she would be free.
Before the winter snows made travel impossible, Marcus returned to Isca, claiming the crossing from Armorica had been too rough to make the trip sooner.
"Did you visit your son?" Yseult asked, her head bent over a fur-lined cape that she was making for Brangwyn as a wedding present.
"I have no need to visit my son," he said shortly, pulling her up from the stool on which she sat and shoving her towards their bedchamber.
She wondered why she couldn't learn to stop provoking him.
* * * *
Yseult tried to be happy for her cousin, and on some level she was. Brangwyn and Kurvenal were to have a Christmas wedding, as Arthur had, small and intimate, and the Dux Bellorum had even promised Kurvenal the command of a fort on the Sabrina Estuary for his years of service in the defense of Britain. Yseult could only hope her own plans to escape in the spring would be successful — without Brangwyn, life with Marcus would be hell.
Brangwyn's happiness was far from her mind, however, when the news from Bro Leon arrived. Drystan had gone missing.
According to the message from Yseult of the White Hands, her husband had disappeared on a trip to Kemper at the end of October. Yseult knew well enough where he had been in November, but they had all assumed he had returned to Armorica after they heard no more from him. But if he was neither in Isca nor Leonis, where was he?
"Is this your doing?" Marcus railed at her, slapping her across the room.
Yseult shook her head. "I have no idea where Drystan is."
He hit her again, and she winced, holding her hand to her cheek. "Careful, Husband. Arthur, Cador and others are coming to the wedding and may take note if my face is bruised."
He turned away with a snarl of frustration. "Arthur or no Arthur, I will kill you with my own hands this time if I find you are behind this."
The plans for the wedding were too far advanced to be called off, even for the news that Kurvenal's best friend was missing. They knew he had not disappeared in Kemper, but they feared something might have happened to him on the way back to Armorica.
Yseult sensed that Marcus was relieved she was so listless and cried so often during the days leading up to the wedding and the Christmas celebration — it meant that she had told the truth, and his son was not hiding somewhere nearby.
But where was Drystan?
* * * *
The cold reminded him of something, if only he could remember what. He had been this cold before, he knew that. Cold and happy.
The happiness was the reason he was here now, he knew that too. But why did so much of what he knew keep escaping him?
He bent down and picked up a smooth agate from the sand, silvery and pale, the color of the full moon, a color that meant joy to him. It was the joy he sought, another glimpse of it, but it eluded him. It wasn't here. He kept searching for it, but it wouldn't come.
He gazed up at the rocky promontory jutting out into the sea ahead of him, empty. Empty of life, empty of delight. The tangled mat of his hair whipped around his face, and he shoved it back with one chapped and calloused hand. He was hungry. It was time to catch fish for dinner.
His bare feet made squeaking noises in the sand as he walked, rubbing grains together, against his skin, squeak, squeak, a strange sound, and he watched his naked toes in fascination for a while, smiling, forgetting his hunger, forgetting what he had lost.
A noise broke through the peaceful sound of surf and sand, human, jarring, wanting something from him.
"Hey!"
He looked up, frozen, not knowing what to do. Down the beach was a fisher hauling in a small coracle. The fisher turned towards him, waving.
He whirled and ran, down the beach, back into the caves. Caves were good. Caves meant safety and protection. The caves would hide him.
But once they had meant more. Why wouldn't the joy come?
* * * *
Some times he knew more than at others. When he touched the wall of the cave, damp and hard against his hand, he remembered her, his joy, remembered the feel of her in his arms, her long hair flowing across his forearms, remembered the scent of her, hot and sweet, not like the cold moonlight of her eyes, remembered the sharp pleasure of entering her.
She had drawn him back here to the Rock, where he first brought her, where he had given her up, where they had made love against the wall of the cave. Where was she now?
* * * *
He spent his days foraging for food and walking the beach and hiding. He didn't understand why they were after him. He meant no one harm, wanted only to keep to himself and wait for her. As the days grew longer and warmer, there were more of them to hide from, but the one he waited for still did not come.
On the cliffs above and the bluffs to the south, the wildflowers were beginning to bloom, and he felt a smile coming to his lips more often as color returned to his life. The sun was warm sun on his back when he dug for clams in the morning. But as life became easier and more pleasant, more people began to intrude on his isolation, none of them the one he looked for, the reason he was here. At least there were places to hide in the rocky cliffs along the beach, formations of rock, slate and granite, jutting out into the sand, into the sea, jumbles of boulders beside and below them, with caves in between, many, many caves. He knew them all now, had explored this thin stretch of beach thoroughly while he hid an
d waited.
He waited, but still she didn't come.
A noise above alerted him, and he gathered his tools and scampered into one of his hiding places. While he watched from behind a tumble of rocks, a large group of people came down on a steep path from the bluff, more than he had ever seen here at one time. They wore tunics belted at the waist and breeches tied at the ankles, and they had daggers tucked into their belts and swords slung over their backs. Warriors. Why would warriors be combing this beach, a place for fishermen and lost souls?
Two of them came near his hiding place, a dark-haired one with a sarcastic slant to his mouth, and another with wavy brown hair and the pain of loss around his eyes. The sight of them tugged at something in his mind. He ducked down, peeking between two boulders leaning into each other.
"This is futile," the dark-haired one said, shaking his head. "We don't even knows if this monster or madman the villagers keep seeing is him."
The other warrior pursed his lips. "Perhaps not, but he disappeared at about the same time the sightings began, and they are always on these beaches near Dyn Tagell."
Dyn Tagell. He gave a start. That name meant something to him, many things. Summers and seagulls and ships, arriving and leaving, ships carrying tin, ships carrying enemies; another cave, an herb garden, baths. Things he wanted and didn't want.
"Perhaps we should try calling him," the brown-haired warrior suggested. His speech was punctuated by the regular sound of the waves, a soothing rhythm, constant, something he could rely on. Not like the things he wanted and didn't want, the things that tugged at him at the sight of these two men.
"He may not know his name — if it is even him, which I doubt."
"But it's worth a try."
The warrior with the sardonic expression shrugged, and then cupped his hands to his mouth.
"Drystan!"
He jumped, even more startled than before. Drystan.
He pressed himself back against the boulder. There was even more meaning here, meaning he no longer wanted.
"Drys!" the other one called out. "Are you there, Drys?"
No. That voice, saying that name ... no.
They moved away, still calling out in competition with the wind and the waves, and he crawled farther back into his lair, hiding from them, from the name they had given him, from the things that had driven him away.
* * * *
Drystan.
The name brought fear, and the fear put a rent in the veil in his mind. He didn't want the knowledge that came with that name. He wanted only the sand and the sea and the rocks, the clams he dug in the morning and the fish he captured in the evening, wanted to wait here for his joy to return, with none of the worry and pain he kept at bay.
His fingers traced a wavy pattern of on the cliff beside him, curved and twisted as if it were soft as clay, bent by the hand of some god.
Drystan. Ever since he had first heard it, the name danced in his head, teasing him to remember. When he built a small fire in the lee of a rock or fetched water from the stream tumbling down from the bluff, the names haunted him, like a marching chant, orders to follow.
Drystan, Dyn Tagell, Drystan, Dyn Tagell, Drystan, Dyn Tagell.
"Drystan!"
He looked up, startled, dropping his bucket. Had the words in his mind taken to the wind?
"Drys!"
No, they were there again. How could he not have noticed? Had he been so lost in his own mind, contemplating the meaning of that name?
And then she stepped out from behind a young, golden warrior who had not been here on the beach before.
She had finally come, his joy. Her moonlight hair trailed down her back in a tight braid, and her moonlight eyes gazed at him questioningly as she approached.
"Drystan?"
He rose. If she spoke the name, he would have to accept it, and everything that went with it.
"Ah, Danu — Drystan, it is you, isn't it?"
He walked forward, aware suddenly that his hair was a mess of tangles well past his shoulders and his clothes were in rags, while she wore the garments of a queen, a long tunic of stiff green silk imported from lands so far away they were more like legends than real places, belted at the waist with a chain of gold. She wore golden bracelets around her wrists and upper arms and a torc of gold around her neck. He touched his own upper arm and realized that he too wore such bracelets.
And barefoot, she was barefoot to walk in the sand.
Finally her name came to him. "Yseult."
"Ah, Danu," she said again. "What have I done?"
He smiled. "You have returned to me."
She broke into tears.
The brown-haired one approached him, taking his arm. "Do you remember me too, Drys?"
Drystan stared at him. The face was familiar, as familiar as his own hand, but the effort to put a name to the face made his head hurt.
"Kurvenal," the man prompted.
"Kurvenal," he repeated. Yes, he knew that name, remembered journeys through Gaul and Armorica, remembered battles shoulder to shoulder, remembered loyalty more complete than any one man deserved. "Kurvi."
Kurvenal's eyes lit up. "You'll come with us now, Drystan, won't you? We'll take care of you, help you recover. Arthur needs every one of his companions now."
Arthur. Arthur needed him? "But there is peace now."
The others looked at each other.
The golden one spoke. "No longer. But we will speak of that when you are recovered."
"Will you come, Drystan?" Yseult asked.
He looked from face to face, the features that tugged at his mind and broke down the protective wall he had built, features and faces he loved. There was pain waiting for him if he went with them, he knew that, the pain he had fled from. He wished he could hide from it, leave it behind forever, but that would only be possible in death.
He nodded. "Yes."
* * * *
Drystan awoke from strange nightmares, filled with faces he should know and names he couldn't remember. The bed was soft beneath his back and the woven blanket warm, very different from the bedding of dry leaves and grass he had made for himself in the cave and the covers of old clothing. Soft voices murmured nearby, Kurvenal and a voice he knew but had no name for. He tried to remember, but his mind resisted and began to ache. He settled for listening.
"He's so thin. It scares me."
"At least we've found him," Kurvenal said, and in his mind's eye, Drystan could see him shrug. "Now that we have him here at Dyn Tagell, Yseult can care for him and he can recover."
There was a short pause. "But he's lost his mind."
"No, it's only in hiding."
Drystan chuckled, a rusty sound, more like wheezing than laughter, and opened his eyes. Two heads whipped around to stare at him.
Kurvenal hurried over. "Drys, are you all right?"
"No, my mind is in hiding, remember?" His voice sounded rough even to his own ears. He wondered when the last time had been that he had spoken a complete sentence.
"How long have you been awake?" Kurvenal asked.
"Not long."
"Good, then we still have some secrets from you."
"Not as many as I have from myself," Drystan croaked. "Perhaps you can help me coax my mind out of hiding — I don't seem to be very good at it myself. I'm trying to push down walls and I don't have the strength."
"How can we help?"
"Tell me things."
The other man joined Kurvenal at his bedside and stretched out his hand. "I am your cousin Cador."
* * * *
They fed him and talked to him, and it seemed every waking moment was full of stomach aches and headaches; food and information were equally difficult to keep down.
And his joy was nowhere to be seen.
"Did I dream her?" he finally asked Kurvenal one day.
Kurvenal looked grim. "No."
"Then why haven't I seen her?"
"She has been tending you while you sleep. You could hav
e seen her if you had awoken at the right time."
Drystan shook his head. "No, you are keeping her from me."
Kurvenal looked away.
"As little as I know, I do know that I love you dearly, Kurvi," he said, swinging his legs over the bed and sitting up. "But if you keep her away from me, I will run away again."
"You need to rest. You are little more than skin and bones, Drys."
"But while I was a wild man, I was running from every person I saw. Now you want me to remain in bed like an invalid."
Kurvenal pulled up a stool and sat across from him. "It's serious, Drystan. You need to regain your strength and your memory. Arthur needs his companions right now, especially you."
"Arthur." Drystan closed his eyes, trying to bring back memories associated with that name. They had given him facts, battles with names that also tugged at his memory, Portus Adurni, Caer Leon, Baddon. With each new name, he regained a little piece of himself: pushing stolen longboats into the surf, crawling through the mud, a wild charge across the Downs. Arthur was there among those images too, leading the charge, pacing in front of a tired army, his graying blond hair glinting in the sun, his expression grim, Dux Bellorum, leader of the defense of Britain.
His cousin.
"Why me in particular?" Drystan asked.
Kurvenal didn't answer for a moment, looking at him as if debating with himself how much to reveal. Drystan's mind may have been in hiding, but he saw the exact moment when Kurvenal decided to tell him everything.
"What do you remember of your father, Drys?"
The mere mention made Drystan clench his eyes shut; yes, there was definitely something here he didn't want to know. He looked up again and stared at the wall painting opposite, a hunting scene of a hound attacking a boar, and tried to get past whatever was blocking his memory. Finally, images of a winter burial came to him, the ground almost too hard for the grave to be dug. "I remember a funeral. Is he dead?"
Kurvenal shook his head. "You must be thinking of your foster father Riwallon. Your father, Marcus Cunomorus, is very much alive. He is in the north now, with the kings who want to place a 'legitimate' heir on the throne of Britain. They are going to vote."
Yseult: A Tale of Love in the Age of King Arthur Page 52
