Queen of Camelot

by Nancy McKenzie

  “He has grown into it, more like. He would protect you from me, if he could. Now he will add jealousy to his dislike of me. It matters not.”

  “But it may matter, Lancelot. He does take things to heart. As for jealousy, it is ridiculous!”

  But Lancelot was sober. “He is jealous for the King’s honor, and for your own. And he does not look at you with a boy’s eyes for his mother, but with the eyes of a man for a woman. Let him go to the King with it. Arthur will set him straight.”

  “He will not take it to Arthur.” I spoke with certainty. “I know him. He will hold it inside his soul, closely guarded, and someday it will out. That is my fear. I think I must speak with him.”

  Lancelot shrugged. “You know him best. But go carefully, Gwen.”

  When Lancelot left me, I sent for Mordred. He came, all stiff and proper and formal. Little Hanna began blushing and batting her eyelids. I sent her from the garden; Mordred hardly noticed her. He began again to apologize to me, but I stopped him, taking his hands in mine, as he had seen me holding Lancelot’s.

  “Mordred. Do you know I love you?”

  Color flooded his face, and his composure broke. “What?” he whispered.

  “This is a thing I want you to know, to be sure of, to seal in your heart. You are my son, as well as Arthur’s.”

  He looked down, away. “Thank you, my lady.”

  “I do not say this lightly, Mordred. For love is bound to honor. I could not love a man, and not honor him, as well.”

  His head came up then, and his black eyes met mine. He began to understand what I was saying.

  “The King your father I honor above all men living. He is my husband and my lord. More than that, he is Pendragon, Savior of Britain. There is no more worshipful man in all the world.”

  He nodded reverently but said nothing.

  “Sir Lancelot is his closest friend and most trusted knight. He and the King owe their lives to each other, many times over. This man I also love and honor. As you will learn to do, as well, and as your father does.”

  He swallowed. There was something he would say but could not.

  “You have been hearing barracks gossip; Camelot abounds with courtiers whose purpose would be served by weakening the King’s bond with Lancelot. If you are going to listen to them, use your head, and judge them carefully. Remember this: I am your Queen, and Arthur’s wife and servant. Do you understand me?”

  “Yes, my lady,” he whispered. But in his eyes I saw pain, and adoration, and the agony of unrequited love.

  “You are young yet,” I said gently, to ease his suffering, “and life is complicated. You will understand in time how it is. Be assured, Mordred, that we have no secrets from the King. His honor is sacred to us both.”

  Mordred slipped gracefully from the bench to the hard ground and bowed his head.

  “You are the soul of kindness and goodness and mercy, my lady,” he said quietly. “And I honor you above all.” Then he rose and walked quickly away. I was left, bewildered, wondering how it was so clear a message could have so unintended an effect.

  Nearly every day I rode out on the downs, in fair weather or poor, with an escort of picked men. Ever since my abduction Arthur had been loath even to let me out King’s Gate, but I would go mad if forced to stay within the fortress walls, so he contented himself with sending a small army of soldiers with me. One hot day that summer I rode out when the heat of the day was past, to spare the horses, and came back toward evening, while light still filled the sky. Ferron was the leader of my escort, and rode beside me. We pulled up near the foot of Caer Camel, where a stream ran through the woods on its way to join the river. We dismounted to let the horses drink, and I knelt on the mossy bank to splash my face with cool, clear water. From the corner of my eye I caught movement and looked up. Some ways away an old woman stooped to gather herbs and cresses. Women from the town often came down to the stream for the purpose, and sometimes brought their children here to bathe, but they seldom came alone. I did not think I had seen this woman before; something about her carriage, or the rags she wore, or the way she moved, struck me as odd. I bade Ferron wait for me, and I approached her to ask her if she wanted escort home.

  “Mother,” I began. She turned quickly, and I stopped in midsentence, startled. Her face was not old, after all, despite her posture, but in the middle of her cheek was a large, black mole, and from it grew a single long, dark hair, so long it bent under its own weight and curved down her face. It moved and trembled as she spoke, so ugly, so fascinating, I could hardly take my eyes from it, although I tried to, for courtesy’s sake. Her hair was wrapped tightly in a shawl; earrings of bone, crudely etched, dangled from her ears. Her skin was clear and unwrinkled, with fine lines at the edges of her lovely eyes, green and slanted like a cat’s. While I stood there tongue-tied, she curtsied awkwardly, her bent, clawlike fingers pulling at her coarsely woven skirt.

  “My lady Queen.”

  “You know me, mother? I don’t remember seeing you before.”

  “I’m new in the district. But everyone knows Queen Guinevere—by her child’s hair.” She spoke with a heavy lisp, in a hoarse voice that did not suit her age. Although her words were rude, she inclined her head politely. She seemed to be comprised of contradictions; confused, I struggled to keep my thoughts straight.

  “Would you like an escort home? The day is going, and I would be happy to lend you the protection of the High King’s soldiers.”

  She smiled, showing blackened teeth. I shivered. “What need have I of men’s protection?” she lisped, and pointed with a crooked finger to the basket beside her, full of lichens, herbs, and moss. “I’ve powers of my own, my dear. It’s men who would do well to fear me.” The noise that issued from her throat was nearer cackling than laughter. The mole hair danced against her cheek.

  “I’m sure, mother, you could frighten anyone you wish.”

  “I’ll do more than frighten, indeed I will.” She glanced swiftly at the soldiers behind me, and her voice fell to a hiss. “I’m out to geld the randy stallion who’s been making rough sport with the girls in town.” She nudged me with her elbow and leered. “You understand.”

  “I have no interest in such matters,” I returned quickly. “Take your salacious tales to someone else.”

  “Stay, lady,” she whispered, as I turned to go. “This is a serious matter. He is a King’s man.”

  “All men suffer that distemper,” I said sharply. “Keep your daughters indoors, and you’ve nothing to fear.”

  “Oh, aye, wise words from a Queen abducted against her will! Or was it by your leave, after all?” She leered.

  “How dare you!”

  “It’s known all over Britain, lady. What did you do, when the lecher accosted you?”

  “I refused him, of course. What do you think?”

  “And how much use was that?”

  I found myself trembling beyond control. “What are you saying, mother?”

  Her lips twisted in an ugly smile; the mole hair twitched against her cheek. “It does my girls no good, either. The ones the lecher cannot seduce, he forces. Three are with child of him now, against their wills. Four babies born last winter, with his stamp upon them. He is a villain if there ever was one.”

  I shuddered. “A King’s man, you say? Mother, bring this matter to the High King himself. Arthur honors women. He will see the man makes reparation.”

  She held up a fist of greenstuff, with moist, dark roots. “I have a better way, and one more certain of results. See this? This will castrate the rutting stag. A powder of these roots slipped into his wine, and he will never lift his spear again to any woman, even his wife!” She chuckled heartily, the mole hair shivered, and the hackles rose on the back of my neck.

  “Surely you would do better to bring this to the King. He will take care of it.”

  She looked up with narrowed eyes. “In this case, even if he were here, he would do nothing.”

  “You do not kn
ow Arthur.”

  She shook the herbs in my face. “This is what the girls have asked of Sybil. And this is what Sybil will do.”

  She glared at me fiercely, and I stepped back a pace. “Sybil, you cannot poison a man so. I tell you, Arthur will see justice done, even to one of his own men.”

  “Ahhh, but he is more than a King’s man. He is the King’s dearest friend. So we cannot expect justice from the King.” She leaned closer and hissed in my ear. “Not against Lancelot!”

  “You lie!” I cried. “It is not Lancelot! It cannot be!”

  Her sly smile again. “Indeed? You do not believe me, lady, you of all people? Then do not wonder longer why we cannot tell the King.”

  “But it’s a lie! And you do ill, Sybil, to spread such slanders! Lancelot’s honor is stainless! Debauchery is beneath him!”

  “As well as you know him, Queen Guinevere, you know him not at all. He has a past that dogs him, like a black shadow, every step he takes. He may spend hours on his knees praying to the Christian God, denying his carnal nature, but when he rises, there is his shadow, back again.”

  “You lie. He does not yield to such temptation. I know this.”

  Her green eyes slid sideways, and she lowered her voice. “He does not yield to you, my lady. ‘Twould mean his life if he did. No, indeed. But when his fire burns, he comes to town and takes out on our young innocents the pent passion of his dark desires.”

  “No! I do not believe you! How dare you suggest it! It discredits you even to think the thought!” Furious, I wiped away a tear. “I bid you stay out of this business, Sybil. If you poison him with your evil herbs, you will face more than the High King’s justice! You will face my vengeance, sure and swift!”

  She began to laugh, a low, ugly sound. I turned my back on her when she reached out and touched my arm—a light touch and oddly compelling. “Think, my lady, not of the man, but of the children. Think of the precious innocents he has fathered and the miserable lives they lead. They live in hovels; their mothers are barely out of childhood and cannot feed them. Does he send a coin? Or a loaf of bread? He sends nothing to sustain them, and they are starving.” She dropped the horrid plants in her basket and faced me directly. “To you he is a friend. But he shows you only what he wishes you to see.”

  I drew myself up to my full height, fighting the ache in my throat. “I do not believe you. There aren’t any children.”

  “No? Would you believe Lancelot, if he told you so himself? Ask him, then, ask him about Black Lake in Benoic. Ask him about Vivienne, the Lady of the Lake, and how he used to spend his time with her. Ask him if his Christian father did not beat him for his stolen visits.”

  I covered my ears with my hands, but still I heard her.

  “Ask Lancelot if Vivienne did not prophesy for him:

  ’You will seek love;

  You will find honor,

  Glory shall be your reward,

  And the sins of the flesh your undoing.’

  “Ask him if he did not love her more than life and seduce her from the Goddess. Go on. Ask him, if you dare.” She moved closer, and I shrank back. “And I have proof, if you are shy of asking or the coward will not admit it.”

  “He is not a coward! You have no proof!”

  “I will send you one of the maidens he debauched. I will have her bring the child she bore him. Poor girl, she will never get a husband now. Is it any wonder she begs my help against him? And yet she does not ask for death, which I could give him as easily; she begs only for castration. And I will do it.”

  “No! No, I mean, let me see the girl first. I must hear it from her own lips before I will believe it!”

  “Very well. I will send her to the kitchens with a gift of cabbages for the King. Be there tomorrow, at noon, and you may have speech with her. Her name is Grethe.” She paused and looked at me thoughtfully. “Her hair is near the color of yours. Perhaps that’s what inflamed him.”

  She turned away, without waiting for my leave, and vanished among the dappled shadows. I watched, rooted to the ground, held powerless by fear.

  In hall that night I sat beside Lancelot, but could not bring myself to speak. I had no stomach for small talk. He asked me if I was ill, and did not believe me when I told him nothing was the matter.

  I could not get Sybil’s words out of my mind; witch, wise woman, sorceress, whatever she was, she haunted my dreams that night and stole my sleep. I was up before Ailsa, well before the dawn, and paced half the morning in my garden, up and down the garden paths, around the little fountain where the water played in the morning sun, trying without success to convince myself my worries were for nothing. Yes, Lancelot was a passionate man, and as a good Christian he fought against his passions. It was true he loved women and had a weakness for beauty, but what man did not? His seduction by Elaine was an aberration; she had drugged his wine; he was not himself when she led him to her bed. More, she had disguised herself to look like me. Even drugged, he had not gone looking for her.

  But what was all this talk about a shadow in his past? A sorceress? A lake near his home in Benoic? A prophecy? Surely that ugly woman was telling lies to frighten me. But to what purpose? For the thousandth time I strove to put these thoughts behind me. I could do nothing until I had met with his accuser. If she came.

  At noon I was standing by the back door of the kitchens, looking out on the kitchen gardens. The cooks glanced nervously at one another, and the servants hurried about with lowered eyes. I had no wish to disrupt their business, but I dared not leave. I waited until the sundial marked well past noon. Just as I drew breath in relief, I saw a young girl come in by the outer gate. Dressed in sacking, barefoot, she held a toddler by the hand and carried a basket under her arm. She looked carefully about. Her dark kerchief covered a head of bright, golden hair.

  With sinking heart I stepped out of the shadow and beckoned her forward. “Pray, what is your name?”

  She dropped me a deep curtsy and made her little boy bend his knee. “Grethe, my lady. I bring cabbages for the King.” The boy unsettled me. With black hair and gray eyes, he bore no resemblance to his mother. Indeed, as Sybil warned me, she was barely out of girlhood herself; her face had not yet lost the round contours of her early years, yet the child with her could not be less than two. As I looked at those two innocents, hand in hand, eyes lowered, my throat closed and I could hardly breathe.

  “Keep the cabbages,” I whispered. “Grethe, come with me.” I led her to a shaded place in the corner of the building, where steps that led down to the cellars had been built into the earth. I bade her sit, but she would not, while I stood.

  “Sybil told me, Grethe, how you got your son. But I should like—I mean, I need to hear the tale from your own lips.”

  But she only shook her head and would not meet my eyes. I strove to keep my voice calm and kind. “My dear, I would help you, if you will let me. If I ask you questions you may answer with a word or a nod, will you do it?”

  She nodded.

  “Very well. Sybil told me that you are not wed. Is that right?”

  Another nod.

  “And that the man who begot your son on you took you by force? Against your will?”

  Two quick nods and a turn of the head away.

  “Also, that you know the man’s name.”

  After a long pause, another nod.

  “Grethe, I must ask you for his name. I will not supply this for you. If you wish justice done you and reparation made, you must accuse him yourself.”

  The girl trembled but did not speak.

  “Grethe, who is his father?”

  The toddler looked anxiously up into his mother’s face and began to whimper. She leaned down and picked him up and wiped dust off his leggings. Then she looked up at me. There were tears in her eyes.

  “Sir Lancelot,” she whispered, biting her lip and crossing herself quickly.

  My knees were jelly. I put out a hand against the wall to steady myself. She watched me anxiously
, as the tears made muddy tracks on her dusty face. “I’m sorry, my lady. Truly sorry. But I had to say it.”

  I nodded, groping for courage. “When did this happen, Grethe?”

  “Three springtimes ago, my lady.”

  “How old were you then?”

  She thought hard, counting back. “Thirteen.” I shut my eyes. It was not possible he could have done it. Not the man I knew. And yet she named him.

  “Has he—have there been—any others?”

  She nodded, adjusting the weight of the child on her hip. “Vorn was the first. But there are others.”

  “You must—it is only fair that he face his accuser. Can you bide here a bit with the child?”

  She looked bewildered. “What for, my lady?”

  “I will go and get Lancelot—”

  “Oh, no!” she cried, gripping the child and swiftly backing away. “No, never!” I reached out and caught her just as she turned to run.

  “Grethe! Here—I will not make you face him—take this coin as my thanks for your courage in even coming.” She threw the coin down, not pausing to see if it was gold or copper, and gathering the child in her arms, she fled from me as fast as she could.

  I collapsed against the cool stonework, shaking, my ears throbbing with the violence of unvoiced sobs. The terror on her face could not have been contrived. I had felt the same when Melwas—when Melwas—Arthur! I cried silently, shutting my eyes against the welling tears. Don’t come home, my Arthur! Gone is your fellowship forever! There is nothing here but dust and ashes! Don’t come home!

  30 THE HONOR OF LANCELOT

  For three days I kept to my quarters. Every day, every hour, Lancelot sent to ask if I was ill, if I was better, did I wish to see a physician? He came himself and spoke to Ailsa, but she would not let him up the stairs to my chamber. And while I lay abed and fretted, or paced my garden and fretted, all I could think of was the black-haired child, and the others like him, scrubbing for bread in the village while coins clinked in Lancelot’s purse and silver armbands gleamed upon his wrists. He could not know! I cried over and over. He could not possibly know those children existed! And yet it was his duty to find out.