Grail Prince

by Nancy McKenzie

  The firelight lent her skin a rosy glow. The soft fur collar of her tunic lay open and at the base of her throat a tiny charm hung on a silken thread. He watched it move and wink in the shifting shadows.

  She stared miserably down at her winecup. “Owaine regards me as a broodmare, not a woman. If I went to Gorre, I should spend all my time in his bed, either getting with child or delivering one. Kastor, my cousin, is a pox-ridden philanderer. He cannot keep his mind on anything longer than five minutes. He has already seduced three of the cook’s girls. I could be powerful in Strathclyde, but I should be desperately unhappy. And Rydor, whom Percival favors, is an excitable man. When it serves his turn he is an easy liar. Half the time he believes his own fabrications. I could bear some faults, but I could not live with a man whose word I could not trust.”

  “Do you despise Talorc? I know him to be an honest man.”

  She smiled bitterly. “Aye, too honest, if you ask me. He has made Percival an offer for form’s sake, but he has left off his wooing. He is a good man, but he no longer wants me. I should only embarrass us both if I accepted him.”

  “No longer wants you? How can you think so? He admires you greatly. He told me so himself.”

  Dane looked up. Her eyes glinted green in the firelight, sea green, like the rolling ocean in a high wind. “I put it to him,” she said softly, “and he told me he would not take a treasure from a friend, even if the friend did not know he possessed it.”

  Galahad felt heat rise to his face.

  “I have dishonored Percival, and he never will forgive me. I didn’t mean to—I thought only to please him and bring honor and wealth to Gwynedd and stability to Britain. I never thought I should—” She stopped, clasping her hands together and looking away, “I never thought I would feel differently about it when the time came. And now it is too late. I cannot back out and I cannot go forward. In six months Percival will bring his bride here. I must be somewhere else by then—I could never stand in her shadow, and she must not stand in mine. Galahad, Galahad, what is the solution?”

  He rose slowly, standing very still. He could find no words to say. She looked at him entreatingly, beseechingly, and he knew she wanted something from him. But all he could think about was the beauty of her firelit hair, the sweet curve of her lips. . . .

  Tears glistened in her eyes. “How could I know I would loathe them all? I cannot do it! I will kill myself first, with my own sword!”

  He jumped forward and caught her arm as she turned toward the ancient weapon against the wall. She was in his arms at once, warm against him, soft and eager. “Galahad,” she whispered, “I choose you.”

  He kissed her lips and pressed her body close. Deep excitement, so long simmering unacknowledged in the center of his being, now exploded into consciousness, alive as liquid fire, overmastering his will. Just as in battle, time slowed down and he moved fluidly, effortlessly, freely in a world that was completely new to him. He had never known a woman’s skin could be so soft. His hands seemed to move of their own will, finding the laces to her clothing, discovering the smooth, fine flesh she kept hidden, caressing the terrifying, secret curves, making her gasp. She drew him down, yielding with joy to his touch. He was amazed to find how easily his body commanded the knowledge he had so long feared to learn. The heat of excitement engulfed them both, and they clung together, one body, one movement, in the young, strong passion of new desire.

  In the black night Galahad awoke. The spell of wonder held him still: the woman’s breath blew soft and sweet upon his shoulder, and her arm lay lightly on his chest. He did not want to awaken, not yet. He closed his eyes and let his hand slide over her skin, glorying in the amazing softness of her, wanting to know every sweet secret of her body, letting his longing free in the delicious dark. She stirred. He stopped her mouth with his and then began to kiss her, letting his lips discover what his hands already knew. Slowly and deliberately he rekindled the flame of her excitement, rejoicing in his power and unsuspected skill, until she gasped his name and reached out for him. When at last he took her it was not with the heat of mindless passion, but with a warm, living love that had flowered within him, sprung up from nowhere, unsuspected and unacknowledged, but as solid and enduring as the rock that enclosed them both.

  “Galahad, my sweet love,” she whispered as her breathing slowed again toward sleep. “They have been telling lies about you.”

  He pulled her head against his shoulder, his hand buried in her wayward hair, and kissed her brow. “They know nothing about me.” His hand slid to her throat, and he lifted the tiny charm on its silken thread. “What is this token you wear about your neck?”

  Even in the dark, he felt her smile. “It is the Hawk of Lanascol and the Gray Wolf of Gwynedd, together. I had it made a month ago when I knew I loved you. I had it made small, so none would notice and discover my secret. But I think my mother guessed.”

  He held it between his fingers, such a fragile thing. “A month ago?”

  “Do you remember the night of your arriving? I knew as soon as I saw you. I knew as soon as you saw me.”

  “Ah,” he whispered, brushing his finger against her lips. “I remember. You took my breath away.”

  She laid her cheek upon his chest. His hand slid along her back in one long, possessive caress.

  “What a powerful charm,” he said.

  When he awoke just after dawn he did not know where he was. He was cold, stiff, and his joints ached as if he had been sleeping on a rock. Rubbing his eyes, he sat up and looked about. He had been sleeping on a rock. Bedding and blankets had tumbled off the thin bed of bracken and lay twisted in a wanton huddle on the bare rock flooring of the cave.

  The cave. He blinked. His hand touched the wolf pelt and he stared at it a moment. Not that cave. He shut his eyes tight and then, with a sense of foreboding, opened them again. Something dark and horrifying lurked on the edge of consciousness and he fought to postpone the moment he must face it. He had killed the wolf years ago, in a bigger cave, with room for a horse at the back of it. But he had not been naked when he killed the wolf, and he was naked now. He pulled on his leggings and his boots as quickly as he could, and cast about among the blankets for his tunic, as if speed could save him. But nothing could slow the tide of returning memory.

  “Good morning, love.”

  At last he looked up. Dane knelt at the cave mouth, stirring a fire, her brilliant hair spilling over her shoulders and down her back. Her smile turned his innards to jelly and he exhaled carefully. She rose and came toward him, a clay cup of steaming tea between her hands.

  “Here. To warm you up. There’s frost on the ground.” She smiled at him. “I nearly let the fire die. I must have been distracted in the night.”

  He shut his eyes. It had not been a dream, after all.

  “Come sit down. I have made you a sweet porridge.”

  He followed her to the fire and sat down on the cushion she had arranged for him, but he could not eat a drop of the porridge.

  “Dane.” Even to his own ears his voice sounded like a stranger’s. But she had returned to the pot on the fire and did not hear him. He watched the long curve of her back as she bent over the flames; it seemed to him he could still feel the smooth skin under his fingertips. His hand shook violently, spilling the tea.

  She turned. “Galahad. What’s the matter?”

  “I must . . . take you back to Percival.”

  “Yes. We’ll go down as soon as we’ve eaten. It’ll be a shock to him, I’m afraid. I don’t think he has an inkling, do you?”

  “Of what?”

  She laughed, and her joy was a power in itself that tugged at him physically and threatened to overmaster him. But if he did not keep a clear head now he would never get another chance.

  She crouched down beside him and kissed him quickly. “Of us, of course.” She touched the charm that lay in the hollow of her throat. “Of the new future we will make.”

  Galahad put down the bowl of porri
dge. “Dane. I meant, I must take you back to Percival . . . and leave you.”

  She stared at him and slowly rose to her feet. “What?”

  He rose, too, and stilled the longing to take her in his arms. “I . . . I can’t stay in Gwynedd. I’m promised elsewhere. I have to—”

  “Promised?” Her chin lifted and her nostrils flared. “To someone else? Who?”

  He shook his head. “To no one else. Surely you know . . . you were the first. And only.”

  She was in his arms then, her soft cheek pressed against his, full of apologies and protestations of affection. He could not help pressing her close. He needed the warmth of her eager, willing nature, for he was cold inside, and getting colder. He kissed her and held her until her trembling subsided. Then he drew a deep breath and said, “I am sworn to find the Grail, Dane. You know this. It isn’t new. But time is short, and I’ve stayed too long already as it is.”

  Instantly she stiffened and drew away. “As it is? Meaning what? You are sorry you came to Gwynedd? Or to the cave?”

  He reached out for her, shivering, but she backed away and he had to let his arm fall empty to his side. “No. Of course not. But—”

  “But what? We are betrothed, after last night. You’re not going to deny that, surely.”

  He looked away, then wrenched his gaze back. This was impossible. He would never be able to make her understand. He spoke very gravely and as clearly as he could. “The Grail—in the right hands—will bring Arthur back to Britain. It will keep Britain whole. United forever. But if that is going to happen, it must happen soon. If I don’t go, all Britain is lost.”

  Dane’s eyes widened and she tossed her head angrily, making her hair fly. “What rubbish! Arthur is dead. Who has been telling you such nonsense? Britain lost! If you do go, your honor is lost! I thought only a stainless knight could find the Grail. Isn’t that what you told me when you brought my brother home? How stainless will you be now, if you debauch me and leave me here?”

  Debauch! He winced at the word, at the vulgarity and brutality of it. It was not the word for what they had shared last night, and she knew it.

  “I am the one who has been chosen,” he said quietly, hating the fear in her face, wishing there were another way to tell her. “Arthur himself chose me. I can’t fail him.”

  “But you can fail me?” Tears sprang to her eyes and she wiped them away so they would not fall. “Can’t you hear how pompous and ridiculous you sound? A king dead these seven years has greater need of you than I do? Galahad, you have filled your head with the ravings of lunatics. Take a moment and think about it. We . . . we ought not to quarrel. Take me down to Percival and he will square it with the other lords. They dare not challenge you. If you have some promised duty to perform, I’m sure Percival will let you go, provided you are back by spring. We must wed and be gone before he brings Guinblodwyn here. That is essential. I must be gone before the first of May.”

  Galahad turned away and covered his face with his hands. He could not abide her suffering, and her own, futile attempts to hold the future at bay. Perhaps it would be better just to go. He remembered the morning old Ban had drowned the rest of Valiant’s litter. The best way’s the quickest, he had said to the grieving boy. Soonest over, soonest forgotten.

  He dropped his hands and faced her, but she read something of his thought in his expression and said quickly, “I love you, Galahad. I have given you proof of that; I have made it as clear as I could. Does that mean nothing to you? Or do you really mean to shame me in my own home?”

  He forced his lips to move. “Dane, I cannot marry you.”

  She stopped as if slapped, and paled. “Coward! Blackguard! Fornicator! Your father is a nobler man; at least he married the woman he lay with and gave her child a name.”

  He took her insults without flinching but they rang inside his head like the hard echoes of a struck bell. As he backed toward the cave entrance her voice grew shriller, and her tears coursed down her cheeks unchecked.

  “Monster! Ill-begotten bastard! Would you betray me? Then you betray your cousin, your uncle, your father! You make Percival your lifelong enemy! You are false to the bone, just like your mother. And what would your father say? Honorable Lancelot, whose name you do not deserve to bear! You shame the House of Lanascol.”

  Sweat poured from his body and dripped from his chin, yet he shivered with cold. He tore the badge off his shoulder and flung it at her.

  “Take it. You may have the House of Lanascol and all that’s in it, for all I care!”

  Sobbing, she stooped to pick up the badge and held it to her breast. “I curse you, then, with all the power of a woman’s rage.” She raised her arms skyward and wailed, “May the sins of your flesh persecute you forever! May you not spend a night in peace, not a single night, until you have paid for this deed! May all your endeavors end in ruin, may what you seek escape your grasp, may your precious Grail be ever hidden from your eyes! Until you have given me back my honor!”

  Stumbling, Galahad made for his horse, grabbed the reins, and flung himself onto the stallion’s back. For the second time he was running for his life away from Dane.

  49

  THE TOWER

  Horse and rider struggled to the top of the ridge in the pelting, late-spring rain. The thin trees gave little shelter and they both hunched against the onslaught as they made their way across rocks and broken scree. They stopped at the edge of broad gully where a landslide had scarred the hill. Trees and bushes gave way to a sea of soft dirt and pebbles which afforded a wide view of the surrounding country. Galahad lifted his head and gazed out across a vast expanse of stark hills dark with wet rocks, gorse, brambles, and the twisted skeletons of long-dead, stunted trees. The change in season had not touched these badlands. Heavy clouds lay like a shroud from horizon to horizon, casting a cold, sinister chill across the barren landscape.

  He stared at the view a long time. Somewhere in his childhood he had seen a wasteland such as this, or dreamed it. He had known even then it was part of his future. The stallion pawed fretfully at the unsteady ground, and Galahad turned him away from the slide.

  Rivulets of cold water coursed down his back. For the thousandth time he shut a mental door against memories clamoring for attention at the edge of thought. For eighteen months Dane’s parting curses had rung in his ears and for eighteen months all his endeavors had come to ruin. What he sought still evaded his grasp. He knew, in that dark, interior place where he kept secrets from himself, that it was too late now to find the Grail and Spear. Time had run out. The trail was cold. He had missed his chance for glory. Yet he traveled on, and searched on, because he had nowhere else to go.

  For eighteen months he had repented his night with Dane, stopping at every chapel, every holy house, every wayside shrine to bend his knee, firmly close his eyes, and pray for absolution. And for eighteen months God had turned a deaf ear to his pleas. He knew the reason. There was a penance to pay. There was a trial coming. He only hoped that it would come upon him soon. And that if he survived it, he would be free at last of this heaviness of heart, this terrible, formless burden which weighed him down so cruelly and made every day a torture. He had lost the clear-eyed vision of his youth. He no longer had dreams he could remember. The road he traveled had once been straight and true, but now meandered. Once his name had commanded the respect of other men, but lately no one had cared much who he was. It did not matter; nothing mattered, for Arthur Pendragon would never be recalled from the mists that held him. That hope, like the others, had died away. Failure lay behind him and suffering ahead. He was as certain of that as of the air he breathed.

  Thunder rumbled in the distance and he raised his head. Black clouds piled on the horizon, and nearer, the sky took on a greenish hue. Lightning forked once, twice as he watched, and a cold wind whipped through the trees ahead. A storm was on the way, and a big one. He did not want to be caught in the mountains and risk losing Farouk in a slide. He put heels to the horse. With
any luck at all they would get across the river before dark and into such shelter as they could find in the valley below.

  On the morning after the storm Megan threw open the shutters and leaned out the tower window into the sun. “Ahhh, what heaven!” she said, feeling the warmth on her face. “Lilia, come look! That wretched storm is over and the moor is full of wildflowers!”

  Her sister joined her, comb in hand. “It’s about time. Let’s ride out. I can hardly bear another day in this awful prison!”

  “Should we ask Father for permission?” Both girls glanced silently upward where, at the top of the tower, their father had spent the entire winter in his chamber without once stepping beyond the threshold.

  “He’s ill,” Megan said decisively. “We’ll ask Germaine. She’ll allow it. She must be as eager to escape as we are.”

  Lilia nodded in agreement. “Hurry, Meg, and put up my hair. Let’s not tell Ariane or Bella. Let’s go out ourselves.”

  Within the hour three young women cantered down the track across the blooming moor. Ahead, across the narrow valley where the river slashed its way south, they could see the barren badlands rising ridge upon ridge to the hills beyond. The land began to slope toward the river and they stopped in a sparse wood to admire the budding trees.

  “Let’s ride down to the water,” Lilia urged. “Father never lets us go so far, and once the grass grows tall we’ll never find the ford. I want to make sure it’s still there, that it wasn’t washed away by winter storms.”

  Megan tossed her red curls defiantly. “He doesn’t want us to find the way out. He wants to keep us prisoners until we’re all spinsters and must serve him till he dies!”

  “Hush, Meg!” Germaine exclaimed. “How do you dare such words? Father is a noble man.”

  “Was a noble man,” Megan corrected, pulling her mare’s nose from the grass. “Now he’s a recluse. Badlands on one side, the endless moor on the other—is it any wonder no one ever comes by our door? How shall we ever get husbands locked away in that godforsaken tower?”