Queen's Heart: An Arthurian Paranormal Romance (Arthurian Hearts Book 2)

by Sullivan, Phoenix

  He moved his shoulders in a small and helpless shrug. “I love her. Thought of her haunts my every moment. Five days of that anguish with nothing to assuage it, and I shall go mad. So, yes, I need this. As much as you.”

  “Or else we go mad together,” I whispered.

  “Just so.”

  Five days in solitude with Des, together keeping grief and guilt at bay.

  How easily I could have been alone in this, betrayed to Mark or abandoned to death. But instead to face it with such a friend and companion… A second self.

  Yes, I did need him. Soul first, heart second. And here in our secret grotto, in our cave by the sea, he proved just how much he needed me too.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN

  PALOMIDES

  Why did it take such grief to draw men together so? I wondered. Fae celebrated the joys of love in all its forms. I didn’t love Tris in the way I adulated and adored Yseult or in the way I still held Brinn full in my heart. Nor was it simple lust for a body as magnificent as his, though I could deny neither its magnificence nor my lust, because lust for Tris was an integral part of my love for him, just as lust for Yseult and Brinn was part of my love for them.

  There was no shame in lust, as men were taught, nor did it lessen love; instead, it added a joyful dimension to love that separated it from the spiritual or familial. In truth, true lust was a gift more rare than love. And to both lust for and love the same being was the gift most rare of all.

  In trust, Tris let me lead him in our first days in the grotto. There was no hurry. Our days were all of hours needing to be filled. Mine was a slow dance of seduction, introducing him to pleasures he could know no other way.

  I worshiped him with breath and tongue, with the gentle rain of my fingertips over him and as much of the hard length of me as he could stand.

  In those first days, his moans alone were my reward.

  On the third day, student became master. When he swallowed me without hesitation or revulsion and his eyes glazed with pleasure as I shuddered against him, he wrapped his arms about my hips to draw me even closer, and I cried my joy to the sea.

  Later, as we lay spent, collecting our breaths for another assault, Tris asked, not for the first or even the third time, “I trust you above all men, Palomides. Tell me today for certain that what plan you have for Yseult will save her from the fire.”

  I laid my palm along his bearding cheek. “If truth could give your heart ease, I would tell it to you loud and strong. There is no certainty. Only hope in a foolish idea and trust that Fate is not yet with the three of us. But I will repeat what you already know. Should my ‘miracle’ fail, I will die at your side to free her.”

  “What has Fate to do with us?”

  “Nothing. Everything.”

  He shoved my hand away. “Why do you still guard secrets from me? Tell me straight what ‘miracle’ may come. A host of angels from heaven? Wee folk and pixies to charm her away? A deluge from the sea to quench the fire? You ask me to trust and trust. Why, then, can you not trust me with the truth?”

  He was right, of course. It was fear that stayed my tongue. He loved Yseult far too much. In all else I trusted him with heart and life. I even trusted that if he knew who I was—what I was—he would not turn me away. Not now. But if he could find a way to use it to keep a wedge between Yseult and me…

  Of course, it was also possible Tristan wouldn’t believe the truth, even when confronted with it.

  “Very well then,” I told him. “What do you know of magic?”

  “What,” he scoffed, “a petty spell like Isolde’s to go awry as hers did? If you won’t tell me truth at least feed me a believable lie.”

  He still only half-believed Isolde’s philtre had anything to do with his rabid desire for Yseult. If he couldn’t believe in the power of simple earth-magics held in bone and leaf and blossom, how could he believe in the Old Magics that had shaped the world? What was wine but earth-magic made popular? Or steel that gave edge to rock but magic forged in fire?

  No, Tris was not yet ready for the truth.

  For my part, I prayed what Old Magics were left in the world for me to command had carried my simple plea to my father: Tintagel on Monday dawn.

  I laid my other palm on a point far from Tris’ bearding cheek. “You have trusted me in this.” I gave him a tender squeeze and he responded by filling the circle of my hand. “Trust that when the time is right, I will satisfy you in every way.”

  His exasperation only tempered for now, still he nodded. Because not only did he want to trust in me, he needed to trust something in this world beyond himself. Mark may well have been that touchstone for him once, but no longer. Yseult could not be counted, for there was nothing of risk there—they who were a single soul. That left me to be his risk, his faith, his humanity. A responsibility I swore to bear with honor.

  He swore his own oath to me. “Today, I will satisfy you in every way.”

  He turned me over then, and later we both cried Yseult to the sea.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT

  TRISTAN

  We slept the day Sunday to be ready for whatever the next morning would bring. Des woke, anxious, just before sundown. Pushing open my arms, he slipped from my embrace. I caught him just before he fled.

  “Running after your miracle?” God help me, I tried to keep the sneer from my voice.

  He trembled in my grip. But that unnatural stare of his held steady on my own. His jaw worked as it tried to find the answer, whether truth or lie, to say.

  “Yes.” He gave the word up like a sacrifice. A promise. Or perhaps a confession. “You know I am forsworn to you. To Yseult. Please, let me go.”

  It was his ‘please’ that undid me, shamed me for the doubt I harbored. He spoke it earnestly, not beggingly. Still, that he felt need to utter it at all here in this cave with me…

  “Is it still possible to doubt where I trust implicitly?” I asked in way of apology.

  Even Des’ half-smile had power to light the shadows. “I think that’s fair to ask of life in general.” His arm slid half-way through my grip till we were clasping forearms like brothers or warriors, in friendship and respect.

  “I’ll return,” he promised. “Soon.”

  Perhaps he went to meet the Gabriel Hound I heard baying by the sea. To tell it the secrets he kept yet from me. Or to absolve himself on the eve of the day we might both be marching to our deaths.

  Mark would have a retinue of knights at the ready in case of our return. Knights in leather and scales, which Des and I had not. Two swords and two horses between us and I without even a pair of leggings, and with only a stolen tunic at that.

  We could call challenge, by law. And by law, I could not defend myself as champion. Des would have to fight for me. If Mark agreed to a settlement by arms, that would give me great confidence as there was not a Cornish man alive, save myself, likely to best Palomides in his wrath.

  The king, of course, was above the law and not bound to it the same as we. Even if we called challenge there was no guarantee Mark would heed our plea. But if challenge was what Des planned, why be secretive?

  He returned just after nightfall, changed in both demeanor and voice when he greeted me.

  “Meditation becomes you,” I said. Anxiety had fallen away and his face was set in grim purpose.

  “We ride at midnight,” he said quietly.

  I nodded. If we arrived too soon there was greater chance of discovery, greater opportunity for all to go wrong.

  The hours before midnight, though, were three of the longest I’d ever known.

  The only ones to rival them were the three we endured outside of Tintagel waiting for the dawn.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE

  YSEULT

  Locked in my chamber, knees bruised from kneeling, days beyond the tears that had earlier flowed so free, I waited for the dawn. Not for death but for salvation. Five days alone in Tintagel with the castle turned against me and not even the comfort of my d
ead handmaid or my absent lovers to sustain me had convinced me I didn’t want to suffer a sixth. Whatever the dawn held, I welcomed.

  I offered one last prayer for the sake of Ireland and the well-being of Tris and Des before the chamber door opened and a young servant girl was rudely pushed inside.

  “M-my Lady, they bid me give you this. I-I’m instructed to help you dress.” The garment she held out was an ugly thing. Gray sack cloth, rude and coarse against my skin as she fitted it to me with a belt of knotted rope.

  I handed her a brush and she gave my hair twenty strokes, leaving it unbound for the fire. I reached for my slippers, but she stopped my hand.

  “Leave her feet b-bare, I was told.”

  Of course.

  I drew myself up in dignity, took the frightened child by the hand and went to meet the men who’d condemned me. Six knights waited to escort me to the stake. They surround me, on high alert, as we walked the league to where Mark, a bishop to preside, and two more knights stood before a mound of faggots and tinder from which a strong young yew trunk upthrust.

  Glancing back over my shoulder I saw this dell had been chosen with care, hidden by a trick of the land from any sight of the castle. Mark and Church meant to keep this a private affair.

  I approved.

  Like nervous geese eight knights ringed the waiting stake, sweating vigilance and fear. They expected unwelcome guests, and I prayed Tris and Des would not be so foolish to oblige them. The days had passed when I prayed rescue from them. That hope was buried. Their safety now was my only care.

  “Yseult,” the bishop said, attaching no title to my name, “do you understand the charge of adultery that has been levied against you?

  I shook my head and my hair tumbled across my shoulders. “Perhaps Your Excellence would be so kind as to explain.”

  “Explain!” Mark’s eyes riveted on me, on the cascade of hair that flowed down my back. “You were caught with Tristan’s cod up your arse. What more is there to explain?”

  “My husband”—I stressed the word—“did you see such a crude display for yourself?”

  “I saw you and Tristan naked in the courtyard. That is proof enough.”

  “I am often naked with others. When I swim. When I bathe. Do you also accuse me of betraying you with the handmaids you’ve sent me?”

  “Don’t be foolish.” Mark’s face reddened in growing anger and exasperation.

  The bishop stepped smoothly in. “Confess, child. Let heaven absolve you.”

  “I have nothing to confess that God has not already been witness to. He has seen fit to not strike me dead. Why do you insist on being the one to do it?”

  “You mistake, child. Church and king are the hands of God’s justice. It is His will we see done. Confess.”

  The word hung stark in the brightening sky.

  Then a thunder of hooves was upon us as two great stallions crashed into the dell. The slur of swords escaping scabbards sounded around me.

  “Hold!” Tris cried, a god upon his steed, the sudden power here, above that of even Church or king. “I demand trial by arms. Or do Cornwall’s own laws not apply?”

  “I am Cornwall and the law here,” Mark replied as his knights closed around.” Judgment and sentence have been passed. Where was your champion to defend then? She will burn for her crime. As will you. Take him!”

  My heart beat wildly as Mark’s knights swarmed. The horses screamed challenge and reared, striking at the men around. No panic this but battle training. Mark’s men, though, were also battle trained, and showed no fear as they grabbed for the bridles to drag the horses down.

  “Flee!” I begged, but my cry was sudden drowned in the blast of a great horn.

  From the woods, snarling and savage, a score of wraiths attacked. Demons out of nightmare. Hell hounds to slay us all.

  God, after all, had seen fit to strike us down. The thought raced through my mind. Every instinct bade me run, bade me cower. I did neither. Mark’s judgment I would fight, but not God’s.

  Shutting my eyes, trembling, I stood, praying it would be quicker than the fire.

  They hit my shoulder first, shaking it hard.

  “Yseult!”

  My eyes flew open at the familiar, urgent cry.

  Tristan.

  Horsed still and urging me up. I grabbed his arm and he swung me back behind the high cantle. It was a precarious seat and I threw my arms about Tris’ waist, trusting him to keep me safe.

  Fallax sprang away, Calannog beside him. One of Mark’s knights screamed, then the horn blew again.

  Run, I urged Fallax. I felt his easy strides lengthen but there was no mad gallop. How would we outrace the hounds?

  We wouldn’t. They ran beside us, easily pacing the big stallions who were built for strength not speed. White-coated hounds with flaming ears, baying with joy as we ran.

  And keeping stride just on the other side of Des…

  The creature was enormous, as black as Fallax and towering at least two handspans above Calannog. And on its back rode… I struggled to name it. A Valkyrie out of legend. An avenging angel. Or…

  “Herne?” I asked Tris.

  “What?” He’d heard me well enough. That he didn’t recognize the name immediately for what it was—who it was—meant Des had yet to share his secret.

  For an hour or more, Herne and his Hounds stayed with us. Then, as we trotted over an outcropping where the woods closed around us, they veered away and were gone. Des’ hand, raised in farewell, was a poignant gesture to a father who’d cursed and abandoned him. But who had come to him still when the need was greatest.

  Why was love always so complicated?

  ~ ~ ~

  I think from the first I knew where they were taking me. When we rode into the little grotto with the mouth of the familiar sea cave open in welcome, it felt a little like coming home.

  Des dismounted first, at once by Fallax’s side to help me down.

  “Tris doesn’t know we were here before, you and I,” he whispered in my ear as he wrapped me in his arms and crushed me close.

  Surely we were done with secrets. Yet here were two today already I’d found he’d not yet shared. Life-secrets too, not just petty lies of omission. Still, I nodded. I owed him that and more.

  Tris swung down behind us. With a simple hand to Des’ shoulder he parted us. Without thought, I melted from Des’ embrace into his. “I knew you’d come.”

  “I knew you’d be waiting.”

  I smiled. Gallows humor. Gentle enough it was and I trusted Tris would take it no further. We were safe for now but what of Ireland and Cornwall? Had Mark even thought what King Anguish would do when he’d cried the order to burn? Or had he simply reacted as a man with great power and not as king, damned be the consequences.

  For now, of course, there was a more immediate and personal issue at stake.

  “What of us?” I asked “What do we do now?”

  “We give Mark time to come to his senses. For Anguish to pressure him. Eventually we go back.”

  “The knights with Mark this morning”—I hardly dared asked— “did the hounds…?”

  “They live,” Des assured me. “The Wild Hunt doesn’t slaughter the innocent.”

  Tris gave him a sharp look. “Then you think Yseult and I are the guilty ones?”

  “In this? There are no innocent. There are no guilty. There’s just Magic and Fate and the turn of the world.”

  I had never heard Des so bitter and sad. “I thought The Hunt would be a joyful thing to see.”

  “The Hunt, Herne, you alive—there has been joy beyond hope this day. Only—”

  I stepped from Tris’ arms to lay a hand of comfort to Des’ cheek. “Only—?”

  “I gained all, only to lose it all again.”

  The Hunt had left him, amenably at least, it seemed, and I was reunited with Tris. And where Tris was Des could never be. Not foremost in my heart nor in my bed.

  “It was brave of you to bring me her
e,” I whispered in his ear. “Know I’ll never forget what this place was to us before.” Was it pain or guilt that hooded him so?

  He looked over my head to Tris. “We have all been very brave today.”

  Tris returned him the same tantalizing look of pain or guilt.

  Another secret? For every one we unburied between us, it seemed we buried another.

  How many more secrets could we possibly reveal?

  CHAPTER FORTY

  PALOMIDES

  Until I heard Dinistriwr, my father’s horn, I did not know whether he would come or no.

  As fae, my pack was with me always, no more than a thought away. And center to our world was Herne who heard all, knew all, or so it seemed. Some fae, such as he and the Lady of the Lake, simply knew when they were needed most and where. It was not a gift he’d passed to me, his son. Or one not yet revealed to me. But I prayed he’d hear my silent plea, perhaps not when I was man but as hound and as close to fae as I could be.

  What more I hoped, I couldn’t say. I thought little beyond Yseult and keeping her safe. I would not beg for my place again in the pack and the curse be lifted. Herne would do so when he saw fit and not before. That much of my father I was certain. He ruled his son and pack alike, and in a world where magic was dying and others of our folk were lost, we survived because of Herne.

  Once Yseult was safe within our keeping, it was pain and pleasure both to ride with Herne. How could it not be pleasure to look upon him once again and to see my kin cavorting, happy to connect with me no matter how briefly it might be? How could it not be pain to be held in this form, unable to shift to join them? To know the curse remained? To watch them fade away so fast?

  And how did it seem an easy idea to return Yseult to the grotto and this cave? She had called it ‘brave’ knowing only the half of it. There was nothing brave in the sweet memories I held of rapture I’d known here with both her and Tris. It was agony to see them lie together on the same cave floor, in the same hollows and on the same shore where we’d once sinned.