“I was fostered with his people,” Arthur explained. “The quiet filled me the way a goblet is filled with wine.”
Yes, the Seal people. If he were not shape-strong, he had ancestors close, ancestors who were. He reminded me of the Gray Watcher and his son Black Leg. I think at first he only meant to touch my hand, but he liked whatever energies he felt in me and carried it to his lips.
Like the Gray Watcher, honesty was a strong trait in his character, because a sadness crossed his face like a cloud shadow crossing a valley, and I knew he knew Arthur meant to deceive me. But he was too loyal to say so, and only murmured a greeting. Then he stepped away to speak with Igrane.
Then Arthur introduced Gawain, and when he took my hand, I felt myself shiver. Merlin had surrounded his young king with them. This one was not fully human, either. He was fair, as I am, and with more than human beauty. He was male, so male that maleness screamed at me, and yet …
I pulled my hand back from his as quickly as possible. He eyed me the way a connoisseur studies a work of art, then turned to Arthur.
“Magnificent,” he said. “She will need some time to ripen, but then”—he made a very Italian gesture—“she will yield a thousand pleasures to a practiced hand.”
I noticed he was dressed as a Roman. No leggings or trousers—only tunic and toga. I later learned he had been fostered in Rome. He gave Arthur a wicked grin, then turned away and joined Cai. They sat together next to Igrane’s reclined figure, on a cushion near her feet.
Arthur took my hand. I was trying to hide the fact that I nearly melted when he did, so I didn’t notice where we were going until we reached the garden overlooking the sea. The roses against the walls were in bloom, and the masses of herbs in separate beds, rosemary and fennel, perfumed the air. Vines I didn’t recognize grew down from above and over the marble rail we leaned on. Each gust of wind shook the white roses and drenched the air around us with a mixture of fragrances that murmured wordlessly of intoxicating desire.
He was standing behind me, his right hand on my shoulder, holding my left hand with his. I was having a lot of trouble thinking at all, and I decided that was probably the idea.
“I told you I would make you an offer,” he murmured into my ear.
I sighed. No problem about that. He was right; I was smitten.
“Your rank, virtue, and beauty all deserve my affection and profound respect.”
I made approving noises—also not difficult.
“My mother,” he purred, “owns extensive estates in Cornwall. A particularly beautiful one lies in a valley near here. It has its own villa, an ancient beauty built not long after the Romans came.”
I noticed he didn’t say conquest. That’s what it was, and a bloody one, too.
He had me drooling. I could practically see the place. No doubt exquisite and also completely impractical, built before they understood the climate of Albion was utterly different from that of Italy. Magnificent entryway, mosaic floors, peristyle garden with an entrancing colonnade. Commodious reception rooms, heated by a hypocaust. And a bath, probably heated by the same hypocaust. Wonderful! And excruciatingly expensive to maintain.
One could sit in the peristyle on a cool spring day, smell the flowers, and convince yourself that the Pax Romana still held, stretching from Arabia to Hadrian’s wall; legions stood well-organized and strong, holding back the barbarian tide. Instead of the mess we were in now with Britons, Saxons, Jutes, Franks, and for God’s sake, God alone knew how many others all at one another’s throats, clawing savagely for power with the one hand while with the other they raped, murdered, stole, enslaved, betrayed, and destroyed as many of their fellow humans as they possibly and profitably could.
“How much land, what kind, and how many people are there to work it?” I asked.
“Hmm,” he answered. His ardor seemed somewhat diminished, but I got a crisp, clear answer.
“About ten thousand acres, heavy black soil that holds water like a jug. About four villages, not overburdened with taxes or tribute. In addition, it’s on the coast and fishing rights go with the property. It has five walled gardens, three orchards—apple, cherry, and peach—a fish stew, poultry yard, and a dovecote. It needs a firmer hand than my mother’s to make it really pay, but I’m betting you’ll develop one. As it is, she realizes considerable revenue from it, and careful attention would probably double that.”
“Cattle, sheep, goats, pasture for same, foundry and forge?” I asked.
“Cattle and sheep, yes. Goats, I don’t care for. Mountain pasture with a long grazing season in summer. Foundry and forge you would have to attract, or go to the considerable expense of purchasing a smith, but the space and equipment are present.”
“Tannery and—” I began.
“Enough,” he said firmly, then eased away from the marble rail.
We stood facing each other, several feet apart. He looked amused and a little surprised. He had beautiful eyes, and his mouth was simply wonderful. I wanted desperately to taste those curved, smooth lips on mine, but I kept the conversation on matters mundane.
“When would I take possession of this very attractive property?”
“Immediately,” he replied blandly. “This is, immediately on the signing of the marriage contract.”
I nodded and pointed to myself. “And when would you take possession of this attractive property?”
This was too much for him. He began laughing. When he got his mirth under control, he answered, “Not for several years. My mother would have to pronounce you ready to be … a wife,” he added delicately.
“My,” I said. “You have my life all planned for me. All I have to do is live it.”
“Yes, I suppose it must look that way to you.” He sounded almost sad. “But it’s not a bad life. In fact, it’s a somewhat better one than most people ever achieve. Certainly a better one than living in the wilderness with a broken-down, exiled druid and his god-knows-what sort of friends and a Pictish slave.”
“That hurts,” I said. “I love Dugald, and the Gray Watcher is shape-strong, kind, loving, and very wise. As for Kyra, she is not a slave. Neither Dugald nor the Gray Watcher would keep a slave. Neither of them believes in it. Dugald told me once that the first, last, and best gift God gave to men and women was freedom. He lives by this precept and so do I. Besides, signing the contract may present grave difficulties. I have no kin here to look out for my interests, and I am not yet of an age to act for myself. And were I of such an age, my answer would be—”
I didn’t get to finish. His hand shot out and covered my mouth. “Don’t say any more.” There was a steely warning in his gaze. “And whatever you do, don’t say no. My mother and Merlin would take it very much amiss if you did, and they are very powerful people—both of them.”
His hand moved from my lips and cupped my chin. “I beg you, don’t say no. They could break you—the two of them—and it would …” His eyes wandered away from my face, and he looked into the distance, out over the sea. “It would,” he continued, and for the first time he looked like he was sixteen, “it would not be a thing that I would enjoy seeing. No, I wouldn’t like it at all.”
I’ll give it to him, I thought after he left. He’d managed to say what he wanted me to do without ever being explicit about it. Stall—stall! Stall for time. I did have one misgiving about him. He was too good at seeming to be on both sides of an issue, sympathizing with your plight while subtly twisting your arm to get you to fall in with whatever plan the powerful saw fit to impose on you. But here we both were, and they were determined to marry me off—and to him. I couldn’t help but wonder why.
Then I remembered Igrane’s tirade about the oracles, and I knew my name must have come up in them once too often. So I was here, and the simplest way to dispose of me was to plant me in the countryside like a tree. I could run an important estate, give him pleasure, and bear him children before I aged too much to be interesting. And that’s how it would go, I knew. Oh, we would b
e deliriously happy for—what? Three years? Four? Five, even? But then the bloom would be off the rose. I would have had children by then, and that changes a woman’s body—coarsens her skin, thickens her waist, weighs down her breasts. But above all, it preoccupies her, and often as not wearies her. Not to mention that he sees his place in her affections slowly grow less and less as theirs grows.
And it is not like his investment would be all in me and our family, the way a poor man’s is. A chief may have as many women as he cares to, as he can afford. Quickly I would be relegated to the background. Sweet Guynifar, snug in her pretty Cornish nest with the brood growing up around her knees, while he ruled, he married for political advantage, he dallied with the fresh, soft young flesh I was sure Igrane and Merlin would procure for his amusement.
In a pig’s eye!
I was thinking these things over when Igrane returned. She had accompanied Arthur and his friends back to whatever place they were lodged. As she glided up the stairs, I saw she had an expression of fixed disapproval on her face. Arthur must have confided my expressions of reluctance to her.
“I hope,” she began, “you will not be difficult about this.”
“Difficult?” I asked sweetly. “Why, whatever do you mean?”
I think my mimicry might have been a bit too blatant, because her eyes hardened and the lines around her mouth deepened into something approaching a scowl.
“Watch out,” I taunted. “Sorceress or not, you’re showing your age.” I had hoped to get a rise out of her, and I succeeded almost too well.
Those slender, long-nailed fingers closed on my hair. Pain, savage and all encompassing, paralyzing, lashed me, culminating in a rush of agony in my right arm and hand. I didn’t scream, or at least, I don’t think I did. But I did make a mewing sound and went to my knees before her. But in the last glimpse of her face, I saw the serpent, because that is what she reminded me of—a serpent. Strong, cold, secretive, and able only too well to blend into its surroundings so you don’t see it until it is too late. But my taunt pushed her into revealing herself. She knew she’d been outmaneuvered, and by a mere child, and was all the more enraged. I knew I could expect no mercy from her when the time came to—as my lord Arthur put it—break me.
I had some powers of my own, but now was not the time to force a duel. She might not win, but even if I succeeded in escaping her, there was Merlin to consider. No, Arthur suggested the best tactic: to adopt a delaying action. All this fleeted through my mind when I landed on my knees. So I began to weep.
“Stop blubbering,” she snapped. “Get up and change. God knows they want you gotten up like a goddess tonight, and I’ve been assigned the revolting task of grooming you for the feast. No, go bathe. And I’ll call my women. I wouldn’t soil my hands by touching you again.”
I dried my tears as I watched her retreating back, rose, and went to the bath by the sea. I wondered who had really tried to kill me in the cave on the island. I was scrubbing my hands with the myrrh soap when something occurred to me. Something had dropped the temperature of my heart to so cold a place that I shivered in the warm sun. If she meant to rule me in this way, how did she and the dark sorcerer Merlin rule her son?
No, I thought. No! That can’t be it, just can’t be. Some things are too awful to contemplate, at least for a thirteen-year-old, and the idea of what it must be like to live day in and day out with those two devils … well, I pushed it out of my mind, and I wouldn’t think about it any longer. Instead, I got out of the pool and delivered myself over to the maids.
They were servile, and I could see why now. A few doses of the pain Igrane liked to inflict and I’ll get servile, too. They were of the immature type, who like to play with dolls up to and into adulthood. Not to collect, not to keep, not to admire, but to play with, and that’s what I felt like—a doll.
They curled my hair—the stink of the irons was appalling. Mud-packed my face—yes, I did have a light tan; what would you expect, as I live and work outdoors. Rubbed a perfume into a half-dozen places on my body, then overdressed me in linen strophium, sleeveless shift, sleeved shift, overdress of silk, and I only just barely managed to fight off a brocade dalmatic. But I won the shoe battle, because they didn’t notice mine had changed. All the while, they were talking about my mother in Latin, which they didn’t think I understood. Repeating poison from Igrane’s own lips about how she was far too free with the “friendship of her thighs,” a nasty euphemism for promiscuity.
I didn’t know, I don’t remember her, not really. And if she was fond of the old ways, it may have been true. Once upon a time women were much freer than they are now. Freer in speech, behavior, and the use to which they put their bodies. A great lady could make a bastard if the day was auspicious, the man a hero, or even especially distinguished in talent or appearance. No one thought any less of her for it. In fact, she was even honored for wanting to bring a fine person into the world. But the Romans, who think women an inferior species of human beings, and the church, which Dugald says mirrors Roman attitudes in many ways, have brought these old customs into ill repute. So the serving women were not slow to slander my mother; and if they didn’t know I spoke tolerable Latin, Igrane, who was monitoring my dressing with an unpleasant smile on her face, probably did know, and the conversation was probably one I was meant to overhear. But I don’t think I gave her any satisfaction, because I managed to keep a stupid look on my face the entire time.
When they were finished polishing me for presentation, who should show up but Magetsky. She landed in a fluff of black feathers on the rail of the garden, strutted along it among the rosemary branches, and swore at me in First, Second, and Third Raven. I would like to have said something back at her, but I was afraid to call attention to her, lest Igrane find a way to kill her. She gave me hope that Maeniel was somewhere nearby, because I knew she wouldn’t fly all this way to find me, not even for him.
But by then it was almost dark, and Igrane dragged me into the procession toward the feasting hall.
When we reached the feasting hall, I knew I was in trouble. The gathering was being held in the same glass pavilion that the Gray Watcher had described to me. It was thronged with the wealthy and powerful of the British court, both Saxons and Romano-British. You see, the two were not separate from each other. The Saxons, then as now, did the bidding of the Romano-British landowners. They held down the old people, from among whom I come, and married their daughters off to Saxon lords and granted land to the ones who maintained their position, collected their taxes and duties. They granted them lands to rule, not to work, as my people did.
This Arthur was their creature; and as soon as the contract was signed, they would regard me as one of them, also.
No, I thought. No, and no, and no! I won’t do it.
“You see,” Igrane said, and pointed at a table very near the door. “We have found a few of your male kin to witness the signing of the papers.”
Oh, God, I thought, and looked and looked again. Oh, no, they were awful. There were three of them. The center one, to whom Igrane was pointing, was red. It isn’t a fashionable color at present, but red he was, with a thick thatch of scarlet hair. His face was the beetroot color of a heavy drinker, though that wasn’t much of a claim to fame in this company. Nearly every fourth man looked as though he imbibed to the point of folly.
The two on each side were worse. The one on the right was big and dark, much like a bear. Wearing a skin cap and old leather armor, very old leather armor—it was ratty and the backing shone through the breaks and weak spots. The other was long and lean, with brigand mustachios and stringy hair. He was wearing a much-rent chain mail shirt.
“We believe the one in the center to be your father.” The distaste and contempt in her voice were stinging.
From where I stood, they all looked drunk, pink-faced, sleepy-eyed. The feast had not begun yet, and many people were strolling, conversing with one another, seeing and allowing themselves to be seen. Merlin was seated
in the chair at the head of the table, or rather in the center seat farthest from the door. After the Roman fashion, he wore a wreath rather than a crown. It was gold and decorated with oak leaves, acorns, and the drooping nude flowers that cover oak branches in the spring. Oak leaves, flowers, and I am sure, leaves and roots would be present, also, an enchanter’s crown, a thing of awesome power. The dalmatic he flaunted over dark leggings was of silver cloth brocaded with blue oak leaves. His mantle was woven silver mail.
He was magnificent.
As was Arthur. He wore gold and scarlet, as befitted the summer king, and the figure of the dragon with scarlet wattles and crest was embroidered in red and gold on his linen dalmatic. No, not one dragon, but two in the neck twine of love or battle. They do it in both; it is a test of strength. His mantle was cloth of gold.
Igrane was introducing me around in a not very flattering way.
“Yes, we will sign the contract tonight. I think it’s time he made some good connections. She is from a prominent Irish family, and we have an eye on several others.”
“Just as well you snagged her now. Those oracles were raising the very devil among my people.” This observation was contributed by a hard-faced, middle-aged woman. “Twice my son-in-law had to put down disturbances on the river, but we will have no more problems with them. I ordered three hundred of them on shipboard to be sold to the Greeks. I find it’s best to go ahead and take the money before the ship sails and let the captain absorb the risk. A lot die in transit. He paid me two hundred aurei for the lot. The slave trade is booming. I let it be known among the peasants who work my lands that I’d just as soon take my profits out in flesh as in kind. They’ve been on their best behavior ever since—even the house servants.”
My stomach lurched. Then I wondered what it’s like to be sold, dragged away from family, friends, all the familiar things in life. Taken to almost another world—there to live life out as a possession treated no better than an animal, if as well, an exile until you die. If that were the only cruelty, it would still be bad, but most often, as Kyra had told me, it’s worse. Slavers, you see, don’t bother with babies, very young children, old folks, not even most adults. They don’t burden themselves with such trash. Mostly they kill them. Especially if they fight, they will kill them, and Kyra’s husband had fought.
The Dragon Queen Page 18
