Lancelot- Her Story
Page 54
"If they were any softer, I would faint when I touch them, so it is well that they are not." Guinevere reached up and caressed Lancelot's cheek. It was far softer than Arthur's cheeks ever had been. Now he wore a beard, and the hair in it was stiff, like a boar's. She was glad that she could just brush her husband's cheek with her lips and be done with it.
She had wanted Lancelot ever since the day they met, but it had taken years to win the sweet warrior to her bed. Lancelot hadn't realized that Guinevere could see that she was a woman. Even when she learned that Guinevere knew the truth, Lancelot had feared the sin of adultery.
The sin didn't worry Guinevere greatly, though perhaps it should. She suspected that Lancelot, who had not received the sacraments since the day they first embraced, said prayers that were haunted with guilt. But how could such a deep love be wrong? Rather, it had been wrong to lie loveless with Arthur.
The night passed all too quickly, and at a dark, early hour, Lancelot had to bind her breasts and clothe herself again. Dawn was the one time that they could not see each other. Guinevere imagined how the rosy light would look illuminating Lancelot's face.
Guinevere called her lover back to the bed and pressed her lips one more time. She gently touched Lancelot's left hand, which had lost two fingers in the Saxon War. It was amazing that Lancelot could still use that hand for many things, fighting included. "'Til tonight," Guinevere murmured.
"A thousand things will happen before we can be together again in the dark," Lancelot said, sighing.
She walked to the largest tapestry, a scene of women gathering fruit, and pulled it back, revealing the hidden panel to the passageway she used when she visited her love.
Guinevere returned to sleep. When dawn had passed and sunlight streamed into the room, her white-haired serving woman, Fencha, who had the only key to the queen's room other than Guinevere's, entered and greeted her.
"Did you sleep well, Lady Guinevere?"
"Indeed. And you, Fencha?"
"Tolerably well, my lady." She smiled because Guinevere had asked her.
Guinevere slid out of bed and took the damp cloth Fencha handed her to wash her face.
A series of mews, increasingly desperate, startled Guinevere.
"Here, Grayse," she called, looking about the room. The cat was not under the table or the bed, nor was she hidden among Guinevere's gowns.
The mews became louder.
"She's in the secret passage," Fencha said, moving to free the cat.
Grayse bounded over to Guinevere, who reached down to pat her. "God's eyebrows, what if someone else had heard her and discovered the hidden door, and the fact that I was using it!" Guinevere exclaimed. Fencha had always known about the door, had in fact told Guinevere about it when she came to Camelot.
"Such a simple thing. How near we came to being discovered." Guinevere gritted her teeth and tried to dismiss the thought.
Arthur did not object to their love, but he would care very much if anyone else learned that his wife was unfaithful to him. Indeed, he would have to punish them. Guinevere did not want to contemplate just what that punishment might be.
Mordred crept through the darkened brothel. He knew what door Dunaut, the owner, slept behind. With a whore, of course. Sometimes when Mordred was younger, he had been the one who was forced to lie with Dunaut. Raped. Now was the time for his revenge.
He wished he could torture the panderer, but that would rouse the others. Mordred clutched the sharpest kitchen knife, the only weapon he was allowed to touch. He was sorry that Dunaut would die in his sleep and would never know that Mordred had killed him, but there was no time for the luxury of confronting him. It was necessary to act as quickly as possible. Mordred understood necessity.
Mordred knew every inch of the brothel, for he had been raised there. He was ignorant of the rest of the world, but he would remedy that.
He wedged his knife through the crack in the door, springing the latch noiselessly. He stole his way to the bed.
Dunaut lay far enough away from the girl so that Mordred could probably kill him without killing her, too – not that he cared. Not when every scar on his back had come from Dunaut's beating. For an instant, he regarded the sleeping panderer. Then he slashed Dunaut's throat neatly.
The girl opened her eyes.
"Make a sound and I'll kill you, too," Mordred whispered. She cowered, and shrank to the corner of the small bed.
There were two other panderers to kill, though Dunaut had been the chief one. All of them had mocked Mordred for being a king's son, born to a whore. If his so-called mother, who was only a whore, hadn't died when he was a small child, he would have killed her too, Mordred thought.
Drunk with elation, he moved to the second panderer's room. His bloody knife was ready for more work. Now for Tudy, who had liked to kick Mordred, when he was a boy, and watch him fall. And then kick him again. Tudy was heavier, and might require a deeper thrust of Mordred's blade.
This latch also opened easily – Mordred had of course tried them earlier. He entered. Tudy stirred in his sleep, so Mordred bounded across the floor and stabbed him. The girl beside him screamed before Mordred could warn her not to and leapt from the bed.
"Shut up, fool! I'll be the owner now, and you dare not disobey me," Mordred said, checking to make sure that his knife had gone home and Tudy was dead.
"What's up?" came a shout from outside the door. Coan, the third and youngest panderer, not so many years older than Mordred, was on his way. Coan had liked to shame Mordred by throwing the food Mordred served back in his face.
Mordred waited. The girl shivered in a corner.
Bearing a rushlight, the panderer peered cautiously through the open door. His other hand held a club.
Mordred grabbed a chair and threw it at him.
Dropping both torch and club, Coan fell. Mordred was on him in an instant, holding down the thrashing man until he could slash his throat. Coan screamed and tried to get away, but Mordred kept slashing until he fell silent.
Kicking the corpse, Mordred grabbed the chamber pot and doused the fallen torch. The brothel was his now, and he didn't want it damaged.
Emerging from the doorway, he yelled, "Here, every one of you! Come here. I'm the master now."
He had waited for a night when there were no customers. Only the whores and assorted rough men who worked at the brothel were there.
"Light the rushlights," Mordred commanded.
Men and women scurried to obey him.
Mordred held his bloodied knife before the assembled throng. "I've killed all three of the masters. Now I'm the master here. Obey me, and you'll live as you did before. Disobey, and you'll follow them. Which will it be?"
Several cracking voices called out, "We'll obey."
“You'd better. Now clean up these rooms. Throw the bodies to the pigs. And bring me some mead."
Mordred took a seat at one of the tables in the front room and waited to be served, for a change, instead of serving. He did not wipe off the blood that had splattered on him. It pleased him.
This was only the first step. He would have money now, plenty of money. And he would find a man to teach him sword-fighting and the ways of the High King's court. He would go to his father, the king, someday, but only when he was prepared.
He was young, strong, and clever. His whole life was ahead of him. King Mordred had a good sound to it. Mordred Rex.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Carol Anne Douglas is a lifelong student of Arthurian and Shakespearian lore. Please review Lancelot: Her Story on Amazon and Goodreads, and subscribe to the RSS feed on her blog at CarolAnneDouglas.com to receive updates about Volume II, Lancelot and Guinevere (978-0-9967722-2-8) as well as other books to come.
ith friends