Nerys smiled.
A little past midday they stopped to eat in a sunny meadow on the hillside. Blanchefleur distributed the food, and as they received, the others dispersed across the clearing in scattered, chattering groups until at last she and Perceval sat tête-à-tête over the empty baskets.
Blanchefleur ate in what she thought was silent awkwardness, but Perceval seemed not to know the meaning of the word. “What is this marvellous contrivance?” he asked, looking at his food.
“It’s a sandwich. Didn’t you have any in Gloucestershire?”
“I believe not.” He took another bite and chewed slowly, eyes narrowed toward the hills. “Remarkable. Like a trencher, but with two trenchers. Do you know, these could be useful for quests.”
“That’s what we used them for,” said Blanchefleur. “Well, not that we ever went on quests.”
They sat for a while in silence, and then, between his first sandwich and his second, Perceval said, “You heard my adventures last night. Tell me yours. How have you fared in Carbonek?”
She thought back over the last eighteen months and shook her head. “It was not half so interesting as your story. Except for Morgan.”
“Morgan? You had trouble with Morgan le Fay?”
“In Sarras.”
She told him everything except Morgan’s memories, and the things they signified—that Arthur was the father of Morgan’s child; that he had manipulated his deadliest enemy against his own kingdom. It never occurred to her to voice them. Until they were backed with better currency than the word of Morgan of Gore, let them lie silent, gnawing on the edges of her mind.
None of the other explorers seemed in any hurry to move on from the drowsy meadow. Blanchefleur took her time over the tale, and Perceval—lying back with eyes shut against the sun’s glare—at length stirred and said: “This interests me, Morgan’s story about a master. You disbelieved her?”
“I did, when I found out she wanted the Grail. After she stabbed me, I was not so sure. She did seem desperate.”
“I can go to Gore and ask questions, maybe.” Perceval lay still a moment longer, brushed away a fly, and said: “Did she chance to mention the name Mordred?”
“Never. Who is that?”
Perceval drew breath to answer, but at that instant Heilyn came and said, “Will we go further down the river, before the sun sinks?”
“By all means,” said Perceval. Heilyn went to collect the others. Blanchefleur stretched and then began gathering up baskets and discarded cloaks. Perceval went to help her.
She asked, “How long will you stay here, at Carbonek?”
He grinned. “As long as you want me to. Command me!”
There was the old Perceval, the one she knew so well. So he had not forgotten her after all. She laughed and teased: “But I thought you had errantry and questing to do. Do not stay another moment on my account.”
He laughed and stood and offered her his free hand to help her rise. “Oh, lady, be kind.”
They were the same words he had used so long ago on the terrace at Kitty’s party, and Blanchefleur caught her breath. Kind! That was exactly what she had not been. For one companionable hour she had forgotten the bitter penitence of her sleepless nights. It all rushed back to her now and she looked up at him with all her regret in her eyes.
“I’ll try,” she whispered, in such a meek voice that she expected him to laugh at her. But instead, he replied in a voice just as soft.
“I am glad, for I have need of your kindness. There is something I must tell you.”
She dropped her head and put her hand in his. They went together to where the horses stood, and he buckled the baskets on in silence and took the cloaks from her and tossed them over a pony’s saddlebow. Then he took her arm and pulled her deeper into the trees, away from her chattering friends, where his own grey horse stood tethered to a chestnut tree. He reached across, past Blanchefleur, and knotted his fingers into the mane.
She willed her dry mouth to work. “What did you name him?”
“Glaucus.”
“Well chosen,” she said, and lifted her hand to rub the horse’s neck.
The others were mounting up. Some of the ponies had already turned to plod back down the path to the river. Perceval cast them a glance and turned back to Blanchefleur, his hand tightening in the mane. He said, “I told you something, last night, about the Disinherited Damsel.”
She traced her fingers through the dusty grey coat under her hand. “You did.”
“You didn’t hear everything.”
In another moment he would confess, and she didn’t want to hear him tell it. “You kissed her. Didn’t you?”
“How—”
“I saw it one night when I was dreaming.”
Branwen’s voice came drifting through the leaves. “Blanchefleur!”
“We’re coming,” she called back. She looked Perceval in the eyes for the first time since he had offered his hand and saw that he had blushed red to the roots of his hair.
But he didn’t move, and the determination in him never flickered. “Another moment and the Quest would have been lost. And Hell would indeed have taken its tithe of me.”
Glaucus shifted away from them. Perceval’s gaze broke at last; he seemed to realise for the first time how he was looming over her. He straightened and stared at his fingers, smoothing out the horse’s mane.
“Damsel, now you know how to think of me.”
She had to say the right thing, or anything could happen. One unguarded look, and this had come. Now what? If she forgave him, what would he say then?
She wasn’t ready.
“Damsel?”
She looked up and laughed and turned up a palm. “It was a fiend. It might have happened to anyone.”
He shook his head. “To Galahad?”
She kept her voice light. “You’re sorry for it now. Don’t do it again.”
“By heavenly grace, I will not.” For a moment he looked his gratitude. Then, to her relief, he lit up with mischief. “So you do mind.” He swung into the saddle and held out his hand to her.
“I don’t have to mind to tell you not to do it again.” She stepped up and landed behind him.
“Oh, do you not? Shall I make you mind?”
“Why, you couldn’t possibly! You’re not heartless enough.”
He threw his head back and laughed. “How right you are. Do you know, I might be insulted, but I have just achieved the Grail Quest. Would you love me if I was wicked?”
“Not a bit.”
“Just as I feared.”
SIR PERCEVAL AND SIR BORS LEFT Carbonek two days later.
The day after the ramble in the valley, Perceval asked to see Blanchefleur, and she led him from the solar to her chamber, the one that had once been Elaine’s, to speak alone. Blanchefleur saw Branwen’s smile as they went, and groaned inwardly. Ready or not, it was too late to stave off the inevitable. And while part of her was laughing and singing because this moment had come, everything most cautious and most foresighted in her had dug in terrified feet and refused to move. Now, as she settled into her chair by the empty fireplace, holding distaff and spindle like a shield before her, she wondered which of them would win the tug-of-war that was her will.
Perceval lounged against her window, thumbs stuck into his belt, easy and indolent in the warm morning. Looking at him, it was hard to believe that he had faced a giant in the burning wreck of her home, or spent so long wandering in the most perilous parts of Britain, or made a name for himself even among the heroes of the Table.
But his voice was businesslike as he said, “Bors and I will ride back to Camelot soon with Heilyn. If you mean to come, best come now, with three of us to guard you.”
“I hardly know,” she said. “I think I had rather wait for the King to send for me.”
“How so?”
Blanchefleur, spinning, picked her words slowly. “He may wish to prepare for my coming. Nerys said he hoped that guarding
the Grail would be a way for me to prove my right to Logres, in case anyone disputed it. Well, I have guarded the Grail. Tell him about it, and let him send for me when he is ready.” She smiled at him. “Besides, I don’t know if Heilyn told you, but on the strength of becoming your squire, he asked Branwen to marry him.”
“Oh, he mentioned it,” said Perceval, grinning.
“She and her mother will travel to Camelot together by winter at the latest. I can ride with them.”
“Still. I hardly like leaving you here, so far away, in such an uncertain world.”
But just when she expected him to press the matter further, he changed the topic: “Do you remember when we met in the Great Hall below for the first time?”
Her hands fell idle. “I remember it.”
“I said I would serve you a year and a day. Lady, it has been longer than that, and I have not always served you as faithfully as I should, but there is no lady in the world I would rather serve. Will you allow me to go on as I have?”
She suddenly feared that was all he wanted, and a stab of mingled disappointment and relief went through her. “Yes. Yes, of course.”
She began to spin in a final sort of way, but Perceval did not take the hint. He walked over and, gently but firmly, took the spindle and distaff away. “Blanchefleur,” he said, and his voice was so serious that she knew it was coming.
She stared at the floor by his feet. “What is it?”
“I have leave to ask you to marry me.”
She did not look up or speak, and he dropped to a crouch so that she was forced to look at him.
“When King Pelles dies, if I live so long, Carbonek will be mine. I am no longer landless. And I love you best of all ladies in the world. I do not deny that at first mine was a boy’s fancy. But I know both you and myself better than I did before, and I have all a man’s devotion to offer you.”
Blanchefleur did not speak. Only the tension in her shoulders snapped tight. But there was more at stake here than her own happiness, and she clung to silence like a lifeline. If he guessed what she felt, would he hear what she had to say?
He was still looking into her face, and a quick play of hope and fear passed through his eyes.
“Will you not give me an answer?”
“I cannot,” she said at last.
“Why not?”
“Please,” she said, rising from her chair and walking to the window, where she gulped a long slow breath to calm herself, “will you allow me a little more time to decide?”
“Time?”
“You—” She fought down the eager half of her and tried again, more stiffly. “You will admit that your fancy, as you call it, began long before I was inclined to welcome it.”
He was silent for a moment. “You mean you do not love me yet?”
She could not bring herself to a lie of that magnitude. “Oh, no, no, it’s…”
He moved toward her, and his purposeful step spurred her into speech.
“It’s my birth,” she said, turning back to him. “I cannot agree to marry you if I do not know who I am.”
Perceval almost looked offended. “That! It cannot matter to me. It’s you I love, not your pedigree. And here in Carbonek, I can offer you a home and comfort even if Logres should not want you.”
He never looked more like his father than now, she thought. Sir Gawain, whose titanic temper stirred so easily even against friends and allies. How angry would he be if Perceval’s wife, the purported Heir of Logres, whom he loved for his King’s sake, should turn out to be a pretender?
“Perceval,” she pleaded, “I only ask for time. I am not saying no. Let me find out for sure who I am, and then ask me again and see what I say.”
He frowned. “Why should it make any difference? It cannot to me.”
“I’m afraid…”
She could not finish the sentence. Not to the son of Sir Gawain. “Oh, Perceval, we are both young. What difference does a year or two make?”
“It makes a great deal of difference to me,” he said. “I may not be alive in a year or two to ask you again.”
Blanchefleur’s stomach turned over. “Why, are you ill?”
“Ill? No.” He looked at her in bafflement. “But you know how I live my life. By the sword and the lance. Sooner or later, I make no doubt, I will die by the sword, or by the lance. You ask for more time,” he went on, softening, “and God knows that if I knew I had it, I would give it. But we may have so little time left.”
A slow cold shiver ran down her neck. To her, Perceval, who faced death so readily with steel and laughter, had never seemed entirely mortal. “That did not occur to me,” she managed to say at last. “But even so, I had rather lose you in waiting than act in foolish haste and regret it, perhaps for many years.”
“I see neither foolishness nor haste in this,” said Perceval, “and little reason to suppose you anything but what you are.”
“But after what Elaine told me, before she died, I am no longer sure of myself. Maybe not now, but once, perhaps, Lancelot and my mother…”
Perceval shook his head. “I grant that. But I still say that I will have you, no matter whose daughter you are.”
“It might not matter to you,” she said, “but it might matter to others.”
She might have told him who then, if he had not flushed dark and cried, “Others? What others? Who would dare—let any man raise his voice against my wife, and I will ram—”
“Don’t say it,” she cried in distress.
Perceval sighed, unclenched his fists, and turned away, running his hands through his hair. When he looked back, his voice was gentle.
“I must arrive at an understanding with you. For the last time, will you marry me? Say yes if you wish. Say no if you wish. But do not ask me to wait.”
Blanchefleur felt inexpressibly weary. So this was the meeting in Carbonek after the glorious achievement of the Grail for which she had waited so long.
“Please don’t…”
“I am asking you. Now. And I think you want to say yes.”
She was wretchedly aware that she must have made some terrible mistake. But she could not put her finger either on what it was, or on how it could be repaired. So she said the only thing she could think of.
“No. My answer is no.”
28
Now the day comes near and near
I feel its hot breath, and see it clear,
How strange it is and full of fear;
And I grow old waiting here,
Grow sick with pain of Guenevere,
My wife, that loves not me.
Swinburne
IN THE COLD PRE-DAWN BLANCHEFLEUR TUCKED knees beneath chin and watched Nerys fold her blankets for the last time.
“Will you be safe travelling alone?” Blanchefleur spoke in a whisper, for on another couch in a corner of the room Branwen sprawled beneath a pile of bedclothes, dead to the world, and in these last minutes Blanchefleur longed to have her oldest friend to herself.
Nerys came over to sit on Blanchefleur’s bed while she combed her long black hair. “I think so.”
“I don’t like it,” Blanchefleur said. “No news from Camelot, and all those stories of disappearing travellers.”
“I am riding west, not south,” Nerys said, her pale fingers coming and going like moongleams in the dark cloud of her hair. “The road to the Apple Isle is long and chancy, but it will not take me near the Silver Dragon.”
“They call him Saunce-Pité. He is only one man. Why doesn’t the Table do anything about him?”
Nerys teased apart a knot, too busy to bother answering what they both knew—that neither of them could tell what the Table might be doing. Blanchefleur pulled the covers closer around her shoulders and said:
“I wish you were not going to Avalon.”
Nerys said, “The rest of my people must know what I saw in Sarras. Now that the Quest is done, it is only a matter of time before the King sends for you. You no longer need my prote
ction, or my counsel.”
“Oh, Nerys,” Blanchefleur said gratefully. “But can’t I persuade you to stay? I will never have as much experience and wisdom as you. And I’m not safely home yet. Perceval went away at the beginning of summer, and we are still waiting to hear from the King.”
Nerys reappeared from behind the sable curtain of her hair. “Some business must be keeping them. Unless the King’s messengers have fallen afoul of Saunce-Pité.”
“Your people can open doorways in space and time. Can’t you get me to Camelot, Nerys?”
Nerys shook her head. “The elf-keys open doors between worlds. I can only take you out of Britain altogether.”
She raked her hair to the back of her head and fixed it with a long silver pin. “Well! I am ready, and there goes Dame Glynis down the passage.”
But Nerys lingered, clouding the air with thought. Blanchefleur waited. She knew that look, and braced herself.
Nerys said: “Blanchefleur, may I give you advice before I go?”
“Of course.”
“If you see Sir Perceval again, treat him more kindly.”
Blanchefleur felt her face grow hot. It was the first time the subject had arisen between them since she first told Nerys why Perceval and Bors had left the castle so soon, six months before.
“Oh, Nerys. I had to tell him no.”
“No man can be toyed with in that fashion. Appeal to him, give your reasons, but either let him decide for both of you, or go your own way and let him go his.”
“I thought it for the best.”
Nerys saw the look on her face and said:
“I have pondered whether to say this. But I know you refused him against every inclination, and that you have been silent and melancholy since, and that despite the answer you gave him you still count the days until you see him again. You told him you would not wed him: Be not surprised if he takes you at your word.”
Blanchefleur stared at her knees, drawn up under her chin. She supposed Perceval might eventually seek another lady. But what most worried her these days were his words at their last meeting in this very room—“Sooner or later, I make no doubt, I will die by the sword, or by the lance…”
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