“No! I have—I have to tell you the truth, Lancelot.” Guinevere hung her head, staring at the rocks that separated her from the water.
“That Merlin is your father?”
Guinevere looked up, shocked. It felt wrong, coming from Lancelot’s mouth, just as it had from Arthur’s. “Did Arthur tell you?”
Lancelot shook her head. “It did not take much to put it together. After all, how would a princess from the southern lands know where Merlin lived in the woods? Why would she be so desperate to save him? Everyone knows what Merlin was to Arthur. Of course Arthur would choose his first protector’s daughter as a wife.” Lancelot smiled, but her smile was bitter. Her hazel eyes narrowed and hardened. “I even understand the deception. Sometimes we have to hide from what others see in order to be what we know we are.”
There was a reason Lancelot’s hand in hers that day in the forest had felt right. Had felt true. Lancelot understood her.
“I cannot touch the water,” Guinevere said. “If I do, I fear the Lady of the Lake will find me, too, and take me like she did Merlin.”
“Then why were you going to throw yourself in?”
“Maleagant would have used me against Arthur. I am not certain I could keep Arthur’s secrets forever against a man like that.” Guinevere shuddered.
Lancelot waded to her. She turned and leaned so her back was presented to Guinevere. “Come on.”
“What?”
“On my back. Hold tight. Wrap your legs around my waist. We are crossing this river.”
Guinevere climbed on as instructed. She crossed her arms around Lancelot’s collarbones. Lancelot adjusted her legs, hiking her up a bit. Guinevere’s skirts were around her waist, her ankles white and forbidden in the sunlight.
Lancelot held Guinevere’s thighs in place on either side, and then stepped into the river.
Guinevere closed her eyes, but now that she knew what the fear was—that it was real, not simply foolishness—she found it easier. The shame of her terror of water had been almost as great as the fear, and without shame, the fear could be faced.
Lancelot’s pace was careful, each foot firmly planted before the next was lifted. It seemed to take a lifetime. As the water got higher and higher along Lancelot’s legs, Guinevere feared Lancelot had judged the depth wrong.
“A little looser, my lady,” Lancelot said, her voice strained. Guinevere loosened her arms, which had drifted up around Lancelot’s throat.
“Sorry!”
“Almost there. Close your eyes. That will make it easier.”
Again Guinevere did as instructed.
Lancelot spoke lightly, her low, rich voice carefully even. “How did you get past the guard inside? Did you use magic?”
Guinevere snorted, lowering her face to Lancelot’s shoulder and resting it there. “You do not want to know.”
“Well, now I want to know more than I have ever wanted to know anything.”
“I will spare you the details,” Guinevere said, breathing deeply of the leather scent of Lancelot’s patchwork armor. It cut through the river smell, helping Guinevere combat the fear. “But it involved a full chamber pot.”
Lancelot laughed, her hands tightening around Guinevere’s thighs. “You did not!”
“He deserved worse. I only wish it had been Maleagant’s face on the receiving end.”
“I am proud of you. A true warrior can make a weapon of anything. I will have to remember that trick.”
“I doubt a bowl of piss will be one of the weapon offerings at the next tournament.”
Lancelot made a low noise in her throat. The splashing stopped. Lancelot went several steps farther, then tilted her head so it bumped against Guinevere’s. “My lady, your noble steed has seen you safely to land.” She crouched low and Guinevere dropped to the blessedly dry ground. “And now we run.”
Guinevere and her knight raced across a broad, rocky plain. Scrubby bushes dotted the landscape but offered little cover. “My horse is there, at the tree line. I could not risk riding her closer. It took me ages to cross this plain, darting from rock to rock. I need not have bothered. They never once came out to keep watch. Maleagant did not fear discovery.”
“How did Arthur know where to look?” Guinevere gasped around a stitch in her side. She had not eaten since the tournament. And she did not know how much time had passed, having spent so much of it unconscious. But she kept pace with Lancelot. She could be tired when they were safe.
“Brangien, your maid, found you. I am unclear on the specifics. Something with sewing and your hair left behind in her combs.”
Dear Brangien! Guinevere’s heart swelled with gratitude. Brangien had risked banishment in order to find Guinevere. Maleagant had not counted on the strength and cunning of women. “And Arthur sent his best knight.”
Lancelot pointed. “We can talk when we are on my horse riding away from here.”
They made it to the trees without any sign of pursuit. Lancelot whistled a high, sharp note. Her horse meandered up amiably. Lancelot boosted Guinevere, then mounted in front of her.
“How far are we from Camelot?” Guinevere asked, her arms loosely circling Lancelot’s waist.
“About a day. But we are not going back to Camelot.”
“Where are we going?”
“North, toward the Pictish lands. Maleagant will expect us to race back to Camelot. He will try to cut us off. I hope that by going north and then angling down, we can avoid him. I love this horse with all my soul, but carrying two riders that long, she could not outpace a hunting party.”
“Will Arthur meet us there?”
Lancelot drew a deep breath, then released it slowly. “Arthur did not send me. Brangien said he was not going to send anyone. Not until he knew more. Most moves against Maleagant end in war, and the king will not enter into a war unless he absolutely must. I never thought I would miss his father, but…sometimes war cannot be avoided.”
Guinevere wilted. It was what she had expected, of course. But knowing it for fact hurt. Some part of her had still hoped that Arthur would risk everything for her, and that hope had seemingly been answered when Lancelot appeared. “Arthur was right to choose as he did,” she said softly. “He must weigh the good of all his people. I cannot tip that balance. I should not. But how did you come? You cannot disobey Arthur. You are a knight now.”
Lancelot’s voice grew unexpectedly gruff, as though she were trying to speak around something lodged in her throat. “I am not.”
“What?”
“I would advise against shouting.”
Guinevere hissed instead of shouting. “What do you mean, you are not a knight? Did they delay the ceremony because of my disappearance?”
“My gender was discovered just as your kidnapping was. I was dismissed without conversation.”
“But Arthur must—”
“King Arthur had more on his mind than one woman’s problems.”
“Than two women’s problems,” Guinevere said, her voice soft and sad. “When we get back, I will demand you receive your place among his knights. You earned it. You are better than any of them.”
“That does not matter now. Your safety is all that matters.” Lancelot paused. “King Arthur was wrong not to choose you.” Her voice was as fierce as her sword. The horse reacted to her tone, moving faster. Lancelot stroked the mare’s neck, patting it and slowing back down. “My queen, you saw me as who I am from the first. I will fight for you for the rest of my life. It is the only honor I could ask.”
Guinevere’s arms tightened around her knight’s waist. She lowered her heavy head, resting her cheek against Lancelot’s strong upper back. “Thank you,” she whispered.
“Thank me when we are safe.” Lancelot rode warily, her head turning constantly from side to side, searching for threats.
Guinev
ere did not want to distract her, but she had more questions. “How did you find Brangien?”
“She went to Mordred, and he found me.”
“Mordred! Brangien went to Mordred?” Mordred ran the courts. It was one thing for him to excuse Guinevere’s magic in the forest when he thought she did not do any more. Another entirely to excuse magic done in the heart of Camelot. “If word of this gets out, she will be banished.”
“Mordred is certainly not going to tell. This was all his idea. He argued with the king, demanding they ride to find you. When the king said they would wait, Mordred stormed out. Brangien had already searched for you and she took the information to him. It was Mordred who recognized the place Brangien described. He is waiting for us at a camp. We thought it best if only one of us scouted. Easier to hide. And if it had come to it, I could have dressed in women’s clothes and tried to get to you that way. Though I am glad it did not. I feel false in women’s clothing. It is like wearing a lie.”
The forest grew thicker and Lancelot had to focus on guiding her horse. Guinevere kept watch, every rustling bird or skittering animal making her certain they were being followed.
As twilight faded into evening, Lancelot directed the horse into a series of low hills, covered with trees.
Galloping hooves pounded toward them. Lancelot drew her sword.
“Lancelot!” Mordred called. He pulled his horse to a stop with skidding hooves. A second horse was being led by a rope behind the first. “You are being followed. I counted six men. I suspect Maleagant is with them. Quick, Guinevere.” He paused, closing his eyes as relief washed over his face. “Guinevere,” he said again, his voice as soft as a prayer. Then he was back to the urgent business of keeping them all alive. He tugged on the reins of the second horse to bring it closer. Guinevere slid down and then climbed onto the fresh steed.
“Are you hurt?” Mordred moved closer and searched her face in the fading light.
“Nothing that will not heal. Lancelot was just in time. You both were. Thank you.”
“Can your horse ride in the dark?” Mordred asked the knight.
Lancelot laughed. “My horse always rides in the dark.”
“Then we need to move. I will not let that monster have her again.”
“We cannot outpace him,” Lancelot shouted as they pushed their horses to a gallop. It was not as fast as the horses could go, but still faster than was safe in the low light of the moon.
“I know!” Mordred gripped his reins in anger.
“We could pick a place to fight before he can gather more men. If we surprise them, we may stand a chance.” Lancelot sounded calm. Resigned. Guinevere did not like their odds. And she would be useless. Unable to help as she watched two people she cared about fight—and probably die—for her.
Mordred shook his head. “Maleagant has powerful allies, and his soldiers are loyal. If Arthur’s nephew kills him, it would mean war just as surely as if Arthur had.”
“But he will never stop.” Guinevere had seen it. Had felt it. War with Maleagant was as unavoidable as the night closing in on them. “He wants Camelot. He will not give up, even if we make it back. He is a threat to the kingdom. To Arthur.”
Mordred slowed his horse. Hers followed suit. “I…might have an idea. But it is a very bad idea.”
Lancelot circled them as she watched for threats. “I am open to any idea that does not end with us dead, Guinevere recaptured, or Camelot overthrown.”
Mordred continued. “We need Maleagant dead. That much we can agree on.”
Guinevere nodded grimly.
“What if we did not kill him? What if his death could never be traced back to Arthur?”
Guinevere considered it. Perhaps they could ride into Pictish territory. And somehow convince the Picts to kill Maleagant? Unlikely. And even if they managed to kill Maleagant’s entire party, there was no reason the story would not spread. “If people know Maleagant took me, any assassin’s blade or arrow will be attributed to Arthur.”
“We will not use blade or arrow,” Mordred said. “We will use a weapon that King Arthur, defeater of the Dark Queen, banisher of magic, would never use.”
Guinevere went cold. “What weapon?”
“We wake the trees.”
Guinevere shook her head. “We cannot! Merlin put them to sleep for a reason.”
“Obviously we will not wake all the trees. There is a copse a few miles from here. Ancient. Powerful. I knew the channel island Brangien described because I fought here at Arthur’s side. If anyone knows what threats sleep in the roots and the soil, it is I.”
“Even if we thought it wise, it cannot be done.”
“It can,” Mordred said. “I know what you are, Guinevere.”
She tried to protest, but he lifted a hand. “You do not have to explain yourself to me. Not all of us agreed with the need to banish Merlin.” He leaned toward her, so near their legs brushed as their horses avoided bumping into each other. Intensity rolled off him. “We lure Maleagant into the trees. You wake them. They kill him. And then we put them back to sleep. Maleagant is dead, Camelot is safe, Arthur is safe. Please. I do not know how I can save everyone otherwise. And I cannot lose him. Or you.”
Merlin had told her Arthur needed her. He had advised her to fight as a queen. But that meant not being able to fight at all in this terrible world of men. Mordred was right. This was a task only she could do. She was terrified, not only of the tyrant chasing them, but of the forest awaiting them. There were so many ways for this to go wrong. Iron was finite, contained. It held magic without expanding. Her knots bound whatever they did, and every knot eventually frayed, the magic fading. But the trees…they were living. And trying to control living things never went as planned.
She had to try. And Mordred, who had always seen her, believed in her.
“To the trees,” she said.
Guinevere knelt at the base of a towering oak. It was gnarled and twisting, with deep score marks running up and down the trunk like scars. She put her hands on them and then pulled back from the pain. They were scars. This tree had done battle.
Lancelot waited on her horse in the center of the perfectly circular meadow that Mordred had brought them to. Guinevere had heard of fairy circles, formed by mushrooms or stones. But this one was fenced in by the trees. As though something had stood in the center and pushed back all around itself. Or rather, himself.
Merlin.
Guinevere longed to speak with him. To ask him what he had done, how he had done it, how she should do it. But he had refused to tell her any truths.
Mordred’s hand came down lightly on her shoulder. “Can you do it?”
“I have no idea what I am doing. Or supposed to do. I have never done this type of magic. I know tricks, Mordred. Cleansing. Knotting. This is so much more.”
“You are so much more.” He knelt at her side. He put his hand over hers, the spark and flame inside leaping back to life. Then he put her hand on the tree. With Mordred’s heat guiding her, she moved past the bark, past the skin and surface of the tree. Down to its heart, its roots, pulsing back up to the leaves. A hundred years of sun and rain, storm and snow, growth and hibernation, rushed through her. She could feel it as though sunshine powered her own pulse. And somewhere, deep within, she could feel the spirit of the tree itself.
“I feel it,” she whispered. “But I do not know how to wake it.”
“Perhaps a shock. Fire?”
It had been fire that had driven them to sleep. And she could not wield fire like a weapon as Merlin had. She was more likely to set the whole forest on fire than to wake anything up, and then she and her friends would die from flames and smoke if Maleagant did not get to them first.
“I can see riders!” Lancelot shouted. “They are minutes away. If you are going to do something, do it soon. Mordred, I suggest you mou
nt and be ready to fight.”
“Iron!” Guinevere said. “Iron is a cold shock to every magical thing.”
Mordred shook his head. “I could not get my sword to the heart of this tree in time.”
What else was magic hungry for? Something that fed magic and had iron, as well. Something that would go to the roots, feeding the entire tree. Waking it.
“Give me a knife.” She held out her hand.
“What for?”
“Just give it to me!”
Mordred pulled one from a sheath at his belt. Guinevere held it in her palm. She closed her eyes. If this did not work, nothing would. She would have to watch Mordred and Lancelot die. Arthur would fall.
She drew the knife across her palm. Mordred hissed in surprise, but she did not open her eyes or look at him. She held her hand over the roots, letting the blood drop there. Letting it seep into the ground. Then she placed her palm over the trunk, tracing one of the simplest knots she knew. Wake. And then one of the most terrible knots she knew, that she had used on the bird to find Merlin.
Obey.
A breeze rustled through the tree, the leaves shivering. But the meadow was perfectly still. There was no breeze. The tree shuddered again. Guinevere still had her palm against it, letting the blood run freely down it.
The leaves quivered and then stopped.
It had not worked. She opened her eyes, devastated.
And then, beneath her hand, she felt the tree wake. She had felt trees before, felt their agitated sleep. Felt the leaf of the forest that had claimed the village, felt the sense of teeth. It was nothing compared to what she felt in this tree.
Triumph. And a joy more terrible than any fear she had ever known.
She stumbled back, falling, then scrambled to her feet. “This was a mistake. We have to go. Lancelot!”
Still her hand was bleeding. Watering the meadow. A root snaked around her feet, pulling her to the ground. She screamed as it dragged her across the dirt. A branch reached down, and the leaves, each as thin as a razor, lashed at her arms. Her sleeves were sliced apart, a hundred cuts.
The Guinevere Deception Page 28
