Geraldus laughed and Arthur at least relaxed.
“It’s settled then,” Mark said. “Like the champions of old, we start at dawn, marching alone to our destiny.”
“I do think, dear,” Guenlian interrupted, “that you might take a few others along. Perhaps Caet, to care for the horses. He’s been moping lately and a quest is just what he needs.”
“Could we take my foster brother, Cei, with us, too?” Arthur blurted and turned red again.
“Well, all right,” Mark bowed to the voice of prudence. “Perhaps I’ll ask a couple of others. But don’t you add anyone, Geraldus. Taking you along is the same as inviting a cohort. You’d better warn your friends, Arthur, about his odd habits of waving his arms about and screaming at the air. Not that I mind. It’s very entertaining. But some people might think it annoying, or assume that he is coming down with St. Vitus’ Dance.”
So, still laughing and talking, the three left again to make their plans for the morning. Merlin sighed wistfully as he saw how Arthur relaxed as soon as he was out of Guenlian’s line of vision. He leaned back on his cushions when they were well away. Guenlian still studied her glass.
He drew a long breath. “Will you keep my secret, cousin? Even from your husband?”
“Yes, as long as you ask. I think I’d rather. Perhaps no one ever need know. Poor boy! There is something endearing about him. I hope his life will not be too hard.”
“Let’s not think of that now,” Merlin answered. “As your son so wisely said, we need no more prophecy. Good night, my dear.”
“Good night,” Guenlian smiled. When he had left, she let herself slip back on her couch. Memories she had blotted out for years were flooding back. Those awful, barbaric years after Ambrosius died, when his brother, Uther, was warlord of Britain. He was a tall, sinewy man, with a wild flaming beard. Guenlian cringed at the thought of him yet. His voice was loud, even when he tried to whisper, and his whispers were vulgar and oily. His lecherous tastes were well known, even after he married Igraine. She and Leodegrance had come to court once, just before Matthew was born. She had returned home for his birth but come back a few months later to be with her husband. It was then she had caught his eye, her hips slender again but her breasts full and round with milk for her son. One night he had sent her the best tidbits from his own plate and ordered her wine poured from his cup. The very thought of eating what he had touched revolted her. Thank God Leodegrance was wiser than poor Gorlois! He had gotten his family away at once and yet connived with Igraine somehow to keep Uther’s wrath from falling on them. Poor Igraine, no one ever believed she had been forced to marry Uther. All her children taken from her, all her dignity, all her pride. How glad she must have been to die!
“Guinevere, my dearest child. I’m so grateful that you’re away from here now. I wish so that you could always stay there, high in the hills, away from all the filth. But, oh, how I miss you!”
She drained her glass and lay there, watching the candle flame until it sputtered out. Much later, Pincerna found her there, asleep. He called Leodegrance, who gently carried her to bed.
Arthur, Geraldus, and Mark set off at dawn the next day, happy and eager. They took only Caet and Cei and three other friends who they thought would appreciate a quest. They rode out bravely, singing at the top of their lungs. Early risers came out to wave them good-bye. They saluted one and all as they went through the gate and across the river, and their voices could be heard long after they passed from sight.
• • •
Two days later, Guinevere woke up with a feeling of intense joy. She had been dreaming again, she knew. But that feeling had never before stayed with her after she awoke. This time she didn’t feel as if she had left something precious behind in her sleep but that it had come with her into the waking world. Today, even Gaia’s stern face could not depress her. She had stopped wondering about Gaia. It was Timon she loved, Timon who teased her and worked with her and yet spoiled her much the way her family did with affection and complete acceptance. When time came for meditation she fairly danced her way among the trees off to her special place.
“That child has no idea of the seriousness of life,” Timon laughed as they watched her go.
“She will have,” Gaia answered bitterly. She stalked back into the hut. Her meditations were spent in its darkest corner. Nature had no lure for Gaia.
Guinevere had dressed herself that morning in a long white robe fastened at the shoulders with plain gold brooches. She had another chain of gold about her waist, but her feet were bare. Gaia had carefully combed her hair into tiny braids, woven about her head, but when Guinevere got to the clearing, she decided to take them all down, just to see how it would feel to run with it all streaming and floating behind her. She slipped the jade pins back on either side of her forehead, just to keep it out of her eyes. Then she ran and danced and whirled until she went round and round in a blinding gold circle. Even after she stopped, the hair continued to swing back and forth like a living thing, keeping time to her dance.
It was through this golden mist that she first saw it fully. It stood on the other side of the clearing, in the shade. Slowly, she brushed the strands away from her face and stared. Her heart beat loudly and her body was still, as if frozen. A passerby might have thought he had come upon two statues from legend, so still were they. The country maiden and the fabulous beast.
Even in the dark beneath the trees, there was a silver glow about him. His coat was pure white and his cloven hooves polished to a deep shimmering purple. His mane and tail were silver, not dull gray, but as shining as the molten metal poured from the flames into the mold. Guinevere knew at once where the single strand she had found had come from. But the most awe-inspiring thing about him was the slender spiral horn rising from the center of his forehead. It was as long as her arm and reflected the light in hundreds of colors, like mother of pearl, as he shook his head. Dark lavenders and blues predominated, but there were flashes of every other color, from orange to green.
Guinevere was too intimidated by his beauty and his wildness to step closer to him. She sank slowly to the ground, her eyes never leaving his face. She was praying harder and more sincerely than she ever had in her life that this marvel, this creature of dreams, would not run away.
The unicorn bent his head, as if bowing to her. He lifted it and stared at her directly. Guinevere caught her breath. A thousand nights of longing came back to her and she held out her arms. Slowly, the creature came to her and gently, humbly, laid his exquisite head in her lap.
“There can’t be any greater happiness than this,” Guinevere thought. Now she knew what her dreams had foretold. She lifted her hand and caressed his shining mane. Her hair fell across it and gold and silver mingled, floating in the light breeze. Her heart ached with the mystery and beauty of it all. The unicorn didn’t move under her touch. It was so still, she wondered if it could be asleep. Timidly, she looked down and carefully brushed the hair from over his eyes.
The deep blue eyes caught her and held her in a visionary world. They wrapped her in emotions she had never known and couldn’t name. Sorrow and joy twined about each other, and a fierce calling swept her into his mind.
No one saw her in that moment. The great passage she took into his loneliness and experience were only reflected in the mirror of the changes it made in her. All that her beauty had been up to then was nothing to this moment. It shone like an exploding star, as her mind and soul were linked to those of the unicorn, the most elusive and perilous of all the mythical beasts.
Guinevere felt his joy in finding her; one that overcame all the desperate grief that clouded his spirit. She smiled at him.
“I have been looking for you a long time,” she whispered.
“Not as long as I have hunted you,” he answered in her mind. “From the moment of your birth, I have been seeking you, only knowing in my heart that somewhere you must exist.”
“Will you stay with me forever, then?”
The blue eyes darkened to violet. “There is no forever; I will stay until I must leave you.”
“You mustn’t go. I love you!” But even as she spoke, Guinevere sensed that he was not speaking his desires but only what must be, and that he would never go from her by choice. He had truly been created for her, as she must have been for him. She was bound by the wisdom in his mind and he by the innocence in her heart.
He lay his head down again, his spiral horn rested in the crook of her arm. They might have stayed that way for years. Guinevere knew only the breath of the wind about her and the comfort and contentment of finding one’s perfect dream fulfilled.
The unicorn stirred, as if troubled by nightmares. Guinevere came half back to reality as she patted him gently.
“Don’t worry . . . what was that?” she started.
There was noise in the woods, a clanking of metal and the swish of branches being pushed aside.
“There’s someone coming! Who could be so far from the roads?”
“Only a hunting party,” the unicorn replied.
“Perhaps. But they are making far too much noise unless they have already sighted the quarry. They sound very excited.”
“They have found the tracks of an animal that they thought never to find. Of course they are excited.”
“What animal?” she asked, and then, unbidden, memories of legends came to her. The unicorn and the maiden. “Not you!”
The unicorn lay still, his head drooped upon her lap, resigned.
“You knew they were coming, didn’t you?” she demanded. “Did you think I sent for them to trap you?”
His eyelids trembled and a burning tear fell on her robe.
“If you believed they would come to kill you, why did you find me?”
“It is my destiny. I have sought you all my life. For one hour of peace, for one day to be joined to your life, for these I accept my fate.”
“But I do not accept mine,” she spoke so quietly he didn’t hear her. He only caught the determination in her mind. “I cannot see you die. I love you and I need you. You are perfect. No one must destroy you. Go. Now, before they see you. I will never let you be caught. Only remember me, remember me and come back to me if you can. I will die without you!”
She stood up, pushing him to his feet. He shook his head as if coming out of a heavy sleep.
“Please,” she begged, “Run, give me the hope of a moment again with you. Run!”
The glorious animal rose to his hind feet and pranced, pawing the air. He still made no sound, but he directed at Guinevere a joy so intense that she felt bathed in the grandeur of it.
“I will find you,” he promised and then he was gone, leaving only the print of his cloven hooves in the grass to remind her that he had been there at all. She stood where he left her in the center of the clearing, uncertain what to do. The voices were coming closer and words could be distinguished.
“They go this way!” one shouted. “See here? Clear and sharp. Hurry, I want to see what kind of thing could have made these!”
There was louder clatter as more people tried to push their way through the high undergrowth. Just as they broke into the clearing, Guinevere turned, so that the sun shone from behind her. She couldn’t see the men as they appeared on the edge of the clearing. They entered one at a time, each saying something to the one behind him. Then they saw her and stopped.
Guinevere heard the first one gasp. She wasn’t afraid of them, now that that her precious unicorn was safely away. But they seemed afraid of her. She smiled to reassure them.
She had no idea how she appeared to them, still bathed in the radiance of her encounter, with her hair undone and the sun creating an aureole about her. She only wondered at their strange behaviour.
The first man stumbled forward, his eyes never leaving her face. The other two followed. Just as she was about to greet them, they dropped to their knees, bowing their heads. This startled her, especially since she suddenly recognized one of them. While they were looking down, she ran for the safety of the trees and hurried back to the hermitage. She disappeared as swiftly and silently as the unicorn before her.
A moment later, Geraldus and Mark arrived in the clearing.
Arthur staggered to his feet, his eyes glazed with awe.
“We have seen a vision,” he breathed. “The holy Virgin herself.”
Cei looked at him oddly. “No, there were flowers all about her. She was a goddess, surely, the guardian of this place.”
Caet stared at them both.
“It was Epona,” he said firmly. “I heard the whinny of the celestial horse, just before we saw her.”
Geraldus looked at Mark, who shrugged. “There were too many branches in my way. I saw nothing.”
Then Geraldus spied something in the grass, near the place the vision had been. He walked past the still-befuddled men and picked it up. It was a small jade pin, set in gold filigree. He nodded, his guess confirmed.
“Guinevere.”
Chapter Seven
Arthur remained convinced that he had seen the Virgin Mary in the forest and nothing anyone said could change him. Mark and Geraldus tried.
“But you didn’t see,” Arthur protested. “How can you doubt my word? She smiled at me as if blessing all my endeavors.”
They wanted to tell him that it couldn’t be. But they were hampered by their unwillingness to admit that it was only Guinevere. There was something strange about the whole episode, they thought. Why hadn’t Caet recognized her? He had known her ever since she was born. They shrugged and kept silent. Certainly, this only renewed Arthur’s confidence in the divine approval of his cause.
“I shall have her image painted on my shield,” he insisted. “She shall be my protectress and my inspiration. If only you had seen her, too. You would then understand. She was so beautiful and so remote, and yet I could feel her kindness and wisdom surging through me, just from a glance.”
Mark and Geraldus gave up. There was no point in trying to argue with a fanatic. Besides, his “vision” seemed only to have strengthened him to do what he had already intended, rid the country of the Saxons. That was all to the good. So the next week Arthur and his men rode off, full of the righteousness of their cause and also the joy of gracious living and aged wine. The inhabitants of the compound watched them go with relief. Now they could return to normal.