Guinevere nodded mutely. She had never seen her mother so angry. Leodegrance said nothing, but the look on his face was enough. Her eyes pleaded forgiveness. Guenlian sat on the edge of the bed and held her closely. Leodegrance rested his hand on her head.
“Never frighten us like that again,” he whispered.
They covered her tightly and blew out the light.
Later, in their own room, Guenlian reflected. “It doesn’t seem right to make religion a punishment. Couldn’t we have thought of something else?”
Leodegrance frowned, then kissed his wife gently before he spoke. “I think we have made her feel the enormity of her disobedience. She may be rebellious for a few days, but it is necessary that she be put into a position where she must think about herself and her place in the world.”
He sighed. “The contemplative life is not a bad one for her to pursue for a few days. Would that we lived in times when we all might retreat for a while into philosophy.”
Guenlian had finished her nightly ritual of washing and creaming her face. She wiped the cream off with a linen towel. It was made of pounded almonds, oil, and herbs and the scent of it lingered through the night. She slipped in bed next to her husband and brushed her hand across his face.
“Our life was our choice, my love. We could have run to the mountains or gone to Armorica and lived in relative tranquillity. I am proud of you and of our children. Who knows, someday we, too, may have time for philosophy.”
For answer, Leodegrance kissed her again and blew out the light.
• • •
Flora was angry with Guinevere, too. She had been reproved by her employers, gently but decidedly, for letting the child stray from her sight. That and her own guilt made her grumble under her breath as she came in to check on Guinevere before she retired to her own room.
Guinevere was still awake. She had been thinking.
“Flora,” she asked timidly, “may I have a cup of water?”
Flora frowned and snorted but brought the ewer and cup.
“I don’t know why I do anything for you, naughty child,” she muttered. “Bringing all this worry and trouble to me and to your dear parents who love you more than you deserve. Why did you go roaming like that, when I told you not to?”
“I’m sorry, Flora,” Guinevere sighed. “But I’ve been scolded and I’m going to be punished, so can’t we be friends again?” She stopped, remembering the gift she had found and leaped out of bed to find it, spilling the water.
“Oh no,” she said, “I’m sorry for that then, too. But I just remembered. I found something for you, just as you asked me—something beautiful and rare.”
She had pinned it to the folds of her dress with one of her hairpins. The dress was still lying on the bench outside her door. Carefully, she unfastened it and came back holding the mysterious silver strand.
At the sight of it, Flora’s whole manner changed. Her back straightened, her head tilted proudly, her carriage was all at once far different from that of an old serving woman. She stared in wonder and then lifted her hands, palms up to receive her gift.
Guinevere held it out to her. “I found it for you,” she repeated. “I don’t know what it is, do you?”
She asked because of the look on Flora’s face. As she laid it across the old woman’s hands, Flora gazed at the strand reverently. Her expression was one of awe and, perhaps, fear. Guinevere stared at her, puzzled. She hadn’t expected such a reaction.
“Do you like it? Do you want it?” she asked. “Have I done something else that was wrong?”
Tears now flowed down Flora’s face, but her voice remained steady.
“Of all the things you could have brought me, this is the one I longed for most. But if you have done the right thing, I cannot tell. Only the god—”
She broke off. With a fierce gesture, she drew Guinevere to her and held her, much as Leodegrance had on the way home. Then, just as quickly, she released her.
“This is a great treasure for me, my dove, greater than you can imagine. But it is also a great burden. You did not do right or wrong but the only thing you could have done. It is part of the Design.”
With this strange remark, Flora set Guinevere back in bed, and, taking her lamp, left the room.
Guinevere lay there, trying to make sense out of the events of the day, most of all Flora’s part in them. But her thoughts wouldn’t follow a logical pattern. As she tried to piece it together, the silver light would burst in, now bright, now dim, until it blurred everything into mist and she fell asleep.
Chapter Two
Summer drifted in. The days were hazy, hot, and dry. The spring rains had ended too soon and the cold well within the compound was so low that water for bathing and washing had to be laboriously carted up the hill from the stream running out of the forest. The hot springs, hidden deep within the tor, were of such a high mineral content that they ruined clothes washed in them and made hair stiff and malodorous. The baths they were used for were only for health, not cleanliness. Servants were encouraged to reverse the process and take themselves down to the stream to wash, which they did with bawdy good humor. The gardeners lovingly sprinkled Guenlian’s flowers to keep some color in the house. The rest of the ground on the tor was brown and barren. There was no grass, only pale, sharp stalks that cut even through sandals if one stepped on them the wrong way. These days seemed designed for inactivity, but the inhabitants of the compound went about as if there were always too much to do.
“Hurry, hurry, we must be ready.” The swishing robes and slapping sandals quickened the pace. “Faster, faster, the time is almost gone.”
The farmers and field-workers were out from earliest light until the last rays flooded the land with a bloodred glow. Weeding, hoeing, carrying buckets and buckets of water to feed their peas and beans, oats and barley. The people in the house bustled from one chore to another; mending, washing, tending the animals. But always, as they hurried, everyone would be looking somewhere else; over their shoulders, across the fields; casting a glance at the dark woods, so close, and the hazy mountains too far for flight. Then they would quickly return to their work.
Rumors swooped across the fields and into the house, fluttering from one low voice to another: We are winning at last. We are losing again. The Irish have made another raid on the Cornish coast. Duke Cador has repulsed the invader in the north. But the Saxons are still coming, pushing in from the ocean like a great tide. They have taken York; they are moving ever north and west, closer and closer. There was a battle at Caledon. Victory or defeat? Who knows? There are tales that we lost a thousand men, that Arthur surrounded the Saxons and starved them into surrender. Who knows? And what of Arthur, this strange boy-king? Who is he? What is he doing? Are the stories about him true? Who knows? What have
you
heard? What will happen to us? Are we safe, should we flee? Who knows?
Into this tense world one day ambled a calm young man on an old, tired horse. It had once been the mount of a soldier and still showed signs of its breeding, but its day had been past for many years and the plodding walk at which it carried its master was the best it could now manage.
Guinevere was not affected by the nervousness with which everyone else conducted their lives, but she found that with all the bustle, she was often in the way. So she had taken to sitting up with the guard in his watchtower by the gate. There was a good view of the road from there, and one felt closer to the trees and sky. Therefore, she was the first to see the visitor. She let out a whoop of delight that brought even Guenlian running from the house.
“What is it, child?” she gasped. “Your brothers? Oh, it’s only St. Geraldus. Oh well, he’s a dear lad. It will be good to have him with us again.”
But she sighed as she went to tell Flora to have a room made up for their guest. Her sons had been away nearly a year now. They would have been a much more welcome sight.
“Come in, my boy.” Leodegrance had heard the commotion and came to greet him. “Tell us the news. Where have you traveled lately? Is it true that the Saxons were beaten at Caledon?
You should know. Come in, come in! Quick, water for our guest!”
“Husband,” Guenlian reproved as she joined them. “We should ask the good saint for his blessing on us and our home before we ply him with questions.”
“Yes, of course,” Leodegrance marveled at his wife’s self-restraint. She was as eager as he for word of the battle.
Guenlian offered a cup of water to the man, who drained it at once. He wiped his mouth sheepishly and then raised his hand in some embarrassment, to bless the household.
“You will want to refresh yourself from your journey before we talk.” Guenlian smiled as she took the cup back. “Caet, see to the good saint’s horse. Anna, tell Filius to bring a bath and clean robes to St. Geraldus in his room.”
“We have had to close the bathhouse during this drought,” she explained. “Now, come right with me and I’ll show you where you will stay.”
She bundled him off so efficiently to wash and dress that Geraldus had no chance to say more than “Thank you” and “Certainly.”
Leodegrance grinned. He was very glad he had married a woman who could think faster than he. He noticed the disappointed faces of the servants and fosterlings. They were all eager for the latest news, too. Better to speak with Geraldus privately, in case he had something disheartening to say. Then the whole household could hear a carefully worded version of it after dinner.
Everyone brightened up considerably at Geraldus’ arrival. Though most of them were only nominally Christian, which was a prerequisite for their freedom, they all felt sure that no harm could come to a house where angels lived. It was common knowledge that angels accompanied St. Geraldus wherever he went, serenading him with heavenly music that only he could hear. Also, he was a cheerful, friendly sort, who ate and drank with everyone else and bathed as often as any Roman. He was also not above singing a few very secular songs after meals, entertaining the hall with tales of battles, magic, and thwarted love. He was certainly different from the usual monkish beggar who came to the gate.
They had little use for these peripatetic “holy” men who believed that by making their bodies as loathesome as possible, they would be closer to God. Flora refused to attend to them when they came.
“Closer to God,” she sniffed. “I wouldn’t sacrifice a lame cow to a god who’d own that sort. It would have to be a god without a nose.”
Guinevere followed her mother as she went through the house overseeing preparations for the evening meal. Guenlian murmured to herself as she planned and organized.
“Lark pie would be nice, but not filling enough. It will have to be a chicken, too. Better tell Rhianna to tell the cook to have someone kill a chicken. At least there is enough for a nice, green sallet. Thank goodness these gardeners have watered, bless their dear, bent backs. I must remember to reward them. Now, wine . . .”
She noticed Guinevere, humming along with her at her elbow.
“Guinevere, dear, go tell your father we need more wine.”
“Yes, mother.” Guinevere ran off happily. She liked the bustle that came with company. She found Leodegrance in the stables, inspecting a late-born foal.
“Father,” she panted. “Mother says we need wine for dinner. May I go with you to get it?”
“Yes, yes,” he answered. “I’ll just wash my hands. Did you bring a pitcher?”
She nodded. He gave some last instructions to Caet about caring for the spindly new animal and followed Guinevere down the side of the tor.
About halfway down the incline was a well-concealed cave. Whether it was natural or manmade, no one knew. Some thought it was the tomb of one of the giants who had roamed the earth years ago, as the Bible stated. Others suggested that it might be a passageway from one world to the next, as the Old Religion preached. Most of the peasants, whose ancestors had lived there since time began, simply said it was a dangerous place and refused to go near it. Leodegrance only shrugged at the speculations with the good nature of a man who has had time to worry only about the immediacies of life, and is not bothered with what comes after.
“It’s big, dark, and always cool,” he decided. “A fine place to store wine and winter roots.”
He never sent any of the servants down there, though, even those who professed not to be afraid. Whenever a new supply of wine was needed he would fetch it himself, even if it meant leaving his guests.
But not only supplies were kept in the cave. Guinevere and her brothers had long ago dared each other to explore the mysterious cavern. The boys had gone first, one at a time, without even a candle, to show their courage. Then they had generously taken their little sister in to see it, too. Leodegrance and Guenlian had been furious when they first discovered this, for Guinevere had had strange and horrible dreams for weeks after her visit, which had to be explained.
She soon got over her fear, though, and demanded to be taken in to see it again. There was something compelling about the enormous table, round like the moon, deep in a dark cavern where no company would ever sit. Leodegrance had wisely ruled that the children could only enter when he was with them. Only then might they stare at the table, hidden in the gloom beyond the torchlight. Guinevere, at least, kept the bargain.
While Leodegrance opened a new jar and poured the wine into the flagon, Guinevere edged over to the table. She ran her hands over the wood, watching her fingers move in the flickering light. For the first time, she noticed grooves in the top, lines that might almost be letters. Slowly, she spelled out what she felt. “S-I-E-G-E-P-E-R- . . .”
“Stop!” Her hand was jerked roughly away. “That is not for you to touch!”
Guinevere stared at him in horror, rubbing her wrist. She was too startled to cry.
Leodegrance held her close in apology. His voice was more gentle.
“That table is very old and has strange powers. I do not know them all. It is not even mine; I only hold it in trust for another. What is written on it is not for us to know. Why do you think I keep it down here in the dark? Even touching it could be dangerous. You must never do it again.”