Shadow of the King (90 page)

“Berries are best sorted when fresh-picked,” she countered, already heading

for the door. She knew her parents’ arguments, had no wish to stay for one

that had all the indications of a full-blown tempest. A pity, she had so enjoyed

herself this morning, strolling along the hedges edging the horse paddocks. It

had been a bright, sun-clear morning with a hint of frost in the air—the autumn

scents were so different here than at home, at Caer Morfa. It was mostly marsh

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there, the dampness of the reeds and the saline tang of the sea permeated into

everything. Oh, the Great Wood a mile or so behind were pleasant, but she

missed Caer Cadan, the wide openness, the hills to the horizon, and the beauty

of the ever-changing colours of the Summer Land. She shut the door behind

her, leant against it a while. She had so wanted to share her news with them this

morning! Last night, she had been too tired.

Their voices were rising from inside. She was almost tempted to put her ear

to the door and listen. Whatever had her mother meant? She knew her father

had an eye for women—what man did not?—but she thought this woman,

Morgaine, had been involved with her two half-brothers, not with her father.

The excited talk of exactly why the accident had happened had been so muddled

and they were all so worried, aye, and frightened when first it had happened,

her husband and herself included. Coed Morfa was openly vulnerable to Saxon

attack; it was only her father’s imposing strength keeping the floodwater of war

at bay.

Fortunate that he had not been dangerously hurt—oh aye, bones took a

while to mend and would often ache for months after, but the breaks were

clean, he had suffered and recovered from far worse, or so Mam had assured

her, during that initial anxious week. How fast she and Natanlius had ridden

here when word was sent! They near on broke the horses! But thinking back,

she never had discovered the truth behind it all. They had returned home after

a day or so, once they were certain her father was in no mortal danger. She

chewed her lip in thought, eased her basket to a more comfortable position.

Happen now would be a good time to find out something more precise. Who

could she ask? None of the men would talk, not about their lord king to his

own daughter. But Medraut would if she made him.

A half-smile crept onto her lips. She would take these berries to the store-

rooms and then seek him out.

“And what exactly do you mean by that?” Arthur asked his wife, coldly.

“What I said. If you had not gone visiting your whore, this would never

have happened.”

“Morgaine was not my whore.”

“No, of course not. It was by accident she birthed you a whelp!”

“I laid with her once and once only.”

“Once each night, aye, that I would believe!” She was being unreason-

able, Gwenhwyfar knew, but now the those words rumbling in her head were

loosened, she could not stop. Almost, it was a relief to be arguing.

S h a d o w o f t h e k i n g 5 4 3

They had not quarrelled about Morgaine at all—because all those years past,

in Gaul, beyond that first awkwardness and uncertainty of meeting again, when

they had found each other to be so wonderfully alive and well there had been

no room for harsh words between them. And anyway, she was no longer a part

of his life. You could not feel angry at someone who was no longer there to

rub the hurt the wrong way. But the niggling worm of jealousy had began to

bite into Gwenhwyfar again since the accident in the caves. The doubts, the

suspicions. He had gone to the White Hills to sort the matter of the lead and

ended up in a whore’s bothy, a whore who happened to be Morgaine. She

could not, just could not, accept it for coincidence.

When he had returned from Gaul, so splendidly with the momentous victory

at Badon, so much had settled back, so quickly, to as it had been before, as if he

had never been away. Yet, there had been differences, subtle, happen unseen

to many, but she knew them to be there. He had held more fears, for one, did

not harbour the great confidence he had once boasted; was more restless and

uneasy, especially during the long winters when confined within-doors, with

little to do. He had never been one to sit idle. He was harder now, too, more

bitter. The disappointments of Gaul had been many, most especially the entire

pointlessness of it all. He and his men had been ill-used, and he had greatly

resented it at first, but all that had eased as time passed. He rarely spoke of Gaul

now, except perhaps when snippets of news reached them, and even then, it

was with sarcasm or indifference.

The dreams began troubling him again, though, after the accident in the

cave. Dreams where he called, out, shouting for the dead and dying. And

occasionally, a name. Her name, Morgaine.

How long had she been there, Gwenhwyfar wondered, selling her body to

the men of the Lead Road? And, more persistent, the nagging thoughts, when

did Arthur learn of her and how often had he seen her?

Unknown to either of them someone was beyond the inner door, a door not

quite latched, that allowed every word to filter out to him as he stood there,

hand raised to tap on the door to seek entrance; stood, not wanting to listen,

but unable to move.

“Was it because you found Cerdic bedding with her that angered you more,

Arthur? Your son bedding your poxed whore—a second whore?” Oh no, she

had not forgotten Mathild!

“Damn you! I knew nothing of Morgaine, had no idea she was here in

Britain. Why should I? She was nothing to me in Gaul, would be nothing

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to me now.” Arthur’s frustration was mounting. Gwenhwyfar was pacing the

room, her arms animated, head tossing—all he could do was sit in the bed, lean

slightly more forward.

“After all these years together, and still you lie to me.”

Arthur slammed his fist onto the bed-furs, sending the basket of carefully

gathered mushrooms bouncing and rolling to the floor. “I do not lie!”

Gwenhwyfar’s voice was rising, the hurt and anger running away, uncon-

trolled. “You would have me believe both your sons knew Morgaine had

become the most notorious whore in southern Britain—yet you did not!”

Arthur’s anger, too, had reached its height. He flung the bed-furs from him,

made to get from the bed, but the door thrust open. Medraut burst through, his

face white, nose pinched, mouth twisted and ugly with his own anger.

“You call my mother a whore,” he roared, “but what are you?” He stormed

across the chamber in three swift strides, stood before Gwenhwyfar, his fists

clenched, face thrust almost into hers. “Have we not all heard how you bedded

with my father’s own cousin—and aye, not just while you thought him dead!

There are those who say you continue to tumble together!”

Gwenhwyfar did not have time to think, or consider action. Her hand came

back, slapped sharp across Medraut’s face, her breath hissing. “How dare you!”

Arthur was half from the bed, swinging the leg bandaged into its splints as best

he could. If he was angry before, the rage in him now was blinding, although it

had shifted ground from Gwenhwyfar to Medraut. He got no further than one

pace, toppled, crying out in agony as pain hurled through his body.

Gwenhwyfar shoved Medraut aside, ran to her husband, fearful, concerned.

Medraut’s hands, too, went to attempt to help his father up, but Gwenhwyfar

barred his way. “Get out of here,” she screamed. “Get out!”

Thirty-Five

Shall I find you a rope?” Archfedd said to Medraut. “You have as

near hung yourself; you ought make a thorough job of it.”

Evening. The frost was sharper already, as the first stars were beginning to

prick the sky; the ground was glistening, whitening. She had tracked her half-

brother down at the stables, found him grooming one of the horses, was leaning

against the doorsill, watching, mocking him.

It was all over the Caer, what he had done, what he had said. Were he not

the king’s son, like as not that rope would have been forcibly provided for him.

Archfedd, though, had an advantage over the men whose anger was so roused

by the insult shouted to their queen. The curiosity that had intrigued her had

almost been sated. She had discovered more of what had happened in the

whore’s bothy near the Lead Road this day than in all the others put together.

“So-o you are the bastard son of a pagan whore-witch. ’Tis no wonder you

never spoke of her, that word was kept so efficiently quiet.”

“Everyone knew my mother’s name was Morgaine. ’Twas no secret.”

“
Na
, but no one knew she and the whore who served the Saex lead-traders

were one and the same.” She sauntered further into the stables, running her

hand over the rump of the nearest horse, holding her hand to another’s muzzle

for him to smell. “Fortunate for you Bedwyr be away on my father’s business.

Your balls would be making fine decoration for the Caer walls by now, were

he not.”

“I am not afeared of Bedwyr.” Medraut said it boldly, knew as well as she it

was a lie.

The contempt was thick in her voice. “No wonder also, why it is my father

has never seriously considered you to be his heir!”

That hurt. Hurt even more than hearing his father and Gwenhwyfar talking

so crudely of Morgaine. He had remembered so little of his mother. The few

memories he had cherished had been the happier ones—the sound of her

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laugh, the swirl of her hair in the sunlight. All those were gone now after

he had seen her doing what she had been doing. Hard enough to bear that,

without hearing the only other two people in this whole world he cared for

talk of her as they had.

Medraut had never held a wish to be king after his father. He knew he

could not be, as he did not have the courage or the strength. Had no talent for

weapons or fighting, but Archfedd’s taunts had so often been stabbed at him,

had so often thrust home into his belly and twisted there. He lifted his head, his

eyes holding hers, said, “He has no one else. I will have to be king after him.”

The horse had been licking at the salt on Archfedd’s hand; she moved away

from the animal and went to stand before Medraut, leant forward, and insultingly

wiped her sticky palm on his cloak. “Oh, but there is someone and, with Fortune’s

blessing, mayhap two.” She smiled at him, haughty in her firm superiority. “The

Pendragon has a grandson already born. And I am again with child.”

Medraut pushed past her, thrust the grooming brush onto a ledge. “Are you

that much the fool, sister? Children will not hold off Cerdic when he comes.

Nor for that matter, will they be able to better me.”

“You?” she called spitefully as he walked out through the open doorway.

“If it came to choice between you and Cerdic, all the people of Britain would

choose him! He at least was legitimate-born to the daughter of a king, not a

by-blown brat conceived of a poxed whore!”

For three days, Arthur lay tossing in a drenching sweat of pain. Through the

day and most the night, Gwenhwyfar sat beside the bed, wiping the hot fever

from him and spooning strengthening buttermilk into his mouth.

When at last he lay quiet, she asked, “You did not believe him, did you? It is

not true, what he said.” Arthur attempted a smile, held his hand for her to take.

“I’ll not believe him, if you believe me.”

Gwenhwyfar’s smile chased the lines of sadness and fear away from her eyes

and mouth. She bent forward, kissed Arthur lightly on the lips. A fair bargain.

Thirty-Six

March 488

Arthur removed his war cap, let the bite of the wind ruffle his hair.

Clouds were massing, bringing in rain. This was wild coastland, these

cliffs of Dyfed, almost as wild as the sea. There were three ships, small against

the grey horizon, straining at their blue-grey sails like horses eager to be away,

galloping. Spray would be billowing over the rails; the waves were rough, the

wind lively. It would not worry the crew, for the Hibernian, like the Saex,

were brothers of the sea. A good sailor, it was said, was born within the sound

of waves booming onto the shore and the feel of the sea tossing in his belly.

Arthur had come here to see for himself how the sea-wolves were

tormenting this rugged line of Britain’s western coast. He did not much like

what he had already seen. His horse stamped a hind hoof, impatient with

standing at the edge of this wind-tousled cliff. There was grass beneath his feet

and he wanted to run. Arthur absently patted his chestnut neck. The winter

coat would be thinning soon, this rough, thick one giving way to the smooth

shine of summer. Brenin—king—son of Onager, sharing the same chestnut

colouring but with more white to his hind feet and a star on his forehead. As

handsome and bold as his father, thankfully, with his dam’s sweeter temper!