"And had every man and woman in the kingdoms sure of his guilt and my shame?" She spoke calmly, but her cheeks had reddened, whether at the memory of that shame or at the young man's fervour it was impossible to guess.
Mordred bit his lip. He recalled the story that Agravain had once told at a meeting of the Young Celts, and that he, Mordred, had not believed. So it was true; and now the cryptic references made by Bedwyr and Arthur at the site of the Princess Elen's rape became clear. He remembered further: the girl's violated body lying under its scrambled covering of pine needles.
He said thickly: "Later, then. But policy or no policy, I would not have let him live."
He took his leave then. After he had gone the Queen sat for a long while without moving, looking out across the deck-rail at the shining water, and the distant shore sliding by, with its trees like clouds, and the clouds above them like towers.
Having installed Guinevere in comfort in the Queen's palace at Caerleon, Mordred plunged into the round of meetings with the leaders and petty kings assembled in the fortress to meet him. What he had not expected, and what Constantine, that western duke, knew well, was the dissatisfaction, even hostility, he found there for some of Arthur's policies. In the remoter highlands, the silver-age Romanization so dear to Ambrosius and Arthur had never been acceptable. It was not only the young men who wanted change; the older kings, too, were chafing against what they saw as the restrictive policies of a remote and lowland center of government. Arthur, in attempting to restore the territorial integrity of Roman Britain, had remodelled his federation of kingdoms in a way that to many of the rulers seemed outdated. To these men Mordred, outlander and Young Celt, was the leader they hoped for. That Arthur had just stood against actual Roman domination in defense of the Celtic lands would do much to bring him nearer their hearts again, but Arthur was presumed dead, and it became increasingly apparent that in the Celtic Highlands his return would not be altogether welcome.
Mordred trod carefully, talked sparingly, counted the allies sworn to his banner, and went every evening to see the Queen.
It was perhaps a little sad to see how Guinevere lighted up at his visits, and how eagerly she plied him with questions. He answered her readily, keeping her more fully informed than Arthur had found time to do, of every move of state. She did not guess that he was simply taking every chance of seeing her, and every means of prolonging his meetings with her, letting her grow easier with him, become used to him in his role of ruler and protector. She thought merely that he was trying to bring her comfort and distraction, and was grateful accordingly, and her gratitude, in that time of uncertainty, grief and fear, brought her (as Mordred had hoped) within touching distance of tenderness, and sighting distance of love. At any rate, when he held her hand to kiss it, or, greatly daring, laid his own over it by way of comfort, she no longer hurried to withdraw from his touch.
As for Mordred, with his new authority, the uncertainty, the brilliant starting of long-held plans, the closeness of the long-desired and lovely Guinevere, he was swept forward from day to day on a full tide of sovereignty and power, and it is doubtful if at this stage he could have gone back. In love, as in other things, there comes a time when the will resigns and franks the desire, and then not even Orpheus, turning back, could cause his love to vanish. He had had that one glimpse of her, the real Guinevere, a lonely woman afraid of life, a leaf to be blown into a safe corner by any strong wind. He would be — was — her safety. He was subtle enough to see that she recognized it, and used her gently. He could wait.
So the days went by, and the wind still closed the Narrow Sea, and each of them, constantly, watched the road and the harbour for the messenger from Brittany. And each spent hours of the night watching the dark and thinking, thinking, and when they finally slept it was not of each other they dreamed, but of Arthur.
Of Duke Constantine, brooding in his Cornish castle, they did not think at all.
7
CONSTANTINE'S LETTER WAS BROUGHT to Arthur at his camp near Autun. King Hoel, feeling his years and his ailments now that the battle was over, had withdrawn towards home. But for Gawain, who in these days was always at his elbow, Arthur was alone.
He was also very tired. He had returned from the brief punitive foray into the mountains to find near-panic among the troops who, though still searching among the heaped dead for his body, believed themselves kingless. Even his return permitted little rejoicing, for Bedwyr, worse hurt than he had admitted, or that anyone had judged, was now seriously ill, and the surgeons shook their heads over the pallet where he lay unconscious in an annex of the royal pavilion.
So Arthur was alone in more ways than one. Bedwyr was dying. Cei, the elder foster-brother with whom he had been brought up, was dead. Caius Valerius, too, the ageing warrior, veteran of Ambrosius' wars, and friend to Uther Pendragon and Merlin… The list seemed endless, the names a roll culled from the tale of Arthur's past glories, or even a simple tally of his friends. Of those close to him Gawain alone was unwounded, and he, flown with the joy of his first great fight and resounding victory, had proved himself a strong support. To him Arthur, feeling his age for the first time (though he was by many years King Hoel's junior), turned in gratitude and affection.
He started to read the duke's letter. Through the skins of the tent wall he could hear the groaning and muttering where Bedwyr tossed on his sickbed. He would die before morning, they said, if the fever did not break.
The letter again. Mordred… making himself High King, talking with Cerdic, gathering the kings of Wales and the north…
"Well," said Arthur, frowning; his head ached and the torchlight made the words swim. "Well, all this is to be expected. If news of my supposed death was taken to Mordred, he would take exactly these steps. We spoke of it before he left Kerrec. He was to meet with Cerdic to ratify the treaty and talk over a possible new settlement in the future. Now, if my death was reported to him, he may well have thought it expedient to negotiate new terms, since the old treaty would then be invalid."
"New terms! An alliance that sounds like folly at its best, and at its worst a deadly peril! This about Cynric, raising fresh Saxon levies over here. Did you know, uncle?"
On the other side of the tent wall the sick man cried out, then was silent. Someone spoke hurriedly, there was muttering, quick footsteps, the swish of robes. The King was half on his feet, the parchment falling to the floor, forgotten, when the muttering began again. Not death yet, then; not quite yet. Arthur sank back in his chair.
"Did you know about Cynric?" persisted Gawain.
"Cynric? Oh, calling men to his standard in Saxony. No, but if it is true—"
"I'm pretty sure it's true," said Gawain. "I've already heard rumours going about the camp. Men massing by the Neustrian shore. Longships lying in the harbours like arrows jammed in a quiver. And for what? Cynric sails, and Cerdic moves towards the south-east ports to meet him, then the South Saxons are caught between the two, and the whole southeast will be Cerdic's, with freedom to invite whomsoever he pleases to come over and swell his army. The South Saxons have been the other wall that contained him, and who is to contain him now?"
His angry eyes glared into the King's, as if the latter's composure chafed him. If he heard the sounds from beyond the wall, he gave no sign of it. He had not attempted to lower his voice.
"No doubt the next courier will bring me a report of Cynric's doings." Arthur sounded weary but relatively unworried. "But for the rest of this letter, Gawain, remember who writes. Duke Constantine did not take kindly to Mordred's nomination as regent: He will have taken even less kindly to his appointment as my sole heir. Everything he says there—" He gestured to the letter on the floor, and Gawain stooped to pick it up. "Everything he says that Mordred has done, Mordred and I agreed should be done. We only have Constantine's word, which is hardly the word of a friend, for the way it is being done."