Gwenhwyfar (14 page)

So she had gone over her gear twice now, cleaning and polishing, mending not only popped stitches, but stitches that only looked a little weak. The saddle, the harness, all looked new. But the brass bits still weren’t
shiny
enough.

They weren’t supposed to be talking. They were supposed to be tending to their gear. “What?” she growled out of the side of her mouth.

“Is he coming? Here? Is he really coming?” Madoc sounded breathless and nervous. Probably at least as nervous as she was about Braith coming.

“Is
who
coming?” she responded, her irritation growing. Peder glanced over in their direction; he’d clearly heard the hissing, though he hadn’t picked out who was talking yet. She bent her head down to her task. With luck, he wouldn’t notice. Maybe she had permission to end her chores of women’s work, but that didn’t mean an end to toil. If he felt she wasn’t paying sufficient attention to repairing her harness, he would probably set her to wood chopping, water carrying, paddock building, or even carrying stones for the many hearths abuilding.

“The Merlin!” Madoc asked excitedly. “Is the Merlin really coming?”

The Merlin! Whatever gave him that idea? The Merlin was the High King’s man. There was no reason for him to come here, of all places.

It was a title of course, not a name; the Merlin was the chief of all the Druids, as the Wren was chief of all the Bards. And his place was at the side of the High King, advising, working Men’s Magic. Not journeying weeks away. Especially not at Midsummer.

“How should I know?” she hissed back, making sure her head was ducked down over her work so Peder couldn’t see her mouth moving.

“You’re the king’s daughter! Don’t you hear everything?” Madoc might well have said more, except that Peder had picked out
him
as the chatterer.

“Madoc!” the older warrior snapped.

Madoc leaped to his feet. Gwen kept her head down. “Yes, lord!” he said, faintly.

“It’s rare for you to have any thought in your mind at all, much less one so burning a hole in it that you can’t leave it until later. Have you something you wish to share with us, Madoc?” Gwen kept her eyes on her work, furiously polishing, but she could hear the mockery in Peder’s voice. She also heard his footsteps coming up beside her. He was just behind her, out of her peripheral vision, but she could feel his presence, looming.

“I only wanted to know if the Merlin is coming to the Midsummer feast, my lord!” Madoc replied, his voice breaking a little on the last word.

“Did you now?” There was a long pause. “Well, as it happens, the Merlin
is
going to be one of the king’s honored guests. So don’t you think you should pay a little more attention to what you are
supposed
to be doing so you don’t shame yourself before him?”

“Yes, my lord!” Madoc squeaked.

“Then get back
to
it, boy!”

Madoc dropped back down to his work and began polishing the brass of his horse’s harness as furiously as Gwen was polishing hers. She heard Peder’s footsteps again and saw his two hairy feet in their old sandals stop beside her. His left big toenail was black, where his horse had stepped on it. She held her breath and continued to polish.

“Acceptable job, squire,” was all Peder said. Then he moved on.

Gwen breathed again.

But she could feel how the lot of them had come alive with the news of such an important visitor. Some of it was excitement, but more of it was fear. There had been fantastic tales told about the Merlin. That he had narrowly escaped being sacrificed by King Vortigern as a young boy, because he’d Seen the dragon coiled hidden beneath the base of Vortigern’s tower—a dragon that subsequently was released to battle another high in the sky above that tower. Some said that he was responsible for the great Stone Circle out on the plain—though that was unlikely for it had been there long before the Romans had come. But certainly,
a
Merlin had built it, which only showed the power that the Merlins held.

It was more likely true that when Arthur’s father Uther lusted for Queen Ygraine, he cast illusions over Uther to make Ygraine and her entire household believe that it was King Gorlois returned from war. That, so they said, was how Arthur was conceived in the first place.

Now Ygraine was—or had been—one of the Ladies. And the Blessing was strong in her line, since both Anna Morgause and Morgana were her daughters, and both were noted for their skill at magic. Some even said Ygraine was a generation or two out of Fae blood, which would not have been completely unlikely. There were Sea Fae of great Power who often chose to wed mortal men, and Tintagel was on a coastal cliff, high above the sea. So to deceive her would have taken a great deal of Power—and a great deal of courage as well. The Ladies were not prone to appreciate men, even Druids, even the chief Druid, meddling in the affairs of one of their own.

Of course, Gorlois had been killed that very night. And Uther did not personally have the Orkney king’s blood on his hands, since he’d been rather busy with Ygraine. And Ygraine had turned about and wedded him, so no one said much about the wrong or the right of it. Or at least not around Eleri’s hearth fire, where, although Anna Morgause was the subject of much headshaking, Queen Ygraine came in for no such censure. Gwen knew better than to ask; she would have been told that the affairs of the very great were of no concern to a mere squire.

But since the Merlin was coming here, it behooved her dig as much as she could manage up out of her memory. The Merlin, it was said, had known that Uther’s life was in danger, and he was the one that had spirited infant Arthur away and kept him safe until he could come into his own. Considering the number of rivals there were for the position of High King, that could not have been easy.

And it was certainly the Merlin, this Merlin, Uther’s Merlin, that put Arthur in the position to take back the throne that was his, first Uther’s own lands, then convincing all the other kings to make him the High King—or beating their armies so they were forced to accept him. There were a lot of stories about how the Merlin had a hand in that, too. Magic swords, mists that sprang up to hide Arthur’s movements, and Arthur and his men being in two places at once, two battles on the same day. The Merlin had done the almost unthinkable: he’d turned an unknown stripling, a mere squire, into the High King in three years. And that meant Power. However you looked at it, whether all of the stories were true or not, there was no doubt that the Merlin was a formidable man. And an ancient one, since he must have been a man when Arthur was born, and now Arthur himself was full grown.

Which begged the question: Why was he coming here?

“Gwen.”

Gwen’s head snapped up, for it was Peder who had spoken her name. She jumped to her feet and bowed. “My lord.”

When she looked up, Peder was eyeing her with speculation. “You’ll be serving the Merlin.”

Her jaw dropped. “M-m-my lord? Me?”

“You’re discreet, you’re well trained. But most of all, you are the king’s daughter. We can’t honor the Merlin too highly. The king your father has said this himself; we will show the Merlin that there is only the best for him. You’ll be serving him.”

She felt her head swimming. “Yes, m-m-my lord,” she managed, and then she sat down heavily.

Serve
the Merlin?
Surely not . . . there must be some mistake.

Gwen was still thinking that, as she nervously stroked the front of her tunic, waiting to be presented to the Merlin as his squire. All the squires had been lined up to greet the Merlin; he was too important to just be allowed to turn up and let his servants pitch his pavilion. He’d been watched for over the course of the last few days by outriders from the King’s Band, and as soon as he and his entourage were in sight, everyone had lined up to greet him, not just the squires.

Now, however, all of the important people had properly greeted him, and only the squires remained in their stiff rank. The Merlin was talking quietly to the king, while Eleri and her women waited attentively. Like the other two girls among the squires, she was dressed as the boys were, in tunic and trousers, rather than a gown. Not that she looked all that different from a boy—except for her hair, which had grown out again and had been braided up and wrapped around her head, rather than just cut off at her shoulders or shoulder-blades.

At first glance, the Merlin did not look particularly imposing. He was quite an old man, in the usual white Druidic robes, but he had none of the usual talismans or other items of power about his person. Not even a single necklace or torque. His long gray hair had been braided and clubbed like a horse’s tail, his beard trimmed short.

But his eyes gave it all away. They didn’t look at you, they looked
through
you, as if he were seeing something else entirely even while he took in what you looked like on the outside. They were very pale, those eyes, the same pale gray as his hair.

He had all his teeth too, a rarity in someone that old. It gave him a very fierce look. He had a curiously sharp, clean smell to him, like juniper. And he was lean, but not emaciated. Altogether, he put Gwen in mind of an old gray owl; you trifled with him at your peril, for he still had talons and knew how to use them.

Finally the Merlin’s manservant came to tell him that his pavilion was ready. That was the signal for her to be presented.

The king crooked his finger; with her mouth gone dry, she came forward. “My lord,” the king said, with the slightest of bows, “This is your squire for as long as you are among us. My daughter, Gwenhwyfar.”

“Braith’s girl.” The Merlin nodded, and Gwen suppressed a start of surprise that he would use that term. “You honor me by sending your blood to serve me.” He turned his attention to Gwen, and the force of his regard landed on her like a blow. “Well, by your leave, I shall take mine. I am an old man, and I need my rest.”

The king laughed politely but in a way that said without words that he believed none of that. “Then your squire shall show you to your encampment. We look forward to your presence at our right hand at supper.”

Gwen thought the Merlin would turn his attention to other things as she guided him to the spot where his encampment had been set up—against the east castle wall, sheltered from wind, shaded from the worst of the heat of the day, but warmed by the rising sun in the morning. And so he did, but not for long. Time and time again, she felt his eyes burning on the back of her neck, and when they reached where his pavilion had been pitched, he stopped her before she could go.

“I have some business I must carry out, and a message I need taken, squire,” he told her. “Come.” And he motioned for her to step inside the flap his servant held aside for them.

She didn’t want to, but what could she do? Reluctantly, she obeyed. He sat down on the stool that had been set ready for him and gestured for her to stand before him. She kept her eyes fastened to her toes. She studied her own feet, studied the wrapped leather shoes she wore, with great care.

“Look at me, squire,” the Merlin ordered, sounding impatient.

“Look up at me, look me in the eyes.”

With even greater reluctance, she raised her eyes to his. The moment their gazes locked, his piercing gray eyes filled her vision, and she could not have looked away if she’d wanted to. She felt dizzy, and yet her knees locked, and she stood as rigid as a statue. As if from far away, she heard him speaking.

“Eleri. The queen, your mother. Was she at Arthur’s wedding?” he asked sharply.

What kind of a foolish question was that? “No,” she heard herself replying. “She was here, she was the Mother in the rites that night. Everyone saw her there and at the feast before and the fire after. Not even eagle’s wings could have got her there and back in that time. Besides, she wanted to be the Mother in the rites, to share the power all the Circles were raising for the High King.” She wanted to hesitate, not to say anything more, but the words kept tumbling out. “She wanted to give Father a son, after so many daughters. So she wanted to be sure she could share in that Power.”

She heard him mutter to himself. It made no more sense than his question. “Could it be that? The sharing of
that
power and not—the portent said it was his son, but could it have meant the child of his
Power
and not of his blood?”

Gwen strained against the invisible bonds that held her but to no avail. “The child she bears—boy or girl?”

She didn’t want to answer, but the answer slipped from her. “A son, as she wanted, the queen says, and so do the signs and all the women.”

And again, the Merlin muttered. “—I dare not risk it. I dare not. Better a hundred innocent perish to remove
that
one—”

She felt like a bird in a net. No matter how hard she struggled, she only entangled herself further. The cold hand of fear clutched at her throat. It was impossible to move even a finger.