Here Lies Arthur (17 page)

XXXVII

 

Myrddin wasn’t there. The curly-headed boy – his name was Cadwy – was alone in the place. He was looking for eggs out where the chickens scratched. When he saw me squelching towards him he knew who I was, and let me inside. Said his master was still in Aquae Sulis. I asked for dry clothes, and he found me some to wear while he washed my soiled, soaked dress. I sat by the fire in his own spare tunic and a pair of old trews, eating bread which I smeared with sooty white fat from a skillet that stood on the hearth. The boy watched me like I was a spirit sprung out of the flames. Even with my hair grown I looked boyish in those clothes. Whatever I’d learned of grace and girlishness, the night had wrung it out of me. Cadwy couldn’t tell what I was.

Later, he showed me a bed to lie down on. And I slept there till that day was near gone.

Myrddin was back when I woke. I heard his voice outside, talking to Cadwy, and went out to find him
climbing down off his old black horse. My own pony Dewi came across the paddock to nuzzle me, and I hugged him and laid my face against his and wished there was a human being in the world who loved me as well as he did.

Myrddin looked strange when he saw me standing there. I’d have said he felt shy, if I’d not known him better. He came towards me cautiously, watching my face.

“You told Arthur,” I said.

Myrddin reached out towards me, but didn’t touch. He said, “Stories were going about, that Gwenhwyfar had a lover. I had to put an end to it. It would have been bad for Arthur’s reputation.”

“You knew she’d go to Bedwyr last night,” I said. “You sent word and told Arthur to ride home quick, and where to find them.”

“Something had to be done,” said Myrddin. “The kings of Britain will never let Arthur lead them against the Saxons if they are laughing behind his back about his wife.” He looked old, I thought, and ill. Kept kneading at his arm, as if it had gone numb. He said, “You should have come with me last night.”

“My mistress needed me,” I said, to make him understand I wasn’t his any more. I don’t know if he did. The mention of my mistress distracted him. “You know where Gwenhwyfar is?” he asked.

“Dead,” I said.

That made him curse. Not because he cared about Gwenhwyfar, of course. “I told Arthur he must spare her,” he said.

“Wasn’t Arthur’s doing,” I said. “She drowned herself.”

Myrddin’s eyes went past me to the hills, the steaming woods, looking for ways to make a story of it. “That might work. She tempted Bedwyr, betrayed Arthur, and then, in guilt and remorse – but that makes Arthur seem weak. And will Maelwas believe it?”

Cadwy was leading the horse away, with Dewi following. I went after Myrddin into the house.

By Myrddin’s fire I heard the news from Sulis. How Medrawt had fled in the storm’s confusion, and how the slaves he left behind said he’d been making for Ynys Wydryn, to lay his sword at Maelwas’s feet. The story was spreading of how Arthur had made sacrifice of Bedwyr and given his head to the old gods at their sacred spring. Bishop Bedwin had preached to a crowd in the forum, saying the tempest had been punishment for Arthur’s sins, and warning the people to throw down their tyrant before God sent worse punishments. Arthur had him beaten, and let his warriors help themselves to the treasures in his church.

“And that has made those who hate him hate him more,” said Myrddin, not talking to me really, just letting his thoughts pour out in words. “And there is Cei. The trust that was between them has soured. Cei may be Arthur’s half-brother, but he’s uncle to Bedwyr and Medrawt too, and a friend to Bishop Bedwin, and he had a liking for Gwenhwyfar. He’s still loyal, but it’s a grudging loyalty now. Arthur’s afraid that there are men in the war-band who will try to throw him down and set Cei up in his place.”

“Cei would never betray Arthur,” I said.

Myrddin glowered, ignoring me. “And Cei knows about every trick I’ve pulled. What if he tells people the truth about Caliburn, or the other tales I’ve built Arthur’s power upon? What if he tells them about you?”

“Why not help Cei throw him down?” I said. “Cei’d be a better lord. Or do you love Arthur so bad you can’t see that?”

“Oh, Cei’d be a good lord,” said Myrddin sourly. “He’d keep Aquae Sulis fat and calm and prosperous, right up until the day the Saxon hordes come west and burn it. Cei means nothing. Arthur’s the one. He has to be. All those stories that I’ve sent out into the world – do you think I can just whistle and they’ll come running home to me like hounds? Arthur is our hope. He is the hope of all Britain. One day the other kings will rally to him and he’ll lead them in a war that will…”

“…drive the Saxons out of this island for ever,” I said wearily. I’d heard that tune before. Believed it once. Now it sounded staler every time.

Myrddin wasn’t listening to me. He said, “Cei’s a problem. Can’t be trusted. I was a fool to let him in upon my secrets. The one thing worse than an enemy is a friend turned false.” He set down the cup he’d been drinking from and rubbed his arm. “I must find a way to be rid of him, before more blood is spilled. Send him away so there is time for all this to blow over. Yes. But how? What reason could there be?”

And he looked at me as if he was expecting me to tell him, but he wasn’t. He’d have looked at the wall for an answer if I’d not been in the way.

Next day when I woke he’d gone again. It was just me and Cadwy, and Cadwy was so nervous of me that he left me well alone, and I had time to think. I wondered if Medrawt and his family had made it to Ynys Wydryn, and what sort of welcome he would get from old Maelwas. The storm had washed away many things, and made others clearer. I saw now that Maelwas had never honestly meant to give Arthur command over his warbands. He’d just been playing for time, afraid of this arrogant bandit who’d set up camp in his borderlands. He would be glad of the news Medrawt would bring, of strife in Arthur’s gang, and God’s displeasure. He would maybe think the time was right to move against Arthur, and give the holding of Aquae Sulis to a better man.

Myrddin came home in the late afternoon, while I was tending to Dewi in the paddock. If he had been thinking about Maelwas it did not show in his face. As he let Cadwy help him down from his horse he was smiling the old, sly smile that I’d first seen when he showed me Caliburn all those years before. A smile of simple delight at his own cleverness. “Well, Myrddin has mended it, as Myrddin always does,” he said. “I had Arthur gather all his men on the steps outside the church. Had him remind them how the Irishman who is our ally has been insulted by Cunomorus. Now we’ve humbled Calchvynydd we must ride to the Irishman’s aid and help him punish Cunomorus before he grows still more ambitious and land-hungry.”

I blinked. So much had happened those past few days that it seemed an age since the Irishman had ridden in to ask for Arthur’s help. “I’d forgotten Cunomorus…”

Myrddin chuckled. “So had they. So had Arthur. But I remember. A leader should always keep a few spare enemies to hand. You never know when you might need a good, far-away war to take men’s minds off troubles close to home. If we let Cunomorus get away with the Irishman’s cattle today, what will he try tomorrow? He must be humbled before he grows any bolder. That’s what I had Arthur tell them. Some of our warriors must ride west at once, to join with the Irishman’s band. Of course, Arthur can’t lead them. He and his riders are war-weary, travel-sore. Cei and his followers will go in their place. By the time they return all this trouble will be behind us. And some may not return at all.”

“What if they won’t go?”

Myrddin scowled at me. “Have you forgotten all you learned about the lives of men? Of course they’ll go. They would look like cowards, else. Anyway, Arthur promised them a good fight, and a share of the booty. Said he wished he could go in their place, but he must stay and guard their homes for them against the traitor Medrawt. And I told them about all the treasures they will take from Cunomorus’s hall. A herd of red cattle. A golden shield. A miraculous cauldron, which is never empty – a drink from it can heal all wounds…”

“And does Cunomorus really have those things?”

Myrddin shrugged. “Who knows? Maybe. I made it up. But the promise of plunder will cheer Cei’s men on their way west. They leave at dawn.”

I could see why Myrddin was so pleased with himself. Cei’s men were those who’d been left in Aquae Sulis while Arthur was off fighting that summer. For the most
part they were men that Arthur couldn’t quite trust; Valerius’s former comrades, the sons of the old
ordo,
men not linked to him by blood or long companionship. The very men who might rather have his brother as their leader. Now, thanks to Myrddin’s cunning, they were all to be sent out of the way for a month or more. They’d return weighed down with plunder, with coin and cattle and magic cauldrons maybe. Plenty of reasons to like Arthur better.

Later, when we’d eaten, and the boy was outside cleaning the plates, and I was thinking about my bed again, another thought came to me.

“Peredur. He’s not going?”

“Long-Knife’s boy? Of course. Didn’t I say? Cei’s taking every man who didn’t ride with Arthur this summer past.”

“But you can’t send Peredur to a war! He’s too…”

“Stupid? Can’t help that, Gwyna. He’s not Arthur’s man. I heard it was he who went to warn Medrawt. Maybe he’s not as foolish as he looks.”

“But he is! I know it’s hard to believe, but he is!”

“So you say. All I know is, I can’t leave him in Aquae Sulis, to plot against Arthur.”

I wondered if I should confess that it had been me who sent Peredur to warn Medrawt. But it wouldn’t have made a difference.

I went to bed, but I couldn’t sleep. I watched the light of the dying-down fire lap on the roof-beams, saffron-colour. I’d been thinking about Bedwyr and Gwenhwyfar so hard I’d half forgotten Peredur, and
how his open, silly face once made my heart catch, and how he’d been when I first met him, dressed up as a maid. My mirror-boy. I couldn’t bear the thought of him riding off to that war. Not even a real war, but one made up to serve Arthur’s purposes, a needless, reasonless war, spun out of lies. Either he’d not come back at all, or he’d come back changed. He’d change the same way Bedwyr had. The last of his girlishness would be gone from him, and he’d be just a man like all the rest.

I slept, and dreamed of Gwenhwyfar walking into the lake. She cradled her wooden anchor like a child, vanishing into her own reflection.

When I woke, I knew very clear what I must do. It scared me, but not enough to turn me back.

Myrddin was snoring in his bed-place. The boy Cadwy was curled up by the hearth. He stirred a bit as I crept round him, but I said, “Sshh, sshhh,” and he settled like a sleepy dog.

I still had Bedwyr’s cloak. It had faded in the rain to a tired brown, and the strip Gwenhwyfar had torn off the bottom made it about the right length for me. I had Cadwy’s tunic and breeks, and in Myrddin’s oak chest I found my own old belt from when I was a boy. There was a white bloom of mildew on the leather, which came off like chalk-dust when I rubbed it with my thumb. I had no shoes except my ruined buskins, so I stole Myrddin’s boots. And I stole a knife, and a leather bag.

Outside, in the dark, old Dewi was sleeping, head down, one hind hoof tilted against the turf. He woke
with a soft whinny when I threw the saddle-cloth across him. Turned his head and nibbled up the hunk of bread I gave him, and seemed glad that we were off again upon our travels, he and I.

XXXVIII

 

In dripping woods close by the Sulis road, I stopped and waited for the dawn. As the light gathered, pools of flood-water showed like glass among the trees. I crouched by one and looked down at my reflection and cut my long hair with the knife. Not too short. I left it shoulder-length, the way Bedwyr had worn his, and tied it back with a string I found in my pocket. I washed my face in muddy water to darken my skin till the sun could darken it properly. Then I stuck the knife through my belt and got me up on Dewi’s back again.

Myrddin had told me they’d be setting out at dawn, but I didn’t wait to meet the war-band on the road. I remembered too well all the snags and delays that beset armies setting off to war: lame horses and snapped saddle-girths, things left behind that had to be hunted for. Men waking late, stupid from too much mead or wine the night before. The lingering goodbyes. Anyway, I wanted to meet them further on, where they would not just have to take my word that I was a young man.

I rode west through the woods, crossed the swollen river at Camlann-ford and came late that afternoon to a place called Din Branoc. I remembered it from my journey with Myrddin two summers before. We’d stopped a night there on our way to the Summer Country, but passed it by when we were coming home. People there might remember a boy who had gone west with Arthur’s wizard, but not the girl he had brought back.

It had suffered in the storms. The hall slumped on its low rise amid the flooded fields like Noe’s Ark wrecked upside-down on Ararat. Men of the household were sculling across the fields in wicker boats, rescuing stranded sheep from knolls and hummocks where they’d fled to escape the deluge. As I urged Dewi through the knee-deep water on the track I felt a knot of fright grow in my gut. These people wouldn’t be in any mood to offer shelter to a stranger.

But they were glad of me. It did them good to have someone to tell about the terrors that had overtaken them. They pointed at their landslip-scarred hills and torn-down trees like men who had seen wonders, and watched my face while they told me of the storm, making sure I was astonished.

I did my best. My time with Myrddin had made a good actor of me. I pretended awe, and never let on that the disasters they were so proud of had happened just as bad or worse at Aquae Sulis, and every other place, probably. For all I know they’re still talking of their great storm in Din Branoc.

And when they asked me who I was I said, “Gwyn.
Servant to Myrddin. Don’t you remember me?” And they nodded and welcomed me again, and said how I’d grown, and never thought to notice that I’d grown into a girl.

“What news from Sulis?” they asked.

I wasn’t sure, at first, what I should say. And then I was. That night, sitting with them on the dais-planks in their mud-floored hall, while wet clothes and bedding sent up a fog of steam about me in the fire’s heat, I told them the story of Bedwyr and Gwenhwyfar.

It didn’t come out quite as I’d expected. I set out with good intentions, and I meant to stay on the road of truth, but somewhere along the way I strayed. Maybe I’d learned too well from Myrddin. I made Bedwyr older and finer than he really was, and told all the usual tales about his feats in battle, glutting the ravens and killing nine hundred enemies and such stuff. And I made Gwenhwyfar younger, and more beautiful, and less selfish. What harm could that do? These people had never seen her. She’d been kind to me at the end. She tucked me up in Bedwyr’s cloak before she went into the mere. It was the least thanks I could show, to make her young again.

I couldn’t tell their story’s ending, neither. The Arthur my listeners knew was Myrddin’s Arthur: noble, wise, and brave. So when I came to the part where Arthur found the lovers out, I made him sorrowful instead of savage. And I let them get safe away. Safe down the storm-lit roads to Ynys Wydryn they went, my Bedwyr and my Gwenhwyfar.

After that, I could never quite believe I’d seen them
both dead. It seemed so much more likely that they were safe together in the Summer Country.

Morning brought Cei’s war-band. Twenty riders with shields on their backs and swords at their waists, and twenty more reflected in the wet fields as they passed along the road. Not many, even if you counted the reflections, but the Irishman would be grateful for them, and when they combined with his band they’d be enough to give Cunomorus some trouble.

The headman of Din Branoc came out with me to meet them. “My lords!” he called, as he waded ahead of Dewi through the flood. “You are welcome! Welcome!” I thought he was going to tell them all about the storm, but instead he pointed to me and said, “Here’s Myrddin’s boy, come to meet you on the way.”

Cei, reining in his horse, looked at me hard.

“Gwyn,” I said. “I’m kinsman to Myrddin.”

Cei nodded. There was a smile hidden somewhere down behind his eyes. “I remember you. I’d not thought to see you again. Any news of your sister, who was in Gwenhwyfar’s household?”

“Gwyna. My half-sister.”

Another nod. “She came safe out of all this?”

“I left her yesterday, at Myrddin’s place. Myrddin sent me to ride with you. I know that country west of Isca, see. I can guide you.”

“You’re welcome then, boy, and I’m grateful to your master. I’ve not been near those hills since we took old Ban’s hall. The time the sword rose from the water.” The faintest trace of a wink. Then his face set hard, as if
thinking on the old times pained him. He looked past me, taking in the sodden buildings and the drowned fields. “We’ll press on. These people don’t need us adding to their troubles. Besides, the sooner we reach the Irishman’s hills the sooner we can finish this.”

The column of men started to move again. Someone was singing a song. The swaying tails of the horses gave off a sweetish smell of old dung. I rode Dewi up on to the track and joined them, and looked for Peredur.