Marion Bradley - The Mists of Avalon

"You dare!" Gareth half rose, turning on Gwydion and gripping the Saxon tunic at the neck. Gwydion put up his hands to loosen Gareth's hold.

"Easy, foster-brother!" He looked like a child in the giant Gareth's grip. "Will you treat me as you treated yonder Saxon because here among kinsmen I speak truth, or am I too to keep to the pleasant lie of the court, when all men see the Queen with her paramour and say nothing?"

Gareth slowly relaxed his grip and eased Gwydion back to his seat. "If Arthur has nothing to complain of in the lady's conduct, who am I to speak?"

Gawaine muttered, "Damn the woman! Damn her anyhow! Would that Arthur had put her away while there was still time! I have no great love for so Christian a court as this has become, and filled with Saxons. When I was first knight at Arthur's side, there was not a Saxon in all this land with more of religion than a pig in his sty!"

Gwydion made a deprecating sound, and Gawaine turned on him. "I know them better than you. I was fighting Saxons while you were wetting your swaddling bands! Are we now to run Arthur's court by what these hairy grunters think of us?"

"You do not know the Saxons half so well as I do," Gwydion said. "You do not get to know a man at the business end of a battleaxe. I have lived in their courts and drunk with them and courted their women, and I venture to say that I know them well, which you do not. And this much is true: they call Arthur and his court corrupt, too pagan."

"That comes well from them," Gawaine snorted.

"Still," said Gwydion, "it is no laughing matter, that these men, unrebuked, can call Arthur corrupt-"

"Unrebuked, say you?" Gareth grumbled. "I think Gawaine and I did some rebuking!"

"Will you fight your way through the Saxon court? Better to amend the cause of slander," said Gwydion. "Cannot Arthur rule his wife better than this?"

Gawaine said, "It would take a braver man than I to speak ill of Gwenhwyfar to Arthur's face."

"Yet it must be done," said Gwydion. "If Arthur is to be High King over all these men, he cannot be a laughingstock. When they call him cuckold, will they take oath to follow him in peace and in war? Somehow he must heal the corruption in this court-send the woman to a nunnery perhaps, or banish Lancelet-"

Gawaine looked anxiously around. "For God's sake, lower your voice," he said. "Such things should not even be whispered in this place!"

"It is better that we should whisper them than that they should be whispered all the length and breadth of the land," Gwydion said. "In God's name, there they sit close by him, and he smiles on them both! Is Camelot to become a joke, and the Round Table a bawdy house?"

"Now shut your filthy mouth or I will shut it for you," Gawaine snarled, gripping Gwydion's shoulder in his iron fingers.

"If I were speaking lies, Gawaine, you might well try to shut my mouth, but can you stop the truth with your fists? Or do you still maintain that Gwenhwyfar and Lancelet are innocent? You, Gareth, who have all your life been his pet and minion, I might well believe that you will think no evil of your friend-"

Gareth said, gritting his teeth, "It is true I wish the woman at the bottom of the sea, or behind the walls of the safest convent in Cornwall. But while Arthur does not speak, I will hold my tongue. And they are old enough to be discreet. All men have known for years that he has been her champion lifelong-"

"If I only had some proof, Arthur might listen to me," Gwydion said.

"Damn you, I am certain Arthur knows what there is to know. But it is for him to allow it or to interfere ... and he will hear no word against either of them." Gawaine swallowed and went on. "Lancelet is my kinsman, and my friend too. But-damn you-do you think I have not tried?"

"And what said Arthur?"

"He said that the Queen was above my criticism, and whatever she chose to do was well done. He was courteous, but I could tell that he knew what I was saying and was warning me not to interfere."

"But if it were drawn to his attention in a way he could not choose to ignore," Gwydion said quietly, considering, then raised his hand and beckoned. Niniane, seated at Arthur's feet, her hands still touching the strings of her harp, softly asked leave of Arthur, then rose and came to him.

"My lady," Gwydion said, "is it not true that she"- he inclined his head very slightly in Gwenhwyfar's direction-"often sends her women away for the night?"

Niniane said quietly, "She has not done so while the legion was away from Camelot."

"So at least we know the lady is loyal," said Gwydion cynically, "and does not distribute her favors wholesale."

"No one has ever accused her of common lechery," said Gareth angrily, "and at their ages-they are both older than you, Gawaine-whatever they are about cannot be much harm to anyone, I should think."

"No, I am serious," said Gwydion with equal heat. "If Arthur is to remain High King-"

"Mean you not," said Gareth angrily, "if you are to be High King after him-"

"What would you, brother? That when Arthur is gone I should turn over all this land to the Saxons?" Their heads were close together, and they were talking in furious whispers. Morgause knew they had forgotten not only her presence but her very existence.

"Why, I thought you loved the Saxons well," said Gareth, in angry scorn. "Would you not be content to have them rule, then?"

"No, hear me," said Gwydion in a rage, but Gareth grabbed at him again and said, "The whole of the court will hear you if you do not moderate your voices-look, Arthur is staring at you, he watched when Niniane came over here! Maybe Arthur is not the only one who should look to his lady, or-"

"Be silent!" Gwydion said, wrestling himself free of Gareth's hands.

Arthur called out to him, "What, do my loyal cousins of Lothian quarrel among themselves? I will have peace in my hall, kinsmen! Come, Gawaine, here's King Ceardig asking if you will have a game of riddles with him!"

Gawaine rose, but Gwydion said softly, "Here's a riddle for you- when a man will not mind his property, what's to be done by those who have an interest in it?"

Gawaine stalked away, pretending he did not hear, and Niniane bent over Gwydion and said, "Leave it for now. There are too many ears and eyes. You have planted the seed. Now speak to some of the other knights. Do you think you are the only one who saw-that?" and she moved her elbow just a little. Morgause, following the slight gesture, saw that Gwen-hwyfar was bending with Lancelet over a game board on their laps; their heads were close together.

"I think there are many who think it touches the honor of Arthur's Camelot," Niniane murmured. "You need only find some who are less- biased-than your brothers of Lothian, Gwydion."

But Gwydion was looking angrily at Gareth. "Lancelet," he muttered, "always Lancelet!" And Morgause, looking from Gwydion to her youngest son, thought of a small child prattling to a red-and-blue carved knight which he called Lancelet.

Then she thought of a younger Gwydion, following Gareth about like a puppy. Gareth is his Lancelet, she thought. What will come of this? But her disquiet was swallowed up in malice. Surely it is time, she thought, that Lancelet should have to answer for all he has wrought.

NINIANE STOOD at the crest of Camelot, looking down at the mists that surrounded the hill. She heard a step behind her, and said, without turning, "Gwydion?"

"Who else?" His arms came around her and held her tight, and she turned her face to kiss him. He demanded, without letting her go, "Does Arthur kiss you like that?"

She freed herself from his embrace to confront him. "Are you jealous of the King? Was it not you who told me to gain his confidence?"

"Already Arthur has had more than enough of what is mine-"