Marion Bradley - The Mists of Avalon

She turned her eyes back to the young men approaching: Arthur, fair and grey-eyed; Lancelet, slender, graceful; and the huge, red-haired Gawaine, who towered over the others like a bull over a pair of fine Spanish horses. Arthur came and bowed to his mother.

"My lady." He recollected himself. "Mother, has this day been long for you?"

"No longer than for you, my son. Will you sit here?"

"For a moment, Mother." As he seated himself, Arthur, though he had eaten well, absentmindedly took a handful of the sweets that Morgaine had put aside from her plate. It made Morgaine realize again how very young Arthur was. Still munching on almond paste, he said, "Mother, do you want to marry again? If you do, I will find the very richest-and the very kindest -of the kings to marry you. King Uriens of Northern Wales is widowed; I have no doubt he would be happy to have a good wife."

Igraine smiled. "Thank you, dear son. But after being wife to the High King, I do not want to be wife to a lesser man. And I loved your father well; I have no wish to replace him."

"Well, Mother, let it be as you wish," said Arthur, "only I was afraid you would be lonely."

"It is hard to be lonely in a nunnery, son, with other women. And God is there."

Morgause said, "I would rather dwell in a hermitage in the forest than in a house full of chattering ladies! If God is there, it must be hard for him to get a word in edgewise!"

For a moment Morgaine saw the sprightly mother of her own childhood as Igraine retorted, "I imagine, like any henpecked husband, he spends more time in listening to his brides than in speaking to them-but if one listens hard enough for the voice of God it is not far away. But have you ever been quiet enough to listen and hear him, Morgause?"

Laughing, Morgause made a gesture, as a fighter who acknowledges a hit. "And what of you, Lancelet?" she asked, smiling enticingly. "Are you betrothed yet, or even married?"

He laughed and shook his head. "Ah, no, Aunt. No doubt my father, King Ban, would find me a wife. But as yet I wish to follow my king and serve him."

Arthur, smiling up at his friend, clapped a hand on his shoulder. "With my two strong cousins here, I am guarded as well, I make no doubt, as any of those old Caesars themselves!"

Igraine said softly, "Arthur, I think Cai is jealous; say something kind to him," and Morgaine, hearing this, looked up at the sullen-looking, scarred Cai. Hard for him, indeed; after years of thinking Arthur his father's unregarded fosterling, now to be supplanted by a younger brother-a younger brother become king-and to find that brother surrounded by two new friends to whom his heart was given.

Arthur said, "When this land is at peace we shall find wives and castles for all of you, no doubt. But you, Cai, shall keep mine for me as my own chamberlain."

"I am content with that, foster-brother-forgive me, I should say, my lord and king-"

"No," said Arthur, turning right round to embrace Cai. "God strike me if I ever ask that you, brother, should call me any such thing!"

Igraine swallowed hard. "Arthur, when you speak so, sometimes it seems to me that I hear your father's very voice."

"I wish for my own sake, madam, that I could have known him better. But I know, too, that a king cannot always do as he chooses, nor a queen." He lifted Igraine's hand and kissed it, and Morgaine thought: So he has already learned that much of king craft.

"I suppose," Igraine said, "that they have already set about telling you that you should be married."

"Oh, I suppose so," Arthur said, with a shrug. "Every king, I suppose, has a daughter he would like to marry to the High King. I think I will ask the Merlin which one I ought to marry." His eyes sought Morgaine's and for a moment it seemed they held a terrible vulnerability. "I don't know so very much about women, after all."

Lancelet said gaily, "Why then, we must find you the most beautiful woman in the kingdom, and the highest born."

"No," Cai said slowly, "since Arthur says very sensibly that all women are alike to him, find him the one with the best dowry."

Arthur chuckled. "I'll leave it to you then, Cai, and I've no doubt I'll be as well wed as I am crowned. I'd suggest you take counsel of the Merlin and no doubt His Holiness the Archbishop will want some say in the matter. And what of you, Morgaine? Shall I find you a husband, or will you be one of my queen's ladies-in-waiting? Who should be higher in the kingdom than the daughter of my mother?"

Morgaine found her voice. "My lord and king, I am content in Avalon. Pray don't trouble yourself with finding me a husband." Not even, she thought fiercely, not even if I am with child! Not even then!

"So be it, sister, though I doubt not. His Holiness will have something to say about it-he will have it that the women of Avalon are evil sorceresses or harpies, all."

Morgaine did not answer, and Arthur glanced back almost guiltily at the other kings and councillors; the Merlin was looking at him, and he said, "I see, I have spent all the time I am allowed with my mother and my sister and my Companions; I must go back to the business of being a king again. Madam." He bowed to Igraine, more formally to Morgause, but as he approached Morgaine he leaned forward and kissed her on the cheek. She stiffened.

Mother, Goddess, what a tangle we have made. He says he will always love me and long for me, and that is the one thing he must not do! If Lancelet only felt so ... She sighed, and Igraine came and took her hand.

"You are tired, daughter. That long standing in the sun this morning has wearied you. You are sure you would not rather come back with me to the convent where it is so quiet? No? Well, then, Morgause, take her back to your tent, if you will."

"Yes, dear sister, go and rest." She watched the young men walk away, Arthur tactfully tempering his pace to Cai's halting step.

MORGAINE RETURNED with Morgause to their tent; she was weary, but she had to remain alert and courteous while Lot talked of some plan Arthur had spoken of-fighting on horseback, with attack tactics which could strike down armed bands of Saxon raiders and foot soldiers, most of whom were not trained battle troops.

"The boy's a master of strategy," Lot said. "It might well work; after all, it was bands of Picts and Scots, and the Tribes, fighting from cover, who could demoralize the legions, so I am told-the Romans were so used to orderly fighting by the rules, and to foes who stood to give battle. Horsemen always have an advantage over any foot soldiers; the Roman cavalry units, I have been told, were always the ones who had the greater victories."

Morgaine remembered Lancelet, talking with passion of his theories of fighting. If Arthur shared that enthusiasm and was willing to work with Lancelet to build cavalry units, then a time might come, indeed, when all the Saxon hordes were driven from this land. Then peace would reign, greater than the legendary two hundred years of the Pax Romana. And if Arthur bore the sword of Avalon and the Druid regalia, then indeed the ensuing time might be a reign of wonder ... . Viviane had spoken once of Arthur as a king come out of legend, bearing a legendary sword. And the Goddess might rule again in this land, not the dead God of the Christians with his suffering and death.... She drifted into daydream, waking to reality only when Morgause shook her shoulder lightly.

"Why, my dear, you are half asleep, go to your bed; we will excuse you," she said, and sent her own waiting-woman to help Morgaine from her garments, to wash her feet and braid her hair.

She slept long and deeply, without dreams, the weariness of many days suddenly descending on her. But when she waked, she hardly knew where she was or what had happened, only that she was deathly sick and must stumble outside the tent to vomit. When she straightened up, her head ringing, Morgause was there, a firm and kindly hand to help her back inside. So Morgaine remembered her from earliest childhood, Morgause intermittently kind and sharp. Now she wiped Morgaine's sweating forehead with a wet towel and then sat beside her, telling the waiting-woman to bring her kinswoman a cup of wine.