Guinevere: The Legend in Autumn Read online

  Geoffrey Ashe has been a constant source of help, information and encouragement throughout this entire project, for which I thank him most sincerely. His generosity of time and spirit in answering questions, guiding me around South Cadbury, or simply discussing the more obscure points of the legend have been particularly treasured.

  The works of John and Caitlin Matthews and Bob Stewart on the Grail proved invaluable in my exploration of that story, and the Merlin books by Mary Stewart were my original inspiration and have been my model during the eleven years I’ve been working on this project.

  Coming to the end of a project that has taken up so many years of one’s life creates a very funny feeling. It has been a wonderful, if sometimes exhausting, experience, and I look back with much appreciation on the many people who have contributed to this work, from Shirley Kahert-Hall, who got me started with the right books back in 1982, to Dr. Ann La Barr, who has answered all kinds of questions about blood and horses this spring. To my agent, Eric Ashworth, I extend my deepest appreciation for helping me get published to begin with and believing I could complete the whole of the trilogy when I’d only just written the first volume.

  That first book was edited by Pat Capon, who extended her own faith in my work enough to recommend that Poseidon publish it. As she shaped the early Guinevere, so my second editor, Fonda Duvanel, has been my mentor, mainstay, and person “without whom it could not have been done” for the second and third works. To both these fine ladies, I will be forever grateful.

  My love and appreciation to Parke Godwin, who, with his sharp eye and trenchant comments, has taught me more about my craft than anyone else.

  And lastly, a toast to the reader…may you thoroughly enjoy both my Gwen and the Camelot she created.

  —Persia Woolley

  Auburn, California

  1990–1991

  Prologue

  I, Guinevere, High Queen of Britain and wife to King Arthur, sat in the shadows of the stone cell and stared into the brazier. A layer of soft gray ash blanketed the embers until a charred branch collapsed onto them and the molten heart of the coals flared up. I gasped and, shivering violently, turned to face the bed.

  A spare pallet lay on the ledge cut into the rock face of the wall. Someone had thought to bring me the old down comforter that had graced Arthur’s and my marriage bed for going on thirty years. I debated dragging it over to my chair—even in high summer a stone cellar holds the chill of winter, and by now both my feet and legs ached with the cold.

  No mind—the dawn will bring heat enough. Heat and flames and swirling smoke around the stake…

  In the corner Enid knelt in prayer, her husband’s heavy cloak draped over her shoulders. I watched her silently, envying her faith—there was not a single god I had not appealed to during the trial, yet now, this last night, I had no wish to commune with any of them. Whether it was fickleness on my part or theirs, I couldn’t tell.

  Nor do I care. It will be enough to get through tomorrow’s dawn with some semblance of grace and courage—to accept my moira with the dignity expected of a Celtic queen. It is a matter of pride and honor, you see…

  I rose and padded across the flags, coming to stand beneath the high, narrow window. The shutters were closed against the cold, but even when they were open, I saw only a small wedge of sky. High up in the dark, a waxing moon hid behind scudding clouds.

  There was a stirring beyond the door, as though a visitor had come, and my heart leapt foolishly. Lancelot!

  No, not likely, for the big Breton lies wounded, or perhaps dead, off in the wildwood somewhere…my Champion, my sanity…and now my death. But I mustn’t think of that.

  “Don’t see no harm in it,” the guard was saying as he tugged open the door. On the wall the candle guttered in the sudden draft, its slantwise flame casting a flicker of shadows over the warrior who bent to avoid the lintel. Once inside the cell, the man straightened up and blinked uncertainly in the gloom.

  “M’lady?” It was Gareth, come to bring me a steaming pitcher of spiced wine.

  I couldn’t help smiling—apparently he’d forgotten that I have no fondness for the grape, and very little tolerance either. Not that it would matter if I got drunk this night; any ill effects I might suffer tomorrow would end at sunrise.

  “I thought perhaps you’d like some company,” he said as the door went shut behind him. “But if I’m intruding, please say so.”

  “No, you’re not intruding at all.”

  Dear, sweet Gareth. Long and lean, with hair the color of white gold and gray-green eyes that take in the whole world with a kind of silent wisdom. Last of Morgause’s sons by Lot, he’d always been the fairest, the gentlest of her brood, and we had long been friends. I could not think of anyone more apt to share this particular night’s watch, for with the end so close, I had no stomach for anything but honesty.

  “How is the King?” My teeth began to chatter in spite of myself and when Gareth handed me a mug of hot wine, I clasped it gratefully in both hands and sank down on the bed. “How is he faring tonight?”

  “He’s devastated, M’lady. Gawain is with him, promising all manner of things if Arthur will just step in and spare your life. It was very unclear how things would be resolved when I left…”

  Gareth’s voice trailed off and he turned aside to put a fresh branch of applewood on the brazier. I tucked my feet under me and pulled the comforter around my knees as I thought of my husband.

  Pacing like a lion, no doubt. Never could handle a crisis without wearing a path through the rushes! Muttering, stamping, flailing against the fates that have brought us here—ah, my dear, could it really have been otherwise?

  Is it, like my loving you, one of those things graven in the heavens above Britain which must be played out, no matter what? Is it woven into our moira—fated as surely as Tristan and Isolde’s love was fated?

  Or did we bring it on ourselves, blindly clinging to the old ways when the world was changing—and neither of us seeing where it was going?

  “I told them I was coming to stay with you,” Gareth went on, seating himself in the chair by the brazier. “If you want someone besides Enid, that is.”

  I glanced at my lady-in-waiting, realizing for the first time she was slumped, asleep, at the prayer bench. Not that I could blame her; it had been a long night already, and daybreak was still far off.

  “I’m grateful to be thinking about something besides the morrow,” I told him, resting the warm cup against my cheek. “It wasn’t always like this, you know—full of dissent and division and wild accusations. Once the Companions saw themselves as family, willing to follow wherever the Pendragon led, confident and proud…”

  Gareth nodded. “Gawain liked to call them Men of Honor.” His voice lifted with an echo of the enthusiasm that used to fill our days. “Why, when I first came to the Fellowship, I was awed to be among such heroes. Of course, I looked on them as any youngster would, seeing a world of demigods instead of a bunch of eccentric hooligans.”

  Eccentric hooligans! The term brought a rueful snort, and I wondered if Gareth truly thought all the Companions fell into that category. Arthur had used the term himself, once, but only in reference to the wildman Gwyn, not the entire Fellowship.

  Yet maybe it wasn’t that far off the mark—hadn’t the Round Table begun simply as a gathering of ragtag warriors come to see who had survived the summer campaigning and who had not?

  That was at Caerleon, and Merlin had lain his prophecy on us, promising that all who joined Arthur’s Cause would find immortality and fame eternal. He foretold a brotherhood like none other, full of adventure and glory—and afterward the fighting men flocked to us as though we had the elixir of life itself.

  But Arthur wanted more. In a world overrun by barbarians, where even the Emperor had left Rome in favor of living in Constantinople, my husband was determined to salvage some semblance of just and civilized behavior in Britain. Originally Merlin’s dream, it had become Arthur’s
Cause. So we’d built the Round Table into a political forum, a Fellowship of majesty and grace, where client kings put aside blood-feuds and agreed to settle their disputes around the council table rather than on the battlefield.

  Eventually even the old Celtic warlords had come to heel under the Banner of the Red Dragon. There’d been enough unity of purpose to stop the Saxons who threatened to overrun the whole of Britain, and make them Federates under our rule. We’d done it all, and done it well, in the first ten years of our reign, and built the fortress of Camelot besides.

  Still, by its very nature, the Fellowship was full of disparate factions. Even among the Companions, the hand-picked cavalry that Arthur himself led, there was a startling diversity, eccentric and otherwise. Men of courage, of vision, of wild commitment to their different causes, they were as likely to go haring off after their personal dreams as a hawk is likely to stoop on a dove…

  “But special, M’lady,” Gareth was saying. “Even the most difficult of them was special.”

  “Special indeed,” I whispered, taking another sip of wine. The steam that rose from the cup danced before my eyes, and in it I saw the past with the bleary cheer of one unused to imbibing. “Splendid people for splendid times, weren’t they? Do you remember the midsummer tournament at Camelot…?”

  Chapter I

  Midsummer

  It was a year of wonders that took us from the simple pleasures of a British spring to foreign realms and thoughts that made my head swim. And it ended with the realization that nothing would ever be the same again.

  The winter had been mild, and when the soft green haze of spring began to hover in the branches of the oakwoods, anemone and primrose burst into bloom like stars flung by the handfuls into the leafy loam. By the time the cuckoo was rending the night with its call, whole drifts of bluebells carpeted the rides between the trees, and thrushes filled the day with their buoyant, life-loving song. And as May stole into our hearts, a trio of hedge sparrows flitted gaily through my garden, though they were more often heard than seen. I was sure I’d never known a more beautiful time in all my twenty-six years.

  The exuberance of the season filled our household. The youngest pages took to putting frogs down each other’s backs, while the squires stared, moony-eyed and hopeful, at my maids-in-waiting, who often as not stared back. Even the warriors felt the change in the air, turning restlessly from sword practice to dreams of victory and great renown.

  I stood in the kitchen doorway, watching Arthur and Lancelot complete their early-morning rounds of the fortress. Matching stride for stride they crossed the courtyard, heads bent in conversation as they discussed the plans for the day.

  Arthur—ruddy and solid and bronzed from years in the saddle, wearing his long brown hair pulled back at the nape of his neck. His cheeks were clean shaven as any Roman, but his mustaches grew full and drooping in the Celtic fashion, and he moved with the natural assurance of a man born to be a leader.

  And next to him Lancelot—lithe and lean, black hair cropped in the pageboy fashion of the Picts. Set wide above high cheekbones, his blue eyes sparkled like the waters off the Cornish coast, sometimes bright and playful, sometimes deep and sad. But it was the mouth that fascinated me, for an overabundance of teeth lent his lips a full and sensual look quite at odds with his otherwise ascetic air.

  Night and day, body and spirit—no two men more different, or more complementary. Surely there was never another more fit to be High King than Arthur, nor ever a lieutenant of better mettle and loyalty than Lance. What woman would not love them both? Or feel honored to be loved by either?

  Arthur came through the doorway, pausing to lift the milk pitcher from my hand and downing the whole of it before taking his place at the kitchen table between his foster brothers, Cei and Bedivere. Even when they were growing up in an obscure court in the heart of Wales—long before anyone dreamed of the High Kingship of Britain—the three of them had been a team, with Arthur spawning the ideas, Cei and Bedivere finding ways to make them happen. Now my husband greeted them jovially, wiping his mustaches with the back of his hand.

  “Lance and I were just discussing how short-tempered and touchy the warriors are getting,” he began.

  “It’s the wages of peace,” Cei grumbled, looking up from a cup of cider. “Fighting men without wars feel cheated of a chance for glory.”

  “Then what do you say to hosting a tournament?” Arthur continued, good-naturedly ignoring the interruption. “Maybe make it part of the next Round Table meeting?”

  Bedivere nodded thoughtfully. Bedivere—craggy and silent, he was as even tempered as Cei was sharp. Arthur’s best friend since childhood and his lieutenant in the early years, he was a man who gave full measure of his love and devotion, never stinting, never regretting. After he’d lost his hand in the High King’s service, he became our diplomat and adviser, helping to train the boys in swordplay and sometimes entertaining us with the harp. Yet he never looked on Lancelot—the one who replaced him at Arthur’s side—with bitterness or rancor.

  “Admirable idea,” he opined, using the gauntlet and hook that replaced his hand to offer the platter of fresh bannocks to Lance. “Give them a chance to turn boasting into action.”

  “And if you opened it to everyone in the realm, we could recruit the best of the newcomers into the Companions,” Cei added, his sourness beginning to give way to enthusiasm. As Seneschal of the realm he not only collected taxes and screened the new applicants for the cavalry, he also kept the royal larder stocked and presented the lavish feasts for which we were growing famous. “I’d like to see it begin on midsummer’s eve; hold the peasant games at night and the warrior’s exhibitions during the day. Might be quite a festival.”

  Thus it was decided, and every messenger carrying word of the Round Table meeting delivered the news that jousts and drills and examples of fine riding would be featured, and any who wished to compete would be considered for placement in the cavalry. Naturally those who were already Champions to the client kings were welcome, but afterward would return to their overlords. That arrangement assured us of having excellent warriors living throughout the whole of Britain, available should there be a major crisis, yet not swelling our own ranks beyond the level of feasibility. Any one king can only feed so many military mouths. It was a good system, and as Lance noted, it bound the smaller leaders to us, and added to the sense of Fellowship in the councils.

  So we set about making plans for the most splendid gathering ever. Cei took charge of the feasts while Lance organized the tournament and Arthur and Bedivere laid out the political agenda. For years Arthur had been trying to establish a code of law that would apply to all Britons, although many of the client kings shied away from it, fearing it would curb their autonomy. Still, he’d be bringing the subject up again this year.

  In the Hall I unlocked the trunks and hampers and cupboards under the loft so that my ladies-in-waiting could sort through our treasure trove, picking the best of silver and pewter, ivory and glass to grace the curved trestles we’d put in a circle. And I opened the cedarwood chests which held the precious pennants, personally shaking them out while the smell of pennyroyal made me wrinkle my nose as I checked for moth holes.

  The lengths of heavy wool—red and ochre, blue and green, black and purple and maroon—all were covered with silk embroidery as rich and handsome as the tapestry of the Red Dragon which hangs beyond the dais at the end of the Hall. Worked in bright colors and gay designs, each bore the name of a Round Table member, and when they were brushed and sponged and hung over the backs of chairs, they became a badge of honor unique to the Round Table.

  As usual the plump little matron Vinnie took umbrage at my wardrobe. “What’s the point of being High Queen if you don’t remember to dress up now and then?” she nattered. “The people expect to see you all decked out and fancy once in a while.”

  It was a battle we’d waged, lovingly, since the days when she was my governess in Rheged. Having grown up a
tomboy in that wild, northern region, clothes and fripperies were the last thing on my mind. So I was more than happy to leave the matter to her, confident that she’d create something suitable out of bits of lace and scraps of Damascus brocade left over from the days when trade flowed freely throughout the Empire.

  On the day our festivities were to begin, I delivered myself to Vinnie and Elyzabel, content that they would clothe my long, lanky frame in regal robes and turn my haystack hair into something approximating a royal coiffeur.

  While Elyzabel coaxed my side locks into waves and looped several long braids up on the top of my head, I reached for the ancient torc of queenhood and admired it once again. A twisted rope of gold shaped to fit the neck, it had wonderful pop-eyed creatures worked into the rounded knobs that protected each end. How many adventures had they participated in? How many monarchs, both good and bad, had they observed? They gave this symbol of free-born majesty both humor and elegance, and I smiled at them once more, blessing the memory of Arthur’s mother, who had given it to me as a wedding present.

  Vinnie was just settling Mama’s coronet on my head when a trumpet call from our gates announced our guests’ arrival.

  “Drat, they’re here already!” I exclaimed, slipping the torc around my neck and jumping to my feet.

  “But the crown’s not pinned down!” Vinnie wailed.

  “I’ll manage,” I shot back, one hand holding the golden circlet firmly in place as I bolted for the door.

  The week to come would see me constantly at our guests’ disposal, feeding and entertaining them, and looking after their every need. I’d have to balance the claims of old friends, new allies, jilted lovers, recent widows, jealous rivals and whomever else the world saw fit to bring to our doorstep. So I climbed up the narrow stairs to the lookout tower atop the Hall, determined to have an early look at them before the formalities began. It would give me a chance to assess who of the Fellowship was coming, who not, and what the mood was likely to be.