Camelot's Blood (33 page)

She faced Agravain, dropping at once to her knees, head bowed and both hands over her heart, for it would not have been seemly for a woman to lay her hand on the warrior's symbol. “I am Laurel Carnbrea, the Lady of Cambryn, wife to Agravain of Gododdin, and I do swear my fealty to you. My soul and self, and all that I hold, are yours to do with as you see fit.”

She lifted her eyes to Agravain, and saw a crowd emotions there: anger, relief, pride, and love. Oh yes, hidden, unspoken, but most definitely she saw love there and her heart constricted.

Now she saw that Cait stood just a little behind him, holding out the crown of silver and sapphires. Agravain took it into his hands, and set it gently on Laurel's brow.

“And may God bless the wearer and the wearing.” Agravain reached down and raised her up, putting her at his right hand.

“So you have heard the oath of my queen,” said Agravain evenly. He spoke over Bryce's head, to the waiting assembly. “And now you shall hear mine. I swear before God Almighty and Jesus Christ Our Savior that all I do, from this day until the day I die, will be for the strength, the honor and the preservation of this land of Gododdin. No king, no emperor, no force under Heaven will change this.” He lowered his eyes and met Bryce's gaze. Bryce's smile was gone, and there was only anger shining in his storm-green eyes. “You have heard my oath, Bryce
mach
Deuchan. You have heard that of my wife and queen. What oath do we hear from you?”

They stood like that, facing each other as if they stood alone, Agravain strong, and absolutely assured, Bryce trying to shore himself up with his anger and his righteousness.

To her, it was no surprise that Bryce shrank in on himself and took a step backwards.

“I will take no oath in this den of wolves!” Bryce shouted. Turning on his heel, he marched from the hall.

One man followed, him out. Then, another stumped after him, trailing a pair of sons who looked nervously over their shoulders at the remaining company. A third man humphed, wavered, and then he too walked out.

But that was all. Three men and two boys, no more, and not one who had taken the oath of fealty.

Agravain did not permit minds to linger over those who had left, nor over what they had said. “There should be a feast at this time,” he admitted. “But our enemies will not wait while we fulfill that ritual. My lords and chiefs, you must come sit with me so that we may discuss our resources and our plans. All others, you shall be made as welcome as my house is able. When peace and safety are ours, we will feast in celebration. Not before.”

The growl that answered was a low and dangerous rumble. It was the sound of approaching thunder, and yet there was clearly approval in it. The assembly dissolved, the chiefs giving orders to their followers and their sons. These took their leave, while their lords moved towards the throne. Laurel feeling keenly the new weight of the crown circling her brow, turned to the duties of lady and hostess. Food and drink, the laying of the tables and the filling of cups. These were all her arena. Outside, the sound of the armorer's hammers rang once more.

That was Agravain's concern now. Her concern was as it had been when she laid down last night and rose this morning. The food. Every hand that was not turned to the work of arms must be turned to the provision of food, and that work must begin at once. Starving men could not fight. An empty fortress could not hold, though it had the finest weapons in the world.

As soon as she was able, Laurel retreated to the kitchens and the dairy. The mistress there had rallied ten lean, brown huntsmen. Every one of them had bright eyes and clever hands. These hunters all boasted of their prowess with net, snare and arrow, but when she spoke plainly to them about the amount of game required, they blanched. To their credit, under the hard eye of Dame Ceana, they rallied and faced the facts.

She gave them cider to drink and a small jug of whisky to carry down with them. These were paltry gifts, but necessary. Din Eityn's reputation would begin to mend on the strength of such small gifts.

Along with the food, they would need herbs too, and all the resources required for tending the wounds of war. Standing in the midst of the dairy, surrounded by crocks of milk, butter and cheese, Laurel tried to rally herself against despair. It was a list of needs that would grow longer as the days progressed, not shorter, and she could not fail, even though her feet ached and her head was spinning.

“Ceana, go make sure all things are in hand in the kitchen, and send Byrd to me here.”

Ceana made her obeisance and left. Laurel sat abruptly down on the dairy's plain stool, glad for a moment's peace. It was likely to be the last she would have for many days to come. Laurel pressed her hand to her brow and felt the hard metal of the crown she had forgotten to remove.

With a sigh, Laurel lifted the beautiful ornament from her head. It felt so foolish to be sitting here now in her finery, consumed with worry about quantities of meat and cheese.

She turned it over in her hands as Agravain had done, watching the play of lights on the silver. It should have tarnished after all this time. Agravain must have had one of the smiths polish it. It was very like him to see to that detail, even in the midst of all the other, more vital tasks that he must complete now.

What had Queen Morgause felt when this beautiful thing was placed on her head? A draught curled around Laurel's hems, and wrapped itself around her neck. Had Lot crowned Morgause as Agravain had crowned her?

Was Morgaine there in disguised flesh or spirit, watching her sister, her soul brimming with its unspeakable gall?

What would you tell me, if you were here? What would you say I should do to help my husband, your son?

What was it you tried and failed to do, Morgause?

The patter of Byrd's footsteps sounded on the walkway outside, and the ancient dame hurried in, bending her knee as far as she was able.

Laurel looked up to see that no one else lingered in the doorway. She listened hard for a moment longer to be sure.

There was another battle that was Laurel's responsibility, and that she did not forget.

‘Byrd,” Laurel murmured. “When Bryce spoke in the great hall, you said it was ‘her doing'. What is it you meant?”

“I think Your Majesty knows.” Byrd peered up into Laurel's bewildered face. Her eyes were tiny, black and cunning. “Look at you,” the old woman clicked her tongue. “Did you think you drove her out the other night. You've been listening too hard to your own hopes.”

Byrd shuffled closer. “Forgive me Majesty, but I will say what I know. She is still here. That was a distraction that night, so she could work her true will. That's what we saw in the hall.”

“Byrd, how … ”

Byrd snorted. “You think you are the only one with eyes that see?” She wagged her head heavily back and forth. “Oh, there were plenty of us once who knew, about the black-eyed ghost in the queen's shape. I am the last.” Her mouth quirked up, finding some irony in that truth. “I only stayed because I had nowhere else to go.”

Laurel looked again to the empty doorway. Softly, so softly that Byrd had to shuffle even closer to hear her, Laurel whispered. “Byrd, do you know what became of Queen Morgause? How she meant to defeat Morgaine?”

“No, Majesty.” Byrd's face fell. She stood so close that Laurel could see that her black eyes were rimmed with red. “I would that I did. No one here could answer that now. Save …' Her head lifted, questioning, as if she had heard her name called from a distance.

“Save what? Who?”

“No.” But Byrd did not look at her. She was seeing some other place, hearing some other voice in her mind. “It is too much.”

“Speak, Byrd. We cannot win this war if we remain in ignorance.”

Slowly, Byrd lowered her gaze, meeting Laurel's eyes. Her own glittered, knowing and dangerous in the dim light. “King Lot would know.”

Understanding she did not wish to possess rose in the pit of Laurel's heart. “He is dead, Byrd.”

Byrd shrugged her crooked shoulders. “What matter? The oldest blood sings in you. For you, he would speak of what he sees in Death's realm.”

“I cannot do that.”

“I know,” the old woman answered simply.

“We will find another way. Morgause too can be made to speak.”

Byrd shrugged again. “By what relic would you call her? That crown? This is a working that requires far more than figured metal.” Byrd straightened for a moment. Then, weariness overtook her and she settled again, small, bent, and so old. “Ah. I wish this had happened when I was younger, when I could still walk these hills. But I am old, and half-blind now, and I've made too many of my own bargains …' She blinked rapidly, remembering where she truly was, and to whom she spoke. “I am sorry, Majesty. You do not need my regrets now.”

Laurel waved her hand. “It is no matter, Byrd. Go. Make sure everything's all right in the hall. I'll be along shortly.”

Byrd shuffled forward, and to Laurel's surprise, laid a light, wrinkled hand on her hair, a gesture of conciliation, and understanding. “You'll do as you must, Laurel Carnbrea. Never fear that.”

Byrd left, and Laurel looked again at the lights that played in the crown's precious gems.

The vision took her so strongly and suddenly that Laurel had no chance to prepare. She saw a woman, saw Morgause. There was no mistaking her, for she knew the shape of her face and her form, and she saw Agravain in the depths of her blue eyes.

Morgause lifted the crown from her black, unveiled hair, and pressed it into a man's hands. That man was Lot. But not Lot as she had ever seen him. This man was broad and blunt, and as solid as the stone cliff that held Din Eityn. His hands were thick from the strength of the sinew within them. Morgause pressed the shining crown into those hands, and it suddenly looked as fragile as a dream.

“You must hear me, Lot. If I do not return, another will come. You will know her when she does. You must tell her what you know. All of it. She will finish what I have begun.”

And Laurel was back in the dairy again, watching, aghast, as the crown slipped from her numbed hands and clattered onto the floor.

“Byrd!” she cried. “Byrd!”

Light footsteps, more shuffling than running, sounded along the passageway, and Byrd scurried back in, the trailing ends of her head cloth flapping like wings behind her.

“What is it, Majesty?”

Laurel swallowed, trying to collect herself, and failing. Her thoughts were filled with Agravain's stern image, with the knowledge that she had already lied to him. She saw him once more as he stood beside his father's bier, heard him cursing the sorceries that had plagued his family.

She knotted her hands into fists. “I need a bowl of water, Byrd, from the sea. I am going to ask King Lot what became of Morgause.”

She did not look up to see the smile on Byrd's face as the ancient dame made her obeisance once more. “Yes, Majesty.”

The silence of the chapel fell over Laurel like a veil. After all the endless noise and hurry of the preparation that filled the outside world, it felt as if some essential element was missing from the air.

Laurel found she was cold too, for the first time in a long, hot day.

King Lot lay shrouded on his wilting bier. Laurel had already sent away Ruadh and the hymn singer, telling them she would keep vigil here for awhile. They went with gratitude. The hymn singer because he was exhausted, Ruadh because he could no longer bear to keep still in the chapel while around him his home, and his living, king, prepared for war.

Laurel had seen little of Agravain for the past two days. She had heard his name attached to orders, some praise and some grumbling. Every so often, she would catch a glimpse of him talking, usually with this captain or that group of workers, while around them the angled, attenuated timber frames of the war engines rose to the sound of straining ropes and thundering hammers.

Once, she had seen him as she was hurrying across the yard, dodging men and oxen. He had been standing high on the parapet over the cliff. He leaned on the stones, not moving, just staring out across the valley. It was not the direction from which Morgaine's army would come.

With a shudder, Laurel realized where it was he must be standing, and what he must be thinking on.

Much later, Agravain had climbed reluctantly into their bed. He was sent by Pedair, he said, who had insolently claimed his king could not longer see straight for exhaustion. She had pressed herself close to his side.

“What became of Tania?” she asked quietly.

He started at that, shifting in the darkness. “She died. What else?”

“No, what became of her body. Where is she buried?”

She heard him swallow, and felt him tense. “I do not know. I went down … as soon as I could, with some … others. But her body was already gone. No one then was willing to admit they had buried her, and I cannot blame them for it.”

“It may be time to ask again.”

He lay in silence for a long time. “When this is finished,” he whispered at last. “When I have finally avenged her, then I will go, and I will bring her home.”

He had said nothing more, and she had not asked any further. But those words had followed her into sleep and out again. They were with her now as she stood alone beside Tania's father, and murderer.

Laurel had hesitated to the last instant. It was a dire thing, seeking to speak with the dead. It was far beyond anything she had ever done, or ever thought to do. But each time she tried to turn away she felt again the force of the vision. Everywhere she went, she heard the endless hammering and shouting. She saw the men out upon the cliffs and the pass, working until they dropped from exhaustion, getting up and working more.

The army was coming and Morgaine was already here, perhaps watching all their preparation, readying her own.

No.

So many dead. So much blood and destruction. No more. It stops here
.

Mindful of where she stood, as well as what she came to do, Laurel set the basin down. She crossed herself and bowed her head.

“In nomine Patris, et Filii et Spiritus Sancti. Pater noster qui es en caelis …” she prayed, letting the familiar syllables play softly across her tongue.
Our Father who art in heaven …
It seemed most appropriate.

When she finished the pater noster, she looked again at the still figure beneath its white shroud. Even as she did, she felt the presence of her own father and brother at her shoulders, cold, expectant.

Mother Mary look down on what I do and have mercy upon it. God forgive me for disturbing this rest that should be peaceful until your Judgment Day
.

Grandmother, let this work
.

With a glance back to make sure she had closed the chapel doors completely, Laurel stepped up to the bier.

Since the ascension ceremony, the shroud had been wound securely around Lot's corpse. Wrestling that wrapping from about the dead man's head was an awkward and undignified process wholly unsuited to either the reverence due the remains of a king, or the atmosphere of a chapel. The only fortunate point was that as she had helped lay the corpse out she was ready for the surprising weight and chill of it. The stench was harsh, despite the careful washing they had given him and Laurel tartly cursed the priest for taking so long to come and lay Lot to his much-deserved rest. She held her breath as best she could, and tried to be gentle. It was difficult. Flesh and sinew, even bone, shifted alarmingly in her hands. Her fingers and hands shrank at the touch of the slack, too-soft clay flesh as they never had at the touch of offal or other rot.

At last she bared Lot's face and torso. The look of peace had left him and decay had set in. His skin was grey and mottled now and emitted foul air. Laurel's stomach churned. The urge to flee prodded at the back of her mind.

Laurel steeled herself. She needed what only Lot knew, if she was to keep her own vow to Agravain. She would have spoken to him in life if she could. Denied that, she must resort to older, darker means.

But she could not do this while he remained guarded. Laurel reached beneath the bier's withering greenery, searching impatiently until her hands closed around the silk-shrouded shape of the scabbard. As carefully as she could, she lifted it free, and laid it at the foot of the altar where the bier concealed it from immediate view.

Then, Laurel picked up the basin and the cloth. Six days ago she had washed him to bring him comfort. Four days ago, it was to lay him to rest. Now she must wash him a third time to bring him back to life.

A draught curled around her ankles, patient and inquiring. Laurel stepped through it, took up the cloth, dipped it in the sea water and wrung it out. The droplets made a sound like clean rain falling.

Gingerly at first, and then with more confidence, she began to dab at the king's face, washing his corrupted skin with the essence of the sea, the source of life and power, her essence, her root and protection, her channel to the world, her way. The draught stirred her hems, wrapping closer. Warning her? No warning could stop this. She needed to discover what knowledge Morgause had left with her husband.

Lot. King Lot. Lot mach Lulach, Lot father of Tania, Gawain, Agravain, Geraint, Gareth. Lot husband to Morgause. Lot of Gododdin. I call you back. I call you here. You know my touch, King Lot, you know my voice. You called me daughter, now I call you back
.

Laurel stretched her thoughts out from herself. It was cold, so cold. The stench of death grew stronger. She breathed it in deeply, taking its essence into herself even as she laid her own salt essence upon the corpse. Death was a yielding thing. It waited just beyond the fine membrane that was Life. Death was not a king in a crown, nor a skeleton with a scythe, nor any other figure of man's imagining. Death was a place, patient and waiting. Death was soft as the womb. It was the promised refuge. Empty and yearning, it waited to receive the weary and the weighted down.

Come back, come home, Lot of Gododdin, Lot of Din Eityn. Agravain needs you. Your kin below need you. There is danger here, Lot. You are needed
.

No. Confusion filled Laurel's mind. She felt another presence fill the room, struggling, confused as a newborn babe. But this was not birth. This was not homecoming. This was too warm, too hard, too filled with blood and motion. It hurt, it hurt after the softness, the dark stillness. It burned too bright. It moved too fast.

Come back, King Lot. Your son needs you. The people you sheltered so long need you. The place you protected with body and soul needs you
.

Death. Cool, soft, shapeless, completely yielding but completely binding. All encompassing, yet smaller than the eye of a needle. So much there, so many. Father here, drenched in red. Colan here, drowned and dissolved in salt that would have saved him had he but asked. Mother, mother swollen with her illness, slick with sweat, her head lolling against the pillows because she had no strength to lift it anymore. Agravain, slaughtered on the battlefield, herself lying on the shingle, half-in, half-out of the waves, reaching with one hand towards the shore …

No!

Lot's eyes flew open. Laurel jerked her hand back, and the corpse turned its head to face her.

No, it was not a corpse that lay before her now, but neither was it a living man. The eyes were occluded with a pearlescent sheen masking the warm brown that had been theirs in life. The jaw slipped and gaped, falling open to show the grey teeth and the slick, slack tongue.

“Laurel,” he rasped. “Laurel why do you do this to me?”

For a moment Laurel stood paralyzed in fear. The sound of death, for it was death, calling her seized her heart in an icy grip.
Run, run, run!
Panic thrummed through her sinews, but her own working held her in place. She had brought this soul here with her own hands. She was bound to it, and could no more leave before this thing was done than it could.

“Forgive me, Your Majesty,” she whispered. She could not have made a louder sound had she wished to. “I need answers that you only can give.”

“I am dead, Laurel. I have neither questions nor answers.”

“But you lived once,” she reminded him, it, him. “You know what you did then.”

“No. No more.”

Laurel clenched her fist around the cold rag. Water dripped against her skin, like a handful of tears. “King Lot, you held for fifteen years against Morgaine the Sleepless. This is not gone from you, not yet.”

Lot did not fit this skin anymore. It had changed its shape, its nature, too much, as his soul had changed. The two were no longer kin, could not knit together anymore. But power and need held them tight for this moment, and in the dimming, rotting memory that was all that was left of life. The dead king smiled. “No, no. That remains.”

“How, Lot? How did you stand against her?”

Lot spoke again, but it was not only his harsh, breathless voice now. This time Laurel heard other voices, far older voices, dragged back from the darkness and bound up with him.

“Strength of stone. This stone, this place, this is mine. Lived and died a thousand times here. Came crawling out of the valley to the burning tree. Held the fire until I died. Born again, I held the forge to heat the stone, and died to make the bronze, and died to make the iron, and died to see the army come and died to beat them back again. Life and death and life and death and over and over and Lot is dead and Agravain lives and the rock is beneath their feet, accepting life, accepting death and God watches over all …”

Laurel's mouth was dry. With each word she felt herself dragged deeper, sinking further into the soft, slack darkness. She could not see, could not feel anything but the current of years, of life and death, winding around her, separating her from herself, from her own power, sinking her beneath its infinitely giving weight.

Lived and died here a thousand times … Strength of stone …

And she remembered how she had taken Agravain's hand and how all had become clear again as she faced Morgaine.

Yes. Yes. Of course. So much sacrifice poured out on this great rock to keep and hold it. The rock had accepted it all and granted the ancient blessing that could come only from earth and life itself. That blessing was strength for the sons and daughters of this place. Bound up and bolstered by the blood of the greater sacrifice which she had brought here.

Lot had never left this place, never slept a night anywhere else since Morgaine first came. He barricaded himself in here to wait for her, and so trap her though she did not know herself to be trapped. She thought she was tormenting him, torturing him for the sins of her sister, but he was the one who lured her back time and again. Distracting her.

Weakening her.

It was truth, but it did Laurel little good. Her blood was not of this place, not of this unyielding rock. Her thoughts struggled, floating and sinking again in the darkness of death.

“She has a weakness? What is it?”

“Not my place. Let me go. Let me rest.”

Desperation crowded into Laurel's mind. The dark was so close, so thick. There was nothing beyond the darkness, but she must find her way out. “She threatens your son. She is coming here now. Help me. How can she be defeated?”

“No.”

Anger stiffened Laurel, broadened her, lent her shape to hold steady. The softness curdled, slipped, rippled around her. “You cannot leave your son to her mercy. Must he live in death for all these years as you did?”

“Never knew. Couldn't learn. Could only hold. Trapped. Alone.”

“You are not alone now. Eternity is with you. I am the one your wife told you would come. Speak, Lot. Tell me.”

“She did not … she never … she never …”

“What?”

“Never spoke. Never left. Never died. Not really.”

She knew those words. She had heard them before, but it seemed a long time ago, at some impossible distance, where there had been light and warmth and her eyes could see, when she was not sinking into this sick, slick, cold pool of nothingness, back beyond the thin membrane. Back when she walked in life.

“The answer is here, Lot.” The words fell clumsily from Laurel. They were wrong. Her insistence was wrong. She had the truth, it swirled around her like the wind once had. Yet it was nothing, another nothingness, so much emptiness. “Tell me …”

‘WHAT IN THE NAME OF GOD HAVE YOU DONE?”

The shout was like a bolt of lightning blazing into darkness. It tore through her, ripping apart death's stillness, letting all the harsh, frenetic movement of life pour in. Lot cried out once in gladness, and fell back into darkness, swallowed up, drowned, gone.

Laurel screamed, hurled suddenly backwards. Stone slammed against her back and skull. Her legs buckled under her and she slid to the cold floor, blinking in her confusion.