THE WARRIOR QUEEN (The Guinevere Trilogy Book 1) Read online

  As I reached him at the altar and my ladies and Sir Ector stood back, Arthur took my hand and kissed it lightly. He had the smug, laughing face of a boy who had got everything he wanted. He was big and strong, clearly, but looked young, barely a man. I would have guessed seventeen years of age at most, from the look of him. Probably younger. Truly, a boy king.

  “My apologies for yesterday, Lady Guinevere,” he said, quietly, as he turned from me to face the altar.

  I gave only a small nod. I had to be obedient, I did not have to be kind.

  The words of the ceremony were unfamiliar, and they rushed by me without my comprehending them. There was nothing about the sun, the moon, the stars, the cycles of the earth; it was all about this strange God of his. I said what I was bidden to say, and when Arthur took me in his arms to kiss me as his bride it was with all of the impetuous passion of a young man, new with women. But still I could feel his formidable strength as he held me to him. I was in the arms of a conqueror. I could not have slipped away.

  There was more of the ceremony – we drank from a libation cup together, and ate a small piece of bread. I did not follow the meaning, but I hoped it was a ceremony about husbands and wives sharing their meat and wine. We had something like the same, and I would have liked to feel that our ways were not so utterly strange.

  As Arthur led me by the hand out of the chapel, the lords and ladies around us cheered and clapped, and threw flower petals over us. I liked their cool soft kisses against the bare skin of my neck and the top of my chest. I closed my eyes against them, for a moment. As we walked out, Arthur leant down and spoke softly in my ear,

  “I am pleased to have you as my wife, my Lady Guinevere. I hope you are pleased, as well.”

  I gave only a little nod. He would not have more from me until he had deserved it.

  He slid an arm around my waist and again I felt how strong he was. Even in that light touch I felt it, the power that was held back. He had earned his throne with war, for sure, and at least this man, who was my king now, was not a king who needed others to fight for him. But it was possessive, too. He put his arm around me as though I were already his. As though he owned me. But then again, I supposed that he did. In the eyes of his law and his god, I was his possession now.

  He led me to Camelot’s great feasting hall. This was more familiar to me than the chapel, though grander than the one I knew from home. There was a long table on a raised dais at one end, where Arthur and I would sit with those he favoured, and down the hall long trestle tables for the other lords, ladies and knights. The high-ceilinged hall was hung with tapestries, embroidered in dark green, red and gold, with scenes of hunting a white hart, or knights riding through the forest. There was a wonderful savoury smell of some kind of meat stew that reminded my stomach that I had not eaten properly since news came to my father’s kingdom of a lost war.

  Arthur pointed to the high table. “My lady, I will put your Round Table there, so that I and my knights may feast around it as equals. I won this kingdom with war, and in war, a king is no different from a knight. These knights are my brothers and my friends, and it is an honour to me that you bring me this table where we might eat as equals with them.”

  He shouted an order, and servants spilled out from the shadows to take away the high table, and brought from behind us through the crowd at the main door of the hall – it was the only place where it would fit – my father’s enchanted Round Table. I felt sick inside once more. It wasn’t an eating table, to be smeared with wine and mead and meat grease. It was a sacred table. I closed my eyes for a moment, and breathed in and out slowly. He was using it for what was sacred to him – his fellowship of knights, his war-band. I had to try, to try to understand his ways, their ways. There was, after all, no going back. The servants set down the Round Table and threw over it a rich tablecloth of crimson embroidered with Arthur’s heraldry, the twisting, roaring dragon of the Pendragon line, bright in gold, and around the border, a little gold row of ivy leaves. Glorious enough for a king and a queen, that simple wood table, when it was thrown over with that. If only its magic could fill the empty seats they were placing around it with the men that had been lost as Arthur forged this glorious new kingdom of Britain from its heart, Logrys, outwards, swallowing up the kingdoms like the dragon swallows its prey. No hesitation. No mercy. A beast has no need for mercy.

  When the table was ready, Arthur led me down through the hall and we sat side by side. He had spoken of equality, but our chairs were gilded and larger than the others, and we had crimson velvet cushions beneath us. Sat round with his men, but still a king. The crown on his head was the crown of his father, Uther Pendragon, who had ruled Logrys before him. It was a war-king’s crown, truly. Made of gold, yes, but wrought with the sharp shapes of crosses and set boldly with sapphires, it looked proud and brave. It shone bright against his golden hair, but it did not look gaudy. It was thick-made and strong set. I no longer wore the slender wreath of ivy leaves brought from my home that I had worn into the chapel. My head was bare – the priest had lifted the little circlet off me when we wed.

  Now approached Arthur’s mother, the Queen Igraine of Cornwall. She was a beautiful woman, still, though she looked as though she must be nearly forty years of age. Long, dark, glossy brown hair flowed down her back, pulled back simply at the front. On it had been a crown like Arthur’s but smaller, the crosses slimmer and more delicate, the gold hammered thinner, and set with little sapphires at the centre of each cross. Now she held that crown in her hands. She moved with grace and around her eyes were the soft lines of kind smiles and gentle wisdom. If Arthur had a mother like the Lady Igraine, then perhaps, perhaps I could be happy. Though I remembered she had not raised him. The Lady Igraine placed the crown gently on my head, and kissed my cheek. I felt the weight of it, pressing down on me.

  “You make a lovely queen, Guinevere,” she said, and leaning down as if to help me adjust the crown on my head she whispered in my ear, “It will get easier, my dear.”

  She had known it, too. She had been married twice to men whom she did not know, who had desired her and chosen her and to whom she had been given. I hoped that she was right. I hoped that she would stay at court. I also hoped that my discomfort was visible to no one else but her. I did not want to show any weakness. She slid into the seat beside me, with a warm smile. I supposed I ought to take some comfort in the fact that Arthur had such a woman as his mother.

  The woad-faced man in the black cowl and habit sat beside Arthur, at his left hand side. His dark eyes were on me, I could feel them. I had not seen him sit down; he must have slipped in there, like a shadow. I tried to ignore him. Approaching the table came Sir Kay and Sir Ector, who greeted us both warmly. Arthur smiled a deep, warm smile like his mother’s as he greeted Sir Kay, his Seneschal and, as he told me then, his foster-brother. I thought it strange that Arthur had been fostered with one of his father’s subjects, but I was glad that they would be there, in places of high honour and close by me, because of it. After them came a pale, slender woman with dark hair pinned back at the front, but loose and free behind, shining in the candlelight in a cascade that fell all the way down her back. She was robed in dark blue, sewn all over with little dark sapphires so she appeared to be covered in a dress made of dark, glossy scales. Her face was pale as porcelain with high cheekbones and thin, arched eyebrows, a tight, thoughtful mouth and watchful grey eyes. Like the man beside Arthur, her skin was decorated with the blue woad of the druids, all over her pale face in delicate swirls like the growth of vines, and down the deep neck of her dress. Her hands, too, were patterned with it, and I suspected she was painted like this all over. She walked up to Arthur and bent down to kiss his cheek. Her gestures were affectionate, but her look was absent. He kissed her other cheek and gave her the kind smile of his affection.

  “Guinevere, this is my sister Morgan, wife of King Uriens.”

  She turned to me with a respectful nod, which I reciprocated, but she looked at me
as if she did not see me, and while Arthur looked on her with kindness, she did not seem to see him either, and the grey eyes remained hollow, as though they were looking at something else far away. She sat beside her mother Igraine, whom she also did not seem to see. From what I knew, it was only the mother they shared, and Uther Pendragon had killed her father in order to have the Lady Igraine for himself.

  After her came the russet-haired woman I had seen sitting beside Gawain in the chapel. I would not have called her beautiful now that I saw her close before me, but she had all the look about her of a noble queen, a broad proud face, striking and attractive, with a few pale freckles. On her head she wore a crown of dark gold, formed in spikes. She must still rule Lothian as Lot’s widowed queen. She seemed strong and brave enough to do so. I wondered why Arthur had not wanted her as a wife, but I supposed she was almost ten years older than I was, and she had many sons already. She came forward to greet Arthur and I noticed that though she kissed his cheek, he did not return the kiss as he had done with Morgan, but seemed to shy back from her. She did a curt little curtsey towards me.

  “My lady Queen Guinevere, I am Morgawse, who was King Lot’s wife, sister to King Arthur and mother to Aggravain, Gawain, Gaheris, Gareth and Mordred.”

  Well, that explained well enough why Arthur did not marry Lot’s queen. And she was older than the other sister. Another half-sister of his. I gave her a little nod and she sat beside her sister Morgan with Gawain and another one who was clearly her son, and older than Gawain. It must have been Aggravain. His name, too, had come to Carhais. Lot’s widow. My father would have known her pain, a widower himself from Arthur’s wars. Perhaps I should ask Arthur to send her over the sea to keep my father company. She was gentle of expression and good-looking, far more comely than her grim sister Morgan. She had a ready laugh, which I had heard already, tinkling like a bell, and something about her movements made her seem as though she were about to dance. I liked her already.

  The fifth knight who had ridden with us from Dover came up and was introduced to us, a quiet, slender youth with a serious demeanour and dark sandy-coloured hair, named Sir Perceval. More came, more names that swirled in my head – Pedivere, Bors, Uriens, Accolon, Urry, Tristan – until I could no longer remember who was who. I would, I supposed, have all the time in the world to learn.

  When all were seated, Arthur stood with his goblet of wine in his hand – a golden goblet, studded with jewels, but old and worn, too, with the hands of many kings of Logrys – and announced, “Lords and Ladies of Britain, I invite you to feast with me and my new wife, Queen Guinevere.”

  Queen Guinevere. I was already becoming someone else. I had been just Guinevere all my life until now. I supposed there had been those who had called me princess, but not in my own land, not in my own castle. And later tonight I would become yet another woman, or I was supposed to. A wife, in every sense of the word. I wrapped my hand tight around the stem of my golden cup, which was full almost to the brim with wine. I did not intend to change.

  There was a loud cheer and a thundering as the people in the hall thumped their cups against the tables and stamped their feet in celebration. I could feel my heart racing within me. I knew no one in the room, really. I was their queen, but we were strangers to one another. I stared deep into my own goblet of wine and in the dark red liquid saw the shadow of my own reflection, red hair, white face, gold crown, and then I drank.

  Chapter Four

  Arthur stood and the room of cheering, singing, drinking, eating people fell silent in an instant. I had eaten little, though I had been hungry, and the wine was soft and strong in my head, and I was beginning to feel pleasantly dizzy. I had not drunk much, and yet I felt it. I had wanted my strength and my wits about me for what I knew was coming next, but I had let my nerves and the wine cloud within me, and I felt the edge of danger in it, how it was blurring through me. I had wanted the food, which had been delicious, but my anxious stomach had clenched shut after a few bites of bread, a few morsels of the succulent beef stew we had been served. I had managed some sweet cake, but not much. The Lady Igraine had given me a sympathetic smile.

  “My lady Queen and I will now retire from the feast,” Arthur declared, and I saw him smile, pleased with himself. There was great cheering at this, too. I knew what this meant. I rose slowly and took the hand he offered me. His hand was steady, confident. I wanted mine to be the same, or better, tense and defiant, but it was neither. I could feel myself trembling.

  As he led me down the hall and from the room he smiled and called to some of his men and they laughed back. He was loved here, by his people. That was some comfort. He did not say anything to me as he led me across the courtyard to the north tower that housed his rooms, nor did I try to speak. There were servants there to open the heavy wooden doors to the tower for us, and he led me up the narrow spiral staircase within. A war-king’s rooms as well. Easy to defend. Camelot was no show-court made for pageantry and display, it was a siege-fortress and the king inhabited the heart of it. The first room off the stairs looked to be a council chamber, although filled with artefacts that suggested the woad-faced man spent his days there – an astrolabe, a row of jars of herbs (or poisons) on a wooden shelf – and we carried on up. The second appeared to be a room for entertainment, bare but for scatterings of crimson velvet cushions and a lute resting in the corner. I had not heard the music of a lute in a long time. All of our musicians had traded their lutes for swords and gone to war. I don’t know if any had returned.

  Finally, we came to a bedchamber. Inside, candles were burning ready for us, and I could see a brass jug of wine, two cups, a silver plate piled with the fruits of Logrys – strawberries, apples and pears – standing on a table beneath the window, and the bed. The bed. I felt my body tense at the sight of it.

  Arthur shut the heavy wooden doors behind us, and drew across an iron bolt. He still had not spoken to me. I would not speak first. If he wanted me, he had to at last be brave, not the kind of man – the kind of boy – who would come and peer at me in secret.

  I could not even run, now, for I had nowhere to go. He had me in his kingdom, and I was just another prize of his conquest. He lifted the heavy crown off his head and set it beside the jug and silver cups on the table. He poured into both glasses, drank from one, and offered me the other. I took it, and drank until it was all gone. My resolve to stay sharp had dissolved away as the moment was finally upon me, and I remembered Christine saying to me this morning, the more you drink, the less it hurts. But I was still resolved to resist. He set his drink down and bent to unlace his boots, taking them off and placing them at the end of his bed; then he unbuttoned and shrugged off the crimson and gold brocade surcoat he had worn all day and set that on an empty chair beside the table. I could see the strength in his shoulders as he moved to take it off, through his shirt. I stood frozen, feeling the bolted door’s presence at my back, waiting.

  Arthur turned to me with a kind smile, but I was still wary. “My lady Queen.” He offered me his hand. I did not reach out to take it, but crossed my arms over my chest. I could feel my heart hammering already. The wine had not helped; if anything it had made it worse. I could feel sweat on the palms of my hands, my feet, between my breasts, bound tight together in the silk bodice of the dress. He is still a stranger to me.

  He sighed when he saw I would not take it.

  “Are you upset that I did not reveal myself to you yesterday?” I said nothing, turning my face up defiantly towards his. He sighed again. “Do you know why it was you I wanted?” He did not wait for an answer. “My advisor Merlin told me that you were of the blood of the Irish Witch-Queen Maev; powerful, magical blood.” He sighed again, softer this time. His gaze on me was earnest, gentle, but it was still that of a king. His tone was patient, but it was the patience of a man who knew there was no other way – that he would eventually get what he wanted. In the light of the candles, his hair was flecked with gold, and in his thin shirt I could see the powerful
muscles of his shoulders and arms. I could see beneath that sweet, young face, the body of what was already a hardened warrior. But his face – it was that of a boy, lost. If I had not been so angry, if he had not been the conqueror who had demanded me from my home, I might have put my hand against his cheek, in comfort, but I did not. I would not. “I have... I have a bad destiny, Guinevere. I did not know who my parents were, and – the child Mordred, the youngest child of my sister Morgawse – he is mine, Guinevere.” His voice cracked slightly as he spoke, and he hesitated to see if I would react. I did not. “I didn’t know, I didn’t know she was my sister, but Merlin tells me that God has cursed me for it. That is why I need you, your powerful magic blood, the blood of the Witch-Queen Maev. I needed to know that you were truly the blood of the Otherworld. Kay, my foster brother, he can tell, and I wanted him to see you, and tell me if what they said about you was true. But you can tell, I know. I saw you notice it in him, too.” He tried a wary smile, but I remained still. He would have nothing from me, if I did not wish it. Not even a smile. “When I saw you I was pleased, so pleased... you’re beautiful, and...” he took a wary step closer, “we will make a son. I will be safe from my evil destiny. Guinevere...” He moved towards me, as if carried by his own imploring words. Perhaps he thought his painful honesty would sway me, but he had not been honest with me yesterday. I did not move away. There was only a foot or so between me and the door, and I wanted that space for when I might finally need it. He reached out a hand and gently touched my cheek. It was more gentleness that I had thought a man of his size was capable of. I felt a sudden rush of heat of my face that I had not expected, and I was resistant to it. I had come resolved, and I would not be swayed. “Was Queen Maev as beautiful as you?”