Camelot's Queen (Guinevere's Tale Book 2), page 21
When I’d first returned, Arthur patiently waited as I found my way back into his arms after Malegant’s brutality. For a while, I’d believed I might serve as his wife in every way again. Once we were sharing a bed, it was as though nothing had changed. During those blessed weeks, under the cover of darkness, I was able to convince myself Morgan didn’t exist. But then I woke in the middle of the night to find Arthur gone. That was when my ears became attuned to the signs of his departure.
Arthur still spent some nights with me, though they were decreasing steadily in number. I wondered if there was any logic to his choice of companion for the night or if he simply decided on a whim.
One night, I worked up the courage to question him about it. “Tell me, husband, how do you decide between me and Morgan each evening? It must be nice having your choice of women.” Admittedly, that wasn’t the kindest way of asking, but I wanted him to know I felt slighted by his actions.
Arthur paused in the middle of removing his tunic. For a long moment, he looked at me as though I was daft. “How can you ask me such a thing? It is my duty to act as husband to both of you.” He stood and headed for the door. A few paces from it, he looked back over his shoulder. “You are fortunate I respect you, Guinevere. Most men would have beaten you for even inquiring.”
So there it was. Our marriage had deteriorated to the point where my husband wanted to hit me for questioning his motives. That was a far cry from the affection and honesty of our early years together. I had gained nothing by my curiosity. In fact, I had practically driven him into Morgan’s arms. Now I would never know his reasons. Maybe Morgan didn’t ask such questions. Maybe she didn’t challenge him at all. Whatever the truth, it was clear she had found a way to satisfy him that I would never match.
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
Summer 503
Word reached us of Pellinor’s death on a stormy night just after Beltane. The weather prevented us from trying to arrive in time for the funerary rites, but despite all that had happened between us, I wanted to be there for Elaine as she mourned her father’s passing. So as soon as the weather cleared and the roads were dry, Arthur, Kay, Lancelot, Sobian, Octavia, and I headed south to the kingdom of Dyfed and Caer Corbenic, where we had first met. As she did not know the family, Morgan remained behind at Camelot to oversee affairs in our absence.
But the pleasant weather was only a tease. For most of the trip, heavy rains hindered our progress, mucking up the horses’ hooves and flinging mud onto cloaks and armor. We had to turn back several times when flood waters made the old Roman main roads impassable. The deluge had spotted the flat land with makeshift lakes and ruined entire tracks of grain and vegetables. Occasionally we encountered the victims of nature’s wrath: hollow-eyed children and starving men thin as rods. We did what we could to alleviate their suffering, but all the gold in the country would not be enough to repair these shattered lives.
The result of this detour was that we had to keep to the roads that hugged the Saxon border, land long ago conquered and settled by the northern invaders. Sometimes we even crossed over into their territory, putting us in much closer proximity to our enemy than any of us were comfortable being. Signs of their growing influence were everywhere, from their strange round huts to the harsh language spoken in the towns and pale faces with nearly white hair peering at us as we passed.
We were in grave danger if anyone recognized us, so we took precautions. We had stopped flying the royal standard of Pendragon several days prior and had stripped ourselves of all jewels. We sent our valuables on separately to Corbenic for safekeeping. Weapons were hidden with care, and we all dressed simply, hoping to appear as innocuous any other riding party. We simply wished to pass through in peace.
The sun was just beginning to slip below the horizon, coloring the dappled clouds a joyous mixture of peach and gold, when we arrived at a village near the convergence of the former kingdoms of Kent and Sussex. The areas were now one realm ruled through an alliance of two Saxon brothers, Alle and Octha, both kings who our spies told us were allied in dreams of a united Saxon empire. We considered trying to push on through the night to escape into less threatening territory, but it soon became clear both men and horses were exhausted.
We accepted the kindness of a local lord who took pity on our fatigued party and lodged us in the safety of his residence for the night. It was nothing like the fortifications we were used to, but his compound reminded me of my parents’ descriptions of their childhood homes. The main building was a large rectangular structure of wood cemented with hardened mud and fortified by a ring of sharp spiked logs sunk into the ground with their points reaching skyward, mortally threatening anyone foolish enough to try to hurdle them. A second spine of points encircled the first and sheltered a set of less important buildings. As we passed through, I spied a storage area, blacksmith, stable, granary, and a handful of other necessities. A wooden gate with heavy iron hinges and a massive bar stood open at the south end of the wall, ready to admit citizens and travelers until nightfall.
Sobian and I had just settled onto our shabby pallets on the floor of the main room, near the central fire with the other women, when a disturbance outside put the servants on alert. Three of them spilled into the courtyard, and I could just make out the silhouette of a hooded woman in the torchlight outside. She was speaking excitedly in the guttural language I had heard as we passed through other towns, urgency apparent in her body language. The servants appeared at a loss to help her, but one slipped back inside and whispered to the lady of the house.
She glided over to us. “Our visitor seeks the services of a midwife. The woman who usually fills this role for us is old and gravely ill. Can any of you be of assistance? She says it is urgent.”
I nodded. “I will help her. I have been well trained in the womanly arts.”
Sobian made to stop me. “Your husband will never allow you to go unattended, and none of the men will go into the room with you.” We had agreed not to refer to Arthur or me by our real names lest we be identified by our enemies. “I am coming with you.”
I wanted to protest, but she was right. Delivering a child in danger by myself would be difficult, and I had no way of knowing how capable the Saxon woman would be of helping. “Then you may be my assistant.”
We gathered supplies and followed the Saxon woman into the night, trailed by Kay as our guardian. As we moved away from the fortress, down a lonely road in the light of a half moon, I watched the Saxon’s round hips swinging in time with the bounce of tight golden curls as she walked, back straight as an iron rod. She appeared to be acting as a maid, but her clothes were not the rags or simple homespun of most servants. I began to wonder what was going on.
She saw me watching her and pursed her full lips in annoyance. “No one knows we are here, and you will keep that secret,” she commanded in heavily-accented broken English.
“Of course. May I know the woman’s condition?”
“Waters flowed early morning, baby not come. She grows weary. I fear she will die.” She fixed me in a piercing blue stare that left no room for argument. “That cannot happen.”
“I give you my word as a priestess I will do all I can to keep her and the child alive,” I swore, showing her the faint blue tattoo on my brow.
There was no cultural equivalent of my status in her world. She regarded me warily and nodded, but something in her expression told me she was not convinced.
The secluded hovel we approached stood out in sharp contrast to the fine clothing the Saxon woman wore. Even from the outside, I could tell it had only one room. Two tiny unglazed windows, a door, and a smoking chimney provided the only ventilation.
I pieced together the most likely scenario. This woman and likely the other who labored inside were obviously nobility. My best guess was the pregnant one had gotten herself with child by someone she should not have—a lover or perhaps the son of an enemy but certainly not her husband—and they had retreated here for the length of her confinement for her own safety. There was nothing around for miles, no neighbors to witness the woman’s shame. It was not the first time such a thing had happened and certainly wouldn’t be the last.
The woman’s strangled cries reached me even before the brawny Saxon guard opened the door to admit us. He watched warily but backed off at a signal from the woman who had recruited us.
I stopped her before we crossed the threshold. “Wait. What is your name?”
Her body went rigid, and I knew she would not answer me.
“I must be able to call to you with instructions amid the chaos we will encounter inside, so please give me a name. It need not be your real one.” I added with a wry smile, “Unless you would rather me call you ‘girl.’”
My implied insult had the desired effect. The Saxon woman’s face puckered in annoyance. “Udele,” she said flatly as she swept through the doorway.
“I am Corinna,” I lied, taking my mother’s name. It was how everyone outside our party knew me on this journey.
A wave of heat hit me as soon as we entered the room. It was even tinier than it appeared from the outside. A fire blazed in a pit built into one wall, smoke struggling up the narrow chimney. Not four feet away, a small, pale woman who bore a striking resemblance to Udele writhed in her mean bed, two serving women alternating between trying to hold her down and trying to give her strength as the contractions rolled through her body.
Udele rushed over to one side of the bed and held the young woman’s hand, speaking quietly to her in their native tongue. The intimacy of the moment confirmed my suspicion they were more than maid and mistress. From their resemblance, I guessed them to be sisters. Sobian set the towels, basin, and bottles of herbs we had brought with us on a small wooden table next to the bed, and I moved to the woman’s feet to examine her. As I probed her belly and peered between her thighs, Udele called the girl Mayda, which I assumed had to be her real name. In her weakened, pain-crazed state, no woman would have been able to respond to a false name.
“Mayda,” I called to the beautiful young girl in the bed, and Udele shot me a dirty look. I ignored her and continued. “Mayda, your body is ready, but your baby cannot be born as it is. I can try to turn it, but it will be painful for you.”
Udele translated what I had said, and the sweat-soaked woman nodded weakly, saying something I did not understand.
“Do what you must,” Udele barked.
My training in Avalon took over, and I lost all connection to what was going on around me as I manipulated her womb, inside and out. I was vaguely aware of Sobian at my side mopping up the blood streaming from between Mayda’s thighs, Mayda’s screams, and Udele’s agitation as she tried to keep her sister calm, but they barely registered. All of my attention was focused on the stubborn babe who was determined not to be born. As the hours dragged on and Mayda’s strength failed, it seemed increasingly likely she would die too. Finally, I was able to slip my hand around the baby and turn its head toward the birth canal.
I rinsed my arms in the basin and stroked Mayda’s head. It was time for her to summon all her strength and push her child into the world. I didn’t need to tell her, for now that the baby was in place, her body was eager to be rid of it. Mayda cried out as a spasm rippled through her belly.
Udele and I helped Mayda sit up, and she braced herself against the waiting arms of her servants. As she bore down, barely stopping to take a breath between pushes, the top of the baby’s head came into view. Mayda screamed again, and I guided the child out, head, right shoulder, left, then the rest came easily in a rush of viscous fluid.
“You have a son,” I told Mayda, and Udele translated.
Sobian took the child, still attached to his mother, and quickly cleaned him. He was a sickly shade of violet but needed no prodding to take his first breath. His throaty wail filled the house just as clearly as his mother’s had. I breathed a sigh of relief and glanced at Mayda. She was crying but whether out of happiness, exhaustion, or something else, I did not know. Sobian wrapped the baby in a clean towel and placed him on the table.
“I know who they are,” she whispered in my ear, followed by a quick explanation.
I had been trying to place why Mayda’s name sounded familiar and understand why this elaborate ruse had been necessary. Sobian put the pieces together for me.
They were royal daughters in their society. The younger of the two southern Saxon rulers, Octha, was engaged to the younger sister of his brother’s wife. Mayda’s name had been mentioned as Octha’s betrothed in our spies’ report, as had her sister’s, because the union of these two royal families represented a formidable threat to our southeast kingdoms. Arthur would be quite interested to learn how I had chanced upon them under such unusual circumstances.
Once Mayda delivered the afterbirth, Udele picked up her dagger and made for the child, but I stopped her. “Burnish the blade in the fire first so the wound will not get infected,” I instructed.
“Matters not,” Udele muttered, but she did as I asked anyway.
I helped her cut the cord and turned to lay the now pink baby in his mother’s arms, but Mayda was sleeping. “He will need to eat soon, so you will have to wake her.”
Udele shrugged and held the gurgling, fidgeting boy as Sobian and I cleaned up. Mostly she regarded it with a look of disdain. I had a cursory knowledge of the language thanks to Arthur, and I thought I heard her tell the child it would have been better had he not been born. A shiver ran down my spine. I remembered Udele’s quick move with the knife and wondered if she’d had a more sinister intent than to cut the cord.
When I looked at her, she was watching me intently. “Will she live?” she asked with a jerk of her head toward her sister.
I carefully examined Mayda, trying not to wake her. The blood had ceased flowing, and her body was quickly returning to normal with no signs of infection or complications. “Yes, but she will need much rest.”
Udele nodded and gestured to one of the serving women, who handed me a heavy purse of coins. “For your trouble.”
It would have been an insult not to accept, so I took the purse, thinking of how we could use the money to help the destitute citizens we encountered on the road, not to mention pay our host for his hospitality. But then another thought occurred to me. “Also for our silence?”
Udele’s smile was wicked. “Of course. Now go, Queen Guinevere.”
I raised my eyebrows. “You know who I am?”
She shrugged and gestured toward my forehead. “Was guess. Others with mark stay with farmers, not crowned men. They have no slaves.” She cocked her head in Sobian’s direction.
“Not many Aethelings bear their children in hovels,” I countered, praying Sobian’s theory was accurate.
Udele—or Elga, as she was truly called—nearly dropped the baby in surprise. “How you know?”
“When you said your sister’s name, it triggered a memory,” I said carefully, not wanting to reveal Sobian as my source of information, or worse, provoke Elga’s wrath. All she needed to do was call her guard, and we would have a bloody fight on our hands. I pressed on before she had a chance to react. “Elga, I mean you no harm. It is in each of our best interests to keep what has transpired tonight a secret. I swear to you I will do so if you will promise the same.”
I hoped she would listen to me, knowing we were at a dangerous impasse. On one hand, she knew who I was and where our whole party was staying. If she but breathed my name, we would all be dead before dawn, and her people would have free reign over the country. But on the other, I knew her and her secret. All I needed to do was let it slip to our host where they were housed, and both Octha and Alle would be on their doorstep before they could flee. The brothers would undoubtedly kill their wives, whose family would seek revenge, sparking civil war and weakening them to the point where our forces could overtake them if they weren’t killed by their own.
Elga gulped, mouth still open. “Why you help if you knew who we are? We are enemies.” Her tone betrayed she truly did not understand. Clearly, she would not have done the same if the roles were reversed.
“I have taken vows to harm no one without cause,” I explained. “You gave me no provocation, only asked for my help. So I gave it.”
“Now I am indebted to you,” she said bitterly, more to herself than to me.
I shook my head. “No. If you keep my presence in the area a secret and let me pass through unharmed, there is no debt. I am not here for political reasons, and I will not harm or disturb a single one of your people. Know that unless you attack us, I am your ally.”
The baby began to cry hungrily, and Elga looked at him as though she had forgotten his existence. The familiar hard look returned to her features. “You say nothing of this.” Then she cocked an eyebrow and added, “No proof anyhow.”
I shivered again, sensing the menace in her words. “It will be as though this night never happened.”
“Yes. I swear you not be harmed, Queen Guinevere.”
I backed slowly out of the room, listening to the child wail. As soon as Sobian and I were safely on the other side of the door, I breathed a sigh of relief. I signaled to Kay it was time to depart and he shoved off with a final glance at his stone-faced counterpart.
We had walked only a short distance when the crying became an ear-splitting screech, was muffled, then suddenly stopped. That was not the sound of a suckling babe. The silence was too complete. I began to shake and sank to my knees as Elga’s warning rang in my ears—“no proof anyhow.” I turned and threw the pouch at the closed door, where it exploded in a shower of silver coins. I could not accept money tainted by the shadow of death no matter how noble my intentions for it.
I turned to the side of the path and retched, grieving for the murdered child and the naive mother who had never gotten to hold him.
