Which begged the question: Why was he coming here?
“Gwen.”
Gwen’s head snapped up, for it was Peder who had spoken her name. She jumped to her feet and bowed. “My lord.”
When she looked up, Peder was eyeing her with speculation. “You’ll be serving the Merlin.”
Her jaw dropped. “M-m-my lord? Me?”
“You’re discreet, you’re well trained. But most of all, you are the king’s daughter. We can’t honor the Merlin too highly. The king your father has said this himself; we will show the Merlin that there is only the best for him. You’ll be serving him.”
She felt her head swimming. “Yes, m-m-my lord,” she managed, and then she sat down heavily.
Serve the Merlin? Surely not . . . there must be some mistake.
There must be some mistake. . . .
Gwen was still thinking that, as she nervously stroked the front of her tunic, waiting to be presented to the Merlin as his squire. All the squires had been lined up to greet the Merlin; he was too important to just be allowed to turn up and let his servants pitch his pavilion. He’d been watched for over the course of the last few days by outriders from the King’s Band, and as soon as he and his entourage were in sight, everyone had lined up to greet him, not just the squires.
Now, however, all of the important people had properly greeted him, and only the squires remained in their stiff rank. The Merlin was talking quietly to the king, while Eleri and her women waited attentively. Like the other two girls among the squires, she was dressed as the boys were, in tunic and trousers, rather than a gown. Not that she looked all that different from a boy—except for her hair, which had grown out again and had been braided up and wrapped around her head, rather than just cut off at her shoulders or shoulder-blades.
At first glance, the Merlin did not look particularly imposing. He was quite an old man, in the usual white Druidic robes, but he had none of the usual talismans or other items of power about his person. Not even a single necklace or torque. His long gray hair had been braided and clubbed like a horse’s tail, his beard trimmed short.
But his eyes gave it all away. They didn’t look at you, they looked through you, as if he were seeing something else entirely even while he took in what you looked like on the outside. They were very pale, those eyes, the same pale gray as his hair.
He had all his teeth too, a rarity in someone that old. It gave him a very fierce look. He had a curiously sharp, clean smell to him, like juniper. And he was lean, but not emaciated. Altogether, he put Gwen in mind of an old gray owl; you trifled with him at your peril, for he still had talons and knew how to use them.
Finally the Merlin’s manservant came to tell him that his pavilion was ready. That was the signal for her to be presented.
The king crooked his finger; with her mouth gone dry, she came forward. “My lord,” the king said, with the slightest of bows, “This is your squire for as long as you are among us. My daughter, Gwenhwyfar.”
“Braith’s girl.” The Merlin nodded, and Gwen suppressed a start of surprise that he would use that term. “You honor me by sending your blood to serve me.” He turned his attention to Gwen, and the force of his regard landed on her like a blow. “Well, by your leave, I shall take mine. I am an old man, and I need my rest.”
The king laughed politely but in a way that said without words that he believed none of that. “Then your squire shall show you to your encampment. We look forward to your presence at our right hand at supper.”
Gwen thought the Merlin would turn his attention to other things as she guided him to the spot where his encampment had been set up—against the east castle wall, sheltered from wind, shaded from the worst of the heat of the day, but warmed by the rising sun in the morning. And so he did, but not for long. Time and time again, she felt his eyes burning on the back of her neck, and when they reached where his pavilion had been pitched, he stopped her before she could go.
“I have some business I must carry out, and a message I need taken, squire,” he told her. “Come.” And he motioned for her to step inside the flap his servant held aside for them.
She didn’t want to, but what could she do? Reluctantly, she obeyed. He sat down on the stool that had been set ready for him and gestured for her to stand before him. She kept her eyes fastened to her toes. She studied her own feet, studied the wrapped leather shoes she wore, with great care.
“Look at me, squire,” the Merlin ordered, sounding impatient.
“Look up at me, look me in the eyes.”
With even greater reluctance, she raised her eyes to his. The moment their gazes locked, his piercing gray eyes filled her vision, and she could not have looked away if she’d wanted to. She felt dizzy, and yet her knees locked, and she stood as rigid as a statue. As if from far away, she heard him speaking.
“Eleri. The queen, your mother. Was she at Arthur’s wedding?” he asked sharply.
What kind of a foolish question was that? “No,” she heard herself replying. “She was here, she was the Mother in the rites that night. Everyone saw her there and at the feast before and the fire after. Not even eagle’s wings could have got her there and back in that time. Besides, she wanted to be the Mother in the rites, to share the power all the Circles were raising for the High King.” She wanted to hesitate, not to say anything more, but the words kept tumbling out. “She wanted to give Father a son, after so many daughters. So she wanted to be sure she could share in that Power.”
She heard him mutter to himself. It made no more sense than his question. “Could it be that? The sharing of that power and not—the portent said it was his son, but could it have meant the child of his Power and not of his blood?”
Gwen strained against the invisible bonds that held her but to no avail. “The child she bears—boy or girl?”
She didn’t want to answer, but the answer slipped from her. “A son, as she wanted, the queen says, and so do the signs and all the women.”
And again, the Merlin muttered. “—I dare not risk it. I dare not. Better a hundred innocent perish to remove that one—”
She felt like a bird in a net. No matter how hard she struggled, she only entangled herself further. The cold hand of fear clutched at her throat. It was impossible to move even a finger.
“Your sister, Cataruna—did she ask to leave because of the new child?” he asked, as her head swam and she found it hard to breathe.
“No, my lord Merlin,” she replied truthfully, and she found herself relating word-for-word that last conversation she’d had with her eldest sister.
“And you? Are you jealous of this prince-to-come?” he asked, his eyes burning into hers.
“No!” she gasped, caught unawares by the question. “No! I am going to be his guardian, his protector! And when he grows up, I will be among his war chiefs, like Braith is. I will be his bodyguard and maybe even his advisor! Father is proud of me! He said I would be chief among my brother’s warriors! It’s all I could want!”
He mumbled something inaudible, then sighed. “Well enough. I will find another means. You will forget all this, Gwenhwyfar. I asked you nothing, I said nothing to you.” His eyes grew dark, and she heard a distant roaring in her ears. “You stood beside my seat, I gave you a trifling message to take to my servant who is with my horses, you delivered it and brought back the answer. That is all.”
She felt as if she were drowning, felt her lips parting, heard herself whisper, “Aye, sir.”
“Very good.”
Abruptly she felt herself released from his gaze. She stumbled back a little, disoriented for a moment. Why was she here? Oh, of course. She’d delivered a message for him.
“Do you need anything more from me, my lord?” she asked, diffidently.
He looked up from the wax tablet he was scribing something on. His eyes were distant, unfocused, giving his whole face an absent-minded cast. “Hmm?” he said, then shook his head, smiling. “No, squire, you can go. Oh—but tell the king I wi
ll be very interested to meet the rest of his brood at dinner.”
She bowed. “Aye, my lord,” she replied and quickly left the tent. But she had two strange sensations as she did so. The first, was relief, as if she had somehow escaped from something very dangerous.
And the other—a sense of unfocused unease—because he wanted to meet her sisters. It made no sense, this unease, but there it was. She wanted of all things to prevent such a meeting, but that was impossible, of course. They would both be there at dinner.
And there was nothing she could do to prevent it.
The smell of baked meats and stewed vegetables, of beer and mead, of the herbs mixed with the rushes, and under that, just a hint that the dogs were not as good about going outside as they could have been, rose about them. So too did the smell of sweat and leather and wool, and over it all, woodsmoke, the eternal scent of the Great Hall with its central hearth. Soon all the meals would be taken outside, for there simply would be no room in the Great Hall for the swarm of guests, but tonight there were few enough that supper was indoors. Gwen stood attentively at the Merlin’s left hand, making sure that his cup was never empty, he never wanted for anything his eyes lighted upon. He was the least demanding person she had ever had squire’s duty for. He chose plain small beer, not mead nor stronger ale nor cider, and his drinking was moderate. He merely sipped, and throughout the meal she had occasion to refill his cup no more than twice. As for food, once served with his choice of a little rabbit, some greens, boiled turnip and bread, he ate slowly and never indicated he wanted anything else. Every time he moved, that juniper scent wafted from his robes, his hair. It was as if he were always part of the forest somehow. He was . . . strange. A distant thing, like a legend come to sit at the table. Maybe it was the Power about him, more than Eleri had, more than any except the Ladies at Cauldron Well.
While he discussed matters of the High King with her father, his eyes were, for a very long time, on Gynath. With the tables and benches set around the hearth fire, there was plenty of light for him to see whomever he chose to look at very clearly.
Completely unaware of this regard, Gynath exchanged clumsily flirtatious looks with some of the other squires, much to the open amusement of the king and queen. Seeing that the Merlin was watching the girl, the king leaned over to his guest and said in an undertone, “She’ll make me a fine alliance one day, there’s no doubt.”
“Oh?” The Merlin smiled with his lips but not his eyes, which kept their sharp gaze on Gynath. “Her ambition rises no higher than that?”
The king chuckled. “Gynath, Goddess bless her, is a maid meant for a man. Oh, she’s a bit clumsy now, but wait a year or two while she learns; the young bucks will be prancing and pawing for her attention.”
And with that, the Merlin seemed to completely lose interest in Gynath. He turned his full attention back to the king. With nothing to do, Gwen found herself watching her youngest sister out of the corner of her eye and was glad to be in the shadows, for she blushed at Little Gwen’s behavior.
The child was utterly shameless. She filched tasty bits off the plates of others when she was sure they weren’t looking and slipped the tell-tale remains to the dogs under the table; and once, she smuggled a cake with a bite taken out of it onto the plate of the little boy next to her, so that when his father looked for the treat and found it missing, the poor lad got a cuffing and sent off to his bed, whimpering that he hadn’t done anything. And Little Gwen watched him go with a smirk. Even when she was full, she continued to steal, hiding nuts and cakes in her pockets.
When she tired of that, she began doing something under the table; what it was, Gwen could not tell, until a dogfight erupted there, and the poor hounds were sent off with kicks by the men. No one else seemed to notice her antics, though, except for the Merlin. Any time anyone cast a glance at her, she was all dimples and sideways glances and got an indulgent smile in return.
It was a relief when the queen rose, signaling the men that it was time to pull the benches together for more serious drinking, while she and the women dealt with the clearing away. Or rather, the women did it under her direction. Little Gwen’s smirks turned to scowls as she was set to doing tasks like anyone else, under the sharp eye of her mother. As for Gwen and the other squires, their duty until dismissed was to keep the cups and horns of their appointed guests full, and with that to be done, she had no more time to watch her sisters. Shortly, the women were gone, and the men were left to themselves.
Again, the Merlin was abstemious, paying close attention now to all the men as well as the king. He said little, and when he did speak, he asked intelligent and pointed questions. Gwen was relatively certain that he was probing for weak points in the king’s loyalty to the High King and looking for signs of wavering or treachery.
If that was true, he found none of it. Lleudd Ogrfan Gawr was a blunt man, not simpleminded but open in his ways. His loyalty was first to his people, second to his personal allies, and third to the High King.
“It’s a good thing to have a strong High King again, and a better to have one who knows his way about a battle,” the king said, to the nods of satisfaction of those around him. “Goddess bring blessings to him! For all that he’s young, he knows when to fight, and when to talk, and when to send sly men to buy him time.”
“And if he calls on you for your levies?” the Merlin probed. “It’s a hard thing to have to travel across the width of the land to fight some other man’s battles.”
“Hard aye, but they won’t be some other man’s battles, will they?” the king responded. “He’s beaten off the Saxons once and the Northerners twice since he was made High King. If we’d had a proper High King when the Romans came, there’d have been no separate peaces, no tearing apart of tribe from tribe. We’d have fought the carlin knaves on the beach, and that’d have been an end to it! Nay, three years he’s been High King, and only once has he called for levies, when the cursed Northern men came in force in those dragon ships of theirs. And what happened? We came, and we beat ’em, and they haven’t come again!” The men slapped their knees or pounded their feet on the floor in agreement. “If he calls for levies, ’twill be because there’s need. And as for other things, ’tis why he has you, Merlin. You’re the Merlin. Whatever you tell him, you have to think of the whole land. That’s your duty. Aye, men?”
The men pounded their feet again in approval or responded with “aye” in varying tones of enthusiasm and satisfaction.
“So. What Arthur wants from us, by the gods, Arthur will get, unstinting.” With a nod, the king dismissed the entire question and moved on to the subject of the tribes in the North and whether or not they were likely to be a trouble this year.
Gwen saw the Merlin’s lips curl ever so slightly in a smile. And then he bent his formidable mind to just that question. Gwen let out a little sigh of relief.
The talk turned to lighter subjects when that thorny problem had been dealt with as best it could be. “You have a fine brood of daughters, my host,” the Merlin said, with a casualness that immediately set Gwen’s senses to alert again.
“Four. My eldest has gone to the Ladies, and a fine Maiden for the Circle she’ll return to us. My second you saw—a good girl, a sound girl. But my pride is at your left hand, my lord Merlin.” The king cast a glance back at Gwen with a warmth in it that made her stand taller even as she blushed for the praise. “The queen always held that she was strong in the Blessing and should be the one to go in Cataruna’s place—but the Goddess clearly had other plans. The Blessing she may have, but it seems it was Epona’s, and she was born for the Path of Iron. She takes to weapons as if she were born with a spear in her hand, and as for the horses! Epona herself surely must have smiled on her birth!” The king laughed. “Well, you’ll see. Her horses are old veterans, and if she doesn’t win, it won’t be for lack of skill or heart, and she’ll make a good accounting of herself.”
“You have great faith in her,” the Merlin said, in a neutral t
one.
“Oh, she has the heart of a Bouadicca but more good sense. If she can keep her head, as her model Braith does, she’ll do well.” The king seemed to realize that he was tempting fate with such praise and coughed. “Of course, that’s in the hands of the gods. But it’s clear enough, for all of that, her place is in the ranks of the warriors, and her love is for horseflesh and the sword.”
“And your fourth?” The Merlin’s eyes had taken on that hawklike brightness again.
“Oh, Gwenhwyfach.” The King shrugged. “A mere chit of a child, given to childish ways and tempers. As unformed as an unlicked bear cub. Too soon to say what she’ll be, and it may be we spoiled her a bit too much. But with the new son coming, she’ll get over that quick enough or have it beaten out of her. My guess is, the way she queens it among the other children, she’ll be another like Gynath, a maid for a man, and make me another alliance. Maybe to Arthur’s son, eh? Now, my lord Merlin, on that head, what of the High King’s coming son? What birth gift would be best to send? I’ve a mind to send him my best yearling foal that boy and horse may grow up together.”
By the time Gwen was dismissed with the other squires, she was glad enough to crawl into bed with Gynath and Little Gwen. But Little Gwen was still awake, and strangely, for once, she didn’t torment her sister. Instead, she was as full of questions about the Merlin as any of the boys.
“What did he have you do all day?” Little Gwen demanded.
“Run errands and messages mostly,” Gwen replied wearily. “Nothing exciting. I didn’t see him work any magic, if that’s what you want to know.”
“And what did he talk about, with the men at the fire?” The child seemed crazed to know about the old man. “Did he talk about what he’s done? What about his magic? Did he tell how he did some of it? How he hid Arthur? How he made Arthur High King? How he helped win battles?”
“Mostly he asked questions.” Gwen yawned. “He wanted to know how Father and the men felt about Arthur, I suppose. He didn’t talk much about himself, or about Arthur, or the new queen, or anything really. He asked about us, about Mother, as you do for politeness.”
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