by Anna Elliott
“My lady Isolde.”
The leaping torchlight showed Isolde a taut, shuttered face, with sharply cut cheekbones; a proud, high brow; and heavy-lidded dark eyes that spoke of a bloodline stretching back to Rome. A face more suited to a monk or priest than a fighting man, despite the narrow scar of a Saxon sword cut along the jaw.
Brychan had been captain of Constantine’s guard, and was only a year or two older than Con himself—twenty-two, now, or twenty-three. First among the king’s fighting men—and Con’s friend, as well, though he’d always been stiffly formal with Isolde.
Like the rest of Con’s men, Isolde thought. Like all the men in this room. They might have willingly sworn the death oath to their king, but at best they’d pay just as much respect as was owed by duty to his queen.
Brychan’s voice now was as cool as ever, and he kept his eyes trained on a point past Isolde’s head.
“The troops of the king’s councilmen, my lady. I have given them leave to make camp on the headland, save for the honor guards. Them I have housed in the barracks here, to be nearest their lords.”
Isolde nodded. “Thank you, Brychan. That is well.”
Brychan half turned, offering his arm. His look hadn’t changed, but Isolde thought that his tone was altered very slightly when he spoke again. “King Marche has volunteered his men to garrison the fort at the base of the causeway, my lady.”
As though of their own accord, Isolde’s eyes went to the place along the opposite wall where Marche sat in the seat next in honor to the High King’s, as was his right as king of Cornwall. He, too, now wore formal garb: a tunic of dark red, heavily embroidered with gold; a fur-lined cloak held in place with a heavy brooch, likewise worked in gold and bearing the crest of the Cornwall boar. As though feeling Isolde’s gaze on him, he turned, and for a brief instant his gaze met hers.
“And you have accepted?” Isolde asked Brychan.
There was another brief pause. Then: “I knew of no reason to refuse, my lady.”
Isolde realized her hands were clenched at her sides. Slowly, she forced her fingers to relax, forced herself to take Brychan’s arm and move with him toward her own place on the benches. “No,” she said. “No reason, as you say.”
She was seeing in her mind’s eye Tintagel’s towering walls, built on the rocky promontory that was almost an island amid the vicious sea. On three sides of the fortress walls the jagged cliffs dropped almost sheer to the beaches and coves below. And on the fourth stretched the narrow causeway, passable only at low tide, that was the sole way back to the mainland and the road.
And now, she thought, King Marche has positioned his forces so that he may stop anyone who wishes to leave. And Brychan, Con’s captain, has approved.
Isolde took her own place, opposite the great central hearth, drawing the skirts of her gown close about her. She had changed her stained and crumpled working dress for a formal one of scarlet-dyed wool with an embroidered overtunic of blue. With Hedda’s help, she had rebraided and pinned her hair into a heavy knot at the nape of her neck, adding a gold fillet to hold the fine linen coif about her brow.
Now, looking up, she saw that Hedda, too, was here, one of the serving women who moved among the great oaken tables to offer platters of roasted boar and pitchers of ale. As Isolde watched, she leaned forward to fill a drinking horn for one of the men—brother to one of the petty kings from the north, Isolde thought. The man’s face was flushed already with drink, and as Hedda poured the ale, he reached for her, one hand fastening on the curve of her breast beneath the shapeless gown.
Hedda, though, made no response, not even by look, to the man’s touch. Her broad, heavy face was stolidly set, her mouth slack, her eyes slightly dull. The man’s bleared gaze focused briefly on her, and Isolde saw him frown, then give a shrug and turn away, dropping his hold.
Isolde forced herself to sit still, telling herself that she would jeopardize the fragile alliance of the council by speaking out. And more than that, Hedda would not thank her for making a scene, for drawing all eyes to the way she was forced to bear such attentions, to how, as a slave, she was unable to defend herself. Still, even watching, Isolde had clenched her hands and gritted her teeth. But Hedda, without pausing, without hurrying, moved away to pour ale for one of the other men.
The harper’s song came to an end, and there was a ripple of applause from the men, a few fists beating approval on the table, a few cries of “Well sung.” But the shouts and applause soon died away, and an expectant silence fell, as the purpose of the gathering returned to every mind.
“My friends. Dukes and kings.”
Coel of Rhegged had risen to face the room. Coel was an old man now, the only one of the king’s council old enough to have fought not only under Arthur, but under the Pendragon, as well. The hair that fell to the shoulders of his tunic was silver-gray, and his face, strong-featured and handsome as it must once have been, was hollowed-cheeked, the skin yellow as parchment with age. Still, he carried the remnants of what must have been a warrior’s strength. His shoulders were bowed, but very broad, and his frame was powerful even yet, though the flesh had begun to shrink and tighten over the bones.
Now Coel’s eyes, deep-set and almost golden as those of a falcon or hawk, swept the room.
“My friends,” he said again, “I have kept largely silent during these last days and nights in the council hall, by reason of my years, and because I could not take the field in the battle you have just fought. But I would ask you to hear me now.
“My friends, the High King whose bravery we have tonight heard sung gave his life in Britain’s defense, and as we begin this session of council, I would beg that you hold the life he gave for us in mind. Every night and every day we spend arguing and debating here among ourselves is another day wasted, a day that could be better spent in planning Britain’s defense, that the deaths of Constantine and all who fell with him may not be in vain.”
They were the sort of words, Isolde thought, spoken at all councils of this kind, the kind that always followed a war leader’s death, whatever the man he might have been alive. But Coel’s voice had wavered slightly in speaking Con’s name, and as Coel finished with a bow, first to Isolde, then to Marche, she thought she saw a glimmer of moisture in the old man’s eyes.
Isolde blinked quickly and looked away. These meetings of the council had been the hardest hours of the past days to get through. When she sat in Con’s place among the men and tried to hold the muffling numbness about her a little longer. When she tried not to think of Con, who had loathed all sessions like this one of endless talk and debate. Who would have been counting the hours until he could escape to drill at sword practice with his fighting men. Though he’d have sat grimly through until the end, however much the hours of talk and debate tried his temper.
Isolde was almost grateful to find that Madoc of Gwynedd had risen in response to Coel’s words. Madoc of Gwynedd was thirty at most, a dark, barrel-chested man with a heavy-jawed face heavily shadowed by a stubble of beard and small, piercing dark eyes. And he had, Isolde thought, disliked her always—even more than the rest of the king’s councilmen.
An odd, silent, brooding man, who spoke seldom and fraternized little with his fellow kings—though he was respected among them as a fierce fighter and a skilled man with a sword. He was known also for a quick, fiery temper, and he carried out more floggings among his troops than any of the other leaders by far. But he was reputed to be a devout Christian, and she knew he rose at dawn every day to hear Mass with Father Nenian. And despite the taunts of the other men, rumor held him to be faithful to the memory of the wife who had died in childbed two years before, leaving him an infant son as heir.
He’d lost his father at the battle of Camlann, which explained, perhaps, why he’d distrusted Isolde from the moment she’d been crowned Con’s queen. They’d met for the first time looking across the bloodied head of a stable boy he’d been beating for mistreating one of the horses. Isolde had lost
her temper and told him in scathing terms what she thought of a man who beat a child not even half his size—whatever the boy’s crime.
“Is that what the Christ teaches you in your Masses and your church?” she’d demanded as she stanched the flow of blood from the stable boy’s nose.
Madoc’s face had been dark with fury, and he’d said, still breathing hard, “They teach at any rate that women should keep still in the presence of men. It’s written so in the Holy Bible. Now get out—and don’t meddle with what’s none of your concern.”
Isolde had refused to leave the boy, though, and eventually it had been Madoc who’d stormed out of the stable yard, leaving her to salve the lad’s bruised ribs and broken nose. She’d never bothered to look up whether what Madoc had said of the Christ-God’s teachings was written so in the Bible or not—though it wouldn’t have surprised her to find he’d told the truth. The Christ and His God, she thought, have a good deal to answer for.
Now Madoc’s manner was stiff, as though he spoke respectfully with an effort, but he made Coel a brief bow. “My lord Rhegged, I mean you no insult. We all know you have seen much in your time, and fought nobly, as well. But it’s we who rule and fight for Britain as she stands now who have to be heard in this hall.”
Coel’s face was impassive, but he gave the younger man a brief inclination of his silvery head, and Madoc swung round to face the rest of the room.
“My fellow kings. I wouldn’t question the bravery of King Constantine. As a brother in arms, I loved the king well. But still I say the time for a High King ruling over all Britain has come and gone. In Gwynedd we fight not the Saxons but the wild raiders from Ireland. Of what use is the High King to me? And while I and my fighting men are called away to do service to the High King, my land is left ripe for their plunder.”
Madoc paused, and Isolde saw the men on the benches shift uneasily under his gaze, and a few mutter to their neighbors. But some were nodding slow agreement.
Madoc raised his voice to be heard over the crowd. “I say we are better off each among us ruling our own kingdoms and seeing to the defense of our own.”
“This is folly!” The speaker was Huel, Coel of Rhegged’s son, his face angry, his voice ringing out across the hall. Huel’s face was narrow and almost a younger mirror of Coel’s own, with the same sharp brow and nose, the same strong chin, though his eyes were muddy brown instead of fiery gold.
Isolde didn’t know Huel well—had never even spoken to him directly that she could recall. Still, as Huel rose from his place by his father’s side and faced Madoc, she tried to remember all she knew of Coel’s eldest son and heir.
She could remember Con returning from campaign and speaking of Huel. And for all she’d been trying to suppress any thought of Con, she found she was thankful that he’d known the men around her and had taken their measure in leading them into war.
A plodder, Con had called Huel, and Isolde herself had already judged him in these last days a less intelligent man by far than his father. Though a good commander and man-at-arms, for all that, according to Con. A good fighter, chiefly because once he gets an idea into that thick head of his, he won’t let up. Whether it’s a sword fight or a battle or an argument at dice, Huel of Rhegged plows on until he’s won.
Con, Isolde thought, had not been a man to seek overmuch insight into the thoughts and minds of his fellow men. If a man was honest and could be trusted to seat his horse and wield his sword well, it was enough. But all the same, Isolde would have taken his word on any soldier’s character, and she thought she might trust his judgment of the man before her now.
Con had said, too, that Huel would not make half the king his father had done. He’d neither Coel’s keenness nor his gift at winning the hearts and allegiance of his men. Coel himself, Isolde thought, might fill the place of High King well. But he cannot live many years more—perhaps not even many more months.
And Huel would never hold the factions together. The kings of Britain might have united under Arthur—and even, though less willingly, under Con. But Huel would never be the man to unite them again.
Though that, Isolde thought, may be beyond the skills of all the rest of the men here as well. A wave of defeat swept through her as she remembered what she’d felt in the chapel. That the hope of Britain had already died with Arthur on the fields of Camlann.
Huel had drawn a breath and now went on, turning to include the room at large in what he said. “For seven years we have watched lands—good lands—vanish into the gullets of the Saxon armies. Watched our settlements pillaged and burned and been able to do nothing but slink farther and farther west like curs with our tails between our legs. Now we have made a stand—done battle with the Saxon dogs and won. And you would throw that away?”
“My friends, peace, I beg you.”
Owain of Powys, too, was a young man, not yet thirty, Isolde judged, and lean, almost slightly built, though with a slim, graceful strength about his frame. “Peace—and pray be seated.”
Coel’s son seemed about to argue, but Coel placed a restraining hand on his arm, and after a moment’s hesitation the younger man subsided onto the bench. Madoc, too, seemed to hesitate, but then, with a grudging nod, yielded Owain the floor.
Owain turned to face the room at large.
He was a handsome man, his features refined nearly to delicacy, with high cheekbones and a narrow, pointed chin; eyes of greenish hazel set under straight dark brows; and a soft, almost feminine mouth. He had a ready laugh and a quick smile, and Isolde had seen the serving maids tonight vying to be the one to refill his drinking horn or offer him platters of food—and seen Owain, laughing, circle their waists with his arm and pull the fairest down onto his knee.
The Popinjay, Con had always called him, for his liking of rich fabrics and fine jewels and clothes. Con had said, too, that he would sooner fight with the Saxon army ahead of him than with Owain of Powys guarding his back. When the fighting’s at its worst, you’ll find him right squarely in the rear. Guarding that pretty face of his from being damaged.
Isolde was inclined to believe Con’s valuation of Owain, as well. She had never liked Owain. Not since she’d sat beside a young serving maid, holding the girl’s hand while she writhed and hemorrhaged and bled to an agonized death. The girl had taken a dirty kitchen knife and tried to abort herself of Owain’s child.
In fairness, though, Isolde was not sure that Owain had known anything of the baby—or the girl’s death. And certainly none of those who lined the benches of the hall tonight would count the incident the slightest bit in Owain’s disfavor.
These were, she thought, the same men who would have been utterly disbelieving—or angry—had she spoken out earlier on Hedda’s behalf.
And all at once a hatred—an almost physical revulsion—swept through Isolde for everything about the council hall. The smoke-filled room, the smell of closely packed bodies, and sweat, and ale from the drinking horns. Everything about this world of men and killing and war that devoured and destroyed men like Con. Or gulped and spat them out, she thought, her mouth twisting, like the fair-haired boy Ralf in the infirmary, so that they were never whole either in mind or in body again.
With an effort, Isolde forced her attention back to Owain. The king of Powys had an easy, good-humored charm that had won him a following among the council’s dukes and petty kings. And his holdings were among the largest—and the richest—of them all. He wore tonight a saffron-dyed tunic, edged with fur at the hem and throat, and over it a cloak of silvery wolf’s-pelt, held in place by a jewel-studded brooch, the green of the stones echoing the flecks of greenish gold in his eyes.
“For myself, I agree with my lord Huel. A kingdom without a king is like a gelding who takes a wench to bed. Not much chance either one is going to get on with the job at hand.”
A ripple of laughter went round the room at that, and Owain’s mouth tipped up into an easy, self-deprecating smile as he paused. It was, Isolde thought with another flicker
of disgust, the kind of speech she would have expected from him. Pleasant, humorous—and calculated to jolly the listeners into a mood where their allegiances could be easily won.
But as Owain stood, head thrown back as he waited for the laughter to die down, Isolde saw Coel lift his head alertly, his eyes, watchful and suddenly keen, going to the younger man’s face.
“But if we cannot yet agree on the problem of choosing a High King,” Owain went on, “perhaps we may at least agree on who shall take up the ruling of the High King’s domain, since tragically my lord King Constantine died without heir.”
Isolde stiffened, but forced herself not to react. She’d seen many of the councilmen turn hostile, searching looks in her direction at Owain’s words, and she could see herself and their thoughts reflected in their gaze as clearly as if they’d spoken aloud. The traitor’s bastard girl had failed to give their king an heir, and so now they would fight for the High King’s lands like dogs over a bone.
And I wonder, Isolde thought, how long it will be before they begin to argue over who will win possession of Con’s widow, as well.
Letting her gaze travel round the room, she happened to see Coel’s face. The old man was looking not at her, but at Owain, and his mouth was thin, his gaze chill. Before Owain could go on, Coel raised a hand again. He was growing weary, Isolde saw. The earlier effort had tired him, and the arm he held aloft shook a little within the flowing sleeve. But he spoke in a clear, carrying voice, his eyes still on Owain.
“My lord of Powys. I would ask you to remember the presence of Lady Isolde.”
His eyes moved briefly to Isolde’s face, and she thought there was a flash of pity or compassion in their gaze, for all Coel had been entirely Modred’s enemy and Arthur’s man. If I were to trust any of them, she thought, it would be Coel. He was honest, a man of honor, whatever he thought of Isolde herself.
There was Huel, though. Isolde’s gaze moved to the younger man, still seated at his father’s side, his narrow face both shadowed and gilded by the flame of the torch at his back.