The Oak above the Kings

by Patricia Kennealy-Morrison

  But she did not say how it made her; and I leaned across the desk to kiss her gently on the forehead.

  "Ard-rian," was all I said; and, just then, I think all she needed, and wanted, to hear.

  * * *

  * * *

  Chapter Twenty-nine

  SO THE JAMADARIN OF THE YAMAZAI, with the Heir of Aojun, came to Keltia, and I was delegated to meet them at Mardale.

  Very like you are thinking that after all this time surely Arthur might have managed to be there himself to greet his ban-charach and their child; or, if naught so personal carried weight with him, then at the least as Ard-righ of Keltia receiving a gallain monarch. But that was not how Arthur did things; and so I found myself, on a brilliant spring afternoon, shifting nervously from one foot to another as I watched the shuttle come in from the orbiting Aojunese flagship.

  For all my training as bard and all my years as prince, I did not do this sort of political chore well or gladly. I have ever loved and studied to be a watcher, not a worker,—to observe great events, not to do them myself. It is the maker's way: One must be distanced from the thing one wishes to make into art. Chance and dan, of course, had arranged things otherwise down the years, as here recounted; but when I had the choosing I preferred to stand back and let others do, so that I might watch and, later, write of it. But that choice was not mine this day. The shuttle door opened, and then Majanah was standing there, the Keltic sunlight on her gleaming hair, looking exactly like herself. Beside her was a tall, shy, coltish creature who seemed more an asrai or annir-choille than a princess… I acknowledged Majanah's smile of greeting—her relief on spotting a familiar face had been very visible, not to mention flattering; but it was as much joy at seeing an old friend as discovering a known countenance amid the faces of strangers. Even queens can be daunted by the unknown; but she came forward with stateliness uppermost in her bearing.

  I had performed this very chore on many another occasion—when one is fostern to the High King, and husband to his sister, one generally comes in for more than a fair share of ceremonial drudgery—and now I ran off as by rote the platitudes of diplomatic greeting, 'In the names of Arthur Ard-righ and Gweniver Ard-rian,' you know how it goes; and Majanah, who had herself endured her full share of similar occasions, responded duly in kind, 'In the name of Aojun of the Yamazai,' and all that. But she and I held each other's gaze gravely and desperately, as if we feared that if we let down our ceremonial purpose for an instant we would be shouting for joy and laughing and hugging promiscuously in front of both our escorts. And, very like, we would.

  At last I came to the end of my mouthings, and Majanah to the conclusion of her parroted formal responses; then, as we settled into the chariot for the ride to Caerdroia, we were free to greet each other as long-parted friends.

  "Ah me," said Majanah, after we had spent quite a few minutes kissing and weeping and laughing, "but it is good to see you again, my fox."

  And that was a name she had given me of old on Aojun; but she turned now to her daughter, who had said no word so far and who had not taken her eyes off me since we met.

  "This is the Lord Talvosghen—Taliesin—who is foster-brother to your father the High King and mate to the King's sister the Princess Morgauna. You and he were great friends when you were a child, but you will not remember,—he your uncle, by his law and our own, so greet him thusly."

  Donah regarded me gravely and shyly out of eyes near as dark as Arthur's own but flecked with gold that came to her from her mother, and still she said no word.

  "I remember you, Princess," I said, to help her over the moment. "Though you were scarce three years old when last I saw you…"

  I faltered, for her gaze was most unnerving; then all at once she smiled, and she was there again, Majanah's kitling, the charming child with the pointed chin and the joyful heart, and spoke softly, shyly.

  "Do you still have your harp?"

  "Indeed I do so, and you will hear it tonight." Turning to Majanah: "Arthur and Gweniver will receive you when we come to Turusachan, and there will be an aonach and feast this even, as befits the arrival in Keltia of a reigning queen and her lovely heir"—here I bowed to Donah, and she giggled like the lass she was. "But that will be all of ceremony; Artos, as you know, does not go in much for state."

  "And the Queen Janfarie?"

  'Janfarie'… gods but the one word took me back in an instant, back to those days in Mistissyn, city of wood—

  "No more than does Artos," I said with great firmness. "As you will see."

  Suffice it to say that Artos and Gwennach had not favored their own coronation with such state as they both seemed to think Majanah's arrival merited… I was well and truly shamed, catching the look Majanah shot me on our arrival in the Presence Chamber. But how was I to know? We speak here of a king who preferred to patch his own tunics and a queen who thought naught of wearing ragged trews to her own Council meetings: But that afternoon for their first, informal meeting with Majanah, and that evening, at the aonach, they had positively glittered with jewels and silks and silver.

  At first dismayed sight, I thought perhaps it was to honor the Yamazai queen; and too, it was the first sight Donah would have of her father in conscious life, no surprise if he should wish to appear in kingly splendor. But that did not seem right either, somehow, though I did not know whyever not. Then, as I watched Arthur and Gweniver at the aonach doing their social work as effortlessly and smoothly as they did their political chores, moving amongst the guests, one or the other of them at all times by the side of their royal visitor, it came to me that they had chosen to appear so as a message to our own folk, not to the visiting Aojunni nor yet their Yamazai queen: that Gweniver and Arthur were Kelts-of Keltia, rulers,—and no gallain queen nor half-Kelt issue could alter it.

  But messages of one sort or another were thick on the ground that night… For one, the Princess Marguessan had actually deigned to come to Court for the occasion. She did not as a rule honor us with her presence more than once a year or so—for which we all of us were ever profoundly thankful—and she had been to Turusachan already once this season; so her attendance this night was most beyond norm and custom. Added to that, she had brought her heir with her, the Prince Mordryth, almost unprecedented; and the crosscurrents of query and speculation were running strong and counter from one side of Mi-cuarta to the other.

  I was watching them both particularly closely, Mordryth maybe even more so than his mother. He was not a stupid young man, that I knew already; not so tall as Arthur had been at his years, a touch stockier too, having more a look of Uthyr to him, or of his father Irian, than of Marguessan or Ygrawn. His uncle though I was, I seldom if ever spoke to him, and tonight was no exception.

  But it seemed to be a night of scions: Malgan ap Owein was here as well, looking altogether more prepossessing than his princely coequal. He had long since ceased to wear the red of mourning for his late and unlamented parents, but tonight by some chance, or perhaps no chance at all, he was clad in garnet-colored velvet, which should have jarred against his red-brown hair but somehow did not. In truth, he looked quite handsome,—but the dynamic that was running between him and Mordryth like a shuttle on a loom had more to it than mere appearances, and was, indeed, baffling and hard to read.

  They two had met often enough before, of course, over the years; indeed, for two young men so much of an age and so near in rank, it would have been stranger still had their paths not run together now and again. People thought them cat-of-a-kind, but that was not so. They were not friends, but neither were they antagonists; wary, respectful acquaintances was about the weight of it, and I thought I knew why…

  But I was hindered from further speculation by Morgan's elbow in my ribs and her voice in my mind,—and I had felt both voice and elbow often enough to know that never did their owner employ either without excellent cause, so now I looked obediently down to see what she would have me notice.

  "See how Malgan looks on Donah," was all
she said, and nodded across the chamber, where the young Heir of Aojun, completely at her ease, was conversing happily with a group that included Tarian Douglas, Alannagh Ruthven and Grehan Aoibhell's niece and nephew, Fidelm and Rhydian.

  I looked again: Malgan Rheged, too shy to go across and be presented as was well within his right to do, was staring at Donah as if she were the first girl he had ever beheld, or the fairest.

  "It is but the novelty of the thing," I said, hoping to gods I was right. "An outfrenne princess—and so fair a one, what lad would not take notice?"

  "She is a child," said Morgan coldly. "And not only that—"

  "Say it not! Nay, cariad, do not even think it too loudly!" I glanced wildly around to see if any had heard—Morgan had a lovely carrying voice when so she chose, and a lovely clear thought-voice that was if anything more carrying still. She could throw her thought or her mood over all this gathering as easily and completely as a blanket; and I knew all too well her thought just now, for I had had it myself—that young Malgan might well be looking with gogglement on his own half-sister.

  I reminded myself of a few facts, and was consoled thereby: Apart from that, even if the youth were smitten, Donah was too young, being but half his years, for him to do aught about it. Though Malgan might well entertain calf-love or wild hopes, such feelings would scarce withstand the decade's stretch before Donah could consider them, or even be considered eligible. And never would they withstand the long star-miles between Keltia and Aojun; not to mention the stance of Arthur and Majanah in the matter.

  Then it came my turn to employ the elbow of significance, and Morgan who must perforce frown and consider Marguessan, her twin, was standing off to one side of the great banqueting-hall; and plainly she had either forgotten Morgan's presence or discounted Morgan's magic, for she was looking at Arthur with such a look of hatred as took my breath away, made me reach as if by instinct for my belt. But my sgian was not there—this was, after all, a party, one does not go armed to a feast in one's own home—and I was all the more unsettled that I should have felt I might have need of it. And the worst thing of all was that Marguessan was smiling.

  Otherwise, it had been so far a most pleasant and successful evening: The Jamadarin could charm the badgers from their winter dens did she so choose, and tonight she had set herself to be as enchanting as even she could be. I perceived easily what some plainly were thinking: that she hoped thereby to win back Arthur for hers; but I can tell you right off that she had no such intention. That was not why she had come to Keltia; and the truth of it was attested by the fact that Majanah was paying Gweniver every courtesy and attention and deference that she was paying Arthur, to the tiniest measure, to the smallest degree the same. Nay, she was here for precisely the reasons she had claimed that afternoon in the Presence Chamber: to foster the friendship between our two nations, and so that the Princess Donah might meet her father and the other half of her heritage.

  That last intent, at least, had been an unqualified success: Both Arthur and Donah had fallen instantly in love each with the other, as a father and daughter should, as if the resumption of their long-abeyant bond were as easy and natural as breathing; as if, indeed, that bond had never been suspended at all. They were astonished and enchanted with each other, and few in all that hall looked on them with aught but benignity and smiles.

  But in the midst of all these dynamics of mood and place, like tiderips of the soul and senses, the dynamic I noted before all others, and had been vainly trying to disbelieve all night long, was the one between Arthur and Gweniver. As I have said earlier, they were utterly in concert as King and Queen these days, had been for many months, even years; but what I saw tonight when I looked on them together, or, especially, apart, was that at last, at long last, Arthur and Gweniver had fallen in love with each other.

  Now whether it had taken Majanah's arrival to bring this result about, had precipitated it like that one last crystal added to a supersaturated solution, or whether it had been just about to happen in the normal road of events—Keils and Gweniver had drifted apart some time since, though still friends—and had only chanced to fall out so tonight, naught to do with Majanah at all, I have no smallest idea. I neither know nor much care, and leave it to those more suited to the graightrai than I to harp about, even. But it was past mistaking, though so far I seemed to be the only person, save Majanah herself, who had seen it.

  And I rejoiced to see it, had been waiting for it to happen since our long-ago days on Gwynedd; had known too that it would come, and that it would come when it would, when it determined to come, and not a moment sooner. But it seemed too that with Majanah's coming to Keltia, all Arthur's past had suddenly been put into perspective; as if all the women in his life had been mere aspects and forerunners of Gweniver, who was his Queen and his wife. Gwenwynbar, Majanah, the ladies of Court and Company with whom he had enjoyed dalliance or romance over the years: All had come together in one woman, and she neither stranger nor incomer but one who had been friend and challenger and equal and goad, for long; and now, at last, his mate.

  And now, it seemed, Arthur knew it as well, and Gwennach also… I was very happy, and turned to Morgan to tell her all this, thinking to boast a little at having perceived the truth of it before she had. But a small commotion on the other side of the hall caught my attention, and I cut through the crowd, Morgan close beside me, to see what went on.

  Surprisingly—or perhaps not so, considering Marguessan's smiling evil look of an hour or two since—it was Mordryth seemed to be at the heart of it. He had approached Gweniver and Majanah, who had been talking together animatedly in the center of a knot of friends—Tryffin and Ysild, Daronwy and her Aojunese lord, Roric, glad to see once more his friend and Queen, Betwyr, a few others. He had somewhat in his hands, and stood now before the two queens, as if to proffer both or either that which he held so close.

  I cannot tell you what a feeling washed over me then—a cold tide, the shadow of the wing of dan, disaster breathing in the room like the coming on of a cam-anfa. But I shouldered brutally through the last few folk who barred my way, pulling Morgan after me, coming to stand just on the edge of the little circle that had formed, near enough to see and hear what passed, and, maybe, prevent the worst…

  Small chance! Looking back, I see that Marguessan must have had this planned for a long time, had been biding her moment, cherishing her ancient hatred. This was not a thing of yesterday with her, but something that had root in the far past. Though all of us had long been 'ware of Marguessan's resentment and ill will to Arthur and Gweniver—as you will recall, she had never ceased to deem herself the rightful heir, as Uthyr's eldest child, no matter the law or the will and wish of King and folk alike—what we had all failed utterly to note was the slow cold nature of that will, that had let her wait in strength unwearied and patience unceasant, until she should judge her time had come to act; as now she had.

  And it was Mordryth who was to be the instrument of that acting… I was close enough now to see what it was he held in his hands: a cup, a quaich of ordinary design, made of silver or perhaps white gold, its rim edged with knotwork and black pearls. And it troubled me strangely, for it seemed that I had looked on just such a vessel once, or one very like to it, though I could not say when or how or where.

  But the cup seemed inoffensive enough in itself, as Mordryth held it out to the two royal ladies; and then he said, in a light clear voice that seemed higher and shriller than usual, "This is the cup that belonged once to Olwen White-track, and came from her to Llariau, and on down."

  And then of course I knew; but it seemed that I could do naught to stop what I was full aware was about to happen' and beside me Morgan seemed as deadened and incapable as I, and we could but watch as the coil played out.

  Majanah's face bore only polite puzzlement and interest, but Gweniver well knew something was amiss and awry, and I could see her gathering herself up to strike even while she sent out fingerlings of her power, like li
ttle spies of magic, to see what mischief was here, or about to be.

  Her sole question came warily. "What nature is to it, and what peculiarity may it possess?"

  I threw back my head with admiration and joy, for that was a ritual question if ever there was one; now, now, the thing was cast, and every sorcerer in Mi-cuarta that night well knew it.

  Not being Ban-draoi, Marguessan did not, and she smiled to make eager answer to the Ard-rian. It must have seemed to her that the moment of her triumphing was come at last; for she answered Gweniver at once, and in so doing she convicted herself before us all. At the time, I thought it a grave mistake; now I am no longer so sure…

  "The nature and peculiarity of this cup are these: that only a true mate may drink from it; and that any who drinks, man or woman, who has done violence or violation to the bonds of marriage or union will find in the cup not wine but ashes and shame. Or worse, perhaps—but do you fear to drink?"

  That last question was delivered with a smiling snarl only Marguessan could have given it; I well remembered that snarl, had heard it aimed at me by the child Marguessan at Coldgates, not yet twelve years of age and already possessed of all the spite and malice we saw displayed here this night. She looked well pleased at the consternation her words had struck: Plainly she had calculated this ploy with Olwen's cup as having most potential for public obloquy and dishonor to her intended victims; knowing as she did the state of her cousin Gweniver's marriage, hoping the worst of Majanah. Across the empty space between us I saw Arthur go black as thunder, and Keils Rathen, who had come late to the feasting and now stood at Arthur's shoulder, white as steel.

  Then Majanah laughed to break the silence, and reached but to take the cup from Mordryth's hands. Sun-bright she looked in that moment, warm and golden as the nooning as she raised the cup to her lips.