Under Camelot's Banner

by Sarah Zettel

  Then, she saw him.

  “Peran?” she spat the word.

  He smiled. “Look again, Lynet. You have good eyes. Look hard, my sister.”

  She did, and her jaw slackened. “Colan?”

  “The same. Now, Lynet, you will walk with me.”

  She drew herself up, hugging the furs toward her in the habit of maiden’s pride. “You’re joking.”

  He shrugged. “As you please. But if you do not come and quietly, I will crush this mirror you prize so much. I will be most interested to see what happens then.”

  Hate and fury twisted Lynet’s face. Colan shrugged it aside. He did as he must, as he had done before. Her blood was as any others. He would mourn her, but he could not let her continue to drag their lands out for Camelot to pick over. She had lied to him, used his guilt against him. He would not permit her to do so again. It was her turn to serve the needs of land and lady and to pay for her sins. To let her go would be to fall into the clutch of his guilt and sin with no victory to buoy him up. He had seen Peran fall that way and he would not permit it to happen to him.

  “Come, Lynet.”

  One deliberate movement at a time, she pushed back the bed coverings, put one foot, then the other, on the floor. She stood. Her eyes never left his. She would kill him with those eyes if she could, but she could not, not as she was, and she knew this, and so did he.

  Holding the mirror out of her reach, Colan walked away. Through the darkness, Lynet followed.

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  The barefoot queen led Gareth out from the hall into the night air. The moon was near full and the heavy clouds scudded across its surface turning the night into a place of silver and shadows. Only the light of the queen’s brazier was gold. It caught in her hair, making her shine.

  “Let us try there,” she said, soft and merry, pointing toward a long, low building that had in other days been a barracks like the one at Camelot. A spark of light showed beneath one sagging shutter. “I do believe that is where were we will find him.”

  Why would Sir Lancelot take himself there? the thought swam slowly through Gareth’s mind. “M … majesty, how could you know?”

  She smiled. “Perhaps earlier he came to me. Perhaps words were exchanged that left him angered and wounded in his pride. Perhaps he did not wish other men to see him so.” The brazier’s flame lit sparks in her night-blackened eyes. “We cannot have my lord Lancelot angry, can we Squire Gareth?”

  Treading gracefully on her beautiful bare feet, she crossed the yard. The whole world was still around them. There was only the wind blowing back her unbound hair and brushing Gareth’s burning skin.

  As they reached the splintered door, the queen turned and winked broadly at Gareth. She handed him the brazier, and he took it. He would have done anything she said. Anything at all. At the same time, something struggled within him. Some small part of him tried to shout that this was wrong. The queen should not be here, not like this. But he could not remember why.

  She reached out and rapped on the door.

  “Who’s there?” demanded Lancelot. His voice was slurred. He had been drinking.

  “You cannot guess?” she replied, her voice deep and smooth as silk. “I should be insulted, my lord Lancelot.”

  Boots slapped against stone and in another minute the door flew open. His face was flushed. Gareth had been right. The knight had been drinking as he did sometimes when anger or other strong feeling overtook him. His cheeks were flushed and he leaned one hand against the stone wall to steady himself as he took in the sight of the queen standing before him.

  “Will you not invite me in, my lord?” she inquired. “It is not safe that I should be abroad here with only this young man for company.”

  The firelight that poured past the knight showed the woman afresh. It picked out every deep curve of her form and every line of her face. Desire, so strong as to shock him, roared into Gareth’s veins. It was wrong. It was horribly, perversely, sinfully wrong that he should be looking on the queen, his aunt in this way, as wrong as the way she was looking at Sir Lancelot now.

  “I thought you ordered me from you,” the knight was saying. “You spoke of treason and how you would never betray such a man as your lord with such as me.”

  She laughed, a light musical sound filled with so many promises. Lady Fiona had laughed at him like that. “You should have persisted, Lancelot. I expected a man such as you to know a woman likes her lover best when he has proved himself in adversity.” She smiled up at him, and Gareth thought he would burst open from the horror and the wonder of it. He wanted to cut out his eyes before he had to see her face for one second longer.

  He wanted with every fiber in his soul for her to turn and look that way at him.

  “Gareth, leave us,” said Sir Lancelot abruptly.

  This is wrong. It is treason. It is sin. “Mm…. my lord …” His mouth was dry. He could barely hear his own voice over the ringing in his ears.

  “Leave us, Gareth.” Sir Lancelot took the queen’s slim white hand and drew her through the door. She went lightly, easily on her bare feet, and her black eyes turned toward Gareth once before the door swung shut between them.

  Gareth stared at the blank wood. Slowly, his mind reeling, he backed away until he stumbled against a stone. Then, he turned and ran.

  He ran into the night, he ran without seeing where he was going or caring who saw him. He ran away from what was happening behind him, and from the lust that pounded at him.

  Oh, God. Oh, God! No! It is not happening! It cannot be!

  But the knight had come to her before, and she had met him in the darkness. He had gone every night to her pavilion to sit beside her, and they had exchanged so many looks, so many glances, and she had been so long beside him before she left to winkle Mark from his hole.

  He scrambled up hills and slipped and stumbled down the other side, only vaguely aware that he was heading for the sea cliffs. He could hear the noise of the waves like the pounding of his blood and his heart. He ran as he had run as a child when he had heard of Talia’s death. Run out into the hills. Get away. Get away from the truth. Get away from the madness and death and disappearing. Get away, get away, get away …

  Gareth’s toe slammed against yet another stone. He went flying and sprawled hard against the ground. He pushed himself to his knees, and all he could see before him was the queen’s beauty, her unbound hair, her bare feet and her smile, and her black eyes turned toward him, so filled with obscene promise.

  Gareth froze.

  Black eyes. Black eyes? His breath heaved, shuddering his shoulders, rasping against his throat. Shadows of the fire, I did not see right. No, I saw. I saw black eyes. The queen’s eyes are grey.

  His fingers dug into the hard packed dirt under him. The pain dragged up another memory, one that had been buried deep under his lust, under his amazement. It was ancient history, from when he was a boy. It was Geraint, kneeling beside him, trying so patiently to explain what had driven their father out of his mind.

  It was not mother, nor was it her shade, Geraint told him from memory. It was Morgaine. I promise you, Gareth. I saw her. It’s the eyes, that’s how you know, Gareth. Be she ever so powerful, she cannot disguise her eyes.

  But as he lifted his head, filled with this new understanding, motion caught his eyes. On the last rise before the cliff’s edge, he saw two figures in the moonlight. Lynet. Lynet walking on the rise with another man. His teeth bit down hard on his tongue to silence his scream. It could not be! Not her, not with someone else! His still-dazed mind could think of nothing else, but then the moonlight flashed, and Gareth looked again.

  The man held Lynet’s mirror, and Lynet followed. Followed as she must because without the mirror the shadows would carry her away once more. She followed that man down the slope to the edge of the cliff.

  That sight drove all other thoughts from Gareth. His mind was suddenly cold and clear as crystal. Crouching low, he moved cautiously, silently
up the rise.

  Lynet followed her brother, down the slopes and up the hills. The mirror he held caught the silver moonlight. Her self strained against her flesh. She could feel Ryol reaching for her, but even this little distance was too much. The shadows came, and she looked and saw how Morgaine held her brother’s hand, leading him on, how she smiled down at him, so satisfied with what now happened, and how her brother glowed with his accomplishment.

  The sea. It was loud here, the rush and rumble, and the sudden thunder-loud boom as they smacked the entrance of the caves below. The silvered land ahead ended in nothing but rushing blackness. Was that where she had been those times she had flown from herself before? In the night over the sea?

  Ryol. Ryol. Help me.

  But Ryol could not answer. Was he even there, or had he already given over the last of himself in her service. She felt herself begin to split. She tried to clench her fists, but she was too weak. There was only cold and pain and the rushing of the wind, and Colan in front of her. Father stood behind Morgaine. He stretched his hands out, but he could not touch his son. Not anymore.

  Anger burned in Lynet, tracing its lines down the wounds of her arms and through the bones of her skull. Colan stopped. So did she. The cliff’s edge waited a bare yard away. Below, the waves shifted and rolled, and called. Called to their white-armed daughters, called to all the dead and drowned. Called to her. Called to him.

  Colan turned the mirror over in his hands. Her pain deepened and fear took her. She could beg. He was still her brother.

  He was still her brother, and she could not permit this to go any further. He would not be stopped, he would not be swayed. She met her anguished gaze of her father’s shadow, and remembered how he had held her hand as she had held the knife.

  Yes, Father, she said to that shadow. I will do this too

  “I am sorry, Lynet,” Colan said, and he did look sorry. There was grief on his face, and a little of the ocean of guilt she had felt before trickled from him now. “I wish this could have been otherwise.”

  “Oh, so do I, Colan,” she breathed. He turned the mirror again, and again, spinning it in restless fingers, feeling how cool and light and precious it was.

  Ryol? Ryol? Can you hear me? Her spirit strained at flesh. She let it go as far as she dared. She shook. She hurt. She could not find her breath. Do you know what I mean to do, Ryol?

  Do it, lady. Mourn not for shadows. This is but the seal on the bargain I made years ago.

  The effort at holding herself together made her sway. Colan watched her, mistaking utterly the reason for her weakness. “I promised our cousins a life,” he said. “And they are more than willing that it should be yours. Do not fear them, Lynet. It will not be long. I am sorry I must lose this pretty thing.” He held the mirror up once more. “I think it would have been most useful in days to come.”

  Now, Lady!

  Colan dropped the mirror to the ground, and brought his boot heel down hard on the glass. In that moment, Lynet burst free of herself. Ryol rushed free onto the wind, but with the last of his strength, his ageless, endless self, he wrapped around her, giving her purpose and strength to form her own shape once more. In the shape of herself, shining with moonlight, fury, and the memory of murder and blood, Lynet stood before her brother.

  “What have you done, Colan?” she whispered, knowing full well he could hear her be wind and sea ever so loud. Nothing could keep her from him. One step at a time, as she had long ago learned to climb toward Laurel, she walked toward Colan. “You were right, you know. You should have kept the mirror.”

  Fear spilled around her like waters in a stream. She scooped it up without pause, and she flung it back at him. He staggered. He stumbled, and she came on. It was easier than she had thought it would be. Ryol kept back the darkness for this moment, but all her anger, all her bitter, bitter desire for vengeance for all that Colan had forced on her, stolen from her flowed from the well-spring of her freed spirit.

  “You’re a ghost,” Colan whispered, backing further away.

  “Am I?” she replied. Another step and another. The sea roared and slammed beneath the cliff. She felt its tides surging through her. The tide knew what was happening. The sea knew and its movement changed as its children fought their strange battle above. That movement, that change, woke the sea-women.

  Good.

  They were on the edge now. The wind blew hard. There was nowhere else for Colan to go. He had to make his stand here. A thousand things flashed through her. So much of life, so much childhood kindness, so much shared sorrow and fear. All the bright moments of their lives, until he turned, and he turned again, and told himself each time he had no choice.

  “Lynet!” screamed a voice.

  Gareth. Gareth running toward her. Did he see herself or only the clay remains. Sadness rippled through her, but she did not let herself focus on him. She needed all her attention for Colan.

  Forgive me, Gareth. She made herself move forward that much further.

  “You cannot touch me!” Colan cried out, willing himself to believe. “Get you gone in the name of Jesus Our Lord! Gareth! Squire Gareth help me!”

  “Too late, brother. Far too late.” Lynet closed her hand around the living warmth of his wrist. She smiled at her brother as he stared at her filled with unspeakable terror.

  Lynet leaned her spirit self out onto the wind above the sea, and pulled Colan out behind her.

  They fell together, absurdly slow, turning and tumbling, the translucent veil of herself wrapping and encompassing him. She felt the last tatters of Ryol fall from around her, and she mourned him in the moment before the waves reached up and gathered them in. She felt their cool touch, but no shock, no change of air or place, only the dimness. Colan struggled, grasping at the waves as they surged over him.

  Then the morverch were there.

  She felt their glee and their triumph. Welcome, cousin. Welcome home. They wound their long arms around him, dragging him down to give him the kiss of greeting, and lead him away. After a time she could feel them no more. She hung suspended in the waters, and peace suffused her. All was done. There was nothing more to hold onto or struggle against. There was a strange sorrow, but that too could be so easily let go. There was only rest now.

  Lynet gave herself over to the rolling waters, and felt herself gently dissolve like foam upon the waves.

  Gareth saw the man smash the mirror. He saw Lynet fall, and saw her ghost rise up. He saw the ghost drive the man from the cliff, saw them fall. He saw the arms reach up from the waves and draw them down.

  He stumbled down the slope to where her corpse lay. She lay sprawled on the grass, one arm pillowing her head, one flung wide. Her bandages had come loose. He knelt, mute and bewildered. Her wounds should not be exposed to the salt air. Carefully, he tucked the end of one of the cloths back into place.

  She did not move.

  Anger, overwhelming and unreasoning flooded through him. “Give her back!” he shouted to the waves. “You have your proper sacrifice! Give her back!”

  But the waves only surged forward and drew back in their ancient, unbroken rhythm. No hand, no voice raised but his own.

  “Give her back! She’s not yours!”

  No answer. He could not speak to the sea and make it hear. He was only flesh and blood, and he could not reach such shadows.

  “Damn you!” he wailed. “She did nothing! It is not her fault! How dare you take her!” In childish desperation he snatched the broken mirror, ignoring the pain and the blood that came instantly, he hurled them into the senseless waves. “You have no right!” he screamed at the ocean. “You have no right!”

  The blood streamed from his hand, and Gareth, alone, fell to his knees, the bitter salt tears raining down his face. He gathered Lynet into his arms. So cold. He kissed her brow. So cold, so cold. She was gone. Vanished. Gone. He threw his head back and cried out wordlessly to the distant heavens. He cradled her head in his arms and wept because he was too late, too sl
ow, too much a fool. Because he’d let Morgaine lure him away from her door. Now she was dead, and it was his fault. His fault. His fault. He had sworn he would be shelter for her, but he had left her to sacrifice herself on these cold cliffs, and he didn’t even know why.

  Then, in the midst of his blinding, searing grief, Gareth felt something change. The winds that blew so hard fell away, leaving a ringing in his ears. The whole of the air changed. The smell of the sea grew stronger, filling his mouth with the taste of salt, like tears, like blood.

  Light. Light coming toward him, moving over the cliffs. Light like the light he had seen on the moors. Light like the Morgaine had carried in the darkness to lure him away from Lynet’s door.

  “No!” he shouted, clasping Lynet to him. “No more! Get away from her!”

  But still the light came on. It mellowed and spread, and Gareth could see a woman. She was not young. Long years had made a map of themselves in the lines of her face. She was tall and strong, wearing a gown of white that trailed down over her feet. She smiled as he cringed back from her. She had green eyes, he saw. Even in the moonlight that leached all color from the world, he could tell they were green. Sea-green. But there was something of the shape of them, something in the way they looked into his.

  “Lynet?” he whispered.

  The lady’s smile fond. “Her mother was my daughter.” With a gentle hand she smoothed Lynet’s brow. “I tried to tell my Morwenna of the difficulty comes when our kind gives their love to mortal man. But love does not have such ears to hear these cautions.” She sighed. “I was very proud of her, my daughter. She remained true to him, as he to her.” Then she lifted her gaze to him and Gareth saw a sympathy as deep and old as the sea itself. “I am sorry for you, Gareth, Lot’s Son. This has been a long, sad tale this. So many fathers. So many sons. All betrayed so badly. Do you know why, Gareth?”