by Jay Ruud
“Bet your Cornish tuckas you are,” Gaheris muttered. “Aren’t we all?”
***
The queen’s private chambers were off the castle’s great hall beyond the throne room. There was a large outer chamber, where I expect her page Peter slept at night, as I had when I worked for her. It was separated from the inner chamber by a thick curtain, manned by the old clerk Master Holly, supervisor of the queen’s household. He recognized me as I approached with Sir Gaheris and rose from a small desk to greet me. “Ah, Master Gildas,” he said, squinting up at me, his welcoming countenance appearing no different from his most forbidding one: both were sour, pinched, and filled with suspicion. “I know that the queen is expecting you. Wait here and I will announce you.”
After a moment, Master Holly stepped back out and waved me in, returning quickly to the papers and figures on his desk. Sir Gaheris turned on his heel to face outward, and relaxed into his guard position. I stepped behind the curtain into the inner chamber and found the queen sitting with her ladies in waiting: Lady Vivien, Lady Anna, and her newest, the fourteen-year-old Lady Constance, eldest daughter of King Bagdemagus, another of Arthur’s vassals. On her right hand sat the lady Rosemounde, the Rose of the World and the bright star of my personal heaven. It had been more than a week since I had even glimpsed those deep brown eyes. Rosemounde’s dark hair was clasped behind her head by a golden pin, and she held some embroidery in her lap. She was not working on it now, for her eyes were looking into mine, searching, and when she caught my gaze the corner of her mouth curled up in her signature smirk. Something was going on between her and the queen, I could feel it.
The inner chamber was only about twenty feet square, and four of the women were embroidering items from their wardrobes, while Lady Anna had a book of romances open in her lap from which she must have been reading before I appeared. Her eyes rose from the book for a quick look at me and then darted quickly to her left to see what Guinevere would do.
“Gildas!” She cried. “It’s been far too long since I’ve seen you. No doubt your duties leave you little time to visit a poor lonely old queen.” I glanced quickly at Rosemounde, who was rolling her eyes, which made me smirk as well. “Oh, you find that amusing, young Gildas of Cornwall? Perhaps Sir Gareth needs to work with you on your courtly manners. And aside from that, look at the state of your clothes! You come before your queen covered with the dust of some pigsty?”
“My lady,” I stammered, as Rosemounde stifled a laugh. “I apologize for the state of my clothing.” Quickly I began brushing the dust of the lists off my hose and doublet, causing Lady Anna to cough and try to fan away the small dust cloud with her book. “Sir Gaheris brought me straight form the lists, where I had had…some misfortune with my horse.” I stopped brushing when Lady Vivian, too, started coughing. Then, regaining my poise, I added, “As for the smile, it was only the absurdity of your calling yourself ‘old’ that made me lose my composure for an instant. Your beauty is so ageless, your poise and charm so timeless, that I could think only that I had stumbled into someone else’s chamber by mistake. But when I saw you, my lady, your visage took away my breath, and I knew I was in your glorious presence.”
Now it was the queen’s turn to roll her eyes. “Glib as always I see, lad,” Guinevere answered. “But if you lost your breath, it was at the sight of the lady Rosemounde, I suspect, and not of me at all.”
“Indeed my lady, her proximity is so close, that it is difficult to divide the radiance that surrounds the two of you.”
“Oh, enough, Gildas, enough,” the Queen grumbled. “Ladies,” she announced, “my devoted servant Gildas has come to meet me in my private closet, with the lady Rosemounde in attendance. Continue your work. And your reading,” she said to Anna as she rose with Rosemounde and started for the door that led into her private quarters. “I shall have to forego hearing about Sir Guy of Warwick again,” she droned in a tired voice over her shoulder.
We entered the room, a rather small bedchamber of about fifteen feet square. The queen and Lady Rosemounde sat on the bed facing me, and I looked around the closet while they arranged their clothing in as seemly a manner as possible.
I had the honor only once before of being in this private room, and the furnishings looked familiar to me: floor-to-ceiling tapestries on three walls portraying, on the wall to my right, the martyrdom of Saint Agnes, tied naked to a stake and beheaded because she would not burn; on my left the story of St. Ursula, martyred with ten thousand virgins for her refusal to give up her chastity; and on the wall behind the bed a much more active heroine, Judith with the head of Holofernes.
On the wall behind me, above the fireplace that kept the small room warm no matter what the season, there hung a shield with the coat of arms of Leodegrance, King of Cameliard, Guinevere’s father, and with it a two-edged short sword in its scabbard—for decoration or defense I couldn’t say. But now that the ladies were comfortable side-by-side on the queen’s bed, I nodded and posed the obvious question:
“My ladies, you have sent for me. How can I be of service?”
“The matter of Sir Tristram,” the queen began without ceremony.
I shrugged. “Your Grace, I know no more of this matter than you do, probably less.”
“We haven’t brought you here to tell us what you know or don’t know, you silly thing,” Guinevere corrected me. “We want you to find Merlin.”
I started at that. I hadn’t seen the old man in months. And what could they want him for? “My lady,” I protested. “My lord Merlin has gone into his cave. He hasn’t been seen since the lady Nimue chose to marry Sir Florent, and took him away to live with her and the Lady of the Lake. The last thing he said to me was that he wanted to be left alone. Is it absolutely necessary…?”
My lady Rosemounde now spoke for the first time. “It may not be necessary but it is optimal,” she said.
“My lady Rosemounde,” I bowed to her. “I would gladly beard the lion in his den for you, which is not much different from bearding Merlin in his cave, but tell me why I need to rouse the old man. What has it to do with Sir Tristram?”
“We need Merlin’s expertise,” the queen answered. “And yours too, my boy, for I know you have been indispensable to him in the past. But he has helped us—helped me particularly—twice before in finding the truth in situations where someone has been falsely accused…”
“Yourself and Sir Florent, yes, your Grace. But who is it that has been falsely accused in this case?”
“My sister!” Lady Rosemounde stood up with some passion as she emphasized her point.
“The lady Rosemounde is anxious for her half-sister, the elder daughter of her father Duke Hoel,” Guinevere explained.
“Oh, what an idiot I’ve been. Isolde!”
“Of the White Hands,” Rosemounde added. “My older sister. She and my brother Kaherdin were the children of my father and his first mistress, Eleanor of Tours. She was nearly grown when I was born, and went off to serve as lady-in-waiting for Eleanor’s brother’s duchess. She later returned to live in Kaherdin’s palace. That was where she met Sir Tristram.”
“And where she married him,” I completed the thought. “But my lady, what has she been accused of?”
“She has been accused of nothing…yet,” the queen replied. “And it is important to keep it that way.”
Rosemounde was still agitated, but now sat back on the bed and strove to keep her emotions in check. “Everyone is saying it. Saying that she killed Tristram, if not with the spear that pierced him then with her cruel words that pierced his heart. My own Gildas, do you see how this affects me? I have not spoken with my sister in years. We were never close because of the age difference between us, but she is still of my kindred. If she is tainted with the accusation of murder, I am shamed along with my whole family. Oh Gildas, you saved my reputation once before. Can you and Merlin find a way to do so again?”
“Of course, if you and the mage plan to truly investigate these deaths, you will have to travel to Brittany. That is where the deaths took place. That is where the lady Isolde of the White Hands resides, as well as her brother Kaherdin, and this doctor who cared for Sir Tristram. Are you up for a sea journey? It should not be difficult, just a short sail across the channel.”
“Sail?” I glanced down, calculating the odds. It was going to be difficult enough just rousing Merlin from his melancholy. Getting him on board a ship seemed beyond imagining.
“The crown shall provide your transportation to and from Brittany,” the queen went on. “All you have to do is get to the bottom of this.”
“My lady,” I replied automatically, “for you and for the lady Rosemounde I would cross a thousand channels. If I cannot rouse Merlin to this task, I shall go myself to Brittany. I will seek to exonerate Isolde of the White Hands, and for myself will look to clear the name of my own lord, King Mark.”
Guinevere was taken slightly back. “I had forgotten, young Gildas of Cornwall, that you too have some stake in this. Your loyalty does you credit. But I urge you: get Merlin’s help.”
“Yes,” Rosemounde agreed, rising from the bed again. “Merlin is vital to the investigation.” She gave me her hand and I brushed my lips across it, catching a hint of rose petals as I kissed her skin that was softer than a baby’s, and, with a slight upturn of the right side of her mouth and a quick raise of her left eyebrow, she passed out of the room, leaving me alone with the queen.
“Well, young Gildas of Cornwall, your little lady seems to be quite infatuated with you now. You’re her hero on the great white horse, apparently. Don’t botch it, my boy!” So she still felt the way she had when I was her page: comfortable dropping the formality while I was present and finding it easier to let her guard down with me than she was even with her own ladies, Rosemounde included.
“I still need to train myself into knighthood,” I answered “Which would be a lot easier to do if I weren’t running off to Brittany on a royal whim,” I answered in the same vein. “I can never win Rosemounde’s hand until I am ennobled by knighthood, since unlike you and she, my queen, I am not of noble birth.”
“And yet have desires far beyond your station. Don’t be a fool, Gildas. By sending you on this mission I am endearing you to the lady Rosemounde’s heart. For that matter, her father the duke may himself be grateful to the young man who clears the name of his elder daughter, a name which, as Rosemounde is well aware, is now a hissing. Win over the daughter and the father, and your dream may come true.”
I had not considered these possibilities, and naturally took great heart at the queen’s words. “So you do think there is a chance after all that I may ultimately win her?”
“She will marry whomsoever her father and the king think will best undergird the stability and the security of the realm. I would not mislead you about that. The lady Rosemounde stands to inherit the duchy of Brittany: her half-brother and sister were not born to Duke Hoel’s lawful wife, and even though he has legitimized them and provided for their living, Rosemounde is his heir. I will not deceive you, my young friend, there is but a slim chance of your being the lucky one. Sir Florent was an obvious choice, as Sir Gawain’s heir and prince of Orkney. But that, as you know, fell through. Your only hope is to be the salvation of the house of Brittany, and win the girl through gratitude. At least this gives you a chance.”
“A chance, yes,” I answered. “But what if I find nothing? I hope to clear the name of King Mark as well, but what if I find that he and Isolde of Brittany are as guilty as everyone is saying? It’s as likely I’ll raise Lady Rosemounde’s ire as her gratitude.”
Guinevere shrugged. “The truth will out. The messenger often gets the blame. You might lie about what you find…come back with a story that exonerates both Isolde and Mark, and stand by it.”
I didn’t know whether she was testing me or making a serious suggestion. But I didn’t like it. And I let her know that indirectly when I said, “Deception has never been my forte, my lady. I know for some it is second nature, and a great deal of deception was certainly wound up in this story of Tristram and Le Belle Isolde. Which reminds me, it was Sir Lancelot who first voiced suspicion of King Mark. I got the feeling he was reading his own story into the finale of Tristram’s.”
The queen’s manner changed abruptly and her tone returned to the haughtiness of transcendent majesty: “Do you dare suggest, Gildas of Cornwall, that the king can be compared with a petty tyrant like your Mark? Or that Lancelot would engage in deception? Bring that up in his presence and you may well forfeit your life. You are to investigate this matter. You are to go to Brittany in the company of our servant Merlin, as his assistant. Neither the lady Rosemounde nor I believe that you have the maturity or the cunning to find the truth of this matter on your own. Go now. This interview is at an end.” With that, she gathered her skirts and swept out of the room as I bowed after her.
“Yes, your Grace,” I said to her retreating back. But mentally I kicked myself. Never learn, do you Gildas? I asked.
Chapter Three
Merlin
The bells of the convent of Saint Mary Magdalene just southeast of the castle were tolling sext when I exited the queen’s chamber and stepped out into the courtyard of the castle. Since I was certainly likely to miss the midday meal if I were going to visit Merlin’s cave, I got it in my head to stop by the kitchen and see if I might beg Roger, the chief cook, for a bit of bread and cheese to tide me over until I returned. The kitchen, a one-story structure along the castle wall with a covered passageway connecting it to the great hall, lay just across the lower bailey, the main courtyard of the castle. But if you didn’t know where it was, you could always just follow your nose. Or your ears. The doors of the kitchen were wide open, as they were even on cold days, but on a warm spring morning so close to Whitsunday, the cooks and kitchen lads inside needed fresh air in those close quarters. Pigs were cooking on spits and the aroma of pork wafted across the courtyard along with the din of furious activity within. But other smells and sounds were coming from the pen to the left of the open doors as I approached, where four goats, three cows, a dozen sheep and some chickens were making their own rough din. I peeked through the doors and called to the back of the first cook I saw. When he turned, I saw he was not Roger, but one of the new kitchen lads, Jerome.
“Jerome!” I begged. “I’ve got to head out on the queen’s business. Can you give me a bite to eat on the run?”
“Give us a minute,” Jerome said through the greasy brown hair that hung in his face. He turned and ducked to his right, first opening the baking oven and grabbing a small piece of bread, and then picking up a large knife and walking over to one of the four fireplaces along the right wall, where two other kitchen boys were turning a whole hog on a spit. He used the knife to chop off a good piece of pork and handed it to me with the bread. The pork, coming from the crispy outer part of the meat, was quite well done, and I admit I made a comment to that effect.
“Well, like my father always used to say, when it’s brown it’s cooking, when it’s black it’s done. If we’d a’ known you was coming, we’d ’ave ’ad better cuisine and a bottle of our best wine for the likes of Gildas, the most important squire in Camelot.”
“Yes, yes, and Arthur’s seneschal Sir Kay himself to wait on me, I suppose,” I took the joking good naturedly, as it was intended. “Well, I see you’re stocking up the animal pen for Whitsunday now. Expecting as big a crowd as usual at the feast are we?”
“Bigger, big
ger, my lad. The great feast of Pentecost, and we’ve got more animals coming in every day. We’ll be feeding all the knights of the Table, I understand, as well as visiting dignitaries; most of Arthur’s vassals’ll be ’ere to see Mordred and Perceval made knights of the Order. The king’s sister, Morgan la Fay, might even be coming down, as well as the Lady of the Lake. Big doings, that.”
“Ah,” I replied. “Can’t wait.” Clearly preparations for a trip to Brittany could not be made so quickly that I would be leaving before the great feast four days hence. Besides, I really wanted to be there. It was the social event of the season, after all.
Merlin’s cave was within walking distance and through a thickly wooded area, so I opted not to stop by the livery to get a mount from Taber, the stable keeper. Instead I strode toward the guardhouse and barbican, finishing my bread and meat along the way. But as I passed under the barbican to cross the drawbridge a familiar voice called out from the guard tower above the gate.
“Halt! Stop and justify yourself, you bloody dolt of a Cornishman!” It was Robin Kempe, captain of the King’s Archers and devoted thorn in my side. I couldn’t see him but I knew his voice anywhere.