THE WARRIOR QUEEN (The Guinevere Trilogy Book 1)

by Lavinia Collins

  “My lady, you are not well.”

  I shook my head.

  Somewhere deep inside me a voice said This is a bad idea. You are angry with Arthur. You are drunk. He is taking you to your bed. This is a bad idea. But it was too far away, and my head was too swimming with heat and lights to take it in. I liked the feel of arms around me, gentle, guiding arms that wanted nothing from me, and the cold air outside.

  When he took me inside, to the tower that held my rooms, I felt the difference, too. Quiet, not like the busy hall, and cool, empty of other people and fire and smoke and noise. The stairs were hard, and I felt my feet drag every step of the way, but I also felt Lancelot’s breath brush against my ear, and I heard his voice, close by my ear, murmuring to me, telling me it wasn’t far.

  When we reached my chamber, I thought he would leave. He had been nervous to meet my eye in public, but now we were alone it did not seem he was shy at all. He came inside with me, and set me down on the bed. My heavy eyes fluttered closed, and I only opened them again when I felt a cool, wet cloth against my face. I opened them, feeling sharper already, to see he was kneeling over me, on the bed. He was so close. I could smell the already-familiar clean smell of his skin, I could see the pale blue of a vein beneath his chin, only a trace against the thin, soft skin there. I followed the touch of his hand and the cool cloth with my face, relishing it. I sighed in gentle relief at its cool touch, or perhaps it was at having him close by. He was so near, so near. My eyes fluttered closed again as the cool cloth moved away, and I felt fingers, light and deft in my hair, unpinning the gold net, and teasing the curls loose from their braid. I let my fingers reach out lazily, and brush against his arm. Now the opportunity was before me, I could not resist but touch.

  “Where are your women?” he whispered by my ear. He was close enough that if I turned my head towards him, we would kiss.

  “I don’t know,” I murmured. He sighed and pressed a cool hand against my brow. I made a little noise of pleasure. Then he moved away, and I felt him pull the shoes from my feet. I wriggled my toes in relief.

  Then I felt his hand on my brow again and my eyes fluttered open, suddenly light. I opened them to see him lying beside me, propped up on an elbow. His eyes were full of thoughtful concern.

  “What happened to you?” he wondered aloud to himself, quietly. “You ate and drank as we all did. What has made you so ill?”

  He noticed my eyes were open and let his hand trail down to stroke my cheek lightly with the backs of his fingers. He sighed very softly again. It seemed, then, he leaned closer, as though drawn by some magnetic force, and if I could have moved I would have drawn him to me. I knew he was going to kiss me again, but then the door flew open and I could hear Marie and Christine chattering away; I could hear their happy voices thick with wine, and Lancelot took his leave of them, and of me, and slipped away. Marie and Christine stripped me off my dress and folded me into the bed. Christine put the back of her hand against my head and clicked her tongue in disapproval.

  “She has a terrible fever. Tell the King he should come back tomorrow,” she said to Marie.

  So Arthur had come for me. To punish me, perhaps, or to collect what he felt he deserved. I rolled over in bed, to press my face against the cool side of the pillow. Arthur would have to wait.

  Chapter Seventeen

  In the morning, my head throbbed, but the fever was gone. Propped up in bed with pillows, Marie brought me porridge with honey. She did not look well either. Behind her back, Margery made a gesture telling me not to ask as I began to, and Marie looked relieved that I did not. I hoped her weary caste had nothing to do with Gawain.

  Arthur came to see me, mid-morning, to see if I was well. He did not mention what I had said to him, and he seemed concerned and kind. Perhaps he had forgotten. He kissed me tenderly and told me he was going out hunting with some of the knights. I nodded, and kissed him goodbye. I was glad he did not want to stay. I still felt weary and fragile, and I was unsure yet whether I was still angry with him, or not.

  I felt embarrassed about letting Lancelot rescue me again, and foolish. I was not so sure in the cold light of day that Morgan had put something strange in my cup. Or at least, it appeared not to be my cup alone. Half the castle was groaning with regret. These woad-faced druids never seemed to do anyone that much good.

  I dressed in a simple dress of purple wool, and plaited my hair into a simple coil. I did not feel like much adornment today, but I did put the little golden circlet of leaves around my hair.

  As I walked down towards the courtyard, I glanced into the room where I usually sat with my ladies. Morgan was sat there alone, with a smug little smile on her face, innocently embroidering a little piece of silk, her white-and-blue hands dextrously guiding needle and silk to and fro. I hurried by, unwilling to speak with her.

  Outside in the courtyard, a pale winter sun was already overhead in a clear, frosty sky. It was a beautiful day already. A few of the knights were in the courtyard, though fewer than usual, and those that were there were not fighting, but were brushing their horses, or sharpening their swords. I was afraid that they might remember my shouting, but they did not seem to, greeting me in their usual friendly manner as I went by. I recognised Kay among them, and Gareth, but the others were men I did not know. Kay walked over, leaving his horse snorting steam and stamping against the hard earth of the yard.

  Kay whistled through his teeth and shook his head.

  “If they all drank like that the day they took Rome, it’s a miracle they made it back alive.”

  I noticed that Gawain was not down in the yard, and smiled, though I still felt a little embarrassed. Kay put a hand on my shoulder.

  “Are you feeling better? Arthur said you were ill.”

  I couldn’t tell if he remembered or not, or if I should be embarrassed about what I had done. I nodded.

  “Is he out here?” I asked, looking around, but I was not really looking for Arthur.

  “He rode out early with my father and Bors, to do some hunting. Best cure for a night of too much wine, he seemed to think.”

  I did not know who Bors was, but I was getting used to hearing names I did not recognise around my own court.

  “You weren’t ill, were you?”

  I looked back to Kay, sharply, and his mischievous face was suddenly filled with an impish, intense seriousness. I wrinkled my forehead into a frown.

  “I was.”

  “Maybe you thought you were. You know the cup you drank from was not meant for you.”

  “What do you mean?”

  But I did not hear what he meant, because striding across the yard, out from the stables, came Lancelot, and though Kay had begun to speak, somehow I couldn’t hear him; it sounded like the rushing of waves on the shore, or the wind. He stopped, when he saw that I was looking away, and followed my gaze. When he saw Lancelot, he made a little ‘hmmm’ noise, deep in his throat, and if I had been able to, I would have challenged him on it, but I was not.

  “You’re up – are you well now?” Lancelot asked, breathlessly. After days of him avoiding me, speaking to me as little as possible, I was finding it hard to take in him rushing across the courtyard to speak to me. The little clouds of our breath mingled between us in the cold air, as I stood in silence, suddenly feeling the intensity of my embarrassment rooting me to the spot, stilling my tongue into silence. I wished I had not come down; I wished I had hidden away for a day, at least.

  “She’s well.” Kay spoke for me, and Lancelot nodded brusquely.

  “Good,” he said, not looking away from me. “I’m glad you are well, my lady.”

  Kay shifted on his feet beside me; I could feel him getting annoyed, though I did not know why.

  “That cup was meant for you,” Kay said suddenly, and Lancelot turned to him, confusion written deep on his face. “Morgan prepared that cup for you, but before Guinevere arrived you switched them around because you spotted some speck of dirt on hers, and you thought the Qu
een ought to have the finer cup.” Kay was labouring the point, but he didn’t need to. Lancelot shook his head thoughtfully.

  “You told me not to.”

  “I told you not to,” Kay agreed, his voice full of bitter victory.

  Why would Morgan want to drug Lancelot? I was not surprised if she desired him for a husband; after all, he was unmarried and handsome, and of an age with her, or thereabouts. Married to that fat old man, she had probably longed for a man like him, but I did not see how plying him with potions to knock him out would have helped her in that endeavour. I toyed with the idea that he might marry one of the women at court. It was not impossible; in fact it was highly likely. Perhaps he had even come back with Arthur to find a wife. All those young and unmarried men and women together in Camelot – spring would be the season for making new marriages, now that the war was over. I did not think I would like it very much, but I could not say exactly why. A woman has no claim over her champion, just as she has no claim over her husband.

  Gareth was calling Kay over for a fight, and he shrugged in frustration and left. Neither Lancelot nor I had given what he had to say our full attention, or at least the kind of attention he had wanted. I supposed vaguely that I ought to tell Arthur, rather than running up to my rooms and accosting Morgan with it myself. I was wary, too, of being alone with another druid. Still, I was struck with quite a burning desire to know what she might want with an unconscious Lancelot.

  “Are you busy down here now?” I said to Lancelot. Obviously, he had been lost in his thoughts as well, because when I spoke he glanced up with surprise, as though he had been shaken from some reverie. He did not seem all that bothered that whatever drug Morgan had put in my cup had been meant for him. I was a little pleased that he was not thinking of her. Though not pretty, she was proud and beautiful in her own way, and as the King’s sister it would not have been a match beneath him.

  “No,” he replied.

  I was struck with an idea, one that might provide me with the opportunity to question Morgan, but not leave me alone with her and nothing more than other women – all of whom I knew I was stronger than – for my protection. I wished that Nimue was somewhere to be found, too. I would put my trust in her magic against Morgan’s, since it was she who had shut Merlin beneath the rock. I was still wary of her from the forest, but she seemed to be mostly benign.

  “Will you come and read to me? I don’t read in French, and I have a book –”

  He nodded, and I smiled. It was only half a lie. I did not read as well in French as I did in English or Breton, but I could understand the book well enough. I was surprised that he agreed so readily. Somewhere at the back of my mind, I wondered also if it was an excuse to be alone with him again, but if it was then surely it was innocent. I had decided that it would be, and drugged as I had been, it had been so last night. A sudden flood of memory came over me, of his face close to mine, and the feeling, strong within me, that we had been about to kiss. No, I had imagined it. It had been what I had drunk. I had imagined it, it was in my head, along with everything I felt, and it was under control.

  When we came up to the room beneath my chamber, it was empty. Morgan had melted away back into whatever murky shadows she had come from. I felt an unsettling mixture of disappointment and relief. I would have liked to know. Lancelot stood in the doorway, looking around at the piles of cushions and the fur rugs on the floor, wondering where to sit. I went to the corner of the room and found the book. It was a small, leather-bound volume, lettered in gold on the front, a French translation of Ovid. It was a terribly dull book, and rude throughout about women, but now we were here, and there was no witch to confront, I thought I would like very much to lie against the cushions with my eyes closed and listen to him read, if just to hear the sound of his voice. I wondered why he had agreed to come. He could have made any excuse, but he had come.

  I walked over and handed him the book. I let our hands brush as I passed it to him. Now I had remembered my resolution to be in control, I could enjoy the tingling sensation the touch of his skin gave mine. I could enjoy being close to him, touching him, and do no wrong.

  I settled myself down on a pile of pillows and lay back, closing my eyes.

  “Where do you want me to begin?” he asked. I felt him sit down beside me, quite close, but with a decorous space in-between that I felt almost humming with anticipation. I peeped out under an eyelid and watched him settle into place, a pillow behind his back, one knee drawn up to his chest with the book balanced open on it, the other leg stretched out long before him.

  “At the start, when the gods create the waters,” I replied, closing my eyes properly once more.

  He laughed softly. I had not heard the sound before, though I had seen it from across the yard. It was soft and deep, and lovely. I felt it gorgeously all around me.

  “You know this book already.” I could hear from his voice that he was smiling. What had changed? He had lost whatever it was that had been making him wary of me. Suddenly, it was as though a veil had lifted. Perhaps it was me; perhaps it was that I no longer seemed tense, and anxious.

  “I don’t remember well,” I lied.

  “Hmmmm.” I heard him flip through the pages of the book. “Since you know the creation so well already, I will read you, hmmm, the story of the gossiping raven. Do you know that one?”

  “No,” I lied again, settling deeper into the pillows. He knew this book well, then. Arthur did not know any literature, not really. He had proudly told me once that he had read the Bible, though I did not think he could have done because it was written all in Latin and even I did not understand those strange and unfamiliar words.

  He began to read. I wasn’t listening to the words, and some of them were unfamiliar anyway, the way he said them. We Bretons read the French all wrong, I had been told a hundred times, and I had only ever heard Christine read it to me, awkwardly and in halting stops. On Lancelot’s tongue the poetry flowed smooth and low, and though I did not understand it all, I felt it all the way through me. I loved, more than anything, just to listen to his voice. More beautiful still in his own language than in English. I was glad the book I had chosen was so long.

  After a while, I heard him ask.

  “Are you sleeping?”

  I laughed softly. I was not surprised he thought so, since I had been lying still with my eyes shut for so long, and shook my head.

  He began to read another tale from the book, but halfway through – just as a woman was changing into a bear – I heard Arthur’s voice from the doorway shatter my lovely dream.

  “What will my country come to, if you take all my best knights away to read to you?” Arthur laughed from the doorway. I opened my eyes suddenly, and sat up. Unaccountably, I felt as though I had been caught at something I should not be doing. But he did not seem angry about it, nor about the feast the evening before, and I was relieved.

  Arthur had come to find Lancelot, to train at fighting with him. He had got used to war, I supposed, and did not know what to do when he wasn’t fighting. Lancelot put the book down gently beside me, and followed Arthur as he left. I was sorry to see him go. I was left alone with my thoughts. I closed my eyes and tried to remember the sound of Lancelot’s voice.

  That night, Arthur came to my chamber. I did not mind, and I was glad he was not angry with me. I was glad, too, of the oblivion of his powerful touch, the all-consuming fierceness of his desire. We did not speak, and he held me fast to him, as though he felt that I might slip through his fingers, and melt away into the night. I realised then that I was glad of his desire, his need for me. It kept me anchored to him. Without it, I was afraid I would float away, like a dandelion seed into the wind. I liked the rough way he held me, and when he was inside me I felt a sense of rightness and belonging, of the wholesomeness of our togetherness. I wanted, in a way, to belong to someone, and I liked the urgency of his desire. I wanted it; I wanted him to want me. To have that pressing physical need for me. I could close my
eyes and lose myself in the intensity of his desire.

  When he blew the candles out, and we lay in the darkness, as we always did, with my head on his chest and his arms around me, he spoke at last.

  “Guinevere, I hope that you know how I love you, I hope that you would not think – I hope that you feel I always treat you kindly, and... think of your wishes, as well as my own.”

  He did remember last night. I put my hands beneath my chin and looked up at him in the dark. I couldn’t really seem him, just a black shape against the darkness, but I could feel his chest rise and fall under my hands, could hear his breathing close beside me.

  “Of course, of course. It was just the drink.” There were not words enough, or the right words, for what I really wanted to say. To say, I wanted it and I didn’t want it. I needed it, it held us close together. There were only words to say that all was well. He leaned up to kiss me lightly and then sighed with content. His thoughts were simply soothed, and I was glad of it tonight.

  “I know things have been different with us, since the war. I have been busy. But the knights coming here from all around will make Camelot, and Logrys, and Britain great. It is something as King I have to do. I have to show them my strength, and the grandness of my court. I know it has been hard. And I have missed you.”

  I made a noise of agreement, and he kissed my hair.

  “It was Morgan, you know, with the drink,” he added, after a short quiet. I was shocked. He knew. He did not seem too worried about it. “And I know it was meant for Lancelot.” What? “Oh, she’s harmless really. She’s just been in love with him since we were children. He was an orphan child, raised on Avalon not far from where she was raised. He used to stay with us, sometimes, when we were all boys together, he Kay and I, and so would Morgan; of course, I didn’t know then that she came because she was my sister. Well, she always liked him. Used to follow him around. She and he would have been about fifteen, I suppose, a little older than I was. Well, it turned out that she wasn’t a maiden when she married Uriens, and he came to me blustering and complaining about it and I offered him the choice of living with it, or rejecting the King’s sister, and he decided that it wasn’t so important after all. Anyway, a lot of people said that was Lancelot, though there are others who say it was Kay. Some even say it was Merlin, because he was around often enough. I don’t know. But anyway, the other day she came to me, dragging Lancelot with her, demanding that I marry them. I suppose she had been waiting to get free of old Uriens for a long time. I offered him the choice, and he said he thought marriage was well enough for kings, but not for him. He didn’t want to leave fighting and adventures to care for a wife. He said he was not the sort of man to take a wife. Well, I doubt if it was either him or Kay, anyway.” He shifted under me, gently pulling me closer. He seemed suddenly hesitant. “Kay and he, well, when we were that age they used to sleep in the same bed.” That didn’t seem that odd to me. Breton boys or girls often shared with relatives if there was not enough room. “Kay seems to have grown out of it, but Lancelot... I don’t know.” I realised what he meant. “He never took any of the women who came with the camp to Rome to his bed. He’s quiet. I’m not surprised he didn’t want Morgan, but he doesn’t want any woman. But he might truly just want a life of fighting. With him, I can’t tell.” He sighed and kissed my forehead. I could feel he was settling down to sleep. I supposed I ought not to be surprised; many young men were so with one another. I just did not – could not – believe that things were still so with Lancelot. “I’m glad you had him read to you. I was afraid that the two of you did not like one another. I never saw you speak together before. It’s good. A queen should show some favour to her champion.”