Isolde

by Isolde (v1. 1) [html]

  A precious dawn of hope sprang in her heart. Then Isolde could love him and take him to her bed. She would go the way of all women and have a child. A new queen would be born, and a clutch of young princes, too… Her mind blossomed with a garland of tender thoughts and dreams. She smiled, and her face shed ten years. Sturdy boys and rosy, blooming girls. New life—new love—

  She prowled the spare white chamber, thrilling with joy. Who was the pilgrim? Now she had to know. She threw open the chest that held his effects and laughed for joy. Inside lay the pearl-white armor of the stranger knight, bloodstained and battered, but unmistakable.

  "So, sir!" The blood coursed through her veins. "Who are you?" she breathed. "Tell me your name?"

  Beneath the bed was a battered saddlebag of ox hide. It held a shirt or two and a spare pair of shoes, a thick woollen cloak and a cap for the rain. His pilgrim's apparel—nothing more. She tossed it aside.

  In the last corner stood a stout cupboard, locked now and the key gone. The Queen laughed. In her own palace, the key she carried opened every door. She was still laughing when the door swung back and she saw inside.

  A great sword stood upright on the point of its scabbard, crying out softly in a high, urgent whine. Hearing the sound, the Queen began to shake. For the metal in the pouch around her neck was calling out too.

  In a trance she opened the pouch and the silver sliver within quivered like raw flesh at her touch. The truth was here, she knew it, she could smell Marhaus's blood. With both hands she reached for the scabbard and drew out the sword. Halfway down, there was a jagged gap in the blade.

  The truth, the truth—

  Trembling violently, she pulled the shard of metal from its pouch and fitted it to the gap. With a sigh, the great sword shivered and took back its own. As the Queen watched transfixed, the blade embraced the broken piece and the jagged edges came together as if they had never been apart.

  "No!"

  The Queen whirled the sword around her head and hurled it from the room. Then she fell to her knees, babbling Marhaus's name.

  "This is the sword of Tristan of Lyonesse. He killed my love, and I will have revenge!"

  Chapter 25

  Overhead the owls called from the bell tower and a harvest moon proclaimed a cloudless night. In the quiet of the infirmary, Isolde and Brangwain had finished binding up the pilgrim's wounds. The lamp light shone on many new gashes on his shoulders and arms, and he was gray from loss of blood. But pale, weak, and shivering, he was alive.

  Goddess, Mother, thanks. Isolde reached for a vial of cordial and tried to smile.

  When she found him near death in his chamber, she had one thought only, to try to stanch his wounds. But as she tore back the sheet, the glory of his long pale body dazzled her eyes, and a dancing, singing bliss pervaded her heart. Trust to your knight, Cormac had said. He will come. She wanted the music within her to play through the world. I trusted to him, and he came.

  At the time, Brangwain had made short work of calling up the servants and getting him to the infirmary, leaving a maid to tidy up his room. Now Brangwain was tactfully occupying herself elsewhere in the room and they might have been alone in the universe.

  I will know my knight when he comes—

  He lay before her in the moonlight and the beauty of him made her soul ache. She saw his strong, well-featured face, full of haunting angles and shadowed planes, and wanted to run her finger around his long, full mouth. In repose his eyelids were as pale as harebells, and she could count every one of the veins beneath the delicate skin. His thick hair fell around his shoulders, and he smelled of willow and heartsease, all the herbs she had used to cleanse and heal his hurts.

  I could …. I could ... I could ...

  Watching him, she slipped into a gentle dream. Goddess, Mother, tell me—is this love!

  He opened his eyes. She saw him swiftly review his surroundings, then struggle to sit up. She came forward with the cordial to revive his heart.

  "Drink this, sir," she said. She did not say, Who are you? I know you are my knight.

  "Thank you." He raised his head, took a sip of the drink, and gave her a pallid smile. "Once again, lady, I owe you my life."

  "And I owe you more," she replied fervently. "My life and freedom from Palomides." The joy of it ran coursing through her veins. "How did you come to fight for me? I left you sick in your bed."

  He shook his head. "I walked out along the high road, looking for knights on their way to the tournament. Most of them were too small for me, or poorly armed. Then a good big knight came along and I offered him all the money I had to lend me his horse and trappings for the day." He smiled wanly. "He told me he wanted to fight for the Princess himself. So I fought him unarmed till he yielded to me."

  "Unarmed?" Her eyes widened. "So you were injured before the tournament began?"

  "Yes. But Palomides had been fighting all afternoon, so that made it fair."

  "You're a true knight indeed," Isolde said, glowing with pride.

  He winced and drew back. "I'm a pilgrim," he said awkwardly. "Not a knight."

  She gave a merry laugh. "Any knight could learn from you!" Then she saw his face and grew serious. "But you must have had some knighthood training at least. Where did you learn your chivalry?"

  He stared at the ceiling, and seemed to be composing his thoughts. "My father was… a poor man," he ventured at last. "But he put me to service in a college of knights. Watching them, I picked up all I know."

  "Oh, sir—"

  Suddenly she did not care if he was a poor harpist or the runaway son of a king. I am your lady, she was about to say, and you are my knight. Then she would lean down and seal the bargain with a kiss.

  "What now; lady?" he said abruptly, before she could speak. She saw he was watching the door, his eyes hard and wary and his face set.

  "What do you mean?" she said, offended by his tone. "You are safe here with me."

  "Not for long, lady," he rasped, "when the Queen your mother learns what I have done."

  Gods above, yes! How could I forget? She bowed her head, struggling with feelings she could not name.

  "She will be angry," she acknowledged reluctantly, "but there's nothing to fear. You acted within the rules of chivalry. The Queen will not threaten you in any way."

  "What?" He stared at her in wild disbelief. "She will try to take my life!"

  How dare he? The angry color flooded her cheeks. "We are not savages, sir, in the Western Isle. Believe me, my mother is a lady and a Queen!"

  I do not believe you, said his level, gray-eyed stare. And in this world, ladies and queens both kill.

  Fury flooded her. "Believe me, pilgrim," she said hotly, "hospitality is sacred in the Western Isle. Our queens do not make war upon their guests—"

  She broke off. Standing in the doorway was a bedraggled maid clutching a sword almost as long as herself. Her mouth was working and she trembled piteously.

  "What—" The pilgrim reared up with a strangled cry, staring at the sword.

  "The Queen!" the girl gabbled, beginning to weep.

  "Now don't upset yourself, child!" Brangwain crossed the room in two or three strides. She drew the servant forward, patting her hand. "Tell the Princess what you saw."

  Isolde watched the little drudge approaching, her mind aflame. What had the Queen discovered? What did she know?

  The girl was babbling out her tale through her tears. "The Queen came in raging for the pilgrim and sent me away but I was too feared to go. She was quiet at first, talking to her Gods. Then she went into the chest of armor and chuckled and laughed."

  Isolde looked at the pilgrim. His face was covered in a sick sheen of fear. "So she knows you were the stranger knight."

  The servant sniveled and wiped her nose with her hand. "Then she came to the cupboard behind the door and laughed again. It was locked, but she's the Queen, she had the key." She nodded her greasy head up and down. "And she found this sword."

  Isolde saw he
r patient shudder, his eyes out on stalks.

  "Enough!" he cried.

  The maid turned to Isolde. "But I heard her, lady, crying for murder and vengeance and naming—"

  "No more!" the pilgrim shouted. "Be gone!" He leapt from the bed and seized Isolde's hand. "Lady, you see now why I have to leave?"

  A chasm seemed to open at her feet. I did not know my mother could be like this. "Yes," she said hollowly. "It seems the Queen is more angry than I thought."

  He was very pale. "I beat Palomides and thwarted her plan for you. Now she seeks vengeance and she wants my blood."

  Isolde drew a long shuddering breath. "There'll be a ship in the harbor. We must get you away."

  Brangwain swung into action. "Fetch a lamp, girl," she cried.

  Fearfully they huddled the pilgrim into a cloak and made their way out of the infirmary and down to the quay. A ship was leaving on the night tide, and if the captain had any qualms about the muffled passenger, his conscience was eased by the exchange of gold. Brangwain made her farewells to the pilgrim and left with the maid. Before Isolde knew it, the ship was ready to sail and they stood on the edge of the dock to say good-bye.

  The rising wind was heavy with salt tears and sobbing in the shrouds like a soul forlorn. He stood before her swaying on his feet, the outlines of his face etched with moonlight and pain. She reached up and touched his cheek.

  "I was your lady," she said. "You were my knight."

  "Every man seeks the woman of the dream," he said huskily. "And I have dreamed of you my whole life long." He drew the ring off his finger and took her hand. "Wear this for me. I shall give it to only one woman in my life."

  It was the circlet of emeralds she had seen on his hand when he first arrived. I knew even then it was a woman's ring. I never knew it was mine.

  The green stones flashed and danced in the starlight's glow. "Emeralds for the greenwood, and for the sea," he said. "And for your emerald eyes." He slipped it onto the fourth finger of her left hand and gave a desperate laugh. "And now your mother hates me, and I have to go." She could see his eyes gleaming with an unearthly light. "But for that, I would never leave your side."

  She nodded, in a dream of sickness. I shall never be well again, now that you have gone. "Nor would I leave you," she cried.

  "Tide's turning, sir," the captain cried from the ship. "All aboard!"

  He groaned like a tree torn up by its roots. "Must I go? It's like parting the sea from the land—it cannot be—"

  "It must be," she said dully. "When hospitality fails, revenge is sacred in the Western Isle, if my mother has sworn an oath, she will never take it back."

  "I shall return!" he cried desperately.

  She heard the night wind sighing round the ship and her heart grew cold. The sailors were loosening the gangplank from the quay.

  "Do not say so, sir," she forced out. "If the Queen hates you so much, it cannot be. The future for us is written in water and blood. The Mother Herself cannot turn back the tide."

  "Aboard, sir—come aboard!"

  Somewhere in the palace she could hear wolfhounds baying on a steady, hunting note. In the darkness above, torches were springing up, and the searchers would soon find their way down to the shore. She lifted her head.

  "You must go," she said.

  He caught her hand and brought it to her lips. "Lady, lady," he muttered frantically, "I can't leave till I've told you the truth."

  The cold now had possessed her, body and soul. "What d'you mean?"

  He closed his eyes. He was trembling from head to foot. "I told you I was born a child of grief. I didn't tell you that my mother named me for her sadness when I was born. When she thought of her sorrow, her tristesse, she called me—"

  "—Tristan!"

  Isolde groaned. A lightning bolt of understanding split her brain. "You are Sir Tristan of Lyonesse, the Cornish champion!"

  He gripped her hands. "And I killed Sir Marhaus, the Queen's chosen one!"

  She tore herself away. Fury flooded her. "And then came here to gloat?"

  "No, no!" he cried in anguish. "Merlin prophesied—"

  "Merlin, Merlin!"

  She was beside herself. "You came here as our enemy and deceived us all! You passed yourself off as a beggar when you're the son of a king. Even today—" She could hardly speak for rage. "'My father was a poor man, I am not a knight!'" she mimicked savagely. "'I come from Terre Foraine. Gods above, every word you said was a lie!"

  "Not every word," he said. He was very pale. "When I told you—"

  "Enough!" she cried. She gestured toward the sea. "Sir Tristan, there lies your way. Be thankful my mother has been cheated of her revenge. Take your wretched life, and try to live better elsewhere."

  His mother's ring flashed in the cold moonlight, the emeralds reproaching her with every winking green flame.

  "Go!" she howled, mad with grief. "Go! You are nothing to me." She turned and strode away. "Farewell!"

  "Lady, lady—" His agony rang off the headland and knocked against the sky.

  "Farewell, sir," she shouted as she went. She did not look back.

  From the headland above the bay, she watched the ship sail away, beating down the silvery avenue of the moon. Her fire had faded and she felt cold and sick. Muttering to herself, she tried to raise a curse to pursue his ship and haunt his days and nights. But her mind could reprise only one haunting refrain.

  I have lost my knight. I have lost the only true love in the world.

  Chapter 26

  Lost-

  All lost—

  The cold on the headland chilled her body to the bone. The rain ran down her face and soaked into her flesh, till every part of her was weeping for the man who had gone. Weeping? She heard her own laughter above the rising storm. Weeping for a man whose name she never knew?

  Tantris—Tristan—taunter—trickster—whoever he was, did it matter now?

  Behind her she could hear the wolfhounds closing in. Turning, she saw a line of torches with her mother at the head. Her gown and headdress fluttering in the wind, the Queen flew into view like an avenging saint.

  "Where is he, Isolde?" she howled. "Where has he gone?"

  The face in the torchlight was childlike, naked, crazed. Isolde felt her heart heaving in her breast.

  "He's gone, Mother," she said, crushing her feelings down. "Gone, and he'll never trouble us again."

  "Gone?" The Queen gasped. Her eyes rolled like a woman in a fit. "You helped him get away?"

  "Mother, I had no choice," she said dully. "The Goddess forbids us to take the life of a guest Whatever he did, he came here in peace, and such a man is sacred, you know that."

  "I swore to have revenge." The Queen's lovely face shone upward through her tears.

  "The Mother teaches us to welcome all who come," Isolde insisted. "As she welcomes and feeds us with the four holy things."

  "The four…" She could see the Queen struggling to comprehend—

  "The Cauldron of Plenty and the Loving Cup—the Sword of Power and the Spear of Light?"

  "Yes." Isolde raised her eyes to the dark void above. "These are our lodestars from the days of the Shining Ones." She felt like a dry husk. "And we must keep the faith."

  "Oh, Isolde," the Queen cried. She clutched at Isolde and reeled like a bird in the wind. "He killed Marhaus!"

  The Queen's scream was lost in the baying of the hounds. The smell of torches, dogs, and men was all round them now. Over the Queen's shoulder she could see a band of knights, every one armed to the teeth, sword and dagger in hand. In the forefront, Sir Tolen stood ready for action, a brutal, stupid look on his handsome young face.

  "Death to the traitor!" he cried, rattling his sword. "Where is he, Princess?"

  "Oh, sir—"

  Gently but firmly she disengaged herself from the Queen. "Call off your dogs, madam," she said in a low, insistent tone. "Their quarry has gone."

  "My knights? No!" The Queen's face crumpled. "I can't do that." H
er eyes were huge and wild. "Without them, we have no one!"

  "Madam, we have ourselves!"

  But the Queen did not hear. Her voice rose to a shriek. "We've lost all our men, all of them, every one. Your father was the first." She brought her fists to her mouth, and cried like a child. "I thought we could conquer the land of the warlike Picts. But my folly sent him down to the House of Death. Then Marhaus was killed, and now—" she was keening as women did over the dead—"now we've lost Palomides and your pilgrim, too!"

  Gods above! Was there no end to her mother's changefulness?

  Isolde clenched her teeth. "A faithless man can never be a loss! And you hated him, madam, for what he did. How could I love your mortal enemy?"

  "Aahh—" The Queen flared her nostrils and tossed her head about. "Love and hate are all the same in the end."

  Mother, Mother, is that true?

  "Always the same." A look of sleepy cunning settled on the tortured face. "But I know—I know about the pilgrim!" She wagged her finger strangely in the air.

  Isolde stared. She is losing her mind, came in a hideous flash. Goddess, Mother, save her, keep her whole—

  But her mother was running on. "I know, I was in the divination chamber tonight! My spirit father told me the stranger was a noble knight and the son of a king." A furious sadness crossed her mobile face. "Couldn't you have loved him, Isolde? A little bit?"

  She stared at the Queen, aghast. "Mother, he killed Marhaus!"

  "Men kill all the time. Marhaus would have killed him if he could. But he would have given us new life to repair that loss!"

  She could have torn her hair. Only moments ago her mother was vowing vengeance, howling for Tristan's blood. Now as soon as he was gone, she wanted him back. Isolde gasped with rage. "He's a man of deceit. He lied to me!"

  "Oh, Isolde." Suddenly the Queen looked a thousand years old. "Men always lie, even the best of them."

  Is that true!

  Isolde felt the ground slipping beneath her feet. "But we don't!" she cried. "Women don't!"

  "Ah, little one—"