He looked at Guinevere.
Guinevere stood abruptly. She could not sit with these flutters of nervous energy going through her. She needed and she wanted and she did not know the source of or the solution to either desire.
The borders of the woodlands had been pushed back. This forest was an hour’s ride from Camelot. Men had contracts to gather wood and bring it back to the city. They also bought rights to hunt there. The once-wild woods, now taxed and regulated. Used for sport. It made her proud of Arthur, and also unaccountably sad.
“Brangien,” she said. “Would you accompany me on a walk? I want to gather flowers.” One of the benefits of Brangien’s knowing about magic was that Guinevere did not have to engineer an elaborate way to avoid her gaze as she gathered some supplies. Brangien could help. And Guinevere wanted to feel out this forest, make certain it was safe from threats Arthur and his knights could not sense.
They skirted along the edge of the trees. They were still in plain view of the canopies. Guinevere glanced back, but she could not pierce the shade to see if anyone was watching them. She picked a few flowers to maintain the charade as they leisurely ambled away.
“Here,” Brangien said. “We can turn into the woods. No one will see.”
Guinevere entered the cool shade of the trees. She let out a long breath of relief. Then she remembered their ride from the convent. “But you do not like the forest.”
“I do not like forests that spring up overnight and devour villages,” Brangien corrected, leaning down to inspect a smooth white rock. She put it in her pouch. “This is one of the sleeping forests, commanded by Merlin himself. It is only trees.” She walked confidently forward. Guinevere trailed in her wake, watchful, listening.
“Is it— Do you mind if I get supplies?” Brangien asked, hesitant.
“Please. And tell me what you are getting, and why.” Guinevere wanted more knowledge that did not come from Merlin. Everything he had taught her seemed tainted now.
“These are good for sleeping. A gentler sleep than my knots.” Brangien tucked some pale violet flowers into her pouch. She spotted a white oak tree deeper in and aimed for it. Guinevere followed, staring up at the way the sunlight shimmered through the leaves. It reminded her of looking up at the sun from a great depth, the cold—
She shuddered and hurried to Brangien’s side. She helped her peel back several pieces of bark. Brangien wanted a certain type of beetle as well.
“I am not familiar with any of these supplies,” Guinevere said. She had intended to gather young stones that she could place around Camelot to absorb things. Then she could get information from them. But she was not certain there was a need. She already had the sentry spells. Besides, nothing happened in Camelot that Arthur did not know about. Even the trees were taxed and accounted for.
Though he had not known about Brangien. Or Rhoslyn. And he did not know anything about the patchwork knight other than the knight’s fighting skills.
Nothing had directly attacked Arthur yet, though. How long would she wait? How long could she wait without letting her guard slowly slip? Without becoming more queen than witch?
“I will teach you,” Brangien said. “I used to specialize in draughts. Sleeping. Love. Confusion. My mother was a witch. My father loved her for it, since he did not carry the prejudices of Camelot or Christianity. Did your mother practice any magic?”
How had she never asked Merlin about her mother? In the forest, life was simply what it was. She had never thought to ask. But who had she been with while Merlin was helping Arthur all those years? Why could she not remember?
A terrible realization gripped her. As she had pushed Sir Bors’s memories out and replaced them, she had felt some of her own slipping away.
Had she forgotten so much because that was not the first time she had done that magic? Who else had she hurt?
Another possibility struck her. Merlin had pushed the knowledge of knot magic straight into her mind. Perhaps he had carelessly pushed other things out. He only ever sought results, never worrying about the things lost along the way.
Or maybe he had pushed things out on purpose. Maybe the things she was learning about Merlin were things she had once known. Things that had been taken from her so she would trust him. So she would do as he asked.
“Guinevere?”
“I remember nothing about my mother.”
Brangien dropped the subject. She went from treasure to treasure, pulling them deeper into the forest. They moved at an angle, though, away from where the men had entered. Neither particularly relished the thought of a spear in her back. Guinevere paused beneath a soaring oak and put her hand against it.
“Brangien,” she said, staring up at the tree. “Brangien, come feel this.”
Brangien joined her, resting her hand on the trunk. “Feel what?”
“Can you not feel it?”
Brangien shook her head. Guinevere had hoped that maybe Brangien, too, had the touch sense. But she was alone.
And she was not alone, because the tree was there. Merlin had sent the trees into a deep sleep, past where the Dark Queen could call to them. Guinevere could feel the sleep, her sense pushed straight down into the roots, the soil.
But it was not a peaceful sleep. It shivered beneath her hand, dreaming. The dream had fire. The dream had teeth. And beneath the roots, darkness. Guinevere yanked her hand away, shaking it to free it from the sensation.
“What is it?” Brangien asked.
“Something—something is trying to wake the trees.”
“Are you sure?” Brangien backed away, staring up in fear.
“No. I am not sure.” Guinevere rubbed her eyes. “But something is giving the trees nightmares. And I have felt it elsewhere.” In the other forest, with the wolves. She should never have left Rhoslyn to her own devices. This felt far bigger than the stones in Camelot. They had underestimated the woman terribly.
“We should go back.” Brangien was already stepping in the direction they had come.
A crashing noise from deeper in the woods startled them. Guinevere turned, expecting to see the knights. She opened her mouth to shout a warning that she and Brangien were there.
But it was no knight.
A boar as high as her shoulders, tusks jagged, eyes red—not with frenzy but with terrifying focus—charged straight toward her.
“Run!” Guinevere screamed. Brangien held up her skirts, sprinting. Guinevere followed. She veered to the right, avoiding a fallen log. The boar copied her.
She moved farther to the right, still running as fast as she could. She was changing her course from Brangien’s. The boar followed.
If Guinevere chased Brangien, the boar would, too. But if she led it away, Brangien would get out.
Guinevere turned sharply away from Brangien and the camp, drawing the beast after her. She ran with all her might. She ran with the strength of a forest girl. Her hood fell as she leapt over roots. Her trailing cape caught on a branch and she tore it off, hair streaming behind her as she pushed herself faster than she ever knew she could go.
The boar did not stop, did not even slow. Her own breathing was so heavy and sharp in her ears she could barely hear the beast tearing through the forest behind her. She weaved through the trees, looking for an escape. Any escape. No trees had branches low enough for her to grab. The boar was too close for her to take the time to climb a tree. She could only run. And soon she would not be able to run much longer.
There was movement ahead. Her heart squeezed, fearing she would see another boar. But no. It was—
“Duck!” a voice shouted. Guinevere dropped to the forest floor. A spear flew over her, meeting its target with a sickening thud. But she could still hear the beast behind her. She pushed up, running to the man. Stunned as she recognized the face of the patchwork knight, she hurried past him. He crouche
d low, a sword in his hand. She could run no farther. Turning, she watched with horror as the boar, a spear jutting from its chest, stamped determinedly forward.
The patchwork knight angled to the side, trying to draw the boar away. The boar never so much as looked at him. It stared only at Guinevere.
The patchwork knight rushed it. Finally, the boar reacted, lunging its head and great tusks toward the knight. The knight leapt over the blow, rolling once on the ground before jumping to his feet and plunging his sword into the boar’s neck. It let out a horrible squealing scream, then swiped its tusks against the patchwork knight, throwing him.
Its focus was immediately back on Guinevere. It no longer ran. It stepped purposefully and measuredly toward her. It moved not like a beast, but like a hunter.
Like a person.
“Who are you?” Guinevere asked.
The boar lifted its head, turning so it could fix one red eye firmly on her. And then it stopped as the knight’s sword drove straight through its neck, severing the connection between head and body. The gleaming red light in its eye dimmed, and the boar fell, twitching. Then it went still.
The patchwork knight yanked his sword from the creature.
Guinevere stumbled backward, tripping on a root and sitting down hard on the ground. She stayed there, staring at the dead creature. Not wanting to touch it. Needing to touch it. She crawled to it, resting a hand on its now-still flank.
Berries. Mushrooms. Sunlight. Mates. Wary avoidance of predators. But then—there—something older. Something darker.
Something foreign.
She felt it curling beneath what the boar had been, seeping through it, poisoning it. Taking control. It was the same thing that had nearly killed Sir Tristan. And then it turned, focusing, toward—
Guinevere yanked her hand free, scrambling back. Whatever had taken the boar was still there. It had seen her. It knew her.
The patchwork knight wiped his sword clean on the boar’s flank, then sheathed it. He grimaced, holding his side. The boar had hit him hard and he wore no armor. Guinevere could not quite make sense of the knight. He was different. Without his armor, he—
“You are a woman,” Guinevere gasped. That was the secret. Not a fairy. A woman.
“And I am bleeding,” the patchwork knight said. She lifted her red-coated hands from her side. Guinevere rushed to the knight and peeled back her tunic. The knight hissed in pain.
There was the faintest tickle against Guinevere’s arm, and then a sting. She looked down to see an elegantly sinister black spider with its fangs embedded in her arm. She brushed it away, leaving two tiny pinpricks of red circled by white. The white spread, and turned purple as she watched.
“Oh,” she said, and then darkness claimed her.
* * *
“She should have woken up by now.”
“Keep going. There, not too much. Ailith, you next. If you start feeling dizzy, stop.”
“What did this?”
“I have never tasted such darkness. And I kissed your brother once.”
“Girls. We need to focus.”
“Can I help?”
“No. Save your strength.”
The voices pulsed in and out as though heard from a great distance. Everything hurt, but the pain was dulling from a lightning-bright tempest to a punishing rainstorm. Guinevere felt fingertips at her hairline, smoothing stray hairs back from her forehead. And she felt something else—soft but insistent—on her arm.
“Spider,” Guinevere whimpered.
“No, dear. The spider is gone. We are taking care of you.”
Her eyelids protested, but she cracked them open. The room was dark, her vision blurry. Someone was sitting next to where she lay on a cot. And someone else was—
“Sucking on my arm?” Guinevere tried to sit in shock but was unable to move.
“It was infecting you. Nasty and very fast. But we almost have it all out.”
“You—you will be poisoned.” The spider and the pain and the darkness. The boar had failed, but something much smaller had succeeded. Guinevere remembered the poison from the wolf’s attack, how fast it raged through Tristan. These women did not know what they were doing. They would be killed.
“Women are strongest when bearing one another’s pain. We each take a little on ourselves. No one dies, and we all heal together.”
“Thank you,” Guinevere whispered, closing her eyes.
“Rest, and let us help you.”
“And be grateful you never have to kiss Gunild’s brother,” another voice said. Guinevere let the bright laughter and long-suffering shush push her back into sleep.
* * *
When she awoke again, only her arm hurt. Two points of agony, but to her relief, they were just pain. There was no darkness, nothing in her that was other.
She sat up, groaning. She was in a shack, a small, dim space with a low ceiling. But the packed-dirt floors were covered with fresh straw and the cot she lay on felt clean. Sitting against the wall was the patchwork knight. She held a blood-soaked cloth to her side, her eyes closed.
Guinevere crossed the room to the other woman. “Did you bring me here?”
The knight nodded.
“Thank you for saving me again, then,” she said, kneeling. “May I?” When the knight nodded, Guinevere gently pulled the cloth back. The wound was deep and still seeping blood.
Guinevere gazed up at the knight. Her eyes were a warm, lively hazel, large and gentle. “You helped me, and I can help you. But first, tell me why you were there. In the forest.”
The knight grimaced. “I wanted to see the king.”
“To hurt him?”
The knight’s eyes widened. “I wanted to see the hunt. Why would I hurt him?”
“I have seen you with Rhoslyn.”
Light flooded the room as a woman entered, backlit by the sun. “How do you know my name?”
Guinevere stood so fast she nearly fell over. “You!”
“Have we met?” Rhoslyn let the mat covering the entrance fall back into place and Guinevere blinked as her eyes readjusted to the dim interior.
“I was at your trial.”
“Oh. That.” Rhoslyn took Guinevere’s place next to the knight, looking at the wound with concern knitting her brow.
Guinevere scanned the room for a threat. There was nothing. “This was all you. The boar! The knight waiting for me!”
“Child, I cannot even control my own daughters. Controlling a wild boar is far beyond my skill.”
“But you were banished from Camelot for magic! And now you seek revenge.”
Rhoslyn sighed, turning her attention back to the knight’s wound. “This does not look good. I have sent for my sister, but it will be a few hours. Stay still.” She stood, wiping her hands on her skirts and eying Guinevere appraisingly. “I have no thirst for vengeance, and no energy to pursue it even if I did. It takes all my strength just to keep my family alive. Not to mention the occasional lost noblewoman who has gotten herself infected with dark magic.”
Guinevere bristled, grateful at least Rhoslyn did not seem to know who she was, only that she was nobility. “How do I know that it was not you?”
“Why would I have saved you if it had been my poison?”
It was a fair point. “But surely you hate Camelot and everyone who lives there.”
“It seems to me,” Rhoslyn said, sitting with a weary grunt, “that it is man’s work to hate and want to destroy what he cannot possess. I was sad to leave Camelot, yes. But it has its rules, and I did not follow them. In the end, we did not fit with each other anymore. Would I like the protection of walls and soldiers and law? Yes. But not so much that I was willing to give up the power my mother learned from her mother, who learned it from her mother. Camelot asked more than I was willing to give. I overstayed
my welcome. I harbor no ill will. None of us do.” She paused. “Except maybe Ailith, who mentions Gunild’s soldier brother’s shortcomings so often I suspect she is still in love with him.”
“What about your knight?” Guinevere gestured toward the woman, whose face was going ever paler.
The knight answered, her voice tight with strain, “They have no one to protect them. And it is good practice for me.”
Rhoslyn nodded. “She does not live here. We do not even know her name. But she protects those who need it out here in the wild.”
“Will you heal her like you did me?”
Rhoslyn shook her head, letting out a long breath. “We did not heal you. We drew out the poison because it was magic, and we could call it and bind it. When it comes to the business of broken bodies, we are limited. My sister has some experience, mostly birthing babies, but she might be able to help. I will go see if Gunild is back with news yet.” Rhoslyn patted her warm, dry hand against Guinevere’s hand. Then she stood and walked out of the shack. Guinevere followed, peeking her head out. No one was watching. She could run.
But she felt none of the menace from the forest. If Rhoslyn wanted her dead, she would be. And they had made no demands, asked nothing of her. There had been no malice in Rhoslyn’s touch. Surely if Rhoslyn could possess and control the same darkness Guinevere had felt from the boar, it would have come through when she touched Guinevere.
Guinevere took her position at the knight’s side once more. “Can we trust Rhoslyn?”
The knight nodded.
“If you are lying and they are plotting against the king, I will kill you.”
The knight opened her eyes. “If I had aided in a plot against the king, I would want to die. I swear to you on my sword, I am loyal to Camelot. I am loyal to King Arthur.”
Guinevere felt the truth of it pierce her. “Very well. You saved me. I will return the favor in exchange for your silence.”
The knight looked puzzled, but she nodded.
Guinevere allowed the flame to surround her hand. She closed her eyes, giving her breath to the flame and summoning it. The knight gasped, but did not cry out. Guinevere let the flame surround her hand. She did not have time to be afraid of being burned again. “Trust me,” she whispered. Then she put her hand against the knight’s wound and let the fire go.
The Guinevere Deception Page 21