Guinevere's Tale

by Nicole Evelina

  From my seat on the dais, I watched Gawain charming, or rather harassing, one of the courtiers on the far side of the room. At first she seemed taken in by his smile and whatever seductive words he spoke softly into her golden hair, but when his hands roamed a little too freely, she turned and smacked him hard across the cheek.

  Peredur burst out laughing, applauding her courage, and Arthur snarled for all of them to settle down. Sometimes I felt as if I was living in a castle full of overgrown children. Finally Arthur kicked them all out, saying he and I would wait out the last of the pleading hours alone.

  Lancelot and Malegant slunk out down opposite hallways as soon as Arthur’s tirade ended. Peredur and Gawain were making plans to meet in the tiltyard when we heard the alarmed voices of the guards outside.

  “Messengers for the king,” one cried while the rest was garbled by chaos we could not see.

  We all jumped to our feet and advanced toward the door, but it opened with a thud before any of us could reach it. A body slumped into the room, another slightly less injured man following and hovering over the prone figure before us. Arthur swore, and I recognized the distinctive uniform worn by the soldiers from the milecastles, small forts along Hadrian’s Wall. Arthur circled the bleeding husk of a man, and I knelt to examine his wounds.

  “It’s a miracle he survived the journey, but I fear he will not live to tell his tale,” I said, shaking my head sadly as the soldier’s life drained out at my feet.

  “He doesn’t need to,” Arthur said grimly, pointing the toe of his boot at the man’s uniform, which was more toga than tunic. “Nor was he meant to. This was the message we were meant to receive. He is Tremonium’s general, so if he is here, chances are good there is no one left to save at the fort.” He rounded on the mute second man, clearly the horseman who had carried the general to us. “How did you escape with your life?”

  The man looked at Arthur with a mixture of horror and shock etched into his ashen features. He was shaking and could only stare. I fetched him some wine, and he drank what he could with unsteady hands. The rest spilled onto the floor where it became indistinguishable from the general’s blood.

  “Chief Caw,” he sputtered, unable to say more.

  Even behind the emotion, the horseman’s voice had a familiar inflection it took me a moment to place. He was Votadini. Why would the Damnonii chieftain send a Votadini man as a courier from a fort mostly populated by Strathclyde Britons? The hair on the backs of my arms raised. It made no sense yet could not be without meaning.

  The solider had found his voice again but only just. “Dead, every one—men, women, horses too.”

  Arthur growled and struck a vase with his fist, sending it shattering to the ground. He ignored the shards grinding into the stone beneath his boots as he paced. “He would have known that fort was more than a garrison. It was a shelter for lowland villagers in times of distress. If there had been any whiff of trouble—and I promise you he gave them one—they would have headed for the safety of its walls like sheep. Heartless bastard.”

  The servants around us stood like statues, shocked by Arthur’s outburst.

  Recovering myself, I gestured to the women nearest to me. “Ladies, please take our wounded messenger to the infirmary and see he be tended to.”

  As for the general, there was nothing anyone could do.

  “We ride to Tremonium then,” Kay resolved, already heading toward the stables.

  Arthur put out a hand to stop him. “No. Not now. That is exactly what Caw expects us to do. He’s counting on us to swoop in on a rescue mission. It would make us easy targets, well-contained for his hordes. No, I will play this out in my own time.” He continued to pace. “Now we wait. Let them grow restless, unsure. Let them wonder. Did the general die on the road to Camelot? Did Caw’s dramatic message fail to make it to the king? Was the king unmoved? Better yet, does the king now lie in wait for him? I want all of these questions, all of these fears, to be chasing their tails around his mind before we move to retaliate.”

  When he finally halted at the base of the dais, I expected to see the familiar gleam of triumph in his eyes, but instead he turned a look of great distress upon me.

  “He’s heading to Lothian,” Arthur said. “Why else send a Votadini with the general? They share tribal bounds with Lot and are his strongest allies. This was no random act of terror but a show of power to indicate what is to come. He’s plotting to overthrow the kingdom and seize power for himself.”

  I was struck dumb by Arthur’s words. If that was true, then Chief Caw had gone mad. The Votadini and the people of Lothian wanted nothing of war. I highly doubted this move had Damnonii backing either. The peace they had built was far too precious for any of them to risk.

  Bedivere must have been thinking along a similar track. “Arthur, do you see what he is doing? If Lothian falls and the Votadini cower, nothing is stopping him from marching south to sack York, which is already weakened thanks to repeated Saxon attacks. From there he would have free rein into Brigante territory and would have amassed a force great enough to bring down even Camelot. It’s not an original plan, another fool tried it about three hundred years ago, but it is a formidable one.”

  Arthur moved into action. “Then we have little time. Gawain, Aggrivane, send our fastest messengers on the most direct route to your mother and make her aware of the situation. Caw has a few days on us, and I do not want Ana taken by surprise. Follow the messengers with our strongest forces and meet us at Traprain Law, but do not take the main roads. I don’t want to risk the Damnonii anticipating our movements. And summon Tristan from Cornwall. Tell him to ride night and day. We will need his skills.”

  He turned to Kay and Bedivere. “Since the two of you know the area the best, I am sending you as scouts up to Tremonium. Look around and see if you can gauge what we are in for, where the threat is greatest. I’m not sure if they will have moved on to Lothian yet, and if so, with what percentage of their forces. Even if they have split, if we can take down part of their army, we will be stronger for it.”

  “Best not appear as soldiers though,” I warned. “Disguise yourselves as farmers or shepherds. Pretend to be picking around the ruins for scraps of stone or whatever else you can find to enlarge your pens. If the Damnonii insurgents even suspect who you are, their archers will pierce you through before you can draw breath.”

  For the first time since the general’s arrival, Arthur relaxed a little as he recognized the advantage of having a battle-trained wife to relieve some of his burden. “A very wise bit of advice you’d do well to heed. I would like to see you both returned to my presence alive.”

  The two men regarded each other with familiar humor, and Bedivere looked down at the stump of his deformed left arm. “I guess this means I am your servant again. Just once I would like to be the master but have yet to find anyone who believes me a proper threat.”

  “Until they have your javelin sticking in their gorge, that is,” Kay added with a hearty laugh. He was clearly looking forward to the adventure.

  “The rest of you,” Arthur addressed the remaining crowd, “brief your men, make your preparations, and say your farewells. We ride with the morning star.”

  It took me all night to convince Arthur to let me come with him to Traprain Law. He sought to exclude me only out of love and concern, but it rankled me nonetheless. These were my mother’s people, and her influence had made me loathe to be kept out of any situation in which my skills could be of use. Even more, I had to admit I feared being left home alone, useless like a dairy maid, while Arthur and everyone I cared about risked their lives. I was a battle queen, and I was going to act like one, pregnant or no.

  “You are in no condition to make such a long journey. We will be riding fast and hard, and I will not risk the life of our heir to appease your self-worth,” he said, seeing my intentions for what they were.

  I sh
ould have been more concerned about the fate of my baby, but I believed that as long as I stayed out of the thick of battle and atop my horse, we would both be fine. And like it or not, Arthur needed me there as strategic collaborator.

  “I am not yet so heavy with child that I cannot sit upon a horse. Even Octavia will attest to that,” I retorted.

  Arthur’s look warned me he was growing tired of our argument. “Would you have me trundle across the country in a chariot with you? Or perhaps you would prefer a cart? I will not slow us down or place you in any danger, Guinevere.” His voice was laced with the guilt he would feel should any misfortune befall us.

  But in the end, he succumbed, and I took my place next to him at the head of the line. Following my warning to Kay and Bedivere, Arthur split up our forces into reasonably sized groups and had us all outfitted to appear as bands of pilgrims on holiday to the holy springs and lakes that dotted the northern lands. He kept us off the old Roman roads and led us down a series of ancient byways and trails, navigating based on the expertise of a Combrogi named Bors who had spent his life in the area.

  After an exhausting three-day journey, we rested at Traprain Law, a little more certain of our safety with our two armies combined. But now there was the question of how to proceed. We had anticipated a quick confrontation with a definite outcome, but that did not appear to be the way things were working out.

  Kay and Bedivere returned from Tremonium the same day. They found the fort exactly as we had feared—torched to the ground with no survivors and very few clues left to tell what, or who, had brought down the once-mighty citadel. Although they had spotted a few lightly armed warriors patrolling the area, Kay and Bedivere were left in peace and did not think they were followed.

  So it appeared Caw’s war band had moved on, but Ana had not had any overture from him that indicated he was near. Much like with the undying heat, we were at an impasse, unsure of how to force the arm of change and even less certain how to ensure it came down in our favor.

  Arthur grew more and more frustrated with each passing day. I wondered if part of Caw’s plan was to drive Arthur to rash behavior, but I didn’t dare voice it. Penned inside the fortress walls, Arthur behaved very much like the bear for which he was named, and I had no desire to feel his wrath.

  As soon as Tristan arrived, he ordered the Cornish knight to accompany the scouts on a tracking mission. They returned with news that Caw and his men were holed up somewhere within the outskirts of the Caledon forest.

  The seam of the wood was just visible from the guard towers on the northeast side of the castle. Arthur, Kay, Bedivere, Lot, Ana, Tristan, and I met in one of the larger square rooms while the rest of the household slept, trying desperately to think of some solution to the quagmire.

  “They won’t attack the castle,” Tristan declared. “I didn’t see any evidence of siege weapons or any indication they were building any, so I doubt they have the manpower.”

  Lot shook his head. “So why come all this way, exert all this effort, if they’re unwilling to do the one thing necessary to overthrow us?”

  “You forget,” Arthur said, “that they need not destroy the town to claim victory. In fact, it is to their advantage to keep it as intact as possible for their own use. All they need is one of our heads.”

  Lot snorted. “So what are you suggesting, that we walk out there and let them take their pick? Or should I dispatch you right now and save them the trouble? Perhaps if I presented your corpse to them politely, they would show me mercy.”

  Ana’s face reddened in a rare display of anger. Lot’s swagger made it easy to forget that she was still in charge, as Arthur had long ago decreed. “Enough, both of you. This is not a boyhood brawl we are facing. It is the future of our kingdoms. The way I see it, if you do not think they will attack, we have three options.” She ticked them off on her fingers. “One, we could try to wait them out, which does not seem wise considering the drought has already undermined our resources and they have the water of the swamps and bogs at their disposal, disgusting as they are. Two, we could do as our frustration bids us and charge in blindly, but that gives Caw the advantage of not only seeing us coming but being able to savor the chaos in which we die. Or. . . we can find a way to flush them out.”

  “I still favor standing at the edge of the wood and shouting, ‘Here I am. Come and get me,’” Lot whispered to me, and I had to suppress my laughter.

  Though amused by her husband, I was proud of Ana for her level-headedness and ability to see clearly through the emotionally charged situation. But then again, she was the daughter of Queen Iggraine and the famous warrior Goloris.

  I turned her words over and over in my head. “Flush them out,” she had said. But how? I tried to think of every angle, to see the impending clash from their point of view and determine what would drive me out were the roles reversed, but my mind moved in the same maddening circles. Arthur, Lot, and Kay’s ideas grew more and more fanciful as the night wore on. I closed my eyes and tried to block out their voices, to summon the sight or call upon the Goddess, but it seemed that avenue of inspiration was as closed to me as my ability to draw down rain.

  I opened my eyes with a sigh just in time to see a sheet of heat lightning illuminate the eastern horizon, revealing the contours of tall puffy clouds that looked like ship’s sails. Suddenly a thought shifted in my brain, a single grain of sand set free to tip the whole balance. The sky flashed violet once again, and I knew Ana was right. We could force them out. And the earth was telling us how.

  “What would happen if that lightning were not contained within the clouds, if it were set free?”

  For a long moment, no one responded to my peculiar question. Six pairs of eyes blinked at me blankly.

  “It would strike something,” Ana answered warily.

  “And say it struck a tree. It would catch fire, right?”

  “I presume so, yes.”

  I turned away from the window, a plan rapidly forming in my head. “So why can we not be the fire? Burn them out. I have seen it used on small game in the hunt, so why not extend the metaphor and make it a little bigger?” I rushed over to Arthur, eager to make him to share in my excitement. “Think about it. They are shielded from our sight and our weapons by walls of trees—dry, brittle wood, thanks to this merciless summer. What difference is there from the fort they just destroyed? What would you do if they were hidden within a wooden castle?”

  “Burn it down,” he said, slowly beginning to understand.

  “But there is a serious flaw in your plan,” Lot protested. “Caledon Wood is not a defined structure. You cannot simply set it ablaze and let it burn. You would destroy the countryside for miles with absolutely no control over where it burns. You would be risking the lives and livelihoods of my people.”

  From his solitary perch on the northern windowsill, Tristan watched me carefully, green eyes narrowed in concentration. “Not necessarily. Ana, you said there are bogs and swamps hidden within the trees, right? Has anyone ever mapped them? Do we know where they lead?”

  “To the river and then to the sea,” Lot said. “A series of canals more or less connects the heart of the wood to the water. My family has been ruling this land for countless generations. There is not much about it we do not know. Yes, the marsh would divert the fire and perhaps control its spread, but it also would provide Caw with a safe place for shelter and a possible method of retreat.”

  “Not if we block it off.” Tristan was on his feet now, bent over the table, fingers rapidly sketching out a drawing of the areas he and his team had surveyed. Lot supplemented what he could recall of the locations of the marshlands. Tristan stabbed a finger at one edge of the map. “If we wait for a night with a southern wind and focus on this area, it will carry the flames exactly where we want them to be, forcing Caw to retreat into this clearing just beyond the periphery of the woodland. If we can get our troops i
n place before we start the blaze, we will have the best chance of ambush as they flee from the flames.”

  We moved contingents out of the fortress over the next three nights, when the moon hid her face and the land was shrouded in darkness. Placed at key points around the wood, each was a self-contained unit of fighters comprised of cavalry and infantry, equally capable of success as a cohesive entity or as highly skilled individuals. The weakness of our army was the strong individual pride that ran in veins more used to clan allegiance and self-reliance than the precise formations demanded by Roman strategy. We had to be certain that even if the unit broke, the men would survive to defeat their attackers.

  I agreed to remain behind with Ana and her family, far from danger, while Arthur, Lot, and their forces plunged in headlong. Occasionally an eagle-eyed Damnonii would spot our army’s movements and leave camp to investigate, but not one of them returned. I had to wonder what Caw made of his slowly dwindling numbers or if he even noticed.

  As the feast of Lughnasa passed, still without a single rain shower, a strange pressure built in the land as if the earth itself would soon begin to boil. If we were restless within the relative safety of Traprain Law, I had to wonder how the foot soldiers in the field, exposed to the elements and all their heat-induced hallucinations, were faring.

  Then one evening, in the dead of night, the winds shifted, their southern heat unmistakable. Huddled in the highest level of the hill fort, Ana and I watched as Caledon Wood went up in flames. The trees themselves seemed to combust, some as though set off by the very dirt in which they grew as torches were flung into their roots, others with hair on fire from flaming missiles. I said a silent prayer for forgiveness to the spirits of the trees that were now sacrificing their lives for our cause.