Page 29 of The Quest for Excalibur
Tiredness pressed down on me, but I had to keep going and fight off sleep. “Her wagon’s right beside the stables. She had every opportunity to damage my saddle. Not hard for her to find out which one it was. Everyone knows Alezan, and we all keep our saddles on the ends of the partition walls.”
I had to stop to take a breath. My aching ribs made talking difficult. “Maybe Morgana’s waiting close by. Maybe she doesn’t have to. I think, no, I know, she sent Hafren to us. She’s always hated me.” I paused again. “And it has to do with the sword Nimuë showed me. I’m certain. Morgana didn’t want me to see it.”
“If it’s her, then she’s waited a long time for this.”
I nodded. “Because of the sword? Excalibur?”
He shrugged. “We’ll probably never know.”
I’d make it my mission to find out, once I was better. “Where is Hafren now?”
“All three of them are in the lockup. Have been since we got you back here and examined your saddle.” He paused. “We’ll need to keep them in there. The other two may well be in league with her.” He shook his head. “She may be guilty of the sabotage, but it can’t have been Hafren who sent you back to your old world. If she were that powerful, I’d know, and I sensed nothing different about her.”
A little smile escaped me. “Like you sensed Morgana was lying to you when she said she loved you?”
He returned the smile, ruefully. “You’re right. I’m blind where Morgana is concerned. Maybe I’m losing my touch. But not with others. I’d have known if Hafren had any power worth speaking of. I always do.”
I reached out a hand and took one of his. “But I’m back now, and we’ve had warning. I’m certain Nimuë tried to help me, to keep her mother away, but she’s a child and she’s not strong enough yet. I think she tried to stop her mother sending me back, but she couldn’t. But she did manage to show me what Arthur has to do next. He has to find Excalibur. I have to help him do it. Maybe that was what Morgana didn’t want me to do. Why she tried to send me back.”
His brow furrowed again. “What is this name– Excalibur? Not one I’ve heard before.”
My smile widened just a little at his ignorance. It wasn’t often I could feel smug that I knew something he didn’t. “Oh, the sword in the stone was one thing, but Excalibur is quite another. You put a warrior’s sword in that stone for Arthur to take, a plain, ordinary sword made magical by your hand… and my words. Perfect for what was needed then. But Excalibur is different. You’ll see.” Why tell him everything? Let him find out for himself.
He sat in silence for a minute, head bent, and my rebellious eyelids drooped. Eventually, he looked up again, eyes glittering in the candlelight. “You need protection, I can see.” A pause, while he sucked his lips. Then he heaved a deep sigh. “I need to do for you what I did for my daughter.”
I’d always wanted to know what he’d done for his baby daughter that night in Viroconium when Arthur and I had retreated out of the doors, chased by the nameless shadowy shapes he’d conjured. A shiver ran down my spine.
“Lie down and close your eyes,” Merlin said.
Chapter Fourteen
Iwas ableto leave my bed in the morning to walk stiffly through the Great Hall and out into the spring sunshine. The children clamored around me, excited to have me back to the mother they knew. They weren’t used to seeing me lying in bed and hadn’t liked it.
Llacheu came running up from the barracks house he shared with his friends, and flung his arms around me, oblivious to my wince. “Gwen,” he mumbled, inarticulate as only a teenage boy can be where emotion is concerned. The top of my head only reached his nose nowadays. I hugged him in return, so glad to be back where I belonged.
Cei joined us. “Ruan and his women are still shut in the lockup. I doubt they can get up to much mischief from in there.”
Hopefully, he was right.
I glanced downhill toward the fortress walls, where the crude hut we called the lockup sat. Low roofed so prisoners couldn’t stand up straight, earth floored and with no latrine. They’d have had to use the floor as a toilet and then lie down on it. Was that fair on Ruan and Heledd? Might they be in league with Hafren? They’d deny it, of course, so we might never know.
But my sense of fairness rose to the fore, and I turned to Arthur. “I think we should have Ruan out and question him.”
“My own thoughts exactly.” He gave Cei a nod, and his brother set off down the slope with a determined stride.
Five minutes later, Arthur and I were seated on our thrones in the Great Hall, with Merlin standing in the shadows behind us, like a guard dog. The doors banged open and Cei and Drustans marched Ruan in, much the worse for wear. Four days worth of gray stubble covered his chin, he stank, and his clothes were filthy. Underneath the dirt on his terrified face, purple bruises were beginning to yellow. The warriors who’d taken him had not been gentle, it seemed. They were all very fond of me.
Cei frog-marched the little man up the central aisle, holding him by the scruff of his neck, so high his feet barely scraped the ground. When they halted, Cei released his hold. Ruan’s legs collapsed under him, leaving him in a pathetic heap in the rushes. From where he stood guarding the door, Drustans grinned in malicious satisfaction.
“Get up,” Arthur snapped, all regal king. He’d gone back into our chamber and put on his gold circlet crown. Ruan couldn’t have missed it.
I shifted in my seat in an effort to get more comfortable, glad of the kind person who’d put a few cushions on it.
The little man pushed himself to his feet, and stood, clasping his hands in front of him, eyes downcast as though he feared to meet either Arthur’s or my gaze.
“Head up,” Cei grunted, giving him a kick in the shins. “Look your king in the eye.”
Ruan lifted his head. His moist bottom lip trembled. A dewdrop dangled from the tip of his nose and his eyes were red. He’d been crying. Well, so had I. My concern for him only went so far.
