Page 47 of The Road to Avalon
Her faded eyes darted from side-to-side as though she might be contemplating flight. “The Princess.” The words came out between almost clenched gums, fighting their way into the air, a strong hint of disapproval in them, or perhaps even of scorn.
Well, both Morgana and Morgawse were princesses, so that didn’t make the situation any clearer. Although it seemed unlikely this old retainer would feel scorn for her true mistress.
“Which one?” Merlin asked, his voice ominously stern, although I’d already guessed the answer.
She blinked up at him for a moment before answering. “Herladyship, the Princess Morgana.” More scorn heaped on with a trowel. Despite her toothlessness, she managed a creditable sneer. No love lost there.
Aha. Shehadcome here. And it sounded, from her wish to let no one inside the house, as though she thought we might be following her. Or at least thatsomeonewas.
“Is anyone else here with her?” I asked, suddenly seized by the desperate hope that Amhar might have fled to his aunt. Not Morgana, of course, but Morgawse.
The old woman squirmed in her effort to make herself vanish into a crack in the floor.
Merlin loomed over her. “Well?”
It would have taken a far stronger person than this old woman to withstand the glare he gave her and his voice heavy with threat. She probably knew who he was, and that would only have added to her fear. Not to mention her possibly greater fear of Morgana, who the ordinary people suspected could turn them into toads. Talk about stuck between a rock and a hard place. I had to feel a little sorry for her.
“The Princess Nimuë be with her,” the old woman muttered into her chest, cringing beneath Merlin’s gaze.
He turned to me, his eyes alight with excitement. “My daughter.”
He didn’t need to say. It wasn’t like I’d forgotten.
How long had it been since he’d seen her? A lifetime. She’d been a toddler when he’d woven his magic over her, a magic that had been at least some protection from her mother’s wiles and had later served to protect me, as well. Every time we’d been to the Council of Kings since then, I’d been aware of his desperate longing to see his child, and every time he’d been disappointed.
And now, here he was, at last in the same house as her.
But as far as I was concerned, Nimuë held no importance. It was Morgana we needed. Morgana whose magic we had to halt. The only question was how.
“Take us to my sisters-in-law,” I said to the old woman, at my most imperious. “Or feel the wrath of the High King on your head.”
Most likely resigning herself to a miserable fate at the hands of one or other of these two practitioners of magic, or possibly the High King himself, the old woman hunched her bony shoulders and shuffled past us into the colonnaded walkway. She turned to the left, skirting the outside of the courtyard, where the strong stark shadows of early evening already crept across the flagstones.
Halfway down one side, she halted beside ornate double doors and peered up at me out of wary eyes. “This be Milady’s chamber,” she muttered. “You’ll have to open that there door for yourselves. I’m away back to guard the front door in case more like you what won’t take no for an answer turns up.” And with that she shuffled off at a far greater speed than she’d previously exhibited.
I turned back to the doors. Each possessed a circular handle in the shape of a lion’s head gripping a ring of metal between its teeth. Before Merlin could move, I reached out, took hold of one of the rings, turned it, and pushed that side open.
With a quick glance at Archfedd’s nervous face, I stepped into the room beyond.
It was an antechamber of the same sort as Custennin had at Viroconium only on a less splendid scale. I’d been in it before, but many years ago, and a quick glance from side to side told me little had changed. In fact, little but its condition had changed since the Romans themselves had left. The faded fresco adorning the walls had patches of paintwork missing, and the mosaic underfoot had long ceased to be level as subsidence had given an undulating roll to the floor.
Windows placed high up in the walls cast bright light into the room, dust motes floating in the sunbeams.
The three women seated on chairs around a low table made a pretty enough picture. Each chair had a solid curved seat that owed more to Roman workmanship than British, with clawed feet and lion headed armrests, and the women all held sewing in their hands. If I hadn’t known better, I’d have suspected them of having posed themselves for our benefit in this tableau of industry.
Two of them I knew, and the identity of the third I had no trouble guessing. Morgana and Morgawse, superficially as alike as sisters could be, with their long dark hair confined in braids, faced us in what looked like surprise. Beside them, the third member of their party and much the youngest, who’d had her back to us, twisted in her seat and stared, dark eyes flown open wide. Her father, Merlin’s, eyes.
Morgana rose to her feet first, letting her sewing drop to the low tabletop, her gaze flicking between Merlin’s face and mine. She couldn’t have seen us coming.
“Good day, Guinevere,” she said, with icy civility. “To what do we owe the pleasure of your company?” She must have been forty by now, and the liberal silvery strands streaking her dark hair gave me a smug feeling of superiority as, so far, I had none. But her lovely face showed no signs of ageing– at least not from this distance. I cherished no desire to get close enough to that scorpion for a better look.
Morgawse, who’d on and off been my friend for most of my time in this world, had no such reservations. She jumped up and ran to me, throwing her arms around me in a welcoming embrace. “Gwen! You’ve come to visit us! I’m so happy!” She planted a kiss on each of my cheeks and turned to Archfedd.
“And this must be Archfedd. You haven’t changed at all. Bigger, of course, but still the same beautiful girl as before.” She glanced at Llawfrodedd. “And is this handsome warrior your husband? You lucky girl.” She chuckled in appreciation.
Archfedd colored hotly, and so did Llawfrodedd, but Morgawse sailed on, regardless, not waiting for an answer. “I’ve been telling my sister it’s high time she saw Nimuë married. She’s getting too old to be without a husband.”
Nimuë, the object of this sentence, placed her own sewing on the table with careful precision and rose gracefully to her feet, a slight smile on her lips, and her eyes fixed on Merlin’s face. Did she know who he was? I stared at the girl I’d last seen in a dream when she could only have been eight years old. Archfedd was pretty, but this girl was a beauty, like her mother.
