"I don't believe you," Galahad said, surveying her with a level stare of hostility. "You think everyone is wrong but you, don't you? My mother says that little ones should not contradict grown-ups, and you look as if you were not so much older than I. You aren't much bigger, are you?"
Morgaine laughed at the angry child and said, "But I am older than either your mother or your father, Galahad, even though I am not very big."
There was a stir at the door and Elaine came in. She had grown softer, her body rounded, her breasts sagging-after all, Morgaine told herself, she had borne three children and one was still at the breast. But she was still lovely, her golden hair shining as bright as ever, and she embraced Morgaine as if they had met but yesterday.
"I see you have met my good son," she said. "Nimue is in her room being punished-she was impertinent to Father Griffin-and Gwennie, thank Heaven, is asleep-she is a fussy baby and I was awake with her much of the night. Have you come from Camelot? Why did my lord not ride with you, Morgaine?"
"I have come to tell you about that," Morgaine said. "Lancelet will not ride home for some while. There is war in Less Britain, and his brother Bors is besieged in his castle. All of Arthur's Companions have gone to rescue him and put down the man who would be emperor."
Blame's eyes filled with tears, but young Galahad's face was eager with excitement. "If I were older," he said, "I would be one of the Companions and my father would make me a knight and I would ride with them, and I would fight these old Saxons-and any old emperor too!"
Elaine heard the story and said, "This Lucius sounds to me like a madman!"
"Mad or sane, he has an army and claims it in the name of Rome," Morgaine said. "Lancelet sent me to see you, and bade me kiss his children -though I doubt not this young man is too big to be kissed like a babe," she said, smiling at Galahad. "My stepson, Uwaine, thought himself too big for that when he was about your size, and a few days ago he was made one of Arthur's Companions."
"How old is he?" asked Galahad, and when Morgaine said fifteen, he scowled furiously and began to reckon up on his fingers.
Elaine asked, "How looked my dear lord? Galahad, run away to your tutor, I want to speak with my cousin," and when the child had gone, she said, "I had more time to speak with Lancelet before Pentecost than in all the years of our marriage. This is the first time in all these years that I have had more than a week of his company!"
"At least he did not leave you with child this time," said Morgaine.
"No," said Elaine, "and he was very considerate and did not seek my bed during those last weeks while we waited together for Gwen's birth- he said that I was so big, it would be no pleasure to me. I would not have refused him, but to tell the truth I think he cared not at all ... and there's a confession for you, Morgaine."
"You forget," said Morgaine with a grim little smile, "I have known Lancelet all my life."
"Tell me," Elaine said, "I swore, once, I would never ask you this- was Lancelet your lover, did you ever lie with him?"
Morgaine looked at her drawn face and said gently, "No, Elaine. There was a time when I thought-but it came never to that. I did not love him, nor did he love me." And to her own surprise, she knew the words were true, though she had never known it before.
Elaine stared at the floor, where a patch of sunlight came in through an old, discolored bit of glass that had been there since Roman days. "Morgaine-while he was at Pentecost, did he see the Queen?"
"Since Lancelet is not blind, and since she sat on the dais beside Arthur, I suppose he did," Morgaine said dryly.
Elaine made an impatient movement. "You know what I speak of!"
Is she still so jealous? Does she hate Gwenhwyfar so much? She has Lancelet, she has borne his children, she knows he is honorable, what more does she want? But before the younger woman's nervously twisting hands, the tears which seemed to hang on her eyelashes, Morgaine softened. "Elaine, he spoke with the Queen, and he kissed her in farewell when the call to arms came. But I vow to you, he spoke as courtier to his queen, not as lover to lover. They have known one another since they were young, and if they cannot forget that once they loved in a way that comes not twice to any man or woman, why should you begrudge them that? You are his wife, Elaine, and I could tell when he bade me bear you his message, he loves you well."
"And I swore to be content with no more, did I not?"
Elaine lowered her head for a long moment, and Morgaine saw her blinking furiously, but she did not cry, and at last she raised her head. "You who have had so many lovers, have you ever known what it is to love?"
For a moment Morgaine felt herself swept by the old tempest, the madness of love which had flung her and Lancelet, on a sun-flooded hill in Avalon, into each other's arms, which had brought them together again and again, until it all ended in bitterness ... by main will she forced away the memory and filled her mind with the thought of Accolon, who had roused again the sweetness of womanhood in her heart and body when she had felt old, dead, abandoned ... who had brought her back to the Goddess, who had made her again into a priestess ... she felt bands of crimson rising in quick successive waves over her face. Slowly, she nodded. "Yes, child. I have known-I know what it is to love."
She could see that Elaine wanted to ask a hundred other questions, and she thought how happy it would be to share all this with the one woman who had been her friend since she left Avalon, whose marriage she had made -but no. Secrecy was a part of the power of a priestess, and to speak of what she and Accolon had known would be to bring it outside of the magical realm, make her no more than a discontented wife sneaking to the bed of her stepson. She said, "But now, Elaine, there is something more to speak of. Remember, you made me a vow once-that if I helped you to win Lancelet, you would give me what I asked of you. Nimue is past five years old, old enough for fostering. I ride tomorrow for Avalon. You must make her ready to accompany me."
"No!" It was a long cry, almost a shriek. "No, no, Morgaine-you cannot mean it!"
Morgaine had been afraid of this. Now she made her voice distant and hard.
"Elaine. You have sworn it."
"How could I swear for a child not yet born? I knew not what it meant -oh, no, not my daughter, not my daughter-you cannot take her from me, not so young!"
Again Morgaine said, "You have sworn it."
"And if I refuse?" Elaine looked like a spitting cat ready to defend her kittens against a large and angry dog.
"If you refuse," Morgaine's voice was as quiet as ever, "when Lancelet comes home, he shall hear from me how this marriage was made, how you wept and begged me to put a spell on him so that he would turn from Gwenhwyfar to you. He thinks you the innocent victim of my magic, Elaine, and blames me, not you. Shall he know the truth?"
"You would not!" Elaine was white with horror.
"Try me," Morgaine said. "I know not how Christians regard an oath, but I assure you, among those who worship the Goddess, it is taken in all seriousness. And so I took yours. I waited till you had another daughter, but Nimue is mine by your pledged word."
"But-but what of her? She is a Christian child-how can I send her from her mother into-into a world of pagan sorceries ... ?"
"I am, after all, her kinswoman," Morgaine said gently. "How long have you known me, Elaine? Have you ever known me do anything so dishonorable or wicked that you would hesitate to entrust a child to me? I do not, after all, want her for feeding to a dragon, and the days are long, long past when even criminals were burnt on altars of sacrifice."
"What will befall her, then, in Avalon?" asked Elaine, so fearfully that Morgaine wondered if Elaine, after all, had harbored some such notions.
"She will be a priestess, trained in all the wisdom of Avalon," said Morgaine. "One day she will read the stars and know all the wisdom of the world and the heavens." She found herself smiling. "Galahad told me that she wished to learn to read and write and to play the harp-and in Avalon no one will forbid her this. Her life will be less harsh than if you had put her to school in some nunnery. We will surely ask less of her in the way of fasting and penance before she is grown."