Mists of Avalon - Marion Zimmer Bradley [514]
Nimue placed another cushion from her own chair under the Merlin’s arm. His bones seemed to protrude through the skin, and when she barely touched his elbow, it seemed that there was so much heat in the swollen joints that it burned her. And she felt a moment’s pity and rebellion.
Surely the Goddess already works her own vengeance! This man has surely suffered enough! Their Christ suffered a day on the cross; this man has been crucified in his broken body for a lifetime!
Yet others had been burned for their faith and had not broken, nor betrayed the Mysteries. She hardened her heart and said sweetly, “Lord Merlin, will you play your harp for me?”
“For you, my lady,” Kevin said in his rich voice, “I will play what you will, and I could wish I were that ancient bard who could play till the trees danced!”
“Oh no,” said Nimue with mocking laughter. “What would we do if they came dancing in here! Why, we would have earth all over the hall, and all our maids with mops and brooms would not be able to clean it! Leave the trees where they are, I beg you, and sing!”
The Merlin put his hands to the harp and began to play. Nimue sat beside him on the floor, her great eyes looking up, intent, into his face. The Merlin looked down on the maiden just as a great dog might watch its master—with humble devotion and utter preoccupation. Gwenhwyfar took such emotion almost for granted. She herself had been the object of intense devotion so often that she never thought twice about it—it was simply the homage that men paid to beauty. Perhaps, though, she should warn Nimue, lest her head be turned by it. Yet she could not imagine how Nimue could sit so close to his ugliness or look at him so attentively.
There was something about Nimue that puzzled Gwenhwyfar. Somehow, the girl’s concentration was not quite what it seemed. It was not the delight taken by one musician in another’s work, nor was it the artless admiration of a naïve maiden for a well-travelled and mature man. No, thought Gwenhwyfar, and it was not a sudden passion, either; that she could have understood and, in a sense, sympathized with—she herself had known that sudden overpowering love which sweeps away all obstacles. It had struck her like lightning and had ruined all her hopes that her marriage with Arthur could be a good and proper one. It had been a curse, yet she had known it was something that came of itself, over which neither she nor Lancelet had any power. She had come to terms with it, and she could have accepted that it had happened to Nimue—even though Kevin the Merlin seemed the most unlikely object for such a passion. But it was not that . . . she did not know how she knew, but she knew.
Simple lust? It might have been that on Kevin’s part—Nimue was beautiful, and even though the Merlin had been most circumspect, she might have kindled any man; but Gwenhwyfar could not believe that Nimue had been likewise roused by such a one when she had remained courteous but cool and unattainable to all of Gwenhwyfar’s handsomest young knights.
From where she sat at the Merlin’s feet, Nimue sensed that Gwenhwyfar was watching her. But she did not turn her eyes away from Kevin. In a way, she thought, I am enchanting him. Her purpose demanded that she have him completely at her mercy—her slave and her victim. And again she stifled the flash of pity that she felt. This man had done worse than simply revealing the Mysteries or the secret teaching; he had given the holy things themselves into the hands