The Last Enchantment - Mary Stewart [118]
"Applegarth."
"I like that. It's right. To Applegarth then, and your long life here!"
"Thank you. And to my first guest."
"Am I? I'm glad. May there be many more, and may they all come in peace." He drank and set the goblet down, looking about him again. "Already it is full of peace. Yes, I begin to see why you chose it...but are you sure it is all you want? You know, and I know, that the whole of my kingdom is yours by right, and I do assure you I'd let you have half of it for the asking."
"I'll let you keep it for the present. It's been too much trouble for me to envy you overmuch. Have you time to sit for a while? Will you eat? The very idea will frighten Mora into an epilepsy, because you can be sure she has been out to ask her father who the young stranger is, but I'm certain she can find something -- "
"Thank you, no, I've eaten. Have you just the two servants? Who cooks for you?"
"The girl."
"Well?"
"Eh? Oh, well enough."
"Which means you haven't even noticed. For God's sake!" said Arthur. "Let me send you a cook. I don't like to think of you eating nothing but peasant messes."
"Please, no. The two of them round me by day are all I want, and even they go to their own home at night. I do very well, I assure you."
"All right. But I wish you would let me do something, give you something."
"When I find something I want, be sure I'll ask you for it. Now tell me how the building is going. I'm afraid I've been too occupied with my dog-kennel to pay much attention. Will it be ready for your wedding?"
He shook his head. "By summer, perhaps, it might be fit to bring a queen to. But for the wedding I'll go back to Caerleon. It will be in May. Will you be there?"
"Unless it's your wish that I should be there, I would prefer to stay here. I begin to feel I've had too much travelling in the past few years."
"As you wish. No, no more wine, thank you. One thing I wanted to ask you. You remember, when first the idea of my marriage was mooted -- the first marriage -- you seemed to have some doubts about it. I understood that you had had some sort of presentiment of disaster. If so, you were right. Tell me, please -- this time, have you any such doubts?"
They tell me that when I guard my face, no man can read what is in my mind. I met his eyes level. "None. Need you ask me? Have you any doubts yourself?"
"None." The flash of a smile. "At least, not yet. How could I, when I am told that she is perfection itself? They all say she is lovely as a May morning, and they tell me this, that and the other thing. But then, they always do. It will suffice if she has a sweet breath and a compliant temper...Oh, and a pretty voice. I find that I care about voices. All this granted, it couldn't be a better match. As a Welshman, Merlin, you ought to agree."
"Oh, I do. I agree with everything Gwyl said, there in the hall. When do you go to Wales to bring her to Caerleon?"
"I can't go myself; I have to ride north in a week's time. I'm sending Bedwyr again, and Gereint with him, and -- to do her honour, since I can't go myself -- King Melwas of the Summer Country."
I nodded, and the conversation turned then on the reasons for his journey north. He was going, I knew, mainly to look at the defensive work in the northeast. Tydwal, Lot's kinsman, held Dunpeldyr now, ostensibly on behalf of Morgause and Lot's eldest son, Gawain, though it was doubtful if the queen's family would ever leave Orkney.
"Which suits me very well," said the King indifferently. "But it creates certain difficulties in the northeast."
He went on to explain. The problem lay with Aguisel, who held the strong castle of Bremenium, in a nest of the Northumbrian hills, where Dere Street runs up into High Cheviot. While Lot had ruled to the north, Aguisel had been content to run with him, "as his jackal," said Arthur contemptuously, "along with Tydwal and Urien. But now that Tydwal sits in Lot's chair, Aguisel begins to be ambitious. I've heard a rumour -- I have no proof of it -- that when last the Angles