The Last Enchantment - Mary Stewart [36]
She broke off. Vehemence had made her raise her voice, and I saw that the girl, like the owl, was also staring awake. Ygraine, recollecting herself, bent her head, a touch of colour in her face again.
"Prince Merlin, you must pardon me. I meant no disrespect."
I laughed. I saw, to my amusement, that the girl must have heard, she was laughing, too, but silently, dimpling at me from beyond her mistress's shoulder. I said: "I am too proud to think of myself in the same breath as girls dabbling with spells. I am sorry about Morgan. It is true that Morgause has power of a sort, and it is also true that such things can be dangerous. Any power is hard to hold, and power misused recoils on the user."
"Perhaps some day, if you get the chance, you will tell Morgan so." She smiled, trying for a lighter tone. "She will listen to you, where she would shrug her shoulders at me."
"Willingly." I tried to sound willing, like a grandfather called in to lecture the young.
"It may be that when she finds herself a queen with real power, she will cease to hanker for another sort." She turned the subject. "So now that Lot has a daughter of Uther's, even if only a bastard, will he consider himself bound to Arthur's banner?"
"That I cannot tell you. But unless the Saxons make heavy enough gains to make it worth Lot's while to try another betrayal, I think he will keep what power he has, and fight for his own land, if not for the High King's sake. I see no trouble there." I did not add: "Not of that kind." I finished merely: "When you go back to Cornwall, madam, I will send letters if you like."
"I should be grateful. Your letters were a great comfort to me before, when my son was at Galava."
We talked for a while longer, mainly of the day's events. When I would have asked after her health, she put the query aside with a smile that told me she knew as much as I, so I let it be, asking instead about Duke Cador's projected marriage. "Arthur hasn't mentioned it. Who is it to be?"
"The daughter of Dinas. Did you know him? Her name is Mariona. The marriage was arranged, alas, when they were both children. Now Mariona is of age, so when the duke is home again, they will be wed."
"I knew her father, yes. Why did you say 'alas'?"
Ygraine looked with a fond smile at the girl by her chair. "Because otherwise there would have been no difficulty in finding a match for my little Guenever."
"I am sure," I said, "that that will prove more than easy."
"But such a match," said the Queen, and the girl made a smiling mouth and lowered her lashes.
"If I dared use divination in your presence, madam," I said, smiling, "I would predict that one as splendid will present itself, and soon."
I spoke lightly, in formal courtesy, and was startled to hear in my voice an echo, though faint and soon lost, of the cadences of prophecy.
Neither of them heard it. The Queen was holding a hand to me, bidding me good night, and the girl Guenever held the door for me, sinking, as I passed, into a smiling curtsy of humility and grace.
7
"It's mine!" said Arthur, violently. "You only have to count! I heard the men talking about it in the guardroom. They didn't know I was near enough to hear them. They said she was big-bellied by Twelfth Night, and lucky to catch Lot so early, they could pass it off as a seven-month child. Merlin, you know as well as I do that he never came near her at Luguvallium! He wasn't