The Last Enchantment - Mary Stewart [75]
"Or he was never in the boat at all."
He gave a slow nod. "Morgause, yes. It would fit. What do you know?"
I told him the little I knew, and the conclusions I had drawn. "She must have known," I finished, "that Lot's reactions would be violent. We know she wanted to keep the child, and why. She would hardly have put her own child at risk on Lot's return. It's clear enough that she engineered the whole thing. Lind gave us more details later on. We know that she goaded Lot into the furious anger that dictated the massacre; we know, too, that she started the rumour that you were to blame. So what has she done? She has put Lot's fears to rest, and made her own position secure. And I believe, from watching her, and from what I know of her, that at the same time she has contrived -- "
"To keep her hostage to fortune." The flush had died from his skin. He looked cold, his eyes like slates with cold rain on them. This was an Arthur that other men had seen, but never I. How many Saxons had seen those eyes just before they died? He said bitterly: "I have been well paid already for that night of lust. I wish you had let me kill her then. That is one lady who had better never come near me again, unless she comes on her knees, and in sack-cloth." His tone made a vow of it. Then it changed. "When did you get back from the north?"
"Yesterday."
"Yesterday? I thought...I understood that this abomination took place months ago."
"Yes. I stayed to watch events. Then after I began to make my guesses, I waited to see if Morgause might make some move to show me where the child was hidden. If Lind had been able to go back to her, and had dared to help me...but that was impossible. So I stayed until the news came that you had left Linnuis, and that Lot would soon be on his way home again. I knew that once he came home I could do nothing, so I came away."
"I see. All that way, and now I keep you on your feet and rail at you as if you were a guard caught sleeping on duty. Will you forgive me?"
"There's nothing to forgive. I have rested. But I should be glad to sit now. Thank you."
This as he pulled a chair for me, and then sat himself in the big chair beyond the massive table. "You've said nothing in your reports about this idea that Mordred was still alive. And Ulfin never mentioned it as a possibility."
"I don't think it crossed his mind. It was mainly after he had gone, and I had time to think and watch, myself, that I thought back and reached my own conclusion. There's still no proof, of course, that I am right. And nothing but the memory of an old foreboding to tell me whether or not it matters. But I can tell you one thing: from the idle contentment that the King's prophet feels in his bones these days, any threat from Mordred, direct or otherwise, will not show itself for a long time to come."
He gave me a look where no shadow of anger remained. A smile sparked deep in his eyes. "So, I have time."
"You have time. This was bad, and you were right to be angry; but it is already barely remembered, and soon will be forgotten in the blaze of your victories. Concerning them, I hear talk of nothing else. So put this aside now, and think about the next. Time spent looking back in anger is time wasted."
The tension broke up at last in the familiar smile. "I know. A maker, never a breaker. How often have you told me? Well, I'm only mortal. I break first, to make room...All right, I'll forget it. There is plenty to think about and plan for, without wasting time on what is done. In fact" -- the smile deepened -- "I heard that King Lot is planning a move northward to his kingdom there. Perhaps, in spite of laying the blame on me, he feels uncomfortable in Dunpeldyr...? The Orkneys are fertile islands, they tell me, and fine in the summer months, but tend to be cut off from the main all winter?"
"Unless the sea freezes."
"And that," he said, with most unkingly satisfaction, "will surely be beyond even Morgause's powers. So distance will help us to forget Lot and his works..."
His hand moved among the papers and tablets on