I Am Morgan le Fay Page 16

  No. No, I wanted only to abide at Caer Morgana with Thomas.

  “My lady, will you not be seated?” he asked, smiling, taking the reins of the two horses from me. “The turf is as soft as a couch of green velvet. Prithee, sit awhile. May I make for you a crown?”

  With a regal nod I deigned to seat myself. The jewel-colored butterfly had flitted away, but sunbeams warmed me like love, and I held my wildflower bouquet like a baby in my arms, thinking, I don’t know why, of the blossom girl in the old story Morgause had read to Ongwynn and me one night. I watched Thomas lead the horses to a distance and hobble them, then start plucking daisies and weaving the stems together. I wondered whether he would add other flowers to my crown. I wondered whether he had ever plucked the petals of a daisy, whispering she loves me, she loves me not, whether he had been thinking of me. Another butterfly, garnet and lapis this time, floated down to land on one of the starflowers in my arms.

  Whispering a small wish, I hugged my flowers and fingered my milpreve. In a moment, butterflies drifted out of the sky like golden and crimson and blue leaves falling, like great bright snowflakes. They alighted by the dozen on the blossoms in my arms, butterflies upon every bloom, every petal, cloud sea mist white amethyst sunshine sapphire porphyry and pearl, butterflies crowding butterflies until they could scarcely fan their heavenly wings.

  I cried, “Thomas, look!”

  He turned, and his eyes widened, for in my embrace I held a bouquet of butterflies.

  17

  THAT WAS THE DAY I MOST REMEMBER, NOW THAT I FLY over battlefields and the screams of dying men echo up to me as fate falls like soot from my gray wings. I think back upon many sweet mortal days, but that day of wildflowers and butterflies, that was the sweetest.

  There were other such days, heavenly days. Thomas grew strong and well and served my small demands ardently, and I gave my token to him, the ring woven of my hair. By that token my knight, True Thomas, knew that I cherished him. And by his deeds I knew that he adored me. All was as it should be.

  Or so I thought.

  Fate thought otherwise.

  It started small, as such dooms often do. It began because sometimes I needed to be by myself, away from the questions of the servants and, yes, away from Thomas’s adoration, away from my own love for him, love so ardent and hungry it frightened me and I never dared to show it to him entirely. Just as I had stolen away sometimes to be alone in my quoit stone when I was a child, sometimes I stole away to be alone by the pool or, this time, by the sea.

  The tide ran high, answering the call of the moon at her strongest, and I sat just above the wet grit with my skirts in a muddle like the wrack at the edge of the waves, with my fingers sorting shells and pebbles for no reason, with nothing in my mind but pink cream amber, when footfalls crunched toward me, running. I looked up.

  “Thomas?”

  “My lady.” He plunged to his knees in the gravel beside me, panting. “My—Morgan, I wanted to walk out on the moor, and something would not let me. It was—it was like a wall of air.”

  “Yes,” I said, looking back at him stupidly I suppose, for I did not yet understand why he had become so distraught.

  He demanded, “Did you do that?”

  “Yes.”

  “But why?”

  “I didn’t want a visible wall,” I said, lifting my grubby hands full of pebbles and whelks, explaining as best I could. “I wanted to be able to see the sea.” Most castle walls were ugly, cutting off light and air.

  Sitting on his heels, Thomas stared at me, his face on a level with mine, his blue eyes clouded with a trouble I did not understand.

  Belatedly I realized that Thomas had not realized that there were walls at all. As they had been composed so as to let him in, and as they went along when I rode out with him, how was he to know? I never should have left him to roam Caer Morgana on his own. “This is a castle,” I explained. “The walls are to stop intruders.” Other than him. A few times my sentries had reported riders to me, knights errant, scouts. The walls had stopped them out of sight of my domed dwelling, my courtyard and fruit trees and Ladywater pool, my blue roses.

  “But, my lady,” Thomas asked me quietly, “how am I to get out?”

  “Just come to me,” I said.

  The trouble in his eyes deepened. He did not speak.

  I tried to explain. “It is like any castle. Someone must open the gate, that is all.” I looked down at my hands and saw how dirty they were. Dropping stones and bits of broken shell, I rose to my feet and stooped as the reaching tip of a wave ran up to me, washing my fingers in the salt water. Thomas stayed where he was.

  “Do you still wish to go walking on the moor?” I asked him. “I will come with you.”

  He shook his head. “I no longer wish to go.”

  After that day, I no longer stole away to the sea to be by myself. I ventured no farther than the spring pool, from where I would see Thomas if he walked outside.

  I did not yet know myself to be a liar. He knew it, I think, sooner than I.

  Truth was, I could have composed the walls to let Thomas out whenever he desired it, just as I had composed them to let him in.

  Just come to me, I had said, as if it were nothing, only a matter of my being the lady of Caer Morgana, the one who had to give certain orders.

  I did not know myself to be a liar until some days later, when Thomas tested my word.

  Shadowed days. Thomas devoted himself to me as a knight and courtier should, but in the nights, sitting in the courtyard as I often did in company with the stars and moon, I sensed that his dreams were troubled. And the same trouble, the same fear, hid gray in the blue of his eyes during those days, and my smile could not cozen it away.

  Sometimes his attention wandered and he stared at nothing, stared away. “Sir Thomas,” I chided that day I should have kept silence, “you are distracted.”

  “Yes,” he said quietly. “I am.” It was a misty gray day; even I, Morgan le Fay, could not make the sky be always sunny for Thomas and me. We sat in the solarium looking out over the sea, watching the waves break their white spines on the rocks, watching young gannets try their wings. Soon the snow geese would make vees in the sky. Soon it would be autumn, then winter, cozy for some, dark and lonely for others. As I thought this, Thomas gave me a sideward look worthy of Ongwynn, as blank as stone. “My lady, I would like to ride along the sea.”

  On such a gray day, threatening rain? But I said, “The sea air would do me good. I will come with you.”

  Thomas stood, but did not offer me his hand. “Thank you, my lady, but no, I would like to go alone. Will you open the gates for me? And,” he added with a wry smile, “tell me where they are?”

  Terror too deep to understand gripped my heart like a giant’s gauntleted fist. “No!” I blurted before I could think. At once I tried to soften the word. “I mean, not today.”

  “Not today? Why?”

  “My sentries tell me there are riders skulking about. Some lord’s vanguard, perhaps, scouting.” This was true, though it was news of no importance to me except as my excuse to keep Thomas by my side.

  “Invisible sentries? Do they know whose men-at-arms those might be?”

  “No.” Rooks were smart as birds go, smarter even than crows, and like crows they made marvelous sentries, ever vigilant, and they could speak to me. But Thomas had just bespoken their limit. “No, they cannot say.” Devices on shields meant nothing to them.

  Thomas stood lance straight. “Then all the more reason, my lady, that I should ride forth to see who threatens you.”

  The steely grip of fear on my heart tightened. No. Please. My father had ridden forth never to return. I could not let Thomas leave me. I could not.

  “There is no threat,” I said between dry lips, and although I would have lied to keep him by me, I believed I spoke the truth, and I spoke strongly.

  Uncertain now, Thomas gazed at me without speaking.

  I rose to stand facing him and
spoke to him for once as Morgan, his longtime friend. “Thomas, it would be folly to court danger for no reason. Stay here. Please.”

  He gave me a doubtful glance, then a nod and a bow. In silence he sat again, and I sat beside him, and in silence we watched the sea.

  I hoped that was the end of it. But although Thomas gave me his smile the next morning, the shadow had deepened in his eyes.

  I did my best, the few days that followed, to divert him. Although I knew my fey powers gave him pause, I used them to summon into the courtyard singing birds, linnets and larks and nightingales to lighten his heart. I gifted him with a pure white fawn to be his pet. I whimmed rainbow fountains out of the sea. I magicked a juggler to shorten one long evening, and tumblers such as I remembered from Arthur’s name-day long ago at Avalon, and a jester to make us laugh. The last evening—although I did not know it was the last evening—I magicked a minstrel who played upon his harp more sweetly than the chiming of bluebells, who sang like golden honey flowing. Because I had made him, he sang my thoughts, and therefore he sang no ballads of knightly deeds or courage in warfare; rather, he sang songs of love.

  My lady love is a fair white candle

  Who scorches my heart with her flame;

  My lady love is sweet winged fire

  No man can hope to tame.

  I have given my heart to my lady fair

  And my love has made me her prisoner...

  I felt my heart go watery and stole a look at Thomas, but he did not answer my glance, and even in the firelight I could see how his eyes had saddened and the softness of his mouth had gone hard.

  My Thomas.

  The honeyed singing of the minstrel might as well have been the barking of a crow to me now.

  I slept badly that night, and left my bed at dawn. In the chill of early morning I sat by the spring pool and gazed long into its still waters, trying to find something of peace or hope there. But all was dismal fog gray, all around me and all within my mind. Ladywater had nothing to say to me that day.

  Thomas rose early also. I found him sitting idly in the courtyard when I entered. He wore a cape and hat of soft wine-colored velvet—the servants supplied him with the most lovely clothes, in accordance with my dreams. I stood just looking at him, he was so beautiful.

  “My lady.” He rose and bowed over the hand I offered, the hand that wore a ring made of his hair. He touched my hand with his, ring to ring. I loved that touch. But he had not yet dared to kiss my hand.

  My gentle Thomas.

  I sat down, and he sat by my side. Servants came and brought us fresh toasted honey scones and milk and roasted apples for breakfast. We ate, the fog lifted and turned to rainbow in the misty sunshine, nightingales sang from the ivy—but Thomas seemed neither to hear the birds’ sweet singing nor taste the sweet food, and I ate little.

  “Roasted apples,” I said to break the silence. “Bah. How common.” Lightly, mocking myself, trying to make him smile with my ladylike nonsense. “Sir Thomas, what I should really like is a bowl of wild strawberries in cream.” The season for wild strawberries had passed a month before.

  “Your wish is my command, my lady,” Thomas murmured, but he did not smile. He merely stood to go find something to try to please me. No chuckle, no quizzical lift to his eyebrows, no—

  He turned back. “No,” he said too loudly for courtesy.

  I felt the steel grip of terror. I could not speak.

  “No,” Thomas said more quietly, “no more of this game. My lady, I cannot live this way.”

  I could barely stir my dry lips to whisper, “Thomas, what—what is wrong?”

  “I am not a man any longer; I am your toy. I am shackled in your pretty dungeon. I cannot bear it.” He turned and strode out.

  Sentries winged in to report to me, their presence urgent in the air, but I brushed them aside; I lunged up and ran after Thomas.

  He had covered half the distance to the walls before I caught up to him amid pomegranate trees. “Thomas,” I cried, panting, “where would you go?”

  “Anywhere.” He turned to face me, and I felt the full force of the storm gray misery in his eyes. “My lady, I am of no purpose, no use here—”

  “But—I—”

  “It is not your fault, my lady,” Thomas said. “I am to blame if I cannot be content with pleasing you.”

  “—I can find a way—”

  “No.”

  “Thomas, let me try—”

  “No. Give me some worthy quest, my lady. I could take news of your brother to your mother at Avalon—”

  “No!” I cried. No, dear lady mother of us all, no, he wanted to ride away into danger and leave me and I might never see him again.

  Something in my face or my cry made him stare at me, then turn and stride away again.

  My chest had gone tight with trying not to weep and I could not run after him anymore, not with the heavy silk gown beating around my legs, the thin useless slippers falling off my feet, and even though I knew the walls would not let him pass, I could not bear to see him storm away from me. I whimpered, “Thomas, come back,” and touched my milpreve. The ring made of his hair would have served as well and would have been gentler, but I was not thinking.

  In a moment Thomas came back into view between the trees, walking toward me yet leaning back as if rough hands dragged and shoved him along, and the horror on his face stabbed me like a dagger to the heart, yet I could not admit that I, I who loved him, was hurting him. And I was terrified because he wanted to leave me, and therefore I did not take away my touch from my druid-power ring until he toppled forward as if he had been flung my way, fell to his knees before me and bowed his head.

  “My lady, please,” he said softly.

  “Sir Thomas, you need not kneel. Stand,” I said, all lady kindness.

  He did not stand. He flung back his head, glared into my eyes and cried, “My Lady Morgan, for the love of all mercy, let me go!” His hands lifted toward me, supplicant.

  Thomas. My Thomas, his true-blue eyes gazing into mine, the agony in them pitiful. Dear Thomas, on his knees to me, pleading. And his pain smote me to the heart of my heart, and I saw: Mother of misery, I had done this to him.

  Cernunnos had tried to warn me. I was not whole, not ready, he had said.

  Ongwynn had tried to warn me.

  All powers above and below, even the sweet lady mother of us all, had tried. This moment was the one that Ladywater had tried to show me.

  In that moment, as Thomas cried out to me like a criminal condemned to die and my own wretched heart cried out against me, I knew: If I were not to hate myself forevermore, I had to let him go.

  Yet I whispered, “I cannot.”

  “My lady, I am begging you! I cannot be a prisoner, not even of love; I cannot bear it!”

  My love had made him prisoner, not his own. I had to let him go.

  Yet truly I could not.

  Deep, deep as I searched myself, I could not find freedom for Thomas in me.

  His hands trembling, his voice trembling, Thomas pleaded, “Morgan, think back. That first day, when I was just a stripling and you were a grubby-nosed little girl—”

  Tears I had held back for days stung their way out of my eyes. Weeping like a child, I folded to my knees facing Thomas, my own supplication the equal of his. I sobbed, “I can’t do it.”

  He tore off his velvet hat and flung it away hard, as if it had done all this trouble to him. But his voice remained soft as he said, “Morgan, of course you can.”

  I shook my head and faced him as if facing a king’s judgment. Facing him, crying, I told him, “Thomas, I can ... converse with finches and ... and fallow deer ... I can summon butterflies ... turn stone into gold ... make a paradise for you, bring forth roses out of ... deep winter snow, but I ... I cannot let you go.”

  “You must.”

  “I cannot! I do not have such power.”

  Silence.

  In deep silence Thomas faced me, his gaze quieting l
ike his breathing as he began to comprehend. Truly I think he understood, for he gently gathered my hands into his. Kneeling, we faced each other, I looked into his eyes and, oh, goddess of wonders, all powers be praised, I saw love there. Even though he knew me now, knew me to my dark, needy and greedy heart, still—Oh, my Thomas, still he loved me, his love so warm and vast I could barely encompass it, or comprehend his forgiveness of me.

  And I wept all the harder with relief, because I thought all would be well now.

  “Morgan,” he murmured, “you have held my heart in your hands since that very first day.”

  I could not speak.

  He stood, keeping my hands in his, lifting me to my feet. “Morgan, I shall always love you,” he whispered, and he kissed me.

  Never before had he kissed me, not even on the hand.

  Never before had any man kissed me that way.

  He kissed me softly on the lips, and that feathery warm touch stopped my heart then set it to pounding, lidded my eyes, made me gasp and sway on my feet. I knew nothing, I could think nothing, there was nothing but Thomas, Thomas, all time all love all living dying yearning in the touch of his mouth to mine—

  And as he kissed me so tenderly, without my noticing he ever so gently slipped the milpreve ring off my finger.

  With a crackling roar like that of a great fire, the orchard of pomegranate trees burst into splinters and fell to the ground around us.

  My eyes snapped open, but nothing made sense. Fruit trees falling to dust, the golden dome of Caer Morgana shattering and falling into shards of dusky-green seawater, and amid the froth the screeches of—of piskies, and the courtyard gone, the blue roses gone, and so much noise, rooks flying over with harsh cries, many men shouting and cheering, steely clamor of shields and swords, an army of hooves pounding toward me at the gallop, my own pulse pounding in my ears, Thomas exclaiming, “Morgan, I’m sorry!”

  Thomas, standing at arm’s length from me, the milpreve in his hands, his perfect face as white and shadowed as the moon.

  Too near at hand, amid the dust of many knights, I glimpsed the face of one of them, a helmed rider charging upon us both, a surly turnip-nosed face, a dangerous face all too familiar yet utterly strange and wrong in what should have been Caer Morgana.