“I remember.”
“And how after faithfully promising to return one day and claim your prize”—she laughed again at this—“you asked me if I would rather you did not?”
I nodded. She went on:
“I thought a lot about you after you had gone, Luke. You came to our land as a stranger and stayed as a hero. The artists are hard at work on the painting of Luke and the Bayemot. The great Gwulum himself is painting the figure of Luke because he cannot trust any of his disciples to do it well enough. It was a strange and dazzling time, your stay with us.”
Strange and dazzling for me also, but I said nothing.
“You had said you would return, and I think you are a man who keeps his word. But your return must be for one thing: our marriage. From that must come a shared life together, a real thing, not a dream. And for me a life in an unknown land and city, since a wife must go to her husband’s country.
“So I resolved to come and see that country first, and to see you in it. Not Luke from beyond the Burning Lands, Luke the Slayer of the Bayemot; but Luke of Winchester and in Winchester. My father promised me to you and he too keeps his promises. But I know you would not yourself hold me to a promise to which my heart gave no assent. So I have come to see, before any irrevocable step is taken, the place where I might live and, I suppose, die at last. And the man with whom that life might be spent.”
She had said this last with a serious face, in no jest but in earnest. I knew she meant it. The awareness struck into me, almost with the cold bite of steel, that I was not sure of her. Her coming here was evidence of that: not reassurance but its opposite.
I suppose my face showed something of my feelings. She said:
“Cheer up, Luke! We are neither of us likely to die just yet. And it gives you the chance to think again as well. I would not hold you to your word, either.”
I said, stammering: “You . . . do not need to.”
“Don’t I?” She looked at me, amused. “You would make a poor courtier, Luke. But being a Prince you have no need to play that role. And I am glad of it. We have glib courtiers enough in Klan Gothlen. You are a warrior. Now, tell me about all your battles and victories.”
• • •
When Edmund joined us he took her hands and kissed her on the cheek as I had done. I was glad to see them so pleased to see each other. They fell to chattering at once, about people we had known at the court of King Cymru. I recalled them well enough myself, but had nothing to say of them.
She had no warning to give to him, of course, so there was no shadow of seriousness and therefore less constraint. In fact his presence made things easier for me as well. I could relax, listening to them talk. I did not have much to contribute, but it was enough to hear them.
Edmund spoke of the banquet which would celebrate her coming. She said eagerly that she loved banquets; she wished it were this evening instead of the next day. Edmund chaffed her, saying it was her vanity that prompted the wish: to sit at the head of the table and see the eyes of all Winchester’s Captains engrossed with her beauty.
She tossed her head. “I am not so vain as to think your Captains must look at me in preference to your own ladies.”
“Perhaps they would not if they had a choice. But since you will be the only lady present, at whom else should they look? At each other?”
“The only lady present?” She looked at me. “Surely not! Your ladies will not refuse to greet me?”
“No,” I said, “but it is not our custom to have ladies at our banquets. That was something we found strange in your city.”
“Can you not change your custom?”
“It would not be easy.”
Edmund laughed and we both looked at him. He said:
“I was thinking of another custom that one would not have thought it easy to change—of the Prince who turned a dwarf into a warrior!”
“What is this?”
He told her the story of Hans. She listened and turned to me.
“There, Luke! If you can break one custom you can break another.”
“It is not the same thing.”
“In what way is it different?”
I tried to explain, but stumbled over my words. One was a question of making good a pledge, of honor. No question of honor was involved in the other. Custom must hold except under a stronger compulsion.
They contested me eagerly, stumbling not over their own words but each other’s in their anxiety to prove me wrong. They were both much readier tongued than I was, and their combined attack, with Edmund reinforcing Blodwen and Blodwen putting Edmund’s argument again but more sharply, overwhelmed me. I did my best, doggedly, to maintain my stand.
Edmund said, laughing: “The one thing he really believes in is the Prince’s will. This Prince’s will, anyway! He will break the customs he wants to break, and nobly uphold the rest.”
“The Prince’s will, indeed!” Blodwen said. “And what of the Princess’s? Does my will count for nothing?”
“Not against this tyrant,” Edmund said. “But if you beg it of him prettily, he may grant it you as a favor. It is worth trying.”
They were both laughing. In mock humility Blodwen dropped to her knees and bowed her head.
“My Lord,” she said, the tone piteous, “will you grant your handmaiden, out of your greatness and nobility, this humble plea?”
I lifted her to her feet, laughing myself. “You will soil your gown.”
“Not in Winchester,” she said. “Your floors may be of plain wood but I notice they are well scrubbed. Well, Luke?”
“You can have your way,” I said, “though Strohan, my butler, will very likely die of shock when he hears. The ladies will be at the banquet.”
“Good!” she said. “I look forward to seeing them. I think a man may be well judged by his lady. I am anxious to see Edmund’s.”
“I have none,” he said.
Her eyes widened. “Not even one in prospect?”
“I have been kept too busy by Luke, what with expeditions into the barbarous north and battles against the city’s enemies.”
“But you must bring someone, now that the great Prince has given way to us!”
“I can bring my sister, I suppose.”
“Then do so! A sister may tell one something about a man as well. Perhaps more than his lady could.”
I watched them and was happy. I did not mind being bested in such a thing as this and by such a pair: my betrothed bride and my best friend.
• • •
She could charm anyone when she set out to. I need not have worried about Strohan; he was already her besotted slave. The banquet was a great success and so were all the other receptions, whether at the palace or in visiting the city’s nobles. People opened to her, like flowers to the visiting sun.
And since she was not one of those who put on a show, of ceremony or graciousness, she was as winning in small intimate gatherings as in more formal ones. She was interested in the diversity of mankind, and loved to hear men talk of their ideas and beliefs. With Blodwen to draw them out, they talked readily enough.
She said one day something about asking someone to join us for supper in her apartments and I nodded absently. My mind at that time was preoccupied with a captaincy that had fallen vacant and the various claims of those who should be considered for the place. She said:
“I must make inquiries in case there are things he cannot eat. In my country the Christians do not eat meat on one day in the week. They may have some such rule here also.”
“Not eat meat? But if they are Christians I suppose it does not matter: they do not have to swing a sword.” I realized, belatedly, what she had said. “But you are not asking Christians to dine here?”
She said, scolding: “You have not been listening to what I said. Not just Christians. Their Bishop.”
“But you cannot do so, Blodwen,” I said. “I know little of the Christians in your country, but here they are despised and rightly. They are a
crazed lot, always talking about this dead god of theirs. They were useful to the city once, when Peter led the army through their secret tunnel, but that has been well paid for. Not only in gold, and now in land, but also in boredom during the time my brother was Prince and they had access to the palace.”
“He is not being asked to the palace,” she said, “but to my apartment as my guest.” I shrugged in resignation, realizing that her mind was made up, and she smiled at me. “You will come, won’t you, Luke? I have asked your friend Martin as well, so you can talk to him if the boredom proves too great.”
“Martin! But he is an Acolyte. You cannot ask him to meet a Christian.”
She smiled again, very sweetly. “I have already done so. And he has said yes.”
• • •
I had seen the Bishop once or twice in the city. Even apart from the black gown he wore and the wooden cross he hung around his neck, he was distinctive in appearance. The priest who counseled Ann and consoled Peter after her death had been a small, weak-looking creature with a stoop. The Bishop was big and broad, with powerful arms and hands and a strong wide face. Like the priest his head was shaved except for a thin circle of hair above the ears, but his huge skull had such a polish on it that I doubted if any hair grew there in the first place.
His voice matched his frame, being deep and booming. He spoke as someone sure of himself, and laughed readily. And however he may have behaved among his lunatic followers, with us he talked in a rational fashion. He spoke of the city, which he said he had long wished to see, and told us things concerning its past, before the Disaster, which were new to me. I had learned from the Seers that there had once been kings and queens in the great city called London, who had ruled all England and territories beyond the oceans as well. The Bishop told us that in still earlier days English kings had ruled not from London but from this city of Winchester. It may have been no more than a fanciful tale, but he told it convincingly.
He did not say anything about his Christian god until Blodwen put questions to him, but then he told that tale well also. It was the wildest fantasy, this story of the maker of the whole universe being born in a stable, living as a man and dying a painful and degrading death, but he described it so well that for the moment one could almost believe it.
But Martin said: “You have not told all, Bishop.” There was anger in his voice. “You have not spoken of his mother being a virgin, or a star moving through the sky to lead kings to worship him.”
The Bishop said: “These things are less important.”
“Are they? Your Christians do not think so. Nor do I. Truth does not surround itself with lies.”
“You speak warmly, Acolyte,” the Bishop said. “You are a devotee of truth?”
“I know of no better thing to seek.”
“And do you find it in the darkness of your Seance Hall, when the Spirits speak with the tongues of men?” His voice was amused, and I saw Martin’s face flush. “But let us keep to abstract matters. There was a poet in ancient days who wrote about truth. He said:
“ ‘Beauty is truth, truth beauty. That is all
Ye know on earth, and all ye need to know.’ ”
Martin stared at him. “It is well said.”
“Well said, but he gives himself the lie. His words are beautiful but they are not true. Truth can be ugly.”
“I deny that!”
“Do you? Listen. A good woman lies dying. She asks after her son. The truth is that he is a convicted felon and will be hanged in the morning. Will you tell her so? Truth which lacks pity is a cruel thing, and where there is cruelty there can be no beauty.”
Martin said: “The poet spoke of the nature of things, not of men’s speech.”
“Is not men’s speech part of the nature of things? What men do matters more than what they know. Our ancestors had wonderful machines.” I started at that word; even to use it was improper. “Men turned against them because it was machines, through the agency of evil spirits, that caused the Disaster.”
The Bishop smiled. “At any rate, that is what the Seers tell us. I am glad myself that the machines are gone but for a different reason. Machines put a distance between men. A man could give an order on one side of the world and command obedience on the other. Our Prince here must earn obedience, from men he sees and who see him. In those days a man could press a button and kill a thousand men a thousand miles away. We Christians, as you know, do not accept any kind of killing, but if killing there must be I would rather it were done by a warrior who kills with his own hand, and knows what bloody corpse he leaves behind.”
I did not like this talk of forbidden things. I would have ordered him to be silent, even though he was a guest of Blodwen’s, but she herself spoke first. She said:
“The old days are dead and gone and it does no good to talk of them. And of course you are right, Bishop, to say that one does not tell harsh truths to someone not strong enough to bear them. But it is a better case when people have that strength.”
“It may be better,” the Bishop said, “but it is not a common thing.”
“Not among your Christians, maybe,” I said.
He shook his head. “Not even among warriors.”
• • •
They were good days, passing lightly, and quickly. I forgot the doubts which Blodwen’s words had put into my mind on that first evening in the palace. And she did not speak in such a way again. If she had seemed unhappy I might have been troubled. But she was content, and that contented me.
I remember a day in high summer when we went in boats on the river. There were no more than a dozen of us in the party, all young. We went down river, scarcely needing to row because the current took us. It was a fine morning, the sky blue and white, the sun hot when it pierced the clouds. We went a long way, past Twyford, and on to the place where the river meanders through a broad valley of water meadows.
We picnicked there and then lay idly on the grass of the river bank, the boats moored and bobbing beside us, and talked and laughed and were pleasantly idle. We were on our own, with no servants even, and I could lay aside the cares and countenance of a Prince. Apart from Blodwen there were three other girls, one of them Jenny. They were pretty enough in their summer dresses. But compared with Blodwen they were daisies to a rose.
Her dress was green, with long full sleeves. It was a Wilsh cloth, more brightly hued than any we had in the south. Its brightness made the grass look dull, as her beauty made the other girls seem plain.
We had no minstrels either, but Edmund and Matthew Grant had brought their lutes. They played them for our amusement, and Edmund sang. He had a good voice, high but sweet and true. One of his songs was “The Miller of Dee,” and Blodwen, applauding it, said:
“We have that same song in my country! In fact it is said that he lived beside the river higher up the valley in which Klan Gothlen lies. It is called the Dee.”
Edmund laughed. “And do you have this song also?”
His fingers plucked the strings in a slow haunting tune. He sang:
“Oh Greensleeves was all my joy,
Greensleeves was my delight,
Greensleeves was my heart of gold,
And who but Lady Greensleeves?”
She clapped her hands and said: “I have heard it, but never so well sung, I think. You should be a minstrel, Edmund.”
I laughed. “I cannot spare him, though! I have more need of him as a warrior.”
It was not long after that the cares of state caught up with me again. Horsemen came riding toward us along the river bank. It was Greene with a small troop. The pigeons had brought word from Romsey: there was trouble there. It had been put down and the garrison was in no danger, but Greene had thought it best to tell me.
He had had the sense also to bring a spare mount. We were almost as near Romsey as Winchester. I said:
“We had better ride over and make sure.”
Blodwen protested: “Do not spoil such a day as this, Luke!
He has told you there is no danger.”
I hesitated, but said: “No, I must go, my love. There will be other days to enjoy. Edmund will row you back for me. Will you not, Edmund?”
“As my Prince commands,” he said, “though I would point out that it will be against the stream. I shall expect a good wage for such heavy work.”
We laughed, and I said to Blodwen: “Give him his supper, and a pot of ale to cool him.”
“You will not be back this night?”
I shook my head. “I think not. But tomorrow, certain.”
I looked back as we rode away. Blodwen sat with her knees drawn up and her small hands clasped over them. Edmund stood by her, playing the lute and singing. It was a fine scene and I was reluctant to leave it. But as I had said, there would be other days.
• • •
Martin came to see me in the palace one night a few weeks after this. He wasted no time, but said:
“I have come to say good-by.”
“Good-by!” I was astonished. “You are not leaving us?”
He nodded. I thought how absurd he looked with his tonsured head and spectacles above the Acolyte’s black cloak. It was hard to believe that he had once fought at my side in the Contest. But despite the absurdity, perhaps because of it, I felt an uprush of affection for him.
I said: “To go where?”
“To Sanctuary.”
“But for how long?”
“I don’t know. Perhaps for good.”
“You cannot do that, Martin,” I said. “Visit your High Seers, if you must, and see their wonders. But then come back to me. They can offer nothing to make up for having to live underground like a mole, with neither sunlight nor fresh air.” I spoke with more confidence, remembering my own time in Sanctuary and how I had chafed against its confinement and restrictions. “You could not do it. It is different for the High Seers. They are old men but you are young.”
“I cannot stay here. I cannot go on with the trickery and deception and lies in the Seance Hall. The end may be good but I cannot tolerate these means. That Christian Bishop mocked me for it and I had no answer.”