Gwenhwyfar
And God made the firmament,
and divided the waters which were under the firmament
from the waters which were above the firmament:
and it was so.
Genesis 1:7, King James Version
The Wave
Morning, the shifting light
draws me into the dawn,
as if I am separate
from waves who came before—
and I, holding that human part
anchored by love, vow, and blade,
wade out again,
into the sea of dreams.
—
for those who have that human part,
however they were made.
RELICTA. REDEMPTA. REDITURA.
Bereft. Redeemed. To Return.
Part 1: Gwenhwyfar
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I. The King Departs
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Artorius Rex stood in the courtyard with his hunting spear across his shoulders and the staghounds milling at his knees. The morning was clear. The banners above the gate snapped in a northerly wind that Queen Gwenhwyfar did not like.
She did not say so.
“Three days,” he said. “Four at the most. The boars have been troubling the tenant farms and my cousins have been sending letters indicating in no uncertain terms that they are running out of patience.”
“Your cousins have the patience of a thunderstorm in spring.”
“The woman speaks truth.”
“Which is to say very little.” She smoothed his cloak at the shoulder, where the clasp had gone slightly crooked. Her hands were always on him before he left. Small corrections. The hem of a sleeve. A lace coming undone. When nothing was off, she made up things that were. She did not know why she did it. It was in small tender things she said the most.
“Gwen.”
“Arthur.”
That was most of their language now. One name each. Over time, marriage had compressed a great many sentences into two syllables. Those syllables said more than poetry.
He looked at her, a last glimpse of a warm hearth.
“You have the throne and the watch.”
“I have the kingdom and will be watchful.”
“You have my blade.”
“I have Excalibur.”
She touched the pommel at her hip. The sword was surprisingly light, but its quality was indescribable and its lethality, second to none. “I have Excalibur,” she repeated.
“You have Gawain, who would face an army singlehandedly if you ordered him to.”
“I have Gawain. I have Roland and Durendal. I have Gareth. I have Percival. I have eleven thousand spears and thirty sails in the harbor. I have the Knights of Sapphire, every one of whom swore a personal oath to you and to me, and who wear my color on their arms and my stone in their hilts.”
He laughed. She loved the laugh. It came frequently when he was going on a hunt, when he looked forward to green woods and cold streams and windy knolls and camaraderie with his cousins. It came from deep in him, a great booming sound, the way a bear laughs, thinking fondly about his woods.
If bears laughed, which they most certainly did not, but if they did, they would sound exactly like Arthur.
“Come home to me, husband.”
“God willing. He has been every time so far.”
She got up on her tiptoes, and he bent down slightly and their foreheads touched. He kissed her head where the sapphire crown met her hair and he breathed her in. The familiar scent: lilacs and spring rain and wind in the treetops. The breath she exhaled, the smell of her hair, her natural scent.
“Mon cœur est toujours avec toi, mon bien-aimé, jusqu’au bout du monde,” she said, softly. My heart is always with you, my beloved, to the end of the world.
He loved it when she spoke in the musical sounds of her native tongue, even though he didn’t grasp all of it. He got a few words, heart and beloved and always, and that was enough.
Then he swung into the saddle and wolf-whistled for the hounds and the gate opened and he went charging out with Sir Leon and Sir Bedivere and Sir Tristram.
Gwenhwyfar watched the road until the dust settled. On her way back through the courtyard, she passed the stone.
It stood where it had always stood. Rough gray granite, black and white speckles, knee-high, with the narrow slot in its crown where the blade had been. The inscription was worn but legible, cut deep into the face in Latin that the rain and the years had not been able to soften.
ARTORIUS REX PULLED EXCALIBUR FROM THIS STONE
MANY TRIED, ALL OTHERS FAILED
THE ONCE AND FUTURE KING
She always stopped, and the Latin that her lips whispered was not the inscription but a prayer. It was quiet, private, the same prayer every time. For his safety. For his return. She was of royal blood, a daughter of the King of Franconia. He had been the poor son of a baker from the village who had tried his luck.
Well, maybe he thought it was luck.
That boy had built a kingdom of justice and mercy with the sword that had come from this rock and was now at her hip.
Her eyes welled. They always did. She did not know why. She did not wipe them. She continued walking.
The wind from the north did not stop.
☀️☀️☀️
II. Lancelot
“Your Royal Highness.”
She did not turn. She had counted the hoofbeats leaving the courtyard and heard the overly practiced trot coming toward her and she had known who it was before he spoke.
“Sir Lancelot.”
“The King has departed.”
“He has. A remarkable observation, Sir Lancelot. I will note it in the chronicles.”
“My Queen, if I may—”
“You may not.”
“I have not yet said—”
“Sir Lancelot.” She turned now. The morning light caught her eyes and they shone like a calm sea. “Your countenance is that of a man who has been composing a speech. I have an instinct about speeches composed by young knights when their king has just left the gate. I would prefer not to hear yours. We shall both be happier and more content.”
“But—”
Sir Gawain stepped between them. He materialized in places as tumultuous weather materializes in mountains—unseen and unnoticed until it is upon you.
“Lancelot.”
“Gawain, I—” He tried to maneuver around him.
Gawain shifted to cover the approach. “Ah-ah.”
Go for the enfilade, Gwen, she thought.
“There is a widow,” said Gwenhwyfar.
“A what?”
“Marooned on the distant shores of Malta while voyaging to the Holy Land. Her vessel’s hull has sustained damage. The tide there is treacherous and no one wishes to make the crossing. She has need of a knight of reputation to help patch the hull.”
“Malta? That is weeks of—”
“Months. Possibly a year. The widow is said to be lonely.”
Lancelot looked at Gwenhwyfar. Gwenhwyfar looked at the banners. They were quite lovely.
“My lady, am I being—”
“Sir Lancelot, you are being honored. It is a mission of great delicacy and the realm thanks you. Gawain will see you provisioned.”
“—sent away?”
“Provisioned.”
He looked from Gwenhwyfar to Gawain and back, and somewhere behind his eyes a small mathematics was being conducted about what a year on a distant shore with a young widow might offer a man of his reputation, charm, and visible biceps.
“The widow,” Gawain said helpfully, “is said to have a very graceful hull.”
Lancelot brightened. “A hull.”
“And other structural features requiring careful attention.”
“I shall depart within the hour.”
He bowed low to Gwenhwyfar, backed away with a flourish, mounted, and rode for the harbor. His hair bounced theatrically the whole way.
Gwenhwyfar exhaled through her nose.
“Thank you, Gawain.”
“My Queen.”
“The widow is my second cousin, Minerva.”
“Indeed.”
“Sir Gawain.”
“My Queen.”
“Thank you.”
He bowed. She was technically his half-sister, possibly the most beloved queen in the world, and despite dozens, if not hundreds of suitors, she had been drawn to Arthur like a dragon to a golden treasure, and it was absurd to think she would permit a cocky young knight to get between them.
What was he thinking?
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III. The Message
The rider came at the hour of Sext.
His horse was damp with sweat and breathing hard. The courier had ridden through the night and into the morning and dismounted quickly.
The message was short. Mordred, suspiciously quiet for weeks, had landed. Two hundred ships were in the western bay. An army was behind them. He had moved overland while his fleet moved by sea, and his fleet had moved quickly, and he was fourteen leagues from the capital and closing.
Gwenhwyfar read the parchment twice.
She did not speak for a moment. She was assessing the chess board: the relative positions of the pieces, what was in position to strike, who was in danger of being surrounded. The western marches were flat and wet in places. An army could move quickly but had little room to hide. Cavalry would be useful. Archers less so. Only Lord Bournville’s keep sat out there in the marshes, and it had been in decline, with only a small garrison and a few knights. She didn’t even know if he was at home.
She considered for a few moments. Finally, she looked at Gawain, who stood by her, as always, the trusted bodyguard.
“We will take care of this.”
“My Queen?”
“Arthur is away on his well-deserved hunt. I do not wish to disturb him when it is well within my power to deal with any threat Mordred could pose.”
Gawain hesitated. He had served for twenty years and was deciding whether to say the thing that was in his mind and wished to pass his mouth.
She saw it. She saw everything.
“Sir Gawain.”
“My Queen.”
“Speak your thought.”
“The King would wish to be notified of the threat.”
“The King is hunting boar in the greenwood. The poor man has had so many frustrations lately, and I fear he is taxed. And vexed. Positively vaxed.” Her eyes looked up for a moment, and she smiled at her own cleverness. Gawain thought she was charming and very, very lovely when she did that. He would never say so. Highly improper. He was a married man and she was his relative.
Yet, he couldn’t help but observe, as one’s eye acknowledges the beauty of a fine painting, executed by a master.
They all loved her, in different ways.
“I would like for him to enjoy his holiday, especially when I’ve got this matter well within my grasp.”
Her pointed crown glistened darkly, the sapphires reflecting fire from the massive blaze in the Great Hall of Camelot. Above the fireplace, the Great White Stag’s eyes glittered and he looked down as if he knew something she did not, as if he was holding his breath. Arthur had named him Albi.
“The King would wish—”
“Gawain. The King left the kingdom in my care because he trusts my judgment. To summon him from a hunt for a matter I can resolve before sundown is to tell him that his trust was misplaced. That his instincts are questionable. I will not insult him. Go fetch the captains. Brief them, gather the sergeants and the men. I will notify Admiral Mocenigo to stand by. We ride out to meet Mordred. He will learn what it is to face the anger of a Sea-Queen without her husband tempering her sensibilities.”
She laughed. Her magnificent blue eyes flashed.
There was arrogance in that laugh, thought Gawain. I don’t like it. Mordred is a snake.
Gawain bowed. He went.
She was already moving, already calling for her armorer, already sending a message to the Admiral, already pouring herself into the work as the wheels of war began to turn.
I will handle this, and Arthur will love me even more for it.
The thought was so natural that she did not recognize it as a thought. It was the water she swam in.
It was the water that would do her bidding.
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