Chapter 38 #2
“You live near?” I kept my voice neutral.
“Just through that grove,” she said, signaling behind me.
“I have been wandering about and have not seen any dwellings.”
“Do you not believe me?”
“It is not that.”
“Then you fear me. A lone woman roving in the dark.”
“I…”
“Come, Lancelot of the Lake.” She nodded to her horse’s saddle. “I will serve you a hot drink and you can tell me about Camelot.”
She mounted her horse. I had no choice but to join her.
“How is my brother, by the way?” she asked as we cantered.
“Who is your brother?”
“King Arthur,” she said, relishing my surprise.
Enchantress, witch, goddess, fairy. I had long heard whispers of Morgan le Fay, but nothing in the legends could have prepared me for this encounter.
Arthur’s half sister, the eldest daughter of Igraine and King Gorlois, led me into her great room where I could see traces of their shared lineage.
She boasted the same defined jaw and quicksilver eyes, and as she filled a pot and boiled water, I also noted the regal slowness of her movements.
Arthur moved through the world in the same way.
Morgan poured a hot drink into gold cups. I scanned the great room. It was similar in size to Viviana’s, with stone walls draped in pale silks. This was no witch’s den. In fact, as I settled into a chair by the hearth, I felt quite comfortable.
“Do you take lemon?” she asked.
My throat ached with thirst, but I thought twice about accepting a drink from her.
“No drink for me, thank you.”
She stopped pouring and raised her eyebrow.
“What have they told you about me? That I trade in dark magic? Commune with evil spirits? That I can control the creatures of the forest with the flick of my hand?”
I’d heard all of these things and more, but I did not want to feed her dread. I settled on something more benign.
“They say that you can fly.”
She rested her cup on the table.
“I hover.”
She cracked the slightest smile, and I felt my shoulders slacken.
“Tell me, Lancelot,” she said, pulling her chair closer. “What do you know about perfect numbers?”
Morgan, it turned out, had a lot to say on the topic.
I sat captivated as she discoursed on everything from the movement of the stars to the numerical symmetry in the spirals of a seashell.
She possessed knowledge of the natural world beyond my comprehension, and I began to wonder if her magic was not magic at all, but rather a mix of intelligence, wisdom and experience. Perhaps most magic was.
“You remind me of my adopted mother, Viviana,” I said, after her lengthy disquisition on the colors of the planets. “She too has great knowledge at her fingertips.”
Her expression darkened. “I am not like Viviana.”
“I meant it as the highest compliment. She is brilliant, kind—”
“I know what she is,” Morgan cut me off. “I am a descendant, too.”
“Of course. I meant no offense.”
She refilled her cup, took a sip. “She never told you the story.”
“What story?”
Morgan let out an aggrieved laugh. “Of how I came to live like this.”
I followed the sweep of her arm. Her quarters were cozy and clean, filled with simple things.
A well-built table, benches, an embroidered rug, and curtains the color of melted butter.
Books on astronomy and maths lined one shelf.
It did not seem such a bad life, but I sensed the lack in other ways. Her life was far removed from family.
“Arthur is the son of Uther Pendragon,” she began.
“He was born to lead Camelot, though he was raised outside of it. But I am the eldest. I deserved a prominent place in the realm. Yet Uther never quite knew what to do with me or my sister, Anna. We were his stepdaughters, not his kin, and he treated us as such. Anna was better at fading into the background, but I didn’t do myself any favors.
I made my desire for power known and Uther did not like it.
When Arthur took the throne, the situation was delicate.
He was very young. He had many people telling him what to do.
He married and I floundered about, until I became Guinevere’s lady-in-waiting.
Arthur and I both felt it could be a stepping-stone towards a more prominent position. For a time we made the best of it.”
Morgan glanced at the dimming fire. She nodded her head just so, and I watched the flames reignite as if peppered with tinder.
“But you must understand, until he pulled the sword from the stone, I did not know I had a brother. I was led to believe he had died in birth along with my mother. I felt betrayed by Uther and was admittedly jealous of Arthur. I fulfilled my duties with Guinevere until I could no longer. I fled to the Isle of Women and learned the ways of the sisterhood. I was going to take Blasine’s place in my family line. ”
“Blasine?”
“The descendant before Glitonea. She was very old and saw my promise. Viviana and I studied the ways of Danu together.”
In all our forest walks, Viviana had never once mentioned Morgan. Though such a discussion would have been forbidden, I now understood that the sisterhood’s lines were widely known. Perhaps it was less about protecting a secret, and more about keeping the knowledge from me.
“Viviana was going to replace Thiten,” she said, speaking the name of Viviana’s precursor as if I’d always known it.
“And I would replace Blasine. And together we would lead the Isle and, by extension, Camelot and the realm. I have the fondest memories from that time. Viviana and I went from cottage to cottage, finding little ways to improve them with our magic. It was our idea to set Elinor’s home in the trees.
We had such fun together. We were true sisters, Viviana and I. ”
I thought back to my very first lake vision, my mother arriving on the Isle’s shores, a younger Viviana embracing her. I could feel the lightness from those years, the expansive sense of joy that cut through the island’s dense fog. It was astonishing to learn that Morgan had been a part of it.
“Then Ganieda came,” she continued. “She was pulled in abruptly after her great-aunt Tyronoe died, immediately anointed as one of the seven. She agreed to join the sisterhood under one condition. That her brother come to the Isle, too.”
“Merlin.”
Morgan nodded. “The sisterhood had no choice. Merlin and Ganieda were young and only had each other. Merlin was prone to wild fits of madness, and Ganieda wanted to keep an eye on him. The sisterhood made an exception.”
Merlin, too, had appeared in my vision. All of them, including my mother, had been on the island together. The distance between us seemed to compress as Morgan shared these recollections.
“The sisterhood helped ease Merlin’s erratic thoughts.
He rarely spoke of his childhood, but I sensed it was awful.
He’d spent most of it in a nunnery, just dreadful.
But on the Isle of Women he flourished. He grew stronger, gentler, and in time more handsome.
I was taken with him and he with me. I cannot quite explain it, but on the Isle of Women it felt easy to fall in love. ”
I fidgeted in my chair, laid bare by the statement.
“Do you still see him? Merlin?”
“No.” Her eyes went cold. “He is the reason I am a pariah. I was cast out from the Isle of Women because of him.”
Across the room a window shutter was flapping in the wind. With one violent glance, she slammed it shut.
“As we grew closer, he convinced me to teach him magic. Little tricks at first, starting fire, levitating objects, harmless things. The sisterhood frowned upon it, but they had grown to love Merlin, too. It was not until he started speaking of our future off the island, the influence we could wield, that I sensed his larger ambitions.”
“He was making prophecies?”
“Not yet. He had enough skill to conduct real magic, but the prophecies would come later. First, I had to steal the sword.”
“You… you stole it? From the lake?” I sat back, dumbstruck. I could not think of a deeper betrayal to the sisterhood.
“I tried. I snuck to the lake and with my magic I extracted it. Merlin and I were halfway to a boat when we were flung back by the others. Immediately I realized the seriousness of my transgression. But it was too late. Merlin and I were banished. My love had blinded me to reason.”
In all my time on the Isle of Women, I had not once known anyone to be cast off from its shores. Morgan’s betrayal was unspeakable. But she was only partially to blame.
“Why are you vilified, while Merlin is celebrated?”
Morgan’s head flew back. “Are you that dense, Lancelot of the Lake? Merlin is a man.”
I went to lift my arms in agreement, but they suddenly felt heavy, as if melded to the chair.
Merlin was mostly at fault, but in my mind that did not absolve her.
It frightened me that Morgan even knew the whereabouts of the sword, and that she spoke of it so freely, assuming I knew its location, too.
“You did a horrible thing,” I said.
She leaned closer to me, getting loud. “And don’t I know? Don’t I live with the guilt every day of my life? It’s an unrelenting gnaw, even infecting my dreams. I cannot escape my guilt, and I am destined to be defined by it.”
I knew of guilt, I wanted to tell her. I knew its vile grip.
“But you still possess great power,” I said. “You could use it for good like Merlin does.”
This set her off. The shutters clapped, the oil lamps flickered and my whole body was now tethered to the chair as if by invisible ropes. I could see the rage curling at the corners of her mouth, her knuckles white against the cup. She dropped her voice to a whisper.
“Merlin is not good. One day you will learn this.”
The invisible restraints slackened and the lamplight returned to normal. Morgan brought her cup to the washbasin and aggressively began to scrub it.
“How is my son?” she asked, as if nothing happened.
“Yvain,” I said, hoping the change of topic would cool her anger. “He is my closest friend in Camelot.”
“Is he really?”
“Most certainly. From the moment I arrived he took me under his wing. I am forever grateful.”
“I raised him well.” Her voice was suddenly mouse-like.
“You did. And his wife, Laudine, is very nice. I’m not sure about the lion, but…”
Morgan was aggressively drying the cup. I could see her eyes growing watery.
“But Yvain’s little boy is charming,” I added.
“Olwen,” she whispered.
“He brought me to a cupboard the other day. He wanted to show me his kitten. He named it Pip.”
“Pip,” she whispered, drying furiously.
“Does Yvain not visit you?” I asked as delicately as I could.
“Not too much.”
“You must miss him.”
“I know he is busy. Busy trying to track down that stupid lost cup.”
“The grail,” I said. “We are searching for it.”
She tossed the rag on a shelf and began to pace around me. Once again, I felt the pull of the invisible restraints. I was trapped here, I realized. I needed to escape, but the woods, I sensed, were under her control, too.
“Let me ask you something, Lancelot of the Lake. Why are you running across the realm looking for that cup?”
“Because we need to find it before the Romans do.”
“But why you?”
“The prophecy says—”
“The prophecy. And who made this prophecy?”
“Merlin did. But—”
“And who made the prophecy about Gawain?”
“Merlin. Yet—”
“And who made the prophecy about Percival?”
“I believe Merlin made that one as well. I don’t—”
“And who made the prophecy about Arthur? And Bedivere? And Pellinore? There are endless prophecies. Why, I recently heard one about your cousin Bors.”
The name caught me like a hook.
“You’ve heard word of Bors? And Lionel, too? Are they all right?”
“I only hear whispers from the mainland. But I believe they are mounting a meaningful resistance against Claudas, gaining prowess as knights.”
I breathed a sigh of relief, happy to hear they were faring well. But her broader point was beginning to crystallize.
“Merlin is the source of all of these prophecies,” I said. “And they cannot all be true.”
“None of them are true. Not a single one. But through them he has achieved his goal.”
“What is that?”
“Chaos. He has the greatest knights spread across creation, searching high and low for a cup that will never be found. You have become his pawns, and Camelot is weaker as a result.” She tossed her arms in the air and the wall silks fluttered. “Well, two can trade in chaos.”
My chest tightened, the unseen ropes straining into my flesh. I had been teetering on the edge of panic, and now, as I gasped for breath, I sensed the real danger I was in. Morgan had all the power of Viviana, with none of the self-control.
Should I reduce the heat? I thought. Or press my hand? I decided on the latter.
“You know where the grail is, don’t you?” I said.
Her laugh struck against my flesh. “Of course I do.”
“Where is it?”
“In a place I know well. Where no one will ever reach it.”
“Where? Tell me.”
“And give Merlin the glory of a prophecy fulfilled? Never.”
“I will attribute it all to you,” I said. “It would redeem you, and expose Merlin for his deceit.”
“Look at you, just like the others, hungry for power and fame, craving to burnish your legend. You are the last person who should find the grail.”
I could feel my pulse throbbing against the restraints. My vision went blurry, the air grew thin.
“No. That’s not why I am seeking it.”
“Lies.”
“I care nothing for glory or fame. I just want—”
“What?” she shrieked. “What is it you want?”
Just then a thunderous knock drew our attention to the door. Morgan froze. The knock became a battering, the threshold shook, and her rage quickly turned to fear. She looked to me for explanation, but I had none.
In a clap of dust the door crashed open, and my body flew forward, the spell of the restraints suddenly broken.
I looked up, but could not believe my eyes.
There in the threshold, draped in furs, stood Sir Gawain.
“Good morning, Aunt Morgan,” he said, stepping into the great room. Was it really morning? In Morgan’s company I’d lost all sense of time. “I’m sorry to interrupt… whatever this is. But I’ll be taking him back now.”
“Nephew,” Morgan said, voice scraped with disbelief. “Won’t you stay for breakfast?”
“No time, but thank you. The others have departed and we need to get back to Camelot.”
Gawain shot me a concerned look. I nodded and rose, more stunned than relieved. Morgan followed us to the door.
She was dangerous, I knew now. But like anyone, Morgan was also a victim of circumstance. As we locked eyes, I felt pity.
“Thank you for your hospitality,” I tossed out, hoping to feed the embers of our connection.
When I looked down, I noticed her feet were a few inches off the ground—hovering.