Chapter 42
Forty-Two
I was in the mews with Arthur, trying to choose a hunting bird.
“Some prefer goshawks,” Arthur said. “But I appreciate the gyrfalcon.” He held his arm out before a white bird with brown-speckled plumage, the largest on the perch. Its notched beak lent it a wise air.
“Why don’t you take the sparrowhawk?” Arthur pointed to a stately bird with gray feathers. “Erec won it in a competition last year. It’s friendly.”
I made my way to the perch in question. The sparrowhawk was fast asleep with its head tucked beneath its wings.
“Her name is Agnes,” Arthur added.
The sparrowhawk shook its head awake. Like all the birds in the mews, it wore a hood.
“Come now, Agnes.”
I tied the hawk’s jess to my leather guard and the sparrow gamely fluttered to my arm. I could feel her talons clamping through the leather.
“I think she likes me.”
“Oh, she does!” Arthur said, coming over to admire her. “How wonderful!” But at Arthur’s presence, Agnes recoiled and screeched, lashing a talon in his direction and casting a bolt of feathers in the air.
“Well,” he said, brushing the feathers from his tunic. “She’s not the first lady of Camelot who takes to you more than me.” Then with a dry, inscrutable laugh, he went outside.
I breathed in the earthen scents trapped in the mews, unsure how to react.
It was the first time Arthur had even obliquely referenced my friendship with his wife.
I gathered from Morien and Yvain that people were talking.
When it came to Arthur and the Round Table, everyone loved to talk.
But the rumors, that Guinevere and I were somehow in love, that we were carrying on, felt so far-fetched that I hadn’t given them a second thought.
Arthur continued to give me favored quests and assignments.
But five months had passed and I’d yet to be knighted.
It did not seem my place to revisit the topic.
And maybe Arthur feared the gossip carried a kernel of truth.
He had called for a hunt to mark the height of spring. We rode for an hour or so, into a clearing in Broceliande forest, where attendants had set up pavilions and tents. Our group numbered thirty, but Guinevere was noticeably absent.
“She’s not feeling well,” I heard Arthur explain to Percival as we dismounted our horses. “She has spells like this. She will meet us for supper.”
Guinevere, I knew, vacillated between glum and effervescent, sometimes refusing to leave her bed for days at a time.
I am everything to everyone, she once said to me. I want people to see through me, to see themselves, just like they do with Arthur. But it is a most isolating perch.
After a light meal, the falcon trainers arrived with our feathered partners. We broke off into groups. Arthur pulled me in with Gawain, Yvain and Laudine.
I stocked my quiver, mind flashing back to afternoon hunts with Galehaut.
Fog burned off, sun beating through the canopy, we stalked boar, pheasant, the occasional stag, hunting only what we planned to eat or share with the sisterhood.
I was a good shot. Galehaut was better. He pulled back his bow, narrowed his eyes and with the subtlest lift of a finger sent his arrow slicing through the air, striking his target every time.
I felt a violent tug on my arm. Someone was yanking me backward.
“Stop moving, you fool.”
It was Gawain, gripping me by the falcon glove.
“What on earth are you doing?”
I heard a snap. Then Gawain shoved my arm away.
“Your strap was undone.”
I looked down at the glove, now firmly cinched.
I smiled at him. “Thank you, Knight of Maidens.”
Gawain shook his head, smiling. “It is nothing.”
Agnes, it turned out, was an excellent hunting partner. She scared up hares, squirrels and other birds.
“Marvelous.” King Arthur squeezed my shoulder. “The sisterhood taught you well, White Knight.”
“A bit premature to be calling him a knight, no?” Gawain handed a limp pheasant to his squire.
“Just the opposite, nephew,” Arthur said. “Why, I would love to knight Lancelot right now, if he only deems himself worthy.”
He turned to me expectantly, and my face flushed. As much as I wanted to be a knight, I still did not feel deserving of the honor. I was beginning to realize I likely never would. I said as much.
Arthur gave a disappointed sigh. But Gawain jumped in. “With respect, uncle, the only person questioning Lancelot’s worth is Lancelot himself! His doubts, to me, should not keep him from knighthood. In fact, I think he is more worthy because of them. They speak of his humility.”
Arthur gave a considered nod. “I don’t disagree with you, Gawain, but we must respect Lancelot’s wishes.”
“But Arthur,” I clarified. “Being knighted by you has always been my wish. I want it more than almost anything. I only worry I cannot live up to it.”
“It is your wish to be knighted?”
“Very much so.”
“Well then, if you’ll get down on one knee?”
I stumbled back in disbelief. After months of waiting, was I really about to be knighted, mid-hunt, next to a pile of dead birds?
“You’re knighting me right here?” I asked.
Arthur unsheathed his sword. The metal seemed to sing.
“Unless you wanted a larger ceremony,” he said. “That can be arranged.”
“No, it’s not that.” And it truly wasn’t. I didn’t care about the backdrop, didn’t need an audience. I was just in utter shock.
“But… why now?”
“Because you said it’s what you wanted.”
“That’s it? I needed to ask? But I still have not conquered all my doubts.”
“I believe you have conquered enough of them.”
“But were my doubts not holding me back this whole time?”
“Other knights aren’t brought here by prophecy. I wanted to ensure that you actually wanted to stay. Your humility only further distinguishes you from others who aspire to the Table.”
Of course I wanted to stay. Camelot, with its heady profusion, its endless adventure, was home now. I would always miss the Isle of Women, but I had not been meant to stay there forever. Galehaut, I felt, would have wanted this for me. He would want me to be happy. He would want me to…
From bended knee, I looked up to Gawain. As Arthur’s sword grazed my shoulders, he gave me a satisfied grin.
“I guess I have to start calling you Sir Lancelot,” Gawain said.
We celebrated that night with a raucous feast. A trumpeter announced the meal, and we gathered in the largest pavilion.
Guinevere had arrived just before dusk, and she and Arthur sat on opposite ends of the U-shaped table.
I took a seat next to Gawain, a trencher of bread and one cup placed between us.
“Looks like we’re stuck sharing,” he said.
“I’d rather starve.”
“You can’t afford to lose any more weight,” he said, squeezing my thigh.
We feasted on roast boar and carrots. The meat was smokey and tender, the juices dripping down my chin. A dessert plate arrived with cheeses and jellies. I ate until I was full. When an attendant came around with more wine, Arthur raised his cup.
“Our Round Table is overflowing with knights of great prowess and humility, but none have captivated our castle quite like Sir Lancelot. I’m eager to give him a proper seat at the Table and keep him by my side. To Sir Lancelot of the Lake.”
The party cheered and raised their glasses, but I was watching Arthur. He was looking directly across the table to Guinevere as he gave the toast. I saw her raise her glass, not to me, but to him.
Arthur called for music. A tambourine player kept the rhythm, joined by panpipes, a lyre and fiddle. We danced around the pavilion, swinging ourselves in circles, wine sloshing in our cups. Even Arthur seemed to be letting loose, having fun.
Lyonesse placed a wildflower behind my ear, but Guinevere came over and plucked it off.
“You don’t mind parting with it, do you?” she said. “I should like a token of Sir Lancelot.”
I tracked the crowd for Arthur but did not see him.
“How are you feeling?” I asked.
“Terrible,” she said. “Come to my tent? Let us talk?”
I leaned into her ear. “I am getting worried,” I said. “About how this looks.”
She stood back, spoke loudly. “How what looks?”
“You and me,” I murmured. “People are talking.”
She let loose a high-pitched laugh. “As people do!”
“But Arthur—”
“Oh, Lancelot,” she said, grabbing my arm. “Come. There is something I must tell you.”
She dragged me out of the pavilion into a dark corner of the meadow.
“I will say this once, then never again. I am not at all in love with you.”
“I didn’t think you were,” I said truthfully. Though her words carried a slight sting.
“I am being honest with you,” she said. “Now it’s your turn.”
“I’m always honest with you,” I said.
She raised an eyebrow. “Are you in love with me?”
“No.”
“Then who are you in love with?”
“I am not in love with anyone.”
“But you have been in love before.” It was not a question.
“Yes,” I relented.
“With whom?”
My face went hot. In all our intimate talks I had never gone into detail about the nature of my relationship with Galehaut.
I did not want to share this side of myself and I did not want to speak his name.
Because if I spoke of him freely, I’d remember the dandelions.
The oak tree. The way his moon-like smile left me with a nameless ache.
I’d remember the first time our legs touched beneath the library table, the way my skin became lightning.
I’d remember his inner arms, smooth and pale like the inside of a shell.
I’d remember how much he loved and respected his mother and how I loved her, too.
I would have died for him. That would have been easy. Living was far worse.
My entire body tightened. The air left my lungs. What to do? How to say this? There were no words. One does not speak of bedrock.
“It is the boy from your training,” Guinevere said, articulating what I could not.
“What…”
“The pain like death.”
The tears burned hot. I was thankful for the dark.
“I…”
“Hush.” She pulled me against her shoulder. “I am sorry for your loss, Sir Lancelot.”
“Thank you” was all I could summon.
“You need not say more. There are some things that go unspoken now, with the rise of the new ways. But I sensed this about you from the beginning. And it is why I knew we could be real friends.”
“We are that,” I agreed, wiping the tears from my eyes.
“And you are not alone. There are other knights like you. Think of all the members who take vows of chastity.”
“Like… Percival?”
She winked. “And others, too. I do not understand the need for such theater. But this is our world.”
“I was warned to hide this side of myself,” I said.
“I would not advise you otherwise. But you are safe with me.”
I thanked her and she embraced me once more. There was nothing more to say. It was a relief to unburden myself, but I also felt like a wolf lying on its back, belly exposed to a hunter’s spear.
We were about to walk back to the pavilion when she said, “And what about Sir Gawain?”
The question caught me like a fishhook.
“What about him?”
“You two have grown close.”
I knew immediately what she was implying.
“To my never-ending surprise, we have,” I said. “He might be my closest friend in Camelot, outside of you.”
“And that is all? Just friends? Nothing more?”
I laughed. “Guinevere, he is the Knight of Maidens!”
She pressed her lips together, letting the unspoken linger. I should have brushed it off, should have ignored it. But spring was a time for sowing and harrowing.
We went back to the dancing, the merriment. Kay was wearing a woman’s mantle and Bedivere was drinking mead from a boot. Dodinel, as always, was the drunkest, but he was a gentle, grinning drunk who bothered no one.
One by one the various Round Table members retired to their tents. Gawain was carrying cups to the washbasin. I grabbed him by the elbow.
“Did you know I needed to ask to be knighted?”
“Not explicitly.” He gave me a wry smile. “But knowing Arthur, I had a hunch.”
I followed him through the torchlit pavilion. We sent away the attendants and did our share of the dishes.
“Now that I’m knighted, you no longer have a leg up on the grail,” I said.
“Don’t be too certain.” His scrubbing and drying suddenly reminded me of his aunt.
“I still think Morgan knows more than she’s letting on,” I said.
“Not that again.”
He placed a damp hand on my shoulder. Normally I’d think nothing of his touch, but Guinevere’s words lingered. I flinched, but did not shrug away.
Dishes clean, we walked towards the tents, but it dawned on me that I did not know which was mine.
“Where do I sleep?” I asked.
“Men are camped on this side,” he said. “Women over there. And it looks like Yvain and Laudine just went in there.” He nodded to a cedar grove.
“Perhaps in nine months Olwen will have a sibling,” I said. “Can I settle in any tent?”
He smirked. “As long as it’s as far away from mine as possible.”
I looked down the rows, unsure which tents were even available.
“I’m joking,” he said. “You’re with me.” He opened the flap, revealing two pallets. “That is, unless you want to find one of your own. We normally double up, but you did just get knighted…”
“No, this will do,” I said.
“Good.”
My heart raced as we ducked inside. An awkward silence as we removed our tunics. Did he feel the tension, too? Or was it a one-sided charge, born of Guinevere’s questioning? Our eyes caught, and we both turned away.
Then I looked up again and he was standing right next to me.
“Lancelot.”
He had said my name countless times, but it had never sounded like this. Urgent, vehement. Weighted with something, I couldn’t tell what.
Just as he was about to say more, the tent flapped open.
“Gawain, there you are,” said Arthur. “Please come with me.”