Only too well. A dirty, dishonorable job with no songs or flags flying, and none of us would sleep very well at the end. “Sir, I …”

The cup paused halfway to Ambrosius’ colorless lips. “Eh?” “I don’t know if I can. It’s not a question of disobedience, but—”

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“But you’re not Herod to slaughter the innocents?”

“No, Imperator.”

“Oh, lad.” Ambrosius rested his head on his hands. “You have the instinct to be noble and the ambition to be great. You won’t be both together, not bloody likely.”

His head came up suddenly. “Bedivere’s more than your captain, he’s your friend. Trystan, Gareth, you care for these men, don’t you?”

“Yes sir.”

1 ‘Then remember this summer that every curly little head you” spare now will be back to fight them later or breeding more for their sons to fight. More agony. Ultimately, how many Britons will you kill with your misplaced mercy? You’ve read logic, Aristotle. Can you refute me?”

“No, my lord, but—”

“Artorius. There are no buts.” The emperor spread another map before me, showing all Britain. He leaned over the chart, visibly tiring, his breathing more difficult. “And if these reasons aren’t enough, here’s another. You know how my very loyal princes are wondering who’ll succeed me. And who is there?”

Who indeed among the parochial princes of Britain? As for Merlin, he was my own problem.

“Not that we lack hopefuls,” Ambrosius went on acerbically. “We’re crawling with royalty. But which of them can see beyond his own province?”

He looped circles in the air over the map with his stylus. “Marcus Conomori? Interested in the south coast and sea trade, doesn’t give a damn about anything else. Caradoc of Dyfneint? If not for his son Geraint, he wouldn’t know there was a Britain beyond his beaches and cliffs. Just keep the raiders off his coast, thank you. The west, the Silures and Ordovict? I’m not even sure who rules them now. They don’t pay taxes unless I go in after them.”

Another loop over Eburacum. “Our gracious Cador, watchdog of the north, smartest of the lot. Has Church support, and he knows how much we need him. He’s the bung in the barrel; pull him out, there’s nothing to stop the Picts. But he puts too much trust in his ability to make two and two come out five. He’s not happy losing his aloe. If that old fox turns north for an alliance, Britain’s that much weaker.”

He rooted among the papers and handed me a rough-draft note in his own hand. “But we are reminded there’s at least one homeless count with no particular tribal loyalty. Out of Cornwall

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by Severn, with perhaps a few other strains thrown in. You are Britain right now, Artorius: schooled in my thinking, at the head of the fastest, most powerful force from Orkney to Castle Dore. Whoever reaches for the crown will ask: does Pendragon back me? Your name will be among those considered. These articles declare you as my own choice for the crown.”

So there it was, the last move on Merlin’s board. Pawn to the eighth square. Miracle accomplished not through dream or magic but simple step by step. Whatever we make of life, it happens that way.

Ambrosius put his hand to his side, breathing heavily. “Give

me your arm, boy.”

I helped him down onto his couch.

“Damn bother,” he fretted. “Feel good for an hour, then— hell, it couldn’t be quick. That’s asking too much. One more cup and we’ll say good night.”

I filled our cups, trying to think clearly. My nomination was no real surprise, but the sudden nearness and reality of it crowded the doubts and questions over me. “Sir, do you think …”

Ambrosius cocked his head at me. “Well?”

“Choosing me’over royal princes. They’ll say you want to found a dynasty.”

Ambrosius snorted in disgust. “Dynasty hell! If I wanted that, I could recall my son from Rome. Fat chance, he wouldn’t have this foggy barnyard as a gift.” Ambrosius coughed, grimacing with the pain it caused him. “Dynasty, my—I’m about as royal as the cook’s cat. When I was chosen to replace Vortigem, you know what I thought? Why me? Simple. Power is its own argument, Artorius.”

“Wasn’t my mother your niece?”

Ambrosius took his time answering, sipped at his wine, the cords on his wasted neck moving as he swallowed. Unusual; he was always so direct.

“I suppose she was.”

“Suppose?”

“My sister Julia lost three children before Ygeraa. Couldn’t carry them past the third month. Didn’t Uther tell you all this?”

“Nothing beyond her name.”

“Gorlawse wouldn’t acknowledge Vortigem’s power, so Uther went into Cornwall to enforce it. He also met Gorlawse’s wife. When the smoke cleared, Gorlawse was a dead rebel and Ygema was pregnant. She died bearing you. Uther took you home.” “I see.”

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“I hope you do, Artorius. It was a long time ago. Flavia’s a loving woman, but what’s hers is hers. It happens.”

The unusual gentleness in his tone prompted me to ask, “What was she like?”

“Ygerna? Oh, tiny, quick, full of wild whims and humors. And temper! Took a knife to a servant once. Had to be thrashed like a boy. I’d say there’s a great deal of Ygerna in you.” Ambrosius studied me closely. “There’s a saying that they always know …”

“Who, sir?”

Ambrosius sighed and sank back on the couch. “Oh hell, just old wives’ tales. And tenacious as women are, they’ll never give a straight version of anything. There’s letters of Julia’s packed away. I’ll send them on sometime. But I’m spun out now, got to rest. Leave me for now.”

He lay back and closed his eyes. I rose quietly and went to the door, but before I could open it, Ambrosius called me again.

“Count?”

“My lord?”

His eyes were still closed. “Just one word on the things a king must do. When I saved the Demetae from Irish raiders, they called me Caesar, offered me undying loyalty and a few of their daughters. When I hanged their leaders for rebellion, they called me butcher and anti-Christ.”

He paused, breathing hard.

“Don’t ever expect them to love you.”

Guenevere had no supper laid for me in her chamber. She was in her nightrobe, hair loose about her shoulders, agitated and short.

“You can’t stay with me tonight,” she said. “There’ll be a guard on my door any moment.”

“A guard? Why?”

“To keep you out, Arthur.” She hugged herself, shivering. “I’m cold. Put another log on the Fire.”

I drew Guenevere down to the hearth’s warmth. “What’s happened?”

She took the hot wine I offered and drank deep. The cup trembled in her hand. “No more than we might expect. God alone knows who’ll wear the crown when Ambrosius dies. And since he’s graciously presented your aloe to Britain at large, we

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need a stronger alliance with the north. Orkney and the Picts. Ambassadors have already left.”

Then the guards on her door meant only one thing. It was comiC; Cador was so devious, he was predictable. I couldn’t help laughing. Guenevere failed to see the humor. “You’re amused?”

“A marriage with Brude?”

Her smile was thin and hard. “That’s not how it’s done. The hint of a marriage, the possibility, at least until the issue of the crown is settled.”

“Brude! Good Jesus, that doddering, unsanitary old man.”

“Who no doubt loves his horses more than me, but that’s rather beside the point.” Guenevere’s head slumped on my shoulder. Every line of her body sagged with exhaustion. “Cador didn’t give a royal damn about you and me before. I can have any man I want. But now I’m required, and I can’t fault father’s thinking. Brude is a simple man. We give him a simple picture. Our ambassadors wil! sing my virtues and, above all, my virginity.”

To laugh or curse? It would be funny if it weren’t so damned calculated and obvious. “A hundred years of war and suddenly an olive branch? Brude’s not an imbecile.”

“That’s part of the game,” Guenevere said as if to a child. “If the marriage is profitable to him, he’ll be forgetful.”

“So now I’m an inconvenience.”

“Never that.” Guenevere nuzzled her lips into the hollow of my throat. “My feelings are private, but my virtue’s gone public. Oh, Arthur, I’m so damned tired. I just want to sleep.”

“Gwen, listen to me.”

She twisted weakly in my arms. “I’ve listened so much tonight. Father, his ministers, then father again. Good God, let me go to bed,”

“Listen to me. You care.”

“About you? Too much.”

“About people.” I held her close with my mouth against her hair. “You’re too good to be thrown away while Cador plays games for the crown. You know how to rule because you know why. You care.”

“Oh, I care.” Her voice husked with fatigue. “Still, at mass today when Anscopius spoke of Christ in the temple, I felt like one of the moneylenders.”

“Kiss me, Gwen.”

**I want to sleep.”

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“Damn it, I said—” I kissed her hard. She held on to me, desperate.

“Father’s right, we need this. It’s be friendly or helpless. But I feel so shabby.”

“Gwen, what if I were king?”

She laughed soundlessly against my chest. “You imagine I haven’t thought of that? You’re the only clean thing I know, you and your men. Like Lancelot when he brought your message tonight, standing there like God’s conscience with his own bare need in his eyes. He’s your man, find him a wife. Soon. Wretched, honorable man.”

“What if I were king?”

She sighed. “It would be so simple then. I’d open our gates and come out to you with flowers in my hair and the white veil of virginity that we could at least pretend was valid. We’d make a strong marriage, strong children and, God damn them all, a strong country.” She tilted her head back to regard me with sleep-sensuous eyes. “I’d even ask now and then if Arthur Pendragon loved me.”

“Now and then.”

Guenevere kissed me with her old, cooJ enjoyment of the act for itself. “And I love you. Most of the time. Do you think we could do it, Arthur? Could we take all this mess and make something clean?”

Agrivaine flatly refused to serve under me and sued instead to remain as commander of Cador’s alae on the Wall. My trouble with him taught a valuable lesson. We were no cohort now, only lord and men, unable to afford petty differences of rank. Every man under me, whatever his birthright, must serve as simple lord-comite among equals, as ^iam-husbands considered each other brothers to love, trust and protect.