"Then the Druids have not robbed you of that, my son?"

"By no means," he said. "But most women are fools, so that I prefer not to trouble myself making play with those who expect me to treat them as something very special, or to pay heed to what they say. You have spoilt me for foolish women, Mother."

"Pity the same could not have been said of Lancelet," said Morgause, "for never did anyone think Gwenhwyfar had more wits than she needed to keep her girdle tied, and where Lancelet was concerned, I doubt she had that much," and she thought, You have Lancelet's face, my boy, but you have your mother's wit!

As if he had heard her thoughts, he set down the empty cup, and waved away a serving-girl who would have scurried to refill it. "No more, I am so weary that I will be drunk at another taste! Supper I would have. I have had enough of hunter's fortune, I am sick of meat, and long for home food -porridge and bannock ... . Mother, I looked on the lady Morgaine at Avalon before I left for Brittany."

Now why, Morgause wondered, does he say this to me? It could not be looked for that he should have much love for his mother, and then she felt sudden guilt. I made sure he should not love any but me. Well, she had done what she must, and she did not regret it.

"How looks my kinswoman?"

"She looks not young," said Gwydion, "it seemed to me that she was older than you, Mother."

"No," Morgause said, "Morgaine is younger than I by ten years."

"Still, she looks worn and old, and you ... " He smiled at her, and Morgause felt the flood of sudden happiness. She thought, None of my own sons have I loved as this one. Morgaine did well to leave him to my care.

"Oh," she said, "I grow old too, my lad ... I had a grown son when you were born!"

"Then you are twice the sorceress she is," said Gwydion, "for one could swear you had dwelt long in the fairy country with time never touching you ... you look to me as you did the day I rode away for Avalon, Mother mine." He reached out his hand to hers and brought it to his lips and kissed it, and she came and put her arm round him, careful to avoid his wound. She stroked the dark hair. "So Morgaine is queen now in Wales."

"True," Gwydion said, "and high, I hear, in favor with the King ... Arthur has made her stepson Uwaine a member of his own personal bodyguard, next to Gawaine, and he and Gawaine are close friends. Uwaine's not a bad fellow-not unlike Gawaine, I'd say-tough and staunch, both of them, and devoted to Arthur as if the sun rose and set where he pissed ..." and Morgause noted the wry smile. "But then it's a fault many men have-and I came here to speak of this to you, Mother," he said. "Know you anything of Avalon's plan?"

"I know what Niniane said, and the Merlin, when they came to take you thither," said Morgause. "I know you are to be Arthur's heir, even though he believes he will leave the kingdom to that son of Lancelet's. I know you are the young stag who will bring down the King Stag ... " she said in the old language, and Gwydion raised his brow.

"Then you know it all," he said. "But this, perhaps, you do not know ... it cannot be done now. Since Arthur brought down this Roman who would be emperor, this Lucius, his star has never flamed higher than now. Anyone who raised a hand against Arthur would be torn in pieces by the mob, or by his Companions-never have I seen a man so loved. This, I think, is why I needed to look from afar on his face, to see what is it in a king which makes him so loved ... ."

His voice fell away into silence and Morgause felt ill at ease. "And did you so?"

Gwydion nodded slowly. "He is a king indeed ... even I who have no cause to love him felt that spell he creates around him. You cannot imagine how he is worshipped."

"Strange," said Morgause, "I for one never thought him so remarkable."

"No, be fair," said Gwydion. "There are not many-perhaps there is no other within this land who could have rallied all factions as he did! Romans, Welsh, Cornish, West-countrymen, East Anglians, men of Brittany, the Old People, the men of Lothian ... all through this kingdom, Mother, all men swear by Arthur's star. Even those Saxons who once fought Uther to the death, stand and swear that Arthur shall be their king. He is a great warrior ... no, not in himself, he fights no better than any other warrior, not half so well as Lancelet or even Gareth, but he is a great general. And it is something ... something in himself," Gwydion said. "It is easy to love him. And while all worship him thus, I have no possible task."

"Then," said Morgause, "their love of him must somehow be made less. He must be discredited. He is no better than any other man, the Gods know that. He fathered you on his own sister, and it is well known here and abroad that he plays no very noble part with his queen. There is a name for a man who sits complacent while another man pays court to his queen, and not so pretty a name, after all."

"Something, I am sure, can be made of that," said Gwydion. "Though in these late years, it is said, Lancelet has stayed far from court and taken care never to be alone with the Queen, so that no shadow of scandal shall fall on her name. Yet they say she wept like a child, and so did Lancelet, when he took leave of her to go and fight at Arthur's side against this Lucius, and never did I see man fight as did Lancelet. One would think he longed to fling himself headlong into death. But he took never even a wound, as if his life was charmed. I wonder ... he is the son of a High Priestess of Avalon," he mused. "It may be he bears supernatural protection of some sort."

"Morgaine would know that," said Morgause dryly, "but I would not suggest you ask her."

"I do know that Arthur's life is charmed," said Gwydion, "for he bears the sacred Excalibur, sword of the Druid Regalia, and a magical scabbard which guards him from shedding blood. Without it, so Niniane told me, he would have bled himself to death at Celidon Wood, and after that ... . Morgaine has been given as her first task to get this sword again from Arthur, unless he will swear anew to be true to Avalon. And I doubt not my mother is wily enough to do so. I doubt she would stop at much, my mother. Of the two, I think I like my father better-he knew not what evil he had wrought when he got me, I think."

"Morgaine knew not that, either," said Morgause sharply.

"Oh, I am weary of Morgaine ... even Niniane has fallen under her spell," said Gwydion sharply. "Do not you begin to defend her to me, Mother."

Morgause thought, Viviane was even so, she could charm any man alive to do her will, and any woman either ... Igraine went pliant at her bidding to wed with Gorlois and later to seduce Uther ... and I to Lot's bed ... and now Niniane has done what Morgaine wished. And this foster-son of hers had, she suspected, something of that power, too. She recalled, suddenly and with unexpected pain, Morgaine with her head bent, having her hair combed like a child, on the night she bore Gwydion; Morgaine, who had been to her as the daughter she never bore, and now she was torn between Morgaine and Morgaine's son, who was even dearer to her than her own sons. "Do you hate her so, Gwydion?"

"I know not how I feel," said Gwydion, looking up at her with Lancelet's dark mournful eyes. "It seems not to run with the vows of Avalon that I should so hate the mother who bore me and the father who got me. ... I would that I had been reared at court as my father's son and his sworn follower, not his bitterest enemy ... ."

He laid his head down on his arms and said through them, "I am weary, Mother. I am weary and sick of fighting, and I know Arthur is so, too ... he has brought peace in these isles-from Cornwall to Lothian. I do not like to think that this great king, this great man, is my enemy and that for the sake of Avalon I must bring him down to nothing, to death or dishonor. I would rather love him, as all men do. I would like to look on my mother-not you, Mother, but lady Morgaine-I would like to look on her who bore me as my mother, not as the great priestess whom I am sworn to obey whatever she bids me. I would that she were my mother, not the Goddess. I wish that when Niniane lay in my arms she were no more than my own dear love, whom I love because she has your sweet face and your lovely voice. ... I am so weary of gods and goddesses ... I would that I had been your son and Lot's and no more than this, I am so weary of my fate ... ." And he lay for a long moment quiet, his face hidden, his shoulders shaking. Tentatively, Morgause stroked his hair. At last he raised his head and said, with a bitter grin that defied her to make anything of his moment of weakness, "I will have now another cup of that strong spirit they brew in these hills, without the water and honey this time ... " and when it was brought, he drained it, without even looking on the steaming porridge and bannock the girl had brought. "What was it said in those old books of Lot's, when the house priest beat Gareth and me until our backsides were bloody, trying to teach us the Roman tongue? Who was yonder old Roman who said, 'Call no man happy until he is dead'? My task, then, is to bring that greatest of all happinesses to my father, and why should I then rebel against that fate?" He signalled for another drink; when Morgause hesitated, he seized the flask and poured the cup full again.