Page 108 of The Faerie Morgana
“Is that a blessing, or a curse?”
“Outliving those you love is painful.”
“But others come along.”
“They do.” He sighed and let his chin drop. “But they can never replace the ones who came before.”
43
Mordred accompanied his brother’s body as it was borne down the stairs of the west tower and through the keep. The prince held himself very straight, his face rigid, showing nothing of his grief and his fear. Morgana, pacing on the other side of the bier, nodded approval of his bearing and his courage. She sensed his anxiety and wished she could reassure him. The Blackbird would be at his side, which would help, but he would take the throne at a dangerous moment for Lloegyr, and there was no one to help him lead the fighting men.
If only Lancelin… But Sir Lancelin had disappeared, as had Gwenvere. There were wicked whispers that they had run away together, but Morgana knew better. Lancelin’s regret had been real. And Gwenvere’s days of enchanting men were over.
Was she dead? Morgana didn’t know, nor did she care. All that mattered was that Gwenvere was gone from Camulod, to spread her poisons no more.
The bearers walked slowly, as Mordred had ordered, to allow the mourning people of Camulod to say farewell to their king. Braithe and Loria had dressed his body simply, as he wouldhave preferred, in a dark blue tunic and pale leggings, his hair brushed away from his face and held by his silver coronet. Morgana had laid the great sword upon his chest and curled his fingers around the hilt. He was beautiful, even in death, even without the sparkle of his sky-blue eyes, the sweet curve of his smile. Maids and ladies openly wept. Knights and their lackeys were stone-faced, but their eyelids were heavy with sorrow, and there were many inadvertent sobs.
Bran, deprived of the formality of a funeral, had nevertheless set out tables laden with cider and ale and the traditional bitter bread. Morgana approved all of this, and the Blackbird, though he hid behind the brim of his hat, walked behind Mordred in support. He leaned on his staff, but the pace was an easy one, and Morgana sensed how the energy of his presence surrounded Mordred. The Blackbird could not rule for the boy, but he could strengthen him.
As the procession passed through the main gate, the knights of the council knelt, their fists to their chests. Morgana had held her composure until this moment, but the gesture filled her breast with such a great grief she was afraid she would weep like one of the kitchen maids.
Braithe, walking behind her, whispered, “Just a little farther, Priestess. A little farther.”
Morgana silently blessed her, and remembered what the Blackbird had said.Outliving those you love is painful.Braithe was her little sister, her handmaiden. Her friend. She couldn’t bear to think of a world without her.
They left the castle behind and made their slow progressdown through the woods toward the lake. People followed, creating a procession just as they might have done for a funeral pyre. When they reached the dock, the bier was lowered gently into the waiting boat. The boat was draped with Arthur’s flags, blue with the black crest. Their edges trailed in the water, rippling on its surface as they had once rippled in the wind.
Morgana stepped into the prow at the head of the bier. Braithe sat behind it, settling herself on the bench seat, and shipped the oars.
No one spoke as the boat slipped away across the sun-dappled waters of late afternoon. Morgana glanced back to see Arthur’s subjects standing in rows along the shore, shading their eyes against the slanting light for their last glimpse of the king. She raised a hand in farewell, thinking she might never see any of them again, and then she turned forward to watch their progress.
Braithe’s rowing had improved enough that Morgana wondered if she had been practicing. Seemingly without effort, she propelled the boat steadily away from Camulod and out into the center of the lake.
Braithe did not know their destination, and Morgana had seen it only with owl’s eyes, but it didn’t matter. When they were well out from shore, they felt the familiar power surge beneath the boat. Braithe lifted the dripping oars and rested them on their locks as the boat sped forward. It wasn’t long before the mist that surrounded the Isle of Apples rose before them, but the boat kept beyond its boundary, sweeping to the right and then bending to the left in a long semicircle.
Several times Morgana looked down at Arthur’s still form, hispale face glowing faintly in the waning daylight. It hardly seemed possible he would not open his eyes, look up at her, ask her with his sweet smile where they were going. She wondered that the intensity of her grief, the piercing physical power of it, did not wake him. Surely such a force of energy should recall him to his body, revive the beat of his heart and the thrum of blood in his veins.
She felt an overwhelming desire to lean down and place a kiss on his icy cheek, but she refrained. She had never kissed her half brother—indeed, she had never kissed anyone since being taken from her foster mother—and Braithe would wonder at it. She couldn’t have explained the impulse. She didn’t completely understand it herself. It was something vague, something about last chances and the bitter finality of this farewell.
The boat with its tragic burden moved far faster than any boatman could have propelled it. The mist-filled night was only half gone when it slowed and turned, pulling to the left. Braithe gave a tiny gasp, then whispered, her voice hushed with wonder, “Priestess! Do you see?”
“Oh, yes,” Morgana said. “I see.”
The temple of the fae was alive with small, flickering lights that lifted and fell and swooped this way and that, like rebel stars come to earth. They glittered through the blanket of mist, giving just enough light to illumine the shore. As the boat drifted toward the land, four figures appeared out of the starlit fog and paced down the little hill toward the dock.
“Priestess!” Braithe exclaimed. “They look just like you!”
“I know.”
“They will not like me coming here,” Braithe said, andMorgana heard the tremor of fear in her voice. “They might—they could—”
“We won’t be going ashore,” Morgana told her. “They are coming for Arthur’s body. They won’t trouble about you.”
“But now I know where their temple is, and they…”
“You could never find it again unless you were invited.”
The boat bumped gently against the dock, and Morgana climbed out to secure it to the bollard. When the rope was secure, she stood waiting.
