Camelot’s Shadow

Except me. She twisted her fingers together. Her handmaid, Aeldra, stood a respectful distance behind her, but she could feel the woman’s quiet disapproval. She should be at loom or spindle. She should be down in the cellar helping with the brewing, or seeing how Gwyneth and her new baby were getting on. She should be doing any of a thousand things.

It is like a verse from a country ballad.

‘And the maid went to her father,

And her knees she bent.

Begging, “Father, dearest father,

will you please relent?”’

She stared at the cloudless sky. Mother Mary, I beg you. Soften his heart.

‘Lady Rhian.’

The sound of Vernus’s voice turned Rhian around. He emerged from the doorway and crossed the yard to her, sidestepping a cluster of squawking chickens. When Rhian saw his shoulders set square and level, she felt her heart rise, but in another moment he was close enough for her to see his face. The lines of bitterness on his brow and around his broad mouth showed clearly.

‘It would seem I have failed in my suit to your father.’ He squeezed his riding gloves in his hands and spoke to the tips of his boots. ‘I am to take myself away and not return.’ He looked up at her. ‘Especially not with an offer of marriage.’

Rhian felt tears sting her eyes even as anger drove the blood to her cheeks. Cruelty. Sheer miserable cruelty. All the worse this time because Vernus was not just some faceless stranger who had sent a letter and gifts. He was a friend from her childhood, who had grown into a tall and handsome young man, well worth the position he would hold in the world. He had even been to Camelot and been presented to the king.

But no. She was not to have him.

‘My father seems determined I should die unmarried and go to run with the apes in Hell,’ she sighed. ‘Vernus, I’m truly sorry.’ And sick and sad and burning with fury. Perhaps I shall burst my heart with grieving and that will be an end to it.

‘Could you speak to your mother? Your father sets much by her counsel, perhaps she could persuade…’ his words trailed away as Rhian shook her head.

‘Not in this, she cannot.’ Tears threatened again. Rhian dropped her gaze to the ground and blinked hard. ‘My father has been turning away my suitors for five years now, and for five years my mother has tried to persuade him of the worth of each of them. But he will not hear of it.’ The heat of her anger dried up her tears. She stared hard at the window of the hall. ‘He will not hear anything from any of us.’

‘I will speak to my father. Perhaps he can persuade Lord Rygehil to part with you.’

Rhian felt a weak smile form. She wanted to touch his hand but decided she had better not. ‘Thank you, Vernus. Perhaps he can.’

Your father will marry you to Melina of White Hill whose father is not insane, and we both know this. Please go away, Vernus. I cannot stand here trading empty words anymore.

‘I must go, Rhian.’ He bowed to her. ‘But I have not abandoned you.’

‘Thank you, Vernus.’ She dropped a curtsey. ‘God be with you.’

‘And with you.’

His cloak swirled as he turned away and marched towards the stables, cutting a straight line through the myriad activities of the yard.

Rhian watched his back for as long as she could stand it. She dropped her gaze and caught sight of her reflection in the horse trough. Her eyes were a pleasant blue and since the age of fifteen, her figure had been rounded and full. She had seen the stablehands and foster boys casting glances at her so she knew she was not uncomely. Her hair was her crowning glory. It was red-gold in colour and even tightly braided as it was, it fell to the backs of her knees.

But it seemed she would have no use for what beauty she might have if her father continued to have his way.

‘Aeldra,’ she said to her maid. ‘Fetch my bow and arrows, and send a boy for my hounds. Meet me at the gate. I expect I shall soon want to be elsewhere.’

She lifted the hem of her skirt and strode into the hall.

It took her eyes a moment to adjust to the dim interior after the bright daylight, but her ears immediately caught the sound of preparations for the midday meal.

He did not even let Vernus stay to eat. Rhian’s teeth clenched together. She stood aside for the servants setting up the trestle tables and bringing the benches away from the walls. Kettles of fragrant stew hung over the fire pits arid a sheep’s carcass turned on a spit tended by ancient Cleve.

Her father, Lord Rygehil of the Morelands, sat slumped in his carved chair at the end of the hall. A wooden goblet dangled from one hand. He looked up when she came to stand before him and dropped the curtsey that respect demanded.

‘Yes, Rhian?’ he said in a tired voice.

‘And the maid went to her father,

And her knees she bent.

Begging, “Father, dearest father,

will you please relent?”’

But she would not beg. Not this day.

‘Why?’ she asked instead.

He sighed and straightened his back a little. His features fell into the hard lines she had come to know so well. ‘Because I did not choose to give you to him.’

As if that were not evident. ‘Lord Father, may I know the reason?’

He looked into the depths of his cup. ‘More ale!’ he called out and one of the servants hastened forward with a pitcher. Rhian wondered how much of that pitcher he had already drained.

‘Lord Father…’ she began again.

He pointed to her with his free hand. ‘Your place is not to question me, Rhian, it is to be silent and obey.’

He downed a prodigious portion of his drink, and when he lowered his cup, Rhian saw something unexpected in his face. Regret, as plain and full as the resentment had been earlier.

She opened her mouth, but all her earlier thoughts had fled her. ‘If you would just tell me what I have done, Lord Father, to merit this treatment.’

He shook his head heavily. ‘Nothing, Rhian. You have done nothing.’

He turned his attention back to his cup.

I have lost. I am lost. Rhian curtsied reflexively. When she lifted her eyes, she saw her mother, Jocosa, standing in the threshold between the great hall and the living rooms. Jocosa gestured to her. Rhian set her jaw again and followed her mother as she walked up the stairs of the stone tower and into the sun room.

‘Now then,’ said her mother, sitting herself down on a cushioned chair. ‘I suppose you will run away and shoot at birds and hares until dark to ease your disappointment.’

Rhian felt her cheeks heat up. ‘That was my intention. What else should I do?’ She threw open her hands. ‘My father consistently denies me other employment for myself.’

‘I know.’ Jocosa took her daughter’s hand. ‘You will forgive your foolish mother. I fear one day you will run off and not come back to us.’

Rhian squeezed her mother’s hand. It felt as worn by years as her face appeared worn by care. In a chest in the treasury Rhian had once seen a miniature of her mother as a young woman. She had been lovely. As a girl, Rhian had wondered where all that beauty had flown. Now, she thought she knew.