The Guinevere Deception (Camelot Rising 1)

“Do two such fair ladies have plans for the evening?” Mordred spun his knife on the table. “Perhaps a lively discussion of what color our queen will wear so as best to stand out at the tournament?”

Guinevere made a face. She could not help it. The idea of spending any more time on the logistics of the tournament was sour in her belly. She wanted to help Arthur, but she had lost being a magical protector for this?

Mordred laughed. “Good. Come with me. We are going to a play.”

“A play?” Brangien repeated, her expression dubious.

“You enjoy watching men pretend to be at war in the arena, but not actors pretending to be in love? Surely we have enough of war in reality. Why play at it in all our free time? Come. Let us celebrate the wonders of humanity.”

Guinevere looked at Brangien. Brangien wrinkled her nose, then shrugged in agreement. “I do not actually want to talk about the tournament any more tonight.”

Mordred clapped his hands together, rubbing them excitedly. “Excellent. You have not seen the majesty of mankind until you have seen Godric the Fair compare his mistress’s charms to the variety and quality of winds he releases from his—well. I do not want to spoil it.”

Both horrified and intrigued, Guinevere could not say no.

* * *

They walked back as twilight lingered and the bells chided them to hurry home.

Guinevere wiped away a tear, her stomach sore from so much laughter. “That was the worst thing I have ever seen in my life,” she said.

“It truly was.” Mordred danced in front of them, moving backward to face them. “It truly was. I have lived nineteen years and could live one hundred more and see nothing worse. Are you not delighted?”

“I am.”

Brangien huffed, but she had laughed harder than any of them when Godric the Fair had mistaken his horse for his betrothed and made amorous advances. The theater was in the lowest part of the city. It was not nearly as nice as the arena, but it was just as packed. If tournaments made the heart race and the blood boil, plays made the heart dance and the tears flow.

“Thank you,” Guinevere said. “I think that was precisely what we needed.”

Mordred bowed, sweeping his arm out. “I am the queen’s most humble and devoted servant.”

Brangien scoffed. “You are as humble as Godric’s poetry was lovely.”

Mordred staggered. “You wound me, fair Brangien. Now hurry along, or we will be picked up by the watch and forced to spend the evening in a cell so we cannot commit any mischief.” He raised an eyebrow, indicating that he was not opposed to mischief of any kind, then turned his back to them and continued stepping merrily toward the castle.

“You seem to have softened toward Mordred,” Guinevere said, watching his lithe form. He was lean, slender and almost delicate. A reed to Arthur’s oak tree. But he was lovely, and he moved with surprising grace. She remembered how he had swung his sword as though dancing with it. And she remembered the spark when his hand had touched hers.

She had been very careful not to touch his hand since.

Brangien nodded. “When I ran from the trees, certain the boar was still behind us and we were about to be killed, he was the first to me. I screamed that you were still in the woods and he did not hesitate. He ran straight in. He did not even have his sword. What he thought he would have done had he found the boar, I do not know. But his willingness spoke volumes. I might have misjudged him.” She paused. “Slightly. And I only said might.”

Guinevere had, too. She had thought him her enemy. But really, he loved Arthur as well as or better than anyone. She suspected he watched her so closely because he was the only other person who knew Arthur’s history with Elaine. He did not want Arthur hurt again. They were united in that.

And he had understood why she healed Sir Tristan. He knew they could not have magic within the walls, but he was not so rigid as to betray her actions in the wild.

When they entered the castle, Guinevere felt settled. Something that might grow to happiness had taken seed in her chest. This was a life. A real one. Not the one she had dreamed of, or thought she had, but one that she could fit into in time. Mordred bade them goodnight and she returned to her rooms with Brangien.

Together, they knotted the hairs for Brangien to visit Isolde in her dreams. Brangien thought it a sacrifice that Guinevere was giving up her own dreams night after night, but Guinevere did not want to dream. There was nothing for her to hope to see. And if Brangien and Isolde could only be together when sleeping, Guinevere would make it happen. At least her magic could accomplish this one thing.

Guinevere curled up into her own bed. She toyed with Merlin’s hairs, still wrapped around her finger beneath a silver ring. She could visit him the way Brangien visited Isolde. But she was still so angry with how he had misled her, and that he had chosen to let himself be trapped. How could a wizard so wise be so foolish?

She closed her eyes, grateful that she would see nothing.

Though Camelot had been buzzing with anticipation for two solid weeks, the tournament seemed to get no closer. Lancelot stayed out of the city—to protect her identity, Guinevere suspected, though in armor and with her voice lowered, Lancelot was not obviously female. But it frustrated those who wanted to have Lancelot in their homes and manors for meals, or to watch the patchwork knight train.

Finally, the night before the tournament arrived. No one was happier than Guinevere that the day was at last upon them. Not only because she hoped her friend would succeed. Or because she anticipated the excitement of watching.

No, mostly because it meant she would never again have to adjust seating plans twenty-two separate times to accommodate all the ladies and their knights and cousins and friends while keeping in mind who was feuding with whom, who hated whom, who would be terribly hurt if they were not in the front, and who needed to be reminded that they did not have the right to demand a place closest to the king and queen. She would rather have done battle on the field than battle over the seating arrangements.