Gawain and Lady Green Read online

  Wanna see?

  Ah. Ech. No. I think I need not see you.

  Wise Gwyneth. You got prophecy?

  I read the future in stones.

  Nah, naaah! Prophecy in heart. Look. See. Know.

  I don’t do that.

  You will.

  What?

  You give us ours. We pay prophecy.

  Gawain stirs under my hand. I glance down at him. He rolls his head toward me, his eyelashes strive to lift—long black eyelashes, lovely as a girl’s.

  That one. Give us that one, Gwyneth.

  Why do they ask and bargain? What choice have I?

  Bitterly, Always choice.

  Always choice…when I thought I had none…

  Gawain’s mouth drops open as in horror. His dear gray eyes startle wide, then narrow and droop. His ruddy face grays, then greens; Gawain’s dear head seems severed from its sturdy neck.

  You give. We pay. Your choice.

  Eyes on Gawain’s dead face, I strive to move. With huge effort I lift my hand from his shoulder, reach out behind me, grasp my green silk girdle. It burns my hand.

  Hah! No need. We go.

  I draw the warm, protecting girdle about my waist.

  Your choice, Gwyneth.

  The voice dies away out of my head. Empty, innocent mist curls past and into my open bower door. The girdle’s warmth spreads through me, from stomach to breasts, down arms and legs. Gawain’s face turns from green to gray to ruddy. Under closed lids, life fills out his eyes.

  Prophecy. They pay prophecy.

  Choice. I have choice.

  Ale mug at hand, Gawain rested in Old Lady Granny’s hut. Light rain splattered the thatch close above him. Then it paused. Rain had come and gone, heavy and light, all this cool, sleepy day. Gawain had passed the morning in Men’s House, telling Round Table tales to the fascinated Square Table. Now toward evening he stretched out alone on Lady Granny’s floor mats, embroidered down cushions propping up head and shoulders. He drank and dreamed.

  “May Queen, that’s me,” a child’s harsh voice declared close behind his head, just outside. “Gimme them flowers.”

  “Aaaah!” another child disagreed. “Maevis. I vote for Maevis.”

  “We don’t vote,” the first voice decided. “I’m May Queen. And May King, that’s…”

  “Alvie! Eddy! Hearny!” Children squealed. A dog barked— Granny’s friendly old Brindle.

  Gawain’s heavy eyes opened. Had he dreamed? He stared up into the arched branches that roofed Granny’s hut. From the highest arch swung pots, brushes, small tools for various tasks—mysteries to Gawain—and clean ceremonial garments. Three long green gowns hung up there, with loops of green jewelry and strings… and strings…and strings of true-gold rings.

  Gawain’s eye rested thoughtfully on dim-shining bracelets and strung rings. He had not been dreaming. Just outside the thatch behind him real children played a real game. Rain could not confine them indoors.

  The first, imperious voice said, “May King’s Brucie.”

  Protests. “Too little. Too ugly. Too dumb.”

  “Ech! You don’t want to be May King, do you?”

  Mumbles.

  “So. Gimme that there crown. Let me put this on you, Brucie…”

  Brucie squawked. Gawain imagined the smallest boy outside squirming as the flower crown descended. He gave a small remembering squirm himself.

  Brindle barked. Gawain could almost see his tail swing.

  “Music!” the bully demanded. And music commenced—what sounded like a broken-pot drum, several quavering reed pipes, and children whistling.

  Gawain sat up, dizzy. (More and more often he woke up dizzy.) He drained the mug beside him.

  “This here’s the maypole. Come on, Brucie. We lead.” One by one, dancing children quit whistling. The reed pipes and drum kept up a fairly lilting rhythm.

  Gawain rose to his knees, stretched, yawned. Tried the mug again. Not a drop left in it.

  “Ynis, let’s stop. That’s plenty there. We gotta breathe.”

  Ynis! Gawain should have known that determined, unchildish voice!

  But he had never seen Ynis play with other children. He had thought they rejected her company, as he would like to do himself. Here she was, not only playing but commanding the play, and the others caved in before her like peasants before a queen.

  “Oh, very well.” The ragged music ceased. “We can’t do Midsummer. So it’s Summerend now. Get the scythe, Con.”

  Scythe? Gawain let the mug fall. With both hands he laid hold of the thatch beside him and pulled apart a peephole.

  Just outside, green-clad, flower-crowned Ynis pointed commandingly to Granny’s chopping block. Two quite big boys laid hold of little flower-crowned Brucie. They plunked him down on his knees in a puddle beside the block.

  Brucie wailed. Brindle swung his tail and whined. The gang of children stood around panting.

  Here through their midst came Con, white-robed like a druid in a man’s worn-out tunic. In both hands he held a scythe. A real scythe.

  “Wait!” Ynis stopped Con in his tracks with a raised palm. “You want oak leaves on that scythe.”

  “Oak leaves!” Con growled and swung the scythe carelessly. Children close by jumped aside.

  That was a real scythe. Sharp. Oak leaves or no. Brucie wailed from the chopping block where the big boys held his head down. Brindle lifted his head and howled.

  Gawain saw himself the only adult in sight. With an effort he gathered his wits. Stood up. Pushed aside the leather-hinged door and glared down at the children. “In the name of holy Christ and Mary, what do you think you’re doing?”

  Small wet faces gaped up at him. Even Ynis betrayed surprise.

  “Con, you better get that scythe back before it’s missed. Run. Scat, you. All of you.” Gawain waved at the gang as Lady Granny would wave at flocking chickens.

  Squawking children scattered. An older girl ran the sobbing Brucie away. His wet flower crown dripped, abandoned, on the chopping block.

  “Except you.” In two strides Gawain grabbed Ynis’s wrist. Reed-thin, it seemed to crumble in his fist. He shifted his hold to the shoulder of her drenched green tunic. Confused Brindle growled, then wagged.

  “God’s teeth, Girl! What evil game do you play?”

  She raised a calm face to him. Her flower crown never slipped. Like her ma, she knew how to fasten it, even in wet hair. “May Day. We was just playin’ May Day.”

  “May Day with a scythe?” He shook her.

  “Couldn’t do Midsummer. You need a fire for Midsummer.”

  “So?”

  “So it’s rainin’.”

  He shook her more fiercely. “The scythe?”

  “So we skipped to Summerend.”

  Summerend. Summerend?

  “Listen, you Girl. You don’t play with real scythes.”

  “Brucie wouldn’t get hurt. Con’s his brother.”

  “Hah! A lot you know about brothers!” Quick, broken memories of his own brothers flashed across Gawain’s mind. “Next May Day game, pretend a scythe.”

  She sighed.

  Dizzy, mazed, he stared down into her quiet eyes. “Pretend a Midsummer Fire too.” No telling what these wild brats might do!

  “Have to,” she agreed. Her flower crown nodded. “If it rains.”

  And now came real rain, hard into her upturned face.

  Gawain awoke.

  He came wide awake lying on his side, staring into clear white moonlight.

  That’s the door of Lady Green’s bower, he thought. She left it open.

  He reached around behind him on the pallet and found it empty. She’s gone out and left the door open.

  Close by, an owl hooted.

  Gawain sat up slowly, to avoid dizziness. This time it did not come. Not dizzy. Head clear.

  Remembrance flooded in.

  Drank no ale yesterday. Dribbled it all on the ground when she wasn’t looking. Why?

&nb
sp; That ale of hers is spiked.

  His deep mind spoke up. Come, Sir! Up and out of here. Let’s find what we can see our self with no lovely Lady Green at our elbow.

  Perfectly awake, Gawain rose, stooped under the low-arched roof. He ducked through the bower doorway and out among the half-moonlit oaks.

  An owl called quickly twice from just above him. Another answered twice from the river.

  Here we are, at last by ourself. Which way, Sir?

  Gawain considered. North lay the pasturelands where herds wandered, guarded by youngsters with packs and tents, on their own for the first time. Like us, Sir!

  Northeast stretched the Fair-Field and mowings. East, over the shallow river, flourished the crops whose growth Gawain and Lady Green encouraged.

  She’s never let you go south.

  Lady Green said that south was sacred grove, then deeper and more sacred grove. She said that nobody goes south.

  Maybe that’s for us!

  Gawain considered this uneasily. A feeling he did not care to call fear prickled his stomach. I think not this time.

  He found himself moving northwest. An owl hooted above him. Two far owls answered. Gawain stopped short, hand on oak trunk.

  Those aren’t owls. Those are sentries.

  Inner Mind commented. You are right, Sir. Notice now that wherever you move, an owl signals.

  I am a prisoner.

  Aye.

  God’s teeth! What do they want? Do they plan to attack King Arthur and fear I might warn him?

  Let us not joke, Sir.

  Gently, Gawain stepped northeast from oak shade to moonlight to oak shade. Sure enough, hooting owls kept pace, and once a twig snapped nearby.

  I’ve been half asleep since I came here. It’s that hell-damned ale she gives me. But, God’s bones, what can they want?

  Little Ynis said in his head, “We couldn’t do Midsummer.” Midsummer was now well past.

  “So we skipped to Summerend.”

  Summerend.

  Gawain came to an edge of grove. He glanced up at the moon. How long now till Summerend? He stood on a rise looking out over the moor.

  Long, long ago he had stood like this on a cold cliff looking over a cold, moonlit sea. A calm voice overhead had said, “At Summerend, the Old Ones cut the May King down like the crops. They gave his blood to the Goddess.” Little Gawain had shivered.

  “We don’t do that now,” the voice continued. “Now we sacrifice a straw man, a John Barleycorn. But in the old days the blood was real.”

  His mother, Morgause, had stood over Gawain, a tower between him and a fierce north wind. Her dark cloak blew about his back. Fascinated, he had asked, “How did they cut him down?”

  “They cut off his head with a scythe. Like the crops.”

  Gawain stood now rooted, staring over moonlit moor instead of moonlit sea. God and Mary shield!

  That’s it, Sir. Your eyes open at last.

  The old ways still lived in this God-forgotten north!

  You remember the fellow they were going to crown May King when you came along? Remember his face, how miserable? And then how happy, when they crowned you instead!

  “God’s blood!” Gawain murmured aloud as his own blood congealed in his veins.

  Hush, Sir. The guard might hear. Let them think you’re still drugged out of your skull.

  Must get out of here!

  Truly, Sir. But how?

  Must think how.

  Drink no more ale, Sir.

  That wretched girl! That Delilah! I’ll strangle her with her own rich red hair!

  Not yet, Sir.

  Far out on the white moor something moved. Something moon-large, moon-white.

  That’s a horse, Sir.

  Too big. All they’ve got here is rough little northern ponies.

  That’s a knight’s charger.

  It is! Big as my own Warrior that the savages ate. Angel Michael, that’s what I need! If I could catch that horse—

  Someone else has.

  The great white horse ambled closer through white moonlight. A figure sat upright on its back. Two figures.

  That’s a woman, Sir. With a child before her.

  She rode easily, swaying erect, guiding the charger apparently with heels and thighs. Gawain saw no sign of reins.

  My mother told me once of a Goddess of horses. Maybe this…

  Goddess? Or ghost, on a ghost horse? Gawain prickled. His tongue swelled fuzzily to fill his mouth.

  Come, Sir! You’ve been thinking too much about the past. That’s a real woman out there with a real child, on a real horse. And they’re really too far to catch.

  Disgustedly, Gawain shook himself. He spit out fear. God’s teeth! I’m crazed. I’ve been crazed since May Day.

  You’ve been drunk-drugged.

  True. Now I’m clear, must stay clear. I’ve wits enough, strength enough, to escape from here.

  In truth, Sir!

  I am a Christian. Angels and Saints will aid me.

  Very true.

  I am Sir Gawain, King’s Companion! If I but keep my head, no northern savages can hold me.

  Right, Sir. Keep your head and keep your head.

  I’ll escape. And Merlin shall sing of my adventure.

  The great moon-white horse paced slowly out of sight into deep moonlight.

  The squat, rough-coated pony shied away from the joust.

  Gawain cursed, clapped heels to hide, beat rump with awkwardly gathered reins. The pony changed its untrained mind. Gawain barely had time to aim “lance” and heft “shield” before the pony bore him, bouncing, into battle.

  The Square Table roared and clashed. Half-wild ponies reared and plunged. Men whacked and thwacked with “lances” (peasant cudgels); “shields” dropped unheeded and were broken under-hoof. Knaves struck each other down, leaped down themselves, and wrestled. Snarling, they lost themselves in crazy rage like fighting dogs. It was by Merry’s good thought that they bore no knives, no weapons but the ungainly “lances.”

  Even so, Gawain did damage.

  As he reeled almost helplessly bareback, young Doon charged him. Gawain aimed his “lance” square at the oncoming face. He fully expected the boy to raise his shield. To his surprise, his “lance” crashed square into an astonished, unprotected face. Gawain felt the hard, familiar jolt.

  Heels over head, Doon went down over his pony’s tail.

  Gawain rode on through the melee, clashing cudgels with all he met, toppling many to the ground.

  Reaching open, uncluttered space he managed to turn the bucking pony. Behind him his challengers found their feet, alone or with help. Ponies bucked loose and galloped away. Men grinned and joked even as they limped.

  Gawain gave a quick glance southward, over the open fields. He imagined himself beating the pony into a gallop. He imagined the Square Table thundering after him, “lances” aloft. Slowly, he rode back into their midst.

  A hand caught his rein. Merry looked up at him soberly. He said, “Doon’s hurt bad. Come see.”

  Merry led the sidestepping, bridling pony back to the boy on the ground. Doon’s friends moved aside to let Gawain look down on the damage.

  Dark young Doon held a fresh-torn rag over his left eye. He rocked back and forth and around and moaned to hurt his friends’ ears. They glared up at Gawain.

  He slid down from the pony. Better not stand out above the crowd like a straw-man target. “He’s alive, God-thank!”

  “No thanks to you, May King,” one man growled.

  Merry said fairly, “We knew this jousting could jar us.”

  Another man spat past Gawain’s boot toe. “The eye’s out, Merry.”

  “Holy Gods.”

  “If this stranger weren’t the May King—”

  “But he is, Bert.”

  “Aye,” men murmured, nodding around Gawain. “Aye, he’ll get it back. Well see him get it back, ayah.”

  Clearheaded, Gawain understood their jargon. They would rejoice to
see Doon’s eye avenged at Summerend. Gawain straightened tall. He said sincerely, “Holy Mary! I did not mean for that.” (Or did he? He was angry enough with all these murderous yokels!) “But you could hardly hope to joust without injury. I struck too truly. But I expected him to shield himself.”

  Merry said again, “We all knew jousting was chancy. You and you, get Doon safe home. I’ll see him there later. May King, what does the Round Table do after an accident like this?”

  “Why, the joust goes on.”

  “Ech, ayah. What I thought. Back at it, men!”

  That morning Gawain learned what to expect of the Square Table. They were savages, fierce and brave, but untrained. They had no notion how to ride and fight at the same time. They did one or the other. The use of saddles, stirrups, and spurs would much aid their horsemanship. But Gawain was not the man to tell them that. Pitted against the Round Table, they would offer no contest. No contest against a bunch of squires!

  And he himself, rightly a-horse, could doubtless fight off the lot of them.

  “What? What can you mean, May King?”

  “I know why you won’t use my name.” Quietly, dully, he says this. Quiet, dull dread echoes his voice in my bones.

  “Gawain. What do you mean, you will not love me? Am I less lovely than before?”

  “No less. Maybe more.” Moonlit, his dark eyes glint.

  We sit under our awning between pea rows, knees touching. Eagerly, my body yearns toward him. In the act of unloosing my girdle, I lean over and slide its soft silk along his furry chest. This gesture has always stirred him. Till now. Now he pushes girdle and hand roughly away. Leaning forward, he challenges me with his eyes.

  Mind shines in his eyes. Ah! Too much mind, much too keen.

  “Wait, love. I know what you need.” I reach out for the bottle.

  “No!”

  “Eh?” Fingers pause on the bottle.

  “Ale will I never drink again, till I come again under Arthur’s reign.”

  “What?” I remember this line, or one like it, from one of Merlin’s stranger songs. “You will not drink…Gawain, you are not yourself.”

  Till now, our May King has seemed a simple enough fellow; brave, honest (not like me!), always ready to drink and love. In truth, many have marveled at his capacity for drink and love. Now I seem to be looking an entirely other, unknown man in the face. Here is a time for slow caution, for feeling my way.