"Comfort All the Way to Comfort..."
Guinever knows better now. She wasn’t old enough to when she first met him, or at least she can say that with a semblance of truth, because she might have been old enough to know but she was young enough to think it was so romantic, and young enough to think romanticism justified it. Romantic, she had thought, to have a lover handsome and exciting, exotic because his accent was from some place across water, further away than Ireland even.
(He would whisper to her, “Do you want to come to France, ma dame?” and she would say, “Yes, of course. I want to see your home,” lying in his bed with his hands at her waist and it wasn’t that he was kinder or better or more honourable than Arthur, just that he was different.)
Her golden hair is, like Arthur’s, filled with long streaks of grey, pulled into a braid down her back or coiled on her head (a woman her age doesn’t wear her hair down). Lancelot could still make her feel beautiful, and Arthur made her feel like an old woman, wrinkling and wintering like Gawain’s lost fairy wife. But hadn’t Arthur always come when she was lost, and hadn’t Lancelot run away?
Lancelot had run away, leaving blood all around him, and she, God, she-- they were all so concerned with Lancelot that no one had stopped to watch her walking through the slain in her night-gown, crying over Gawain’s fine young children and Agravain’s eager followers. God, what had he done? She remembers that she held Agravain, because he was so rough and so angry and far, far back in the beginning she had used to think he was warming to her a little, but when Lancelot came he was cold to her.
Agravain was old like she’s becoming, his reddish Orkney hair as streaked as hers or Arthur’s, his bitter mouth weathered, and she had wanted to bring him back to life, but she knew better on that count. She knew better, and she still knelt there cradling his body, with his head against her breast, until Mordred threw her away from him in anger.
What would his wife think? What would any of their wives think? And it isn’t her business to wonder about those things any more. She looks to the door, but it’s still barred, and she knows they’re going to burn her, because Arthur has no choice, and why would he choose otherwise? He always came when she was lost, and she chose Lancelot over that, she chose Lancelot over Camelot, over the lives of all those men--God--Gawain’s children. Those boys whose swords she’d given them on the day Arthur knighted them.
And Lancelot is gone. He’s run away, to leave her alone with all those bodies and her own responsibility.
She sits quietly in her barred room, still wearing her night-gown, still with her braid hung down her back, still with Agravain’s blood a reddish stain like his hair on her breast. Perhaps she had always loved Agravain the most, because he had almost loved her. Agravain had held her to a higher standard than Arthur, who turned his face away to pretend he didn’t know his wife and his dearest friend would betray him. Lancelot had wanted--what, of her? Had he loved her? Surely he loved her, or else he wouldn’t have stayed so long, or fought so hard so many times. Every man should have one chance to be a coward without being condemned.
But if she were betrayed, wouldn’t she deserve it?
Agravain had never dissembled. He had only hated. In its honesty it seems more noble now than any deed Lancelot has ever done in her name. In its straightforwardness it seems the thing Arthur should always have done. If he were here now Guinever wonders what she would say to him, whether she would apologise, and realises that here now is something Agravain will never be anywhere ever again in any place or time. The world is empty of Agravain. Soon the world will be empty of her.
Weeks later, when the world is only empty of Mordred’s poor brothers, she thinks that Lancelot betrayed her worse to come back than he ever did to leave. The castle is worse than a barred room, and to walk in it in her mourning dress is sadder and darker than her scorched night-gown with the smear of blood down the front.
When she walks she feels as though the earth is going to cut out from under her like an unexpected precipice. Mordred’s brother Gareth still had the face of a child, and Gaheris had probably been too mad to understand what was happening. All she can think of is Lynet, strong, fierce Lynet, who managed her husband’s madness as if it were commonplace, who stood by him unchanging after his mother’s murder, who bore through the exile with him, who endured it all, sobbing, “I could not find him all, O, God, I could not find him all.”
Guinever’s burned feet have healed, but she thinks that’s all that has.
Arthur is a country away, and she doesn’t expect Mordred to forgive her, not now, not for this. Mordred never had any reason to love her much before, but now she doesn’t expect anything less than hate. She feels more barren than she’s ever felt, worse than the year after year after year of giving Arthur no children--she feels like all the fields in Britain in winter, like all the empty seed husks, like all the dry rivers. She never bore anyone anything.
In the end, all she gave Britain, and Arthur, and Agravain, is this, is war, and wives whose husbands were cut into so many pieces they couldn’t all be gathered from the field.
For her vanity? For what? She doesn’t know. For an accent from a country she’d never see and a chance to feel like a girl again? Because she didn’t know better then?
She knows better now.
(He would whisper to her, “Do you want to come to France, ma dame?” and she would say, “Yes, of course. I want to see your home,” lying in his bed with his hands at her waist and it wasn’t that he was kinder or better or more honourable than Arthur, just that he was different.)
Her golden hair is, like Arthur’s, filled with long streaks of grey, pulled into a braid down her back or coiled on her head (a woman her age doesn’t wear her hair down). Lancelot could still make her feel beautiful, and Arthur made her feel like an old woman, wrinkling and wintering like Gawain’s lost fairy wife. But hadn’t Arthur always come when she was lost, and hadn’t Lancelot run away?
Lancelot had run away, leaving blood all around him, and she, God, she-- they were all so concerned with Lancelot that no one had stopped to watch her walking through the slain in her night-gown, crying over Gawain’s fine young children and Agravain’s eager followers. God, what had he done? She remembers that she held Agravain, because he was so rough and so angry and far, far back in the beginning she had used to think he was warming to her a little, but when Lancelot came he was cold to her.
Agravain was old like she’s becoming, his reddish Orkney hair as streaked as hers or Arthur’s, his bitter mouth weathered, and she had wanted to bring him back to life, but she knew better on that count. She knew better, and she still knelt there cradling his body, with his head against her breast, until Mordred threw her away from him in anger.
What would his wife think? What would any of their wives think? And it isn’t her business to wonder about those things any more. She looks to the door, but it’s still barred, and she knows they’re going to burn her, because Arthur has no choice, and why would he choose otherwise? He always came when she was lost, and she chose Lancelot over that, she chose Lancelot over Camelot, over the lives of all those men--God--Gawain’s children. Those boys whose swords she’d given them on the day Arthur knighted them.
And Lancelot is gone. He’s run away, to leave her alone with all those bodies and her own responsibility.
She sits quietly in her barred room, still wearing her night-gown, still with her braid hung down her back, still with Agravain’s blood a reddish stain like his hair on her breast. Perhaps she had always loved Agravain the most, because he had almost loved her. Agravain had held her to a higher standard than Arthur, who turned his face away to pretend he didn’t know his wife and his dearest friend would betray him. Lancelot had wanted--what, of her? Had he loved her? Surely he loved her, or else he wouldn’t have stayed so long, or fought so hard so many times. Every man should have one chance to be a coward without being condemned.
But if she were betrayed, wouldn’t she deserve it?
Agravain had never dissembled. He had only hated. In its honesty it seems more noble now than any deed Lancelot has ever done in her name. In its straightforwardness it seems the thing Arthur should always have done. If he were here now Guinever wonders what she would say to him, whether she would apologise, and realises that here now is something Agravain will never be anywhere ever again in any place or time. The world is empty of Agravain. Soon the world will be empty of her.
Weeks later, when the world is only empty of Mordred’s poor brothers, she thinks that Lancelot betrayed her worse to come back than he ever did to leave. The castle is worse than a barred room, and to walk in it in her mourning dress is sadder and darker than her scorched night-gown with the smear of blood down the front.
When she walks she feels as though the earth is going to cut out from under her like an unexpected precipice. Mordred’s brother Gareth still had the face of a child, and Gaheris had probably been too mad to understand what was happening. All she can think of is Lynet, strong, fierce Lynet, who managed her husband’s madness as if it were commonplace, who stood by him unchanging after his mother’s murder, who bore through the exile with him, who endured it all, sobbing, “I could not find him all, O, God, I could not find him all.”
Guinever’s burned feet have healed, but she thinks that’s all that has.
Arthur is a country away, and she doesn’t expect Mordred to forgive her, not now, not for this. Mordred never had any reason to love her much before, but now she doesn’t expect anything less than hate. She feels more barren than she’s ever felt, worse than the year after year after year of giving Arthur no children--she feels like all the fields in Britain in winter, like all the empty seed husks, like all the dry rivers. She never bore anyone anything.
In the end, all she gave Britain, and Arthur, and Agravain, is this, is war, and wives whose husbands were cut into so many pieces they couldn’t all be gathered from the field.
For her vanity? For what? She doesn’t know. For an accent from a country she’d never see and a chance to feel like a girl again? Because she didn’t know better then?
She knows better now.