Wow, this is surprisingly hard to write. Especially this week, for some reason. Oh well. Muchas gracias to my reviewers! ^_^ I feel so validated....
Gwenyfar is hard to write. I think she was more a person to be pitied than anything else, the poor little nutbar. People only know what they're taught, after all... I hope the text doesn't mush together at the top; I've been having trouble with quad spaces lately.
It's not fair.
Why can't the world ever be kind toward me? I get the distinct feeling that I am the butt of some cosmic joke. Oh, how Morgaine would delight in my misery now. She would, that evil witch! Always, she-
But no, I mustn't blame Morgaine. True, we are on less than cool terms, but she has never wrought harm for me that I can prove. No, my anguish is my own fault, my punishment. I am no heathen; I should know better than to act as I do. Ah, I am such a sinful woman! Even to think of my countless sins after all these years pains me. But penance first requires confession, so I will remember it all.
I had fallen in love with Lancelet before ever I set eyes on Arthur. So, you see, I was licentious from the first. I was an adulteress before I was even married. Perhaps if I had said something to my father, arrangements could have been made for me to marry Lancelet. But I am no man to choose...
Lancelet is a man. Why, if the looks he gave me back then were indeed unfeigned, why didn't he ask for my hand himself? I would find out eventually...
When I learned that I was to marry the High King, my broken heart fell down to my feet. All during that eternal ride to Camelot, I felt as one who was riding to her execution. I was sorrowful and angry. Sorrowful, because now I would never marry my Lancelet; angry, because I was part of a purchase of horses and soldiers, taken sight unseen like a piece of property. Such, however, is the lot for women in life, and another of my sins was that I couldn't accept that. Dear Lancelet tried to soothe my obvious distress by extolling the virtues of his cousin the king, his kindness, his wisdom. With a playful wink, he also praised Arthur's beauty, assuring me that I would be a happy woman indeed and a wonderful High Queen. I agreed half-heartedly, certain that I would be miserable.
I was proven wrong within a week after my wedding. True, Arthur was awkward, not accustomed to women in general, but he was honest and tender, and over time he became dear to me. He lacked Lancelet's cleverness, but cleverness in a king is improper. And he was a good High King. Arthur truly loved his people, all of them, right down to the Old People of the tribes, which was more than I could say for myself. His heart was limitless in its compassion, and I found him faultless for years.
Of course, I was unworthy of him. That should come as no surprise. A good woman would have been content with such a man as Arthur, but not I. No, not I... I really haven't any right to speak of Morgaine's harlotries, for I am worse than she. She isn't married, she isn't a queen... There wasn't a day during our entire marriage that I was wholly faithful to Arthur. Always, Lancelet was in my thoughts, my dreams. We saw one another often, as though we were close friends; he was hardly ever far from me if he could help it, and I would often invent excuses to speak with him. For many years, I assured myself that I was no adulteress, that I hadn't bedded him. ...But adultery is a sin of the heart, not of the flesh. To think of him was enough.
I could have stopped it from going further, from damning us all. I was too weak. May God have mercy on me! If only Britain knew what sort of horrid woman they had as their queen...
Happy as I was with the success of the true faith, there were still an appalling number of pagans in our land. One Beltane (may that cursed ritual be forgotten), I arranged a great feast to be held at Camelot, in an attempt to save even a few of my subjects from the fires on Dragon Island, and the fires of Hell that would surely come afterward. My feast achieved its aim, and in my arrogance I enjoyed myself even more than our guests. Lancelet was there, and that improved my spirits, and my appetite for drink, even more. He too was taking on a glazed look to match my own. Perhaps the only one present more intoxicated than us was my own dear husband. At last, it was decided that we retire for the night. Poor Arthur could barely stand, so Lancelet took it upon himself to support Arthur's bulkier frame. Both were drunk beyond walking, and watching them from behind as they tried to clamber up that first flight of stairs was unduly amusing to me. Of course, I was in no better condition: it seemed as though the floor kept rising and falling unexpectedly, undulating from side to side. I was happy, though, and as we made our way slowly to Arthur's chamber we shared jokes and spoke in a way that no sober man would find intelligible.
Finally, we reached our destination, and it was there that Arthur said something that cleared a bit of the drugged fog out of our minds, that ruined everything...
No.
I ruined everything, because the final decision was left to me, and I chose sin. Arthur explained to us that he knew about...about Lancelet and myself, that he had known for years. Tears started in more than one pair of eyes as Arthur assured us that he wasn't angry, that he loved us as much as he ever did, that our happiness was more important to him than his image. I felt dizzy, and my heart ached, for I knew that everything he said, he said in earnest. I saw traces of pain in his eyes, and behind his words it was as though he was apologizing to us for getting in our way all these years. Apology! We should have atoned for our ways then and there. Lancelet and I should have ended it. I did not deserve such a husband...
Arthur went on, much as I wished he would stop. He took the blame for our childlessness on himself, something that I should have put a stop to. I knew that miscarriage wasn't the man's fault... Then he made a proposal, and I proved myself a failure, a doubly lost soul. He proposed that I take Lancelet as my concubine, so that Camelot might have an heir.
The decision was left up to me...
I cannot relate what happened then, it is too shameful even for my twisted heart.
I don't know why I awoke in the middle of the night. Perhaps it was a strange dream. I was embracing my Lancelet, whose deep breaths told me that he was deeply asleep. Opposite him was Arthur, dear Arthur, who had one arm draped over us both. It is my greatest shame of all, but just then I was so happy... My heart swelled as I smoothed a few strands of dark hair behind Lancelet's ear and watched both of them for a while.
Idly, foolishly, I wondered if Lancelet talked in his sleep. Arthur didn't. Perhaps he would whisper something tender as he dreamed. Perhaps it would only be my name. Arrogance again. I smiled at the thought; my name really sounded like something beautiful and pure when Lancelet said it... Some five minutes hence, I was proven half right. Just as I was falling asleep once more, I heard a small, muffled sound next to me. Straining my ears, I caught the name that fell from Lancelet's lips, little more than a breath.
"Gywdion..."
I was too tired to comprehend the meaning in those terrible syllables, I drifted into sleep, and it wasn't until the next morning, when Lancelet had gone, that I remembered. And I understood. Oh, God, I deserve whatever comes to me...
I awoke first, and was staring in bleary adoration upon my husband when I noticed... Dotting Arthur's body, here and there, were bruises. Little, light, bruises. I puzzled over this for a moment, stroking his arm absently.
And then, as the wine's effects began to wear off completely, the previous night came back to me, and I wept silently in disgrace. To be so selfish, to abuse Arthur's kindness in such a way... I was the very lowest of filth.
Until an hour had passed, and I recalled Lancelet's invocation of Arthur's awful pagan name. I recalled things I had seen with my own wine-clouded eyes. Sinful as I was, there were worse offenders than I...
Horrified, I drew back and studied my husband. My heart softened for an instant: Arthur looked so...angelic while he slept. My Arthur, the Arthur I knew and loved for his goodness, for his purity. But my eyes could not ignore those bruises, those marks that exposed him for what he was, all he'd done.
Sodomy. I could not believe it, could not get my mind around it, but there it was. My own husband. Dear God, my own Lancelet. I was too shocked to cry. My poor heart was shattered again; it was no less than I deserved. What better punishment for an adulteress than to have it thrown back in her face? Then, my humiliation gave way to anger. There was no justifying...that! My gaze on Arthur became a searing glare; I was surprised that he didn't wake up because of it. I could have throttled him at that moment. How dare he? How dare he do such things! He knew better! He was a Christian king and this was a Christian court, a Christian kingdom!
Bitterly, I shunted the blame for everything, the night before, my barrenness, everything, farther away. Farther from me...
Pagans. They were the root of it all, when one got right down to it. Both Arthur and Lancelet had come from pagan stock, were raised pagan. Conversion, obviously, could not wipe out entirely the wickedness that had been nurtured into them since the cradle. And those fires on Dragon Island that the Old People had insisted on lighting. Those abominations affected everyone...
Morgaine. And then there was Morgaine. Just when I'd think I was rid of her, she'd come back. Who knows what sort of things she'd whispered into my husband's and Lancelet's ears when she was about, that witch... And she was a witch. I wouldn't have been surprised if she hadn't woven a curse over all of us; she's always been jealous over Lancelet. It would not have been above her simply to...
My theories and accusations branched out even farther and wilder, like brambles. Also, the sickness that comes after a night of heavy drinking was coming upon me, souring my mood further. When Arther woke up, I attacked him immediately, and he reciprocated, likely with a headache worse than mine. We fought long, longer than we ever had before. It was misery, but I couldn't stop myself. Again and again, I found worse things to say, until finally I went too far. Right or not, I went one step too far. I was practically screaming by this time, not knowing what I said. I shouted that Arthur was lustful and sinful, that he loved Lancelet better than he loved his own wife, the wife he had bought for himself; that he had only used me to lure my Lancelet into his bed.
The sound of my own words pouring from my mouth shocked me into silence. Arthur, too, was frozen, staring right through me. I covered my mouth with my hand and sobbed once. Had I said those things, those horrible, hateful things... I knew myself to be righteous, and yet...
When Arthur recovered, he was furious. Not once had he ever seemed someone for me to fear, but his anger now crippled me.
"You say that again, and wife or no, love or no, I will kill you, my Gwenyfar."
Arthur was earnest in all that he said and did, much as I now wished things otherwise. I began crying; I nearly pissed myself, I was so very frightened. As he dressed, I tried to steel my shaking nerves. Why must women be so weak? I swear, we cry at everything. A man wouldn't have cried, I berated myself, Lancelet wouldn't have cried. But, I thought, bitterness and venom stopping my trembling, Arthur never would have threatened Lancelet. Oh, no, never would he say such a thing to dear Galahad...
Love left me then.
The years after that ill-conceived Beltane dragged by wearily. I never gave birth to a child, and so that night had been all in vain, in the end. Lancelet, tricked again by that hateful woman, Morgaine, married and was a father. I can attest to the fact that he didn't love her. And so the circle broadened...
Try as I might to rekindle what had once been between my husband and I, between my Lancelet and I, it was gone. So life went back to the way it had been before, out of habit. The only difference was that, this time, everything was a hideous lie. My life, my happiness, had come crashing down about my head, just as I used to fear the sky would... Year after dreary year, we plodded on, never able to leave the ashes of what we'd had for a few scant hours.
A few scant hours, followed by a lifetime of emptiness. We deserved it.
But I don't understand. My entire life, I'd tried to be good. I was sinful, but I wanted so much to be good; I'd tried so hard.
At my time of trial, why wasn't I strong enough?
Gwenyfar is hard to write. I think she was more a person to be pitied than anything else, the poor little nutbar. People only know what they're taught, after all... I hope the text doesn't mush together at the top; I've been having trouble with quad spaces lately.
It's not fair.
Why can't the world ever be kind toward me? I get the distinct feeling that I am the butt of some cosmic joke. Oh, how Morgaine would delight in my misery now. She would, that evil witch! Always, she-
But no, I mustn't blame Morgaine. True, we are on less than cool terms, but she has never wrought harm for me that I can prove. No, my anguish is my own fault, my punishment. I am no heathen; I should know better than to act as I do. Ah, I am such a sinful woman! Even to think of my countless sins after all these years pains me. But penance first requires confession, so I will remember it all.
I had fallen in love with Lancelet before ever I set eyes on Arthur. So, you see, I was licentious from the first. I was an adulteress before I was even married. Perhaps if I had said something to my father, arrangements could have been made for me to marry Lancelet. But I am no man to choose...
Lancelet is a man. Why, if the looks he gave me back then were indeed unfeigned, why didn't he ask for my hand himself? I would find out eventually...
When I learned that I was to marry the High King, my broken heart fell down to my feet. All during that eternal ride to Camelot, I felt as one who was riding to her execution. I was sorrowful and angry. Sorrowful, because now I would never marry my Lancelet; angry, because I was part of a purchase of horses and soldiers, taken sight unseen like a piece of property. Such, however, is the lot for women in life, and another of my sins was that I couldn't accept that. Dear Lancelet tried to soothe my obvious distress by extolling the virtues of his cousin the king, his kindness, his wisdom. With a playful wink, he also praised Arthur's beauty, assuring me that I would be a happy woman indeed and a wonderful High Queen. I agreed half-heartedly, certain that I would be miserable.
I was proven wrong within a week after my wedding. True, Arthur was awkward, not accustomed to women in general, but he was honest and tender, and over time he became dear to me. He lacked Lancelet's cleverness, but cleverness in a king is improper. And he was a good High King. Arthur truly loved his people, all of them, right down to the Old People of the tribes, which was more than I could say for myself. His heart was limitless in its compassion, and I found him faultless for years.
Of course, I was unworthy of him. That should come as no surprise. A good woman would have been content with such a man as Arthur, but not I. No, not I... I really haven't any right to speak of Morgaine's harlotries, for I am worse than she. She isn't married, she isn't a queen... There wasn't a day during our entire marriage that I was wholly faithful to Arthur. Always, Lancelet was in my thoughts, my dreams. We saw one another often, as though we were close friends; he was hardly ever far from me if he could help it, and I would often invent excuses to speak with him. For many years, I assured myself that I was no adulteress, that I hadn't bedded him. ...But adultery is a sin of the heart, not of the flesh. To think of him was enough.
I could have stopped it from going further, from damning us all. I was too weak. May God have mercy on me! If only Britain knew what sort of horrid woman they had as their queen...
Happy as I was with the success of the true faith, there were still an appalling number of pagans in our land. One Beltane (may that cursed ritual be forgotten), I arranged a great feast to be held at Camelot, in an attempt to save even a few of my subjects from the fires on Dragon Island, and the fires of Hell that would surely come afterward. My feast achieved its aim, and in my arrogance I enjoyed myself even more than our guests. Lancelet was there, and that improved my spirits, and my appetite for drink, even more. He too was taking on a glazed look to match my own. Perhaps the only one present more intoxicated than us was my own dear husband. At last, it was decided that we retire for the night. Poor Arthur could barely stand, so Lancelet took it upon himself to support Arthur's bulkier frame. Both were drunk beyond walking, and watching them from behind as they tried to clamber up that first flight of stairs was unduly amusing to me. Of course, I was in no better condition: it seemed as though the floor kept rising and falling unexpectedly, undulating from side to side. I was happy, though, and as we made our way slowly to Arthur's chamber we shared jokes and spoke in a way that no sober man would find intelligible.
Finally, we reached our destination, and it was there that Arthur said something that cleared a bit of the drugged fog out of our minds, that ruined everything...
No.
I ruined everything, because the final decision was left to me, and I chose sin. Arthur explained to us that he knew about...about Lancelet and myself, that he had known for years. Tears started in more than one pair of eyes as Arthur assured us that he wasn't angry, that he loved us as much as he ever did, that our happiness was more important to him than his image. I felt dizzy, and my heart ached, for I knew that everything he said, he said in earnest. I saw traces of pain in his eyes, and behind his words it was as though he was apologizing to us for getting in our way all these years. Apology! We should have atoned for our ways then and there. Lancelet and I should have ended it. I did not deserve such a husband...
Arthur went on, much as I wished he would stop. He took the blame for our childlessness on himself, something that I should have put a stop to. I knew that miscarriage wasn't the man's fault... Then he made a proposal, and I proved myself a failure, a doubly lost soul. He proposed that I take Lancelet as my concubine, so that Camelot might have an heir.
The decision was left up to me...
I cannot relate what happened then, it is too shameful even for my twisted heart.
I don't know why I awoke in the middle of the night. Perhaps it was a strange dream. I was embracing my Lancelet, whose deep breaths told me that he was deeply asleep. Opposite him was Arthur, dear Arthur, who had one arm draped over us both. It is my greatest shame of all, but just then I was so happy... My heart swelled as I smoothed a few strands of dark hair behind Lancelet's ear and watched both of them for a while.
Idly, foolishly, I wondered if Lancelet talked in his sleep. Arthur didn't. Perhaps he would whisper something tender as he dreamed. Perhaps it would only be my name. Arrogance again. I smiled at the thought; my name really sounded like something beautiful and pure when Lancelet said it... Some five minutes hence, I was proven half right. Just as I was falling asleep once more, I heard a small, muffled sound next to me. Straining my ears, I caught the name that fell from Lancelet's lips, little more than a breath.
"Gywdion..."
I was too tired to comprehend the meaning in those terrible syllables, I drifted into sleep, and it wasn't until the next morning, when Lancelet had gone, that I remembered. And I understood. Oh, God, I deserve whatever comes to me...
I awoke first, and was staring in bleary adoration upon my husband when I noticed... Dotting Arthur's body, here and there, were bruises. Little, light, bruises. I puzzled over this for a moment, stroking his arm absently.
And then, as the wine's effects began to wear off completely, the previous night came back to me, and I wept silently in disgrace. To be so selfish, to abuse Arthur's kindness in such a way... I was the very lowest of filth.
Until an hour had passed, and I recalled Lancelet's invocation of Arthur's awful pagan name. I recalled things I had seen with my own wine-clouded eyes. Sinful as I was, there were worse offenders than I...
Horrified, I drew back and studied my husband. My heart softened for an instant: Arthur looked so...angelic while he slept. My Arthur, the Arthur I knew and loved for his goodness, for his purity. But my eyes could not ignore those bruises, those marks that exposed him for what he was, all he'd done.
Sodomy. I could not believe it, could not get my mind around it, but there it was. My own husband. Dear God, my own Lancelet. I was too shocked to cry. My poor heart was shattered again; it was no less than I deserved. What better punishment for an adulteress than to have it thrown back in her face? Then, my humiliation gave way to anger. There was no justifying...that! My gaze on Arthur became a searing glare; I was surprised that he didn't wake up because of it. I could have throttled him at that moment. How dare he? How dare he do such things! He knew better! He was a Christian king and this was a Christian court, a Christian kingdom!
Bitterly, I shunted the blame for everything, the night before, my barrenness, everything, farther away. Farther from me...
Pagans. They were the root of it all, when one got right down to it. Both Arthur and Lancelet had come from pagan stock, were raised pagan. Conversion, obviously, could not wipe out entirely the wickedness that had been nurtured into them since the cradle. And those fires on Dragon Island that the Old People had insisted on lighting. Those abominations affected everyone...
Morgaine. And then there was Morgaine. Just when I'd think I was rid of her, she'd come back. Who knows what sort of things she'd whispered into my husband's and Lancelet's ears when she was about, that witch... And she was a witch. I wouldn't have been surprised if she hadn't woven a curse over all of us; she's always been jealous over Lancelet. It would not have been above her simply to...
My theories and accusations branched out even farther and wilder, like brambles. Also, the sickness that comes after a night of heavy drinking was coming upon me, souring my mood further. When Arther woke up, I attacked him immediately, and he reciprocated, likely with a headache worse than mine. We fought long, longer than we ever had before. It was misery, but I couldn't stop myself. Again and again, I found worse things to say, until finally I went too far. Right or not, I went one step too far. I was practically screaming by this time, not knowing what I said. I shouted that Arthur was lustful and sinful, that he loved Lancelet better than he loved his own wife, the wife he had bought for himself; that he had only used me to lure my Lancelet into his bed.
The sound of my own words pouring from my mouth shocked me into silence. Arthur, too, was frozen, staring right through me. I covered my mouth with my hand and sobbed once. Had I said those things, those horrible, hateful things... I knew myself to be righteous, and yet...
When Arthur recovered, he was furious. Not once had he ever seemed someone for me to fear, but his anger now crippled me.
"You say that again, and wife or no, love or no, I will kill you, my Gwenyfar."
Arthur was earnest in all that he said and did, much as I now wished things otherwise. I began crying; I nearly pissed myself, I was so very frightened. As he dressed, I tried to steel my shaking nerves. Why must women be so weak? I swear, we cry at everything. A man wouldn't have cried, I berated myself, Lancelet wouldn't have cried. But, I thought, bitterness and venom stopping my trembling, Arthur never would have threatened Lancelet. Oh, no, never would he say such a thing to dear Galahad...
Love left me then.
The years after that ill-conceived Beltane dragged by wearily. I never gave birth to a child, and so that night had been all in vain, in the end. Lancelet, tricked again by that hateful woman, Morgaine, married and was a father. I can attest to the fact that he didn't love her. And so the circle broadened...
Try as I might to rekindle what had once been between my husband and I, between my Lancelet and I, it was gone. So life went back to the way it had been before, out of habit. The only difference was that, this time, everything was a hideous lie. My life, my happiness, had come crashing down about my head, just as I used to fear the sky would... Year after dreary year, we plodded on, never able to leave the ashes of what we'd had for a few scant hours.
A few scant hours, followed by a lifetime of emptiness. We deserved it.
But I don't understand. My entire life, I'd tried to be good. I was sinful, but I wanted so much to be good; I'd tried so hard.
At my time of trial, why wasn't I strong enough?