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Mother strives with the sun to be born anew."
    Isolde stood transfixed. Suddenly she saw a mist rising, a ring around the moon, and a tall stranger shining in the night.
Goddess, Mother, bring me to my love
—
    "And that's not all!" The Queen's voice came from very far away. "You refuse to take a lover here at court! How long has Sir Palomides courted you now? Any other girl would thrill to a Saracen knight, a king in his own land and a hero in ours. And still you rebuff him with your girlish ways and little frozen smiles." She strode around the chamber in increasing agitation, plucking at her gown. "I know what I must do! I shall hold a tournament and the prize shall be your hand. All the knights of chivalry will compete, and the worthiest will be yours."
    "Madam, no!" Isolde cried. A strange sensation passed over her and she seemed to hear slow hoof beats approaching down the avenue of time. Was that a mounted figure, the shape of a man? She brushed the sight away. "I will know my knight when he comes."
    "Your knight is here!" The Queen seized Isolde's arm in a ferocious grip. "And you'll forget all about Marhaus when you mate with Palomides! You need a lover, since you're jealous of mine!"
    Isolde met her mother's wild black eyes and did not flinch. "Hear me, madam!" she said passionately. "I wish you joy of Sir Marhaus, as I wished all your companions before. I know you must maintain your vigor, when your vital life is the life of all the land. A queen changes her consort for the good of all."
    "So?" The Queen widened her eyes, then gave a tremulous smile. "Then you know more than I thought, Isolde."
    "Champions fall, men grow older, flesh decays," Isolde pressed on furiously. "So we hold new championships, to let younger men triumph in their turn. As the Mother at Beltain renews herself with the young sun, the God Bel, so the Queen may restore herself at will."
    The Queen's eyes were huge and luminous. "For the life of the people," she murmured dreamily.
    She had to break into the dream. "But, Mother—a queen does not choose for herself. It may be her duty to renew the marriage of the sovereignty with the land by taking a new consort every year—"
    Her mother stiffened. "Yes?" she said dangerously.
    "—but a queen is married to her country, not to one man." She paused for emphasis. "She must choose for her country, not for the man she loves. If you send Sir Marhaus to Cornwall, that will not help us here in the Western Isle!"
    "Isolde, enough!" the Queen raged. "Who is Queen here, madam, myself or you?"
    Isolde shook her head. "We hold this island in a line of queens. Our foremothers had it from the Great One Herself. In Her name, we should not make this war." She raised her voice. "Sir Marhaus must not go!"
    "Too late!" A peal of mocking laughter echoed around the room. "Marhaus has gone! He sailed on the evening tide!"

     
     

Chapter 6

    The high road lay open and shining in the morning sun. Ahead was a granite coast of soaring cliffs and ragged inlets, and the moist air was sharp with the tang of the surge below. A young knight was dreaming his way down the hill, singing along with the sea. Sometimes he heard sweet tunes on a fairy wind and wove them into fleeting melodies. But more often he sang his own songs of delight, especially on golden days like this.
    Other days the sounds in his head 'were harsher and the music still and sad. The knight frowned, and a flurry of bleak thoughts chased one another across his well-made face. The life he had been living was hard, seeking gain and glory at foreign tournaments, living in camps or on the road, eating and sleeping with the worst and the best. But from his birth he had stood too near the sorrow at the heart of things.
    At the foot of the hill the road dipped, then rose again to another mighty crag. His horse, a powerful gray, twitched his ears and fell into the rhythm of the song. To the right of them now the cliff dropped away to a sheltered cove, where the