Free Pendragon's Heir by Suzannah Rowntree

fingers ran down her cheeks as the tears spilled over.
    Then Nerys was beside her carrying a scrubby bough from a dead bush on the bank, and Blanche was grateful for the dark that hid her cowardice.
    “Shh, be calm,” Nerys said to the horse. To Blanche she said, “We must throw down branches for her to step on.”
    Blanche scrubbed her woollen cuff across her eyes and splashed to the bank. She could hear the hounds crying. Were they already in view? She seized more twigs and branches and plunged back into the water. So Morgan wanted to kill her? Good. But she would not die whimpering.
    Beyond all hope they extracted Florence from the bog, but the sound of the hunt was coming over the hill and the horses were stumbling with weariness.
    “Mount again,” said Nerys through the darkness. “They may yet lose our scent in the water.”
    They toiled on up the slope ahead, and had reached the rocky shoulder of the hill when the baying of hounds fell silent behind them. Blanche looked back and a gleam of moonlight showed dark shapes coursing to and fro on the far side of the slough.
    “We’ve outfoxed them!” she said, and they turned the corner of the rocky outcrop and blundered into firelight.
    The campfire under the rocks illuminated only one man, a wizened old creature with a beard that reached his knees. His mule lay in shelter, chewing stolidly, but the man himself stood leaning on his staff by the fire, watching the night.
    At the sight Florence and Malaventure stopped of their own accord, their heads drooping, sensing, perhaps, the bewilderment of their riders. Blanche looked at Nerys and saw something like defeat in the line of her mouth. Her eyes prickled with tears again. What was this old man doing here, so far from any shelter?
    The ancient shifted his weight and spoke.
    “Nerys of the Folk,” he said. “It’s a cold night to be wandering in the wilds.”
    Nerys’s voice was flat as she replied. “How do you know me?”
    “And Blanchefleur, heir of Logres. Exalted company for my poor fireside.”
    In the distance, the musical cry of a hound announced to his fellows that the scent was found. Blanche saw Nerys’s back pull tight and knew that she had heard.
    “Tell us your name, since you’re so free with ours,” said the fay fiercely.
    “My name? That is no secret,” said the old man. “I am Naciens.”
    A pause—a long pause, while the hounds behind them gave tongue. At last Nerys spoke again. “Naciens of Carbonek? I know the name. What brings you here?”
    “The witch of Gore is on your trail,” Naciens said. “You will find the Castle of Carbonek in the valley beneath us. She will not.”
    “Carbonek!” The word came out like a gasp, raw with desire. Blanche stared. But then Nerys’s hands gripped the reins tighter, and she was herself again. “I am taking the damsel Blanchefleur to safety, to Camelot. I cannot risk losing her in a place beyond space and time.”
    Naciens shrugged. “Ride to Camelot, then!”
    The sound of hunting-horns floated mockingly up the hill. Blanche set her teeth and shivered in the wind. Nerys did not change expression.
    “Camelot is seven days’ ride from here, with fresh horses and on the right paths,” said Naciens more gently. “If you ride alone, Morgan will certainly catch you. If it is safety you need, nowhere is safer than Carbonek.”
    Nerys said: “If I leave her at Carbonek, what hope have I of finding her again?”
    Naciens stroked his beard in silence before replying. “Carbonek is not lost to those to whom it is given to find,” he said at last. “Or do you think that I myself have brought you through these hills to our doorstep in the nick of time? Tell me, have you forgotten what is kept there?”
    Nerys bowed her head. And then Blanche thought she must have gone mad, for in the hush, below the ever-louder baying of hounds, she sang.
    I have fled from the wilderness fasting, with woe and unflagging travail,
    I have sought for the light