I Am Morgan le Fay by Nancy Springer Read Free Book Online Page A

night—the king had died, and now something huge was happening. Something midnight hidden, something Redburke must not know. Where were we going?
    Laden by baggage, Nurse trudged across the courtyard to the gates, and—now what? There were guards at the gates. They would send us straight to Redburke.
    â€œHalt! Who—”
    â€œOpen the gates,” Nurse said in that flat way of hers.
    Her female voice brought a sentry out of the gatehouse to look at her. He scanned us all and grinned. “Woman, are you moon-mad? Where do you think—”
    Nurse gave him such a look as she had given me earlier that day, the fey green gaze that had kept me from saying to anyone, even to Morgause, what I had heard. I saw her eyes flash green, like the flash of a salmon just under the surface of a wave, and I shivered.
    â€œOpen the gates,” Nurse told him, and without another word, dumbly like Morgause’s muslin doll, he turned and began to crank up the portcullis. The wheel creaked, the chain rattled, and other guards came running down.
    â€œWhat—”
    â€œOpen the gates,” Nurse commanded them. Her back was to me, so I did not see her eyes. But the same green power must have been in her, for their eyes widened, their mouths closed, and they obeyed. They spread the gates wide.
    We issued out in silence. I heard the gates close behind me, but I did not look back. Morgause hid her head against the back of my shoulder and began silently to sob.
    In that moment I felt a chill in the marrow of my bones, a sure sense that my life had utterly changed.

    Under a vast, cold indigo sky we wound our way up the moors, past quoit stones and tall upright stones that stood like shadowy giants in the night. I drew my mantle close over my chest and felt glad of Morgause’s warm presence at my back. She had ceased crying, but no one spoke.
    Finally in a low voice Thomas said, “Protector, by what title am I to address you?”
    Nurse turned to him and said gently enough, “By my name.”
    I must have been quite stupid as a child. It had never occurred to me that Nurse had a name.
    But she did not tell it to us. We plodded on in darkness and silence.
    Thomas hazarded, “Ongwynn?”
    She turned to him as if to an equal. “Yes. How did you know, Thomas?”
    â€œI—I don’t know. I don’t know anything.”
    â€œBut you do. You know much.”
    Ongwynn? It was not a name I had ever heard. Who was Ongwynn? And who was Thomas, that he knew of her?
    Morgause must have felt as bewildered as I did. From just behind my ear her voice quavered, “Nurse?”
    â€œYes?”
    â€œWhere are we going?”
    â€œTo my home.”
    It had never occurred to me that Nurse had a home either.
    Morgause whimpered, “But—but why?”
    Nurse slogged on without answering. I told Morgause, “Because Uther Pendragon is dead.” Somehow it was now permissible for me to say this.
    â€œWhat?”
    Thomas reached over to take one of the bags from Nurse—from Ongwynn, rather. As he walked, he spoke over his shoulder to Morgause and me. “The king is dead. His lords and stewards will want to seize his lands. Your sons, if you have sons, will be the rightful heirs of Cornwall. Anyone who wants to claim Cornwall will try to kill you or imprison you.”
    Including, no doubt, Redburke. We had survived this long because he did not know we knew. He had no reason to think that Thomas would tell us. Thomas was our protector, I realized, as much as Nurse was.
    No, her name was not Nurse. It was Ongwynn.
    Without turning Ongwynn said, “Uther Pendragon would have slain you before now if it were not for your mother.”
    I felt my breath stop. I sat on Annie with my mouth open, gulping like a fish.
    Morgause asked, her voice bleakly calm now, “We—we are not going home again?”
    No one answered.
    I found my breath again, and started babbling,