Merlin watched, amused, as Arthur readjusted the brooch holding his cape for the eighth time.

"At this rate the feast will be over before you get there."

"Shut up and help me adjust this thing."

"I've already helped you," Merlin watched him fiddling with the clasp, "You keep un-helping yourself."

Unfazed by the Prince's muttered curses, Merlin added, teasingly "I'm sure the Lady Guinevere will collapse with awe at the sight of you. Poor girl, she won't know what hit her."

"Merlin?"

"Yes?"

"Fetch me my sword."

"Why? You said you weren't wearing it for the feast."

"I'm not." Arthur stood up straight, seemingly satisfied at last with his cape, "I need it to kill you."

"Now that is just rude."

***

Guinevere felt trapped. Not only was she required to spend an entire feast in the company of the Pendragons, but the King had insisted on beginning the feast with the ancient welcome rituals of Eirinn. Since the widowed Peadar had no children, as royal ward the dubious honor of proffering the cup of welcome fell to her. While Gwen acquiesced with a calm she had perfected out of necessity, internally she was an exhausting mixture of emotions. The welcome rituals had descended from countless generations, harkening back to a time when druids, warlocks and witches sat at feasting tables beside kings and queens, when those who practiced the Old Religion were not looked upon with suspicion, but held in esteem. As a child she had watched her mother Offer Welcome to guests, awed by the simple stateliness of the ritual and hoping, one day, to handle the Tokens herself. She was surprised that Peadar wished to indulge a gesture so steeped in the Old Ways, until he told her there should be no Tokens, nor blessings.  The welcome, she realized grimly, was intended by Peadar as a gesture of friendly supplication to Camelot, a pledge to align them with Uther's power by relinquishing all hints of sympathy for the Old Religion. 
A cowardly act, she thought angrily, and traitorous too, gilded with the blood of innocents. How could she partake in such dishonesty? Especially when one of the guests, Arthur Pendragon, knew, had seen in fact, that she partook in the old rituals? Her face grew hot at the thought of standing before him, offering calm welcome, when he had seen her with undone hair and bare feet. Would his eyes scorch her the same way, unmasking her?

Now she stood beside the King in the Great Hall, waiting for the doors to open for the royalty of Camelot. In the generous candlelight her skin glowed with a simmer of unspoken words, warmth of cinnamon against her blue gown. She felt the eyes of the court on her, curious and sceptical. Never far away from the King, Melwas watched her also. I wish Morgana were going to be here.  Her sardonic presence would have been much comfort. But her friend had taken to bed earlier in the day, citing a digestive indisposition. Gwen forced herself to think of her mother, who had left her homelands and followed love across the seas to a strange land, never prostrating herself before the courtiers' scorn. She straightened her shoulders as the trumpets sounded.

***

"Eirinn has changed a great deal," Uther noted approvingly to Arthur, as they prepared to enter the Great Hall, "I'm beginning to think this will prove a powerful alliance for us."
Arthur nodded but said nothing. He was still ignorant about the circumstances prompting the attack on the villagers, his father having divulged nothing but that his men had successfully routed a known group of magic sympathizers, and expressed disapproval that Arthur could not be found that night to lead the charge. Arthur had apologized, contriving a clumsy excuse about a horseback ride and clearing his head after council meetings. Merlin was the only person who knew his true whereabouts, who knew also about his rescue of Guinevere.

Soaring trumpets greeted their arrival in the Great Hall, and lords and ladies bowed their heads scrupulously as they passed, like reeds in a long breeze. The air was golden with a rich perfume of candles and honeysuckle, warm with the breath of a gathered crowd. The standards of Camelot and Eirinn were unfurled above the King's table, red-gold beside silver-green, solemn and glittering. 

How very different this was from their first meeting, when he had watched her swirling in naked torchlight, her hair a dark and sensual caress. Here she stood statuesque beside the King, her rich hair half-gathered with soft flowers, all poise and coolness in her gown the colour of blended blue and seafoam. 

She unarmed him completely. He felt again as he had that night, unable to wrench his eyes from her, disconcertingly prepared to risk things he had never before considered worth risking.

“My lords,” she said softly, bowing her head, “We bid you welcome.”

Gwen hoped against hope they could not hear the tremor in her voice.  The whispered imaginings of him that had haunted her dreams paled, shrivelled and fell away before the bright, aching realness of his presence: all broad shoulders and wheaten hair and deepest blue eyes in a face whose perfect angles her treacherous fingertips demanded to trace.

Quickly remembering herself, Guinevere smiled and took from Peadar the one permissible token, a goblet of mead, and offered it in greeting, “May your cups never run empty, beneath our roof and beneath yours.”

Uther, whose blue eyes unlike Arthur’s were cold and speculative as they appraised her, took the goblet carefully, sniffing its contents before deigning to take a sip. He then passed the cup to Arthur,

Peadar grasped Uther’s arm in a hearty exchange, “May this herald the beginning of a new age, an age of Camelot and Eirinn united under the same banner.” There was a hum of approval about the room, and even a smattering of applause.

Thus the Welcome would have concluded, if Peadar had his way, the Rituals swept aside and forgotten.

“Milords! If you would,” and before they had time to ask any questions she gestured to Aili, who stood waiting in the corner with the Token Gwen had prepared earlier.

The court fell silent as she took the Token in her hands, holding it out to King Uther and his son.  It was a bowl of plain clay marked with runes of peace, half filled with water and wrapped around with laurel, a small candle floating. Earth, water and leaf: the symbols of life, of bodies that are sustained before the long rest of death. And the fourth, the island-light, Avalon: light of faith and love, fire of the heart without which life cannot exist.

Vaguely she was aware of the menacing silence all about her, the shock and anger in Peadar’s face. She could not hear, but she could imagine, the courtiers’ whispers What is she doing A disgrace to us all I’m sure her mother was an Afric witch.

 “May the waters of your homeland run clear, its crops spring eternal. May the Ancient Light never fail within your hearts,” Guinevere held her hands steady and met Uther’s cold gaze without flinching. Take it, tyrant and murderer of children. Take it though your bloodstained hands are unworthy.

Arthur could sense his father bristle at the offering. Her lovely uplifted face was numinous with determination, the elegant column of her throat unyielding. 

Seemingly unflustered by Uther’s cold silence, she turned to him, and Arthur felt the unwavering challenge in her pure-dark eyes go through him like a lance.

He reached out and took the token from her hands, feeling her tremble slightly as their fingers brushed. Her lips parted in surprise, and she hoped he could not hear the thunderous pounding of her heart as her breath heaved against the blue-white bodice.

As their hands held the Token between them, Guinevere felt the world around her hush into insignificance.  For an infinitesimal moment, nothing existed but the endless blue of his eyes.  He smiled slightly, almost knowingly at her, and she felt her skin grow warm.

Then Arthur drew back and held the Token for the court to see, “To peace, and friendship!”

Relieved applause and cheering broke out, as the court seemed to release a collectively held breath.  Even Uther was forced to nod tensely, and the royal assembly repaired to the King’s table. Guinevere was light-headed with exhilaration, and she turned a dazzling smile on Arthur, who was contemplating her features with a slightly dazed expression.

Suddenly, inexplicably, Guinevere felt hopeful for the future.