I was in the Castle of Light in the Time of Light, a place beautiful and safe, with high walls of stone glowing warm soft gold. I wasn't sure who I was, quite, but it didn't matter; the King of this place was a good man who had welcomed me here, and I knew this even though I had never seen him, never met him. I drifted through the days in gentle bewilderment, spending my time with a pretty blonde woman, almost a friend except that she kept a careful cordial distance between us. At first that hurt, but it quickly quit mattering as I found focus outside of myself or her, in a tall man who pulled his long black hair out of his face, whose voice was soft and shy, whose laughter was a surprise. He was clear and beautiful and I watched him constantly, drinking his joy and sorrow, always there but never quite touching. I had a small silver scar on my right hand, a crescent shape in the soft pad under my thumb, and he had one too; we compared them one day, wondering at it. After that I always knew how near or far he was, because the scar ached with cold fire, burning deeper the more we were separated.
Time passed, a long time of quiet light, until one day I came around the corner and into the great hall of the Castle. It was a place I'd been a thousand times before, but today, today the King was there, a blonde man who glowed like the walls of his home. A man named Arthur, of course, for who but King Arthur would rule the Time of Light? That was the first crack; if he was Arthur and this tall man I loved his friend, then this tall man must be Lancelot. Who, then, was I?
Arthur and I spoke, words filled with grey shadows as I tried to figure out who I was. He said a few things about my husband, about the scar, and I thought I was perhaps Elaine of Carbonek, who married Lancelot by a trick and loved him in vain -- but she at least had a child of him, and this Lancelot, my beautiful amber-skinned Lancelot, seemed as drawn to me as I was to him. Who, then? Was I Guinevere, and this golden King my husband that I never saw?
I puzzled and went walking, ignoring for once the light around me. Walking, and then suddenly it all came clear, like a flower unfolding in my mind. My blonde, careful friend, that was Guinevere, and I, I was Morgause, the King's younger sister. As Guinevere was the chosen of the Path of Light, so I was of the Path of Dark, chosen not choosing. Sooner or later that would come due. Walking, down stairs and up them, avoiding my common places, not daring to see Lancelot now that I knew I could never touch him, that the story demanded he belong to her and nothing I could say or felt would change it.
Walking, and I met a man, a gray man with wild hair and beard and eyes like stone. He smiled when he saw me, not a pleasant smile, and took me unprotesting by the hand. We left the castle and he spoke, of the demands of the story and my place in it. No light without dark, just as no day without the night. Guinevere was made for the light this time, and that left no room for me except to take the dark path. As we walked the scar began to ache and then to burn, like silver ice pressing farther and farther into my hand until I finally felt the cold splinter into my heart. It *hurt*, and I could barely keep moving, but the man kept walking on, my hand in his, assuring me that I'd get used to even that.
We came finally to the bank of a river, and on the other side was an archway leading into darkness. The dark path was not all bad, he said. We were in our way doing a great service; watch and see. I stood still and watched, vision hazed by the pain in my hand and heart. Dim yellow light filled the arch, slowly, and against it I could see floating shapes, black and tattered with a center of luminous gold.
"These are the ones who came before us," he said. "They have lived full lives on earth, in every form, and they know all the sorrow the world has. They realise how terrible it is to be alive in this world, and they have dedicated themselves to freeing every one of us. They could simply let go and be finally free of this misery, but instead they remain, every day, teaching those wise enough to come. The more deaths we bring them, the more people we free from the nightmare of this earth."
He smiled again then, a thin gray smile. "You see? We are doing the world a service. The path of dark is for those who know that this place is hell, and our goal is to free everyone. Only when all life is gone from here will our task be done."
I knew he was lying, *knew* it, deep in my bones, deep in my heart where the cold pain ached without end. But at the same time I knew there were no other choices for me, not this time around; I was made for the path of dark and the story would not have it any other way. Why not believe, or pretend to believe, since I must act regardless? I managed a smile, nodded. He dropped my hand.
"Let me show you."
From somewhere he produced these things like lengths of black cloth, but warm and skin-smooth in my hands as he gave me one, like a jacket someone had just stepped out of. He leaned on his heels, took a step back, and flung his handful of black out across the river. It caught at the very edge of the arch and then fluttered upwards, filling with light. The black figures floated around it in an almost-dance of welcoming.
He looked to me, the piece of black in my hands. "Now you."
I gritted my teeth and threw, knowing as I did it that I wasn't serious, that I was pulling back at the last moment. The cloth landed in the middle of the river, nowhere near the arch, and I waited for his anger. It never came; as quickly as the cloth landed it floated to the arch, where the figures inside swooped down and stroked it with the edges of themselves until the bedraggled thing picked itself up and filled with gold like the rest.
"What now?" I asked him.
He was silent a moment, then said with some gentleness, "The scar aches because of your lost husband. It will always ache; this time around the story does not let you two come together. This time she is Guinevere, not you. The next cycle may be different." A pause, and the grayness returned to his voice. "But you have your work to do, and as you do it the pain will bother you less and less, until finally it becomes a part of you. When that happens you will learn to love it, and when your lost husband dies and the scar's ache with him you'll find yourself in pain all over again from its loss."
I nodded as though I could trust him, and we walked slowly back to the castle, where I took a room near him and became his apprentice, the first to study with Merlin for five hundred years.