“Even in high summer, Tintagel was a haunted place; Ingraine, Lady of Duke
Gorlois, looked out over the sea from the Headland.  As she stared into the fog and mists, she wondered how she would ever know when the night and day were of equal length, so that she could keep the Feast of the New Year.  This year the spring storms had been unusually violent; night and day the crash of the sea had resounded over the castle until no man or woman within could sleep, and even the hounds whimpered mournfully.” (3)

 The opening paragraph of the Mists of Avalon sets the lonely picture of Ingraine
and her marriage to Gorlois.  Later, Bradley paints the character of Uther Pendragon as the foil for Gorlois.  Both arranged marriages, but one seems to be arranged be fate, while one is arranged by christianity.

 “Ingraine bent her head, barricading her mind against the tenderness in the old man’s voice.  she had always known, without being told, that Taliesin, Merlin of Britain, had shared with her mother the spark of life which had made her, but a daughter of the Holy Isle did not speak of such things.  A daughter of the Lady belonged only to the goddess, and to that man into whose hands the Lady chose to give its care” (17)

 This is a section of the early scene in which Ingraine’s part in Viviane’s plan is
revealed to her.
 
 Bradley, Marion Zimmer. The Mists of Avalon.  Alfred A. Knopf, 1982.