Legacy: Arthurian Saga 1-4

by Mary Stewart

  After this were many years of wars, and battles, but then came Merlin on a great black horse, and said to Arthur, "Thou hast never done, hast thou not done enough? It is time to say Ho! And therefore withdraw you unto your lodging and rest you as soon as ye may, and reward your good knights with gold and with silver, for they have well deserved it." "It is well said," quoth Arthur, "and as thou hast devised, so it shall be done." Then Merlin took his leave of Arthur, and traveled to see his master Blaise, that dwelt in Northumberland. So Blaise wrote the battles word by word, as Merlin told him.

  Then one day King Arthur said to Merlin, "My barons will let me have no rest, but needs I must take a wife."

  "It is well done," said Merlin, "that ye take a wife. Now is there any that ye love more than another?" "Yea," said King Arthur, "I love Guinevere, the king's daughter, Leodegrance of the land of Cameliard, the which holdeth in his house the Table Round that ye told he had of my father Uther." Then Merlin advised the King that Guinevere was not wholesome for him to take to wife, and warned him that Lancelot should love her, and she him again. In spite of this the King determined to wed Guinevere, and sent Sir Lancelot, the chief of his knights and his trusted friend, to bring her from her home.

  On this journey Merlin's prophecy came to pass, and Lancelot and Guinevere loved one another. But they were helpless to realize their love, and in time Guinevere was married to the King. Her father, King Leodegrance, sent the Round Table to Arthur as a wedding gift.

  Meanwhile Arthur's half-sister Morgause had borne her bastard son by the King. His name was Mordred. Merlin had prophesied that great danger should come to Arthur and his kingdom through this child, so when the King heard of the birth he sent for all the children born upon May-day, and they were put into a ship and set adrift. Some were four weeks old, some less. By chance the ship drove against a rock where stood a castle. The ship was destroyed, and all in it died except Mordred, who was found by a good man, and reared until he was fourteen years of age, when he was brought to the King.

  Soon after the wedding of Arthur and Guinevere the King had to leave the court, and in his absence King Meleagant (Melwas) carried the Queen off into his kingdom from which, as men said, no traveler ever returned. The only way into her moated prison was by two very perilous paths. One of these was called "the water bridge" because the bridge lay under water, invisible and very narrow. The other bridge was much more perilous, and had never been crossed by a man, made as it was of a sharp sword. No one dared go after her but Lancelot, and he made his way through unknown country, until he came near Meleagant's lodge that had been built for the Queen. Then he crossed the sword bridge, and sustained grievous wounds therefrom, but he rescued the Queen, and later, in the presence of King Arthur and the court, he fought and killed Meleagant.

  Then it befell that Merlin fell in a dotage on one of the damosels of the Lake, whose name was Nimue, and Merlin would let her have no rest, but always he would be with her. He warned King

  Arthur that he should not be long above earth, but for all his craft he would be put alive into the earth, and he warned him also to keep his sword and the scabbard safely, for it would be stolen from him by a woman that he most trusted. "Ah," said the King, "since ye know of your adventure, why do you not put it away by your magic arts, and prevent it?" "That cannot be," said Merlin. "It is ordained that ye shall die a worshipful death, and I a shameful death." Then he left the King. Shortly after this Nimue, the damosel of the Lake, departed, and Merlin went with her wherever she went. They went over the sea to the land of Benwick, in Brittany, where King Ban was king, and Elaine his wife had with her the young child called Galahad.

  Merlin prophesied that one day Galahad should be the most man of worship in the world. Then after this Nimue and Merlin left Benwick, and came into Cornwall. And the lady was afraid of him because he was a devil's son, and she did not know how to make away with him. Then it happened that Merlin showed her a cave in a rock which could be sealed with a great stone. So by her subtle working she made Merlin go under that stone to show her the magic that dwelt there, but she cast a spell on him so that he could not ever come out again. And she went away and left him there in the cave.

  And anon a knight, a cousin of the King's called Bagdemagus, rode out from the court, to find a branch of an holy herb for healing. It happened that he rode by the rock where the Lady of the Lake had put Merlin under the stone, and there he heard him lamenting. Sir Bagdemagus would have helped him, but when he went to the stone to lift it, it was so heavy than an hundred men could not have moved it. When Merlin knew he was there, he told him to save his labour, for all was in vain. So Bagdemagus went, and left him there.

  Meantime it had happened as Merlin had foretold, and Arthur's sister Morgan le Fay had stolen the sword Excalibur and its sheath. She gave these to Sir Accolon with which to fight the King himself. And when the King was armed for the fight there came a maiden from Morgan le Fay, and brought to Arthur a sword like Excalibur, with its scabbard, and he thanked her. But she was false, for the sword and the scabbard were counterfeits, and brittle. So there was a battle between King Arthur and Accolon. The Lady of the Lake came to this battle, for she knew that Morgan le Fay wished ill to the King, and she wanted to save him. King Arthur's sword broke in his hand, and only after a grievous fight did he get his own sword Excalibur back from Sir Accolon and defeat him. Then Accolon confessed the treason of Morgan le Fay, King Urien's wife, and the King granted mercy to him. And after this the Lady of the Lake became the friend and guardian of King Arthur, in the stead of Merlin the enchanter.

  AUTHOR'S NOTE

  "The wicked day of destiny," as Malory calls it, is the day when Arthur's final battle was fought at Camlann. In this battle, we are told, "Arthur and Medraut fell."

  This reference, from theAnnales Cambriae, which was compiled three or possibly four centuries after Camlann, is all we know of Mordred. When he reappears some centuries later, in the romances of Malory and the French poets, he has taken on the role of villain necessary to the conventions of romance. Mordred the traitor, perjurer and adulterer is as much an invention as the lover and great knight Sir Lancelot, and the roles played by both in the tales of "King Arthur and his Noble Knights" are filled with the absurdities inevitable in a long-drawn series of stories.

  In the fragments of those stories that have been used in this book, the absurdities speak for themselves. Throughout the final debacle Arthur, that wise and experienced ruler, shows neither sense nor moderation; worse, he is tainted with the same treachery for which he condemns his son. If Arthur had had any reason at all to distrust Mordred (for instance over the murder of Lamorak or the exposure of Lancelot and the Queen) he would hardly have left him as "ruler of all England" and guardian of the Queen, while he himself went on an expedition from which it was possible he might never return. Even granted that he did appoint Mordred his regent, it is hard to see why Mordred, with every hope of becoming his father's heir, should have forged a letter purporting to tell of Arthur's death, and on the strength of that seized both kingdom and Queen. Knowing that Arthur was still alive, and with a vast army at his back, Mordred could be sure that the King would come straight home to punish his son and repossess kingdom and Queen. More, the final battle between King and "traitor" was brought about by accident, in the very moment when the King was about to seal a truce with the villainous Mordred, and grant him lands to rule. (it is another, though minor, absurdity that the lands are Cornwall and Kent, at opposite sides of the country, the one already held by the Saxons, the other by Arthur's declared heir, Constantine.)

  For none of the "Mordred story," then, is there any evidence at all. It is to be noticed that the Annales Cambriae does not even state that he and Arthur fought on opposite sides. It would have been possible — and very tempting — to have rewritten the story completely, and set Arthur, with Mordred at his side, against the Saxons, who (as recorded in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle) fought a battle against the Britons in A.D. 527, and
presumably won it, since the Chronicle does not emphasize Saxon defeats. The battle, at the right date, might even have been the battle of Camlann, the last stand of the British against the Saxons.

  But the temptation had to be resisted. Until I came to study in detail the fragments that make up Mordred's story, I had accepted him without question as the villain of the piece, an evil man who brought about the tragedy of Arthur's final downfall. Hence, in my earlier books, I had made Merlin foresee that doom, and warn against it. So I could not rewrite the Camlann battle. Instead I tried to iron out the absurdities in the old story, and add some saving greys to the portrait of a black villain. I have not made a "hero" out of Mordred, but in my tale he is at least a man who is consistent in his faults and virtues, and has some kind of reason for the actions with which legend has credited him.

  Perhaps the most exciting thing about the tale of the final years of Arthur's reign is the way which the actual historical events can be made to fit with the legend. Arthur most certainly existed, and so may Mordred have done, but since the traitor of romance was a figment of the storyteller's imagination, then I would suggest that the Mordred of my story is just as valid, since I, too, have perhaps earned a place among those of whom Gibbon writes with such urbane contempt: The declamations of Gildas, the fragments and fables of Nennius, the obscure hints of the Saxon laws and chronicles, and the ecclesiastical tales of the venerable Bede have been illustrated by the diligence, and sometimes embellished by the fancy, of succeeding writers, whose works I am not ambitious either to censure or transcribe.

  Some other brief notes

  Camlann. The site of Arthur's last battle cannot be identified with any certainty. Some scholars have suggested Birdoswald in Northumbria (the Roman Camboglanna), others the Roman Camulodonum (Colchester). The most usually accepted site is in Cornwall, on the River Camel; this because of Arthur's strong connection with West Country legend. I have set the battle beside the River Camel near South Cadbury in Wiltshire. The hill at South Cadbury has, owing to recent excavations, a strong claim to being an Arthurian strong point, possibly "Camelot" itself. Hence there seemed no need to look further for the site of the final battle. I do not know when the local stream was called the Camel, but the long ridge nearby was in antiquity known as "Camel Hill."

  At that date, also, there would be lake and fenland stretching right inland from the estuary of the River Brue almost as far as South Cadbury. The hills of modem Glastonbury would then be islands — Ynys Witrin, or the Glass Isle — and Caer Camel "not far from the seaside." The barge that carried the wounded Arthur to be healed at Avilion would have only a brief journey to the legendary place of healing.

  The date of Camlann. Scholars place the date of the battle somewhere between A.D. 515 and — a wide choice, but a date somewhere about to 527 seems reasonable. One date given for Badon Hill is A.D. 506, and we are told (in the Annales Cambriae) that Camlann was twenty-one years later.

  The following is a table of the "real" (as opposed to guesswork) dates:

  524 A.D.

  526 A.D. 527 A.D.

  527 A.D.

  Neustria. Drustan.

  Clodomir, son of Clovis and ruler of the central part of the Frankish kingdom, was killed at Vézeronce in battle with the Burgundians. Two of his sons, aged ten and seven, were put in charge of Clevis' widow, Clothild, in Paris, but were murdered by their uncles. The third son fled into a monastery.

  Theodoric, King of Rome and "emperor of the West," died at Ravenna. Justin, ageing "emperor of the East," abdicated in favour of his nephew Justinian.

  According to the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, "in this year Cerdic and Cynric fought against the Britons at the place which is called Cerdicesleag" (Cerdic's field or woodland).

  This was the name given to the western portion of the Prankish empire after its division at Clovis's death in 511.

  Drust or Drystan, son of Talorc, is an eighth-century wan who later was absorbed into the Arthurian legend as Tristram.

  In one version of the Gareth legend he marries Linet.

  Liones, in another her sister Linet.

  Arthur's sons. We have the names of two, Amr and Llacheu. The word did not always, as now, imply a religious house for women only. It was used interchangeably; convent with "monastery."

  Many of the foundations had communities of both women and men. This is a free translation of an Anglo-Saxon poem, The harper's song. "The Wanderer," which in The Last Enchantment I attributed to Merlin. Seal Island: Selsey. Sutthrige: Surrey. Edinburgh and Lochawe, 1980-1983

  A NOTE ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  MARY STEWART, one of the most popular novelists of all time, was born in Sunderiand, County Durham, England. After boarding school, she went on to Durham University, and later worked there as a lecturer in English Language and Literature, until her marriage in 1945. Her husband is Sir Frederick Stewart, who has recently retired from the chairmanship of the Geology Department of Edinburgh University. He is a Fellow of the Royal Society.

  Lady Stewart's career as a novelist began in with the publication of Madam, Will You Talk? Since then she has published sixteen successful novels, including The Wicked Day, the fourth of her novels of Arthurian legend. Preceding it is her magical Merlin trilogy, about the legendary enchanter Merlin and young Arthur. (the novels of the trilogy are The Crystal Cave, The Hollow Hills, and The Last Enchantment.) Her books for young readers, The Little Broomstick (1972), Ludo and the Star Horse (1974), and A Walk in Wolf Wood (1980), quickly met with the same success as her other novels. In 1971, the Scottish chapter of the International PEN Association awarded her the Frederick Niven Prize for The Crystal Cave . In 1974, the Scottish Arts Council Award went to Ludo and the Star Horse.

  Table of Contents

  Prologue

  The Crystal Cave

  The Hollow Hills

  The Last Enchantment

  The Wicked Day

  Epilogue

  The Legend

  Author’s Note

  About The Author