The Serpent's Tale

by Ariana Franklin

  “Take the woman out,” Henry said. “No, first get this fellow’s name.”

  “Rhys,” the interpreter said.

  “Now then, Rhys ...” He had to wait until the page, with some difficulty, hauled the screaming Welshwoman out of the tent. “Tell me about Arthur.”

  The prisoner’s eyes kept blinking in terror. He was a tall, lanky man, probably in his thirties, with unfortunate teeth and straggling fair hair. His voice, however, was captivating and, isolated from his comrades, with the yells of his mother audible outside the tent, and the axe’s blade practically touching his nose, he used it to answer questions.

  No, no, he hadn’t fought with the rebels, not actually fought, they’d taken him along to put their prowess to song. Very content he was, personally, with King Henry Plantagenet to reign, and there was a fine name for a eulogy that he’d be happy to provide anytime.

  Yes, yes, he’d spent a year as an oblate in England, in Glastonbury. His uncle Caradoc ap Gruffid had been a monk there, see, but he, Rhys ap Gruffid ap Owein ap Gwilym ...

  Fulk hit him.

  ... had decided his vocation lay in the bardic world and he’d wandered away back to Wales to learn the harp. A fine bard he’d become as it turned out, oh yes, his “Marwnat Pwyll”—well, “Death Song for Pwyll” it was in English—was considered the finest composition since Taliesin had ...

  Fulk hit him again.

  “Oh, well then, the vision. It was of Arthur in his coffin being buried and lamented. My uncle Caradoc saw it. Just after the earthquake it was, see, and terrible that was, the ground heaving like a ship ...”

  Slapping him was useless; the man wasn’t being obstructive, he was physically incapable of keeping to the point. It was a matter of waiting it out.

  Eventually, wearily, the king said, “So your uncle saw a vision of Arthur’s burial. In the monks’ graveyard at Glastonbury, between the two pyramids.”

  “Yes, yes, very old those pyramids, very exotic ...”

  “Take him away, Fulk. Better keep him separate from the rest. They’re not going to be happy with him.” Henry turned to his bishop. “What’s your opinion, Rowley?”

  The Bishop of Saint Albans’s attention was being dominated by the tweezers that were picking shreds of chainmail from his leg.

  He tried to consider the matter. “There are true visions, I don’t say there aren’t, but a dying old man ...”

  “Worth telling Glastonbury about it, though?” While his friend havered, the king said, “I need Arthur dead, my son. If there’s something down in that fissure, I want it dug up and shown to every bloody Celt from here to Brittany. No more revolts because a warrior from the Dark Ages is going to lead them to freedom. I want Arthur’s bones and I want them on display.”

  “If they’re there, Henry. If they’re there, they’d require some sort of verification.”

  The poker-end in the brazier had become a molten white and the doctor was lifting it out.

  Henry II showed his vicious little teeth in a grin as he held out his arm; he was going to get some reward from the situation. “And you know who can provide that verification—saints’ bollocks.” The smell of scorched flesh pervaded the tent.

  “Not her, my lord,” the bishop pleaded, watching the poker approach his leg. “She’s— goddamn—she’s ... oof ... earned the right to be left in peace. So have I.”

  “She’s my investigator of the dead, Rowley. That’s what I pay her for.”

  “You don’t pay her, my lord.”

  “Are you sure?” The king puzzled over it, then said, “If she gives me a dead Arthur, my son, she can name her price.”