In Principio

by J A Cummings

  The man was a prideful boor, but a valuable soldier and a good ally to have. He was as skilled as his tapestries alleged, which was the only reason Merlin tolerated being urgently called and then kept waiting.

  He felt her before he saw her, her power sweeping down the tower stairs ahead of her like fog. Queen Sybile came into view, garbed in green velvet and ermine fur, pearls and diamonds dripping from her headdress and swaying as she walked. More pearls hung around her neck in heavy strands, graduating from smaller to larger until the largest pearl bounced against her lower abdomen, right above her womb. His demon sight showed him the tiny glow of an extra life force in her belly, the signature showing him a strong child just beginning to grow.

  She inclined her head toward him, and he rose to his feet, giving her the same salute. “Your Majesty,” he said. “It’s been quite a while.”

  “Good morning, my lord Merlin,” she replied. “How fares Ynys Môn?”

  “Roaring well. Congratulations on your new son.”

  Sybile looked surprised for half of a heartbeat, then displeased, and her face just as rapidly vanished into cool and false serenity. “A son? I would have thought it would be too soon to know, but nothing escapes your gaze, it seems.”

  He smiled. “No. Nothing does.”

  “What brings you here to our humble home?”

  She knew as well as he did that their castle was the grandest in all of Cambria. He allowed himself the liberty of a sardonic snort at her words. “I was summoned by the king.”

  Sybile’s smile turned venomous. “Perhaps you should seek him in his tower, my lord. His retainers keep him locked away more often than not these days.”

  “A fact which no doubt pleases you greatly.”

  They stared at one another, each taking the measure of the other. She admitted at last, “Yes. It suits me well.”

  “Mama!” Aglovale cried out, and he bolted from his minders, pelting straight to Sybile with a drooly grin. Sybile caught him and swung him up in her arms, chucking him affectionately beneath his messy chin and tickling his throat. The child squealed in delight and kicked his feet, squirming in his mother’s arms.

  Merlin looked fondly on the child. “Your son will be among the best of men,” he prophesied.

  “That surprises me not at all,” the queen said, “for he is the best of boys.”

  “He resembles you, Your Majesty,” he observed. “He has your eyes.”

  “Then he is a lucky child. No one will look on him and see his father there.” She kissed her son, and he grasped her pearls in sticky fingers. She allowed it, indulging him. “He will be able to make his own way and his own name without the king’s shadow falling across him.”

  “He is a fortunate child indeed, and will be the most fortunate of your children.”

  The clinking of armor and boot heels attracted their attention. Sir Gamerion emerged from the king’s tower, his face grim. He bowed to the queen, then said, “My lord Merlin, please come upstairs. We need your wisdom.”

  The druid bade the queen good day and followed Gamerion up the stairs. When they reached the king’s chambers, Merlin stopped short. Pellinore was standing on his bed, naked as on the day he was born, swinging his fists at the air, grunting with the effort of each blow. When he saw Merlin, the afflicted king leaped toward him, pointing at the space beside his clothing chest.

  “What is that?!” he demanded

  He looked and saw nothing with his physical senses, but he could feel the presence of a magical creature in the room. He lifted his hand and whispered words in the druidic tongue, and abruptly the monster was in full view. Sir Gamerion gasped and took a step forward to protect his king, and the beast bayed with mixed anger and agony.

  “There are many names for this thing,” Merlin said calmly. “Some call it Melltith. Some call it the Questing Beast. It is the subject and means of a dire curse that was devised by the Irish.”

  Pellinore’s face reddened in rage. “Get rid of it.”

  “I cannot.” The king raised his hand to strike the druid, but an invisible force prevented him from connecting. Merlin stared at him, unimpressed. “Think well before you try that again. I do not suffer fools for long.”

  The king reeled back, his hand smarting from the collision with something he could not see. He glared at the Beast. “If you can’t get rid of it, tell me how to kill it.”

  “You can’t. Not until the terms of the curse are met.” He stepped closer to the Beast, which snapped at him, its eyes rolling in its head. “I can’t get rid of it, and I can’t tell you how to kill it, but I can keep it from stalking you.”

  “Anything you can do to keep this thing away from me, do it,” Pellinore ordered.

  Merlin considered the monster, which took a menacing step closer to the druid. He stood his ground. “There is a price to be paid for this intercession.”

  Sir Gamerion interjected angrily, “What price?”

  “King Pellinore, I will prevent this creature from haunting you, but in return, you will be compelled to seek it out for nine months out of every year. Once you find it, you will be compelled to do battle with it. I cannot say that it will never hurt you, or that you will never hurt it, but I can say that neither of you will die from your wounds when you fight.”

  The king glared. “How is this an intercession?”

  Merlin turned to him. “It is an intercession, because you will no longer run wild and naked in your castle, frightening your servants and attacking thin air. You will be a king still, and a knight errant, and there will be none who will call you mad in the presence of your detractors and rivals.”

  Pellinore looked hard at the druid, considering his words. “And if I refuse?”

  “Then I give it two weeks before you are clapped in chains and bundled off to a monastery to be imprisoned for your own safety, and where you will meet with an unfortunate accident. Norgalis will have a new king, and it will not be Aglovale. Your line’s power will end.”

  The king ground his teeth and considered the options. Finally, he nodded. “Do it.”

  Merlin stepped back and closed his eyes, gathering his power. The Beast growled at him, and Sir Gamerion took another step forward. Pellinore pushed his knight commander back.

  Merlin held his hands together at the level of his hips, fingers interlaced and palms flat toward the floor. They began to tremble. A cold wind began to fill the room. The Beast stepped back from Merlin, its tongue flicking nervously over its bared teeth. The wind blew harder and harder, roaring like a cyclone through the king’s bedchamber, and both Pellinore and Gamerion found themselves gripping the furniture to stay on their feet. Merlin, unmoving, his eyes still closed, murmured to himself.

  The Beast shuddered and vanished, and the wind escaped through the tower arrow slits as if it had blown the creature away with its strength. The chamber went silent and still, apart from a few loose down feathers that had escaped from the king’s pillows and were floating toward the ground like snow.

  “Jesus,” Gamerion said.

  Merlin opened his eyes. “Remember, Pellinore. When you begin to feel compelled to pursue the Melltith, you must do it. You must not stay here in this castle or among your people when the need to hunt is upon you. In truth, you will find it very hard to remain.”

  Pellinore nodded, just happy to be rid of the thing. He picked up his robe and pulled it on, trying to gather himself. “I understand.”

  “Sir Gamerion,” Merlin said quietly, “you were unfortunate enough to see the Beast with your own eyes. You may find a portion of the curse has touched you. If you find yourself longing to hunt, go to it.”

  The knight nodded solemnly. “I understand.”

  “Good.” Merlin brushed his hands off, as if they had gotten dirty. “Now I am needed elsewhere in your kingdom.”

  With a shimmer of blurred colors that ran from foot to head, he vanished from sight like the Beast had before him. Pellinore looked at Gamerion, who looked back. They stared
at one another in consternation for a long moment until finally the king clapped him on the shoulder.

  “I don’t know about you, my friend, but I could do with a drink.”

  The knight nodded again. “I couldn’t agree with you more.”

  When Arthur and Sir Ector arrived, the great hall was teeming with more people than Arthur had ever seen the old building hold. Sir Kay and the knights who had attended the ceremony, along with Father Marcus, sat at tables that had been erected in the room in the shape of a horseshoe. A number of Sir Ector’s most prominent tenants had joined them to sit at the lord’s table, men and wives and their eligible daughters. Sir Kay sat at the head table, where he was being fussed over by a trio of serving women that Arthur had never seen before. A trio of musicians were preparing their instruments in the corner, and a man in a green cloak with a lap harp was sitting in the center of the room, surrounded on three sides by tables that were filled with place settings, fresh-cut flowers and platters piled high with roasted meat.

  Sir Bedivere rose when he saw them, and he brought forward two young people, a boy who looked a bit younger than Arthur and a girl perhaps a year or two older, just on the cusp of marriageability.

  “Sir Ector,” Bedivere said, “please allow me to present my niece and nephew. These are Griflet and Garwen.”

  “Well met, to be sure,” Ector said, a friendly smile on his face.

  The young lady dropped a demure curtsey. “The honor is mine, Sir Ector. I was raised with stories of your gallantry, and it is a pleasure to meet so fine a warrior.”

  The master of Caer Gai smiled. “I believe, young lady, that you have spent some time in a royal court.”

  “Indeed she has,” Bedivere said proudly. “Until recently, she was one of the ladies in waiting to the Queen of Rheged. Now that the queen is gone, her services were no longer needed, and I thought it best if she spent no further time in the close reach of King Uriens.”

  Arthur frowned. “Is King Uriens dishonorable?”

  His foster father nodded. “As most kings are.” He smiled and bowed to Garwen. “Welcome, my lady.”

  Bedivere turned to his nephew. “Griflet was until recently squired to a knight named Sir Maridoc. Due to an unfortunate incident with a stout spear and a stouter opponent, Griflet finds himself without a position at present.”

  “Hard luck,” Arthur said.

  “Harder for Sir Maridoc,” Griflet said with a smile.

  The brother and sister were clearly related, with a strong resemblance to Sir Bedivere, down to their pale eyes and fair hair, which set them apart from the dark-headed throng in Cambria. Griflet’s green eyes were particularly merry, Arthur thought, which seemed to indicate that he mourned the passing of his knight very little, if at all.

  “Of that I have no doubt,” Sir Ector said. “Well, I am suddenly without a squire, myself, so if you’d like to have the job, young Griflet, then I would be happy to accept you.”

  Griflet beamed, and Bedivere put a hand on the back of the boy’s neck. “There, you see? All sorted.” He looked at his old friend. “He was afraid no knight would take him on now, seeing him as somehow cursed.”

  “Many a squire has survived the knight he served,” Sir Brastias said, strolling over to them, a mug of hard cider in his hand. “Such is the nature of the business of knighthood. When you have as many fights as we do, eventually you lose one, and sometimes you lose everything.” He considered Garwen and spoke softly. “I see much of your mother in you.”

  She curtsied again. “Thank you, my lord. My mother was a passing good woman.”

  “Was?” Brastias frowned. “Surely she’s not come to any misfortune?”

  The girl kept her eyes demurely cast down as she answered quietly, “She passed into the Underworld this winter.”

  The knight blinked, then drained his mug. He turned his face away, but not before Arthur could see his stricken expression. Brastias muttered, “Damned bad news, that.”

  “It was a sorrow, to be sure,” Bedivere said, sounding anything but sad. Arthur frowned at the dichotomy of word and expression. Something seemed amiss. Griflet, too, seemed to be dismayed by his uncle’s tone, as the merriment in his eyes faded and he looked at his toes.

  Brastias held his mug up to a passing serving girl, and she filled it with the jug in her hands. He nodded his thanks and drifted back to his seat. Sir Ector put his arm around Arthur’s shoulders and told his guests, “If you’ll excuse me, we should get to our places so we can all start eating before the food goes cold.”

  Garwen bowed again, graceful as a dove, and Griflet bent his head in respect. Arthur walked away at his father’s side.

  They went to the head table, where Sir Kay was beaming at the party that had been called in his honor. “Father, I can’t believe all of these people are here just for me!”

  “They are indeed, my son.” Ector sat in his chair, a heavy oaken affair with the tallest back at the table, suitable for the lord of the castle. Kay was at his right, and he gestured for Arthur to sit at his left. The boy obeyed. “A knighting is an uncommonly happy occasion, the happiest a man can have.”

  Arthur said, “I thought that the happiest occasions a man could have were his wedding and the birth of his first son.”

  Sir Ector smiled. “Those are delightful days, indeed, but without a knighthood, some men can never find a wife, and without a wife, a child born is just a source of shame. It’s all because of this day that Sir Kay here will someday experience the others.”

  He was feeling argumentative. “But don’t farmers and beggars have wives and children, too? Surely they’re not prevented from having that happiness just because they can’t be knights.”

  Sir Ulfius, seated on the left-side arm of the horseshoe, interrupted. “Why do you care about farmers and beggars, boy? It’s not as if anything in their lives is a source of happiness.”

  “They’re still people,” Arthur objected.

  “Bah. They’re a resource.”

  The boy leveled a cold look at the Norse knight. “Do you have lands, Sir Ulfius?”

  He saw the glare on Arthur’s face and was clearly annoyed by it. “Of course I do. How else would I get the money to keep myself in horses and armor? It’s all from rents, boy.” He narrowed his own blue eyes. “Why do you ask?”

  “Because I pity your tenants.”

  Sir Ector grumbled warningly, “Arthur…”

  “Your ward has a sassy mouth for an unwanted bastard,” Ulfius told Ector, his gaze locked with Arthur’s. “Perhaps all of this soft feeling for the underclasses is because he knows that’s where he belongs.”

  “If you are trying to insult me, you’ve failed,” Arthur said. “I may well be a bastard by blood, but at least I’m not a bastard in behavior.”

  Ector grabbed his ward by the back of the neck, his one good hand hauling him out of his seat. The boy winced as he was dragged to the floor and pushed down onto his knees. “I will not have you speak this way to a man who is your superior, and a guest in my home. How dare you?”

  He knew he should have apologized, but it would have been a lie. He held his silence, his eyes cast down onto the flagstones. Ector rose and pulled him over to kneel in front of Ulfius.

  “Apologize to him! Now!”

  Arthur struggled with his conscience and came up with words that wouldn’t make him a liar. “I apologize that I offended you, Sir Ulfius.”

  The man grasped his chin in his hand and squeezed, his thumb pressing painfully. He forced Arthur to look up into his face. “Who do you think you are, whelp?” Ulfius hissed.

  “No one, sir,” he answered with difficulty.

  The knight spat in his face. “On that we are agreed. You are no one. You are not fit to sit at table with fine noblemen like Sir Kay, whose celebration you are ruining.” He released his grip on his face. “Send him away, Ector. I don’t want to see his face again.”

  “Go to your room, Arthur. Now.”

  The boy rose
stiffly, his rage barely contained in his tension-strained muscles. He was spoiling for a fight, bubbling over with anger that needed a place to go. He considered taking one last verbal shot at the Norse knight, but he thought better of it and wiped the spittle from his face instead.

  He turned to the assembly. “I apologize for the disruption in this celebration. Sir Kay, I wish you very well in your new life. Excuse me.”

  Without waiting for anyone to respond, he left the great hall and went up the stairs to his sleeping quarters.

  Arthur sat on his pallet with his back against the wall, his hands on his knees. He could just barely hear the celebration downstairs through his open door, the laughter and the music reaching him in an indistinct jumble of sound. He wished he had kept his opinions to himself. He was hungry, having fasted with Kay and Ector before this morning’s Mass, and his stomach rumbled uncomfortably.

  He sighed and looked up at the ceiling. There was a crack in the masonry that he had stared at a hundred times before, and here he was, staring at it again. It seemed that his life was destined to be lived in this little room from beginning to end.

  At least it was his and his alone now. Kay’s belongings had been moved out to the guest house, where he would be staying from now on. As a knight, he would be given more comfortable accommodations, with soft sheets and an actual bed instead of a straw pallet covered over with blankets. His scriptorium had been moved out as well, although Arthur was reasonably certain that it would see no further use now that Kay’s book education was ended. He sometimes marveled at the depths to which his foster brother’s laziness could extend.