Excalibur

by Bernard Cornwell

  I had not seen Merlin all that day, and that night Galahad told me the Druid had already left the valley, going north. I had found Galahad standing beside Cuneglas’s balefire. ‘I know Cuneglas disliked Christians,’ Galahad explained to me, ‘but I don’t think he would object to a Christian’s prayer.’ I invited him to sleep among my men and he walked with me to where they were camped. ‘Merlin did give me a message for you,’ Galahad told me. ‘He says you will find what you seek among the trees that are dead.’

  ‘I’m not sure I’m seeking anything,’ I said.

  ‘Then look among the dead trees,’ Galahad said, ‘and you’ll find whatever it is you’re not looking for.’

  I looked for nothing that night, but instead slept wrapped in my cloak among my men on the battlefield. I woke early with an aching head and sore joints. The fine weather had passed and a drizzle was spitting out of the west. The rain threatened to dampen the balefires and so we began collecting wood to feed the flames, and that reminded me of Merlin’s strange message, but I could see no dead trees. We were using Saxon battle axes to chop down oaks, elms and beech, sparing only the sacred ash trees, and all the trees we cut were healthy enough. I asked Issa if he had noticed any dead trees and he shook his head, but Eachern said he had seen some down by the river bend.

  ‘Show me.’

  Eachern led a whole group of us down to the bank and, where the river turned sharply west, there was a great mass of dead trees caught on the half exposed roots of a willow. The dead branches were matted with a tangle of other debris that had been washed down river, but I could see nothing of any value among the scraps. ‘If Merlin says there’s something there,’ Galahad said, ‘then we ought to look.’

  ‘He might not have meant those trees,’ I said.

  ‘They’re as good as any,’ Issa said, and he stripped off his sword so that it would not get wet and jumped down onto the tangle. He broke through the brittle upper branches to splash into the river. ‘Give me a spear!’ he called.

  Galahad handed down a spear and Issa used it to poke among the branches. In one place a stretch of frayed and tarred netting from a fish trap had been snagged to form a tent-like shape that was thick with dead leaves, and Issa needed all his strength to heave that tangled mass aside.

  It was then that the fugitive broke cover. He had been hiding under the net, poised uncomfortably on a half-submerged trunk, but now, like an otter flushed by hounds, he scrambled away from Issa’s spear and tried to escape up river. The dead trees tripped him, and the weight of armour slowed him, and my men, whooping on the bank, easily overtook him. If the fugitive had not been wearing armour he might have thrown himself into the river and swum to its far bank, but now he could do nothing but surrender. The man must have spent two nights and a day working his way up the river, but then discovered the hiding place and thought he could stay there until we had all left the battlefield. Now he was caught.

  It was Lancelot. I first recognized him because of his long black hair of which he was so vain, then, through the mud and twigs, I saw the famous white enamel of his armour. His face showed nothing but terror. He looked from us to the river, as if contemplating throwing himself into the current, then he looked back and saw his half-brother. ‘Galahad!’ he called. ‘Galahad!’

  Galahad looked at me for a few heartbeats, then he made the sign of the cross, turned and walked away.

  ‘Galahad!’ Lancelot shouted again as his brother vanished from the bank above.

  Galahad just kept walking.

  ‘Bring him up,’ I ordered. Issa jabbed at Lancelot with the spear and the terrified man scrambled desperately up through the nettles that grew on the bank. He still had his sword, though its blade must have been rusty after its immersion in the river. I faced him as he stumbled free of the nettles. ‘Will you fight me here and now, Lord King?’ I asked him, drawing Hywelbane.

  ‘Let me go, Derfel! I’ll send you money, I promise!’ He babbled on, promising me gold beyond my dreams’ desires, but he would not draw the sword until I prodded his chest hard with Hywel-bane’s point and at that moment he knew he must die. He spat at me, took one pace backwards, and drew his blade. It had once been called Tanlladwr, which means Bright Killer, but he had renamed it the Christblade when Sansum had baptized him. The Christblade was rusted now, but still a formidable weapon, and to my surprise Lancelot was no mean swordsman. I had always taken him for a coward, but that day he fought bravely enough. He was desperate, and the desperation showed itself in a series of slashing quick attacks that forced me back. But he was also tired, wet and cold, and he wearied quickly so that when his first flurry of blows had all been parried I was able to take my time as I decided on his death. He became more desperate and his blows wilder, but I ended the fight when I ducked under one of those massive cuts and held Hywelbane so that her point caught him on the arm and the momentum of his swing opened the veins from the wrist to the elbow. He yelped as the blood flowed, then his sword fell from his nerveless hand and he waited in abject terror for the killing blow.

  I cleaned Hywelbane’s blade with a handful of grass, dried her on my cloak, then sheathed her. ‘I don’t want your soul on my sword,’ I told Lancelot, and for a heartbeat he looked grateful, but then I broke his hopes. ‘Your men killed my child,’ I told him, ‘the same men you sent to try and fetch Ceinwyn to your bed. You think I can forgive you for either?’

  ‘They were not my orders,’ he said desperately. ‘Believe me!’

  I spat in his face. ‘Shall I give you to Arthur, Lord King?’

  ‘No, Derfel, please!’ He clasped his hands. He shivered. ‘Please!’

  ‘Give him the woman’s death,’ Issa urged me, meaning that we should strip him, geld him and let him bleed to death between his legs.

  I was tempted, but I feared to enjoy Lancelot’s death. There is a pleasure in revenge, and I had given Dian’s killers a terrible death and felt no pang of conscience as I enjoyed their suffering, but I had no belly for the torture of this quivering, broken man. He shook so much that I felt pity for him, and I found myself debating whether to let him live. I knew he was a traitor and a coward and that he deserved to be killed, but his terror was so abject that I actually felt sorry for him. He had always been my enemy, he had always despised me, yet as he dropped to his knees in front of me and the tears rolled down his cheeks I felt the impulse to grant him mercy and knew there would be as much pleasure in that exercise of power as there would be in ordering his death. For a heartbeat I wanted his gratitude, but then I remembered my daughter’s dying face and a shudder of rage made me tremble. Arthur was famous for forgiving his enemies, but this was one enemy I could never forgive.

  ‘The woman’s death,’ Issa suggested again.

  ‘No,’ I said, and Lancelot looked up at me with renewed hope. ‘Hang him like a common felon,’ I said.

  Lancelot howled, but I hardened my heart. ‘Hang him,’ I ordered again, and so we did. We found a length of horsehair rope, looped it over the branch of an oak and hoisted him up. He danced as he hung, and went on dancing until Galahad returned and tugged on his half-brother’s ankles to put him out of his choking misery.

  We stripped Lancelot’s body naked. I threw his sword and his fine scale armour into the river, burned his clothes, then used a big Saxon war axe to dismember his corpse. We did not burn him, but tossed him to the fishes so that his dark soul would not sour the Other world with its presence. We obliterated him from the earth, and I kept only his enamelled sword belt that had been a gift from Arthur.

  I met Arthur at midday. He was returning from his pursuit of Cerdic and he and his men rode tired horses down into the valley. ‘We didn’t catch Cerdic,’ he told me, ‘but we caught some others.’ He patted Llamrei’s sweat-whitened neck. ‘Cerdic lives, Derfel,’ he said, ‘but he’s so weakened that he won’t be a problem for a long time.’ He smiled, then saw I was not matching his cheerful mood. ‘What is it?’ he asked.

  ‘Just this, Lord,’ I sa
id, and held up the expensive enamelled belt.

  For a moment he thought I was showing him a piece of plunder, then he recognized the sword belt which had been his own gift to Lancelot. For a heartbeat his face had the look it had borne for so many months before Mynydd Baddon: the closed, hard look of bitterness, and then he glanced up into my eyes. ‘Its owner?’

  ‘Dead, Lord. Hanged in shame.’

  ‘Good,’ he said quietly. ‘And that thing, Derfel, you can throw away.’ I threw the belt into the river.

  And thus Lancelot died, though the songs he had paid for lived on, and to this day he is celebrated as a hero equal to Arthur. Arthur is remembered as a ruler, but Lancelot is called the warrior. In truth he was the King without land, a coward, and the greatest traitor of Britain, and his soul wanders Lloegyr to this day, screaming for its shadowbody that can never exist because we cut his corpse into scraps and fed it to the river. If the Christians are right, and there is a hell, may he suffer there for ever.

  Galahad and I followed Arthur to the city, passing the balefire on which Cuneglas burned and threading the Roman graves amongst which so many of Aelle’s men had died. I had warned Arthur what waited for him, but he showed no dismay when he heard that Argante had come to the city.

  His arrival in Aquae Sulis prompted scores of anxious petitioners to clamour for his attention. The petitioners were men demanding recognition for acts of bravery in the battle, men demanding shares of slaves or gold, and men demanding justice in disputes that long preceded the Saxon invasion, and Arthur told them all to attend him in the temple, though once there he ignored the supplicants. Instead he summoned Galahad to an ante-chamber of the temple and, after a while, he sent for Sansum. The Bishop was jeered by the Dumnonian spearmen as he hurried across the compound. He spoke with Arthur a long time, and then Oengus mac Airem and Mordred were called to Arthur’s presence. The spearmen in the enclosure were making wagers on whether Arthur would go to Argante in the Bishop’s house or to Guinevere in the priests’ quarters.

  Arthur had not wanted my counsel. Instead, when he summoned Oengus and Mordred, he asked me to tell Guinevere that he had returned and so I crossed the yard to the priests’ quarters where I discovered Guinevere in an upper room, attended by Taliesin. The bard, dressed in a clean white robe and with the silver fillet about his black hair, stood and bowed as I entered. He carried a small harp, but I sensed the two had been talking rather than making music. He smiled and backed from the room, letting the thick curtain fall across the doorway. ‘A most clever man,’ Guinevere said, standing to greet me. She was in a cream-coloured robe trimmed with blue ribboned hems, she wore the Saxon necklace I had given her on Mynydd Baddon, and had her red hair gathered at the crown of her head with a length of silver chain. She was not quite as elegant as the Guinevere I remembered from before the time of troubles, but she was a far cry from the armoured woman who had ridden so enthusiastically across the battlefield. She smiled as I drew near. ‘You’re clean, Derfel!’

  ‘I took a bath, Lady.’

  ‘And you live!’ She mocked me gently, then kissed my cheek, and once the kiss was given she held on to my shoulders for a moment. ‘I owe you a great deal,’ she said softly.

  ‘No, Lady, no,’ I said, reddening and pulling away.

  She laughed at my embarrassment, then went to sit in the window that overlooked the compound. Rain puddled between the stones and dripped down the temple’s stained facade where Arthur’s horse was tied to a ring fixed to one of the pillars. She hardly needed me to tell her that Arthur had come back, for she must have seen his arrival herself. ‘Who’s with him?’ she asked me.

  ‘Galahad, Sansum, Mordred and Oengus.’

  ‘And you weren’t summoned to Arthur’s council?’ she asked with a touch of her old mockery.

  ‘No, Lady,’ I said, trying to hide my disappointment.

  ‘I’m sure he hasn’t forgotten you.’

  ‘I hope not, Lady,’ I said and then, much more hesitantly, I told her that Lancelot was dead. I did not tell her how, simply that he was dead.

  ‘Taliesin already told me,’ she said, staring down at her hands.

  ‘How did he know?’ I asked, for Lancelot’s death had only happened a brief while before and Taliesin had not been present.

  ‘He dreamed it last night,’ Guinevere said, and then she made an abrupt gesture as if ending that subject. ‘So what are they discussing over there?’ she asked, glancing at the temple. ‘The child-bride?’

  ‘I imagine so, Lady,’ I said, then I told her what Bishop Sansum had suggested to Oengus mac Airem: that Argante should marry Mordred. ‘I think it’s the worst idea I’ve ever heard,’ I protested indignantly.

  ‘You really think that?’

  ‘It’s an absurd notion,’ I said.

  ‘It wasn’t Sansum’s notion,’ Guinevere said with a smile, ‘it was mine.’

  I stared at her, too surprised to speak for a moment. ‘Yours, Lady?’ I finally asked.

  ‘Don’t tell anyone it was my idea,’ she warned me. ‘Argante wouldn’t consider it for a moment if she thought the idea came from me. She’d marry a swineherd rather than someone I suggested. So I sent for little Sansum and begged him to tell me whether the rumour about Argante and Mordred was correct, and then I said how much I loathed the very thought of it and that, of course, made him all the more enthusiastic about it, though he pretended not to be. I even cried a little and begged him never to tell Argante how much I detested the very idea. By that point, Derfel, they were as good as married.’ She smiled triumphantly.

  ‘But why?’ I asked. ‘Mordred and Argante? They’ll make nothing but trouble!’

  ‘Whether they’re married or not, they’ll make trouble. And Mordred must marry, Derfel, if he’s to provide an heir, and that means he must marry royally.’ She paused, fingering the necklace. ‘I confess I would much rather he didn’t have an heir, for that would leave the throne free when he dies.’ She left that thought unfinished and I gave her a curious look, to which she responded with a mask of innocence. Was she thinking that Arthur might take the throne from a childless Mordred? But Arthur had never wanted to rule. Then I -realized that if Mordred did die then Gwydre, Guinevere’s son, would have as good a claim as any man. That realization must have shown on my face for Guinevere smiled. ‘Not that we must speculate about the succession,’ she went on before I could say anything, ‘for Arthur insists Mordred must be allowed to marry if he wishes, and it seems the wretched boy is attracted to Argante. They might even suit each other quite well. Like two vipers in a filthy nest.’

  ‘And Arthur will have two enemies united in bitterness,’ I said.

  ‘No,’ Guinevere said, then she sighed and looked through the window. ‘Not if we give them what they want, and not if I give Arthur what he wants. And you do know what that is, don’t you?’

  I thought for a heartbeat, then understood everything. I understood what she and Arthur must have talked about in the long night after battle. I understood, too, what Arthur was arranging now in the temple of Minerva. ‘No!’ I protested.

  Guinevere smiled. ‘I don’t want it either, Derfel, but I do want Arthur. And what he wants, I must give him. I do owe him some happiness, do I not?’ she asked.

  ‘He wants to give up his power?’ I asked, and she nodded. Arthur had ever spoken of his dream of living simply with a wife, his family and some land. He wanted a hall, a palisade, a smithy and fields. He imagined himself a landowner, with no troubles other than the birds stealing his seed, the deer eating his crops and the rain spoiling his harvest. He had nurtured that dream for years and now, having beaten the Saxons, it seemed he would make the dream reality.

  ‘Meurig also wants Arthur to give up his power,’ Guinevere said.

  ‘Meurig!’ I spat. ‘Why should we care what Meurig wants?’

  ‘It is the price Meurig demanded before he agreed to let his father lead Gwent’s army to war,’ Guinevere said. ‘Arthur didn’t tell you before the
battle because he knew you would argue with him.’

  ‘But why would Meurig want Arthur to give up his power?’

  ‘Because he believes Mordred is a Christian,’ Guinevere said with a shrug, ‘and because he wants Dumnonia to be ill-governed. That way, Derfel, Meurig stands a chance of taking Dumnonia’s throne one day. He’s an ambitious little toad.’ I called him something worse, and Guinevere smiled. ‘That too,’ she said, ‘but what he demanded, he must get, so Arthur and I will go to live in Silurian Isca where Meurig can keep an eye on us. I don’t mind living in Isca. It will be better than life in some decaying hall. There are some fine Roman palaces in Isca and some very good hunting. We’ll take some spearmen with us. Arthur doesn’t think he needs any, but he has enemies and he needs a warband.’

  I paced up and down the room. ‘But Mordred!’ I complained bitterly. ‘He’s to be given back the power?’

  ‘It’s the price we had to pay for Gwent’s army,’ Guinevere said, ‘and if Argante is to marry Mordred then he must have his power or else Oengus will never agree to the marriage. Or at least Mordred must be given some of his power, and she must share it.’

  ‘And all Arthur achieved will be broken!’ I said.

  ‘Arthur has freed Dumnonia of Saxons,’ Guinevere said, ‘and he does not want to be King. You know that, and I know that. It isn’t what I want, Derfel. I always wanted Arthur to be the High King and for Gwydre to succeed him, but he doesn’t want it and he won’t fight for it. He wants quiet, he tells me. And if he won’t rule Dumnonia, then Mordred must. Gwent’s insistence and Arthur’s oath to Uther ensures that.’