by Jacob Sannox
‘The oaths I made do not end in death or get wiped away by new life,’ said Tristan. ‘I followed you when I was young, when this land was young, and I pledged my sword to you, forever. I mean to honour my commitments, as is our way.’ He reached for the bottle and drank deep. ‘I cannot, however, speak for the rest of the company.’
Murmurs of assent burbled around the table like quiet waters over stones, yet Arthur was not content.
‘What would you say if I were to release you?’ he asked, his eyes fixed on a knot in the wooden surface of the oak table.
Tristan frowned, sitting back in his chair as though considering an insult thrown by a stranger in a tavern.
‘As a fantasy or a possibility?’ asked Kay. His tone was artificially light, and in this Arthur perceived a hidden truth. The old clock on the wall ticked the seconds away.
‘If you were not constrained in answering,’ said Arthur. ‘If you could speak from the heart.’
Tristan folded his arms across his chest.
Arthur looked around the table at his knights, searching for answers, and in their faces he found them. He saw the wives and children they never had, he saw the dreams of peace and even rest. And in some he saw the fierce desire to be out in the world at large, engaging in its forward motion, rather than bobbing on the river surface or being anchored to the past.
Kay was about to speak, but Arthur held up his hand.
‘It is enough that you have answered for yourselves, I need not hear it,’ he said. ‘Let fate play out without herald.’
He took the bottle from Bors and screwed on the lid. He held it up before him and rotated it in his hand, watching the caramel-coloured spirit swirl around the bottom.
‘I do not know if we can defeat him,’ said Arthur at last, ‘and even if we can, I think not all of us will survive. Another hard question. Are you prepared to make that sacrifice? No,’ said Arthur. ‘Do not answer with your first instincts, but with heart’s truth. We are not the heroes of old, warriors of legend that exist in the storybooks, embellished by each new author. We are not even that ragged band which became war leaders when the Romans fled these shores. There is no nation to forge, and in truth, I have lost all notion of countries and nations. We are here, in this land, of this land, and in truth, it is as unified as it will ever be. What little can we do, but the ordinary good that can be done by any with wealth and influence. This reckoning with Branok will be the last chapter in the myths of this land, the last battle which only we can fight, for he is one of us, one of Merlin’s adopted few. None will know we fought this battle, whether we lived or died in it, and we will have no thanks either way. If we fail? Well, we have seen what his contagion has done before in the days when his powers were but fledgling and yet to take full flight. Many will die until his ends are achieved.’
‘His ends will never be fully achieved. This land, this England, it is an ever-changing thing,’ said Kay, quietly. ‘All loyalties to anything but one’s neighbour are fleeting by necessity. Time and time again, the people will attempt to throw down the last vestiges of old empire and even more ancient kingdoms in favour of some new republic. It is inevitable, and Branok will fight them down the ages. We cannot let it stand.’
‘Hear, hear,’ said Tristan, and he took the bottle from Arthur once more to drink his fill.
‘To this last battle, and an end to the legend,’ said Tristan, ‘if not to loyalty.’
‘A final battle,’ nodded Arthur. ‘And when it is done, I will set you all free to go where you wish. You have all served and suffered long enough. No king could ask more of his knights than I have of you, and no knight could serve more faithfully than have those who are gathered here.’
The bottle passed around the circle once more in silence.
By mid-afternoon Arthur had sobered once more, and the sound of a key turning in the front door lock signalled that the company were soon to be full assembled. Sure enough, Merlin and his escort paraded into the hall, all of them laden with bags and disguised swords, save for Merlin who made straight for the nearest armchair. Arthur greeted his knights and followed the old man into the sitting-room on the first floor of the townhouse.
‘No sign, I take it,’ said Arthur.
Merlin shook his head.
‘I always suspected he would be here, at the heart of government and the seat of power,’ said Merlin, ‘and I imagine I am not alone in that.’
‘No, not alone,’ said Arthur, ‘but we had to be sure. Things are moving apace now, Merlin. Branok is exerting all of his influence. We must move against him. Tonight.’
The old man leaned forward in the armchair, elbows on his knees, his hands draped over one another. He sighed and looked up to meet Arthur’s gaze.
‘The White Tower?’ said Arthur.
‘I imagine so,’ said the wizard. ‘He is near. I can feel his breath on my neck.’
Merlin shuddered.
‘Take your rest. We strike on the stroke of four, before the dawn,’ said Arthur. ‘We all go.’
While Merlin slept, each of Arthur’s knights prepared his arms, his mind and his soul as seemed fit to him. Many of them took the opportunity to sleep, rest or pray before the allotted time, which came all too soon. It was odd, thought Arthur, to realise one may have seen one’s last sunset. He woke those who were sleeping one by one, leaving Merlin till the very last minute, knowing that it would take all of the wizard’s strength to contest Branok’s power.
When they were all assembled in the hall, each of them armed with a sword, amongst other weapons, except for Merlin who carried only his staff, Arthur stood before them.
‘Tonight we put an end to Branok and his familiars,’ said Merlin.
‘And we all know where we will find them,’ said Arthur as he pulled on his black woollen coat. He withdrew his Colt from his shoulder holster, snapped it open and confirmed it was fully loaded.
‘At them, sir?’ said Tristan, grinning.
‘At them,’ said Arthur. ‘Through them if we must.’
Chapter Twenty-One
30th of June 1916 –The First World War
Arthur could tune out the crackling rifle fire and distant artillery explosions, but his guilt prevented him from immersing himself in his book, the text barely visible by the meagre light afforded by his Orilux torch and a cluster of candles, rammed into empty glass bottles. Arthur sighed, closed the book, its pages crinkled from days of wetting and drying out, some spotted with black mould.
He sat stooped in a rickety chair, the back of his hair tickling against the low ceiling of the dugout. His was a narrow space in which he was hemmed in by a wooden post, supporting the ceiling, and the planks covering the walls. And yet even in such a sparse environment, he knew that his men had it far worse in their makeshift shelters or, worse, funk holes, dug into the walls of the trench itself.
On the other side of the subterranean dwelling, Lieutenant Daniel Phillips seemed to be having a little more success in relaxing. He sipped at his brandy as he made his way through a pile of old letters from his wife.
Arthur stood, still stooping, and began to pull on his trench coat in order to check in with the men. He drew his recently acquired Colt revolver from its holster, checking it was loaded out of habit and then put it away. Before he reached the door, there was a knock and Phillips called for whoever it was to enter.
A young man of about eighteen entered and saluted.
‘Post, sir,’ said the boy to Arthur, presumably as he was standing.
‘I suppose I hope in vain that our provision box has come from London?’ he replied.
‘Sir, afraid so, sir,’ said the boy. He drew four letters from his bag.
‘Two for Lieutenant Daniel Phillips, one for Lieutenant Simon Marwood and one for Captain Arthur Grimwood.’
Arthur took the letters and dismissed the soldier. He handed Phillips his letters, made his way to the rear of the dugout to where Marwood was sleeping in one of three wire beds screened off by a p
artition wall. He placed the letter on the sleeping man’s chest, then set off back to his chair to read his own post, doubtless from someone at the company, his solicitor or his accountant. The world was at war, no doubt, but business went on back in Blighty.
Arthur heard a strangled moan from the common area before he’d rounded the partition wall. The top of his spine tickled and his throat constricted, knowing instinctively what was coming.
He paused then continued walking, readying himself.
Phillips was still seated, a torn envelope on the wooden duckboards beside his chair and the single page of the letter held in a trembling hand.
Arthur bent to pick up the envelope and placed a comforting hand on the younger man’s shoulder. Phillips flinched at the touch, but continued staring at the page even when Arthur plucked it from his shaking fingers.
It was as he had suspected.
Phillips’s father-in-law informed him, with regret, that his young wife had died three days after giving birth to their daughter. He conveyed his own grief and his sadness that Phillips was forced to open two such letters in such a short space of time.
Arthur was confused momentarily and then, realising, his eyes settled on the second unopened letter waiting on the table beside him.
The baby, thought Arthur.
“GAS! GAS! GAS!” someone shouted from above. Phillips jumped to his feet automatically as the alarm began to wail. Despite Arthur’s concern, the lieutenant found his respirator as though he were working on automatic. Arthur secured his own as he ran to wake Marwood. When he returned, Phillips had secured the gas-curtain in place over the doorway.
1st of July 1916 – The First Day of the Battle of the Somme – The First World War
0728hrs.
Arthur’s company were assembled with bayonets fixed, leaning up against the wall of the trench when the mines exploded, ripping apart German defences and tearing great craters in no-man’s-land.
‘Bloody hell, sir,’ said Tristan as the roar of the explosions thundered on.
‘Easy now, Sergeant,’ replied Arthur. He turned to address his gathered men, among them not only the working-class men of England, but some of his knights, Gawain, Galahad, Percival, Gareth, Bors, Kay, Dagonet, Lamorak and Gaheris. The rest were spread out along the western front.
‘Men, all I ask is…’ but suddenly whistles began to blow, and he too placed a whistle to his lips and blew.
It begins, he thought as he clambered up the ladder, closely followed by his knights, his officers and his men.
‘Onward!’ roared Arthur, drawing his sword and holding it aloft as he charged through the smoke towards the German frontline, the battlefield of no-man’s-land masked by drifting banks of smoke. Cordite and blood-iron scented the air.
This was it, thought Arthur, this was what he could contribute in this modern age. King Arthur would lead his fellow countrymen into glorious battle at their time of need.
Perhaps they were just being brought into action, startled by the sudden ferocity of the attack or perhaps Arthur was just hearing them for the first time, the German machine-guns fired as his company rushed on, clambering over barbed wire, their boots sinking in patches of quagmire between the fallen soldiers, whose bare skulls grinned up from the mud. The air filled with zipping bullets, explosions and screams, artillery thundering on and on. Arthur checked to either side of him and found Galahad and Lamorak running beside him.
The smoke grew thicker. Had seconds or minutes passed? Arthur could not tell. And yet still no enemy to fight. He lowered his sword, concentrating on the ground before him. Then Galahad cried out, gurgling as bullets stitched across his chest and throat. He fell back dead and Lamorak fell beside him. Arthur felt the weight of their loss, of their centuries of kinship as though he had been shot in the head. He staggered, the hem of his coat dipping into the mud, and then, seeing his company overtake him, he rushed after them, leaving his knights to die alone.
Arthur screamed as he ran, screamed for his men to have courage and to keep on. He screamed the same orders over and over, as he passed the broken remains of Lieutenant Daniel Phillips, who had gone to meet his wife and daughter, and of Lieutenant Marwood, though he did not know it for the man’s head was gone. Arthur charged onward, thinking that if he could just reach the enemy, he would make an account of himself to shame even the legends of his past.
A bullet smashed through his left calf and Arthur pitched forward into the mire. He crawled forward and looked ahead of him but there was nothing to see but smoke and flashes of explosions through it. All around him his company groaned and cried out and fell silent. Arthur tried to stand but his leg was shattered. Live fire whistled all around him, and he was forced to throw himself on his face.
The pain became too much and, as Arthur went into shock, his knights began to fall, just like so many men, all along the western front.
Blinding light. Where was he?
Arthur had begun to think the worst when he saw a shaded electric lightbulb hanging above him and felt a relatively soft mattress beneath him.
‘That,’ said a familiar voice, ‘is a Blighty.’
Arthur blinked, letting his eyes adjust and found Tristan standing above him in a clean uniform, leaning on a stick and pointing at Arthur’s leg.
‘Home for you,’ said Tristan, smiling a weak, cold smile.
‘Hospital?’ asked Arthur, and Tristan nodded.
Arthur felt hungover, his head swimming. He didn’t know who they had lost and yet he felt the losses without needing to be told. Did it matter who? He knew exactly what had befallen his company, and surely what had befallen all of his brothers who had come to fight in the trenches.
He draped his forearm across his eyes as he began to sob.
Tristan sat on a chair beside Arthur’s bed, but he said nothing.
Finally Arthur asked for the butcher’s bill, but it took Tristan quite a while to begin answering.
‘We only have estimates, sir, but the numbers are grievously high,’ Tristan admitted.
‘How many?’ said Arthur again.
‘Impossible to say, sir. You were pulled out by a chap called Goody. He’ll get a medal, like as not, but there are still plenty of the men unaccounted for as of yet. Still between the lines.’
‘Tristan,’ said Arthur, gripping his knight’s wrist.
‘If you’re going to press me, sir, I’d say twenty to forty per cent casualty rate, including the injured, but that’s no more than a guess, sir,’ said Tristan, taking Arthur’s hand in his own.
Arthur stared up at the ceiling, unable to comprehend.
‘Forty per cent,’ he whispered.
‘A rough estimate,’ said Tristan.
‘This is on my head,’ said Arthur through tears. ‘I had no business leading men in battle. I’m a relic and should have consigned myself to the past.’
‘If that’s true, it’s true of most of the commanders,’ said Tristan. ‘Our losses are not so different from anyone else’s.’
Arthur said nothing, attempting to regain his composure.
‘This is not war as I understand it,’ he said.
Tristan held his hand a little firmer.
‘I never even saw their faces,’ said Arthur.
‘You should be glad of that,’ said Tristan, his voice low. ‘I saw them. I reached them.’
Arthur sought to meet his knight’s gaze, but Tristan lowered his eyes.
‘What of our brothers?’ said Arthur.
‘Galahad, Gaheris and Lamorak are gone from our company. I have heard no word from the rest as of yet,’ said Tristan, ‘but I think we should prepare ourselves.’
Arthur winced as the pain in his leg flared.
And as the Battle of the Somme raged on, Arthur accepted sedation and slept.
Chapter Twenty-Two
London – November 2019
As Arthur’s foot stepped down and touched the pavement, the ground shook, and he fell back against the rail. He clung on whi
le the tremor subsided, watching as windows shattered in the old building opposite. Glass shards fell onto the street and tinkled on the concrete below.
Arthur held his scarf over his mouth against the foul fumes that swirled about him under the streetlights and, accompanied by the racket of a thousand car and burglar alarms sounding, he advanced down the street. The doors of the neighbouring houses opened up and people spilled into the night, as people are inclined to do when faced with an unexpected act of nature, or at least, something approximating an unexpected act of nature. They looked about, alarmed, and went back inside, those who did not seek their cars in order to start the journey to escape the capital.
The streetlights went out, as did the lights in the buildings all around. A raven’s call could be heard above, but its flight went unseen in the meagre light afforded by the moon and stars.
‘Come on,’ said Arthur without turning back. ‘He’s calling to us.’
He limped onwards, and Merlin fell in beside him.
Any thoughts of taking a cab or driving disappeared as a mob swarmed across the junction at the end of the street. Arthur saw a lit petrol bomb career in a high arc across the sky and explode against a police car as it screeched to a halt, its sirens blaring and blue lights aglow.
Arthur saw his knights line up beside him in his peripheral vision. Together, in a line, they paced towards the mob. They were an unruly lot, working as a horde rather than a unified force. Arthur doubted they wanted anything more than to bask in the chaos.
They had been seen and several individuals wielding iron bars and baseball bats, their faces covered in ski masks, charged towards them, peacocking, arms wide, necks exposed, and ‘Come and get me’, written all over them in invisible ink.