King Arthur: The Bloody Cup: Book Three

by M. K. Hume

  ‘The failure is not yours, Brother Simon,’ Artor replied distantly, as if he could sense some evasiveness in Simon. ‘I, too, recall seeing him drink from that same vessel all those years ago. I remember that it was round at the base with a simple flange of metal to serve as a handle. Was that the cup you recall?’

  ‘Aye. He treated it as if it was a commonplace thing, but it was a memory of his past and he used it daily.’

  ‘But why would these brigands take a simple cup?’ Taliesin whispered to Artor, his mind haunted by images of the bloody goblet he had seen in his dreams. ‘Unless the object is some relic with a history of its own, it would have no value to anyone, apart from Lucius.’

  ‘I don’t really understand either, but the cup must mean something to the black warrior.’ Artor switched his attention back to Simon. ‘What did the cup mean to Lucius, my friend?’ he asked softly. ‘Come, Simon, you’ll not harm your old master by telling me what you remember about this object.’

  Simon’s eyes appeared clear and honest as he considered the king’s request. He was obviously thinking carefully and only Taliesin and Percivale saw a fleeting shadow appear, and then disappear, in their guileless depths.

  What is Simon hiding from the king? Percivale wondered warily. He’s very cautious, even for a man of God.

  Percivale turned towards Taliesin, who raised one eyebrow in mute agreement.

  Is this cup the source of Mother’s dreams? Taliesin wondered to himself. His hand itched to make the sign that wards off evil. The cup must be something of far greater significance than an old campaign mug.

  ‘Lucius once told me that it had come into his possession when he was a soldier.’ Simon’s brow knitted with the effort of remembering, or hiding, the memories passing through his mind. ‘He was ashamed of the violence in his early life and rarely mentioned his youth, but I remember that he referred to it once in a way that I didn’t really understand.’

  ‘I also remember speaking to Lucius about the cup,’ one of his fellow priests added. ‘I, too, asked him why he had kept it for such a long time. He told me that its design appealed to him. I took his meaning to be that the cup had been made in the land of his birth.’

  Another old man joined the conversation. ‘I remember I once spilled some water by overfilling it, and Lucius brushed aside my apologies by saying that water stains were cleaner by far than the bloody hands that had befouled it in the past. The bishop smiled in that sad way he had when he spoke of his younger days. I remember that we were very curious about it at the time, for the bishop was such a romantic figure to us when we were young men.’

  ‘But it’s only made from base metal’, Balyn protested. ‘Why would anyone want to steal it?’

  The king and his retinue stared into the grave, but it gave no answer to the enigma they faced. After a moment, Artor turned back to Mark and broke the uncomfortable silence.

  ‘Did you see the direction in which the black warrior and his men fled?’

  ‘Those men who were afoot headed across those small hills towards the river,’ Mark replied, grateful to change the topic. ‘The black warrior separated from them and circled round to the north on his horse.’

  ‘Then we’ll begin our search by following their trail towards the river. Guard Glastonbury well during my absence, Brother Mark, and keep a sharp watch at night. I’d be surprised if any other marauders return to shatter your peace, but continued vigilance will ensure your safety. Perhaps you can remember us in the prayers you make to your god and, if he’s willing, we’ll find the dogs who murdered your bishop.’

  Despite Mark’s invitation to remain for the night, Artor knew that any sudden shower of rain could destroy the spoor of the fugitives and leave them with a very cold trail. They prepared for an immediate departure and rode off into the softening evening light.

  Bedwyr led the way, accompanied by Taliesin on foot. As fleet as any woodsman, Nimue’s son was well versed in hunting and could easily keep up with Bedwyr’s horse as the two men sought their quarry through the telltale signs of broken leaves, dislodged stones and scraped bark.

  Shortly after leaving the last of Glastonbury’s fields, the party came to the river that was flowing slowly between gently sloping banks.

  ‘There are signs that coracles have been drawn up here,’ Bedwyr called back to Artor.

  ‘Aye,’ Taliesin agreed. ‘Rain has blunted their traces, but they’ve left many footprints behind to show their presence. The tracks of two horses have also stirred up the mud.’

  ‘These traces would be of the two horses they stole.’ Bedwyr murmured.

  He stared intently at the earth and leaned forward, snatching up a single bedraggled feather that had been trampled into the soft mud. ‘One of these men wore a raven’s feather on his cap. A fitting reward for scavengers.’

  ‘Keep it safe,’ Artor ordered economically. ‘Which way did they go? Did they make a fast escape downstream? Or did they travel against the current?’

  ‘It would be easier to continue travelling towards the east if they were on foot,’ Gawayne offered. ‘Why would they run so far and then paddle back over ground already covered?’

  ‘I agree,’ Artor answered brusquely. ‘We’ll follow the river downstream.’

  The waning light slowed their progress. At some fords, Taliesin and the twins crossed to the far bank to look for signs of a landing by the coracles, but they found nothing.

  When full night came and the horses were imperilled by rabbit holes and poor ground, Artor drew his troops to a halt and they ate a frugal meal under the willows. On the far side of the river, Taliesin sang softly of his home and the twins were entranced by the magic of his voice. Slowly, to the soft whickering of the horses as they cropped grass in their hobbles, the force settled down to sleep.

  At noon the next day, when Gawayne rode past the Isle of Salinae Minor, he felt only a momentary pang of guilt, but Galahad’s brows furrowed suspiciously as he considered the isle and its inhabitants. The thought of Gronw’s deceiving eyes made his nerves twitch, although the young zealot kept his thoughts to himself.

  Later that afternoon, Artor’s men came to the grey sea. The pebbled beach and the mournful cries of seagulls chilled the hearts of the warriors. No matter how carefully they scoured the banks of the estuary, there was no sign of the coracles.

  Angry and defeated, Artor stared at the leaden sea with its treacherous currents.

  ‘No small craft could survive in that mess.’

  ‘A man can easily carry a coracle on his back, but we’ve seen no spoor to indicate they came this far, Artor,’ Bedwyr said. ‘It’s likely they left the river at some point upstream, perhaps along one of those small tributaries we passed on the way.’

  ‘There’s been no sign at all,’ Taliesin added, ‘although both the men and the horses could have walked through the shallows to hide their presence.’

  ‘They haven’t flown away,’ Artor retorted.

  ‘They’re more familiar with the terrain than we are,’ Taliesin offered evenly, refusing to take offence. ‘Perhaps we should investigate those tributaries upstream. Although . . .’ His voice trailed away.

  ‘What?’ Artor snapped.

  ‘Look!’ Taliesin pointed towards a flock of gulls that rose from a partially concealed streamlet. ‘Over there! Those birds must be feeding on something.’

  The harpist would never have noticed the birds if a falcon hadn’t hovered on the wind above the flock, disturbing the gulls and sending them into the air in panic.

  ‘Bedwyr, check it out!’ Artor ordered.

  Bedwyr wheeled his horse and Taliesin swung up behind him. Together, they rode back up the pebbled beach to the sluggish, wide river mouth and urged their horses to enter the water. After crossing the flooded inlet, they disappeared into the marshy, reed-choked watercourse on the far side of the stream. Within minutes, Taliesin reappeared on a small knoll and waved to the waiting horsemen.

  ‘I’ve found something, Artor,
’ he said as the king and his retinue joined him at a spot where the stream flowed around a series of natural stone steps. ‘The gulls have been feeding on a corpse.’

  A bloated, water-sodden body was caught in a cleft between two wet boulders. Even now, gulls were returning and beginning to tear at the exposed flesh with their long, hooked beaks.

  ‘I never liked those birds overmuch,’ Gawayne muttered. ‘How did we miss this body?’

  ‘We were looking at the ground for signs of men and horses, not in the air where the birds fly,’ Taliesin replied. ‘Nobody notices the cries of gulls when they’re near the sea.’

  Balan dragged the battered corpse on to dry land.

  Artor recognized a worn leather jerkin set with iron plates, which fitted the description given by Brother Petrus. The king grunted in disgust.

  ‘So, where are the others?’

  As if he had heard the words of his master, Bedwyr reappeared. He rode out of a small copse of stunted trees that had been partly hidden from the riverbank by rising ground. To gain the attention of Artor and his warriors, Bedwyr whistled piercingly and then returned to the shadows of the copse.

  Artor’s retinue remounted and hastened to join the scout.

  The copse of trees was twisted and gnarled by the force of the offshore winds that prevailed in these climes. Scudding over low cliffs that hunkered above the gravelled beaches, the wind swirled back to eddy over the lower river flats. A heavy grass cover grew around tortured trees that provided shade and shelter and there, beside a long-dead campfire, lay four corpses in contorted, unnatural positions. They had died violent deaths in hideous spasms of agony, yet none of the bodies bore a single wound.

  ‘Be careful, Taliesin!’ Artor warned from the back of his horse, but the harpist was already kneeling beside the nearest bloated body, his nose close to the convulsed, purple mouth. The other members of the hunting party looked away in revulsion.

  Taliesin rose to his feet and dusted off his knees. ‘They’ve been poisoned, Artor. The black warrior obviously believes that dead men can’t tell tales.’

  Taliesin picked up an iron cap from which two bedraggled raven feathers still dangled. After a few moments of searching, he discovered a coarse pottery bottle, sealed by a leather plug.

  Artor shook his head slowly. He could imagine the proffered bottle, the unsuspecting servants drinking deeply, then the first burning pangs in the gut.

  ‘Shite!’ Gawayne swore. ‘The poor sods must have trusted whoever killed them.’ He looked away in revulsion. ‘Animals have been feeding on their bodies.’

  ‘All God’s creatures must feed, Father,’ Galahad responded piously, although Gawayne noticed that the young man’s complexion was very pale. Galahad leapt from his horse and approached the bodies. A couple of the victims had vomited and their twisted mouths were encrusted with a vile, yellow residue.

  ‘Forget them, Galahad,’ Artor ordered shortly. ‘They’ll rot where they lie. I’ll accord them the same respect that they gave to Bishop Aethelthred.’

  The twins and Galahad looked shocked at Artor’s callousness, but Taliesin merely nodded in understanding.

  ‘We’ll ride on for a few miles and try to find some trace of the black warrior’, Artor’s body was rigid with controlled fury. ‘He’s managed to elude us so far, and he’s made sure that there are no live witnesses to betray him, but I intend to find him.’

  Eventually, the hard ground revealed some telltale traces of passage. Both Taliesin and Bedwyr dismounted to examine a series of horse tracks that they found on patches of softer earth. Two horses had galloped off in one direction, heading back towards Glastonbury, while another set of tracks showed that one horse had cantered away on a path running parallel to the river.

  ‘Ignore the trail of the two horses,’ Bedwyr grunted. ‘You can see how much shallower the indentations are than the single hoof prints. Those two horses have no riders, and they’ve been set loose to lead any searchers astray. There’s a keen intelligence at work that devises diversionary tactics without knowing whether we are in pursuit.’

  ‘So we’ll follow the single track,’ Artor stated grimly.

  The king’s retinue remained prudently silent.

  Gawayne was uncharacteristically introspective as the troop returned along the riverbank.

  Finally, when they were once more close to Salinae Minor, he approached the king and begged his pardon. Then, hesitantly, and with eyes that couldn’t meet those of his master, he explained his experiences at the strange island in the centre of the river.

  Taliesin noticed that Gawayne took care to remain beyond the reach of Artor’s sword arm.

  When Gawayne had finally run out of words, Artor pulled on the reins of his horse until he faced his nephew. He pushed his horse as close as possible to Gawayne’s beast, grimaced, and then struck Gawayne across the face with his gloved fist. Dumbstruck but little hurt, Gawayne was tumbled from his horse by the force of the blow and landed squarely on his plump backside.

  ‘Are you a complete cloth-head, Gawayne? No! Don’t bother to answer! We’ve wasted a day in the saddle while the black warrior has probably run to ground on this damned island of yours. Shite!’

  Gawayne scrambled to his feet, his dignity in tatters. With a horseman’s ease, he leapt on to the back of his horse, taking care to remain beyond Artor’s reach. Artor turned his back on his nephew, leaving Gawayne looking unhappy and ashamed.

  ‘I was deceived, uncle. But when have I ever been able to resist the ladies?’

  ‘You have a grown son, Gawayne! You’re no longer a boy who smiles charmingly and expects to be forgiven for the most heinous of crimes. In this case, we rode right past a place that could harbour a murderer and what did you do? Nothing!’

  ‘I was embarrassed . . .’

  ‘Is that sufficient reason to send your king on a wild-goose chase?’

  ‘No, but we did find the black warrior’s accomplices.’

  Uncharacteristically, Artor spat on the stony ground in disgust and stared down along the banks of the river.

  ‘I disliked the place,’ Galahad interjected piously. ‘But Father found the lady to be particularly pleasant company.’

  Both Gawayne and Artor stared at the young man’s complacent face with amazement, reproach and disgust.

  ‘Galahad!’ Gawayne warned.

  ‘And you failed to tell your king that she has a squat servant whose body is covered with woad tattoos,’ Galahad finished with a triumphant flourish. ‘I never trusted those pagans.’

  Artor furiously kicked at his mount’s ribs, causing it to rear and whinny shrilly, while Gawayne stared at his horse’s mane as if the earth was about to swallow him.

  ‘You always think with what hangs between your legs, nephew,’ Artor admonished the prince. ‘You’re lucky I don’t knock you on your arse again.’

  Galahad smirked at his father’s discomfiture, but he’d reckoned without Artor’s sense of fairness.

  ‘As for you, young Galahad,’ the king began, one lip curling derisively. ‘A son who tells tales on his father with such obvious pleasure has neither honour nor respect. I may chastise your father, for I am his liege lord. You are not! You, too, neglected to tell me of your visit to Salinae Minor, so take care that I don’t punish you for your failure towards me and towards your father.’

  Galahad’s cheeks reddened, whether with shame or anger it was impossible to tell, but to Gawayne’s relief the boy chose to remain silent.

  The king forced his lips to remain regal and firm, disguising his contempt; Artor had little time for sanctimony and hypocrisy, least of all in one who lacked respect towards his elders.

  ‘The lady’s servant is called Gronw,’ Gawayne said, as much to break the uncomfortable silence as to provide more detail. ‘He is an unpleasant creature but I doubt he’d risk returning to the island if he is the black warrior. But he does have tattoos . . . he’s pagan . . . and he’s very short and quite squat.’

 
Gawayne quailed under the king’s jaundiced expression.

  ‘It’s time I met this lady who’s been banished from her own home to set up house on my doorstep,’ Artor said decisively. ‘I’ll also enjoy meeting this Gronw person.’ He smiled as a more pleasant thought occurred to him. ‘Besides, if the villa has been built in the Roman fashion, it may have a bath. I’d kill for a chance to remove the grime from my body.’

  Galahad sniffed. Like all good men beyond the Wall, he wasn’t entirely sure that daily bathing was either healthy or manly. However, he could hardly accuse the High King of being a sybarite.

  Artor knew exactly what the young man was thinking, and he was quietly amused. He booted his horse into a gallop and his warriors were forced to hasten to catch up with him.

  That’s torn it, Gawayne cursed mentally. Galahad will be the death of me, especially if Miryll tries her tricks with Artor.

  Alerted by the message mirrors, a small flotilla of coracles and skiffs soon left the island of Salinae Minor and were rowed to the banks of the river where Artor and his party waited. To Gawayne’s heartfelt relief, Gronw was nowhere in sight. Against his inclination and his nature, the Otadini prince felt pangs of responsibility, an unfamiliar and unpleasant sensation that he had avoided for most of his adult life.

  As the villa and its gardens came into view, Artor’s spirits lifted. If he ignored the looming tower, Salinae Minor could have been a pocket version of the Villa Poppinidii where he had grown to manhood. The High King realized that he was homesick.

  ‘I’m getting old, Odin,’ he remarked quietly to his bodyguard.

  ‘Yes,’ Odin replied in his calm, economical fashion.

  ‘Am I finished, Odin?’ Artor put one foot on the prow of the simple fishing craft and stared at his boot. His relaxed posture gave no hint of the sad nostalgia that coloured his thoughts.

  ‘Not yet, Artor. There’s still red work for us to do, and golden days like this one to enjoy.’