Searching for Arthur (The Return to Camelot #1)

by Donna Hosie

  As we walked, I kept my head down, but my ears alert. The five were friends, that much was obvious, and as I listened to their conversations, I started to feel less afraid. They were far too polite for a start, constantly referring to each other as sir.

  “Sir Gareth,” called Bedivere.

  “Yes, Sir Bedivere?” replied the one presumably called Gareth. He had a round face, hazel eyes, and was the same height as me.

  “Did Sir Percivale’s messenger say any more of your brothers?”

  “Alas, he did not. I will pray for more news once we reach the castle of Caerleon.”

  “We will find them, Sir Gareth,” said another in an Irish accent. “I long to make merry and laugh with Sir Agravaine once more.”

  “Sir Talan,” said the plump one called Gareth to the Irishman. “Sir Agravaine has not yet forgiven you for the riddle you served upon him before the enchanted sleep took hold over Logres. You may ride to meet my brother and yet you may ride to meet your doom.”

  As the five laughed, Slurpy muttered under her breath, “I’m at a bloody freak convention.”

  The fifth one was called David. He looked younger than the others, and was several inches shorter. His voice had barely broken, and small tufts of baby soft hair were dotted around his chin.

  “Will we make camp tonight or ride on to Caerleon, Sir Bedivere?” asked David.

  “We will make camp,” replied Bedivere. Then he looked at me; he appeared hesitant, like he wanted to say something.

  Talan was singing as we walked. He had a really gorgeous soulful voice, although all of the songs had the same theme: rescuing fair damsels in distress. It was all very strange. By the way his grey eyes kept darting towards Slurpy, it was clear he was hoping she may need his heroic services at some point. Perhaps he doubled as a manicurist? She had chipped a long purple nail in the struggle by the lake and was very upset about it.

  The path we were following had reached a crossroads. Tied to several trees were five horses. Both Slurpy and I cooed at the sight of them; they were gorgeous. Three were dapple grey with white bodies that looked like they had been sprinkled with grey ash. The other two were dark chestnut, glossy and warm. All five pawed at the ground and whinnied at the sight of the men.

  For the first time, I saw a glimmer of affection on Bedivere’s face. It totally transformed him. He smiled, and deep dimples formed on his cheeks. For a yeti he was actually pretty good-looking. He immediately went to one of the chestnuts, pulled something grainy out of a worn leather saddle bag, and nuzzled into the horse as it fed from his hand. The other men did the same, leaving Slurpy and I alone for the first time.

  If it entered Slurpy’s head to attempt a run for freedom, she didn’t show it. Instead she went straight to the smallest dapple grey, pulling at her bonds as she went. Talan pulled out a short knife and released her hands.

  The curly-haired blonde called Tristram glared at him, but Talan didn’t seem to care.

  “If they were witches, we would be under their spell by now,” he said in his Irish accent. “They are strange to be sure, but I see no malevolent intent in their eyes.”

  “Sir Talan is in love,” laughed the young one called David, and the others, with the exception of Tristram, laughed along with him. “He is bewitched already.”

  This led into a song, although David’s breaking voice was no competition for Talan’s.

  I felt a tugging at the ropes tying my hands, and then they were free. A spasm of tension immediately flooded my upper back and shoulders, as the pain in my wrists registered. As I rubbed my fingers over the deep red welts that had appeared on my skin, Bedivere placed his own knife back in its sheath.

  “Thank you,” I croaked.

  Bedivere opened his saddle bag once more and pulled out a triangular leather pouch. He threw it at me. I fumbled with the stopper and sniffed at the liquid inside. It smelt like flowers.

  “You should drink,” he ordered, although his voice, while still gruff, sounded softer. I could see him out of the corner of my eye; he was watching me, but when I looked back, his green eyes quickly moved away to his horse.

  “Thank you,” I said quietly, handing him back the water pouch. His fingers touched mine as he took the pouch. He flinched and dropped it.

  Excellent. I was capable of repelling other freaks just by my touch.

  “Brother knights, we’ll need to make camp for the night soon,” said Bedivere to the others, quickly side-stepping me. “We’ll make for Caerleon at first light.”

  “And what do we do with the witches?” asked Tristram.

  “The dark one can ride with Sir Talan,” replied Bedivere. “If she really has bewitched him, then maybe she can cease his singing.”

  “Not even witchcraft could slay the magic of song,” said Talan, as Tristram and David jumped onto their horses like they had springs on their feet. Talan held out his hand to Slurpy, and helped her climb onto the back of a grey.

  “And the fair one?” asked Gareth.

  “She rides with me.”

  Bedivere had already mounted his horse. I stroked its long nose as I stumbled forward. Bedivere grabbed my forearm and pulled me up in front of him. His arm then clamped itself in front of my stomach, like one of those padded rests that secures you into your seat on a white-knuckle rollercoaster. His legs were against mine; his whole body pressed up against me. I’d never been this close to a guy before in my life. I didn’t know where to put my hands, legs. Should I lean back? Why couldn’t I just walk behind them?

  “Yonder is the court of Caerleon,” said Bedivere into my ear. Just the sensation of his breath down my neck sent spasmic goosebumps down my back. I shifted my weight to the right and leant around to my left. Not to look at Bedivere, but to move away from his mouth, but the second we locked eyes again I had that feeling of familiarity that I had experienced down by the lake. Bedivere’s throat bobbed as he swallowed. Why was I looking at his throat? Because I couldn’t look into his eyes, that’s why. I should look down – NO – don’t look down, look up.

  Without another word, Bedivere kicked his heels into the ribs of the horse and we galloped away.

  I thought I knew discomfort and pain. When I was nine, Arthur accidentally knocked me off a swing. The sun-parched ground was like concrete and the fall had broken my arm. At the age of eleven, I was deliberately targeted by a human elephant wielding a hockey stick on the school playing fields. That resulted in a broken cheekbone. Then just a year ago, my appendix had burst during a rather gruesome family holiday to Disneyland Paris.

  Yet nothing could compare to the sheer agony that was riding bareback in a pair of skinny jeans for over three hours. By the time Bedivere had dismounted his horse, my buttocks were threatening to disengage themselves from the rest of my body and run off to a far corner of the wood, where they would no doubt weep at the misfortune of being mine. I had chaffing on my chaffing.

  Slurpy had drawn the long straw. Sir Talan was proving himself quite the knight in shining armour, and had, at some point, placed his cloak under her butt cheeks which had absorbed the shock.

  “The cloth you wear is strange,” said Bedivere gruffly, as I fell onto my back and attempted to remove my jeans from my arse. “They are not suitable for a quest.”

  “You don’t say,” I snapped back.

  Bedivere snorted, but it was more from amusement than annoyance. The cracked edges of his thin mouth started to rise. It would have been optimistic to call it a smile, but it was an attempt.

  And then I knew. We both knew: the cave; the blind ancient warrior; me, falling into the grave.

  “Are you Arthur?”

  But the voice this time was mine.

  Bedivere’s eyes sparkled, no longer the light sucking black voids of before.

  “It wasn’t a dream, was it?” he said, his voice low, wary.

  I stood staring at Bedivere, catching flies with my open mouth. It was six days since I had fallen through the hole in the forest ground. Six days
since the blind ancient warrior had asked me, “Are you Arthur?” In six days my world had turned upside down and inside out, and one half of my brain was now trying to tell the other half that this Bedivere was the same person.

  And he knew it as well.

  “How is this happening?” I asked. “I don’t understand any of this.”

  “Your name, it is Lady Natasha?”

  I nodded. Hey, if they could be sirs, then why couldn’t I be a lady? Bedivere pulled out a woollen blanket from beneath a strap on the back of his horse, and placed it around my shoulders. His movements were clumsy and self-conscious. Was I really that repulsive?

  “I knew I had seen you before, but I was certain it was in a dream. The longest dream of all,” he said, staring into the ground. “I do not have words of comfort for you, Lady Natasha, for I am ashamed that I do not understand all of it myself. Long have we borne our penance for the damage inflicted to Arthur and the court of Camelot. We must earn absolution, and yet rumours of dark magic and a Saxon invasion have persisted in the short time that has elapsed since we were allowed to awaken from our sleep.”

  Nope. I still didn’t understand any of this. But at least I had gone from being a witch to being a lady. My mother would be so proud.

  Bedivere turned to the others. “We’ll make camp here. Sir Gareth, the first watch is yours.”

  Tristram was walking back to the group; his arms filled with sticks of various lengths. He threw them onto the ground by Gareth’s feet, but claimed the longest stick for himself. With a violent stab, he plunged it into the earth and then unclasped his cloak, which he draped over the stick to make a small tent. David had been charged with settling the horses, but once that was done, he followed and within minutes, he was snoring softly.

  “Sir Talan, sleep will forsake me whilst you continue to sing,” called Tristram. “Have pity, sir.”

  Talan grinned at me, and the tension in my shoulders lifted even more. They may have had swords and spears, but they weren’t going to hurt me, not now.

  I had been totally thrown by the realisation that Bedivere, this bedraggled stranger with the chestnut hair and penetrating green eyes, was the same person I had met on that fateful day when I fell through the earth.

  It just wasn’t possible.

  But then ghostly baby rabbits with starlight eyes aren’t possible either are they, and yet there it was, guiding you to this strange land. Time to suck it up and start believing.

  Bedivere was lying down on his back, and from the flickering amber light of the fire I could see his eyes were closed. I knew he wasn’t asleep though. His body was too rigid; his breathing too controlled. He was faking, and he wasn’t very good at it.

  “I know you aren’t asleep,” I whispered, crawling over to him like a caterpillar with his cloak wrapped around my body. “Tell me about Arthur. What do you know about my brother? Do you know where he is?”

  Bedivere opened one eye, then the other. Close up they were even more beautiful, framed by long black lashes that most girls would kill for. I noticed he also had another dimple, set deep into his square chin. I shuffled back; I had gotten too close for comfort.

  “Arthur is the only one who can unite the kingdom of Logres once more,” said Bedivere quietly. “Without him, there is only darkness.”

  “But my brother is eighteen. He can be brilliant, but you’ve taken the wrong Arthur. He isn’t a king – he’s a math student.”

  “We did not take Arthur,” replied Bedivere.

  “Then who has him, Bedivere?”

  A chilling howl echoed through the air. It was followed by high-pitched cackling, and the swift, shallow sound of something airborne flying through the sky towards our camp.

  “Dwarf-riders,” yelled Bedivere. “Arm yourselves, knights of Logres, and protect the maidens.”

  In one fluid movement, Tristram, Gareth and Talan rose and drew their swords. The sleepy David was a little slower.

  “For Logres,” they cried, as four monstrous black wolves leapt out of the wood and hurtled towards us. The shadows cast by the amber firelight made the monsters appear the size of elephants. The drooling beasts were on the five knights in three bounds, and if their sharp blood stained teeth were not frightening enough, sitting on their backs, holding onto scraggy tufts of oily black fur, were four hideous little creatures. They were naked, apart from filthy loincloths which barely covered their skin. Even in the firelight, the green pus-filled boils that covered their hairy bodies were too easy to see – and smell.

  The dwarves – who possessed wide, bright yellow eyes that glowed like headlamps – were armed with small bows. Their thick stubby fingers were amazingly dextrous, as arrow after arrow was slotted and fired, before being immediately refilled from a fringed quiver that was strapped to their humped, hairy backs.

  Bedivere beheaded the first wolf and sent its rider the same way before it had time to strike. David was not so fortunate. An arrow pierced his sword arm and another quickly followed into his thigh. With a blood-curdling howl, a wolf lunged for him and pinned the knight to the ground. Sparks from our camp fire exploded as the wolf ran straight through the flames. The beast was about to bite a chunk out of David’s throat, when Tristram and Talan combined to gut and slice the wolf until its guts fell sizzling and smoking onto the ground, like a mass of roasted grey snakes. The dwarf-rider lost both his arms before Gareth leapt forward to slit his throat. Even in the darkness, I could see the spilled blood was dirty green in colour. The ground beneath the blood appeared to sink down, like water draining from a bath.

  “The sword,” I yelled at Slurpy, who was standing like a stone statue in a frozen silent scream. “Use David’s sword.”

  She picked it up, and howling like a banshee, started twirling it around her head like a mace. It was bizarre. The firelight seemed to frame her in a blue haze. Slurpy didn’t look real. I frantically searched for something sharp in the darkness, and noticed one of the spears lying on the ground by Bedivere’s cloak. I picked it up and charged. My brain and body filled with thoughts of Arthur and a primal instinct to survive.

  Bedivere and I combined to bring down another dwarf that had shot several arrows at Talan, while Gareth and Slurpy joined forces to slice the head off another wolf. Slurpy’s high-pitched screeching accompanied every hack she made at the oily fur neck of the wolf. She continued to scream and stab long after the beast had stopped shuddering on the ground.

  The wolf that had lost its rider, and the lone surviving dwarf, ran back into the wood with Talan and Tristram in pursuit. Only the wolf made it.

  Slurpy and I slumped to the ground. It was only when I registered the snot running down into my mouth that I realised I was sobbing. Slurpy bypassed the tears and started heaving up the contents of her stomach. Bedivere had no time for hysteria. He pulled us up onto our feet.

  “We cannot tarry,” he said seriously. “The arrows of the dwarf-riders are riddled with poison. We must ride now to Caerleon, or it will be too late to save Sir David.”

  The embers of the hastily-doused fire were still flickering as we rode away into the darkness. I kept my ears primed for the howl of wolves, but only the heavy hooves of our horses, the groans of a dying knight, and the shallow breathing of Bedivere accompanied us.

  Chapter Eight

  Caerleon

  Exhaustion totally owned me. The rocking motion of the horse, the physical exercise of the strange day, and the fear in my system combined to send me to sleep, secured firmly by Bedivere’s arm.

  It was still dark when we arrived at Caerleon castle, but the hasty opening of the iron portcullis, and the teeth-grinding crunch of rusty metal were enough to wake me. The five horses were led through a narrow stone passageway and into a large rectangular courtyard. Blazing torch brackets lined the cobbled walls, and the smell of horse manure burned the inside of my nostrils.

  “My lord Bedivere,” cried a barefoot man in rags. “Sir Percivale and Sir Ronan have been awaiting your arrival; they
are in the Great Hall. I will call for the men to take you there immediately.”

  Bedivere jumped down from his horse and opened his arms to help me. The ragged man gasped as he saw my shadow in the light of his own torch, which was spitting sparks at his filthy feet. I looked around for Slurpy, wanting an ally for my strangeness, but several horses were blocking my view of her.

  “Advise Sir Percivale that I will come soon,” replied Bedivere, “but first you must send for the new court physician. Sir David has been wounded – mortally I fear – by the arrows of a dwarf-rider. We were ambushed as we made camp.”

  “And the witches, sire?”

  “They are not witches; they are kin to Arthur. Take them to the ladies quarters, and ensure they are attended to as befits a lady of the court.”

  The ragged man bowed deeply, but as he rose, Bedivere grabbed his wrist.

  “Ensure she is not harmed. I will personally remove your head if a single hair on hers is damaged.”

  “Yes, sire,” whimpered the man, and his bare feet scuttled away into a dark tunnel.

  I was confused why Bedivere was now acting as protector, when several hours earlier he had held me captive. He threw the reins of his horse into the outstretched fingers of a tiny stable boy, who couldn’t have been older than six.

  “Is it safe for us here?” I asked.

  “You are safer here than out there.” Bedivere jerked his head towards the castle walls. He stared at me. I felt very self-conscious, but not in a bad way. Bedivere’s face wasn’t hard and angry, it was softening. It made my chest tighten.

  “I want to stay with David…and you,” I stammered, thinking safety in numbers.

  Bedivere shook his head. Beads of sweat scattered in all directions, like a dog drying itself after a bath.