Echoes of Avalon (Tales of Avalon Book 1)

by Adam Copeland

  “Aimeé,” Patrick said, reaching out and touching her wrist. He stared at her momentarily with those pastel colored eyes, then finally said, “Thank you.” He withdrew his hand quickly, like someone realizing they were crushing the butterfly they were holding.

  She swallowed hard under that gaze and something inside her melted at the timbre of his voice. She took a deep breath, then answered with a smile and a nod before leaving him.

  #

  She fetched him a drink, and true to his word he minded his own business, doing not much more than take sips of Aphelon and glare at people.

  And true to her word, she came by regularly to refill his cup.

  Back in the kitchens, she pulled Anna and Claire to a quiet corner. “Should I just bring him an entire flagon so he can fill it himself?” she said discreetly. They were older and she trusted their advice.

  “No, no lass,” Anna said, a little louder than was necessary to be heard over the din. “That will draw too much attention to the boy. Besides, it would be unseemly for him to be sitting there all alone with a flagon all to himself.”

  “Sshh, sshh!” Claire added, wavering a little where she stood. “And we don’t want others demanding their very own pitcher of Aphelon. There just isn’t enough to go around.”

  Aimeé’s eyes narrowed at the two women, who were more red-faced than usual and in uncommonly high spirits. “What have you two gotten into?”

  The elder maidservants started to giggle uncontrollably and produced from behind their backs the very spirits that were lifting them up.

  “Sacre bleu!” Aimeé put her hands to her mouth. “Are you mad?”

  “Go on lass, take some yourself. You’ve earned it! You’ve tamed yonder beast and averted tragedy.”

  Aimeé first looked around carefully, then took the goblet from Claire’s outstretched hand. She sipped from the brim and tasted the bittersweet hardness of Aphelon.

  “That’s a girl.”

  #

  The next portion of the evening became a blur.

  It was a frenzied collage of bright colors, smiling faces and raucous laughter that echoed into the night. Even the full moon seemed to beam down a cheerful smile that lit up the grounds. Nobody could tell who was enjoying the occasion more, the help or the revelers. Maidservants danced with noblemen, knights danced with nuns, Father Hugh’s legs protruded from underneath a table as he slept on the bench, and Mark found it in himself to smile for the first time in a long while.

  Between filling cups, serving food and being occasionally flung in a merry circle by Sir Corbin or Sir Bisch, Aimeé managed to keep Patrick’s cup full, though the knight was mostly dozing.

  On her last trip to fill his cup, she found him irrevocably passed out. His body was draped over the wood, mouth wide open, snoring heavily.

  She shrugged and picked up the mostly full cup at his feet before he or someone else knocked it over. She returned to the kitchen, and just before entering, she looked down at the golden drink, raised it to her lips, and finished it off for him.

  #

  It didn’t seem long before somebody was nudging him awake. When he opened his eyes, the dinner was evidently long over, all the lights save the fire place were extinguished and all the Guests were gone. And more, the fact that a headache was growing in his skull proved that he was on the road to being sober.

  It was Aimeé who was kicking at his outstretched boots. She had a slight grin and at first Patrick thought it was his vision that was swaying from side to side, when in fact it was she who was unstable.

  “Rosa Maria was impressed with how fast we cleaned up,” Aimeé said with a hiccup, “especially since we did not wake you in the process.”

  Patrick squinted at the maidservant. “Have you been drinking?”

  Aimeé giggled and made a small gesture with thumb and forefinger.

  He shook his head, which was a mistake, then struggled to stand, but the rolling floor suggested that he wasn’t as near to being sober as he thought. Aimeé offered to help. At first he declined, but then accepted when he realized he couldn’t walk in a straight line.

  “I thought you would be needing some help. Some of the other knights were making wagers on whether or not you had died there in that chair.” She placed his arm around her neck.

  “Somehow that doesn’t surprise me, Avangarde humor isn’t known for its subtlety,” he replied.

  Despite the weight difference, she held him up well. She was very strong and once they reached the outside of the keep proper, Patrick was better able to walk. The fresh air helped sober him up. The moon was setting, leaving the heavens to his brethren the stars, who twinkled with their own quiet mirth. The air was warm, but breezy. The Hall for Guests loomed ahead, beyond gently swaying branches.

  Aimeé stayed at his side and insisted on accompanying him to his door.

  “Probably a good idea,” Patrick mumbled. “I’d probably fall in a ditch and drown.”

  Achieving his door was not so difficult. Once there, Patrick leaned against it heavily, clawing at the latch to open it.

  Aimeé leaned into him harder to keep him from sagging to the floor and reached for the latch herself. Patrick fell over her leaning back.

  “Sir Gawain!” Patrick groaned. “Don’t move, I need to rest for a moment.”

  Aimeé struggled to make him upright again. “You can rest all you want once I open your door.” Patrick slumped again. His chin was over one of her shoulders, an arm over her other. Patrick’s eyes slowly opened as he realized the nearness of her. He hair smelled faintly of honey, her dress of baked bread, and her bosom of sweat and Aphelon. Her muscles were hard from years of labor, yet it was not an unpleasant feeling and Patrick held her in his arms to upright himself. He let his hands linger on her. She too held him tighter and let him start to nuzzle her neck.

  Patrick brushed his lips along her cheek and moved to her waiting mouth. Her embrace was warm and passionate and it stimulated Patrick to return the kiss intensely. She cried out in pleasure as his mouth moved again to her neck and he bit gently.

  She started to run her hands over his body and he returned the gesture by cupping her bosom. She quietly cried out again. The door opened under their weight and they fell into Patrick’s room.

  #

  Faint sunlight woke him.

  His head was pounding and his mouth felt as if it had been the repository for all the waste of the world. He sat up in bed, gingerly touching his forehead, where some memory nagged at him. A sense of dread turned his stomach as he attempted to put a face to what it was that made his world feel out of place...something other than residual alcohol that made the room spin.

  A subtle movement at his side jolted him to the present and the memories came flooding back—Aimeé was asleep at his side, a smile curled at the corner of her mouth.

  The bottom of his stomach fell out.

  He placed his face in his shaking hands, not wanting to believe what he knew all too well was true. He had committed a stupid act that he couldn’t possibly explain away without totally devastating the girl. He had done the one single thing he shouldn’t have done: betray Aimeé’s trust.

  “Patrick,” a voice startled him from behind.

  He jumped from the covers naked, and there standing near the bed was his mother, cowled, a profoundly sad look on her face.

  “Wasn’t it enough to hurt yourself?” she implored.

  Patrick’s heart twisted in his chest and he fell to his knees, biting his knuckles as he used to do as a child. He felt more than just naked—he felt as if his entire broken soul were laid bare.

  The sad look on his mother’s face turned to a leer as she stepped forward, raising an accusing finger. “Is this how I raised you?” Her countenance transformed into a hideous caricature of a woman; a crazed harpy with a skull-like face and flaming eyes.

  He bolted for the door and was gone in moments, howling like a madman.

  Aimeé stirred from her sleep, awakened by Pat
rick’s cries. She sat up in bed just in time to see his naked form depart.

  “Patrick!”

  She looked around the empty room, pulling the sheets over her nakedness.

  #

  Patrick ran through the mist. He did not know how he reached the forest so quickly or how he slipped by the guards without being noticed. All he knew was that he could not run fast enough to be away from what he had left behind. He felt it was all he could do to run, run, and keep on running. He was gibbering and barely aware of the sticks and stones that he tread on in his flight, or the branches and brambles that reached up and scored his bare flesh. He staggered through stream and brook and blundered through underbrush and bounded like a deer through ferns. The mist obscured his path, but he moved deeper and deeper into the wood.

  A silhouette formed in the mist—a person. His eyes widened in recognition, and he slowed to a stop.

  On a grassy knoll beneath huge trees was a beautiful dark haired girl, her skin as milky white as the mist that surrounded her. She shook her head sadly, a look of eternal pity in her striking blue eyes.

  Patrick fell to his knees and his breath came out in huge puffs of steam in the chill morning, his chest still heaving from exertion. The girl continued to stand and stare compassionately.

  “You wanted to marry unto God?” Patrick screamed at her between gasps of breath. “Did you really? Then why did it turn out the way it did? Why!” Patrick tore up the ground in front of him and threw rocks and dirt at her, but they passed through her even as her form vanished like a reflection on the surface of moving water. Patrick let forth a scream of anguish and turned and ran further into the wood, his feet bleeding and his naked body striped with lacerations.

  Ahead of him was another mist-shrouded figure, but this time no taller than his waist. She came running towards him with arms held out, a plea for help and mercy in her dark eyes. She cried in a strange language and her features were dusky, her clothing foreign. Patrick ran to meet her, no longer naked, but wearing a blood-and soot-smudged white surcoat emblazoned with a red cross. His sword dangled in one hand, a shield in the other.

  To his left, a group of similarly dressed men crested the hill on horseback. Their surcoats were soaked in blood, and their tack and harnesses jangled menacingly.

  They spotted the running girl and put spurs to horse and surged forward.

  “No!” Patrick cried out. “Not again!”

  Patrick threw sword and shield aside and raced for the girl as fast as his feet would carry him. He called to the knights and leaped to push the girl from their path, but he was too late. The mounted warriors trampled the child, kicking up mud and tossing her body about like a rag doll.

  Patrick came to rest on his knees before the broken body. Bloody foam swelled from her mouth. One of the mounted knights circled back to Patrick, raising the visor of his helm to reveal a mean face and wiry gray beard.

  “There are no innocents here,” he stated with a sneer.

  Patrick’s eyes opened and he realized that he was lying on the cold ground, still naked. His head snapped in all directions, but he was all alone.

  He rose to his knees and looked skyward, ripping at his hair. He longed to weep, but all that would come from him was a noise too pathetic to even be called a moan.

  From the corner of his eye he glimpsed another visitor to his delirium. He turned to see the pale face of David of York. The smile lines around his mouth were set grimly as he leaned against a tree in his armor and green greatcloak, shaking his head at the Irish knight. After staring for some time, he silently turned and began to walk away without a word.

  “No!” Patrick called, rising and chasing after the image in the mist. “Don’t leave me again!” Patrick tackled the Englishman, only to find he was as solid as the mist. He lay on the ground for a while, in the dead leaves and dirt. Then, he started to laugh.

  At first it was a mere gurgle in his throat, but then quickly turned to a full-blown guffaw and his face contorted into a twisted parody of joy. He struggled to his feet and directed his laughter to the heavens.

  “Is that it?” he railed at the sky. “Is that the best you can do?”

  He twirled about like an idiot, got dizzy, then stopped. He wiped his nose on his hand.

  “Why must you torment me so?” he called. “Why must you send silly ghosts and demons to do your dirty work? Can’t you just crush me with your thumb and be done with it? What did I do to displease you to begin with? Had I not followed you faithfully? Did I not memorize your words? Or was it that I didn’t follow your word well enough? What! What was it?”

  Patrick looked around as if expecting an answer to come out of the trees. He balled his hands into fists and screamed in frustration.

  “You want to hear your words? Do you? Do you want me to repeat it to you, so you will know how dutifully I committed it to memory? Well, here is a little something King David said to you: Because of you my friends shun me; you make me loathsome to them; Caged in, I cannot escape; my eyes grow dim from trouble.

  “All day I call on you, Lord; I stretch out my hands to you. Do you work wonders for the dead? Do the shades arise and praise you? Selah! Is your love proclaimed in the grave, your fidelity in the tomb? Are your marvels declared in the darkness, your righteous deeds in the land of oblivion?

  “But I cry out to you, Lord; in the morning my prayer comes before you. Why do you reject me, Lord? Why hide your face from me?”

  Patrick made a mocking bow, “I couldn’t have said it better myself! Did you answer him, I wonder? Did you!”

  This last heated assertion sent his mind reeling, blinding his senses in a red rage that sent him back to pulling out his hair and spinning in circles. His head felt like it was going to explode with anger and frustration, and images of all the ghosts that came to visit him this day, plus many more, surrounded him every which way he turned. Each one was a reminder of something brutal. The images spun faster and faster until they were just a blur, leaving Patrick with only the sensation of the sound of wings surrounding him like a flock of pigeons in a madhouse.

  He became nauseated and fell to his knees, clutching his ears to block out the sound. He breathed heavily, eyes shut, and waited for the vertigo to subside.

  Slowly, eventually, it did—along with the mad beating of wings.

  Around him, the forest was steely silent.

  He carefully opened his eyes, and standing before him was the hooded Apparition, arms crossed over its chest.

  “Go to hell, you cowardly thing,” Patrick shouted at it. “Have you no powers but to look menacing? Am I to fear a shadow? I will not any longer! You couldn’t possibly take away anything from me that hasn’t already been taken. You can’t hurt me! You can’t touch me!”

  Patrick threw a fist at it.

  It caught his fist in mid air with its gloved hand. Patrick could not free his hand nor overpower the creature. It began to squeeze his knuckles with an icy grip, forcing Patrick to his knees. A sensation like creeping death traveled down his arm, causing him to fight for his breath. With a wicked twist, the Apparition threw Patrick aside by his arm. His body somersaulted to the ground, and before he could rise again, the Apparition picked him up by the throat into the air.

  Patrick hung there suspended by the specter’s outstretched arm and he clawed at the gloved hand. The Apparition held up its free hand and gestured with its index finger. This it moved back and forth as if to tell the Irishman he had done a naughty thing.

  Like a puff of smoke in the wind, the Apparition disappeared. Patrick fell to the ground.

  He lay there for a very long time.

  #

  Aimeé listlessly kneaded the dough on the kitchen table, a dazed look in her eyes. For the past couple of days, it was all she could do to put her body through the motions of performing her duties. Soon Rosa Maria would catch on to her air of indifference and either scold her for it or mercilessly question her about the cause. Aimeé wanted neither to happen.
<
br />   She straightened up and stared at the dough.

  Moments later she sleep-walked past Anna who worked at the table next to hers, mumbled something about needing fresh air and left the room. She wandered down the maze of corridors and came to a dead end where several dust-covered barrels were stacked beneath a high window. A beam of light formed a pool on the flagstones. Dust motes floated in the air. The place whispered of sanctuary and privacy.

  She sat heavily on the barrels, causing more dust to plume into the air, and she put her elbows on her knees, cradling her chin in her hands.

  “What am I doing?” she mused out loud.

  She thought long and hard, but could not manage to untie the knot in her stomach. A vague amount of time passed, and Anna’s portly frame appeared in the hallway, and approached.

  “Ah, lass, what is a matter with yea?” Anna asked, stroking her friend’s tawny hair.

  Aimeé embraced Anna and managed a shrug. “I’ve gone and done it,” she lamented. “Threw myself at him foolishly, and in a drunken state he took me up on my offer. Then left me lying there.”

  “Well, if I recall correctly, you weren’t of proper mind that night, either,” Anna pointed out.

  “Still, he left screaming, in a hurry, not even bothering to put his clothes back on. He’s been gone for days now. What is it about me that would cause a man to do such a thing?”

  Anna grabbed the younger woman’s chin and made eye contact. “Now, you listen to me lass, that right there should tell yea somethin’. The boy has his own demons and it has nothin’ to do with yea. You are a good person.” Aimeé’s face scrunched up on the verge of tears, but Anna’s smiling cherubic face kept her from breaking down. “You’re goin’ to be all right, Aimeé dear.”

  “But what do I do?”

  Anna shook her head. “Yea don’t do nothin,’ yea just take it day by day. Besides, yea haven’t heard his reasonin’ yet. Maybe he’s been sittin’ on a toilet this whole time. Anyone who drinks that much Aphelon is bound to have problems.”

  They laughed at the image, and it seemed the room grew a little brighter.