by Liam Perrin
He stopped and with a contented smile playing at his lips said, "Noble steed and loyal friend..."
He had to laugh at himself; it sounded so foolish now, but he continued, "At the start and at the end..."
There was a sudden snort to his right and a large head pushed into his hand at just the right height.
"Booker," said Thomas, and opened his eyes.
Booker, the dilapidated gray workhorse with the oversized – and overactive – nostrils. Booker, the horse no knight in his right mind would adopt.
"Thomas!" yelled a voice outside.
"In here!" he yelled back. "In the stable." He stroked Booker's muzzle, and Booker turned his head sideways to look at Thomas's face with one large, weepy eye.
Philip appeared in the doorway, followed by Marie.
"There's a messenger here," said Marie.
"From Camelot," added Philip. Philip looked anxious.
"What's the matter?" Thomas stopped petting Booker, who pushed his head into Thomas's shoulder hard. Thomas fell sideways and caught himself, laughing.
A third person came into view. Dusty from travel, the blue and gold markings of Camelot were still clearly visible. He strode right up to Thomas.
"Sir Thomas the Hesitant?"
"Aye," said Thomas hesitantly, "I suppose that's me."
The man unfurled a short scroll and read, "Sir Tuttle the Authorized, on the orders of King Arthur, Lord of Britain, summons all Less Valued Knights to assemble in Camelot with the Round Table, the Knights Errant, and the Knights of the Watch in a matter of utmost urgency."
He furled the scroll with a flick, and turned to leave.
"Hold on," said Thomas. "What's this about?"
"Something about a magic cup that's gone missing," said the messenger, raising one eyebrow and giving a small shrug.
The man glanced at Booker and blurted, "Is that your mount, sir?"
Thomas looked Booker in the eye.
"Why yes," he said, after considering it a moment. "Yes he is."
Booker jerked his head nervously.
"Nonsense," said Thomas speaking to Booker, "you'll be fine."
EPILOGUE
Dear Reader,
A final word, if you will. You probably have many questions, as did I. What about the ring with the letters "LVK" and the phrase Somnia Salvebis for instance?
It seems the ring was given to Thomas by none other than Sir Tuttle the Authorized in honor of his outstanding service to the Table of Less Valued Knights. "Somnia, Salvebis" translates, of course, as "Nonsense, you'll be fine." It's doubtful, however, that the specific occasion for this award relates directly to the events in my grandfather's manuscript: Sir Thomas the Hesitant went on to do so many other important things.
And what of Marie? Or Sir Philip the Disadvantaged? Or young Elizabeth Abigail Farmer? These are all tales for another day.
Instead, I'd like to leave you with the message I gleaned from my grandfather's legacy. It is this: The best kept secret in the world may be no vast conspiracy, no grand hoodwink, no colossal ruse. It may be the simple fact that someone, all along, has been watching out for us.
Here's to the Less Valued.
Liam Bartholomew Perrin
April 29, 2008
Read Sir Thomas’s Alternate Ending
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ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Liam Perrin has been roughly geosynchronous for more than a few decades and likely will remain so. Most recently, he orbits the center of Earth from a position outside of Phoenix, Arizona where he tries to avoid high speed collisions with his wife, one daughter, a miniature Australian shepherd, a Russian tortoise, and a cat which turned up uninvited.