Sleepless Knights

by Mark Williams

  The Master made straight for the Grail and knelt before it. The sound was clear enough for me to make out their words if I pressed my ear to the transparent wall between us.

  “Hurry, sire,” said Sir Lancelot.

  The King, lost in wonder, seemed almost coy. “Do I just… take it?”

  The other knights were similarly bashful. “Don’t ask me,” shrugged Sir Pellinore.

  “Presumably,” said Sir Lancelot.

  Why do they not ask Merlin? I thought. From this angle, the wizard looked as if he was standing next to me — that is, the earlier me — as I watched over the Master, although Merlin had certainly not been present back then.

  The Grail moved, as if it were looking at us all. Or looking to us, perhaps; hopeful and expectant.

  “Tell me of your power,” said the King. “Tell me what can you do.” And he listened, as the Grail spoke to him alone. Through the glass I saw that by some trick of the light Merlin grew in stature for a brief moment, his body outlined with a spectrum of prism-cast light.

  “Then, you will serve me?” said the King. In answer the Grail lifted itself up off the table. As it did so, I heard a scream, painfully loud and clear on my side of the glass, coming from outside the walls of the city.

  “Hark! Mermaidens!” said Sir Pellinore.

  Sir Lancelot shook his head. “Le Fay. Sire, we must not tarry.”

  “Sire, please,” said the earlier me, on the other side of the glass.

  “Haste!” said Sir Pellinore.

  “Yes, of course, we must fly,” said the Master, getting to his feet. “To the Prydwen!” The knights turned and ran, the Grail following its new master. I watched them go, the scream rising to a shriek.

  Merlin stood with his head bowed, a forlorn curator mourning the theft of his prize exhibit. I pounded on the glass wall between us with my fists, desperately trying to break through. The wizard glided quickly out of the hall. Then the walls of the Glass Fortress cracked and shattered, plunging me into a world of flying particles. Shielding my eyes with my arm, I ran back down the disintegrating corridor.

  Volcanoes of glass erupted in my wake. A wide fissure snaked after me down the centre of the quaking stairway and out through the revolving door. The sword bridge collapsed beneath my feet as I ran across it, and with one last stumbling leap I made it back to the other side.

  VI

  Faithful Plum was waiting, impatient for the off, his hooves crunching in the raining glass. Merlin was also back on his grey mare, galloping away towards Annwn and the fortress of Morgan Le Fay. The Dark Queen’s billowing form rose up into the clouds, preparing to bring down her reckoning on the fleeing knights. Behind me, through the still-collapsing ruins of the Glass Fortress, I could see the shoreline and the storm-tossed shape of the Prydwen striving against the waves.

  Plum sped across the flat fields. The spirit of Morgan left her hilltop castle and passed above us. The remains of the Glass Fortress fell. As they did, a gust of wind swept out from the fresh ruins, a warm wave that ruffled the grass around me. At its touch, every living thing fell into instant decay. Leaves turned to a dead autumnal brown. The grass withered as if at a dragon’s breath, and the green hills ahead became black and cankerous. I looked at my hands and was relieved to see that I was not affected. Plum shivered at the sudden drop in temperature, so I geed him forwards on Merlin’s trail.

  †

  Merlin’s route took us through the dead fields and along the bottom of a valley. On I followed, weary of the chase now, hoping against hope this was the last leg of the journey. The valley narrowed and came to an end in an opening in a wall of rock — the start of a cave leading into the hillside, under Morgan’s castle. Plum reluctantly stepped inside. I shared his hesitation, regretting my fervent hope that this was the end of our quest. For that is how it felt, going into the hillside. Like stepping into the end of something.

  No sooner had Plum entered the cave than he collapsed beneath me with a whinny of pain. I had thought him immune to the ill wind that decomposed the landscape outside, but I was mistaken. His legs had turned a ghastly green, bones visible beneath the skin. His coat was cold to the touch and felt loose and limp on his body, a thin blanket that the slightest tug would pull free. Plum sank down with a shudder, head bowed and tongue lolling, flecks of foam collecting in the corners of his mouth. “Come on old boy,” I said. “Let’s get you back outside.” But even as I tried to move his equine bulk, he fell still and silent.

  I gripped his reins until they cut into my palms. “Merlin!” I shouted, my voice echoing in the cave. “Show yourself!”

  Shapes moved in the dark. Low moans, like a whispered curse. In the dim light I suddenly saw that the cave was teeming with the creatures from the ruins of Camelot. They swarmed over poor Plum’s body, tearing at him with their hands, dragging him off somewhere underground. One of them lunged at me. His hand did not pass through me, but gripped me around the throat with bony fingers half covered in flesh. “Merlin is my master,” it said, with a wheeze of rancid breath.

  I pushed it away, gagging and choking, running back to the cave entrance. From outside, away over the dead plain and from out to sea, there came a sound like a door being slammed with a great thooming thud. Just as I reached the way out, the exit closed in front of me and everything went dark.

  †

  I experienced the sensation of being pressed among a large number of the putrefying creatures, pulled along by their forward momentum and powerless to resist. The ground sloped beneath my dragging feet, sometimes falling away completely as if we had entered a shaft. At such moments I felt the creatures’ hands passing me down like a piece of baggage, going to great pains to manoeuvre me past various obstacles in the total blackness. As soon as the ground levelled out, a small amount of light met my eyes, growing brighter until we emerged into an empty torch-lit cave no bigger than a broom cupboard. I was deposited there without formality as the creatures went about their business, leaving me to gather the few of my wits still worthy of the name.

  My first impression was an accurate one. This was indeed a broom cupboard, or at least, its infernal equivalent. All manner of tools lined the walls, fashioned from the bones of the dead and in a state of poor repair. Behind me was the way I had come in, a door of rock closed tight on my arrival. In front of me was another closed door, through which my escorts had departed. As I was inspecting it for a handle, this door swung smoothly open.

  Two of the creatures entered, taking down spade-like implements from a long rack chiselled out of the rock. Their previous manic intensity had left them upon arriving in the depths, and they walked with the methodical shuffle of a slow-moving queue. All I received by way of acknowledgement was a simple look from their bloodshot eyes, as if the onus were on me to speak, and when I did not they simply left in order to carry on with their work.

  Merlin’s work, I should say, for I had surely arrived in his true realm. I wondered how he had come to this, what he had done to deserve an afterlife so far from everything fresh and fine. But I was clearly not going to find the answer in a broom cupboard. This time, the creatures had made no attempt to close the door as they left, and so I ventured cautiously out behind them.

  VII

  The creatures were working in a long room, poorly lit and low-ceilinged, with a conveyor belt running down the centre. Two of them stood either side at the far end, operating the belt by turning a winch. Above them, through a hole or chute in the rock, a large object slumped down onto the conveyor. At the halfway point, the conveyor stopped long enough for another creature to remove items from this object and drop them into a wooden wheelbarrow, which another creature trundled away. Coming closer, I saw that these items were weapons — a knife, a sword and a shield. Curious, I went to inspect the large object on the conveyor belt.

  I stepped back in horror when I realised that this was the dead body of Sir Gareth.

  He was dressed as he had been at Camlann, bearing the fresh wounds o
f one recently slain in battle. I picked him up and tried to remove him from the conveyor belt, but one of the creatures pulled him away from me and put him back into place, while another held me back until the belt started moving again.

  “What are you doing?” I said, struggling against its iron grip. “This knight is of King Arthur’s court!” But the creatures only looked at me with dismay. As soon as the body had moved into the next room the creature let go of me, and I followed after Sir Gareth’s corpse.

  A blast of heat and light and noise greeted me. I was standing on a broad outcrop of rock looking out over a vast cavern. The heat and the noise came from my right, where a group of the creatures were working in an armoury, smelting and re-forging Sir Gareth’s weapons into new blades, black and jagged. These were dropped over the precipice, creating a curious fizzing sound. The conveyor belt stopped just over the end of the crag. I was just in time to see Sir Gareth tip over, and I ran to the edge.

  The end of the conveyor was positioned directly above a large underground pool that steamed and simmered with sulphurous vapours. Here was the source of the light that filled the cavern with a luminous intensity, which increased when the fresh-forged weapons passed into the water. Sir Gareth’s body hit the surface with a similar fizz, creating a small geyser that bubbled and broiled as he sank below the lake. The surface of the pool grew calm. Moments later, the waters broke at the other side. A round oval shape emerged, gleaming white. A skull.

  “The damned dead, brought to life,” I said. Those who died with their minds mired in pain and frustration. The skeleton that used to be Sir Gareth gripped his new jagged blade and marched off out of the cavern. So this was the occupation of these poor creatures! This was the industry overseen by Merlin: clearing the field of Camlann, creating an army that served Morgan Le Fay! But I would save at least one soul from this dark destiny.

  I ran alongside the conveyor belt into the low room again, all the way back to the chute. But she was not there; none of them were. There were no more bodies left. Back into the cavern I went, frantically searching for answers in the blank stares of the pitiful creatures, for someone to tell me that I was not too late, that her fate was not already sealed.

  “Sir Gareth was the last of them,” said a voice. “The one you seek is not among the skeleton army of the dead. She was not a knight.”

  I turned to where the voice was coming from. Just above the armoury, on a chair cut into the rock, sat the overseer of all this demonic industry. I approached his throne, a bold petitioner with nothing left to lose.

  “Merlin,” I said, my voice wavering as tears rolled down my cheeks. “If this is indeed your realm, then please. Release her. Keep the rest, keep all of them. Just give me back Beaumains.”

  “I cannot.”

  “Then take me instead.”

  He laughed. “You cannot offer what you have already given.”

  “I did not come here as one of the dead. These creatures have no claim on me.”

  “They might not agree with that.”

  “But this has nothing to do with me!”

  “Ah, Sir Lucas the butler. It has everything to do with you.”

  “Lies do not become you, Merlin.”

  “I did not create any of this. You did.”

  “No.”

  “Master?” said the nearest creature, tugging at my arm.

  “I am here to welcome you to your kingdom, Sir Lucas. To conduct you through your realm. To show you how its foundations were laid in the decision you made.”

  “Master?” said the creature again.

  “All this belongs to you,” said Merlin. “Take up your rightful place. Head Butler to the domestic damned, the service staff of Hell.”

  “Lucas?” said the creature, and I pulled my arm away angrily from its fetid grasp. Then saw its hands, jaundiced and rotten, but still with patches of their old pale skin. The strong supple hand of a kitchen worker.

  “Beaumains,” I said.

  And Merlin smiled.

  Taking up a freshly forged blade still hot from the fire I ran at Merlin and attacked him with all my might. Lightly, he jumped down from his throne and met my onslaught with ease, blocking every blow. The harder I attacked, the easier time he seemed to have of it, shifting his sword from left hand to right, then holding one hand behind his back, laughing at my efforts. The more he laughed, the harder I attacked, and on it went. Not once did he strike any blow, but simply waited for me to wear myself out.

  When at last his patience had expired, Merlin employed a light offensive, pushing me back to the very brink of the outcrop. I quickly expended my remaining energy in maintaining a feeble defence, until every movement of my sword felt like trying to lift a tree trunk with one hand.

  “You can never defeat me, Lucas,” said Merlin.

  The blade started to slip from my numb fingers. “Nevertheless, I will die trying,” I said.

  “Yes,” said Merlin. He pulled down his hood. “You will.”

  I looked fully into the face of Merlin. I dropped my blade and stumbled backwards to the edge of the outcrop. The noxious fumes wafting up from the pool were like a draught of smelling salts, bringing me to my senses. For at last, deep in the bowels of the earth and at the end of all things, I understood.

  I understood everything.

  And it was too late.

  I accepted my fate, and stepped off the edge of the precipice.

  The Last Day

  I

  Today being Initiation Day, I rose an hour earlier than usual, to pay particular attention to the preparations for my successor. I was up to meet the sunrise, and sat in the study window seat with my morning cup, the wash of the waves below the cottage a pleasant soundtrack to the reviewing of yesterday’s final amendments. I took a sip of tea, noting that, as ever, she had brewed it to perfection, and considered my speech.

  It was true that my words did not possess the narrative sweep of a Chronicles, or the authoritative clout of a History. But what my address lacked in literary flourishes, it more than made up for in practical application. Plus, as I knew better than anyone, in our line of work practical application is everything. With that in mind, I decided to heed the advice my dearest had given me only last night, and get it to the person it was intended for. I finished my tea, picked up the first page, and sent my mind strolling through time and space.

  Every human consciousness that has ever existed spread out before me like stars in the night sky. I needed no map to guide me, for only a handful of souls in every generation gleam as brightly as ours. Stepping softly, lest I tread on his dreams, I stood in the corner of his consciousness and uttered a small cough — just enough to make him aware of my presence. Then I spoke the following words:

  Gwion. Gwion? Do not be alarmed. This is indeed the voice of Sir Lucas, your old employer. Speaking into your head. Hello there. Please, calm down, you are not possessed. No no, do not get Geraint, he will only add to your confusion. Just lie back and take a deep breath.

  There.

  Better?

  Good.

  Now, I want you to do something for me. I want you to remember all those times recently when you’ve heard my voice in your head, and put it down to a trick of the imagination. ‘It cannot be him,’ you have told yourself. ‘He is long gone.’ Well, yes and no, but more of that later.

  You will, I know, have heard me speaking to you, either in fragments, or as if from a very great distance. You will have heard my voice during moments of high stress. Or perhaps on those absent-minded occasions when you entered a room and forgot what you came in for. Maybe you have heard me in the hinterland between sleeping and waking, a still small voice in the corner of your consciousness. Such moments were often accompanied by certain episodes, weren’t they? Alarming occurrences, such as the ability to manipulate the minds of others, or of time slowing down and even stopping around you for apparently random intervals.

  Well, I am here to tell you that there is nothing alarming or ind
eed random about any of this. My voice is speaking within you now as a sort of welcome address, to help you find your feet and take those first steps over the threshold of a new life. I will explain everything that you need to know, in a way that it was never explained to me. This was partly the fault of my predecessor, who preferred puzzles and tests, such as so-called amulets of teleportation, which have no power in themselves, but serve as a means of focusing and honing our latent abilities. But a great deal of the blame also lies with me, for misunderstanding the true nature of my life’s work.

  True service, as practised by the best in our profession, is about fluctuation and change. So much of the business of butlery and housekeeping has to do with maintenance and preservation that it is very easy to overlook this fact. Indeed, once such a truth is overlooked, avoiding it can become something of a life’s work. When that happens, you risk destroying the very thing you are seeking to preserve. It was in such a way that I turned my back on magic, as on a black sheep of the family, little realising (as I should have done from the example of my then-Master, who had some experience in the matter of troublesome family members) that a black sheep shunned only bleats louder.

  But I digress. I have promised myself that I will be a better mentor than I was a novice, and to that end I have composed this address to help you along the way. Not to do all the work for you, you understand. The quest — and it is a quest, make no mistake about that — is yours alone. Think of these as guidelines. With that in mind, the best way to guide you is to tell you about the end of my own working life and the start of my new one, so that you might learn from my mistakes. For I made a lot of them, Gwion, enough to fill a thousand years with their telling. But we are butlers, to the end and beyond. And as you shall see, butlers always find a way of getting the job done, often in the most trying of circumstances, and with precious little time for a sit down.