Gwenevere's Knights- The Complete Knights of Caerleon Trilogy

by Jesikah Sundin

  Lancelot slowed his horse and turned toward his king. “Arthur?”

  Arthur was staring between his horse’s ears as if he’d seen a ghost. “I . . . I’m not sure. I just have a strange, unpleasant feeling.” He met Lancelot’s intense stare and lifted a faint, shaky smile. “I’m fine. Let’s go.”

  Lancelot placed a comforting hand on his skittish horse and considered Arthur’s odd premonition. Some believed that moving from the woods and into the meadow was like leaving the Otherworld. Maybe they had crossed through a forest the fae governed.

  He and Arthur rejoined the others, who were waiting a few hundred yards ahead, where they had stopped.

  “Everything all right?” Galahad asked.

  Arthur nodded, his face still pale.

  It wasn’t until they crested the next hill that it became clear that everything was most definitely not all right. His king—and Lancelot’s stallion, for that matter—sensed true.

  “My gods,” Lancelot said as he surveyed the landscape before him. A river snaked through a checkerboard of farmland below. But everything the river touched seemed to have—withered. Dry and cracked crops shaded into the brighter green health of adjacent fields around them. As if the river carried poison, killing everything the tainted water touched. But only in this area. Was the disease spreading?

  “What could do this?” Fionna breathed out, her mouth pinched in sorrow.

  “Reminds me of old faerie tales about the Formorians,” Lancelot said, unable to hide the disgust in his voice while mentioning the ancient enemy of the Túatha dé Danann.

  "The Fomhóraigh?" Fionna asked, eyes growing wide.

  Arthur didn’t answer, kicking his horse into a canter.

  The knights followed not too far behind, riding after him toward the blighted fields. As they neared, the destruction became more evident. Dead fish lay on the riverbank, their carcasses bloated and white. The bodies of birds and even a deer who had the misfortune of approaching for a drink littered the affected land.

  “The water’s been poisoned,” Percival said, his eyes wide with horror. “Who would do such a thing?”

  But Lancelot knew exactly who. And if Percival thought for a moment, he would too. Morgana. Elaine. Morgause. And their bloody curse. A curse on the building elements of Caerleon. A curse of destruction.

  Lancelot swallowed the bile rising in his throat. This destruction was a result of his recklessness. His choice. He memorized it, taking in each withered blade of grass, each dead, glassy eye rotting on the bank. This was the cost of betraying a fae. This was the cost of a faerie curse. This is what would happen—and worse—if he gave in to his weakness and slept with Fionna. This. This. This. He beat himself with the word, with the images, an intentional self-flagellation. He wanted the wounds, the memories, to dig deep. So deep that he wouldn’t forget the next time his cock stirred in Fionna’s presence.

  Arthur had dismounted and was kneeling at the edge of the blighted line, his fingers brushing the stalks of spring wheat that still lived.

  A crow cawed loudly in the trees behind them and Lancelot jumped. He swiveled in his saddle and regarded the bird, its black-feathered head cocked to one side, seeming to watch him through one glassy eye. Icy fingers of fear crawled up his spine as he remembered Morgana fleeing from his chamber, leaping out the window and into the night air, borne aloft on dark crow wings. He shook himself. Crows were commonplace. The bird was just here for the carrion below, a decaying feast along the riverbank.

  “What did this?” Fionna asked, summoning his attention back toward the group. Her voice was hard and angry. “We will kill them for it.”

  Arthur stood slowly. “I don’t know,” he said, turning back toward them. Lancelot hid his surprise when the king sent a knowing look toward him, Percival, and Galahad. He didn’t want to share the truth of the curse with Fionna. Why? The other knights seemed to understand Arthur’s silent admonition and stayed quiet.

  Arthur pulled himself back into the saddle and nudged his horse forward with his heels. “But rest assured, we’ll find out.”

  They rode in silence the rest of the day, each knight in quiet contemplation. Sorrow warred with anger and guilt within Lancelot. And somewhere, deep down, a kernel of hope. Merlin had seen a way out. With Fionna’s help, they could find the Blessed Grail. And, if they found the Grail, they could fix this. They had all grown distracted by her beauty, by the light she infused in their little brotherhood. The river was the clear reminder they had all needed. This wasn’t a game. It wasn’t fantasy. This was life and death, and their enemies were playing for keeps.

  THE VILLAGE OF Ewloe which, according to Percival, bordered Lord Bronn’s manor house, appeared first as a smudge of smoke on the horizon two days later. Three days in the saddle with the earth for a bed and stars for a blanket. But as they approached, the smoke proved black and oily, not the cheerful puffing of wood-burning hearths.

  “Something’s wrong here,” Galahad rumbled.

  Arthur pulled Excalibur from its sheath and the others followed suit.

  They rode into the village at a slow walk, their horses shying from the strange smells. As soon as they saw the first body, Lancelot’s spirits sank. This village had been attacked.

  “Skies,” he hissed under his breath.

  No building was spared and, it seemed, no villager either. The thatched homes had burned to ash and rubble, many with their inhabitants still inside.

  Fionna swung down from the saddle, her arm thrown over her nose to ward off the smell. “A day ago, perhaps?” she said. “The fires would be out by now, if the attacked had happened before then. And these bodies aren’t too ripe yet.”

  “They seem pretty ripe to me,” Percival said, his face white as snow.

  Fionna knelt in a patch of charred grass, pulling an axe from the back of a woman’s body, and then examined the wood-carved handle and blade marks. “Flaming hells,” she swore, standing.

  “What is it?” Arthur asked, dismounting and striding over.

  She held out the axe to him. “See this detailing on the handle? It’s Dál nAraidi. And this symbol? The blackthorn tree? I know this clann. It’s the Uí Tuírtri.”

  “Who are they?” Arthur asked.

  Fionna bit her lip, seeming to hesitate. “They’re a rival clann in Lough Insholin who wants to rule in Antrim, including the lands of Allán. I know the leader, Donal O’Lynn. He’s a bastard. But . . . I don’t know why his fianna are raiding here. I didn’t even know they’d been to Briton.”

  Lancelot narrowed his eyes. Fionna’s explanation rang false. Did she know more than she was letting on? Yet, Arthur knew more than he was telling Fionna. Perhaps there was a good reason for her to keep her own secrets.

  Arthur threw the axe into the ground, where the blade stuck, quivering. “They picked a fight with the wrong king. The Kingdom of Gwynedd cannot rid themselves of these pests, but I will. If they’re only a day’s ride, we’ll take them.” His words rolled and boomed like thunder.

  “Arthur,” Percival said. “If the raiders came here . . . they might have visited Bronn’s manor. Spoils to be had, in a house like that, ye ken.”

  Arthur’s skin sickened to a greenish pallor. “Do you think . . .” He looked at the body by his feet, pale and unmoving.

  Percival grimaced. “I think we better find out.”

  LORD BRONN’S HOUSE was a large, sturdy lime-washed cob and black timber manor with a thatched roof, surrounded by stone walls. But even as they approached, Arthur’s senses rang in alarm. Adrenaline coursed through his body. The grounds were too quiet.

  Fionna’s hand rested on a dagger at her side; Percival rode with a sword in his hand.

  A bird burst into flight from a nearby bush, swooping low across the dirt trail before them. Arthur jumped in his saddle, spooking his horse, Llamrei.

  Galahad’s horse danced in reply. “We’re a cheerful bunch, aren’t we?” the big warrior muttered.

  They rounded the last cu
rve and the manor’s front came into view. Arthur let out a muffled curse. The wide oak door hung off its hinges, splintered and cracked.

  The knights dismounted and pulled their swords from their scabbards. They crept into the manor.

  Signs of raiders were everywhere. Mud trekked onto the plush woven carpets, dishes smashed to the floor, the lime-washed walls singed with smoke.

  Up the stairs they went, one at a time, with Arthur leading the way. Then he saw it. A booted foot, poking out from around the corner.

  His heart sank.

  The man was broad and well-muscled, with thick dark hair and a neatly-trimmed beard. His brown eyes stared wide and vacant, frozen in death. A dark bloom of dried blood colored his white shirt.

  “Lord Bronn is dead,” Arthur said, his voice dull. The first lead he had received in years, and the man was dead.

  Percival knelt by Lord Bronn’s face and gently closed his eyes.

  “Damn it!” Arthur cursed, swooping a hand across a nearby bookshelf. Papers and books scattered amongst the raid’s detritus.

  Fionna recoiled slightly at his outburst but, in that moment, he didn’t care. He leaned his forehead against the bookshelf, closing his eyes. They had seemed so close. First Fionna, next finding the letter from Lord Bronn—a clue to the Grail mystery that had haunted his family for decades. Veiled hope had blossomed inside him, too powerful a feeling for him to remain guarded. And now that hope was dead, cut down as easily as poor Lord Bronn.

  “We’ll find another way to reach the Grail,” Percival said softly.

  Arthur heaved a sigh. “The first lead we have had in years. We can’t wait years to find another. Caerleon can’t.” His frustration and disappointment kindled into rage within him like sparks striking dry tinder. These Dál nAraidi, this clan, had sailed into Wales and England and killed and maimed and took. He was supposed to protect these people as their High King. To defend this land, regardless of whether the Kingdoms recognized him as their Head Dragon. But he had failed. The people of Ewloe had died, and who knew where these Dál nAraidi snakes were slithering to next.

  Arthur spun to the others, who stood mutely around the room. “We ride,” he said. “We find the men who did this and we make them pay. I will not have these Irish bastards returning to their shores and gloating that Wales is ripe for the picking. Mount up.” He wanted to rage and thunder and plunge Excalibur deep into the gut of whatever raider did this. Those men had taken something precious from him and they would pay for it. With their lives.

  “No,” Fionna said, her voice sharp as steel.

  “What?” Arthur growled.

  “Not until ye tell me why this Grail is so important. There’s something unspoken between ye, and it’s thick as sap. As much as I want to kill Uí Tuírtri, I’m not plunging into battle without knowing why.”

  “Isn’t it enough that these Irish slaughtered my people?” Arthur asked.

  “It would be, if that’s the only reason we’re here. But it’s not. If I am to fight at yer side, Arthur Pendragon, if I am yer knight, I deserve to know the truth.”

  The other knights exchanged wide-eyed, pregnant gazes.

  “She’s right, Yer Majesty,” Percival said. Arthur opened his mouth to tell Percival to shut it, but the fool man kept talking, his words coming faster. “Either we trust her or we dinnae. The Fates brought her to us so she could help with this quest. Let her help us.”

  Arthur ground his teeth in frustration. He didn’t know exactly why he had been keeping the secret of Morgana’s curse from Fionna. No, that wasn’t true. The reason was his pride. He didn’t want to admit to this beautiful stranger that he was fallible. That his kingdom was cursed and, by extension, so was he. But Percival was right. He had knighted Fionna. Excalibur had shown her to be the one. He couldn’t keep her on the outside anymore.

  “Fine, Percival.” Arthur’s shoulders sagged. “You tell her. But on the way. I’m not letting these dogs get one more minute on us.”

  “Should we bury him?” Galahad asked as they trampled down the stairs and out into the fresh air.

  Arthur took in a shuddering breath, letting the cool air fill his lungs—banishing the oppressive stench of death. “Yes. On the way back. We can’t risk losing the raiders.”

  The knights mounted, and Arthur kicked Llamrei into a gallop. Sometimes he felt that his horse was his oldest and truest friend. She sensed his mood better than most. And, right now, he wanted to be borne away by Llamrei’s powerful strides, to let the whip of the wind wipe away his worries and fears and failures.

  If only resolving matters were that easy.

  Behind him, he knew Percival was shouting at Fionna, explaining to her the messy sordid tale of Arthur’s failure as a diplomat. His half-sister’s wrath and her sisters’ cruel magic. Lancelot’s fool mistake, falling in love with a faerie, and then his even worse mistake of falling out of love with one. He kicked Llamrei’s heaving flanks with his boots, urging her forward, the landscape bleeding into a blur of green grass and golden fields and blue sky.

  And then she was beside him, her white-blonde braid trailing behind her like a pennant, her dappled grey mare matching Llamrei stride for stride.

  “How could ye not tell me?” she shouted at him. The wind’s pull almost stole her words from his ears. “Did ye not think I needed to know?”

  “You know now,” he said, not able to confess to her the real reason, to admit that sometimes he wasn’t an infallible king, but just a man.

  “Percival had to convince ye,” she said accusingly. “Ye should have told me yerself. Ye should have chosen to trust me.”

  “And do you not keep your own counsel, knight?” He needed to sting her back, push her away, keep her from getting too close.

  She recoiled as if struck. Nor did she shout back a clever retort.

  “Tell me of this clan. What do I need to know?”

  “They bleed as red as any men. Seems that’s all ye care to know,” she said, before reigning in her mare and falling behind him.

  Arthur slowed Llamrei as well, though he stayed before the other knights. The raiders’ trail wasn’t hard to follow, with a dozen men on horseback heavy laden with treasures but, in his haste, he didn’t want to miss a turn or change in the trail. His mind was a whirlwind of three thoughts—Lord Bronn and the Grail, the crimson need to cut down these Irish for what they had done, and Fionna. Always Fionna. Had he driven her away by keeping the secret of the faerie curses from her? Would she forgive him? And what would he do, if she didn’t? The very thought of being without her felt crippling. Felt like a cloud passing before the sun. Fionna had integrated herself into their lives so quickly. She had become a firm fixture of his court. He didn’t know why she had fought in his tourney, but he knew this: she belonged here. With them. He would convince her of that.

  The whicker of horses was his first warning that they were coming upon the raiders’ camp. The smell of campfire smoke was the second. A small, cautious part of him knew that he should reign in Llamrei and survey the camp with a measured, dispassionate eye. But that part of him was an ant compared to the lion of his anger. A need roared within him to rip apart these men for what they had done to that village, for killing Lord Bronn and murdering Arthur’s chance at finding the Grail.

  And so, he urged Llamrei forward and ignored the muffled curses from his knights behind him. He pulled Excalibur from its sheath and rode toward the Uí Tuírtri clan, a savage smile on his face.

  I HAD A ritual I always followed before battle. I would wash my face and hands, and carefully paint on lines with blue woad in the runic pattern that marked my clann—Beith, the silver birch. With blue stained onto my fingertips, I would then pray to The Morrígan, sister goddesses of war and fate, that my sword would swing true, that my shield would hold fast, marking each weapon with Beith runes as well. Afterward, I would sit in silence, if even for a few moments, feeling what it was to be inside my body, fully aware of the breath in my lungs and the blood in m
y veins. These were gifts that were fleeting, and I never felt that lesson so keenly as before battle. Small and fragile and mortal. After battle, I thrummed with power like the sister goddesses themselves, invincible and terrible.

  But not today.

  Today there wasn’t woad or prayers or quiet contemplation. There wasn’t even a plan. Today there was a wild gallop into a force of men three times our size. If this is how these knights fought, I had a thing or two to teach them.

  And, today, there was a whirlwind of anger and emotion, hurt and betrayal, gut-twisting guilt. Arthur had lied to me from the moment I had arrived here. But I had done the same. Who was one liar to judge another? I needed time to think. To scream and shout into the uncaring breeze and pound a sparring strawman with my sword until my shoulder ached from the force of it.

  I would have no chance to do any of it. Caerleon was cursed. And if Merlin and Percival were to be believed, I was a key to undoing that curse and finding the Grail—the one item that could stop the creeping elf-shot sickness that was overtaking this lush land. And I was leaving. Stealing Arthur’s most prized possession, his sovereign-blessed connection to this land, and running with my tail between my legs back to Ireland.

  Was I really willing to do that?

  Could I truly abandon these men and leave Arthur’s entire kingdom to its fate? Was that worthy punishment for a lie? Only the goddesses knew. I had told myself I would pay any price to ransom my father and sister back. But now I grasped for another way. How had things become so twisted so quickly?

  All these thoughts spun in my head, a blizzard of emotions where the quiet calm before battle should be. I tried to focus on the force before me, to absorb the details that might save my life.

  The Uí Tuírtri were camped in a sparse wooded bluff overlooking the River Dee. Their left side was flanked by a trickling stream that poured over the bluff in a waterfall down to the river’s banks, while the right was guarded by a pile of large boulders that were arranged as if they had been tossed there a thousand years ago by a Fomhórach, an Underworld giant. This area was a smart and defensible position and, in the end, Arthur’s mad dash was a fairly effective strategy.