By Force Alone

by Lavie Tidhar

  It isn’t in the nature of the fae to think too deeply of the greater mysteries, and yet. What does it mean? he wonders. Are we truly just atoms, as the Greeks have proposed, made up of millions of tiny particles too small to see? What then animates the body, what makes a mind? It just seems so unfair, for death to be an end.

  For Outham the Old had well and truly lived. Had thought and dreamed and schemed and felt, knew pain, knew joy – perhaps he even loved, for all that kings do not have the luxury of such a thing. But his presence was felt upon the world.

  And now he vanished, just like that. And who could say, in years to come, that he had been at all?

  ‘Cheer up, Merlin.’

  ‘Yes, my lord.’

  Later, they set the place on fire and walk away. They pause on the edge of the wood. The flames lick the night, and sparks shoot up into the heavens.

  ‘I want the word out,’ the king says. ‘Outham’s dead, and Urien of the Hen Ogledd. I want them all, my wizard. Send out word. Of the Six Kings only four remain. I want them gone.’

  And are the Christians right? Merlin wonders. Is there a soul, and does it live on, does it go into the heavens? Or were the Greeks and Romans right instead, and one goes to the underworld? And being of a practical bent of mind, he has to wonder – how does it work, a soul, if such a thing exists? Can it be weighted? Is it located in the body or outside it? Is it an energy like magnets or electricity, of which Thales wrote that they are filled with gods? And had he not been said to have regarded the soul as something endowed with the power of motion, had he not argued that the lodestone has a soul because it moves iron?

  But Merlin doesn’t know the answers to these questions. No one does, he thinks. No one upon this world.

  But there may yet be other worlds than these. Perhaps upon those worlds lived beings who had the answers.

  ‘Yes, my lord,’ he says.

  ‘A thousand gold pieces.’

  ‘Yes, my lord.’

  ‘Bring me their fucking heads!’

  53

  The word goes out, and attempts are made.

  …They do not always work.

  Tor and Lamorak pull the boat up on the jagged rocks. It’s night and freezing in these northern climes. The waves are high. The stars above are bright and cold.

  ‘I’m going to be sick,’ Lamorak says.

  ‘Hold it in, man, for crying out loud!’

  Lamorak throws up on the rocks.

  ‘God damn it!’ Tor says.

  ‘It’s gods, not God,’ Lamorak says. ‘You freaking Christian.’

  ‘There’s but one true God, and his son is Jesus Christ,’ Tor says.

  ‘Where did you pick that nonsense up,’ Lamorak says. He wipes his mouth with his sleeve.

  ‘I’m cold,’ he says.

  ‘Let’s get this over with.’

  ‘Yes, let’s.’

  They draw their knives. Assassins in the night, here in the outer reaches of the Orkney Islands.

  Planted in the sandy ground above the beach is a wooden stick with a skull nailed to it. The skull is human. It grins at the two men.

  ‘Motherfucking Picts.’

  They go around the skull. They creep along in the dark. They come to a village. Dogs bark, but they ignore them. Cooking fires smoulder. The village is asleep. The two men circumnavigate the huts. They follow a small packed dirt road.

  ‘It can’t be far.’

  ‘There!’ Lamorak says. He points. Tor squints. In the dark, under the stars… They see it. A stone house on the cliffs above the sea. The waves pound the shore below. The house is solid and fires burn. They creep along. They melt into the shadows. They are professionals.

  Woooohoooo… a passing formless shadow whispers.

  ‘What was that?’

  ‘What was what?’

  Tor stares from side to side.

  ‘Just the wind.’

  They reach the castle wall. King Lot of Orkney, old geezer that he is, who rules the sea Picts and their northern brood, a man who thinks himself secure here in his wild kingdom, where neither gannets nor great skua tread without his blessing. They say the very land here heeds his word, the Orkney voles obey his every order. The trees don’t sway unless the king commands the breeze to make it so.

  ‘That fucker’s got it coming.’

  His partner nods. They throw a rope and scale the wall. They are professionals.

  Woooohoooo…

  ‘What was that!’

  For just a moment Tor is certain he had seen a ghostly lady pass and smile at him.

  ‘Something I ate, maybe.’

  ‘Don’t get sick on me now.’

  They speak in whispers. The night here is so quiet and somewhere a sea bird cries and Lamorak flinches. But on they go. They come upon a guard and slit his throat before he even wakes. They tiptoe through the courtyard to the house.

  They speak in gestures now.

  Upstairs.

  They creep with knives. They find a room. The door is open.

  They go in.

  The door slams shut behind them.

  In front of them there is another door.

  It opens on to air.

  The castle’s built along the cliff, and here’s a door built into wind and ocean.

  Hello, boys…

  And now the ghostly lady, pale as foam, rises in the doorway. She motions for them, smiling, her long thin fingers ringed in pearls and seaweed. The two men turn. They hammer on the door but it is locked and strong. They turn and turn.

  The lady smiles. The lady beckons.

  Come…

  ‘Our Father, who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name…’ Tor says.

  ‘Jupiter!’ Lamorak screams. He runs at the lady with his knife meant for her heart.

  The lady smiles. The lady opens wide her arms, the better to embrace him. Lamorak screams. Lamorak passes through her ghostly form. Lamorak falls, a small black spot against the whiteness of the foam that rises from the waves.

  His bones break on the jagged rocks. His body sinks beneath the waves. A current under sea picks his bones in whispers.

  The lady turns. The lady smiles.

  ‘Forgive us our trespasses!’ Tor says. ‘As we forgive those who trespass against us!’

  ‘God forgives,’ the woman says. ‘I don’t.’

  She takes on solid form. Her bare feet step lightly into the room from that impossible doorway. She smiles and smiles, and her teeth are like a shark’s, and she is hungry.

  Gently, almost lovingly, she takes Tor in her arms. His useless knife drops to the floor. The lady’s lips caress his skin. Her tongue darts to that pulse of blood under his jaw.

  Her mouth opens wide, and then she feeds.

  *

  But it only takes one to succeed:

  Conan Meriadoc runs through the thick forest on the edge of his estate. His chest is bare and covered in bleeding cuts. His breath heaves. He is barefoot. His eyes are large and the pupils dilated.

  Where is it? Where is the thing that hunts the mightiest of all the kings?

  He jumps at shadows. He shies away from roots. Strange nameless creatures slither in the dark away from him.

  How had it come to this?

  Blurred memories. His troop of men, a raid on one of Arthur’s villages. They slaughtered the lot of them and burned the place and stole what they could. Drinking later in their meeting place, Conan was merry, a suckling pig cooked on the spit, there was a heavy smoke, it tasted sweet…

  There was a woman. Smiling, gesturing. Saying something, but he couldn’t really hear.

  Then pleasure.

  Then pain.

  Then darkness.

  When he woke it was to the sight of his men dead, and the thing vanished. But he knew it was there. Some sort of shape-shifting demon-knight.

  So he ran.

  *

  Conan Meriadoc, that mightiest of kings, runs through the dark forest. High overhead the shape of his predator watches. I
t is some sort of shape-shifting demon. Dressed all in black and wearing a mask on its face. The figure leaps from branch to branch and tree to tree, lightly. It makes no sound. It watches Conan Meriadoc as he stumbles. The king stands blindly in the forest, amidst the trees. He looks from side to side.

  The predatory knight nocks an arrow and fires. It whispers through the air. It hits Meriadoc in the thigh.

  The king hollers in pain.

  He hobbles away. He has his sword in his hand. He won’t go down easy. He screams and he curses. ‘I’ve killed babes in their mothers’s arms and dragons’s brood and things that have no earthly name and I yet live! I am Conan Meriadoc son of Conrad son of Khong, and there is no man alive who can defeat me!’

  The knight high in the trees merely nocks another arrow, lets it fly.

  Conan falls to the ground, the arrow through his shoulder.

  ‘Show yourself, you coward!’

  The knight drops lightly from the tree. It stalks towards the fallen king. It stands above him. Removes its mask.

  ‘Men,’ Isolde says. She smiles.

  ‘Oh fuck—’ from Conan Meriadoc. He tries to crawl away. He can’t. ‘Oh, fuck, oh fuck, oh fuuuu—’

  *

  When it is done there’s just another carcass left to rot. It is the fate of men and women both, of rats and snakes and ants and bees, and all that lives on land, in air, or deep under the sea.

  Isolde does collect her arrows. ‘You piece of shit,’ she says, and crouches there, and urinates upon the fallen monarch. She gathers up her garment and departs.

  ‘The king is dead,’ she says. The quiet secret creatures of the forest watch her pass.

  ‘Long live the king.’

  54

  ‘Well?’ Arthur says.

  ‘’Tis done, my lord.’

  ‘Give a thousand gold coins to Isolde, then, and my thanks.’

  ‘Yes, my lord.’

  ‘What of Lot?’

  ‘He lives still.’

  ‘That old fucker!’

  ‘He has magical protection, sire.’

  ‘Raise the bounty, Merlin. Fifteen hundred gold on all their heads, and two on Leir. I want them gone and buried.’

  ‘Yes, lord.’

  They’re standing outside the keep of Tintagel.

  Arthur is quiet then.

  Merlin keeps a respectful distance.

  ‘She’s there?’ Arthur says at last. A tone of voice so soft it’s hard to bear.

  ‘Yes, lord. And I have not been back since you were born.’

  ‘Merlin, I…’

  But he does not complete the thought.

  ‘Wait here,’ he says.

  ‘Yes, lord.’

  The wizard watches as his king strides to the bridge that links the land to Tintagel. The castle rises on its island much as he remembers it, for all that last time he went was as a stork – or was it as some other bird?

  He wishes most devoutly to accompany the king. As Arthur’s power grows it produces a delirious effect on Merlin. The taste of it has gone from smoky beer to fine aged wine from vanished Rome. It is intoxicating.

  And this meeting!

  ‘Oh, Merlin, it’s you.’

  ‘Isolde.’

  ‘Is he happy?’

  ‘He is satisfied. There is your coin.’

  ‘And thank you kindly, wizard boy.’ She weighs the money and grins. ‘Guess old Isolde can retire now.’

  ‘You will not follow Guinevere?’

  The woman shrugs. ‘She’s made her bargain. I would not wish to be a queen and put up with that asshole.’

  ‘That asshole is your king.’

  ‘Your king, Merlin. Just remember to wash your hands after you jerk him off.’

  She laughs.

  ‘Be well, Isolde, and goodbye.’

  ‘Can’t say as I’ll miss you. What’s in that castle, anyway?’

  ‘A woman.’

  ‘Already he is straying? They haven’t even sealed the deal yet, Guinevere and him.’

  But Merlin’s barely listening. Remembers that night, so long ago and yet only a moment past. The woman and the baby, and how she looked when he gently took the child away.

  ‘Not that kind of woman,’ he says; but he does not elaborate, and mercifully Isolde doesn’t ask.

  Enjoy your gold, he thinks.

  *

  It is late at night when Arthur returns, and the milky-white moon shines down on the graceful towers and the narrow curving bridge. He walks alone, and what he thinks nobody knows but him.

  His wizard meets him on the land.

  ‘My lord?’

  ‘Yes,’ Arthur says. ‘Yes.’

  But it is clear he isn’t listening.

  Tomorrow, then, the wizard thinks.

  And he remembers the lady Igraine, and how she looked at him, and said not a word when he took her child.

  It was for the best, he thinks.

  The moon shines down on the black water.

  And Merlin sees the vision of a ship with white sails under dark clouds, a storm on the horizon. Sea spray and a bird crying. Sailing towards a distant shore.

  ‘What was my father like, Merlin?’

  The question catches the wizard by surprise.

  ‘My lord?’

  ‘My father. What was he like?’

  ‘What would you have me say about him, lord? What? Would you have me say he was a kind man? He was a wise man? He had plans?’ Merlin rubs his hands together. He is suddenly cold. ‘That he had wisdom? Bullshit, man! He could be terrible. He could be mean. He was a man as men are of this world. He lived and died by force alone.’

  ‘Yes,’ Arthur says. He stares across the water at the Castle Tintagel. ‘Well, good night, Merlin.’

  ‘Good night, sire.’

  Merlin watches the king walk away. He stares at the dark sea, and thinks dark, watery thoughts.

  *

  And some slip through the cracks:

  ‘What manner of a thing are you?’ King Lot inquires.

  ‘A jester, sir, by name of Dagonet.’

  ‘A clown?’

  ‘My lord, I can perform the ball and cups exquisitely, make coins and scarves appear at will and vanish, I know the dirtiest of jokes in seven languages including Aramaic, and I have mastered both the wet leaf slip and falling on my bottom.’

  The king yawns.

  ‘Is that it?’

  ‘I can juggle five balls in the air.’

  ‘I’ll have your balls if you don’t entertain me.’

  The jester looks at the king with a faint smile. Lot is old, and he sits on his hard throne and his women of the water around him. They look at the jester and lick their lips.

  ‘Tell us a joke, then, little man.’

  ‘This is from Greece,’ Dagonet says. ‘A man goes to the philosopher and says, “Sir, I am ill. I cannot lie down and I cannot stand up. I can’t even sit.” The philosopher looks at him and says, “Then I guess the only thing left is to hang yourself!”’

  Dagonet looks expectantly at the old king. Lot stares at him. His mouth twitches. Then he starts to laugh.

  He laughs and he laughs, his beard shakes and his stomach rolls, until tears come to his face. His women of the water smile politely, then fade back into the sea. The king summons the jester, ‘Come! Come!’ and Dagonet prances to the throne. The king shoves a goblet of wine into the little jester’s hand. The jester drinks.

  No one sees when the tip of his little finger, smeared with a certain kind of fine powder, trails along the inside of the cup before he hands it back.

  The jester prances. The jester juggles. The jester tells lewd jokes. Later, the little man slips away into the night with his pockets heavy.

  Later still, the king begins to foam about the mouth.

  *

  ‘Motherfucker!’ Morgause says.

  Morgan le Fay smiles faintly. ‘Troubling news, dearest one?’

  They are sitting in the solarium of the House of High D
udgeon, in the fairy realm. They’re drinking hot mint water and nibble delicately on biscuits.

  ‘They did for Lot, and I was backing him.’

  Morgan shrugs. ‘The man was old. He was always a long shot.’

  ‘That useless old tosser. That’s years of work down the shitter.’

  ‘Language, dear Morgause!’

  ‘Oh, fuck off, Morgan.’

  Morgause folds her hands over her stomach. She is heavy with child. She smirks at Morgan, who pretends to ignore her. Let Morgause play the long game if she wants. The babe’s not even born yet.

  ‘Is it a g—’

  ‘A boy.’

  ‘You know for certain, then?’

  ‘I have a fairly good idea.’

  Morgan mulls this over. Morgause sips her drink. She smacks her lips.

  ‘So who is left, then?’ Morgan says.

  ‘Yder and Leir.’

  ‘It would be only a concession,’ Morgan says. ‘Even if Arthur wins all their territories there are the incumbents to consider.’

  ‘Angles, Saxons, Jutes!’ Morgause says derisively. ‘Their kings are dogs and the rest of them are fleas upon the flesh of Britain. I would not piss on them to put out a fire.’

  ‘Pregnancy has made you ever more pleasant…’ Morgan says.

  ‘…Fuck you.’

  They sit companionably and sip their drinks while the giant multicoloured caterpillars frolic in the gardens outside under the canopy of plants that have no earthly name.

  *

  And sometimes the days make for strange bedfellows:

  ‘Ulfius.’

  The knight turns, startled. It is night, under the stars, a clearing in a forest, somewhere outside Londinium. He’s come alone, and he is armed, for all that arms are useless here where he is bound.

  ‘King Leir. I did not hear you come.’

  ‘I watched you,’ he says. ‘What news, then?’

  Ulfius shrugs, uncomfortable. ‘The bounty on your head has been increased again.’

  Leir smiles, but tightly. ‘How much is it now?’

  ‘Four thousand gold coins, and land.’

  ‘Land, now, is it?’ Leir considers. ‘Anyone specific?’

  ‘Half the knights in the realm are hunting for you, lord, and every halfwit with a kitchen knife and dreams of glory.’

  ‘Village idiots and Londinium curs I can handle, Ulfius.’