By Force Alone

by Lavie Tidhar

  ‘Then what is it you fear?’

  ‘I fear nothing.’

  But Ulfius sees in some surprise that Leir’s uncomfortable. The man is rattled, at long last, he realises. He’d underestimated Arthur once again.

  ‘You thought you’d have him at the Council of Six,’ he says. ‘And you were wrong. You thought you’d have him shortly after, and you were wrong again. If I were you I’d start to think of making peace or running.’

  ‘It is too late for peace,’ Leir says, ‘and I do not intend to run.’

  ‘Then what, lord?’

  But when he looks again, King Leir is gone.

  *

  ‘They will come back at you, and hard,’ Merlin says.

  ‘I know that, wizard,’ Arthur says in mild irritation.

  ‘Leir has at least one man of ours giving him information.’

  ‘To be expected, really,’ Arthur says.

  ‘My lord… this star stone business—’

  ‘It can wait.’

  ‘I worry.’

  ‘You always worry, Merlin. You should eat something.’

  The wizard licks his lips. What sustenance he craves cannot be found in bread or cheese or apples. The king must know this.

  ‘Besides, they will have to find me first.’

  Merlin looks at his king. Arthur has always been wiry, but now he seems like a taut string, playing a single deep note. They move each night, from place to place, in secret. Visiting their troops and monitoring the battle that’s still raging. Consolidating the dead kings’ lands will take some doing, there’s need for proper administration, census taking, effective tax control. The villagers will always try to hide their extra rations, unlicensed gambling dens and brothels still proliferate, the mines are under constant threat from robbers – damned freelancers!

  ‘It will all work out, Merlin. You worry too much.’

  They’ll need a proper capital, and soon, the wizard thinks. A central seat of power.

  For a moment he lets his mind run wild, imagines a glimmering city to which the brightest minds of the realm are inexorably drawn – scribes, alchemists, natural philosophers! He dreams of a library to rival Alexandria’s, dreams of a place where rationality can once more flourish.

  Then he looks at his king and the dream dies. Arthur is many things, but he is not inclined to wonder at the wonder of the world.

  Well, you’ve made your choice, he thinks, so stick with it. There’s little point in playing games of ifs and could-have-beens. The game’s the game – same as it ever was.

  ‘My lord,’ he says, in acquiescence.

  *

  The attack comes three nights later on the shores of the Irish Sea. Three long boats filled with shadowy assassins. The Irish never felt the wrath of Rome and see themselves superior to Britons.

  Leir of the Ridings always had an understanding with the savages across the water. Now they come, and steal onto the land. And how did they know where to find King Arthur?

  Merlin watches them from the branches of a tree, high above the shore. Leir has his informants, that’s not in dispute. The assassins steal towards the camp.

  ‘Now,’ Merlin whispers.

  On cue, lit arrows flame across the sky. The camp’s a dummy and a death trap, it’s filled with hay and kindling and wood. The fire takes hold and in an instant blooms to life. It snatches hungrily at the invaders. It hugs their flesh and roasts their bones, it catches playfully in their hair. The men scream. They run like torches. A few die in the sea.

  Later, three boats are pushed from shore towards Hibernia. They’re piled high with corpses. Away from shore the flaming arrows fly again. Now three long boats on fire sail back towards their source.

  Merlin watches from the shore. A warning and a premonition to those devils out in Eire-land.

  Your time will come.

  *

  And sometimes, they just get the wrong man:

  ‘There he goes! There, d’you see him? It’s freaking Leir, Lord of the Ridings!’

  ‘It can’t be, Hywel, surely you are mistaken – hello, who’s that? I dare say you might be right, for once!’

  ‘Let’s get him, boys!’

  They stir from their shelter up on the hill. The Llanfairpwllgwyngyll Lads of Mary’s Hollow, rough and ready, mount their horses, grab their swords and thunder down under, giving chase.

  The man turns, sees them. He is of middle age, has all his teeth, a good head of hair and wears nice clothes, and he’s alone. He spurs his horse and flees.

  ‘After him, boys!’

  ‘String him up!’

  ‘We’ll be rich!’

  The man’s horse isn’t suited for a long excursion. The men surround him quickly. They grab and pull him off his horse. They stand around him as he lies there on the ground.

  ‘Thought you could get away from us, Lord Leir?’

  ‘Nothing passes by the likely lads of Llanfairpwllgwyngyll!’

  He stares at them in hurt confusion. ‘I don’t know what you mean, please, this is a mistake!’

  They laugh at him. ‘You northern fool! You thought your northern magic would protect you from the Lads? Round here, friend, we are the law!’

  ‘Please, let me go!’

  But they do not, of course. They torture him a little, just for fun, and then they chop his head off with their dull-edged swords so that it takes a while for the man to die. But die he does, and that’s another for the tally, and it is only when they carry round the disembodied head to those who take the count that it is made clear to them, in no uncertain terms, what bloody idiots they are.

  They’re lucky to get out with their lives.

  *

  This happens more and more, and meanwhile skirmishes continue between Arthur’s knights and Conan’s holdouts and Outham’s remaining Franks and Leir’s Brigantes. There are so many tribes fighting so many factions that Merlin’s hand-drawn maps keep changing daily.

  In truth, he is sick of the whole damn thing.

  But months later they’re still turning up bodies.

  55

  A nobody by the name of Tristan improbably gets Yder with a spear to the belly. An inglorious end to an inglorious bastard.

  Tristan collects his gold and, when he comes to court, encounters Isolde, who’s been hanging round. The two – so Merlin gathers – promptly fall in love, if fucking behind the kitchen counts as love, then pool together their fortune and take off to Gaul to fight giants. At least that’s one love story that ends happily, Merlin, the romantic, thinks.

  Which leaves only King Leir…

  *

  Two months later Arthur narrowly avoids a lone assassin wielding a sort of curved sword of a form unfamiliar in Britannia. Merlin concludes it is of an eastern origin, but who the man was, or how he came here, is unknown. Some hired assassin brought over from beyond the sea at great expense. They bury him in an unmarked grave, but strange stories begin to circulate not long after. A spring erupts in the burial place, and its water is said to heal the sick and wounded. A small temple is built on site and pilgrims start to travel there. Later, the temple is destroyed in a mysterious fire, and a Christian church is built in its place. Small hostelries open to accommodate the travellers. In time, a city flourishes.

  *

  ‘How about here?’ Merlin says.

  They stand in a temperate valley. Surveyors, recruited from the old Dolaucothi mines, are busy taking measures.

  ‘We could run Roman-style sewers all along here, public baths here and here, there’s a ready supply of water from the nearby river, good defensive positions on the peaks all round, we could put your palace right over there, put a forum over there, plenty of access to local produce, we could – Arthur, are you even listening to me?’

  ‘What? Yeah, whatever. I suppose.’

  ‘Do you even like the place?’

  ‘I’m not a builder, Merlin.’

  ‘We can’t use Londinium indefinitely. Too open, too rebellious. Yo
u need a base, lord. A place to call your own.’

  ‘I have Dinas Emrys.’

  ‘Too far.’

  ‘Tintagel, then.’

  ‘And what of your mother?’

  ‘Damn it, Merlin. Then do as you will with this place.’

  ‘Lord, could I—?’

  ‘No libraries!’

  Merlin sighs.

  ‘My lord,’ he says.

  Arthur stalks off. He doesn’t build, he doesn’t read, he wields a sword and kills without compunction and therefore he is king. And he will take this damned forsaken island with its thousands of squabbling tribes and lordlings and make something of it if he has to destroy it in the process.

  A shared identity, Merlin thinks. A story to unify all these warring tales, so that Britons now and in centuries to come could tell each other that they share a thing. That they are one. And to be one, as Arthur understands implicitly, you must be defined against an other.

  Whether the stories have any truth to them whatsoever matters not in the least.

  ‘I’ll call you Camelot,’ Merlin says, and he looks fondly on the valley and on his surveyors. Yes… It’s empty now, but soon he’ll bring in carpenters and diggers and bricklayers. They’ll dig the foundations and ensure latrines are built to his exact specifications, and where that clump of trees now stands will soon be the beginning of the castle. They’d need lots of rooms for all the knights – and sparring fields, and stables for the horses, and inns and hostelries and theatres and, and… For a moment he lets himself dare to dream.

  ‘Camelot…’ he breathes.

  Yes. He likes the sound of it. He likes it very much indeed.

  *

  A riverboat filled with mercenaries narrowly misses Arthur on his way east and rams the wrong contingent of knights. The would-be assassins are promptly slaughtered by Agravain of the Hard Hand and his men. The few survivors are tortured for information, but they have none that is useful to impart, other than that Leir had sent them.

  *

  ‘Ulfius?’

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘Don’t move.’

  He feels the cold blade on the skin of his throat.

  ‘Who are you?’ he says.

  ‘Name’s Lancelot. Could you tell me where to find King Leir? If you wouldn’t mind.’

  ‘He’ll kill me.’

  ‘That strikes me as less immediate, somehow… Try not to swallow.’

  ‘You’re right,’ the other concedes.

  ‘Well, then?’

  ‘There is a hidden valley some miles from here, where the stream vanishes underground. I have been there once before. Look for a stunted black tree to mark the passageway. But you will never make it through alive.’

  ‘I’ll worry about that, not you.’

  ‘Lancelot?’

  ‘…Yes?’

  ‘Can you loosen the blade? I feel it is cutting into my skin.’

  ‘Is this better?’

  ‘Yes. Thank you.’

  ‘What is it like, serving two masters?’

  ‘…Miserable.’

  ‘What will you do now?’

  ‘It occurs to me a life on the continent might be more suitable for my constitution at present.’

  ‘That might be wise.’

  ‘I will go on pilgrimage. I long to see the Holy Land, and those places where the Saviour stepped on the way of the cross.’

  ‘Jerusalem’s a bit of a shithole, you know.’

  Lancelot releases him. Ulfius massages his throat. He grimaces.

  ‘Thanks.’

  ‘Go far from here,’ Lancelot says. ‘One can still purchase passage to Gaul from the occasional trader, maybe even go farther than that. If you make it to Judea… Hell, I don’t know. It’s swarming with Christians now. You’ll be right at home.’

  ‘Thanks,’ Ulfius says. But when he glances for his attacker, Lancelot is gone.

  *

  The stunted black tree is right there where he told him. Lancelot finds the hidden passage and follows it, through thickets and brambles, until he finds a narrow twisting dirt path that takes him to a hillside. He beholds the valley. Down below, though cunningly disguised, he can see Leir’s castle. It appears the ruins of a building, with weeds and blackberry bushes growing from the riverbank to mask the brickwork, but Lancelot’s not fooled. It’s well maintained in its disguise, and any moment he expects to find the secret guards who must protect this hideout…

  He finds one, slumped against a tree. The man’s head rests upon his chest. Lancelot gently lifts it up, and sees the throat’s been cut neatly.

  Oh, shit.

  A soft rustling overhead, and something drops behind him, smooth as silk. He turns with his hand on the hilt of Secace.

  ‘Don’t even think about it, Lancelot.’

  ‘Iblis,’ he says, disgusted.

  He hates to admit that she always had the better of him.

  She smiles. The moonlight wreathes her in white. Her eyes are black. Her hands are bloodied.

  ‘If you’re here for the bounty you’re a little late.’

  ‘You?’

  She shrugs. ‘Girl gotta eat.’

  ‘You fuck.’

  ‘And I figured you’d be coming round sooner or later.’

  ‘This kill was mine!’

  She shrugs.

  He takes a half step back. Pauses. Raises his hand from his sword, palm open, extended.

  ‘You want to play it like that?’ she says.

  She crouches. Lancelot moves his hand up and to the side. Iblis raises hers, breathes evenly. They stare at each other. They don’t move. This lasts for a minute.

  ‘It’s not too late to walk.’

  ‘It’s been too late for us for a very long time, Lancelot.’

  ‘Iblis…’

  ‘Hush. Let us do this.’

  After another minute she takes a tiny step to the left. Lancelot mirrors her. He lowers his hand. She matches him.

  ‘Really, this is ridic—’

  Their blades flash simultaneously.

  ‘Oh.’

  ‘Oh.’

  Lancelot looks down with some surprise at the naked blade protruding from his side.

  It doesn’t hurt. It doesn’t hurt at all.

  ‘Huh,’ Iblis says. She pulls Secace out of her own side. A trickle of blood emerges from the small, neat wound, and she dams it with her hand.

  ‘You seem to have missed any vital organs.’

  ‘You, too.’

  Lancelot pulls Iblis’s blade out. It hurts, but he’s still alive. The wound, like hers, is neat and contained. He tosses her back the sword. She grimaces and lets go of Secace, which comes flying back into Lancelot’s hand.

  ‘Pass me those leaves? They look clean.’

  ‘…Pass that shred of cloth? Should tie it up nicely.’

  When they’re done and the wounds are bound they look awkwardly at each other.

  ‘Well, do you want to try it again?’

  ‘Not really.’

  ‘Is Leir actually dead?’

  ‘Have you ever known me not to finish a job?’

  ‘I can’t say that I have, Iblis.’

  ‘I go by Sebile now, actually.’

  ‘Whatever.’

  They stare at each other.

  ‘So?’

  ‘So fuck off, Lancelot. I’m off to get my bounty and then retire.’

  ‘Retire, Iblis? You’ll run through the cash in two or three years and be back on the road again before you know it.’

  ‘Dream on, lover boy.’

  He shrugs casually. Then winces from the wound. Reaches into a hidden pocket, and comes out with a much folded piece of parchment, which he holds.

  ‘What’s that?’

  ‘Oh, nothing.’

  ‘Lancelot… I don’t have patience for your shit.’

  ‘It’s a map,’ he says.

  ‘A map of what?’

  ‘The grail…’

  ‘Come off it, you ass. Yo
u think I care about that? I have a good thing guaranteed, here.’

  ‘Suit yourself. But that’s a lot of gold just sitting there…’

  ‘Supposedly.’

  ‘The master said all gold comes from the sky.’

  ‘The master said a lot of stupid shit.’

  ‘Aren’t you curious?’

  ‘You’re grasping, Lancelot.’

  ‘Then walk away,’ he says.

  She stares at him. And Lancelot remembers once, when he was yet an awkward boy not yet a man, the master took him to the shores of Sheba where they trained, and taught him to catch fish. It was a long and boring afternoon, and nothing happened, and the master taught him how one must wait on the line, wait for a gentle tug, the pull that indicates a fish is nibbling.

  But he knew just as well that Iblis had the same knowing as him.

  ‘In good time,’ she says; and he tries not to give away that tiny jump of victory he feels.

  ‘So where have you been all this time? I had an inkling you would follow where I went.’

  ‘Don’t flatter yourself, Iblis. I went after the grail, same as you.’

  ‘I know plenty of the grail,’ she says. ‘Leir had his contacts.’

  ‘With the Aetheling of Deira?’ Lancelot says. He sees her surprise. ‘Oh, I’ve done my work, Iblis. This map’s no fake. For a year I scouted up and down this dismal island and to the farthest reaches of the north, where things get… weird. And I know your Leir never set foot behind the wall.’

  ‘He did like to work through intermediaries,’ she concedes.

  ‘I was there,’ he says. He doesn’t tell her of the things he saw. Mutatio and a land burned black, a pool of green, fused glass, polluted rivers, ailing birds, a coin that spun and spun and broke to poisoned dust in his hand.

  Perhaps she sees it in his eyes.

  ‘How bad is it?’ she says.

  ‘It’s bad.’

  She considers.

  ‘Lancelot, you have aroused my curiosity.’

  He knows her, better than he knows himself. It’s not the lust for gold that drives her, not entirely. Iblis, he knows, has got the questing bug.

  And how she’d love to lord it over them! The old fools of the Inner Circle of the Venerated Secret Brotherhood of the Seekers of the Grail! ‘Brotherhood’, he thinks. It always rankled with Iblis. There were some women members of the order but few and far between and, like the men, all mad. But still.