by K. M. Shea
Sir Kay was silent for a few moments. “Well done today,” he finally said.
Britt grinned. “Thanks. It has certainly given me a lot to think about.”
The horizon was barely pink with dawn when Britt arose the following day. Few of the knights were up, and those that were spared Britt no second glance as she walked to the edge of their camp, gazing in the direction of Camelgrance.
“What is on your mind, King Arthur?” King Pellinore asked, clamping a giant hand on Britt’s shoulder.
“Please, just Arthur,” Britt said with a weak smile. “My knights will not budge on calling me ‘my lord,’ but you are a fellow king.”
King Pellinore nodded. “Very well, but only if you extend the same rule to me. What is it that weighs you down, Arthur? You have been thoughtful since your return yesterday.”
“I have never interacted much with King Leodegrance. Ywain and Gawain both gave me…unfavorable reports of him yesterday.”
“That worries you?”
“It does. I feel foolish saying it, but I always thought of my allies and me as being honorable.”
“Righteous?”
“I suppose so, yes. I find it discomforting that one of my allies might not be a very good person,” Britt said, turning to look at the older king. “You are not allies with King Leodegrance. Why?”
King Pellinore hooked his thumbs on the belt of his tunic. “Anglesey is far north of Leodegrance's lands. There’s never been a reason to be allies. But even if he had asked, I would be reluctant to accept an offer of friendship from him.”
“Why?”
“As far as kings go, Leodegrance isn’t such a bad fellow. He’s no fool. He sees that his people are fed and that his army is provided for. But he lacks the courage to push back enemy forces. He bends easily and would rather have an ally help him than stand on his own.”
“Like when King Ryence attacked him. King Ban and Bors and a company of my own men saved him,” Britt said.
“That sounds like Leodegrance, yes.”
Britt sighed, and King Pellinore once again rested a hand on Britt’s shoulder. “He’s not evil, Arthur. He’s just greedy.”
“I see.”
“Perhaps you should take a look at him, and judge his conduct for yourself,” King Pellinore suggested. “When again will you have a chance to see him, unguarded and unaware of your presence?”
Britt nodded thoughtfully. “Thank you for your advice, Pellinore.”
King Pellinore shrugged. “You’re a great king, Arthur. Certainly you are a better king than I. Listen to your gut,” he suggested before striding back into the camp.
Britt thoughtfully scratched her cheek. “Judge for myself, huh,” she muttered. “I cannot stand with a man who isn’t good,” Britt finally said.
None of the barely conscious knights paid much attention when Britt returned to her bedroll to collect Excalibur. She set off from camp at a walk, and by the time she reached Camelgrance the sun was a disk on the horizon.
Britt entered the castle and made her way to the keep. The inner courtyard buzzed with activity. Servants swarmed like worker ants, carrying supplies in and out. They moved at an almost frenzied pace. Grooms stacked hay high in the stables and double the guards patrolled the castle walls as the day before.
After kicking up her heels for fifteen minutes, Britt realized how stupid her plan was. “Just because I show up there is no guarantee that Leodegrance is going to go off on a hunt or something, and I am not venturing into the keep without backup,” Britt muttered as she left the inner courtyard. “I was an idiot for coming here without telling anyone. Merlin is going to kill me if Kay doesn’t throw me into a dungeon first.”
Someone on the castle walls blew a horn, and Britt leaped out of the main road to avoid a heavily loaded wagon pulled by a team of oxen. A farmer and his family scurried at the wagon’s side, and Britt realized with unease that a great deal of people and animals from the farm land surrounding Camelgrance were pouring into the castle.
Britt ran the remaining distance to the castle gatehouse, dodging goats, chickens, and people. Fear curdled her blood when she saw that the gate portcullis—a wooden and metal grille—was down, blocking all traffic. A squad of soldiers was stationed around the portcullis and gatehouse. One of the soldiers blew a horn again.
“No,” Britt breathed as she lunged forward, pushing her way through the crowd of people gathered near the entrance.
Through the narrow window the portcullis provided, Britt could see a small squad of mounted knights, bearing a flag with a coat of arms Britt did not recognize.
One knight stood separate from the rest. He rode a red roan horse and carried a heavy looking lance and a shield.
A racket arose behind Britt.
“Make way for the King!”
“Move. Step aside.”
A man Britt vaguely recognized galloped up to the portcullis, pulling his horse to a halt at the last moment. A troop of guards accompanied him, but it wasn’t until the knight on the red roan horse outside spoke that Britt recognized him.
“King Leodegrance, you are wise to cower behind your gates,” the knight shouted.
“What brings you to my doors so early and dressed for war, oh great Duke Maleagant?” King Leodegrance said.
“I am here to learn if you are a friend, or a foe,” the knight on the red roan horse said. Assumedly he was Duke Maleagant based on King Leodegrance’s greeting.
“Oh?” King Leodegrance said.
“Indeed. If you are a friend I shall put aside my weapons and we will feast together, toasting a blessed companionship,” the duke said.
“But certainly we are friends,” King Leodegrance said, nodding.
“If that is so, you will give me your daughter Guinevere as my wife,” Duke Maleagant said.
King Leodegrance didn’t even pause to think. “Absolutely, I would be much honored to call you my son-in-law.”
“In addition you will grant me the lands that she will inherit from her mother,” Duke Maleagant said.
King Leodegrance paused, a fat frown spreading on his face.
“I will give you two days to decide if we are friends or foes. If, at the end of those days, you decide we are friends we will put this matter aside and prepare a wedding feast. If, at the end of the two days, we are foes I shall march against Camelgrance with the army I have brought to the borders of your lands.”
“My daughter Guinevere has many admirers, what do I tell them?” King Leodegrance asked, squeezing the reins of his horse’s bridle.
Duke Maleagant laughed. “If any man so deeply loves Guinevere that he dares to fight on her behalf, he may challenge me at the end of the two days. When he loses I will kill him.”
“And if he wins?” King Leodegrance asked, perking up.
“No man can hope to win against me in combat. But should such a thing come about, I will leave these lands and relinquish all my demands. Now, I will wait the agreed upon two days. Make your decision, king,” Maleagant said before he wheeled his horse around and rode off.
His companion knights did not follow him. Instead they dismounted and started sliding gear off their horses, settling in and setting up camp
“The gates remain closed,” King Leodegrance said to the soldiers before he too turned his horse around and rode back to the castle keep.
The crowd dispersed and even the soldiers returned to their patrols and their positions. Only Britt remained, staring at the portcullis and knights that separated her from her men.
Britt was trapped.
Chapter 4
Trapped
Britt sat on the edge of a fountain inside the castle gardens. Excalibur lay balanced on her lap, and she placed her hand upon it, as if stroking a cat or dog.
She was in trouble.
If King Leodegrance agreed to ally himself with Maleagant the castle would open and Britt would be free to return to her companions. However, Maleagant (and King Ryence) would likely march up
on Camelot as soon as he was married to Guinevere.
If King Leodegrance grew a spine and said no, Britt would be locked in the castle when Maleagant laid siege to it. If she was lucky Merlin would figure out where she was and bring an army from Camelot. If she was not lucky…
“The best scenarios involve war for my people,” Britt said, clenching her hands into fists. “I don’t want that.”
Her only hope was for a champion to fight Maleagant on Guinevere’s behalf. “Where is that priggish Lancelot when you need him?” Britt grumbled.
“Oh,” said a feminine voice.
Britt looked up to find a ladies maid, the same ladies maid who chased the white cat and helped her look for the Round Table the day before. “Good morning to you, My Lady,” Britt said, rallying a smile for the girl’s sake.
The young lady’s eyes grew large and she clasped a hand to her chest. Without a word she turned and ran, her skirts flapping as she disappeared into the castle.
“And now I frighten females. Wonderful,” Britt said. She sighed and leaned back, closing her eyes and listening to the fountain bubble at her back as she considered her options.
Britt was almost dosing—insomnia makes for great morning and mid day naps—when she was again jarred from her thoughts.
“See!”
“My word, it’s true.”
Britt opened her eyes to the ladies maid, who stood with a lavishly dressed young maiden. She had reddish blonde hair that was artfully arranged in a complex braid, wide eyes, and a smile that said she was exactly aware how beautiful she was. She was a little older than the ladies maid, but certainly not more than 17 or 18.
Britt instantly recognized her, even though she had seen her only once before with Merlin. This teenage girl was the infamous Guinevere. Britt knew because she had burned her image in her mind as someone to distrust and dislike.
“I thought my luck was bad to bring Lancelot to my courts, but to encounter both of them in the same week? Wretched,” Britt grumbled.
“Are you an Elf King?” Guinevere asked.
Merlin would throttle her if he learned she had treated the daughter of a king with disrespect. So Britt flattened her lips and arranged her expression into one of amusement. “Although I am often asked that question I can tell you with certainty, I am not.”
“A faerie lord then?”
“No, I am not that either.”
“But surely you must be. I have never before met one so striking as you,” Guinevere persisted.
Britt didn’t understand why people insisted she was so comely—she was not gorgeous after all—and shrugged. “That reveals more about the people you have met than it does of me,” Britt said, standing and strapping Excalibur to her belt.
Guinevere approached Britt and extended a hand.
Britt caught her by the wrist when she almost touched Britt’s face. “What are you doing?”
Guinevere gazed up at Britt. “I am staring into the face of the noblest man in Britain.”
Britt smiled again to keep from laughing. Guinevere sounded like a lovesick high school girl. If this was her character it was no surprise she eventually fell for Lancelot. “I regret to inform you, but you do not,” Britt said, dropping Guinevere’s arm and backing away.
“How can you say that?” Guinevere said, batting her thick eyelashes at Britt.
Britt was not impressed. “Because I apparently have met more men than you have and know better. If you will excuse me, My Lady.”
“You leave?”
“I do.”
“How can you?”
“Quite easily, I assure you.”
Tears welled up in Guinevere’s eyes. “Will you not give me a token to remember you by?”
Britt frowned. “You’re nuts aren’t you?” she said before recovering and adopting the proper words. “Forgive me, My Lady, but we have met for but a few moments. What is there to remember?”
“A pure love that began on a spring morn,” Guinevere said. Her tears began to flow, and Britt was still unmoved. She was about to tell Guinevere so when another ladies maid scrambled into the gardens.
“My Lady, your father the King calls for you,” the ladies maid said.
Guinevere’s tears dried. “He what?” she asked, her forehead creasing with an emotion Britt couldn’t put her finger on.
“He summons you, and desires to speak with you and your honorable mother,” the ladies maid said.
No one noticed as Britt started to edge away.
Guinevere looked down and stared at the garden path.
“I wish you well, Lady Guinevere,” Britt said, safely on the other side of the fountain. She bowed and fled, not taking the chance to look over her shoulder to see the ladies’ reaction.
She had a bad feeling she knew why King Leodegrance was calling Guinevere.
“As shallow as she is, I don’t think any girl deserves to be stuck with Duke Maleagant,” Britt said, ducking into the courtyard.
She walked past the stables and yelped when someone grabbed her and dragged her inside.
Britt grappled for Excalibur as a hand covered her mouth.
“I ought to kill you, you stupid lass,” a rough voice hissed into her ear.
Britt looked up, and to her surprise found herself standing eye to eye with Merlin.
“Merlin?” Britt said, her words muffled by his hand.
“Yes,” Merlin said, removing his hand.
“Merlin! Finally, something is going right.” Britt said, throwing her arms around the wizard and leaning into him.
“No thanks to your hard work,” Merlin wryly said, although he fixed an arm around her waist and patted the back of her head.
Britt sagged against Merlin’s chest, breathing in the woodsy scent of his robe. Merlin was warm and steady. Even better, with Merlin around Britt knew she would be safe.
Merlin pressed his cheek to her head for a brief moment. Britt felt him stiffen, and he abruptly pushed her back. “See here, now. If someone sees us there will be questions we cannot answer,” he said, shaking out his robe before leading the way down the stable aisle. They ducked out a far door, joining a crowd of farmers who were grimly setting up camps in the castle courtyard.
“How did you know I would be here?” Britt asked.
“King Pellinore. When Kay discovered you were missing this morning he told us he might know where you ran off to,” Merlin said. “Gawain, Lancelot. I found him.”
The two knights were standing in the shadows of a wall. They both looked up when Britt and Merlin approached them.
“My Lord,” Gawain bowed.
“I am glad you have been found, My Lord,” Lancelot declared.
Britt ignored the foreign knight’s greeting. “Hello Gawain. Did the three of you make it into Camelgrance before the portcullis closed for Maleagant?” Britt asked.
“No,” Merlin said. “We saw Maleagant issue his warning to King Leodegrance though.”
Britt frowned. “If you didn’t get in before, how did you make it inside?”
Gawain looked queasy. “Magic,” he said.
“Merlin is quite the impressive wizard,” Lancelot added, for once somewhat subdued.
“Indeed. I was going to bring Sir Kay and Gawain with me, but at the last minute Lancelot pushed Kay back just before I finished the spell to get us through—King Pellinore was holding back Ywain as he was hotly demanding he come with—getting the spell cast on him. So I had no choice but to bring Lancelot in Kay’s place,” Merlin said, sounding just the smallest bit disgusted.
“I find myself gladdened by this news,” Britt said.
Merlin raised an eyebrow in surprise. “Are you?”
Lancelot beamed. “I am pleased my presence delights you, My Lord.”
“It’s not that. Since you kept Kay from coming to get me in all likeliness that means you are now higher on his list of people to maim than I am,” Britt said.
Merlin coughed to cover a laugh, but Gawain seriously considere
d Britt’s words. “He has a list?”
“What do you think he’s always writing in that logbook of his?”
Gawain nodded. “You must be right, My Lord.”
“So what’s the plan?” Britt asked.
“For what?” Merlin said.
“To leave Camelgrance?”
“There is no plan.”
“Can’t we go out the way you came in?” Britt asked.
“No,” Merlin said as Gawain shuddered behind him. “It took a lot of magic to get us in. I certainly don’t have enough to get four of us out.”
“We could always leave Lancelot behind,” Britt mumbled before Merlin elbowed her.
“Sir Bodwain is riding back to Camelot as we speak. He means to muster an army to aid King Leodegrance and free us,” Gawain said.
“In the meantime we will sit tight,” Merlin added.
“We shall have to stay on the streets with the rest of these poor outcasts,” Lancelot said, benevolently looking at the peasants crowding the courtyard.
“Not on your life. I have several contacts living in Camelgrance. We will stay with one of them,” Merlin said, setting off into another part of the castle. “Follow me.”
Merlin’s contact was a short, skinny merchant who seemed to be scarcely less intelligent than Merlin himself. He agreed to host them and provided beds and food for all four of them. Merlin spent most of the afternoon closeted with the merchant, leaving Britt with Lancelot and Gawain.
Due to a particular member of her company, Britt had a headache by the time night fell. When the midnight watch called the headache still hadn’t left. Rather than wake her companions, Britt told the merchant—who was wide awake and inspecting his wares—she was going to take a walk.
He insisted she wear a short, hooded cloak, which Britt put on before she slipped out of the house and wandered Camelgrance freely. “They have quite lax security here considering it’s much smaller than Camelot,” Britt said after nodding to a patrolling soldier—who didn’t even stop to question her reason for being out at such a late hour.
Britt’s wanderings eventually brought her to the keep. As she passed near the stables she thought she heard crying. Britt followed her ears to the castle garden. She kept to the shadows, stopping when she saw the sobbing came from Guinevere.
