by Gary Dolman
He turned to Atticus.
“Quo Fata Vocant, Atticus Fox. You are in the enviable position of having been called by the Fates, but then you know that already. Our destinies and those of our respective wives are inextricably woven together it seems. When I engaged your services, I was simply looking to commission an investigator. You were merely supposed to follow my pointers to Britton’s door. I needed someone with an intellect and education superior to that of the police detective, do you see, someone who would likely know of the Arthurian legends and who could therefore piece together my clues. Belt and braces you might call it.
“But who can fathom the will of the Norns? They were calling for you, Atticus. When I lost my temper and bawled you out of my house, I risked losing everything. You see, it is your own life that is the seventh and final part of my gift to the Norns. It is you I must kill and you I must mark with the seventh rune.”
“But you’ve killed seven times already.”
“I’ve killed many, many more times than that, Atticus, on and off the battlefield. But that was never part of my gift. You are. I need Igraine, my only true love, to return to me, whole and unsullied. The temptations she so unfortunately succumbed to in her last life have been removed. I, myself, have devoured their hearts – all except Bessie Armstrong’s; I wouldn’t want anything of a woman’s heart, of course – and Britton will be shamed. You, Atticus Fox are now the only thing that stands between the will of the Norns and its fulfilment.
“Of course, I know you will submit willingly to your fate. Whither they call, Atticus, just like me, you will follow.”
“How do I stand in their way, Sir Hugh? I never even knew Lady Igraine much less carried anything on with her.”
“Haven’t they told you? Don’t you listen to their words? You see, Atticus, I have been offered the most precious thing. All I have to do is to offer seven lives as gifts to the Norns and they in return will give me back Igraine with her honour restored, whole and unblemished.”
“How could they possibly do that?”
“It will be miraculous. They told me that once their gift is complete, and once Britton has been humbled, they will take her spirit and they will put it into the mortal body of another. That woman is to be your wife, Lucie Fox, and that is why you must be the final part of the wergild.
“This is a famous opportunity for you to serve the Fates, Atticus. Your journey here to Hexhamshire has become truly serendipitous.
Atticus leapt back, pulling sharply on the thick, pewter handle of his cane. From its length he drew out a long, slender, steel blade and brandished it defiantly at Lowther.
The light from the miner’s lamp slid back and forth along the thin steel ribbon as it swayed in Atticus’s trembling hand.
Sir Hugh hesitated and ran his tongue over his lips as he eyed it with relish.
“A swordstick. A toy blade. So you want to make a fight of it eh, Fox? Good for YOU!”
On this last syllable, Lowther lunged forward and brushed Atticus’s flimsy weapon away in a single, sweeping, back-handed stroke of his arm. It struck a spark on the side wall of the vault and clattered away into the shadows.
“Oh, very bad luck, Atticus,” he mocked.
Creeping forward again, Sir Hugh Lowther shadowed the four as they pressed back towards the rear wall of the vault like some demented sheepdog with its flock, grinning madly as he lifted the cutlass to begin the slaughter.
“Drop your sword, Lowther.”
Sir Hugh twisted round, arm still aloft, instantly ready to meet the new threat.
“Lucie Fox; there you are, my dear. I was concerned as to where you had got to.”
“I told you to drop the sword. Do it, Sir Hugh. Do it directly.” Lucie stood, feet apart, both hands gripping a length of broken branch like an oversized cudgel. Her expression was ferocious.
Lowther dropped back against the side wall of the cavern. His eyes flitted continually between Lucie and the others as he rapidly and coolly appraised the situation. He was an experienced, first-line soldier in the British Army and to him this was just one more skirmish, one more battle to be won.
“I have spent my entire life fighting my way around Her Majesty’s glorious dominions, Lucie,” he sneered. “Eleven million square miles in all. I have fought mutinous Indians, Afghan tribesman and the fuzzy-wuzzy Dervish of Sudan. I’ve faced sword, spear, musket, rifle and even cannon, by God. Pray tell me; do you now intend to defeat me with that lump of wood?”
Lucie gripped the branch yet tighter.
“I have a proposition for you, Lucie,” Sir Hugh continued, “given to me by the Fates themselves. You are a handsome woman, a very handsome woman indeed – not perhaps as classically beautiful as Igraine was, but very handsome nonetheless. You will soon be free of your current marriage. ‘Until death do us part,’ as they say. If you would consent to then become my wife, I will be glad to spare your life.
“As my wife, you could not of course testify against me in law but you could very soon expect the greatest of honours; that of becoming Igraine herself, brought back from the dead by the Norns.”
Lucie stared at him incredulously.
“You are quite, quite insane!” she exclaimed at last.
Lowther bristled.
“I am not insane! This is the will of the Norns, Lucie. The
Norns have willed that it is your place in this world that must be given up for Igraine. Atticus must be killed lest she comes back as his wife in your stead and that would never do. If you doubt me, ask them yourself.”
“He speaks the truth, Lucie Fox,” Verthandi confirmed. “It is your Wyrd.”
“There. Do you hear her?” Sir Hugh asked.
“What the devil are you talking about?” Lucie retorted.
“My Lady Verthandi is speaking to you. Listen to what she says.”
“I heard what you said to my husband; that you hear the Norns actually speaking to you,” Lucie said, her tone moderated now by professional curiosity.
“Of course I hear them. I’m a true Northumberland Fusilier. Quo Fata Vocant.”
“Listen to me! Those voices are not real. They exist only in your mind. You have a terrible, terrible illness of your brain. Sir Hugh, you must believe me. I’ve seen this before.”
“Nonsense,” thundered Lowther. “I know they’re real. How else could they know the things they do – private things? They’ve been speaking to me since I was a boy so don’t go telling me they aren’t real. And they say that you will be married to me.”
He lashed the blade through the air in anger.
“And I say I will never will.”
“She rejects you,” Verthandi sneered.
“Then she rejects us too,” Skuld retorted. “Kill her; she is not worthy of the honour after all.”
“But we will still owe Lowther a gift, Sisters. He has paid us six parts of the wergild and there will soon be the seventh.” Urth was emphatic.
“If not Lucie Fox, then whom?” Verthandi asked.
It was Skuld who answered her. “Give him Jennifer. He can have the bastard in her belly given the iron and then he can marry her somewhere no one will know she’s his daughter.”
“Very well, Lucie,” Sir Hugh growled. “Then you shall die with the husband you’ve chosen. Igraine can take Jennifer’s place in this world instead. I will marry her.”
Jennifer gasped. “Father, what are you saying? You’re jesting, surely? I’m your own daughter.”
“Only my daughter by Victoria and you won’t even be that once Igraine’s spirit possesses you.”
“So the finest swordsman in England, the great hero of the Empire, makes war on women does he?” Artie steps forward now.
Sir Hugh turns on him, eyes blazing.
“Damn you, Arthur; it is the will of the Fates.”
“This isn’t about fate. It’s simply about a murderer; a brutal, multiple murderer, who can’t accept that his wife loved another. It’s about a coward who would slaughter i
nnocent women to escape the truth. You murdered Bessie and now you intend to murder Lucie Fox. I am ashamed that I ever called you ‘Father.’
“Do as she says, Colonel Sir Hugh Douglas Lowther, KB. Drop that sword and face your accusers like the man I thought you were. For the sake of your honour and your family’s honour, drop your sword!”
“Even the madman’s bastard knows what you are, Lowther!” Verthandi exults, “Even he knows you are a coward.”
Artie’s words seem to strike home somewhere deep within Sir Hugh’s soul. It is as if he is crumbling from within.
Lucie Fox sees this. She hesitates for just a moment, then lifts the branch high above her head and hurls it with as much force and venom as she can muster, straight at his breast. He turns, not knowing whether to parry or avoid it and it strikes home painfully against his shoulder, the shock more than the blow throwing him back against the vault walls. Lucie darts forward past him and falls into Atticus’s outstretched arms.
But the pain and the shock of the blow serve only to enrage the dragon that is Sir Hugh Lowther. He bellows with shame and indignation and leaps forward, sweeping the heavy blade of the cutlass viciously through the empty air where Lucie has been just a split second before.
“You missed her,” Urth taunts. “A woman beat you with a lump of wood after all.”
“Again!” screams Skuld, “Kill her this time. Kill her. Kill her. Kill her. Kill her like you killed that Sepoy’s girl in Cawnpore. Remember Cawnpore!”
Atticus pushes Lucie back to shield her from Sir Hugh’s wrath as he begins to advance on them. He raises his empty cane and tries to remember what he has read about singlestick. He thinks of David and Goliath.
He is aware too of Uther Pendragon next to him, stirring, snarling and fulminating.
There is a rush of movement and something black and heavy catches Sir Hugh Lowther full in the chest, smashing him down. The cutlass clatters from his grasp and the something drops to the floor with a flat, heavy crump. It is one of the kegs of nitrate. A dark liquid gurgles steadily from one shattered side and creeps through the dust around it, turning it into a spreading black pool.
Uther Pendragon snarls again and in one fluid movement, sweeps up the dropped cutlass from beyond Lowther’s scrabbling fingers.
Sir Hugh springs to his feet, superbly fit for a man of his years and draws his own, sheathed blade.
They stand, sword tip to sword tip, measuring each other like two strange dogs.
Sir Hugh Lowther lunges low, towards Uther’s hip and Jenny screams. Perhaps he is still stiff from the body blows because the movement is laboured. Uther easily catches the blade on his own and pushes it aside. Sir Hugh recovers instantly from the parry and thrusts high and fast and directly at Uther’s face. It was a feint. Uther ducks and the tip of the blade sears a thin, bloody line across his cheek to plunge behind into his long, flailing hair.
They both fall back on guard, facing each other again, watching, waiting, alert now to lunges or feints. Uther, running with sweat and blood is wide-eyed with fear and concentration. Lowther is relaxed, almost amused by the encounter. He is a natural, practiced swordsman who has devoted his life to the art of the blade. He knows he can deal with Britton as easily as he could swat one of the many rock spiders that scuttle incessantly back and forth across the cavern walls and, for now, this is merely a game.
He feints again, and then laughs derisively when Uther hurls himself away. Stung by the ridicule, Uther cuts back straight at Lowther’s chest. Still laughing, Sir Hugh meets his blade with ease and parries it harmlessly away.
But his riposte is instant. It catches Uther Pendragon full and hard in the centre of his chest, directly on the red, enamelled dragon of the breastplate he still wears.
Uther staggers back from the blow. But the smith who had forged that steel had understood the art of his forbears well. A wide chip of red enamel flutters gently to the floor.
“You are out of practice, Uther Pendragon,” Lowther mocks, “And that was just a warning. My next blow will kill you.”
“You cannot win, Sir Hugh Lowther.”
Uther speaks quietly, timidly even, seeming to force each word out in turn. “Merlin prophesied that the Red Dragon must prevail in the end.”
“What?” Sir Hugh bellows incredulously. “Merlin prophesied? Did you hear him, my ladies? What heathen nonsense is that? Let me tell you of another prophesy, Pendragon, that of St John in the Book of Revelation. Let me tell you of a dragon that is seized and bound and shut into an abyss for a thousand years.”
He makes a gesture of flourish around the vault with his free hand.
“Behold, Uther Pendragon, here is your own abyss.”
“We will see.” Britton wipes his hand, slippery now with sweat on his trousers and once again falls back on his guard. He is panting heavily, eyes fixed intently on the tip of Sir Hugh’s gently swaying blade.
Lowther’s expression changes as he too postures to meet his enemy. It changes from mocking amusement to deadly determination. When he speaks again, there is cold venom to his voice.
“Uther Pendragon,” he growls. “You should make your peace with your gods. You should say your farewells to your son and to your unborn grandchild because now it is time.”
With the speed of summer lightning, he lunges. It is hard, fast and deadly accurate, aimed directly at the soft flesh below the steel of Uther’s breastplate. Uther has no time to parry and instinct alone hurls him back.
The worn, leather soles of his boots slip on the cavern floor, slick now from the smashed keg of nitrate and he falls heavily onto his back, gasping explosively as the air is driven from his lungs.
Sir Hugh steps forward and plants one of his beautifully polished boots onto the wrist of Uther’s sword arm. A thin smile gradually curls the edges of his mouth as he brings his sword tip down over his enemy’s exposed throat.
“Farewell, Uther Pendragon,” he spits. “I have waited twenty long years for this moment. You are humiliated. Now you will repay your debt of life to the Norns.”
Uther’s whole body is trembling violently and with his free hand he clutches desperately at his hurt. In the lamplight, his fingers glisten red and wet as his heart pumps away his lifeblood into them.
Sir Hugh reaches into his tunic pocket and pulls out a long, golden-yellow fragment of silk.
“Does the great King Uther Pendragon have anything to say before I stop up his worthless mouth for all eternity?” he jeers. “Before I stop him inducing any other man’s wife to stray beyond the sacred vows of her marriage?”
Uther stares up at him. He lifts one trembling, blood-drenched hand from the wound in his belly and, gasping with the effort and the pain, reaches high to the shelf above his head. His grasping fingers find the smooth, cold brass of the bugle horn there and close around it.
Sir Hugh cackles.
“Do you see?” he mocks. “But this is worth a Maharaja’s ransom! As his final act, Uther Pendragon intends to summon King Arthur from his enchanted sleep. Go ahead, Britton, die as madly as you lived. Blow the bugle if you have enough breath left in your body. See if anyone comes to your aid.”
Uther pushes the quivering mouthpiece to his lips. He blows a single, short, whispering note and falls back, utterly spent.
Lowther stares at him, his face a contortion of pure hatred. He reaches down and forces the length of yellow garter roughly into Uther’s open mouth. Uther shakes his head weakly, tries to lift his hand to resist. But he cannot.
Sir Hugh stands to his full height once again and raises his sword arm to strike.
“No!”
The scream fills every inch of the vault. A shape erupts from the floor in front of the two bodies and hurls itself at Sir Hugh who seems somehow to freeze in shock and horror.
Arthur Lowther and Sir Hugh stand locked together, straining face to straining face, Arthur gripping the wrist of Sir Hugh’s sword arm and Sir Hugh’s fingers clenched around Arthur’s throat.
<
br /> One, two, three seconds pass.
Then, all at once, Sir Hugh’s whole body seems to sway and to slacken, his hand slips from Arthur’s throat and his sword drops from his grasp.
Urth’s cackle echoes through the beats of his fast-failing heart.
“So in the end you have given yourself as the seventh part of our gift. The bastard defeated you. But so be it. We accept. You have repaid your own debt of life.”
It is fitting that the last voice he hears in this life is Skuld’s, a voice so very, very much like Igraine’s.
“In return, we will reunite you with Igraine. Your spirits will live here forever.”
His eyes, filled with the relief of a struggle now passed, slowly drain of life.
Arthur stares down, struck with horror at the warm blood spilling over his hand and the pewter hilt of the swordstick he has plucked from the floor, and which he now holds hard against Sir Hugh’s chest.
Sir Hugh Lowther’s legs buckle and very slowly, he slips away down the length of the slender blade and crashes limply to the floor. His mouth twitches as if to speak, but instead of words, a tiny trickle of blood bursts from the corner of his lips and snakes down his cheek. His jaw falls slack and he moves no more.
Artie stares at him for several, long seconds before he turns and kneels by Uther Pendragon. Gently he pulls the gag from his mouth and slips his hand into the tangle of matted, bloody hair behind his head.
“You will be safe now, Uther,” he says softly. “The White Dragon is gone. He is dead. He can’t hurt any of us now.”
“Arthur, is that you?” whispers Uther.
“Yes, Father, it is me.”
“You came?”
“Yes, Father.”
“I woke you… in the Hour of Need, at the End of the Days?”
“Yes you did. You awakened me. You did well… very well.”
