“Where are Merlin the wizard’s chambers, boy?”
The boy looked flustered.
“Pardon, but I do not know, sir! I don’t see much of the castle past the crocks and me own bed.”
“Doesn’t he take supper?”
The boy shook his head, eyes wide.
“Barnock says he sups on our swevens while we sleep,” the boy whispered.
“He must frequent a certain part of the castle over others,” Balin said.
“I have only ever seen him in the throne room and the dining hall. He never eats, but often counsels the king there.” The boy sucked his lips thoughtfully. “Truly, come to think of it, I have never spied him anywhere else in the castle.”
Balin released the boy and passed through the empty throne room to the dining hall, where he very nearly gasped at what he saw.
The long tables had been pulled from the center of the room and stacked against a wall, where they waited to be hauled out.
In their place, in the center of the room, was a vast oak table, round and surrounded by many baroque, high backed chairs, each with a gleaming golden plate set into the back.
Balin felt his knees tremble. All thought of the painting and Merlin washed from his mind as he approached the immense table. He could see the seams where it was disassembled for transport, and with one shaky hand, he reached out and stroked the grooves cut into it, old marks of utensils wielded by storied, mighty hands. In the pit of the deepest marks, he saw the gleam of the silver beneath the wood. The legends that this was the table of Joseph and his disciples were true.
Next, he turned his attention to the sieges with their red velvet cushions. There were more than a hundred. On the back of the one nearest him, the unblemished golden plate shimmered, and he was taken aback by the sight of his own name in a bold, regal script:
Sir Balin of Northumberland
“They change as warranted,” said a familiar voice from across the room that made Balin start.
Sir Dagonet stepped out from an alcove, sloshing a goblet of wine. He went to one of the chairs and plopped down into it, lackadaisically throwing his boots up on the table.
“Try it. Look at that seat over there,” he said, pointing with his goblet to a siege four places over.
Balin went to it and saw his name on the plate again. He squinted at the one next to it, saw it shimmer, and read his name. It was as though the plates bore no name at all until they were observed.
He laughed uncontrollably and ran like a boy around the table, watching his name appear on each chair as he passed it.
“They all change. Except that one,” Dagonet said, pointing to another.
Balin stopped behind it. This one, the plate did not alter to show his name. It bore no inscription at all.
“What does it mean?” Balin whispered.
“Merlin brought the table with Leodegrance’s knight, three days ago. He told me that was Joseph of Arimathea’s chair and can only be filled by the holiest, most pure knight.”
Balin’s heart pulsed in his ears, and he touched the chair.
“Be careful, my friend.” Dagonet hissed, standing. “He also told me that four knights in Uther’s time tried to sit in it and were burned away by a column of heavenly fire.”
Balin paused. But surely, he was the greatest knight. He had been told so at every turn. What had he to fear?
“I know what you’re thinking,” Dagonet said. “The sword said you were the greatest. But pay attention to the words. Are you the holiest? Are you the purest?”
Truly, Balin believed he had no guile that he was aware of, and the sins of other knights, the pettiness and the feuding, these were not in him. But was he correct?
He touched the hilt of the Adventurous Sword, and a flicker of doubt passed through him. Something held him back from claiming the seat.
What was it, this unmanly doubt?
Surely he felt no guilt at the beheading of the Lady of The Lake, which he had done the last time he’d set foot in this hall. He had murdered no innocent woman. He had destroyed a dangerous witch. A succubus. A servant of the Evil One.
No, it was not that.
The seat called for the purest knight, not the greatest.
Was he a pure man, indeed?
This sword.
Could he rightly say his claiming of this sword had been an act pure of intent?
He recalled again the words of the maiden who had borne it.
Keep it, and you shall be the greatest knight in Albion. But in the end, you will fight to the death with the man you hold most dear.
Arthur. There was still the promised doom of the king. He knew that if he did claim this seat, and sat here, eventually, it would mean the king’s death at his hand.
Then why had he taken it?
For his own glory? To be the knight he had always wanted to be as a child? But what did that achievement have to do with serving the Lord’s own king?
Now this very symbol of his merit was an impediment to his taking his rightful place at the Round Table.
He drew the sword, of a sudden impulse to fling it from him, and he caught sight of the beautiful blade once more, of the carvings on it.
There was the depiction of the Battle at The Crossroads. He realized it now. The two knights shown were himself and Brulen, attacking Rience.
Above it, there was a new engraving.
It was a double headed eagle, like the one he had seen in the painting in St. Stephen’s vestibule, the one that had seemed so familiar to him at the time. A lion was devouring it.
The attitude of the lion was familiar too. It was the same lion on the pennant and shield of Pellinore and his sons, but he could not puzzle out what this meant.
And now, two more designs had appeared on the sword.
One, a circular wheel orbited by smaller circles, was undoubtedly the table before him. The Round Table.
The second made no sense. It was of two hearts, pierced by a single lance.
Dagonet stood beside him now.
“The sword tells your future, does it?” he asked. “Or is it your past?”
“What do you mean?” Balin stammered.
Dagonet pointed out the headless maiden.
“Here is the Lady of The Lake beheaded.”
He pointed to the crossroads battle.
“And here is your battle with King Rience. Yes, I heard tell of it. Who hasn’t? Good show.”
“But what does this mean?” Balin asked, exasperated, pointing to the lion and the two-headed eagle.
“A lion devouring a two-headed eagle,” Dagonet observed. “The lion is the symbol of King Pellinore or one of his sons.”
It was customary for knights to bear on their own charges emblems inherited from their fathers. Pellinore and his sons all bore variations of the golden lion on their charges, just as he and Brulen had the red boars of their father on their own.
“And I’ve seen a double headed eagle on Sir Gawaine’s shield,” said Dagonet.
Gawaine. That was where he’d glimpsed it. On Gawaine’s shield as he charged by him at Carhaix.
If Gawaine bore a double-headed eagle, then his father had too.
“Lot,” said Balin quietly. “The double-headed eagle is The King of Orkney. I saw an eagle like this in a painting at St. Stephen’s.”
Dagonet looked sharply at him, his eyes, usually half-lidded and cynical, suddenly alight.
“Brother Preudom’s painting,” said Dagonet.
“Yes! What does it mean? The eagle…was attacking the king in his bedchamber? Attacking his castle?”
“No, he wasn’t. Think harder, Balin.”
“If you know…”
“It’s not for me to know. It’s for you to discover. Think.”
Balin thought back to the painting.
“The eagle was…attacking the servant in black. Protecting its nest.”
Dagonet nodded. “And?” he pressed.
“But the nest, had a serpent’s egg in
it.”
“Yes!” said Dagonet.
“Lot told me, on the field at Carhaix, the last time I saw him. He told me to look at that painting. He told me to count the eggs. There were four.”
“Yes, Balin,” said Dagonet patiently, but still with a hint of excitement.
“He told me, if I counted the eggs and counted the number of rebel kings, I would know Arthur’s secret shame. But there were eleven rebel kings. I don’t understand. And why…?”
“There were eleven rebel kings, yes, Balin,” said Dagonet. “How many were killed?”
He tried to think back to the day Segurant came to the court and proclaimed the defeat of the rebels at Rience’s hand.
“There were three,” he said at last. “The King With A Hundred Knights, the King of North Wales, and the King of Cornwall.”
“And now the King of Orkney,” Dagonet finished.
Four. Four eggs, four dead kings. But what did that mean? Were the eggs the kings? Which was the serpent? What did Merlin have to do with any of it? Why had Lot told him these things?
“Why is Arthur shamed?” Balin asked bluntly. “Tell me, if you know.”
“I have sworn not to speak it, Balin,” said Dagonet. “Even a fool keeps his word sometimes. Especially a fool knight.”
“I didn’t kill Lot,” Balin said.
“I know,” said Dagonet, with a look of sad empathy.
“It was Pellinore, or Lamorak.”
“I expected that,” said Dagonet. “Balin, my friend,” he said, looking down at the Adventurous Sword and tapping it. “I wish you had taken your oath with my sword. Believe me, the sword of a fool is no great burden. But the sword of a hero…”
“What is happening, Dagonet? The painting. The serpent. This damned sword. What does this all mean?”
Somehow, it was all of it tied together. Somehow. He could feel it. He wanted to press his hands against his head, to squeeze the answer from his mind, if it was there.
Dagonet put his hands on Balin’s shoulders.
“May the day never come when you understand, Sir Balin,” he said strangely. “May the day never come. It will break your heart twice over.”
Balin put the sword away, his eyes lingering on the perilous chair.
“I’m going to claim that seat one day, Dagonet. I swear it to you now. I’ll claim it or I’ll die trying.”
“I know you will,” said Dagonet.
Balin turned angrily away.
“I must find Merlin.”
“Yes, perhaps you should. Goodbye, Sir Balin,” said Dagonet.
***
Dagonet watched Balin pound across the hall like a frustrated child.
When he had departed, Dagonet saw a child standing in the shadows, glaring at him. A serving boy from the kitchens.
Dagonet smiled at him.
The boy stomped away in Balin’s path, the very mirror of his frustration.
CHAPTER THREE
Balin packed Ironprow with lance and shield, and donned his armor.
Merlin had all the answers, as he always did.
But where to find him?
In the forest, of course. He would ride for the forest, go calling for the damned Cambion if he had to, or cut his way through every brush and hedge until he found himself back in the Garden of Joy. Then he would put the point of the Adventurous Sword to the wizard’s throat, along with every question, and by God, he would be answered.
He rode out from Camelot without a word to anyone, skirting the Black Cross and St. Stephen’s, where Preudom was tolling the bell signifying the end of poor Lot’s funeral. He wanted to stay awhile and see Lot interred, but he could not tarry in Camelot, not until this riddle was solved.
He had a dilemma with the Adventurous Sword. A part of him told him to get rid of it, to cast it at the foot of the Black Cross and put leagues between it and his person.
But many things nagged him. His faith in the weapon, for one. It had served him well and he was fond of it. Perhaps he had too much faith in it. Could he still be the greatest knight in the world without it?
It served another purpose, too, though. Dagonet was right. It told his future. Maybe it could help him find Merlin somehow.
Dagonet had told him something else. He had said that if he found the truth, it would break his heart twice over.
The latest design to appear on the sword was a pair of hearts, pierced by a lance.
But what did that mean? Was the sword telling him his future or his past?
He pondered these things for many miles and came at last to the edge of Camelot, where a stream emerged from the green wood and cut a meadow in two.
In that forest, he knew he would find Merlin. He was sure of it.
Ironprow was winded and tired. They had ridden a long time and it was well after noon, so he dismounted, stripped off his harness and the saddle from the war horse’s back, and led him to water.
He fed and brushed the beast, and had just plucked a fat silver fish from the stream with a thought to dinner when he heard a splashing and saw a mailed knight atop a lathered rouncey.
Balin dropped his fish back in its abode and ran for his swords, but the mailed rider stopped in the center of the stream and twisted in his saddle to look back the way he’d come, and made no move to even acknowledge Balin. His armor was sorely used and dented. He had lost his shield, and his lance was shivered, his horse in poor shape.
As he watched, the horse began to dip its head toward the water around its ankles, but the knight cruelly pulled hard back on the reins, keeping it from drinking.
Balin stepped forward.
“Ho there, knight!”
The knight tensed and grabbed at the sword hanging on his saddle.
“Wait!” Balin urged. “If it’s blood you want, allow me to get my armor, or at least, to mount.”
The knight gripped the handle of his sword, but did not draw.
“It is not blood I want, sir. Only water and a moment’s peace.”
Balin jammed his sword in the earth and held out his hands.
“Take it, then.”
The knight looked at him for a moment, and again over his shoulder, then swung down and dropped to his knees on the bank, setting aside his broken lance. He pulled off his helmet, revealing a red face and yellow growth of beard, before plunging into the water and thirstily lapping beside his mount.
“Your horse is nearly dead, sir,” Balin said. “To what purpose are you pursued and by whom?”
The knight laughed.
“To what purpose?” he glanced furtively upstream yet again, and then got to his feet, as if remembering his peril. “Who are you, sir?”
“Sir Balin of Northumberland, knight of Camelot.”
“Camelot.” The knight looked around wonderingly. “My God, am I in Camelot?”
“The border. If you require sanctuary, I can take you to King Arthur.”
The knight looked tempted, then shook his head vigorously and prepared to mount.
“No, no. It would only do me harm and Arthur not much good.”
The knight tried to pull himself back into the saddle, but gasped with the effort and sank back.
“Your horse is near collapse, and you aren’t much better,” Balin observed.
The knight looked back at Balin.
“Sir Balin, will you promise me safe conduct?”
“I will, to Camelot,” Balin said, “on my honor. Provided you are no outlaw.”
“On the contrary. It’s a base villain who pursues me. But you’re right.” He gasped. “I am past spent, and my horse…”
He stopped speaking and stood bolt aright, listening.
Balin heard it too.
It was nothing, deafening in comparison to the prior incessant, hushed discourse of bird and brush, bug and brook.
Beside the trickle of the stream around the stones and the horse’s labored breathing, the ambient chatter of the meadow insects and the trilling of birds in the trees had ceased.
>
Then Balin heard a fast galloping from the road leading into the forest mouth, and an unexpected rush of violent wind kicked up, howling like the primordial death rattle of some beast from the very belly of the woods. It bent the grasses and kicked up dust from the road and blew the leaves from the trees. A mossy robin’s nest crashed at his feet, spilling a clutch of twitching, half-blind, mottled juveniles across the ground.
“We’re too late!” wailed the knight, pulling himself into his saddle with effort and grabbing his sword.
A terrible, cockle raising laugh insinuated itself through the howling wind. The galloping became deafeningly loud along with it, as if a gigantic horse were pounding across the meadow.
Balin whirled all around, both swords leaping into his hands now. Ironprow fought his hobbles and reared, but there was nothing but the bending boughs and grasses, and a shower of leaves stripped from the trees.
The knight spurred his horse, but the exhausted beast was sluggish, and stumbled rather than bolted.
There was a rapid series of splashes in the streambed, followed by a clang of steel on steel.
Balin squinted through the swirling maelstrom of blowing leaves and dust and saw the right side of the knight’s harness rend and split outward with a burst of blood, as if something irresistible had torn through him.
Another row of splashes erupted downstream followed by the pounding of those thunderous hooves again. The devil wind and its accompanying laughter dwindled, and as the storm of leaves at last settled to the ground, so too fell the knight from his saddle, splashing facedown into the stream.
Balin rushed up and dragged the wounded knight clear. The great cut in his side was dumping blood without surcease.
The knight blinked as his eyes filled with blood and the stuff trickled darkly from his drawn lips. He looked as surprised as Balin by what had happened.
“What was that?” Balin stammered, horrified as blood poured over the hands that he clamped bootlessly over the terrible wound.
“A mad knight, with some foul enchantment that renders him invisible. His name is Garlon. He has slain many innocents. My quest was to find him, but…I suppose…he has murdered me.” With effort, the knight reached out and gripped Balin’s fingers. The metal of the gauntlet was ice cold from the stream. “I beg you, Sir Balin. Take my body to my lady, Lorna Maeve. She is at the Castle Meliot. Lay me in the churchyard there, as befits a Christian.”
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