The word reminded Perceval of the King. “Sire?” he croaked.
Arthur stepped over the wounded man and knelt on the other side, removing his helm. He glanced up at Perceval and said, too quietly for the others to hear, “Well done.” Then he looked down at Sir Breunis.
“Do you wish to live?”
A nod.
“You know who I am,” said the King. “Say my name.”
Breunis grimaced and groaned and got it out. “Arthur Pendragon. High King.”
“Then you know what charge is upon me. You have robbed and pillaged my people. You have robbed and pillaged me. If I do not avenge them, who will?”
The man was silent.
“Answer me. Tell me why I should spare you.”
“They say that no one ever asked your mercy in vain…”
That was bold, perhaps bolder than Perceval himself would have been in such a case, and he half expected the King’s anger to kindle.
But Arthur Pendragon nodded. “It is true. And it does not delight me to kill and maim, but neither do I give my mercy freely. The cost is your freedom. You must become my man. You must swear to abandon your pillage, restore their property to those you have robbed, and put your strength at the service of all oppressed ones, wherever you may meet them, for as long as your life is spared upon the earth. Will you so swear?”
“I swear it.” The brigand began to sob, loud heaving cries. “I swear it. Let me live, O King.”
Perceval, sickened by that abject plea for mercy, suddenly despised him, and the hand holding the poniard went ice-steady. But the King said:
“I give you your life, then, sir, what’s left of it. See that you mend yourself and abandon this habitual thievery, for if I hear otherwise you will surely die.”
He nodded to Perceval, who with a mixture of relief and disappointment shot his poniard back into the sheath and picked up his bloody sword. The King rose and turned to his knights.
“Sire,” said Gawain with a note of reproach in his voice, “your mercy is too sublime for my understanding. This man is worthy of death.”
“So too are we,” said the King. “Have the castle thrown open and thoroughly searched.”
Kay and Ywain went up the road to see to this, but Gawain held his ground. “We? How so? We are your majesty’s instruments of justice. And your majesty’s justice is the justice of Heaven.”
“Fair nephew,” said the King, “all this is true, I hope, especially that I am ruled by the justice of Heaven. And yet, Gawain, we are sinful men.”
Perceval flopped to the ground and watched the King and Sir Gawain with a furrowed brow, wiping his sword on the grass by the wayside.
Gawain was saying, “We are sinful men, sire, but this man is beyond saving.”
The King laughed. “God help me, Gawain, if you were ever to read the sin in my soul.”
“I know you better than to think it might be found there, sire,” said Gawain, with an oddly sweet smile lighting up his harsh face.
But the King’s laughter had faded. He glanced at Sir Breunis, whose men had come from the castle to carry him in.
“Do not deceive yourself, Gawain. There are black places in the heart of every man.”
Perceval thought of the disappointment he had felt when the King gave Sir Breunis his life, and was suddenly ashamed. As Sir Breunis’s men lifted him onto a handcart, Perceval ran to him.
“You have taken as your lord the best man of the world,” he said, gripping the sides of the cart on each side of the wounded knight’s head. “You know it.”
At first Breunis threw back his stare from a blank face. But then he dropped his gaze and grunted: “I know it.”
“That makes us brothers.” Perceval spoke slowly to let each word, with its weight of menace, sink in. “But if I find that you have deceived him, you will die by my hand. I swear it.”
10
Then they showed him the shield, of shining gules
With the pentangle pictured in pure gold hues.
Sir Gawain and the Green Knight
ONE WET EVENING IN LATE OCTOBER the five knights-errant rode out of the forest and saw the grey bulk of Camelot rising gently from its little green hill under low dark clouds and plashing rain. Light shone from a hundred windows and glimmered off the deep swift river-water at the hill’s foot. Over the bridge they rode, up into the town, with doors slamming open and voices calling news and welcomes. The King pulled off his helm so that he could be seen, acknowledging the news and returning the greetings.
They had ridden hard all day to be back at sundown, and when they reached the castle courtyard Perceval was glad to slide from his saddle, hand the reins to a squire, and walk stiffly after the others into the keep. Here they were met by a flock of maidens. Two of them took Perceval by either hand and led him away without a word. He glanced back at the others, almost in a panic, and saw them being spirited off likewise. From the door into the Great Hall he heard the buzz of voices, saw the warm blaze of candles, and smelled meats and spices that made his stomach growl—but it was already too late to say anything, for he had been swept into a dark passage, and could only blindly follow his maiden guides.
They brought him to a room on the east side of the castle, not large but by far the most luxurious place he had yet seen, with clean rushes underfoot and thick bright tapestries to shut in the warmth. These were worked with trees and grotesquely beautiful creatures he did not recognise, so that for a moment he thought he stood in some foreign and oppressive wood. The hearth was wisely built, drawing the smoke off the fire and filling the room with heat. Perceval, accustomed to the crisp free air and endless halls of the forest, stood still in dumb amazement while the two maidens whisked off his armour. A third brought him a cup of heated and spiced wine, and then hot water and a flannel.
When they ushered him back to the Great Hall, Perceval hardly knew himself—clean and warm, clad in soft new wool under the fur-lined robe worn by knights in time of peace. Although they were inexpressible ease to his weary body, something about the warm furs, the scented heat of the fire, and the all-embracing tapestries had disquieted him, and when the maidens bore away his armour for cleaning and repairs, he had almost begged them to leave him his sword—then felt a little foolish when they silently returned it to him, and found a new belt, not clogged with mud and rain, for him to hang it from.
But with the heft of it at his hip he felt more of a man, and less of a house-cat, and better able to walk into the Great Hall, and the company of the knights of Logres.
He could not help remembering the last time he had been here, at the Feast of the Ascension with the hall in an uproar over the insult he had avenged. But here was a peaceful, almost a domestic scene: the Queen at the head of the Table plying the King with food, a hum of conversation from the ladies in the balcony, a louder chatter from the long tables where the squires and servants sat, and little knots of knights clustered among the empty spaces at the Round Table, deep in talk.
Perceval paused, uncertain, in the doorway—did he belong at the Table, or with the squires and wanderers? But then a foot fell on the rushes behind him and he turned to see Sir Gawain, who beckoned him to the Table.
“Gawain! About time!” said one of the knights, rising from his seat, and Perceval blinked at him, for the smile which flashed across his face seemed a duplicate of Gawain’s. “Who have you brought with you?”
Gawain seemed to expand slightly. “Cast your eyes over the Table, lads, and see if there’s a place for Sir Perceval…mab Gawain.”
“What’s that?” someone asked, and Perceval found himself surrounded by a curious ring of onlookers.
“Sir Perceval’s seat is over by the Siege Perilous; the letters appeared at midday,” said the knight who had spoken first. “What do you mean, mab Gawain? I’ve a grown nephew? Why was I not told?”
“I could not have known, myself,” said Gawain. “Ragnell left without telling me.”
“I thought she had gone to Avalon.”
“And you say you knew nothing about it?”
“Sir Gareth, we do not starve information out of our captives here.” It was a lady’s voice, cool and imperious. But when Perceval glanced at the Queen, he saw that she was laughing.
Sir Gawain laughed with her, and said to Perceval, “This is my brother, Gareth. Now come and eat. No, no, Caradoc, later. Gaheris, I’ll see my new niece after I eat, or I may eat her. Perceval. Your siege.”
Like all the others it was a big, square-hewn wooden chair, carved with leaves and acorns, and bearing letters on the back in gold: Sir Perceval of Wales. Gawain’s own siege was next to him on the right. On the left was an empty seat with no words on it at all.
“What’s this?” he asked, but Gawain was piling food onto his trencher and did not hear.
“This? This is the Siege Perilous. Never sit in it, as you value your life.” Sir Gareth kicked away the seat on the other side of the Siege Perilous (it was labelled Sir Bors) and sat on the Table.
Perceval nodded, and leaned back for the serving-man to give him bread and a partridge. “I’ve heard of it. It is intended for the Grail Knight?”
“Yes. Anyone else who sits there—fzzt, he turns to flame and ash.”
Perceval remembered the damsel Blanchefleur’s message, which he had given to the King in the hills of Wales. “He will come soon.”
Gareth nodded. “The King told us. When will it be?”
“I know nothing more, neither the day nor the hour.” Perceval paused before biting into the meat. “It is strange to find an uncle. Are there more?”
“Two more,” Gareth told him. “Gaheris is over there.” He pointed. “Agravain is gone on some quest or another.”
Perceval swallowed. “And your father?”
“King Lot of Orkney, dead many years. Mother—Queen Morgawse—rules now. Then there are the cousins. Ywain you know. He’s the son of Uriens King of Gore.”
“And of the Queen of Gore.”
Gareth laughed softly. “Our sweet aunt Morgan. Yes. But Ywain is like his father. Mordred is like—Mordred is not like his father.”
Gawain turned to them.
“Mordred,” he said, frowning. “Have you seen him, brother?”
“Not for months.” Gareth squinted across the Table and sighed with mock disappointment. “He must be alive somewhere. His siege still bears his name.”
“Gareth!” said Gawain, but his reproachful voice shook with laughter. “What has he done to deserve that?”
“Nothing,” returned Gareth. “Ah, Gawain, you are right. Mistrust is an ugly guest, and the only one not welcome among brothers.” He turned to Perceval again. “Gaheris and I are married men, and can give you cousins of your own, but they are yet young to break spears.”
Perceval was beginning to speak, but when the other knights fell silent and Sir Gareth slipped off the Table, he turned to see what had made them all stand up so straight.
It was the Queen. The back of his mind noticed that he, too, had stiffened as if to attention. Perceval had lived with the immortal beauty of his mother all his life, but even he was awed by Guinevere.
She set a silver and glass cup before him. “You sent this back and avenged the slight upon me,” she told him. “The cup is yours now.”
“I thank you, madam.”
She smiled, and walked on. “Goodnight,” she said in a louder voice. “Sleep well, and sleep safe. Ye are guards on the borders of darkness: look upon what you protect, and rest from your labours. Goodnight!” And she passed from the hall.
AS NOVEMBER BLEW IN, TURNING THE forest to grey smoke, Perceval stayed at Camelot, for here he had the chance to continue his training under the eye of his father and other knights of the Table.
There was also an item of business that had to be finished before he could undertake another quest. Sir Gawain took him one afternoon to see Sir Bleoberis, the King’s herald, about a device of his own.
The knight was surprised to hear that Perceval had been using a blank shield. “Surely,” he said, reaching down a folio stuffed with painted parchments, “you used something to signify your name and lineage.”
“I had not the slightest idea of my name and lineage, sir,” Perceval said cheerfully.
“Well. Look at these.” Sir Bleoberis produced a parchment showing a white shield bearing red diagonals. “Argent, three bendlets gules. You know this one, of course.”
Perceval squinted thoughtfully. “Oh, that is Sir Lancelot’s shield.”
“Right. And here—Argent, a dragon passant gules.”
That was more familiar—the King’s own shield, with its red dragon. “The Pendragon. What about Father? A red shield with a yellow star.”
“Here it is,” said Sir Bleoberis. “Gules, a pentacle or. But the question remains what bearings you should carry. I meant to show you this.” He extracted a sheaf of parchments and spread them out.
Gawain leaned over to look. “Here are the Orkney arms.” He pointed to a purple shield bearing a double-headed golden eagle. “Gareth, Gaheris, and Agravain bear variations of this.”
“Why do you have something different?” Perceval asked.
From the look that fleeted across Sir Bleoberis’s face, Perceval wondered if he had said something wrong. But Gawain bent his head and traced the pentacle with his forefinger, answering without heat. “The Endless Knot signifies the five virtues of knighthood. And these are generosity, fellowship, purity, courtesy, and compassion. I took it to remind me of them.”
“Then there is nothing I had rather bear,” said Perceval.
Sir Bleoberis picked up the parchment and pursed his lips. “We should have to differ it from your father’s shield, to prevent confusion.”
“Label it,” Gawain said. “When I am dead, he can remove the label.”
Sir Bleoberis took a new parchment and dipped his pen in ink. “Gules, a pentacle or, bearing a label of three points or. I will enter it in the rolls.”
ON AN EVENING NOT LONG AFTER this, Perceval was on his way to Sir Gareth’s rooms when Sir Kay passed him in the passage with a woman shrouded in a black cloak, glistening with rain. He caught a gleam of eyes from within the hood, and then the lady put her hand on Sir Kay’s arm to stop him.
“Sir Perceval,” she said. “Come with us to the King’s solar.”
Perceval wondered how she knew him and looked at Sir Kay half-expecting a reaction. But even Sir Kay dared not gainsay this lady. “If you think so, madam.”
“I am sure of it,” she said, and passed on.
Perceval waited only to send a page with a message to Sir Gareth, then followed Sir Kay and the stranger to the solar. This was a warm room on the south side of the castle, well-tapestried against the cold, where in his few leisure hours the King could often be found playing chess or hearing the news of knights-errant. He sat there now with the Queen by him and an assemblage of the older knights: Sir Gawain, Sir Lucan, Sir Bedivere, Sir Ywain, and Sir Kay.
In other words, a gathering of the King’s council. Perceval bowed deep, wondering what he might have done to draw their attention. But then the lady he had met in the Great Hall turned from the fire, where she had been warming herself, and came to him with an outstretched hand.
“Sir Perceval,” she said, “do you know me?”
She had laid aside her cloak and wore a robe sheened with silver threads like water. Her hair, tied into a long black braid, snaked almost to the floor. Her face—but when he looked at her face, he wanted to fall to his knees and grip the ground to know that it was still there, that he was not suddenly floating lost and anchorless in vast starry spheres.
With an effort he stiffened his knees and remembered when he had last sensed that overpowering immensity. This woman was a fay.
“The Lady of the Lake.”
She smiled, and the stress of her regard lessened a degree. “Very good.”
Gawain said: “Now that he is here, let us begin.
You have yet to explain what he has to do with the King’s daughter.”
“A little, son of Lot. And more hereafter, if I see clearly. He has spoken of the errand given him at Carbonek Castle?”
“That the Grail Knight draws near? He has,” said the King.
“And, sir knight,”—to Perceval—“do you remember the name of the damsel who gave you this message?”
“She said her name was Blanchefleur.” His mouth went dry all of a sudden, and he gulped. “The King’s daughter?”
No one heard his question. The King was speaking to the Lady of the Lake. “She is here, in Britain?”
“She was in Carbonek, and has returned to the other world now,” said Nimue. “But I have seen her keepers and they say they must speak to us, Lord Arthur. She is no longer safe in hiding. Morgan has already been there.”
“Then it is time for her to come home,” said the King. “We have been too long without her company.”
A slight frown wrinkled the Queen’s brow.
“Remember the reason you sent her away,” said Nimue.
“That she might be safe until the time comes to fulfil the prophecy,” said the King. “Yes. But if Morgan has found her way to the other place, she will be safer here.”
“Even Camelot has not always protected you, O King,” Sir Ywain put in. “My mother has the cunning of a rat in a garderobe.”
“And yet I am still alive,” the King said.
“You face the danger for Logres’s sake, sire,” said the Queen, speaking for the first time. “But Blanchefleur is yet young for such burdens.”
“Is she?” The King spoke gently, to make the words less harsh. “She can be no younger than Sir Perceval, here, whom I have seen adventure his life in combat. One day she must carry Logres. I only hope we have not kept her unburdened too long.”
“There is another choice, besides Camelot,” said the Lady of the Lake. “With safety, but also hardship, and a certain kind of danger.”
The others in the room looked at her in surprise. “Say on,” said Arthur.
Nimue said: “I was riding in the night through Torfaen when I met the Hermit of Carbonek, waiting for me at the Greyflood crossing. ‘Tell the High King,’ he said, ‘that Sarras needs a maiden.’ ”
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