Pendragon's Heir

by Suzannah Rowntree

  “Well, good evening,” said the stranger in a stiff and surprised voice, and Perceval saw the pale bearded face of the knight pointed out to him at a distance in Camelot as Sir Mordred.

  “I ask your pardon,” Perceval said. “I thought I saw someone I knew.”

  “We are strangers, I believe,” said Mordred. He checked in the midst of a motion to leave. “But I remember. You are the son of my good cousin Gawain, are you not?”

  And despite the primness of his voice, there was a friendly flash of white teeth from within his black beard.

  “Perceval of Wales. You must be Mordred,” said Perceval, and held out his hand. Mordred bowed.

  “Even so.” He straightened from the bow and put out his hand to take Perceval’s just as Perceval returned the bow.

  “I am glad to meet you,” Mordred said, glancing awkwardly at his hand. “Gawain often speaks of you, always with such pride.” He dropped his hand to his side and looked up with a smile. “It is good to see. Gawain was so unhappy in his own father.”

  Perceval opened his mouth to ask about it, but Mordred raised a hand and forestalled him. “Forgive me for bringing up the old family history, cousin. Are you fighting tomorrow, as well?”

  “Assuredly,” Perceval said with a grin.

  Mordred bowed again. “Then we shall not see each other. I am riding out on quest tomorrow evening, but I will be at Camelot for Pentecost. Farewell!” And he walked on and was lost in the crowd.

  Perceval turned and went back to the smithy, thinking that Sir Mordred his cousin was hardly the sinister figure he imagined from Gareth’s warnings. He was collecting his bridle when a boy ran in with the news. Sir Lancelot had arrived with Sir Gawain.

  He lengthened his stride on the way back up the hill to the keep, and found his father in the great hall.

  Gawain beat Perceval on the back. “They told me you were here! Northern air has done you good, I see. What have you been up to all these months? Hunting and haunting bowers, I’d wager.” But there was a twinkle in his eye.

  “Discovered! Alas,” returned Perceval, straight-faced.

  Gawain laughed. “And you slew the Brothers of Iscoed on a day that you had nothing better to do, or so I hear.”

  A grin stole over Perceval’s face which he could not have reined in if he tried. “Just to keep in training.”

  Sir Lancelot strolled over from where he had stood speaking to Sir Ywain. “I hear fair things of you, son of Gawain. One day soon I shall have to break a spear with you.”

  Perceval tried not to betray the flush of delight that went through him at Lancelot’s words. The Knight of the Lake never jousted with young or untried knights. Breaking a spear with Sir Lancelot meant a reputation as a seasoned warrior.

  Beside him, Gawain, though one of the few knights of Logres capable of matching Lancelot, seemed no less keen. “Tomorrow?”

  Lancelot turned to Perceval. “I am captaining the King of Northgales’s side tomorrow, against King Carados and the Scots.”

  “Agravain and I have been fighting under the King of Northgales,” Perceval said. “I had rather fight with my kin under you than against you for now, sir. If nothing else I may watch and learn.”

  For a moment Perceval wondered if Sir Lancelot was offended, he seemed so surprised. But then he bowed as if to a king. “Your son has bested me in courtesy, Gawain,” he said. “If he is as skilled in arms, my star will set.” He turned back to Perceval with a smile like sunshine. “And the King of Gore tells me you have shown yet unmatched skill these past two days.”

  “Well, yet,” said Perceval. Then King Colgrevaunce came walking by and called Lancelot over to talk. Perceval turned to his father.

  Gawain said: “You are a wiser man than I,” and he did not smile, but the praise in his words was better than anything Lancelot had said. Perceval kicked the rushes underfoot and changed the subject.

  “I wondered,” he said—and it was true, in the last ten minutes he had been wondering—“why you never mention my grandfather much. What was he like?”

  Gawain was taken aback. “Why do you ask?”

  “I should dearly like to know something about him, sir.”

  His father looked, not at him, but through him. At length he stirred as if floating to the surface of memory and said, “It is a long story, and not one to be told in this company.”

  “You can tell me another time.”

  “Yes,” said Gawain. But there was something secretive and shamefaced in his father’s manner, something so ill-suited to his temperament and renown that Perceval found, for the first time in his life, a mystery he did not care to solve.

  THE NEXT DAY, SEEING SIR LANCELOT and Sir Gawain cut through the press, Perceval felt with a bittersweet twinge that the decision not to fight Lancelot today had been the right one, not just for courtesy’s sake but also for pride’s. Then, when the day drew toward the afternoon Perceval saw the blue boar of Odiar again. This time the knight of Gore checked his pace, kicked his horse round, and laid his spear in rest.

  Perceval fewtered his own spear, spurred Rufus into a gallop, and met his old enemy with a crash. There was a nauseating blow to his body, and Perceval hit the ground. When he slid to a stop, gasping with pain, he went to push himself out of the mud and instead passed out.

  HE SWAM TOWARD THE MURMUR OF voices. Light broke above him. Slowly, his father’s worried face came into focus.

  “What happened?” Perceval whispered.

  “You’ve lost far too much blood,” Gawain said. “But you’ll mend. Odiar was lucky. He ran straight through the mail and grazed the tenth rib.”

  “Not lucky,” Perceval gasped, although his head was swimming and he felt sick. “Stronger. Faster.”

  Gawain said: “Tell that to the judges.” And he hefted a clattering purse.

  Perceval had no strength to speak. He only opened his eyes a little wider.

  “When the day was over, the prize was declared for Sir Lancelot. But he had gone, and could not be found. You were judged second-best.”

  “Pentecost,” Perceval said. “Give it back. Not mine.”

  Gawain shook his head. “Calm yourself. He wouldn’t take it. He conferred an honour upon you last night, but you refused it.” He chuckled. “Old Lancelot had to have the last word.”

  There was someone else in the room, who now moved between Perceval and the candlelight. “Drink this,” said the voice that was not Gawain’s, and Perceval gulped down a warm, salty draught.

  IT WAS APRIL BEFORE THE SURGEONS released him. Frantic to get out of doors and be part of the spring, Perceval scudded up and away, straight north, past the Emperor’s Wall, into the wildest country he had yet seen. Here were adventures to be found in plenty, but he clung to the road north in the unexpressed hope of reaching Orkney, the islands of his fathers. Long before he reached the north seas, however, one evening high up in the hills, he went toward the light of a blazing fire and found there an ancient man with a donkey.

  “May I share your fire tonight, good father?” Perceval asked him, sliding off his horse.

  “You have far to travel, Sir Perceval of Wales,” said the old man.

  “But not tonight, I hope,” he said with a grin, and went to tie Rufus to a tree. The man spoke again.

  “Pentecost draws nearer,” he said. “The Grail Knight is at hand. The Quest will begin. Ride back to Camelot.”

  Perceval turned back to the old man, the hair rising on the back of his neck. “Who are you to say so?”

  “I am Naciens, the Hermit of Carbonek.”

  The Quest! Perceval sat by the fire that night, watching for dawn. The spring-fever that had driven him so far north seemed a small thing compared to what came upon him now at the thought of the Grail. It was time. At last, it was time.

  He saddled Rufus again before the sun rose, but turned to ask one last question of the Hermit.

  “Tell me, did she come to Carbonek safely, the heir of Logres?”

  “Ye
s.”

  “I am glad to hear it,” said Perceval, and rose back into the saddle. “Until we meet in Carbonek, fair sir.”

  But no smile relieved the harsh gravity of the hermit’s face. “Beware,” he said. “You think that you stand. Beware of falling.”

  “Sir, I will,” said Perceval, much struck by the old man’s earnestness.

  He reached Camelot on the first day of summer, three days before Pentecost. Perceval found the royal city full and overflowing, much as Carlisle had been, but for a different reason. From all corners of Britain the Knights of the Table were returning to their citadel for the feast, but a steady stream of men of all estates followed them. For rumour had been busy, and it was afoot that the Holy Grail drew close to Logres. Pavilions burst into silken bloom up and down the riverside meadow outside the gates. At every meal Camelot’s great hall was packed with guests, and Perceval and the other knights were kept busy hunting boar, venison, and fowl to feed them.

  In the greenwood by day, riding down the black boar with his brother-knights, lightly clad in leather and linen, throwing the slender darts he had not forgotten to make, now and again hearkening as in the distance a sweeter horn blew and other hooves with dim crying of hounds came and rushed away just beyond eyesight, or finding a merry troupe of maidens with hawked wrists to accompany; in the high hall at night, scented with spring flowers and hung with blazing banners, as more people than he had ever seen before in one place supped and laughed and listened to the songs of minstrels—in those brief days, Sir Perceval moved in a hushed awe, and wished that it would never end, that no matter what happened hereafter, in some quiet corner of Britain King Arthur would still hold his court at Camelot, and Logres would reign bright and ageless in strength and beauty.

  On the evening of his arrival Perceval went looking for the King, and heard from a page that he was in the garden.

  The castle garden occupied the eastern slope of the Camelot-hill. It was not a big one, but its designer had made the most of the space, filling it with trees, hedges, and riotous spring flowers. In the mazelike middle of the garden a fountain gushed water which streamed away to join the river girding the castle. Here, amid the scent of daffodils, under trees hung with tiny lanterns, the King paced with a hound at his heels, speaking to Sir Bedivere.

  Sir Perceval paused at a distance until the King looked up and called him. At the summons he started forward and bowed and gave his news.

  “Naciens the Hermit of Carbonek spoke to me in the Scots’ land. And I heard that the Grail Knight will be here at Pentecost.”

  Before the King could reply, another step fell on the path, and the three looked up to see bars of argent. It was Sir Bors, a cousin of Lancelot’s.

  “Sire,” he said, with the breath of a man who has been hurrying, “I saw Naciens the Hermit in Lyonesse, and he told me that the Grail Knight would come at Pentecost.”

  “I can well believe it,” said the King with a smile.

  “I rode five days without drawing rein to tell you,” said Bors.

  Silence fell. The only sound was the soft splashing fountain. Above, moon and stars. Around, perfume. Beyond, the wild faint thread of a nightingale’s song.

  “Earth is weighed down with Heaven tonight,” said Perceval, almost in a whisper.

  The King stirred. “The noontide of Logres,” he murmured.

  “Not so, by my faith,” said Bors, “but the dawn.”

  “Good Bors, the son of succor!” said the King. “But I stand here in fear and trembling for a thing I cannot fathom. Who can say if the works of our hands will endure before the glory that is coming?”

  On his way back to the castle, Perceval saw a figure moving through moonlight and shade, and recognised it as Sir Lancelot. With a murmur of apology he left Sir Bors and followed the Knight of the Lake’s shadowy form into the labyrinthine garden.

  The sense of awe was still upon him, and he walked softly, almost breathlessly, lest by some loud noise or sudden movement he should break the spell of that graceful garden. Too softly: before he had gone more than ten paces from the path, on the shadowed border of a moonlit clearing he paused with a sudden sense of mistake. There was a ghostly apple-tree, covered in white blossom. Below it walked like a silent vision three others, rippling in and out of moonlight and shadow. At the approach of Sir Lancelot, one of them came forward. In the full moonlight, her hair and skin and samite gown shone like silver. Only her eyes were invisible, thrown into shadow, black pools of distance.

  The Queen.

  Perceval stood immobile. What had he stumbled upon? Unbidden, the words of the Lady Nimue came into his mind. She would be burned. Before they had flashed through his memory he wheeled around to hurry back the way he had come. He took only two steps into the bushes and came face to face with his father’s youngest brother, Sir Agravain.

  Perceval stared at his uncle, his stomach churning, feeling like a sneak and a spy. But even in the grip of that dreadful moment he recognised the same look in Agravain’s twisted features.

  Only for a moment. But as they both mastered themselves, it came burning hot into Perceval’s mind that Agravain must have been following Lancelot on purpose and not, like himself, by accident.

  A rush of anger sluiced through him like floodwater. Afterwards, Perceval could not determine whether what he did next was right or wrong. “Agravain,” he cried out, in a voice that tried to be jovial, but choked on the horror of the moment. “Have you come to speak to Lancelot too? I saw him walk this way.”

  Agravain, who had opened his mouth to speak, almost flinched as Perceval’s voice split the night air. “I—” he faltered.

  “What a surprise,” said Perceval, still at the top of his voice and grinning madly, “to find you here. Shall we go on together?”

  “I was just going back to the castle,” Agravain muttered.

  “The evening is yet fair,” said Perceval. But as he sang out the words, footsteps approached, and the Knight of the Lake stood by them, straddling the path with his hands on his hips.

  “I hear my name called,” he said with a gleam of laughter. Agravain conquered himself with an heroic effort and spoke a greeting. Then, so soundlessly that Perceval thought he was dreaming, under the dappled moonlight behind Lancelot the Queen appeared like a white shadow.

  “Well,” she said, and her voice, like herself, was cool and silver. “I did not look to see such a gathering when I craved a moment of time from the Knight of the Lake.”

  At the sound of the Queen’s voice Lancelot stepped aside with the measured grace that marked all his movements, but Perceval knew from the way he had stood blocking the path from them that he must not have expected her coming. And yet, such was his perfect self-command that not an eyebrow flickered when she spoke.

  The Queen came forward flanked by the two other damsels Perceval had noted earlier. Lancelot, if outwardly composed, nevertheless stood speechless; Agravain’s eyes narrowed; Perceval, watching them all, felt like one waking from the dead. For had the Queen’s tryst with Lancelot been guilty or secret, she would not now stand before them, uttering a gracious word to each.

  He realised that she was speaking to him.

  “And I am glad to see you, Sir Perceval, still upon your feet,” she said. “For it was told to me that you took a wound at Carlisle.”

  “Madam,” he said, sagging with relief, “and I also am right glad to see you here.” Whether she caught the double meaning or not was not apparent. She dropped her lashes, smiled, and moved on.

  19

  O servant of the high God, Galahad!

  Rise and be arm’d: the Sangreal is gone forth

  Through the great forest.

  Morris

  ON THE DAY OF PENTECOST THE High King of Britain held festival at Camelot.

  Even that morning, latecomers still straggled in to the bursting castle. Sir Gareth and Sir Gaheris arrived before breakfast, having ridden south a few days on a quick patrol. While they still stood stret
ching their legs in the courtyard, Sir Kay returned from Trinovant with Sir Ector and the Bishop of Ergyng. Then at mid-morning, just after church, two kinsmen of Sir Lancelot came riding in on horses stumbling with exhaustion: Sir Hector de Maris and Sir Lionel. Through gulps of water, they told the others that they had ridden night and day since escaping from the dungeons of the Castle Nigramous. Finally, a short space before midday, with the feast about to begin, Perceval rode through the keep gate and saw Gawain on the ramparts above, staring up the river with shaded eyes.

  “Is all well?” Perceval called, reining in his horse and speaking through a thicket of white blossoms. Nine of the Queen’s maidens had carried him on a last-minute maying, and his arms were full of the thorned flowers.

  “Sir Lancelot went away with a damsel after sunset last night,” Sir Gawain told him, “and he is still gone.”

  “Did he not say when he’d return?”

  “Not a word.”

  “I am mounted and ready. Shall I ride after him?”

  “No,” Gawain said with a laugh. “I’ve seen Pentecost feasts before. If he does not come, let me ride out. Though it will be a pity, for his is the only siege empty, saving the Siege Perilous.” He turned and scanned the landscape again. “Wait!”

  A single knight came trotting out of the forest, bearing the familiar argent and gules. When Gawain stuck two fingers in his mouth and whistled, he waved his lance in the air and spurred his horse to a canter.

  “He is in a good mood,” Gawain said, leaving the ramparts to join Perceval in the gate. On reaching the keep, Lancelot reined in beside them and pulled off his helm, revealing a flushed and grinning face.

  “Perceval was worried about you,” Gawain told him very seriously. “Where have you been?”

  “I knighted a boy,” Lancelot said through the grin, and trotted on, up the hill, to the stables.