M. K. Hume [King Arthur Trilogy 04] The Last Dragon

by M. K. Hume

  When Arthur hailed him, Germanus raised his hand instinctively to the petrified shell hanging round his neck on a chain of fine brass. Back in the far reaches of time, someone had drilled a small hole through the spiral shell, presumably in order to string it on a piece of hide. Now it rested on the greying chest hairs of Germanus, a mercenary born far from this ancient land.

  ‘Do we have to begin our journey back to Arden today, master?’

  Bleary eyed, Germanus eyed his student warily. He had drunk too much wine the night before and felt both guilty and hung over, while Lorcan had conveniently disappeared. ‘Why?’ the mercenary demanded irritably, being fairly certain that Arthur wanted something of him that would be either time-consuming or physically taxing.

  ‘I’d like to see where King Artor grew to manhood,’ Arthur replied candidly. There was no point in lying to Germanus, who was far too astute to be fooled. The tutors had known Arthur since he was a boy, so they could usually guess at his questions before he asked them.

  ‘Seems fair. I’ve heard he grew up at a Roman farm called the Villa Poppinidii, only an hour or two from here by horse. I believe it still exists, although it’s run down. Where’s Lorcan?’

  Arthur shrugged, saddened that such an important place had been neglected over time. As he grew older, all the places that had seemed so real and inviolate during his youth were disappearing. Since that day on the snowy hill overlooking Rab’s farm, Arthur had lost any faith in the firmness of the earth under his feet. The loss of his childhood meant he could never be quite certain that any day was perfectly safe. But the legends had seemed real. Now, the decline of the Villa Poppinidii would underline the decline of the tribal world, legends included.

  Just then Lorcan entered, whistling tunelessly through his teeth. He looked as disreputable as ever, with mud caught between his dirty toes within his scuffed leather sandals. Arthur found it almost impossible to believe that not much more than twelve hours earlier Lorcan had been clean, sweet smelling and newly released from Aquae Sulis’s most luxurious bathhouse. It was hard to imagine what he had done in the intervening hours to become as untidy as an unmade bed, but Lorcan never stayed neat and well dressed for long. Oddly, no one ever held his appearance against him, as if slovenliness were an easily discarded coat, non-essential to the man who lay beneath the surface untidiness.

  ‘You’re both awake,’ Lorcan said unnecessarily, oblivious of the mud he had tracked into the room. ‘Aquae Sulis is only so interesting, Germanus. There’s a limit to what I can find to amuse me in a post-Roman city that doesn’t really care what visitors think of it. Have you eaten?’

  Germanus groaned and carefully shook his head. On the other hand, Arthur felt his stomach rumble at the mention of food. ‘I would happily eat a horse,’ he answered hopefully. ‘You’ll need sustenance, because you’re about to embark on a journey with me to the Villa Poppinidii where King Artor spent his childhood. I have a yen to see the shadows of the past.’

  ‘Let’s not go,’ Germanus mumbled. Putting a cushion over his head, he tried to pretend his companions had vanished into some silent, empty void.

  Lorcan looked interested. ‘I’ve heard talk about a very special garden that grows near the villa, and I’d be interested in seeing it. Up, Germanus! Arthur has given us something profitable to do with our day, rather than ride back to Arden or watch you spend your free time sleeping.’

  With a quick burst of energy, he tore the woollen blanket off his fellow tutor, baring Germanus’s hairy legs and a rucked-up tunic which he had slept in after tumbling, half drunk, onto his pallet. ‘For the sake of the Christus, Germanus, spare the blushes of a priest by covering your hairy arse.’

  ‘You weren’t acting like a man of the cloth last night,’ Germanus grumbled, but he yawned hugely and clambered to his feet, stretching his long, northern arms to show an alarming expanse of narrow flank. ‘I know you’re going to make my life miserable until I give in, so I’d best get dressed and join you.’

  Then, with an old soldiers’ efficiency, Germanus dressed, packed his saddle bags and was ready to leave before either of his companions. He was chewing charcoal to clean his teeth when the others joined him.

  ‘Take it from me, boy,’ he mumbled through the charcoal, ‘look after your teeth, especially if you’re going to be a fighting man. The inability to chew makes us old and weak faster than anything else I can think of. Rotten teeth can kill, not to mention giving you breath that stinks worse than a week of sweating. Bathing is all very well, and quite pleasurable, but good teeth beat cleanliness hands down.’

  Arthur nodded, his face showing attention, while his mind travelled ahead to the villa and what he might see there. He had heard Germanus’s opinion on oral hygiene many times and always cleaned his own teeth with a small twig after every meal, although the habit had earned him some good-natured ridicule at the Warriors’ Dyke.

  ‘Come on, old man. I’m eager to see the place that nurtured Artor. Perhaps I’ll understand him better after I’ve seen the villa,’ he urged, dancing in excitement like an overgrown boy. Under the tidal wave of his enthusiasm, the two older men were herded to the innkeeper to settle their account. It included the cost of stabling their horses, a sum which proved to be greater than the charge for their own quarters. As Germanus drew on his coarse sheepskin gloves, from which the fingers had been cut off at the first joint for dexterity, he carefully checked the three mounts and the packhorse and pronounced himself satisfied with the care they had been given.

  Then, in a flurry of fallen leaves, the trio spurred their horses into a brisk trot through the crowded streets. Arthur felt elated at the thought of becoming his own man again after three seasons digging in the mud and slush of the Warriors’ Dyke. Now all he needed was to prove his worth in battle. To outstrip the deeds of his father was an impossible ambition, but a part of Arthur that he kept well buried yearned to become a person of note in his own right. At the moment, he was a pale copy of a great man. He was happy, but he hungered to be a warrior renowned for his own deeds rather than those of the formidable Bedwyr, his ostensible father, and his sire whose name could never be spoken aloud. As he set off on the journey to the Villa Poppinidii, he was hopeful that this historic place might begin to fill the hole in his heart.

  After two hours on the road, the three men were less cheerful than at the outset of their adventure. The terrain was rendered interesting by rolling hills, all of which were suitable for agriculture, as the farmer in Lorcan recognised immediately. A huge, menacing forest lay to their right, and Arthur told Germanus the tales of this sullen and forbidding place that the great Myrddion had included in his scrolls.

  ‘Apparently, there’s a garden around a ruin near that part of the farm where the villa’s land abuts onto the forest. Myrddion speaks of Artor’s first wife living and dying there when the High King was still a young man, but he is very hesitant to reveal much of what happened in those far-off days. I don’t really understand why this Gallia was deemed to be unsuitable as a wife for the heir of Uther Pendragon.’

  Lorcan snorted as his eyes searched the rolling land in front of them for signs of the villa. ‘I asked about the history of the family when I was wandering through Aquae Sulis. One of the old women in the market was quite forthcoming, and she told me that Artor’s first wife was the daughter of a Roman fish trader. It seems the family was very rich, but any merchant’s daughter would have been considered unsuitable as a queen in those days. As she would today.’

  Arthur’s spine stiffened. ‘Do you think that Artor would have cast her off to become High King?’

  Lorcan recognised the autocratic note and moderated his tone immediately. ‘No. The scrolls of Myrddion Merlinus tell us that he’d have refused the throne if he’d been forced to make a choice. I think Master Myrddion was very glad that he didn’t have to face the issue and that mad old Uther killed his daughter-in-law before one of Artor’s friends – himself, for instance – was forced into the same positio
n.’

  As Arthur gaped, shocked by the ruthless demands of power, Lorcan continued with his impromptu lesson. ‘Quite apart from her father’s trade, the tribal kings would never have accepted her Roman lineage. The queen had to be a tribal woman, one like Wenhaver.’

  ‘Can we leave ancient history in the past?’ Germanus asked plaintively, for he cared not a jot for the history of the tribes, except as it affected his lad. ‘I believe the villa is in sight on the top of that hill. We should be watching for a path that leads off the road.’

  The way to the villa was soon found. The gates were hospitably open, and the three horsemen began to ride in a long slow arc up the gravelled track to the house on the hillside. No one still lived who would remember the other three visitors who had come to the Villa Poppinidii when Artor was twelve years old, in search of a wild-haired boy called Artorex. Dozens of men and women had died in that quest by the time the lost child had eventually been found in this bucolic place. Now another Artorex was riding up to its doors.

  The companions could tell that the walls of the villa had once been whitewashed until they shone in the sunshine, but neglect had allowed them to become so earth coloured that the lines of the building disappeared into the hill. As they neared the house, they saw chickens, ducks, several dogs and two young children playing in the courtyard, but almost immediately a servant hurried through the scarred wooden doors, ordered the children inside and straightened upright to demand the identities of the uninvited visitors.

  Arthur announced his name and the names and callings of his companions. Mention of Bedwyr raised the man’s eyebrows, and he begged the visitors to dismount and wait for just a moment. ‘There’s water in the pail and a dipper hanging beside the well. Help yourselves, gentlemen, while I fetch the mistress.’

  ‘Our thanks, good sir,’ Arthur replied courteously, and swung off his horse with an easy grace. A tow-haired boy appeared out of nowhere to take the reins. Arthur noted that the boy’s eyes were pale blue, and he wondered how such northern eyes had a place in a Roman villa.

  A woman came to the forecourt with the soft murmur of house slippers on stone as Germanus and Lorcan joined their master afoot. Her warm brown hair was neatly bound into matron’s plaits at the base of her neck, although several curling tendrils had escaped and were moving softly in the light breeze. With pale hazel eyes, she scanned her visitors and lowered her head in the briefest of acknowledgements.

  ‘I am Luned, daughter of Livinia Minor and wife of Llewyd, master of this villa. What is your business here?’

  ‘I apologise for any concern that our sudden appearance has caused, Mistress Luned. I am kin to Artorex, who was the foster-son of the master of this house many years ago. I’m also kin to Queen Anna who was called Licia at her birth, and to her son, Bran, and her grandson, Ector. I have long wished to visit the home of my forebears and to see the garden of Gallia with my own eyes. We will take our leave if we are intruding, for I have no desire to make you uneasy or uncomfortable.’

  With the same formality, Lady Luned dropped into a low curtsey. ‘Lord Arthur, you couldn’t intrude on us by visiting the Villa Poppinidii, where even the stones themselves remember the footsteps of the Great Ones. So enter and rest yourselves. My husband is absent with the grain harvest, but after you have taken refreshment I will escort you to the garden. You and I are also kin, remember?’

  Arthur thought of the female line that ran back through the family to Lady Livinia Major, who had served as Artor’s foster-mother when he was known as Artorex. As he struggled to remember the details, Mistress Luned seemed to read his mind.

  ‘Yes, Lord Arthur, it’s a tangled history, isn’t it? And it’s had more than its fair share of family tragedies. But let’s not dwell on what we can’t change. Join me in a jug of the sweet cider we brew with our own presses. My cook will find some of the tiny cakes that the slave woman, Frith, made to tempt the appetite of Artorex when he was a boy. Aye, it’s odd to live with legends, isn’t it? And stranger yet to treat them with easy familiarity while the rest of the world marvels . . . at least, those who can still remember.’

  Mistress Luned’s word was good and sweet cider appeared in cups of coloured Roman glass, ancient and infinitely precious. ‘We have no Falernian wine nowadays, nor even the Spanish wines that my mother favoured. Our water source is clean and pure so, like any provident countrywoman, I make my own cider and ale. Please, drink . . . eat.’

  As they enjoyed her hospitality in the ancient triclinium, Arthur’s mind was buzzing with half-remembered details from Merlinus’s scrolls, and a familiar feeling of déjà vu came over him when he saw the verdigris-covered bronze fish that had been so carefully described by both Artor and Merlinus. The atrium had changed very little in the intervening decades, for nature wears well with the passage of years, although the single tree was taller now and the vegetables that grew like exotic flowers around the pool and fountain were sparser than those described by Myrddion. Time plays tricks with even the greatest minds, Arthur thought, and applied himself to amusing Luned with tales from the building of the Warriors’ Dyke.

  Afterwards, the mistress of the house led the three companions across freshly ploughed fields that had been prepared for the spring crop. Around them, the farm was a hive of ordered activity: the fruit trees and nut shrubbery near the main house, the vegetable gardens beside the old slave quarters, and a small flock of sheep in a fallow paddock not far from the stables which housed the farm livestock. Even the number of beehives indicated careful husbandry on the part of the master.

  ‘The villa may have seen better days, but this is a still a snug, well-managed farm. I’ve rarely seen better. And Arthur’s doing well. He’s a natural courtier for a boy who’s never been anywhere much,’ Germanus whispered to Lorcan, who nodded thoughtfully. Both men had remained silent throughout the refreshment at the villa, watching Arthur carefully as he carried the weight of the conversation. None of the social niceties had been neglected: another test had been passed.

  Gallia’s garden was set around the ruins of a small villa. The fire-cracked stones of the courtyard were decorated with dried flower heads, mosses and artfully ordered natural plants surrounding a small pool with a huge monolith at its centre. Rudimentary designs had been chiselled out of the weathered, lichen-slick surface of the ancient stone, including a complex pattern of channels and an odd off-centre cup. Despite the warmth generated by their vigorous walk across the fields, Arthur felt the hair rise on the back of his neck.

  ‘May I touch the stone, Mistress Luned?’ he asked, for an itching had begun at the back of his skull.

  ‘Of course, Lord Arthur. This monument is called the Mother Stone and the older servants swear that Artor ordered it to be brought from the Old Forest to decorate his forecourt. I can’t vouch for the truth of it, but it is certainly far older than anything else at this villa.’

  Careful not to disturb the large fish that lurked under the water weed in the pond as it waited for an unwary dragonfly to skim too close to its watery home, Arthur leaned out to touch the surface of the rough-cut stone.

  The itch became more pronounced, but he felt no threat, only a cold, heavy watchfulness, as if the monolith had seen rites so old and arcane that human memory had blotted out any memory of them. It seemed to recognise him – or someone like him – and the sensation was strange but not unpleasant. Like his father before him, he wondered what that tilted cup had been designed to hold, and instinct told him that the stone held a significance far beyond his understanding. Regretfully, he drew his hand away and moved through the forecourt to examine the remnants of walls that were thick with climbing roses and clematis, the crumbling stones bound together by great drifts of ivy and briar.

  ‘See? That urn is rumoured to hold the earthly remains of Targo, while the ashes of Gallia and her woman Frith lie under the wild red rose over there. Across the forecourt, you can see a seat of old limestone which is perfectly placed for contemplation. Ector Major is in
humed beneath its plinth. As Artor’s beloved foster-father, he earned his place among the noble dead who originally inhabited the villa. Men who are far more knowledgeable than I have said that the High King wished to lie here as well. Only Caius, the last of the Poppinidii gens, lies elsewhere, for Artor refused to permit his murderous foster-brother to befoul his loved ones. I speak frankly because I assume that you are all privy to the High King’s secrets, judging by your speech. If I do wrong, then the good God will punish me, but I feel no censure in any of you.’

  While Arthur wandered through Gallia’s garden, Germanus and Lorcan sat with Mistress Luned, and were told much of the history of the Villa Poppinidii. She had met Artor on several occasions during her youth, for the High King could never completely forget the place where he had spent so many happy years. Whenever he was forced to travel to the north, he always contrived to deviate to the villa on the hill and the gardens that lay beyond.

  As the sun lowered in the sky, heralding the approach of twilight, a man came running towards them from the villa. Luned rose from Ector’s seat, straightened her skirts and waited for him to reach the small group.

  ‘Ah, Gareth, I should have called you myself. Arthur has come to visit the family. You may have heard of him? He is the son of Lady Elayne and Lord Bedwyr of Arden Forest.’

  Lorcan and Germanus exchanged glances. Clearly this Gareth was not privy to the secret of Arthur’s birth.

  Gareth was younger than Arthur and not as tall, standing at six feet and one inch. His wide shoulders and narrow hips indicated a superb physical specimen, but his blond hair, blunt-cut at the shoulders, was unplaited, so he had yet to attain the status of a warrior.

  ‘Gareth?’ Lorcan queried. ‘One of King Artor’s famed bodyguards was called by that name.’

  ‘Aye, he was my father. I was born in his old age, after the death of his master. It was a time when he felt that his life belonged to him again. I am a direct descendant of Artor’s nurse, old Frith, and my father’s ashes lie beneath the daisy bank where they placed Targo’s urn. They were friends for most of their adult lives.’