The Wolf and the Crown (The Perilous Order of Camelot Book 3)

by A. A. Attanasio

  "Then, are we to leave this Spiral Castle," one of the men asked, "and return north to inform our king, Cruithni?"

  "Does that way lead to the Skyward House?" Guthlac replied with a derisive twist of his head. "Aidan must taste fear. Then the bird chatter of Iron Hammer's Latin will not sound as sweet."

  "Lot and Kyner flank Iron Hammer," another of the warband spoke up. "They will taste not fear but our blood if we attack them. We will find our way to Skyward House for certain—but our king, Cruithni, will be ill served. And how after that will we account proudly for ourselves among the war heroes?"

  "So, we are agreed among us!" Guthlac smiled, exposing teeth filed to points, the better for rending his enemies' flesh. "We will slip among them by night, take our trophies, and leave them with the sickening taste of fear."

  Rising in Fire

  "I have good news for all of you," Kyner spoke with Aidan's men and their families in the fortress ward while King Arthor and Lot sat with the chieftain in the mead hall. "The great and nameless God, the creator of the universe, has sent His son to walk among us and to save us from the realm of the dead and that dark realm's goddess Hel."

  To entice the pagan Celts to come away from the elephants shackled at the front gate and the entertainers resting in the colorful tents of the main courtyard, Cei offered amber beads to all who would listen to his father's sermon. Each translucent bead had etched upon it a tiny fish emblem, a Christian symbol for the Greek word for fish, ichthys, an acronym for "Jesus Christ, Son of God, Savior".

  To the Celts knowledgeable of runes, the etched fish appeared as Oddal, symbol of inherited land and property—and that made the amber beads magical implements for acquiring tangible possessions. The people received them eagerly and listened respectfully to Kyner's tale of virgin birth, magical events, gruesome death, and resurrection.

  Entertained by the story and gratified by the amber gift and its promise of wealth, the people cheered Kyner when he concluded. Those already familiar with Christianity and scornful of it cheered anyway, obliged by their Celtic tradition to display hospitality to the guests that their chief had admitted into their community.

  None stayed for the baptism to follow, and Cei shouted irately at them to come back as they dispersed for their noon meal.

  "Save your voice, son." Kyner shook his leather pouch of amber beads. "We've plenty more enticement left, but it's wasted here in the settlement. These townbound souls are hardened with greed. Let us go out into the surrounding fields and thorps and preach the good news to the rustics."

  Cei agreed, and they departed on horseback by a side gate. The remainder of that afternoon, they rode the narrow traces among steep hills, visiting farms and crofts, handing out their beads and their message of God's son rising in fire to heaven.

  From afar, hidden in the tree-crowns, Guthlac and his warband observed the meandering transit of the preachers. Toward nightfall, they silently advanced upon a wattle farmhouse the Celts had visited earlier. The watchful geese squawked warning to the farmer, and he emerged with scythe in hand—little challenge to Guthlac, who caught the man's sweeping blade in the notch of his ax and used the harvesting tool to lop the farmer's head from his shoulders.

  The others swiftly removed the heads of the farmer's wife and their four children. Then, donning the clothes of their victims and wearing their scalps, Guthlac and one other Pict hitched the farmer's wagon and carried the others covered in hay sheaves and as many farm animals as they could lug to the side gate of the stockade.

  Eufrasia in Thrall

  With his face obscured by scalp hair and twilight, Guthlac announced to the gatekeeper in passable Latin, "We have received the good news from Lord Kyner. He bids us deliver these animals for a holy feast. Let us in."

  When the keeper opened the gate, Guthlac stabbed him through the throat, stoppering his death cry. The wagon trundled onto the equestrian range, keeping to the stockade wall behind the horse stables. Always before, Aidan's warriors patrolled the perimeter, too vigilant to allow such a grievous breech of their defenses. This night, King Arthor's astonishing entourage distracted them. They had joined the settlement's residents, who had gathered in the main courtyard to watch the boy-king's court performers emerge from their tents and begin the evening festivities. Elephants paraded, bears danced, wise dogs jumped and frolicked to jubilant music, and no one observed the thirteen Pictish warriors move furtively as shadows past the granary, the storage sheds, and the emptied barracks.

  Guthlac's men deployed across the ward before the mead hall. Two positioned themselves behind the flour barrels at the bakehouse while two others entered and cut the throat pipes of the cook and his apprentice. Three more clambered onto the bailey scaffold, silent as wraiths, and killed the two guards of the chieftain's keep while they leaned on their spears and watched the celebrations in the far courtyard. Three stationed themselves at the back and sides of the mead hall, swords ready to dispatch wandering sentinels. The last two of the warband waited as the stars brightened. A servant emerged from the chieftain's manor, returning to attend the dignitaries in the mead hall, and the raiders cut her throat, then barged into the timber lodge.

  Eufrasia sat in her chamber inspecting herself in a mirror when Guthlac kicked open her door. A thrown knife silenced a screaming maid. The other servant gaped in voiceless terror as the gruesome Pict pointed a sword at Eufrasia and said gruffly, "Come silently or die!"

  Eufrasia, a chieftain's daughter familiar with weapons, snatched a dagger from her bedstand. Before she could throw it, the Pict's sword flashed and knocked it deftly from her hand. The next moment, two more Picts entered, freckled with the blood of the guards they had slain in the corridors. She shouted an alarm only briefly before leather thongs secured her mouth, hands, and feet.

  Heaved over Guthlac's shoulder, she struggled in vain as he carried her into the night. Quickly, he retraced his steps, gathering his warband behind him as he went. At the wagon behind the stables, Guthlac tossed the chieftain's bundled daughter among the warriors, with a strict warning from Guthlac to his men not to molest her. That privilege belonged to him.

  Out the side gate the wagon exited. Guthlac on the riding board wore the farmer's clothes and his scalp. Kyner and Cei saw the wagon in the distance as they returned across the nightland and, embittered by their failure to win even one soul for their Savior, paid the yeoman no heed.

  Treasures of the Otherworld

  Merlin as a dwarf and Dagonet a monkey walked the perimeter of the lake on Avalon, searching for some sign of the Nine Queens. They found only ruffled cabbage flowers poking through the windfall apples.

  Hopefully, Dagonet pointed up the bracken slopes to a thin cascade that trickled from where they had arrived.

  "No, Dagonet," Merlin replied. "We were lucky to get out of the hollow hillth without magic. If we go back, we may wun into the pale people. And they are a mithchievoth lot."

  Dagonet picked up a newly fallen and unblemished apple and bit into it. He followed Merlin as in a dream, chasing after his own physical form as they wandered among apple trees and a few renegade elms.

  At one of the larger elms, the wizard paused and pointed to a hole at the base of the tree. "Wook! And thmell!"

  Monkey Dagonet crept up to the grass-fringed hole and smelled a feverish reek.

  "Dwagon bweath!" said Merlin.

  Dagonet backed away swiftly, squeaking a small cry.

  "Don't be afwaid." Merlin crawled into the hole and disappeared. A moment later, his big, freckled head poked out. "Come on! The Dwagon ith athleep."

  The wizard descended into darkness, and Dagonet hesitated, clutching nervously at his tail. He edged into the hole, feeling his way along the steep descent by grasping root tendrils and jutting knobs of rock. The darkness thickened remorselessly. The hole above dwindled to a distant star. When the monkey's eyes had adjusted sufficiently, Dagonet discerned a soft glow in the depths.

  Like a full moon in a jungle night, the ligh
t from below shone through tangles of organic loops and fronds that were actually roots and plates of silhouetted shale. Dagonet dropped into a grotto illuminated by a percolating pool of sulfurous water, orange and frothy red. He put a hand to his nose.

  "Yeth, it thtinkth—but wook, Dagonet! Wook where we are!"

  Merlin pointed to glossy shelves of rock upon which lay heaped dunes of gold coins, toppled urns of fiery rubies, and cauldron pots of diamonds. "The Tweathure of the Otherworld! The Dwagon hath collected thith hoard from the cawavanth and thipth it hath thwallowed over the yearth."

  Dagonet climbed a stalagmite and plucked a polished diamond from a pot of gems. He sniffed it, then bit it, and tossed it to Merlin with a querying shake of his head.

  "You're wight, Dagonet. It appearth like a diamond of our world. But the Dwagon hath changed it, imbued it with hith power. Behold!"

  Merlin tossed the diamond into the bubbling pool—and the water agitated, then went perfectly calm—still and reflectant as a mirror. In its surface, they peered and faced themselves in their true forms—Lailoken a demon of flanged jaws, serpent grin, and hooded flame-core eyes. And beside him, where the monkey gazed, a Fire Lord stood, resplendent in golden flames.

  King Arthor's Shame

  The blood of the gatekeeper, four guards, the baker and his apprentice, a maidservant, and almost surely Eufrasia's blood as well weighed heavily on the young king.

  "I am ashamed," he admitted to Aidan after they heard the surviving chambermaid's account of Guthlac's bold abduction of the chieftain's youngest daughter. From the fleece rug splattered with the blood of the dead maid, he picked up Eufrasia's dagger. "I am ashamed that you have suffered such a terrible loss while under my protection."

  "Your protection?" Aidan's ruddy face darkened. "You're but a boy—younger than the daughter I lost."

  "I am your king," Arthor replied calmly, his face ashen and grim but not flinching before the enraged chieftain's tight stare. "You had every right to expect security in my presence—and I have failed you."

  "Retrieve my daughter, boy, and I will bend my knee and call you king." Aidan turned away in disgust, then stopped in the doorway and pointed a thick finger at the youth. "If my Eufrasia is dead or in any way maimed, do not dare show your hairless face at the Spiral Castle again!"

  After the chieftain stalked out of the manor lodge, Arthor looked to his aide, Bedevere. "See that the elephants and all the performers are sent back to Camelot. I have undertaken this tour of my kingdom too merrily."

  "Sire, this tragedy is not your fault," Bedevere consoled. "You are a guest in these walls and under Chief Aidan's protection and Lord Lot's countenance."

  "Is that what it means to be king, Bedevere?" Arthor admonished the steward with a frown. "No. I alone am responsible. I am the high king, and all my people must have faith that I can protect them. Otherwise, I am no better a monarch than the carnival mummers I parade with."

  Kyner and Cei met King Arthor as he exited the manor. "My lord, forgive us!" the elder Celt beseeched contritely. "We saw the Picts upon the high road leaving the stockade and did not recognize them for the brigands they are."

  "How the harrowing Hades were we to know, father?" Cei glowered morosely. "It was dark, and they rode past disguised."

  "You should not have been about the countryside preaching!" Arthor scolded, then caught himself. "Forgive me, father—brother. I'm wroth, because my negligence has brought grief to this castle. I should have thought to establish my own perimeter. I was so eager to win the hearts of these people, I did not think to protect them."

  Lot emerged from the bailey with armed escorts bearing torches. "Aidan tells me you are determined to go after Eufrasia. That is a fool's promise, my lord, for you will have to go alone. We have tracked the wagon to where the Picts abandoned it at the cliff traces. They have disappeared into the gorges. Not even Aidan's men will descend into that confusing wilderness. Ambuscade is too far easy down there—and besides, once a rescue party is seen by the Picts, Eufrasia's life is forfeit."

  "I intend to go alone."

  "I will go with you, brother."

  "No, Cei. You know I love you for your courage, but it would be easier to hide an elephant on those cliff trails."

  Concerning Ghosts, Demons, and Wizards

  The pale people took Gorlois' hat and robes and ran laughing through the trees, crying, "Follow us! Follow us!"

  Naked but for his hemp sandals, the ghost in the body of Merlin gawked about fearfully. Trees like old women, like beggars, stood stooped on all sides, eye-sparks watching from holes in their trunks.

  He bolted after the Daoine Sid, hoping they would lead him out of this dark wood. Soon only the scornful laughter of the elfen people remained, and then that, too, dwindled into the maroon air.

  Gorlois stopped running and shouted a curse, "Damnation on all of you!" In frustration, he kicked at a pulpy log fallen to mushrooms, stubbed his toe, and cried out again.

  The pain startled him. I'm alive! he thought and giddily recalled the grievous sensation he had experienced when he first awoke inside a monkey and learned that he had been slain on the plains of Londinium. He had no memory of that; however, the throb in his toe had a good memory—and that made him laugh.

  Astonishingly, the gust of laughter opened the gates of power in the wizard's body. The dry stalks of grass around him rustled in a wind that rose directly out of the ground and lifted dead leaves spiraling into the brown air.

  "I am a ghost!" he laughed louder, and the leaves flew back onto their branches and swelled with green sap. "I am a ghost who defeated a demon and became a wizard!" His laughter widened maniacally, and he slapped his naked body and guffawed to see blue sparks jump from his pallid flesh.

  "The magic is inside me!" he realized. He urinated, and tiny, quartz-petal flowers sprouted where he splashed.

  More laughter sent him running again, this time for joy. The nightmare had become a euphoric dream. He ran faster, until his churning feet no longer touched the ground, and he flew with his white beard forked by the speed of his flight. Swerving among the trees, he looked for the pale people. And there was no sign of them.

  He willed himself to stop—and his flight accelerated! He began to soar. Fright replaced joy, and he lost his buoyancy. He fell in a tangle of limbs among the leaf drifts. Groaning, he sat up and brushed beetles and snails from his beard. "Let up, Gorlois!" he chided himself. "Magic is an art."

  At that thought, he allowed himself a chuckle. "I, an artist!" He swirled a finger in the air and drew paisleys of light. That inspired further laughing, and soon the gates of magical power swung wide again.

  Gorlois bounded upright and charged into the gloom, spry as a gazelle.

  The Dragon Pool

  Merlin stood back from the clear water in which he had seen the monkey reflected as a Fire Lord and stared dumbfounded at the beast. "You are an angel?"

  The wizard knew that humanity had been shaped over aeons by the Fire Lords—that the entire universe served as their workshop, in which they built the cosmic devices that would carry them back to heaven, to the realm of pure light from which all creation had emerged at the start of time.

  People functioned as a prototype of beings yet to come, complexities intricate enough to carry the Fire Lords out of the cold and dark of space to the eternal glory of paradise. And he knew, also, that, crude as they were, human beings housed immense charges of energy.

  His mother, Saint Optima, had embodied enough angelic force to weave a human form that could hold his demon power. Yet, he still doubted that a human body could contain the luminosity of a Fire Lord.

  He peeked again into the Dragon Pool and scrutinized the shining form he saw reflected by the monkey. He noticed that the Fire Lord did not actually radiate from Dagonet's soul but enclosed it. That in itself astonished the demon, though it made sense upon reflection. The propinquity of great entities often distorted the flesh of mortals. That was why Dagonet had been born a dwa
rf: an angel escorted him.

  "You don't know it, Dagonet, but you have a gweat fwiend who watcheth over you." The wizard scratched his curly, orange locks, wondering about this. "Then it wath no acthident that you found your way to our King Arthor. You have a holy dethtiny, and your thtunted body ith the pwithe you mutht pay for it."

  Before Merlin could dwell further on this, bright laughter gleamed from among the stalagmites. When he spun about in response, he nearly toppled backward into the Dragon Pool. A tall man wearing his conical hat and robes stood at the far end of the cavern. "Who are you?" the dwarfed wizard shouted in alarm.

  The tall stranger gave no answer.

  The monkey scampered across the grotto and snatched the hat, revealing the wet-looking tip of a stalagmite. More laughter echoed from deeper recesses of the jewel-strewn vault.

  "The Daoine Thid!" the wizard surmised and went to retrieve his garments. "How came you by thethe?"

  No reply followed, and laughter sparkled from farther away.

  "Thomewhere, Gorlois wanderth naked in my body." Merlin fit the hat to his head, and the magic in it immediately widened the range of his hearing.

  He listened to the pale people snickering at his predicament, heard the Dragon snoring from the depths of its millennial sleep, and detected by the echoes of subterranean streams a honeycomb of caverns beyond this one.

  "Dagonet, the pale people are playing with uth. We now have enough magic to get uth into thome weal twouble."

  Falon

  Torrential light poured through a rift in the tranquil trees, illuminating Arthor as he stepped down the goat paths of a verdant gorge. With Excalibur strapped to his back, he edged carefully along narrow stone ledges. He wore a simple doe-skin kilt and no hat to cover the badger bristles of his hair.