Camelot (11 page)

The fourth Royal Messenger, Sir Bedivere, had actually been away from Camelot on many occasions. Each time he had slipped away under cover of darkness and avoided the castle gatekeepers by using a small boat he kept hidden under a bush at the back of the castle. His ‘little holidays', as he called them, always had one very simple aim. To transform other people's gold and jewels into his gold and jewels. Because of his totally unscrupulous nature, he had become the richest person in Camelot.

So if all else fails,
he thought,
I can always bribe someone to take on the dragons,
though parting with any of his money would most certainly be the very last resort as it always gave him an upset stomach.

‘I haven't got where I am today by giving money away,' he said.

‘Indeed, master,' said his squire, Barnakle, who had not been paid a single groat in the past year.

This was exactly how long he had been Sir Bedivere's squire and in that time his master had borrowed everything his servant owned, including
his socks. This was the Olde English meaning of the word ‘borrow', which means ‘take and not give back, ever'.

There had only been one occasion when Sir Bedivere had returned something after he had borrowed it from Barnakle. It was a sticking plaster that he had worn on a very nasty pimple for seven weeks, though he borrowed it again a few months later before handing it back for good, by which time it had lost all its sticking ability and it was impossible to tell which side was which.

‘Thank you, my lord,' Barnakle had said as he scraped the residue off.

Sir Bedivere was not stupid. Other things he was not included nice, popular, conscientious, hardworking and honest. He was probably the nastiest of the Knights of Camelot and therefore the most likely to lure an unsuspecting knight back to venture into the dragon's cave, except to do so would require quite a bit of effort, something Sir Bedivere was not fond of.

Once they had left the valley a few hours behind them, Sir Bedivere left the main road and travelled
along a pleasant lane until they were out of sight of everything, except the bushes on each side of them, four sparrows and a dragonfly.

‘Right,' he said, pulling out a scroll. ‘Let's have a look.'

‘At what, my lord?' said Barnakle. ‘All I can see are some bushes and four sparrows. There was a dragonfly, but it's just flown off.'

‘Not that, you idiot,' said Sir Bedivere. ‘My hostel guide. I'm looking for a nice remote inn where we can go and take our ease for a couple of weeks while the other idiots rush round looking for a knight.'

He may have been tighter than a baby mosquito's left ear, but life with Sir Bedivere was a lot more relaxed than it was with any other knight. Although he had never been paid, Barnakle was envied by all the other squires, who spent all day rushing round and all night polishing armour.

‘This looks like the perfect place,' said Sir Bedivere, pointing to the scroll. ‘The Owl and The Cauliflower. It is seventeen miles from any other building, hidden in the middle of a thick forest and,
as luck would have it, is fifteen miles along this very track.'

‘Excellent, my lord,' said Barnakle, well aware that the next few weeks would be ones of pleasant luxury followed by a very rapid running away in the middle of the night to avoid paying the bill.

Still,
he thought,
it's nothing we haven't done before.

‘Indeed, master, I packed the Cloaks of Invisibility just in case,' he added.

People like Sir Bedivere, who lie and cheat their way through life, gathering large amounts of money as they go, seldom get what people think they deserve. They steal crown jewels and get away with it. They rob banks and then get paid a reward for false information that gets someone else arrested for it. They run away with other people's wives, sheep and cauliflowers, and instead of being condemned for it, everyone thinks they are exciting and romantic like Robin Hood
⁴⁵
or Ned Kelly, who were both common criminals with very good public relations.

So it was that when Sir Bedivere arrived at the inn and had booked the finest suite and had a bit of a rest in the huge comfy bed with a glass of champagne and a bowl of chocolate-covered strawberries and then gone downstairs for dinner, the only other guest at the inn turned out to be the Bravest Knight in the Whole World. He was EXACTLY what Sir Bedivere had been sent out to look for.

Tall, dark and handsome yet at the same time of medium height with a head of golden hair and skin like polished porcelain yet at the same time with a hint of a beard that was just enough to show he was a fearless superhero.

Bit too perfect to let him get burnt by a dragon, really,
thought Sir Bedivere.
Still, business is business and I can see it now as the King hands me a huge bag of gold sovereigns for being the one to bring back THE Brave Knight to kill the evil dragon.

‘Good Sir Knight,' said Sir Bedivere. ‘Well met and with whom do I have the honour of dining?'

‘I am Sir Lancelot,' said the Bravest Knight in the Whole World.

‘Ah, well, sir, your name is legend,' said Sir
Bedivere, who could flatter the back and front legs off a whole field of donkeys. ‘And what brings you to Avalon?'

‘I am freshly returned from foreign parts, where I lanced a lot of Heathen Goths and slayed Vlad the Inhaler himself,' said Sir Lancelot.

‘Vlad the Inhaler?'

‘Yes. He is the son of Vlad the Impaler, who I also lanced a lot, and he has a bad sinus problem,' said Sir Lancelot. ‘Or rather, I should say he
had
a bad sinus problem. Breathing no longer causes him any difficulty. And I am here,' Sir Lancelot continued, ‘to try and win the hand of the King's sister, Morgan le Fey.'

‘Indeed sir, well, I may be able to help you there,' said Sir Bedivere, proving yet again that fortune favours the selfish and greedy.

‘You know the lady?'

‘Indeed, sir,' lied Sir Bedivere, unless seeing her from a window as she crossed the courtyard qualified as knowing.

‘And is her beauty as enchanting as it is said to be?'

‘There are not words enough to describe it,' said Sir Bedivere.

‘So she's hot stuff then, eh?' said Sir Lancelot.

‘My lord, so hot she could boil a kettle if you sat it down on the other side of the room,' said Sir Bedivere. ‘And when she sings or simply just speaks, why, nightingales feel so inadequate they beat their heads against trees and are struck dumb.'

‘Wow. And you can introduce me to her?' said Sir Lancelot. ‘If 'tis so, I should be forever in your debt.'

Not so much forever,
thought Sir Bedivere,
only until you have rewarded me with your entire wealth.

‘I think that the Lady Morgan le Fey is away at present,' said Sir Bedivere, who still fancied a week of peace and quiet at the inn sitting in the sunshine listening to the singing of the birds and the clinking of Sir Lancelot's bag of gold, which he had just noticed.

‘That is a fine bag, Sir Lancelot,' he said.

‘Indeed it is, for it was given to me by none other than Leonardo da Vinci,' said Sir Lancelot. ‘He used to keep his pencils in it.'

‘It must be priceless.'

‘Indeed. There are three hundred gold sovereigns inside it, yet I believe the bag itself is worth ten times that amount,' said Sir Lancelot.

‘Oh my goodness,' said Sir Bedivere, beginning to dribble uncontrollably.

Barnakle had seen his master drool in the presence of wealth many, many times before and always carried a big hankie for such occasions. With one quick flick of his wrist he cleared his master's chin before Lancelot noticed.

‘But see here, my good and helpful friend,' said Sir Lancelot, ‘let me make you a present of it. This priceless bag and its contents are mere trifles compared to the treasure of my Lady Morgan le Fey, whose heart I hope to win with your selfless help.'

‘Oh, I couldn't,' said Sir Bedivere with all his fingers and toes crossed behind his back.

‘I insist,' said Sir Lancelot. ‘It is the least I can do.'

Oh wow, there's more?
thought Sir Bedivere. The sheer weight of the bag and its gold in his hands made him so weak with delight that he would have
fallen over if Barnakle hadn't propped him up.

Who's the coolest knight in the whole world?
he thought.
And who's going to be the richest knight in the whole world and the most popular knight in Camelot?

Ooh, I wonder who it could be?

Oh, of course, it's moi, the great rich and famous Sir Bedivere of Bedivere.

Yeah, I TOTALLY RULE!

He didn't answer the bit about who was the most popular knight, because he didn't really care about that. As long as he got all the cash, people could dislike him as much as they liked.

‘I believe, Sir Lancelot,' he said, ‘that the angel of whom we speak is due to return to Camelot in five days' time.'

‘Excellent,' said Sir Lancelot. ‘We shall rest here until then and feast on the finest venison and wines which it will be my honour and delight to provide you with.'

‘As you wish, my lord,' said Sir Bedivere. ‘I was on my way to a dark cold monastery to purge my soul in a cold dungeon wearing nothing but a horse-hair shirt and eating naught but gravel for a week,
but for you, my lord, I shall sacrifice my penance and be your guest.'

‘Wonderful,' said Sir Lancelot. ‘You are a good and true friend and I shall give thanks to the gods by throwing a bag of gold down the Well of Thanksgiving at the back of this very inn.'

Sir Bedivere gave a barely discernible nod to Barnakle, who went out to the stables and put on his wellies. It would not be the first time he had gone down a wishing well to relieve it of its contents and no doubt it would not be the last.

 

 

IMPORTANT NOTE

The Leonardo da Vinci referred to in this chapter was not THE famous Leonardo da Vinci, the great artist and inventor. Nor was it his even more famous descendant, Leonardo da Vinci, who won the 2007 series of
Transylvania Waters's Got Talent
with his brilliant song ‘I'm In The Mood For Blood'. This was an earlier ancestor called Leonardo da Vinci, who was very famous for his wonderful handbags.

 

‘You know how you keep banging on about being the King of the Dragons?' said Primrose.

‘Well, I am. I am Spikeweed, King of the Dragons,' said Spikeweed.

‘As you are forever saying,' said Primrose. ‘Trouble is, you are also King of the smallest Kingdom of anything, with a total population of five.'

‘Hey, it's quality, not quantity, that counts,' said Spikeweed.

‘Oh yes, of course, try telling that to those feeble Italian dragons,' said Primrose. ‘If they realised there was only five of us, they'd be here tomorrow morning and have us conquered before morning tea.'

‘Um, er, not necessarily,' said Spikeweed, but he knew his wife was right. ‘And another thing.'

‘What?'

‘What's tea?'

‘Never mind all that,' said Primrose. ‘The point I was trying to make is that we need to increase our population.'

‘And how are we going to do that?'

‘Duh,' said Primrose, pointing up at the three big trees that stood outside the cave.

At the top of each tree was a brand new dragon's nest. ‘I've already started,' she continued. ‘I'm going to sit on two eggs and the kids are going to sit on the two other nests. If you hadn't burnt down all the other trees we could have hauled your old granny up and sat her on another clutch.'

And then for the first, and probably last, time in his life, Spikeweed had an idea that was not totally useless. It was in fact, a good, though extremely revolutionary, idea.

‘Why do we have our eggs in the tops of trees?' he said.

‘Well, that's where we build our nests, stupid,' said Primrose.

‘Why?'

‘So they are safe from predators, of course.'

‘What predators?'

‘Dinosaurs, of course,' said Primrose.

‘You mean all the huge animals that we roasted into extinction?' said Spikeweed.

‘Exactly.'

‘Extinction? Extinction? Ring a bell?' said Spikeweed. ‘So how many dinosaurs are there left?'

‘Well, probably, um…' Primrose began.

‘None.'

‘Yes.'

‘So we could actually build our nests on the ground?' said Spikeweed.

‘Of course not,' said Primrose.

‘Why not?'

‘Because we build them in the tops of trees.'

‘Why?'

‘So they are safe from predators, of course.'

‘What predators?'

‘Dinosaurs,' said Primrose. ‘Oh.'

‘Yes.'

‘Um.'

‘And another thing,' said Spikeweed. ‘The nest is only there to stop the eggs falling out and if the nest is on the ground, they can't fall out. So we don't actually need to build a nest at all. We could just scrape a little dent in the ground to stop them rolling away.'

‘Wow,' said Primrose, seeing her husband in a whole new light, which was hardly surprising because it was dawn and the sun had just come up.

‘Here's a thought,' Spikeweed continued. ‘Why not just lay some eggs in the back of the cave and while I lift my granny off the ground, you could roll them underneath her.'

Primrose was almost speechless. She was amazed at how she had misjudged her husband. Sure, it had taken his tiny brain about thirty-five years to come up with one good idea, but it was a seriously good idea.

‘You really are the King of the Dragons,' she said, fluttering her lovely eyelashes at him.

‘I call it Speed-Breeding,' said Spikeweed proudly.

Dragon eggs take anywhere from one week to seventeen years to hatch out depending on the circumstances. Being placed beneath a very old dragon where the temperature was always a constant 51 degrees and the atmosphere a steady 115 per cent moisture content, due to regular leaking, can make a dragon egg hatch out in as few as eight days.

So it was that within one month, Spikeweed was King of a population of twenty-three, no, hold on, twenty-seven, no, wait, thirty-two, no, there's another one…

‘Can we come down now?' Bloat shouted down from the top of his tree.

‘Yes, I'm really, really bored,' shouted Depressyng from the top of hers.

‘Me too,' said Primrose.

As the Gorella incubator was doing so well, the three dragons up in the trees pushed their eggs out of their nests and sent them crashing down to the ground, where the thirty-three, no, thirty-nine, hold on, forty-seven baby dragons ate them for breakfast.