The Last Enchantment (40 page)

We rode home through a brilliant day smelling of primroses. The clouds had packed away, and theLake showed blue and glittering under its golden willows. An early swallow hawked for flies, close over the bright water. And the Spring Queen, refusing the litter we had brought for her, rode beside me.

She spoke only once, and then briefly.

"I lied to you that night. You knew?"

"Yes."

"You do see, then? You really do? You see all?"

"I see a great deal. If I set out to look, and if God wills it, I see."

The colour came into her face, and her look lightened, as if something had set her free. Before, I had believed her innocent; now I knew it. "So you, too, have told my lord the truth. When he did not come for me himself, I was afraid."

"You have no need to be, now or ever. I think you need never doubt that he loves you. And I can tell you, too, Guinevere my cousin, that even if you never bear an heir forBritain , he will not put you aside.

Your name will stand alongside his, as long as he is remembered."

"I will try," she said, so softly that I could hardly hear it. Then the towers of Camelot came in sight, and she was silent, bracing herself against what was to come.

So the seeds of legend were sown. During the golden weeks of spring that followed, I was more than once to hear men talking under their breaths of the "rape" of the Queen, and how she had been taken down almost to the dark halls of Llud, but brought back by Bedwyr, chiefest of Arthur's knights. So the sting of the truth was drawn; no shame attached to Arthur, none even to the Queen; and to Bedwyr was credited the first of his many glories, the story growing, and its hero gaining in stature, as his hurts healed and at last were well.

As for Melwas, in the way these things have, if the "Dark King" of the Underworld became linked in men's minds with the dark-avised king whose stronghold was the Tor, it was still without blame to Guinevere. What Melwas thought nobody knew. He must have realized that Guinevere had told Arthur the truth. He may have grown tired of being cast as the villain of the story, and of waiting (as everyone was waiting) for the High King to move against him. He may even have cherished hopes, still, that he might in some dim future come to possess the Queen.

Whatever the case, it was he who made the next move, and by doing so gave Arthur his way. One morning he rode to Camelot, and, perforce leaving his armed escort outside the council hall, took his seat in the Chair of Complaining.

The council hall had been built on the style of a smaller hall that Arthur had seen on one of the visits paid to the Queen's father inWales . That had been merely a larger version of the daub-and-wattle round house of the Celts; this in Camelot was a big circular building, impressively built to last, with ribs of dressed stone, and between them walls of narrow Roman brick from the long-abandoned kilns nearby.

There were vast double doors of oak, carved with the Dragon, and finely gilded. Inside, the place was open, with a fine floor of tiles laid out from the center, like a spider's web. And like the outer ring of a web, the walls were not curved, but sectioned off with flat panelling. These panels were covered with matting of a fine golden straw to keep out the draughts, but in time would be ablaze with needlework; Guinevere already had her maids set to it. Against each of these sections stood a tall chair, with its own footstool, and the King's was no higher than the next man's. This place was to be, he said, a hall for free discussion between the High King and his peers, and a place where any of the King's leaders could bring their problems. The only thing that marked Arthur's chair was the white shield that hung above it; in time, perhaps, the Dragon would shimmer there in gold and scarlet. Some of the other panels already showed the blazons of the Companions. The seat opposite the King's was blank. This was the one taken by anyone with a grievance to be settled by the court. Arthur had called it the Chair of Complaining. But in later years I heard it called the Perilous Chair, and I think the name was coined after that day.

I was not present when Melwas tabled his complaint. Though I had at that time a place in the Round Hall (as it came to be called), I seldom took it. If his peers were equal there to the King, then the King must be seen to match them in knowledge, and to give his judgements without leaning on the advice of a mentor. Any discussions Arthur and I had were held in private.

We had talked over the Melwas affair for many hours before it came to the council table. To begin with, Arthur seemed sure that I would try to stop him from fighting Melwas, but here was a case where the cold view and the hot coincided. To Arthur it would be satisfying and to me expedient that Melwas should suffer publicly for his actions. The lapse of time, and Arthur's silence, with the legend I had invoked, ensured that Guinevere's honour would not be in question; the people had taken her once more into their love, and wherever she went flowers strewed the way with blessings thrown like petals. She was their Queen — their darling's darling — who had almost been taken from them by death, and had been saved by Merlin's magic. So the story went among the common folk. But among the more worldly there were those who looked for the King to move against Melwas, and who would have been quick to despise him had he failed. He owed it to himself, as man and as King. The discipline he had imposed on himself over the Queen's rape had been severe. Now, when he found that I agreed with him, he turned, with a fierce joy, to planning.

He could, of course, have summoned King Melwas to the council hall on a trumped-up excuse, but this he would not do. "If we harass him until he makes a complaint himself, it comes to much the same thing in the sight of God," he said dryly, "but in terms of my conscience — or my pride, if you like — I will not use a false charge in the Round Hall. It must be known as a place were no man need fear to come before me, unless he himself is false."

So harass him we did. Situated as theIsland was, between the High King's stronghold and the sea, it was easy enough to find causes. Somehow or another there came to be constant arguments about harbour dues, rights of free way, levies and taxes arbitrarily imposed and hotly contested. Any of the petty kings would have grown restive under the constant stream of minor vexations, but Melwas was even quicker to protest than most. According to Bedwyr (to whom I owed an account of the council meeting), it was apparent from the start that Melwas guessed he had been deliberately brought before the King to answer the older, more dangerous charge. He seemed eager to do so, but naturally enough allowed no hint of this to come into words: that must have meant his certain death for treason by the vote of the whole Council. So the grievances over dues and taxes, the arguments over the right levies for the protection offered by Camelot, took their long-drawn and tedious course, while the two men watched one another as swordsmen do, and at last came to the heart of the matter.

It was Melwas who suggested single combat. How he was brought towards this was not quite clear; my guess was that he took very little steering. Young, keen-tempered, a good swordsman, knowing himself to be in grave danger, he must have leaped at the chance of a quick decisive solution that gave him a half-hope of success. He may have counted on more. His challenge came at last, hotly: "A meeting to settle these matters here and now, and man to man, if we are ever to agree as neighbours again! You are the law, King; then prove it with your sword!"

Uproar followed, arguments flying to and fro across the hall. The older of those present found it unthinkable that the King should risk himself, but all had by this time some inkling that there was more at stake than harbour dues, and the younger knights were quite frankly eager to see a fight. More than one of them (Bedwyr was the most insistent) offered himself as combatant in Arthur's place, until finally the King, judging his moment, got decisively to his feet. In the sudden silence he strode to the round table at the hall's center, lifted the tablets where Melwas' grievances were listed, and sent them smashing to the floor.

"Now bring me my sword," he said.

It was midday when they faced one another on the level field in the northeast quarter of Caer Camel.

The sky was cloudless, but a steady cool breeze tempered the warmth of the day. The light was high and even. The edge of the field was deep in people, the very ramparts furred with folk. At the top of one of Camelot's gilded towers I saw the cluster of azure and green and scarlet where the women had gathered to watch. The Queen, among them, was in white, Arthur's colour. I wondered how she was feeling, and could guess at the still composure with which she would hide her fear. Then the trumpet sounded, and silence fell.

The two combatants were armed with spears and shields, and each man had sword and dagger at his belt. Arthur was not using Caliburn, the royal sword. His armour — a light helmet and leather corselet —

showed neither jewel nor device. Melwas' dress was more princely, and he was a shade the taller. He looked fierce and eager, and I saw him cast a look toward the palace tower where the Queen stood.

Arthur had not glanced that way. He looked cool and infinitely experienced, listening apparently with grave attention to the herald's formal announcement.

There was a sycamore tree to one side of the field. Bedwyr, beside me in its shade, gave me a long look, and then drew a breath of relief.

"So. You're not worried. Thank God for that!"

"It had to come to this in the end. It's best. But if there had been danger for him, I would have stopped it."

"All the same, it's folly. Oh, I know that he wanted to, but he should never risk himself so. He should have let me do it."

"And what sort of showing would you make, do you suppose? You're still lame. You could have been cut down, if not worse, and then the legend would have had to start again. There are still simple folk who think that right is with the strongest sword."

"As it is today, or you'd not be standing idly by. I know. But I wish..." He fell silent.

"I know what you wish. I think you will have your wish, not once but many times, before your life's end."

He glanced sharply at me, started to say something more, but then the pennon fell, and the fight had begun.

For a long time the men circled one another, spears poised for the throw, shields ready. The light advantaged neither. It was Melwas who attacked first. He feinted once, then, with great speed and strength behind the throw, hurled the spear. Arthur's shield flashed up to deflect it. The blade slid screaming past the boss, and the spear buried itself harmlessly in the grass. Melwas, snatching for his sword-hilt, sprang back. But Arthur, in the same moment as he turned the spear aside, flung his own. By doing so he cancelled the advantage that Melwas' first thrown had given him; but he did not draw his own sword; he reached for the other's spent spear, upright by him in the turf, pulled it up, and hefted it, just as Melwas, abandoning his sword-hilt, sent the King's spear also whizzing harmlessly from his shield, and turned, swift as a fox, to pick it up in the same way and face spear with spear once more.

But Arthur's weapon, harder flung, and more desperately parried, flew spinning to one side, to bounce level along the turf and skid away from Melwas' hand. There was no hope of snatching it up before Arthur could throw. Melwas, shield at the ready, feinted this way and that, hoping to draw the other's spear and so regain the advantage. He reached the fallen weapon; he stooped for it where it lay, the shaft half-propped to his hand by a clump of thistles. Arthur's arm moved, and the blade of his spear flashed in the light, drawing Melwas' eye. Melwas ducked, throwing his shield up into the line of the cast, at the same time swerving down to grab the fallen weapon. But the King's move had been a false one; in the unguarded moment when Melwas stooped sideways for the other spear, the King's, thrown straight and low, took him in the outstretched arm. Arthur's sword whipped into his hand as he followed the spear.

Melwas staggered. As a great shout hit the walls and echoed round the field he recovered, grabbed the spear, and hurled it straight at the King.

Had he been any less fast, Arthur must have closed with him before he could use the spear. As it was, Melwas' weapon struck true when the King was halfway across the space between them. Arthur caught it on his shield, but at that short range the force was too great to turn. The long shaft whipped in a half-circle, checking the King's rush. With the sword still held in his right hand, he tried to tear the spear-point from the leather, but it had gone in close by one of the metal stays, and jammed there, caught by its barbs. He flung the shield aside, spear and all, and ran in on Melwas, with nothing to guard his naked side but the dagger at his left hand.

The rush gave Melwas no time to recover himself and grab a spear for a third cast. With the blood streaming down his arm, he dragged out his sword, and met the King's attack, body to body, with a slithering clash of metal. The exchange had left them still evenly matched, Melwas' wound, and the loss of strength in his sword against the King's unguarded side. Melwas was a good swordsman, fast and very strong, and for the first few minutes of the hand-to-hand struggle he aimed every stroke and slash at the King's left. But each one met iron. And step by step the King was pressing him; step by step Melwas was forced to give in front of the attack. The blood ran down, weakening him steadily. Arthur, as far as could be seen, was unhurt. He pressed forward, the ringing blows coming fast and hard, the whining whip and parry of the long dagger chiming between. Behind Melwas lay the fallen spear. Melwas knew it, but dared not glance to see where it lay. The dread of fouling it, and falling, made him slower. He was sweating freely, and beginning to breathe like a hard-ridden horse.

One of those moments came when, breast to breast, weapon to weapon, the men stood locked, totally still. Round the field the crowd was silent now, holding its breath.

The King spoke, softly and coldly. No one could hear what he said. Melwas did not reply. There was a moment's pause, then a swift movement, a sudden pressure, a grunt from Melwas, and some kind of growled answer. Then Arthur disengaged smoothly, and, with another low-spoken sentence, attacked afresh.