Chapter 56
Fifty-Six
The betony worked. I slept a dreamless sleep and woke after daybreak. Guinevere had laid out a fresh set of clothes for me, and as I dressed, the first hints of snow were visible through the window.
It was an early snow; it would not stick. But the sight of it whisked me back to my arrival in Camelot. I had not yet experienced time as a wheel, hadn’t truly sensed how it might layer and accumulate. The seasonal echoes sharpened my sense of time’s passage.
I arrived to morning assembly just as Kay was unfurling his parchment. Gawain sat among his brothers, and Galehaut was with Sir Morien. The mere sight of them panged me. I spotted an open chair by Sir Erec.
“Let’s get to the day’s agenda,” announced Kay, as he flapped the parchment. “Percival, please share a report of your quest to The Land Beyond.”
Percival stood awkwardly. For such a renowned knight, he was surprisingly shy, with a reedy voice and clipped speech. He was about to offer his bashful review when a collective gasp snapped the air.
At first, I thought it was some sort of theater, a surprise performance from a pageant wagon. At the opposite end of the great hall, a knight on horseback invaded the doorway, sending squires and attendants scattering.
Was this an echo of yesterday’s delusions?
A figment of my madness? The knight was riding towards the dais with reckless speed, horse hooves thundering against hard-packed tesserae.
The Round Table stood. Swords unsheathed.
But something held me back. An aura of familiarity spasmed through my stomach.
Had I seen this moment before? Envisioned it at the lake?
No, it wasn’t the scene that felt familiar. It was the knight himself.
The others were about to charge, but I soared across the dais in recognition.
“NO!” My voice echoed. “STAND DOWN.”
I ran down the aisle, my heart leaping. He looked weathered and wet, with a few new scars. But he was still my cousin.
“Lionel!”
“Oh, Lance.” He pulled me in for an embrace, his chain mail digging into my ribs.
“Quite the entrance,” I said into his ear.
“Only for you.” He stepped back to regard me. “You look well.”
“So do you. It is so good to see you. More than you know. How is Bors?”
His face went grave. “That, in part, is why I came.”
My muscles tensed. I braced myself. His lips opened to say more, but then he stopped mid-breath, eyes catching on a sight across the platform.
“Is that… no… it can’t be.”
Galehaut was walking down the aisle, wearing a similar expression of shock.
“I thought you were dead!” Lionel exclaimed.
“In a way I was,” he said as the two embraced.
“This is so… wonderful and… I don’t know what to…” The words eluded him as he pulled Galehaut in for a second hug.
Arthur quickly called off the assembly and instructed the three of us to accompany him to his chambers.
“You too, Gawain,” Arthur said.
He had been lingering to the side, still gripping his sword.
“If you insist.”
In Arthur’s great room, we helped Lionel out of his armor and found him some bread and meat. He ate and drank ravenously, just as he had on the Isle of Women that first day.
“You’ve traveled a long way,” Arthur said.
Lionel set down his bread. “Forgive me,” he said between mouthfuls. “I caught a ship to Sandwich and rode straight through.”
“Please,” Arthur said. “Eat first. We are in no hurry.”
“I’m afraid I am.” Lionel patted his lips with a napkin and addressed Arthur in an official way.
“As you know, our kingdom was once a staunch ally of Camelot until King Claudas seized our land. Claudas has resided in my aunt and uncle’s castle ever since.”
“I am aware,” Arthur said.
“Then you are also aware that Claudas held my brother and me in that castle when we were younger.”
He nodded.
“Claudas has my brother again,” Lionel said. “He’s holding him prisoner.”
I pictured Bors locked in a tower, shivering beneath a rat-bitten cloak.
“We must liberate him,” I said. “The Round Table must go immediately.”
Lionel placed his hand atop mine. He was not finished. “Who knows what torture Bors is now facing. But that alone is not why I came here. I also bear a warning. King Claudas is plotting an attack on Camelot.”
Arthur rested his hands on the table. He seemed unsurprised. “First, I am sorry about your brother. And I am aware of the threat King Claudas poses. He has been plotting against us for years, but he knows such a campaign would be costly, and likely to fail.”
“With all respect, Arthur, the cost of Claudas’s rule is already too high. Adherents of the old ways have been driven underground. Rome’s legionaries are everywhere.”
Arthur spoke slowly. “We’re all too aware of the legionaries.”
“But are you aware of the Greek Fire?”
The air shifted. Lionel’s words cracked through Arthur’s stoic facade.
“He has it,” Lionel whispered. “Claudas has Greek Fire. And he plans to use it against Camelot.”
I looked around the room. Gawain and Arthur’s eyes were locked. Lionel saw it, too.
“You already know this, don’t you, Arthur?” Lionel let out a harsh laugh. “You know Claudas has a weapon that could destroy your kingdom. And yet you do nothing.”
“We’d heard rumors,” said Gawain. And I knew—this was why Arthur had pulled him from the tent that night. “How can you be certain?”
“Because I saw it.”
Arthur went still. Why was he not rushing into action? If Claudas had a weapon that could level our realm, what was he waiting for?
I watched as he furrowed his brow and placed a finger to his lips. Arthur was no strategic ruler, no god-anointed king. He was a lost man, forever an outsider, endlessly tortured by the caustic whip of his own ambivalence.
He had no real strength, I now realized.
He was only as powerful as the people around him.
Merlin. The Round Table. Guinevere. The backing of the sisterhood.
He was the conduit of other people’s desires.
A jeweled vessel. A gilded mirror. He would throw a banquet, arrange a tournament, open his coffers—anything to avoid a conflict.
Was he always this ineffectual, and I was only now seeing it? Or was I the shortsighted one, na?ve and vengeful and insecure? I hated to sit idly by, but if I were in Arthur’s position, who’s to say how I would rule. Maybe I too would hold power by sharing it, by prizing peace above all else.
“What’s Greek Fire?” asked Galehaut.
“Ancient weapon of war,” Gawain said. “Made of pitch and bitumen and more exotic ingredients. One bottle could destroy this chapel. On catapult boulders, it could destroy the whole city.”
“False instructions have circulated for years,” Arthur added. “But the real recipe was said to be lost.”
“It’s not,” Lionel said. “I saw it with my own eyes.”
“But how can you know Claudas plans to use it against us?”
“We have ears in his castle. He’s openly saying so. He’s not even trying to hide it.”
“So we strike first,” I said. “We catch him off guard. It is the only way.”
“Maybe we negotiate,” said Arthur. “What does Claudas want? Silver? Ships? A portion of our harvest?”
“The only thing he wants is Camelot in rubble,” said Lionel. “This is why I came here. To tell you this in person. If you choose not to strike, you must evacuate Camelot before they cross the sea. They could already be preparing to leave.”
“How many Roman soldiers are in Benoic?” Arthur asked.
Lionel scrunched his brow. “Three or four hundred?”
Arthur stood and went to his map. “That’s far less than I thought.”
“We could take them in a day,” Gawain said.
“You can choose to wait this out,” I said to Arthur. “But I can’t. Greek Fire aside, they have Bors. I’m going to Benoic.”
Arthur looked out the window, lost for a moment in the swirls of snow.
“I never should have allowed Claudas to encroach on Benoic to begin with,” he said.
“To begin with?” I was lost.
Arthur looked down at his hands, visibly anguished.
“Years ago,” he began, “when I first assumed power, I had the opportunity to defend Benoic. I equivocated, and by the time I dispatched knights, it was too late. Even if he did not have Greek Fire, I’d owe it to you to vanquish King Claudas.
My inaction led to your parents’ deaths. ”
I remembered the sword vision, the agonizing way my parents had died. Arthur could have saved them, I thought, with a tendril of fury. What if he had? An alternative path suddenly unspooled, completely upending me.
Because if Arthur had acted, I would not know Viviana. I would not have grown up on the Isle of Women or lived alongside my grandmother. I would not have trained under Bagotta. And I would not have met Galehaut.
I would never be thankful for death or tragedy. But I could see how Arthur’s decisions had shaped me in essential ways. I looked into his gray eyes, sensing his profound regret. I could feel his guilt as if it were my own.
“It is not your fault,” I said.
Lionel rose to standing. “Lancelot is right. The blame lies with Claudas.”
Arthur drew a deep breath. Clutched his ruby necklace.
“If the blame lies with Claudas, then it is time we take action.”