“My lord, this is in the mists of time. Almost no-one recalls…”
“And it wasn’t far from the truth, Alaric. Bedivere and I were only boys. We lived in fear of his very shadow as he roamed that gaunt structure, his face a twisted mask. My mother had already ceased to love him — in her eyes he’d been a monster long before he’d come to resemble one.”
Again, Lucan hung his head. Again, he swayed dangerously — so much that Alaric took a nervous step forward.
“Though he knew he was a gargoyle, his warped mind invented different reasons for this revulsion,” Lucan said. “He became certain that mother was taking lovers…”
“My lord!” Alaric interrupted. “You are not your father!”
“I’m not?” Lucan glanced around. His bloodshot eyes had narrowed to slits in his white, rain-soaked face. “I inherited my father’s banner, his black wolf-fur… yet they called me the Black Wolf of the North, not him.”
“A figure of speech…”
“A figure of fear. That’s what I am. There’s no sense denying it, Alaric. Every slaughter I wrought on Arthur’s foes was a nail in my reputation’s coffin. The order I brought to the northern frontier was the order of blade and spear. For years the locals lived in terror that my father had somehow returned.”
“You are no longer the Black Wolf,” Alaric stated flatly. “It’s a family emblem, nothing more.”
Lucan hunched in the rain and wind. Only with painful slowness did he at last turn, step down onto the battlement walk and sit in the embrasure. “Some of us are just born bad, Alaric.”
“My lord?”
“Born of sin.”
“My lord, please…”
“Or infected by it, as I was by the serpent’s bite.”
“My lord, this is nonsense.”
Lucan glanced up again. “Where did the Penharrow Worm come from?” He struck his own shoulder. “Why does the injury I received from it no longer hurt me?”
“These things just happen.”
“They shouldn’t. Not in a world that God has created. This beast came from the mist, from Hell itself… a harbinger of darkness!”
“You slew it!”
“Of course, but it had done its duty. Its call to arms was passed on.”
“No, my lord!”
Lucan stood up. “We must all embrace our destinies, Alaric. Do you know what my father did to Fleance, the household knight he suspected of bedding my mother? He hanged him by the feet in the garderobe, so that every man and woman in the castle would shit and piss on him through his death agonies.” Lucan strode from the battlements. “Personally, I think he got off easily.”
Lucan was the last man to enter the chamber of the Round Table.
King Arthur, crowned and in royal purple, was in his customary place. All other members of the august brotherhood, also in full livery, were seated in their great, carved seats, their personal escutcheons pinned to the wall above their heads. There was a bleak silence as Lucan closed the chamber door behind him. Only the flames sounded on the hearth, and the wind groaned in the chimney.
“Sir Lucan, you have our heartfelt commiserations,” the King said.
“Thank you, my liege,” Lucan replied, walking around the table to his seat, located between those of Bedivere and his cousin, Griflet. Both men eyed him sympathetically.
“Are you alright?” Bedivere mumbled.
Lucan nodded tersely.
“Sir Lucan, we have discussed matters at length during the course of this morning,” Arthur said, “but in short, the situation is as follows. New Rome has picked a fight with us.” He raised a parchment written in an elegant hand, along the bottom of which Lucan could see a number of signatures. “They clearly came here looking for a pretext, and Sir Cador unwittingly gave them one.”
Across the table, Cador’s cheeks burned.
“Not that this matters,” Arthur added. “I would have been happy to renounce my so-called claim to ownership of New Rome, but they didn’t give me the chance. According to this document, they are disturbed and insulted that we had the temerity to make such a claim of Emperor Lucius, who sent his envoys to our court seeking nothing but good relations. We are not fooled by this charade, and I doubt His Holiness the Pope will be, but this will provide all they’ll require to petition for his support. Without this, they’d doubtless have found something else. The main question now is how do we respond? Your suggestion that we launch a pre-emptive strike is thus far finding favour… if for no other reason than to assist our allies in Brittany, who even now, I suspect, can count their days of peace on one hand…”
Outside in the ante-hall, various courtiers and retainers had gathered to listen to the rumble and roar of debate.
By instinct, they stood in household groups. Turold, Wulfstan and the rest of Lucan’s mesnie were already present when Alaric came and joined them. Archbishop Stigand paced the room with frustration. It baffled him that, despite Merlin having left the realm, taking all lingering pagan influence with him, senior churchmen in Albion were still not accorded the full rights of nobility. Stigand had many times advised Arthur that his Round Table was a dated institution, and that only when his senior abbots and archbishops were allowed to sit in on the greatest matters of state would Albion be granted access to the College of Cardinals in Rome.
“This does not bode well,” he muttered, hearing mumbles of consent from the room beyond. “When the King emerges, I shall be in my writing office.” He stalked from the hall. “I must consult with my brothers Canterbury and York.”
A short time later, the door to the main chamber opened and Arthur’s knights emerged, each approaching his own household to issue orders. Through the door, Alaric glimpsed Arthur, Bedivere and Kay still at the table, inscribing various documents.
“Turold!” Lucan said. Turold leapt to attention, as did the rest of Lucan’s retainers. “Ride to Penharrow.”
“Of course, my lord.”
Lucan handed him a bound scroll. “This is a summons for all military forces.”
The tempo of Alaric’s beating heart rose steadily. On one hand, this was something he’d long been awaiting — a real war in which to test himself. On the other, a war like this — with all its terrifying repercussions — was hardly desirable.
“As you see, it bears the Royal Seal,” Lucan added, “so it gives us full authority. For the avoidance of doubt, every company of household knights in my personal demesnes is to muster, and to bring all squires and pages. Every retainer — every baron, every landed knight, every owner or holder of keep, tower or manor house — is to respond in the same fashion. There is to be no scutage, you hear me? The Castle Guard at Penharrow, Grimhall and Bullwood are also to be drawn upon. Two in every three mounted men-at-arms are to head south with full weapons and equipment, and one in every three foot-soldiers. Every twenty men must be accompanied by at least one officer, to maintain speed and good order on the march.”
Though they had anticipated this, his party listened in astonishment. This would be the largest muster any of them had ever seen.