“A burial place,” Sir Gawain muttered. “Yes, a burial place.” He had been moving slowly around the chamber, sword in one hand, candle in the other. Now he went towards the arch, but stopped short of the second chamber, as if suddenly daunted by the brilliant moonlight. He thrust his sword into the ground, and Axl watched his silhouette leaning on his weapon, moving the candle up and down with a weary air.
“We need not quarrel, Master Axl. Here are the skulls of men, I won’t deny it. There an arm, there a leg, but just bones now. An old burial ground. And so it may be. I dare say, sir, our whole country is this way. A fine green valley. A pleasant copse in the springtime. Dig its soil, and not far beneath the daisies and buttercups come the dead. And I don’t talk, sir, only of those who received Christian burial. Beneath our soil lie the remains of old slaughter. Horace and I, we’ve grown weary of it. Weary and we no longer young.”
“Sir Gawain,” Axl said, “we have but one sword between us. I ask you not to grow melancholic, nor forget the beast is near.”
“I don’t forget the beast, sir. I merely consider this gateway before us. Look up there, you see it?” Sir Gawain was holding up the candle to reveal along the lower edge of the arch what appeared to be a row of spearheads pointing down to the ground.
“A portcullis,” Axl said.
“Exactly, sir. This gate isn’t so ancient. Younger than either of us, I’d wager. Someone has raised it for us, wishing us to pass through. See there, the ropes that hold it. And there, the pulleys. Someone comes here often to make this gate rise and fall, and perhaps feed the beast.” Sir Gawain stepped towards one of the pillars, his feet crunching over bones. “If I cut this rope, the gate will surely come down, it will bar our way out. Yet if the beast’s beyond, we’ll be shielded from it. Is that the Saxon boy I hear or some pixie stolen in here?”
Indeed Edwin, back in the shadows, had started to sing; faintly at first so that Axl had thought the boy was simply soothing his nerves, but then his voice had become steadily more conspicuous. His song seemed to be a slow lullaby, and he was rendering it with his face to the wall, his body rocking gently.
“The boy behaves as one bewitched,” Sir Gawain said. “Never mind him, we must now decide, Master Axl. Do we walk on? Or do we cut this rope to give us at least a moment shielded from what lies beyond?”
“I say we cut the rope, sir. We can surely raise the gate again when we wish. Let’s first discover what we face while the gate’s down.”
“Wise counsel, sir. I’ll do as you say.”
Handing Axl the candle, Sir Gawain took a further step forward, raised his sword and swung at the pillar. There was the sound of metal striking stone, and the lower section of the gate shook, but remained suspended. Sir Gawain sighed with a hint of embarrassment. Then he repositioned himself, raised the sword again, and struck once more.
This time there was a snapping sound, and the gate crashed down raising a cloud of dust in the moonlight. The noise felt immense — Edwin abruptly stopped his singing — and Axl stared through the iron grid now fallen before them to see what it would summon. But there was no sign of the beast, and after a moment they all let go their breaths.
For all that they were now effectively trapped, the lowering of the portcullis brought a sense of relief, and they all four began to wander around the mausoleum. Sir Gawain, who had sheathed his sword, went up to the bars and touched them gingerly.
“Good iron,” he said. “It’ll do its work.”
Beatrice, who had been quiet for some time, came up to Axl and pressed her head against his chest. As he put an arm around her, he realised her cheek was wet with tears.
“Come, princess,” he said, “take heart. We’ll be out in the night air before long.”
“All these skulls, Axl. So many! Can this beast really have killed so many?”
She had spoken softly, but Sir Gawain turned to them. “What do you suggest, mistress? That I committed this slaughter?” He said this tiredly, with none of the anger he had shown earlier in the tunnel, but there was a peculiar intensity in his voice. “So many skulls, you say. Yet are we not underground? What is it you suggest? Can just one knight of Arthur have killed so many?” He turned back to the gate and ran a finger along one of the bars. “Once, years ago, in a dream, I watched myself killing the enemy. It was in my sleep and long ago. The enemy, in their hundreds, perhaps as many as this. I fought and I fought. Just a foolish dream, but still I recall it.” He sighed, then looked at Beatrice. “I hardly know how to answer you, mistress. I acted as I thought would please God. How was I to guess how dark had grown the hearts of these wretched monks? Horace and I came to this monastery while the sun was up, not long after you yourself arrived, for I supposed then I had need to speak urgently with the abbot. Then I discovered what he plotted against you, and I feigned complacence. I bade him farewell, and they all believed me gone, but I left Horace in the forest and returned up here on foot hidden by the night. Not all the monks think alike, thank God. I knew the good Jonus would receive me. And learning from him the abbot’s schemes, I had Ninian bring me unseen down to this place to await you. Curse it, the boy starts again!”
Sure enough, Edwin was singing once more, not as loudly as before, but now in a curious posture. He had bent forward, a fist to each temple, and was moving slowly about in the shadows like someone in a dance enacting the part of an animal.
“The recent events surely overwhelm him,” Axl said. “It’s a wonder he’s shown the fortitude he has, and we must attend to him well once we’re away from here. But Sir Gawain, tell us now, why do the monks seek to murder such an innocent lad?”
“No matter how I argued, sir, the abbot would have the boy destroyed. So I left Horace in the forest and retraced my steps …”
“Sir Gawain, please explain. Has this to do with his ogre’s wound? Yet these are men of Christian learning.”
“That’s no ogre’s bite the boy carries. It’s a dragon gave him that wound. I saw it right away when yesterday that soldier raised his shirt. Who knows how he met with a dragon, but a dragon’s bite it is, and now the desire will be rising in his blood to seek congress with a she-dragon. And in turn, any she-dragon near enough to scent him will come seeking him. This is why Master Wistan is so fond of his protégé, sir. He believes Master Edwin will lead him to Querig. And for this same reason, the monks and these soldiers would have him dead. Look, the boy grows ever wilder!”
“What are all these skulls, sir?” Beatrice suddenly asked the knight. “Why so many? Can they all have belonged to babies? Some are surely small enough to fit in your palm.”
“Princess, don’t distress yourself. This is a burial place, nothing more.”
“What is it you suggest, mistress? The skulls of babes? I’ve fought men, beelzebubs, dragons. But a slaughterer of infants? How dare you, mistress!”
Suddenly Edwin, still singing, pushed past them, and going up to the portcullis pressed himself against the bars.
“Get back, boy,” Sir Gawain said, grasping his shoulders. “There’s danger here, and that’s enough of your songs!”
Edwin gripped the bars with both hands, and for a moment he and the old knight tussled. Then they both broke off and stepped back from the gate. Beatrice, at Axl’s breast, let out a small gasp, but at that instant Axl’s view was obscured by Edwin and Sir Gawain. Then the beast came into the pool of moonlight, and he saw it more clearly.
“God protect us,” Beatrice said. “Here’s a creature escaped from the Great Plain itself, and the air grows colder.”
“Don’t worry, princess. It can’t breach those bars.”