“Let him send us some fresh beef, then, and the blasphemies will stop.” Merlin grinned.
Arthur got between them and ordered them to stop their bickering.
“I was not bickering,” Merlin said emphatically. “Merely making an idle comment about the weather is enough to get himstarted.” He pointed at Gildas with his spoon.
“Stop it, both of you.” Arthur used his best command voice. “If you have to engage in this kind of nonsense, do it outside where it won’t bother anyone else.”
Suddenly a young man rushed into the room. Merlin recognized him as one of the knights’ squires; he was not certain which one. The squire bowed deeply to Arthur. “Your Majesty, I am Philip of Manchester, squire to Sir Accolon.”
Arthur stopped eating. “Yes, Philip. What is on your mind?”
“Accolon sent me to report to you, Sire. We have a crisis.”
“Crisis? We’re in the middle of a forest. What kind of crisis can there be?”
“The knights, Your Majesty…”
Arthur wanted to get back to his dinner, such as it was. “Well, what about them?”
“Someone is bothering them, Sire.”
“Bothering them?”
“Throwing things.”
Merlin broke out laughing. “Someone is throwing things at the knights? And that is your idea of a crisis?”
Arthur brushed this aside. “What is being thrown?”
“Stones, sir. And handfuls of mud.”
Again Merlin laughed. “Which knights have been spattered with mud?”
Philip started to answer but Arthur cut him off. “Try and hide your amusement, Merlin. Philip, who is doing this?”
“No one knows, Your Majesty. He throws his missiles, then disappears into the forest.” He looked abashed but added, “The undergrowth is especially thick here.”
“This is all well and good.” Merlin sipped his soup. “But in the name of everything human, what do you want us to do about it?”
Philip blushed. “The knights and the other squires sent me to ask you for instructions. How are we to deal with this?”
“Surely,” Merlin said gravely, “Camelot’s finest knights can mange to catch a trickster.”
“But is it merely a trickster?” Arthur directed the question at no one in particular. “We are moving into unfriendly territory. The local kings and barons here have never really reconciled themselves to the idea of a central government under one man’s rule.”
“Excellent point, Arthur. But if our knights cannot capture one mud-throwing hooligan, what chance will they stand against an armed force led by a determined ruler?”
Arthur sighed heavily. “There are times when I think I should never have made myself king.”
Merlin put on his best schoolteacherly manner. “Nevertheless you did it.”
“Yes,” the king said, a bit sadly. “I suppose I did. All those wars I fought. We fought. All that bloodshed.” Then he found his resolve again. To Philip he said, “Tell the knights to redouble their efforts at catching this… whoever it is.”
“They won’t like hearing that, Sire.”
“Well, what the devil do they want to hear? I can’t very well go out and capture this imp for them.”
“Yes, Your Majesty.” Philip bowed and left. Arthur bit into a piece of bread more fiercely than seemed quite necessary. Merlin held his tongue and ate, too.
The next morning Accolon, rested and looking fit except for a cut over his eye, approached Merlin.
“Accolon. You are looking quite fine. Travel agrees with you.”
“Thank you, Merlin. I wish I were as well rested as you think I look.”
“Troubled sleep?” He chuckled. “What is bothering your conscience?”
“Spare me your sarcasm, Merlin.” Accolon had been in England since Arthur took the throne. His English was only mildly inflected with a French accent. “I’d like you to have a word with the king.”
“Why not talk to him yourself? You are as close to him as any of the knights.”
Accolon sighed deeply. “What I have to say to him, he doesn’t want to hear.”
“Oh. And what do you have to say?”
“It’s about this pest that’s dogging us. Throwing things.” He reached up and rubbed his brow. “That is how I got this cut.”
“I see.”
“No, I don’t think you do. I’m far from the only member of the party who’s suffered an injury. Most of them are minor, granted, but the number of them… Arthur has to do something.”
“If you can’t catch whoever is doing this, how do you expect Arthur to?”
Peter of Darrowfield was standing nearby, eavesdropping. He joined them. “How hard can it be to run down one prankster?”
“We don’t know that it’s only one,” Accolon grumped. “Stones, twigs, blobs of mud, leaves chewed up and soaking with spittle-they seem to come at us from every direction.”
Merlin clucked his tongue in sympathy and shook his head. “So you think this may be a band of random pranksters?”
Accolon scowled at the dig. “We don’t know what to think, Merlin. The barons in this territory are not friendly to Arthur. This may be their way of letting us know we’re not welcome.”
“I see.”
“Still,” Peter went on, “there can’t be that many of them or you’d have caught a glimpse of them by now. Perhaps you should redouble your efforts.”
Accolon brushed this aside. “Arthur told Bors this morning that he thinks this is probably just a matter of mischievous boys. He doesn’t want us using too much force.”
“That’s quite sensible.” Peter was not about to be left out of the conversation. “If they really are just boys, being too hard on them would only antagonize their fathers. That would be the last thing Arthur wants.”
Again Accolon ignored him. “We don’t want to impale them or behead them or anything. We only want to use a bit more force and tenacity hunting them down-and making them stop this puerile behavior. By whatever means.”
Merlin rubbed his brow thoughtfully. “Fine. I’ll have a word with the king. But let us wait until he is in a generous mood.”
“When will that be, in this god-awful country?”
“Patience, Accolon. I will do what I can.”
And in due course, he did so. Later that night, Arthur was rested and seemingly at peace with himself and the world. Merlin broached the subject. “They are insisting that something be done. You have told them to try and capture the culprit or culprits, but not to hurt him. The knights say that makes no sense. They want action. As usual, they want bloody action.”
Arthur was breezy. “What do they want me to do?”
“Give them permission to use force.”
“I don’t believe that would be advisable, Merlin. This attacker, whoever he is, might well be injured. Or worse.”
“You know I dislike violent conflict, Arthur. But for goodness’ sake, so a few bumpkins get their ears boxed. What of it?”
“I am the king of all Britain’s people, bumpkins as well as knights. How can I authorize such a thing?”
Merlin sighed. “I am the one who is supposed to persuade you to use reason. You are turning the tables on me.”
“Relax, Merlin. You can’t always be reasonable. No one is, not even you.”
“I-”
“I’ve seen that contraption you use to go up into your tower. There is nothing even remotely reasonable about risking your neck to save a few steps.”
“Stop it, Arthur.”
“We’ll be out of this country in another day or two. Suppose our villain-in-hiding is the son of one of the local barons? One whose loyalty to me is shaky? And suppose the knights present the boy’s head to me on a pole? Do you realize how much trouble that could cause?”
Again Merlin sighed. “I suppose I see your point. But your knights are restive. If they decide to take this matter into their own hands… Well, you could find yourself with more than one disloyal vassal.”
“Merlin, I know it.”
“Good. If only you’d been persuaded to bring a larger force… There has to be some way out of this.”