Sleepless Knights (15 page)

“But what about the others, and the Grail?”

“The power of Merlin will see to all that. You are forbidden to contact the traitor Lancelot. Let him flounder in the wilderness and pay for his duplicity. Now go.”

“Yes, sire,” I said, and left the Royal Chambers. Sir Kay made to follow me, but the Master raised his hand. “Not you, Kay. You stay with me at Camelot.”

Sir Kay hesitated, and then nodded curtly. “Of course. But with your leave, I would like to pay a visit to my old scriptorium.”

“Very well. But remain on the premises.”

Sir Kay followed me out of the Master's chamber. He waited until we were out of earshot, then drew me aside. “He doesn't give two hoots for the fate of Perceval and Pellinore. It's like they never existed.”

“I am sure that is not the case, Sir Kay. The Master has a lot on his mind, that is all.”

“So what are you going to do?”

“What else can I do, but follow my orders? I trust that the Master will soon see for himself that he is wrong about Sir Lancelot.”

“Is he, though? Lancelot's no stranger to the limelight, after all. In which case…” Sir Kay's eyes glittered strangely.

“Sir Kay?”

“Never mind. Of course,
you
could always find out what Lancelot's intentions are.”

“Out of the question. That would mean disobeying the Master.”

“But you wouldn't be disobeying him. Not technically. You would still be finding Merlin.”

“I fail to see how, Sir Kay.”

“Think about it. You've got more chance of finding Merlin with the help of the others than you have on your own, haven't you?”

“Yes, but —”

“So, by finding Lancelot, you will still be finding Merlin, and serving the Eternal Quest. Which is what Arthur wants, after all.”

I was beginning to concede that Sir Kay had a point. “Then again,” he added, “you've got enough on your plate just getting out of Camelot in the first place. How on earth are
you going to cover any distance, with no transport, and with the entire world alerted to our presence? You'll be arrested in five minutes flat. Of course, I could have told Arthur that, if he'd bothered to ask. But oh no, I'm nothing more than a glorified typewriter. Anyway. Best of luck,” Sir Kay patted me on the shoulder and headed for the scriptorium, leaving me alone on the landing.

Sir Kay was not overstating the difficulties presented by the Master's orders, whichever way I chose to interpret them. It was then that the glimmer of an idea came to me. I cannot say that I cared for it. In fact, as soon as the idea started to take shape, my entire mind rebelled against it. But the more I tried to wipe it out, the more ground the thought gained, like a stubborn stain that grows in prominence for all one's efforts to remove it. I yielded to its logic, and resolved to make my way to the Great Hall at first light.

 

Early next morning, I peered into an empty fireplace with no small amount of trepidation. The hearth was stone cold but, even if a roaring fire had burned within the grate, I could not have been more reluctant to put my hand inside. I kneeled by an inglenook and inspected the wide expanse of the chimney. Nothing. I breathed a sigh of relief. But suddenly a finger of sunlight poked through the window, illuminating the back of the fireplace with such brightness that I recoiled as if burned. Regaining my wits, I noticed that this dazzling intensity was caused by the very object I was reluctantly seeking.

At the back of the chimney, suspended on a protruding stone, hung a thin silver necklace with an amber jewel strung upon it. I carefully reached in, minding not to touch the gem with my hands, and held it before me. The rising sun caught the ornament again, sending splashes of golden light dancing about the tapestries on the wall like hungry moths. There was no mistaking it. Against all odds, the amulet of teleportation had remained where I had left it, confiscated from young Gwion and cast in anger to the back of the fireplace at that long ago Winter Feast, never to be retrieved. Until now.

With a ceremonial slowness I lowered the chain over my head. The amulet itself was the size of a small fist. It hung between my ribcage, and the unfamiliar weight caused my head to lean forwards, as if the jewel were demanding my
attention physically as well as mentally. This was just as well, as I had completely forgotten how to work the thing. I tried to cast my mind back through the centuries. I seemed to recall that they operated by control of thought; that the amulet-wearer simply had to visualise the person or place he wanted to go to, and he would be taken there in a heartbeat. If that were so, then I quailed at the mental diligence required to use it effectively. But I had to test it nonetheless.

My first impulse was to see how matters fared with my fellow knights. I was sorely tempted to go straight to Sir Lancelot, but it would be highly unwise to start my teleportation experiments on such a scale. I decided instead to picture somewhere in the immediate vicinity; a safe environment where my sudden appearance would be less obtrusive. I settled on the scriptorium. I closed my eyes and thought of the word ‘scriptorium.' I opened one eye. There was a slight blurring at the corner of my vision, but other than that I was still very much in the Great Hall. Perhaps, then, one had to touch the amulet at the same time? I placed my right hand onto its cool, smooth surface. I took the first in a series of increasingly deep breaths. This time, as well as thinking of the word ‘scriptorium,' I tried to picture something of the room as I remembered it. The high wooden shelves. The neat rows of rolled parchments. Scores of archived vellum tomes, the accumulated wisdom of the ancient world.

As I did so, I became conscious of a sea change in my thoughts. Although my memory of the scriptorium was weak and inaccurate, the very act of thinking about it brought the place vividly to life. My ears experienced an alteration in pressure, as of a sudden difference in altitude, accompanied by a soft, low popping sound. All at once the shelves of the scriptorium appeared, and I realised that I was standing directly in front of them. Unfortunately, so was Sir Kay, gathering materials from a writing bench. He
turned towards me, and only the large stack of parchments piled up in his arms prevented him from seeing me quickly disappear again.

I opened my eyes back in the Great Hall and sat down to catch my breath, for I was weak at the knees and shaking all over. I was overwhelmed by a conflicting series of emotions: elation at the feat I had just accomplished, guilt at betraying an old principle, and relief at not being caught in the act. One thing I knew for certain; I had been entirely correct in banning their use. Such an experience could very easily become habit-forming.

Disobeying the Master's orders, on the other hand, could certainly not, and yet that was precisely what I had to do next. I reminded myself that I was serving the Eternal Quest by doing so, and attempted to gather the necessary resolve. I was on the point of touching the amulet, when I stopped myself. How could I have been so stupid? There I was, about to attend to my fellow knights, without anything in the way of weaponry to bring to their aid!

I teleported to the armoury, surprised but also pleased at how much easier it was the second time. I selected a sword each for Sir Lancelot and Sir Gawain, and, on reflection, one for Sir Pellinore and Sir Perceval, in the happy event of their being found overnight. These I packed in a long hessian drawstring bag, designed for carrying two or more swords comfortably about one's person, which hung behind my back with the reassuring ballast of a knapsack. It would have felt all the better for the addition of a thermos of tea and a packet of sandwiches, for they were sure to be in need of refreshment, but I thought it best to be on my way. This small act of preparation had settled my nerves, and was enough to help me muster the confidence required to close my eyes, touch the amulet, and picture Sir Lancelot in my mind.

There was a soft, low popping sound.

Immediately followed by a loud, high, roaring sound.

I opened my eyes to find myself several thousand feet up in the air, plummeting to earth with all the grace of a man with four swords tied to his back.

 

My first thought was that the amulet had been bewitched by some ill enchantment and delivered me to my doom, and that this was what happened when one compromised the hard-earned principles of a lifetime. In fact, I reflected as the wind thundered in my ears, I jolly well deserved it, and should think myself lucky it was nothing worse. This bout of self-pity was fleeting, and I tried to focus my mind on teleporting back to the Great Hall. This was rather difficult, as that portion of my mind not concerned with my imminent appointment with the ground was trying to figure out how to stop myself from performing a series of sickening somersaults. I pictured the Hall as best as I could, and reached for the amulet.

It was not there.

I tore frantically at my neck and torso, only to see the amulet falling just below me, down towards the shape of a large white cloud. A white, dragon-shaped cloud, the size of a single-decker bus from head to tail, with a man clinging to its neck and repeatedly punching it. Either I was hallucinating cloud formations as I approached certain death, or the amulet had indeed transported me to the vicinity of Sir Lancelot. I turned my body upside down, the better to reduce wind resistance and sky-dive down to my target. I came level with the white dragon in time to see the amulet hook around its tail and fall towards the point where it joined the beast's hide.

With both hands I grabbed the tail, as thick as a human thigh and thrashing at the air like an angry serpent, and hung on with all my strength. I reached along the tail to where the amulet was wedged around the scaly skin. The necklace had no clasp, and I pulled uselessly at the chain. Clearly it could only be removed by pulling it back the way it came.

The dragon presumably employed its tail as a sort of rudder, for the addition of my weight caused it to rear up in flight, sending Sir Lancelot falling backwards. The dragon turned its head to determine the source of the de-stabilising influence, then flicked its tail sharply upwards. The tail buckled beneath my hands, sending me flying forwards onto its back; a not unwelcome development, as the dragon then sent a jet of flame at the spot I had recently occupied. The flame singed the dragon's own tail, and it uttered a screech of pain that tore at my ears. From my new perch on the beast's haunches I crawled, using its sparse tufts of spiny hair as handholds, to where Sir Lancelot had once again reached the dragon's neck.
En route
I was able to build up a more complete picture of the situation.

Our white dragon was the middle one of three of its kind, flying in a diagonal formation — a green one ahead and above us, a red one behind and below. From the snatches of ripe Caledonian curses coming from ahead and above, I identified the figure on the back of the green dragon to be Sir Gawain. The red dragon behind and below us seemed to be the only one not carrying a knightly passenger. When I dared to glance over the white dragon's flanks, the patchy view of the ground showed us to be approaching a major habitation, shortly revealing itself, by several recognisable landmarks, as the city of Cardiff. From the little I knew of dragons, this made perfect sense. As a species they were instinctively drawn to major populations, those being the best places to satisfy their basic needs of flesh, riches and ruin. The denial
of such simple dragon pleasures was presumably the work upon which Sir Lancelot and Sir Gawain were engaged; work in which a sword would prove an essential tool.

There was also the matter of the red dragon to contend with; a task which, by process of elimination, fell to me. As clearly as if I had heard them only yesterday, the words of Sir Pellinore came back to me.
Dracontias. The dragon stone. Lodged in its brain. Cut that out with a blade to the top of the head
.

And so to work.

Now that it had removed me from its rudder, the white dragon was flying relatively straight and steady. The amulet was still lodged around its tail. Well, it would just have to remain there for the time being. Releasing my handhold, I drew myself into a crouching position, loosened the drawstrings of my bag, and took one of the four swords from its scabbard. I did not dare throw the sword directly to Sir Lancelot. But perhaps there was a way of simultaneously securing it for him to retrieve, and of conveying me to the red dragon?

“Sir Lancelot!” I shouted. He turned from his position at the dragon's neck and almost let go of it, so startled was he by my inexplicable presence.

“Lucas? What the hell?!”

“I shall explain at a more convenient time!” I yelled. “I have brought you a sword! Hold on tight!” Sir Lancelot nodded, and redoubled his grip.

The red dragon held its position behind and below the white. A jump would not be enough to cover the distance without some form of propulsion. I turned again towards Sir Lancelot and took aim for the centre spot on our white dragon's back, where the flesh was slightly softer. I threw the sword as hard as I could. It struck home like a javelin, embedding itself by several inches. The beast howled in fury.
Its entire back convulsed like a trampoline, catapulting me backwards past its tail, through the air, and directly down into the flight path of the red dragon.

This was when I detected the first flaw in my plan. The part of the red dragon to which I was flying head first was its jaws; jaws that were quick to open wide in anticipation of the airborne fast food heading in their direction. In one fluid movement, I pulled another sword from my pack and, just as the jaws closed around me, thrust the point up into the roof of the dragon's mouth and wedged the hilt behind its lower teeth. I pulled myself up out of the mouth by using its nostrils as a handhold, a jet of flame shooting past my escaping feet, and took up position behind its mighty neck.